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Text: " That was the most surprising story I had ever heard. It sparked my curiosity so I went digging. I needed to know more about the life of Grandpa Mouloud. It wasn’t an easy task as most of the people from that generation had either passed away, had memory problems or were reluctant to speak to me. There were very few records and practically no books. It made me so sad that the stories of the past were slipping away like sand through my fingers. In a desperate attempt, I put posts on a few facebook groups. It was like a message in a bottle. I didn’t get any answer for months until one day I got a message from a woman I didn’t know. She was a friend of a friend. She said that had seen my post but didn’t contact me then because she had forgotten where she had seen the post so there was no way for her to contact me. My message stayed on her mind until one day, while she was talking to the friend we have in common, my story came up.

Malia, her name was Malia, reached out saying that her grandfather lived in the same street as Grandpa Mouloud when he was young before he moved to Switzerland after the independence. She said that he was a photographer and that he took thousands of photographs. She said that he kept pristine records. He was a kind of amateur archaivist. He kept dated journals and letters too.

“I am his only granddaughter,” She wrote, “I inherited all his documents. I spent hours and hours looking through the photographs he took wondering what stories hid behind the beautiful faces on the black and white paper. A few stood out. On one of them you can see a group of five young people, four men and one woman. All smiling. One of them looks like he suffered a burn on his face. Another is holding an Aoud. It was the woman who has always intrigued me. She looked like a movie star. She looked so lively and good humored and kind. It’s hard to explain. She was just shining through the page. It’s really one in a million chance that one of them is your grandpa but I mean, it’s worth a shot. Please find attached a few pictures that were taken in the old neighborhood.”

My jaw hit the floor when I opened the attachment. There he was, young Mouloud, staring back at me from across a century. He was so handsome. I was looking at a precious treasure. What other stories do the rest of the photographs hide? Stories of bravery and sacrifice, stories of beauty and friendship. I can’t help but wonder about all the long lost stories, the forgotten heroes, of our shared past. This story ends here but it’s not actually the end of the story. But that’s for another day."

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Text:

"The man stood up and gave me the warmest handshake of my life. I was completely confused. For a moment, I thought he had mistaken me for someone else.

Then he said, “It’s such an honor to meet one of Si Mouloud’s grandchildren. My family owes him so much—we owe him our lives.”

I was really taken aback. I was stunned. I didn’t know what to say. He continued talking, and I listened, wide-eyed, unable to believe what I was hearing.

Here’s the story he told me:

Back in the early days of the Algerian revolution, his grandfather, Sidali Laouar, was a musician. But not just any musician—he was a member of the resistance. A very handsome man and a gifted oud player, he performed alongside his wife, Lalla Deedee, a singer with a voice so moving it was said to bring people to tears. The fact that they were stunning must have helped too.

Together, they were a beloved musical duo. Their talent opened many doors—including those of the enemy. They often performed at hotels and events attended by French officials. Their popularity became their cover. While entertaining guests, they secretly gathered information. Through coded lyrics in their songs, they passed intelligence to the armed resistance. Their role was crucial in several key operations.

But how does my grandfather fit into all this?

After eighteen months of working as messengers, the authorities caught on. The French police had discovered their secret and were planning to execute them. Sidali and Deedee who were used to the lavish life of entertainers, became fugitives overnight.

One desperate night, they knocked on Grandpa Mouloud’s door. They told him everything. He was terrified—rightfully so. Helping them could mean death. But he couldn’t turn them away.

He let them hide under the stairs in his home. The big house was one of those old style houses with a courtyard in the middle. He tucked them behind some furniture, he fed them, and kept them hidden. The risk was enormous. Any one of the nearby families could have been interrogated. And the French police were not known for their mercy.

A few days later, the police came knocking. They wanted to search the house.

Grandpa was so terrified that his body temperature spiked. He turned red. He was sweating and shaking uncontrollably—he looked severely ill. Grandma Sousou acted fast. She told the officers he was gravely sick, possibly contagious. That scared them off. They backed away and left without searching.

He had saved the musical duo’s lives. She had saved their family’s lives… "

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Text: Grandpa Mouloud

Nobody knew that Grandpa Mouloud was a Moudjahid. Well, maybe Grandma Sousou knew, but if she did, she took that secret to the grave. None of her children had any idea, not even my mother, who was the eldest and the most trusted of them all, always by her parents' side. She was her mother’s confident and her father’s right hand,andeven she didn’t know.

But you know what they say: the truth always comes out and this time, it happened in the most unexpected way.

Let me tell you how it all unfolded.

Two summers ago, I went to Turkey for a much-needed vacation. It had been a rough couple of years. The shop had gone under, and we had to rebuild everything from scratch. We went back to the drawing board, searching for a new idea. I had to call in every favor, reach out to everyone I knew, no matter how distant the connection. I worked 80-hour weeks, 100-hour weeks even, for months on end. It was exhausting. Thankfully, it all paid off. By summer, things were finally looking up, so I decided to treat myself to a vacation. I needed to clear my head.

Anyway, back to the story.

I was having lunch at a restaurant in Bodrum when I overheard someone at the table next to mine speaking Dardja, with the very distinct accent of my tiny village. I couldn’t help myself, I turned around and said hello. We all laughed at the coincidence and fell into the usual Algerian routine of: “Do you know so-and-so?” “Oh yeah, I know so-and-so.”

Then I mentioned my grandfather’s name.

Their jaws dropped. It was like they had seen a ghost.

One of them stood up and gave me the warmest handshake I’ve ever received in my life. I just stood there, completely confused. “What is this about?” I thought…