Fala - Short Story  by Rachid Khouya


Fala is a little girl. She is orphan. Her father died when she was a baby, but he mother is still alive.Fala’s family is so poor. They are not wealthy. They don’t have enough food to eat and sometimes they don’t have enough clothes to wear.
Fala is a student. She loves her study. She loves reading little stories like: Kalila and dimna, Joha’s tales.But her favorite one is: The grasshopper and the ant.
Fala thinks that life is not easy. She is sure that “life is difficult to live when you are poor, when you can not have what you want». She always says her best proverb: ‘when we don’t have what we like, we must like what we have’.
... Fala believes in God. Every day she prays for God to help her achieve her dreams. She never asks people to help her. She eats what she has and drinks what she has and wears the clothes she has.
Fala believes that one day she will be a famous doctor. She will help the unhealthy people, she will buy a house for her family, she will help the poor, she will listen to the people and she will share what she has with those who have nothing at all.
Everyday, Fala revises her lessons before she sleeps. She usually gets the first mark at school. Fala wants to go to university next year. This year she passes her Baccalaureate exam. She will succeed as she believes that “nothing is impossible” and “when we want it, we can get it”.
She speaks four languages. She reads a lot of books. When students ask her: ‘why do you study a lot, Fala”? Her reply is:”Because what is hard today, tomorrow will be easy…and what is black tonight, in the morning it will be white”.
She goes on telling them that the people, who work hard in the present, sleep a lot in the future and vice versa; the people who sleep a lot in the present will work a lot in the future. They will suffer a lot as they will pay the price tomorrow.
Sometimes the teacher invites her to the board and asks her to advise her fiends. Without hesitation, she moves to the front of the classroom and looks at everyone‘s eyes and says:
1-we have to listen to our elders and teachers.
2-Befriend our books and dictionaries.
3-Be hopeful, ambitious, hardworking and responsible.
4-we don’t have to put our guns till the end of war because life is a war that we have to win.
5-Do your Duty and be sure you will.