The Wrong End of the Telescope

by Rabih Alameddine

  The Ballad of GoFundMe Jeff

  In the middle of Moria, the long line of people on my left inched forward. The small groups who were chatting while they waited began to funnel into a single file, shuffling forward like docile beasts of a recently domesticated species. An NGO was handing out large gift boxes with dried cereal and Barbie Dolls.

  I recognized Rasheed’s laugh before I saw him or his Palestine Red Crescent Society vest. His face broke into a child-on-Christmas smile when he noticed the kids and me, greeted me like a long-desired present. I explained about the safari guides accompanying me, about waiting for the boat that morning, about Sumaiya and her family. He suggested I leave Skala Sikamineas and check in where his group was, at the Mytilene Village Hotel, which was closer to the camp. I could still go to the beaches for the boats if I wished—they’d be closer in any case—but I would be of better use at the camp. More effective, he said, less sexy, fewer opportunities for selfies.

  As if on cue, panicked selfie-girl from the beach made her grand entrance onto our stage. She explained to a new group of volunteers that someone had stolen her phone, that she had traced it to the camp using the Find My iPhone app before the battery died. It was here somewhere, and she was going to find it even if it meant going through everyone’s belongings. No, she had not erased all her personal data yet because she hadn’t backed up the photos and didn’t want to lose them. She seemed about to have a conniption right there and then.

  Rasheed explained to my kids what was going on. The little Pakistani boy approached selfie-girl, tugged on her arm, and in broken English said, “Phone in bathroom,” pointing to the public bathroom at the bottom of the hill.

  She hesitated, gasped as she grasped what he meant.

  “My cell phone is in the bathroom?” she said for emphasis before racing down the hill.

  The Pakistani boy looked back at his friends, raised his arms in triumph. His friends laughed. The little leader yelled, “You speak English? Arabic?” The Pakistani boy grinned, shook his head, then fled in the opposite direction from the bathrooms. The kids followed him, scampered up the hill through the chain-link fence into the barracks. They didn’t say goodbye, but the Iraqi girl turned around behind the fence and lifted a two-finger victory sign before disappearing.

  Rasheed chided me for making fun of selfie-girl. These youngsters were a wonderful lot who were trying to do good in the world. If I needed to belittle someone, I should channel my disdain toward GoFundMe Jeff, someone who deserved everyone’s contempt.

  GoFundMe Jeff was a student at some university in the American Midwest. Rasheed couldn’t remember which. At some point in the beginning of the boat crisis, in September or October of 2015, Jeff put up a GoFundMe page stating that he couldn’t keep watching the refugee drownings without responding. He was going to take the semester off, travel to Lesbos, and help in whatever way he could. For a round-trip ticket, food, and lodging, he asked for five thousand dollars, an amount that was reached and exceeded in less than three days. It seemed everybody wanted to help GoFundMe Jeff help refugees.

  GoFundMe Jeff never made it to Lesbos. For all anyone knew, he was having a good time on a paid-for European vacation. Rasheed wasn’t sure which two sins finally tripped him, greed or vanity, probably both. GoFundMe Jeff thought he had the fundraising talent of a television preacher. He went back to his page to ask for more money. In order to do that, he needed photos of Lesbos and of suffering refugees. Easy peasy. He found what he needed on Facebook, posted the photos on his site, and asked for more money. Cha-ching. One of the photos he posted was a selfie of a lovely young volunteer. She looked charming and delightful with a Syrian baby in her arms, and the boy couldn’t help hinting that she was his new girlfriend.

  Rasheed didn’t know how the girl’s parents found the picture. Someone might have alerted them. They were furious, since their daughter was on Lesbos with her fiancé. How could she? She didn’t of course. She and her fiancé began looking for GoFundMe Jeff. They asked everyone they knew and those they didn’t. No one had heard of or seen any GoFundMe Jeff on the island.

  What could they do? Not much. Someone contacted the parent company of GoFundMe. Jeff’s site was taken down before he reached his second goal, so he wasn’t paid again. At least three different Americans threatened to sue, but nothing came out of that. Jeff’s Facebook page disappeared. The story died.

  Rasheed said one of the photos Jeff had posted of Lesbos was of a beautiful sunset from behind an olive grove looking toward the sea taken by a well-known Greek photographer. GoFundMe Jeff claimed it as his.

  Doctors in Drag

  I rushed to the barracks when Emma texted that the family had settled in. The barracks were just that, one large room where everyone slept, a house of cards that would have fallen apart had it not been for the clouds of cobwebs holding it together. Symbolic walls, a sheet here, a hanging coat there, were put up around some sleeping spaces. The actual walls, white with a tinge of sulfurous yellow, made every person inside look as ill as Sumaiya. She and her family had to share two thin cots darkened with stains. We hoped that they would not be sleeping in the camp for more than a week, that they would soon be on their way to Athens and beyond. Where beyond, Emma could not be sure, not yet, but she was working with her NGO to see if she could get them to Sweden.

  Sumaiya asked if I had had a good sleep. Her two youngest daughters lay with her on the cot on either side, so close that a thread of silk could not pass between them. I could see that she was feeling better than she had on arrival at the beach, yet she was not doing well. At least she was breathing normally. On the little table next to the bed, a small bottle of oxycodone peeked from behind a larger one of local water. No wonder she felt a little better. I asked her how long she’d been on it, whether she knew the right dosage. She looked perplexed until Sammy explained that Emma had given them the bottle. Emma patted the pockets of her parka. You learn not to meet a boat without a good pharmacy, she said. Antibiotics, antiemetics, antidiarrheals, pain medications, she had them all in those pockets. So much to learn, I felt as if I were back in school.

  Unadorned bulbs covered in insect flecks dangled from the ceiling, providing even less light than the high windows. The barracks inhaled air, and with each exhale the room turned darker. A few cots to the left, one of those bulbs dimly haloed the tonsure of a reader. I tried to recognize the book he was reading but was unable to in the bad light. A little girl slept on his lap. The barracks were for families, it seemed.

  Emma had done all she could for the time being. Her NGO would send a physician the next morning, as well as people to interview the family and hopefully send them on their way. I shouldn’t worry. I should come back the next day; she would too. We had to convince Sumaiya to go to the hospital, but for the time being we should return to Skala Sikamineas and let the family rest.

  “You’re leaving us?” Asma said, surprised. She was sitting next to Emma on the other cot, but her question was directed at me.

  Sumaiya explained to her daughter that we had to go because there was no room for us to stay with them. Asma said she didn’t wish me to leave soon because she had questions about being a doctor that she desperately needed answers for. I assured her that I would return the following day and answer any and all questions, but it seemed that one question could not wait.

  “Are you a man?” she said.

  Her mother gasped. Her father began a harangue. How many times had he told her that she must think before she spoke? She must consider that her words were important, that they could hurt people.

  “I’m not offended,” I said.

  Emma insisted I translate what Asma asked.

  “Well,” Emma said, “what are you going to tell her? This should be amusing.” I could see her eyes light up, an impish grin on her face. “I keep telling you to use lipstick, but you don’t listen to me. No, you never do. And those pants are horrific. The things I
could do for you if you let me.”

  I realized that I did not relish being an interpreter.

  “I’m not a man,” I told Asma. I was still standing, and I felt that I should talk to her while sitting, be at her level, but there was no space on the cots and I wasn’t about to sit on the floor, not with my aging knees. “I was born male, but that wasn’t who I was.”

  Surprisingly, no one in the family seemed either startled or shocked. Only Sumaiya’s face showed some emotion, and she looked more concerned than anything.

  “Oh no, my sweet dear,” she said. “That was not what she was asking. Forgive her, forgive us. Let me explain.”

  “No, let me do it,” said Asma. “I can tell the story.”

  “Not you,” said her father. “Your mother can do it.”

  “What’s going on?” Emma said. “Tell me, tell me.”

  From their small village in Syria, the closest clinic was a half hour’s drive at least. There weren’t that many doctors before the skirmishes and wars began, and then most of them left or were killed. By the time the so-called Islamic state took over their area, only one doctor remained, and that was because his mother was dying; he had to take care of her. His name was Dr. Fawaz al-Sultan. Now, the militiamen allowed him to treat his mother because she was his relative, but he was not to go anywhere near any other sick woman. There were no female doctors in the area, no other doctor period. These fanatics did not care if a woman was ill. Well, Dr. Fawaz did. He was a good Muslim and a local. Knowing that the punishment for what he did was certain beheading, he put on a full niqab and had his brother drive him to various surrounding villages to tend to the sick. When Sumaiya felt her earliest symptoms, he was the first to show up. During a four-month period, Sitt Fawzieh paid her eleven house calls. The entire family, the whole community adored that poor doctor, who had to work twice as hard because if a village had sick people of different genders, he would first come to treat the men as Dr. Fawaz, then his brother would have to drive him back home and he would return as Sitt Fawzieh. They had to stop at each checkpoint twice. He was a smallish man and not one of the militiamen ever thought of questioning him as a woman. Apparently, Sitt Fawzieh was not to be messed with. Once inside a home, he would take the niqab off and put it back on as he left. No one in the community betrayed him, of course. He was one of them. And so was she.

  You in Drag

  You were twenty-one when you tried on a dress for the first time. We’re almost the same age, so I assume that must have been around 1981. You were on vacation in Rio de Janeiro, a recently out young gay man having fun. The city had the ability to unleash many a desire, and you partook in quite a few. You enjoyed assignations with men of all colors, all persuasions, gay, straight, bi. The demarcating lines were blurred in Rio. But you did befriend a black femme boy, as one should. Even though you and Celso had little in common, you were surprised by how well you two got along, how easily you were seduced by the exoticism of his world, by its sheer fabulousness. Out of little, Celso created the divine. He called you sister. Somos irmãs, he said. He introduced you to friends, accompanied you to the local bars. You watched the Academy Awards on television together, giggling joyously as Bette Midler sent coded messages to her gay worshipers. He asked if you had ever worn drag. You hadn’t, you told him. You’d never thought about it. You must, you must.

  He led you into the women’s bathroom in the back of a bar one night. Waiting for you were his friends, all in various stages of transformation. They searched through shopping bags until they found the right dress, a dark green, conservative, front-buttoned number with matching cardigan. They wouldn’t have to shave your chest or arms. Dark double nylons and no one could see the hair on your legs. No wig for you since they were expensive and not one of them could afford to lend you his. But look, a pillbox hat with a tacky goldfinch on its side and a veil that covered your eyes. They covered your face with so much makeup that you felt like a cadaver being readied for an open casket. But no, you were no cadaver; with lipstick, eyeliner, and a good foundation, they restructured your face, built another atop the one you wore. The face regarding you in the mirror was both foreign and familiar, new but ancient, a mask that covered and revealed. The girls led you into the bar, sat you on a stool, and handed you a dry martini. You took a sip, cast a glance at all the men in the bar, and you freaked.

  Thirty seconds was as long as the transformation lasted. No one noticed as you rushed back to the women’s bathroom, took off everything, folded it impeccably, washed your face with an assiduous thoroughness you hadn’t thought you possessed. Out, out, damn spot. You dressed yourself in your own clothes, men’s clothes, and sneaked out of the bathroom, out of the bar, into your safe hotel room.

  A gay bar was not a safe space for you, was it? How could any space be when it was peopled?

  But a seed had been dropped in fertile soil. How long did it take for you to dress up again, six months, a year? Halloween in San Francisco, not only did you dress up but you shaved your chest because the cleavage of the gown you found fell almost to your belly button. The wig made you look like Elsa Lanchester. I loved the photograph you showed me. You looked young and innocent, full of hope. You sparkled. You greeted many of the one-night-of-the-year drag queens, nodding or blowing a kiss, ignoring the voyeurs. But then you saw the burly policeman. There were two cops ahead of you, a man and a woman, standing, observing, pretending they were there to keep the peace. You honed in on him, the handsome man sporting a facial contortion between an amused smile and a smirk. You went up to him, so close your fake breasts almost bumped his lower ribs, stared up at him, challenged him, and you said, “I look terrible, a disaster, don’t I?” He was stunned, pulled back a bit, confusion sculpted his face. But you—you didn’t hesitate. Both hands, ten spread fingers pointing to your face, then your magnificent though cheap evening dress. “Tell me,” you said. “It’s shit, right? I look like shit.” The policewoman laughed. The policeman blushed. “No,” he said. “You don’t look like shit. You look fabulous.” You gave him an appraising eye. “Why, thank you,” you said, turning your back and walking away.

  And the diva was born. With lipstick and stilettos, you could face this harsh world. When Francine saw an old picture of you in heels high enough to make any mortal dizzy, she asked how you could bear it. You said that for her, heels were oppression, but for you, they were liberation.

  How many diva incarnations have you had? Lady Orangina, Mezzanine Fleur, Agnes Day, Mimi Chaim-Furst, Gay Ally, Checka Myrack, Lotta Botox, and more, quite a few more. I almost forgot Jane Joyce, who wrote You Sissies.

  One day you realized you could transform into the diva without putting on a dress or high heels. You never really needed lipstick. It was merely training wheels.

  The Women: Mrs. Peel and Jennifer

  Unlike you, I didn’t need lipstick when I was younger, not in the same way. I was a peculiar child. I was clearly not a boy, not in how I saw myself. I’m not sure how I saw myself exactly. I knew what was in the picture, but the picture itself was out of focus. What I was certain of at the time was that how the world saw me was not me. In retrospect, I could now say that I didn’t see myself as a boy but instead as more of a tomboy. Like I said, peculiar.

  I had few role models, of course, and fewer that were positive. At a young age, I found the Lebanese comedians who dressed as women for a joke offensive and, worse, unfunny. I disliked their American counterparts as well. I never understood what was amusing about Milton Berle in a dress. Bugs Bunny in drag, now that I enjoyed.

  Even when I began to wake, when I was able to read and, more, when I was able to research, I came across little that shed light on what I was feeling. Most of the writing was about biological males who felt feminine and were attracted to men. I was romantically and sexually attracted to women. I couldn’t read my own map.

  I recently came across one of your essays in which you described how literature
validated your feelings as a young man, how reading Gide and Genet made you feel less alone. The poetry of Abu Nuwas healed you. You wrote that when you were a teenager in Lebanon, a teacher mentioned in passing that many of Shakespeare’s love sonnets were written for another man and in that instant your life, your soul, unfurled like a morning glory at the sight of dawn. Yes, you wanted to be compared to a summer’s day, you wrote, wanted to be more lovely. The sonnets quenched a thirst you did not know you had. So long as men could breathe or eyes could see, so long lived this, and yes, this gave life to you. I felt envious when I read that. I had no exemplars, no heroes to guide me.

  My feelings were in code, and I was a horrible cryptographer, could not find the right key. When I was eight or nine, I watched the British show The Avengers religiously, and I worshiped Mrs. Peel—a strong, beautiful woman with a never-to-be-seen husband was someone I wanted to fall in love with and someone I wanted to be. Who needed a cape when one could have her catsuits—serpentine catsuits that pushed and highlighted her breasts as if they were being served on a tray? Good morning, may I offer you my breasts with a martini?

  Mazen and I would lie next to each other on the carpet, chins nestling on hands, entranced by her beauty and her Jaguar. Mazen would insist that he wanted to marry her, and I would think that I wanted to grow up to be Mrs. Peel, but I certainly had no wish to marry Mazen.