Early Life
He was born on May 20, 1907, under the name Aît Ouarab Mohamed Idir Halo, on 4 Rue Tombouctou in the Casbah of Algiers. His family was originally from Béni Djennad (Tizi Ouzou Province); his father was Mohamed Ben HadJ Saîd, and his mother was Fatma Bent Boudjemaâ.
His father was taken ill on the day of his birth, and had to be replaced by a maternal uncle for registering the birth, which caused an error recording his name. His uncle presented himself as such to the registry employee, by saying "Ana Khalou" ("I am his uncle" in Arabic), and the employee wrote "Halo". So he became Halo Mohamed Idir from then on.
He studied in three schools from 1912 to 1918: Koranic (1912–14), Brahim Fatah (in the Casbah) from 1914–17, and another in Bouzaréah until 1918. He left school to go to work before his 11th birthday.
Read more about this topic: El Hadj M'Hamed El Anka
Famous quotes containing the words early and/or life:
“The secret of heaven is kept from age to age. No imprudent, no sociable angel ever dropt an early syllable to answer the longings of saints, the fears of mortals. We should have listened on our knees to any favorite, who, by stricter obedience, had brought his thoughts into parallelism with the celestial currents, and could hint to human ears the scenery and circumstance of the newly parted soul.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“In this world there’s room for everyone, and the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men’s souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goosestepped us into misery and bloodshed.”
—Charlie Chaplin (1889–1977)