Nūrā was accustomed to sitting in the lap of her beloved grandmother to listen to a story, Samr and the Moon, at the end of each week. Every time her grandmother began the story, she would embrace her to her chest and say affectionately: “There was once a beautiful girl whose name was Samr. Samr would contemplate the sky and watch the stars every night, dreaming of reaching the moon.” The grandmother would look at the sky through the window, and Nūrā would follow her with her eyes, hoping to see something in the sky.
The Grandmother’s Tale and Nūrā’s Dreams:
The grandmother continued to narrate the story and said: “Several moons revolve around some planets, but as for the planet Earth, one moon revolves around it, and that is what we call the Moon.” The story amazed Nūrā greatly, each time anew. She would go into her dreams revolving around the shining stars in the dark sky, whose light reflected magically on the face of the sea water near her house.
Who Inhabits the Moon:
When Nūrā returned home, she would contemplate the sky from the window of her room and see the stars and the beautiful orange moon in the darkness. She would wonder: “I wonder if there is someone there? I wonder what the surface of the moon is like?” She would try to analyze the shapes that appeared on its face from afar and say to herself: “As it appears, there are mountains there? Or is it a large lake? Or are those the houses of space creatures who live there?! Are there trees and flowers?! Who inhabits the moon?”
Nūrā and the Moon’s Surface:
Whenever Nūrā saw any movement, or thought she saw movement among the varied shapes she saw from afar on the moon’s surface, she would bring a tale and tell everyone about it the next day, regarding the inhabitants of the moon, what they did, how they played or swam in the large lake there. Everyone would laugh at her wide imagination, saying to her gently and affectionately: “Next time, bring us a gift from the moon when you go there.”
Does the Moon See Me:
Nūrā always wondered how to reach the moon. She would fly in her imagination and see the shining stars in the dark sky hanging like a long rope extending to her to lift her upward and take her to the moon! She would wonder: would the moon know her? Or would he see her from afar when she looked at him? Therefore Nūrā decided to make a journey to the moon and thought of a way to reach it.
Nūrā and Her Father and the Seashore:
How would Nūrā reach the moon? Nūrā went down in the evening with her father to the small boat near the house gate perched on the sea shore. She asked to accompany him to his work on the opposite side. Her father began rowing, heading toward the limits of the distant horizon, where she saw the moon every evening when it emerged from there and rose in the sky slowly upward.
Reaching the Horizon:
But the farther the boat went from the shore to approach the finish line at the horizon, the farther that line went! She understood that reaching that horizon was impossible. How would Nūrā reach the moon? She went to the electric chains, suspended by thick iron wires that transport people from the shore to bring them to the mountaintop, where she also sees the moon hanging near the summit. But when she reached the summit, the sky was still far away, and the moon looked down from above, with a broad smile on his lips. She understood that he was farther than the summit of this mountain.
Nūrā’s Wings:
Nūrā decided to make wings to fly like a bird to reach the moon hanging in the sky. She brought small sticks and paper, made two small wings, attached them with glue, decorated them with colors, then tied them to her small shoulders with threads of wool she had taken from her grandmother.
First Flight Attempt:
Nūrā stood on a chair, spread her wings, jumped upward, but her paper wings tore and the wooden sticks broke, and Nūrā fell to the ground.
Study and Search for the Moon:
Nūrā continued to dream of reaching the moon and began searching and reading to know more about the moon, about its soil, its location in the sky, its distance from Earth. She understood that its light is a reflection of the sun’s light, and it is always present in the sky, but we see it more clearly at night than we see it during the day. As for reaching it, it is possible only by spacecraft.
Nūrā decided to visit the nearby observatory to enjoy observing the stars and planets. Through the telescope, she saw the North Star, the Great Bear, the Little Bear, Orion’s Belt, some planets from the solar system, and the Milky Way, and her joy was immense.
The Tale of the Moon and Stars and a Growing Dream:
Her determination increased more that one day she would land there in her spacecraft, to be the first whose foot would touch the surface of the moon from the people of her country. Then Nūrā returned to her grandmother to tell her about the observatory and narrate to her the tale of the stars she had seen through the telescope, and about all the information she had gathered about the planets and about the moon revolving around the planet Earth.