We had a tribal picnic where all the descendants of Abdulla bin Said bin Masoud al-Kharusi were invited, together with their spouses. This Abdulla, my great-grandfather, emigrated from Wadi Bani Kharus (alHijeir) to Bahla, and finally to Zanzibar with his wife, looking for a better life. We knew his wife as BiMwalimu (the teacher) but her real name was Shamsa bint Abdulla alRajhi. She lived to over a hundred years old and died in Zanzibar in the early 1950s. I do not know of anybody alive today who ever met Abdulla bin Said. I do not know when he died, but it was way before I was born, perhaps in the 1920s? I hear that BiMwalimu sometimes complained that her husband was harsh, making her bend down to plant clove seedlings with her young son Muhammed (my grandfather) strapped to her back. I suppose all that struggling did pay off in the end and neither their descendants nor their wives have to do such hard work these days. Thanks be to God. Be forever humble and never forget where you came from, the tummy of BiMwalimu, planting those clove seedlings.

How are you related into all this? Abdulla had two sons, Muhammed and Said.

And a daughter, Shamsa, whom we knew as Bibi wa Mombasa. She used to live at a shamba called Mombasa, in Zanzibar, now built up and a suburb of Zanzibar Town, on the way to the Airport. She did not have any offspring. But she made the best Mkate wa Mayai (a sponge cake made without baking powder) in Zanzibar, super springy. So I went to her one day with my friend Malik al Adawy to get a demo of her making it, also Kashata za Mayai, and I wrote down the recipes. Unfortunately the recipes got lost in the aftermath of the Revolution, but Malik still recalls the recipe for Mkate wa Mayai. So her legacy endures...

Said bin Abdulla was married to a woman we all knew as Bibi wa Kinyasini. Kinyasini was the name of their main plantation in Zanzibar. Her real name was Suleyma bint Said bin Salim bin Rashid alBarwani. Their children, chronologically, were Abdulla (Boss), Muhammed (Far Better), Masoud, Asia, Homoud, Ahmed (Guy), Ali, Suleiman and Rahma. All his children are now dead.

My own grandfather Muhammed bin Abdulla was married to six or seven women, not all at once! and I do not recall all their names either. He died in the early 1930s at a bit over 60 years age and, I believe, was buried at his plantation at Bagamoyo, Pemba. His wives and former wives' deaths were spread over many decades, from 1911 (my own grandmother Zuhra bint Abdulla Shaksy) into the 1980s (Zakia's mother BiMdogo). Nevertheless his children were: Ruqaya, Shamsa (Ma Biubwa or Bibie wa Portsmouth), Soud (my father the dentist) and Zakia. Only Zakia is still alive, the last, and also the youngest amongst that entire generation. She could not make it to the picnic since she was abroad attending a funeral of one of her sons-in-law.

The above lot begot many offspring! But I hope the above top-tier names are enough for you to trace which branches you are descended through and how you fit into the grand scheme.

The pictures below are to jolt your memories in the far future. There was a huge number of descendants who were away from Muscat and could not come, and probably many at the picnic that I missed to photograph or who blinked badly in their photos and I had to delete them. Apologies to all. I tried to get names to attach to each photo, but the process was far too slow and I had to give up very early on. The ones I got or that I can recall are entered below each picture. The ones I do not have, you will hopefully provide, and I will update the pictures. These are the data I request:
Picture number (IMG_xxxx), full name including father, grandfather and qabila, date of birth (leave blank if you are shy), full name of mother including her father, grandfather and qabila. I will then try to place each photo in the appropriate branch of the family. Because of inter-marriage some individuals may also appear in two branches. Please email me these details for as many as you can identify. Yes, you! If enough people send several identifiers each, we should be able to populate the tree very quickly. Do it, today! Otherwise at least view the photo of the unidentified person and add a "comment" with the details.
My email address is: samirkharusi(at)hotmail.com
The branches listed here, into which everyone falls into, are those grandfathers and grandmothers who had descendants. Some died without any children. These branches are, together with the linked sub-galleries:

1. Muhammed bin Said bin Abdulla
2. Masoud bin Said bin Abdulla
3. Asia bint Said bin Abdulla
4. Homoud bin Said bin Abdulla
5. Ali bin Said bin Abdulla
6. Rahma bint Said bin Abdulla

7. Ruqaya bint Muhammed bin Abdulla
8: Shamsa bint Muhammed bin Abdulla
9. Soud bin Muhammed bin Abdulla
10. Zakiya bint Muhammed bin Abdulla

Click any of the photos to follow that family tree branch.

Pity that we do not have pics from all the great Eid picnics we used to have at Kinyasini in Zanzibar during the 1950s...

For other stuff peruse my primary website: http://www.samirkharusi.net/index.html