I arrived in August to this new and foreign place that was hot and humid. It did not take me long to notice that most local girls wore beautiful, elegant, minimalistic make-up, abayas, and slippers. The slippers! As I began to immerse myself more into this new culture, I decided I wanted to own slippers like those. When I told my friends, a girl took me promptly to her room, and, before I could decline, I owned my very own pair. She was my first friend in university and her radiating kindness made this country and its people feel very welcoming. My sister in the name (her name being Meera, like mine) persisted that I must take the slippers since she won’t wear them anyways, and proceeded to touch up my blush and offer me lipgloss. Her room smelt of rose and oud, and before I even realized it, I walked out with the slippers. This gift of a dear friend would accompany me throughout my first year in Abu Dhabi.

When I first wore them, I got blisters that turned bloody. After I had accustomed my feet to them, it wasn’t long until my right foot broke. The doctor asked me if I wore slippers regularly, and when I said: “Yes, every day,” he replied: “You shouldn’t”. During the healing phase, I was banned from wearing slippers, but after a few weeks, I was back to clacking down the staircases as I progressed down the steps.

These slippers became my witness for all I experienced in this tumultuous first year. They went on my first date with me, lay in the sand next to me on my solo beach days, failed to warm my feet in the AC-dominated classrooms, went on the second date, and so forth until I started switching to heels for those occasions. When I made the friends that are now so dear to me, they were with me, they moved dorms with me and took trips to the library with me. They took me to smoke breaks late at night and to my first Iftar in the United Arab Emirates, at a friend’s house. They became a constant: subtle, but persistent.

During Ramadan, many nights after they were gifted to me by a friend, I left them behind in a mosque. It was Laylatul Qadr, and my two friends and I attended prayer at the Sheikh Zayed Mosque. I arrived early and sat for a while, watching the people, before I started to make my way in. Before entering the mosque, I placed my slippers on rack 27C, even taking a picture of the spot where I left them.

Having grown up a Muslim, with a father who was often distant, I had learned a lot about faith in the past months and was grateful to be experiencing Ramadan in a Muslim country, happily taking the opportunity to learn more about my religion and familiarize myself with its beauty. That night was the third night I prayed in the mosque during Ramadan, and I loved the feeling. I felt cushioned, in a way, removed from everything that was going on around me, and closer to reality.

Having reached long before my friends did, I put the prayer mat on the floor of the mosque and sat down, trying as much as possible to keep some space free next to me while the mosque was filling up. A few minutes before the prayer started, they hurried through the crowd, thousands of women gathering in the court of the mosque, the inside having filled up long ago already. There were old women being assisted with crutches and their daughters, and small girls, holding their mother’s hand, waiting for prayer to start. My friends settled in next to me and the Imam started.

After the prayer, we tried as best as possible to make our way through the masses, patiently lining up to exit the mosque. My friends had taken their slippers in their bag, but mine were on the other side of the mosque, on their rack. Barefoot, we made our way across and started searching. They were gone. Amongst hundreds of slippers, mine were nowhere to be seen. Aware of the traffic that would await us if we waited much longer to depart, I slipped on socks, and we walked. The streets were full of people, streaming out of the mosque, making their way to their cars. It was a core memory, leaving the Laylatul Qadr prayer in socks.

In my mind, we reached a full circle. They were never really my shoes, were they? My friend had gifted them to me, seeing that they were unused in her dorm, and they became my companions for a while. During the time they accompanied me, a lot happened, internally and externally; I grew, and I experienced. We parted ways in the mosque. Whether they were stolen, or I just did not succeed in finding them, does not matter. I was filled with gratitude that night, for the friend who gave me those slippers in the first place, for the friend who gave me her socks and drove me home from the mosque and who always answered any questions I had about religion: gratitude for the months that were behind me, challenging but a blessing. They had made me an adult, and this hot, humid, foreign place was no longer this foreign to me.

Where are the slippers now? Continuing their journey! As I am continuing mine.