The Witch of Portobello Page 0,5

her Athena. Her real name is Sherine. Sherine Khalil, our much-loved, much-wanted daughter, whom both my husband and I wish we had engendered.

Life, however, had other plans when fate is very generous with us, there is always a well into which all our dreams can tumble.

We lived in Beirut in the days when everyone considered it the most beautiful city in the Middle East. My husband was a successful industrialist, we married for love, we travelled to Europe every year, we had friends, we were invited to all the important social events, and, once, the President of the United States himself visited my house. Imagine that! Three unforgettable days, during two of which the American secret service scoured every corner of our house (they'd been in the area for more than a month already, taking up strategic positions, renting apartments, disguising themselves as beggars or young lovers). And for one day, or, rather, two hours, we partied. I'll never forget the look of envy in our friends' eyes, and the excitement of having our photo taken alongside the most powerful man on the planet.

We had it all, apart from the one thing we wanted most a child. And so we had nothing.

We tried everything: we made vows and promises, went to places where miracles were guaranteed, we consulted doctors, witchdoctors, took remedies and drank elixirs and magic potions. I had artificial insemination twice and lost the baby both times. On the second occasion, I also lost my left ovary, and, after that, no doctor was prepared to risk such a venture again.

That was when one of the many friends who knew of our plight suggested the one possible solution: adoption. He said he had contacts in Romania, and that the process wouldn't take long.

A month later, we got on a plane. Our friend had important business dealings with the dictator who ruled the country at the time, and whose name I now forget ( Editor's note: Nicolae Ceau¼escu ), and so we managed to avoid the bureaucratic red tape and went straight to an adoption centre in Sibiu, in Transylvania. There we were greeted with coffee, cigarettes, mineral water, and with the paperwork signed and sealed, all we had to do was choose a child.

They took us to a very cold nursery, and I couldn't imagine how they could leave those poor children in such a place. My first instinct was to adopt them all, to carry them off to Lebanon where there was sun and freedom, but obviously that was a crazy idea. We walked up and down between the cots, listening to the children crying, terrified by the magnitude of the decision we were about to take.

For more than an hour, neither I nor my husband spoke a word. We went out, drank coffee, smoked and then went back in again and this happened several times. I noticed that the woman in charge of adoptions was growing impatient; she wanted an immediate decision. At that moment, following an instinct I would dare to describe as maternal as if I'd found a child who should have been mine in this incarnation, but who had come into the world in another woman's womb I pointed to one particular baby girl.

The woman advised us to think again. And she'd been so impatient for us to make a decision! But I was sure.

Nevertheless trying not to hurt my feelings (she thought we had contacts in the upper echelons of the Romanian government) she whispered to me, so that my husband wouldn't hear: 'I know it won't work out. She's the daughter of a gipsy.'

I retorted that culture isn't something that's transmitted through the genes. The child, who was barely three months old, would be our daughter, brought up according to our customs. She would go to our church, visit our beaches, read books in French, study at the American School in Beirut. Besides, I knew nothing about gipsy culture and I still know nothing. I only know that they travel a lot, don't wash very often, aren't to be trusted, and wear earrings. Legend has it that they kidnap children and carry them off in their caravans, but here, exactly the opposite was happening; they had left a child behind for me to take care of.

The woman tried again to dissuade me, but I was already signing the papers and asking my husband to do the same. On the flight back to Beirut, the world seemed different: God had given me a