11A few days after meeting Mishaal, I finally went to a diwaniya, one of those places my mother had told me so much about. There’s hardly a house in Kuwaiti that doesn’t have one – an outer room where friends meet. The image that the name evokes is the one my mother planted in my imagination when I was young. It was where my father, Walid and Ghassan got their fishing tackle ready, where they discussed books or important political events, where they gathered round the television to watch big matches. I wasn’t planning to do any of that. Just going into a diwaniya was enough for me.
A little after sunset my telephone rang and it was Mishaal at the other end. ‘Are you ready?’ he said. ‘I’ll meet you in five minutes in the car park under the building.’ What could he mean by ‘ready’? I’d been
