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ح​ب​ك و​ط​ن // Your Love is Home

by Alsarah

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about

Written specifically as a response to the upcoming novel "Home is Not a Country", by Safia Elhillo (our March 2 via PenguinRandomHouse), this song is a celebration of nostalgia and diaspora. In the novel the lead character Nima, a Sudanese girl raised in the USA by her widowed mother, has a special love for old Egyptian movies which connect her to a past she doesn't know or understand fully. Rather than re-narrate the character's story, I chose to imagine a parallel world and character to it that echos the same feelings. In doing so I hope to connect the common thread of the feelings of diaspora and longing regardless of the physical location.

I imagined this song to be coming out of a scene in old Egyptian movie. It's the late 1970s Cairo at a typical local cabaret/club from that era. I imagined a Nubian singer who is the first in her family to be born in the big city after the high dam was built. She is displaced and experiences a feeling of diaspora within her country. She is torn between the past world of her family and their stories of home, and her new home in the cosmopolitan center that is Cairo. She feels the longing yet doesn't know what it is she exactly longs for because all she knows are bits of stories. I wanted to create a song that reflected that sentiment. So I went to Cairo and produced this song there with some of my favorite musicians out there in order to fully capture the atmosphere I was seeking.

lyrics

من طمي النيل معجون بهواك اه اه
لابس الصوميت معقود بحجاب اه اه
حبك بلاد بدون حدود اه اه
مكان ميعادنا بين الصخور اه اه
والريح يغني للنخيل اه اه
يوم الفراق مكتوب مصير

تحت الشباك مريت يا فلان اه اه
وانا خلف الشيش عيوني متابعاك اه اه
شايل معاك الاماني والآمال اه اه
ماشي سواح ولا العوده ما لها ميعاد؟

زي البحر عمق الآهات اه اه
وفي المنام اسمك يقال آه آه
يتردد بين الأمواج اه اه
والحور يغني عن الفراق اه اه

من طمي النيل النيل النيل

حبك بلاد بدون حدود اه اه
مكان ميعادنا بين الصخور اه اه
والريح يغني للنخيل اه اه
والحور يغني عن الفراق
يوم الفراق مكتوب مصير اه اه
يوم الفراق مكتوب مصير اه آه
يوم الفراق مكتوب مصير آه آه
ليه الفراق مكتوب مصير

A rough translation-

From the silt of the Nile you are molded , I love you /long for you
Wearing someet* knotted w a protection amulet
Your love is a country with no borders
Our meeting place between the boulders
And the wind sings to the palm trees,
the day of parting is written destiny

Under the window, you passed ya fulan**
And I'm behind the shutters my eyes following you
Carrying with you hopes and dreams
are you going a tourist or does the return have no date?

Like the sea so is the depth of my wails
And in slumber your name is called, echoing between the waves
And the sirens sing about the parting

From the silt of the Nile the Nile the Nile

Your love is a country with no borders
Our meeting place between the boulders
And the wind sings to the palm trees
And the sirens sing about the parting
The day of parting is written destiny
The day of parting is written destiny
The day of parting is written destiny
Why is the parting written destiny

*someet = a kind of bead worn during weddings and other important ceremonies
**ya fulan = o person

credits

released March 2, 2021
Written/Composed/Performed by: Alsarah
Qanoon + Keys: Fady Badr
Accordion: Wael Elsayed
Bass: Ahmed Omar
Percussion: Rami ElAasser
Backing Vocals: Nahid
Produced: Alsarah
Recording Engineer: Muhammed Hassan El Bossiley at 14th st Maadi, Cairo
Mixing and Mastering Engineering: Kamilo Kratc at Soundworks Recording Studios, Queens NY

Photo by: Wael Gzoly
Artwork by: Rana Jubara

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Alsarah New York

Alsarah is a Sudanese singer/songwriter and bandleader of Alsarah & the Nubatones

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