by Eva Nour
Hussein, the Bedouin shepherd, was the only one who seemed happy and relaxed. He didn’t talk much but had eaten his meagre meal as though it were a feast, praised the hot water in the shower and contemplated his bunk for a long moment before tying his arm to the frame with a scarf.
‘What are you doing?’ Sami had asked.
‘Making sure I don’t fall,’ Hussein said as he made himself comfortable.
‘From now on, no lie-ins,’ said a soldier standing in front of them with his feet wide and his arms crossed.
He looked like a soldier from the movies. A caricature of a strict officer, with a neat moustache and rolled-up shirtsleeves that fitted snugly over bulging muscles. Everything felt cinematic and surreal. At any moment, someone would step through the backdrop and say, Cut, let’s try again. They were given heavy boots, thermal underwear and green camouflage uniforms. Outside in the yard, barbers were waiting to shave their heads, cheeks and chins. Bill’s bleached fringe fell to the ground, as well as Hussein’s dark beard. They both looked younger and somewhat naked afterwards, even if the uniforms added some years.
Sami’s own hair fell on to the dirt in soft tufts. There and then, the events of the past few days and weeks sank in, the open fields in al-Nabek and the meandering journey to the camp. There was no going back. From now on, he was a soldier.
The second morning they were woken up at half past four by the same banging on the steel door. They put on their uniforms, tied their boots and assembled in the yard. The lower edge of the clouds showed a glowing fringe. The sky turned a rich red and pink, which was then watered down by the light of the rising sun. It was as though someone was taking a firm hold on the blanket of clouds and lifting it up, and underneath was the dawn, cold and clear like spring water.
The morning began with a workout: push-ups, lunges and squat jumps. The Canadian asked when was breakfast. Soon, was the answer, they just had to go for a run first. The run was two miles through forest and over hills and then the same way back. Hussein was the only one who managed with ease. Bill threw up in the bathroom and Sami saved some breakfast for him: two eggs, bread and bitter tea. He felt like he had barely eaten at all, his body not yet recovered from his weeks in prison. Hunger was like a wild animal, tearing at him from the inside.
Their first class was weapons training, then they duck-walked for four miles, which entailed moving at a squat with their hands raised behind their heads. Lactic acid started pumping through their legs after just a few steps. The morning was wrapped up with a double session of martial arts and military strategy.
‘You are the pride and backbone of this country,’ said their instructor.
He told them Hafez al-Assad had joined the Baath Party at sixteen and shortly thereafter become a fighter pilot. He quickly rose through the ranks.
‘As we hope you will.’
Everyone knew that was a lie because in practice only Alawites were able to advance into the highest echelons. Their instructor continued by telling them how the Baath Party had saved the country from annihilation by assuming power in 1963. Hafez al-Assad had become head of the air force and later the country’s defence minister. Then he seized control of Syria, through a corrective revolution, in order to get the politics and the country back on the right track.
‘Finally, Christians, Sunnis, Alawites and Druze could live in peace and security together,’ their instructor concluded, leaving out the Kurds, since they didn’t exist in his eyes anyway.
Their instructor was called Bassel and was named after Hafez’s eldest son, who had been expected to take over the rule of Syria one day. Bassel al-Assad had been famous for his love of fast cars and horse racing. But Bassel never got to take the reins as the leader of the regime. One foggy January morning in 1994 he was driving his Mercedes to Damascus’ international airport. There was a car crash on a roundabout and Bassel, who was not wearing a seatbelt, died instantly.
There had been three national days of mourning. Schools, shops and offices had closed. Luxury hotels had abstained from serving alcohol. Bassel was declared a national martyr. Hospitals, sports arenas and an airport were named after him. When the confusion and grief had subsided, people started looking around. Who would now shoulder the burdens of governing if something were to happen to Hafez? It was Bassel’s less well-known brother Bashar al-Assad, the British-educated ophthalmologist, who stepped up. Granted, he lacked charisma and gravitas, but one day he was going to follow in his father’s footsteps.
When Hafez al-Assad died at the turn of the millennium, people didn’t believe it at first. He, the eternal father of the nation, couldn’t just die. Bashar was given the epithet ‘Son of Hafez’ in an attempt to have some of his father’s radiance rub off on him. At first, Bashar banned the public posting of pictures of himself and ruled more as his late father’s proxy. In time, however, he assumed his new role wholeheartedly and then some.
Naturally, their military instructor didn’t tell them all that. He also didn’t tell them that Assad, which meant lion, was an assumed name: Bashar’s grandfather had been a farmer who changed his surname from Wahesh, which meant savage or monster. Their instructor did, however, say that from now on, whenever they were asked where they were from, they should answer ‘Assad’s Syria’.
The afternoon and evening were conducted at the same tempo. Theory and training, a final lesson until eight o’clock, then dinner and rest until ten. Sami’s feet were red and swollen and full of blisters from his shapeless boots. He sent his parents a loving thought for having packed plasters for him.
Darkness engulfed the barracks when they fell into their beds. Snores ebbed and flowed in the dormitory until the banging and shouting woke them at half past four, and everything started over again.
15
SAMI SOON REALIZED the officers were targeting the weak. Either the physically weak or the ones who didn’t have the mental stamina to do the drills. And then there was Bilal, or Bill, who didn’t know Arabic. He had been given language teaching back in Toronto but only knew a few phrases he had practised with his grandmother. One of the other recruits was always with him, translating the officers’ commands, but sometimes it didn’t help.
‘Where are you from, soldier!’
‘Canada,’ said Bill.
The officer smiled and paused to draw the situation out.
‘Where did you say you were from?’
‘Assad’s Syria,’ Sami whispered, but Bill had already repeated: ‘Toronto, Canada.’
‘Wrong answer. Go to the shit pit.’
Bill went over to the shit pit, which was exactly that: a hole full of mud mixed with excrement from the latrines. The smell was putrid and sickening and a swarm of flies hovered above it. A fever had recently devastated their division and the officer had pointed out in their previous class how important personal hygiene was: wash your hands, don’t share cutlery, keep your feet dry and clean.
‘In the shit pit, you piece of crap.’
No translation was necessary because the officer was pointing with his whole hand. Bill hesitated for a second, then started unbuttoning his uniform with trembling hands. When he bent down to unlace his boots, the officer stepped in and gave him a kick in the behind. Bill fell head over heels and the mudhole swallowed him with a splash.
On the fourth night, they were woken up at two. From now on, a new element was added to their training: punishments. This usually started with them being forced into the yard in nothing but their underwear. Nine! Everyone did squat jumps. Seven! Everyone dropped to the ground and pushed their chests up and down. Buckets of ice water were poured over their backs if they didn’t work hard enough.
Some were broken by the training. One morning during the first few weeks of training Sami was woken by loud cries from outside. He quickly put on his uniform and ran out, and saw that several other soldiers had gathered in a circle on the yard where they had their morning assemblies. In the middle stood one of the newcomers, dressed only in his underclothin
g, dark with sweat or some other fluid. Sami recognized him as one of the young men he had taken notes of on the first day. It was the first and last time they had talked. Now the young recruit stood shaking on the frosty ground. Beside him lay a big, empty can.
‘Stay away. Don’t get any closer.’
Despite his shaking, his face was strangely still. Wet hair stuck to his cheeks. The young man lifted his hands but Sami couldn’t see what he was holding. A needle? A tiny box?
‘I swear, I’ll do it … Anything but this.’
It was then that Sami smelled the petrol. He took a step closer and released a sound that he didn’t know came from himself. The young man struck the match and the flames rose up.
Sami found he couldn’t move, couldn’t comprehend how quickly the body became black, how fast the smell of burnt meat spread. From a distance, he saw how Hussein and two other recruits threw themselves over the burning soldier and tried to quench the fire with their own bodies. Paramedics were summoned but it was too late.
That night, Sami heard Bill sobbing from the bunk bed over his. Sami lay silently and listened, then sat up and walked over to Hussein’s bed.
‘How are you?’ Sami whispered.
He could see that Hussein’s eyes were open. He lay on his back with his arms crossed over his chest, white bandages covering the worst burn marks.
‘You know,’ Sami continued, ‘I think everyone’s in shock. It’s OK to feel sad or angry or afraid, or whatever you feel …’
It was as if Hussein didn’t hear him. Sami turned and took a few steps in the dark, then heard Hussein’s muffled voice behind him.
‘Fear is like poison. If you let it grow roots, you will be lost for ever.’
Not long after the fire incident another soldier died of a heart attack. In both cases their trainers explained it away as personal weaknesses, physical or mental. Sami no longer felt as if the pain penetrated into the depths of him. He woke up, he did what he was told and then he slept. But it was as though something happened to him at night, a slow transformation.
Gradually Sami started to consider it a challenge to break the rules. To drink a bottle of contraband wine, just to see the look on the sergeant’s face when he didn’t react to the ice water. Sami and Hussein also made a habit of stealing from the pantry, and Bill happily shared with them, even if he was afraid of punishment. They would take a carton of eggs or tinned beans. Once they got their hands on an entire chicken, which they roasted and ate in silence, an unadulterated joy.
During Sami’s first night watch he started smoking cigarettes, and it soon became one of his few pleasures. The night watch was otherwise a psychological challenge. All sounds were amplified in the dark, from the barking of wild dogs to the hissing of hyenas in the distance. One time a soldier came running back to base camp, white as a sheet.
‘What happened? You look like you’ve seen a ghost,’ Sami said.
‘Not far from it,’ the soldier mumbled.
He couldn’t speak until he had sat down and collected himself.
‘Do you believe in jinn?’ the soldier asked. ‘I thought they were made up, myths. But after tonight …’ He shook his head to cast off his unease. ‘I was sitting by the fire, smoking, when I spotted a cat slinking along the tent wall. A cat in this cold, can you imagine? You won’t believe me but it’s true, wallahi. The cat crept closer and closer and in the end it was so close I could touch the tip of its tail. The fur was stiff with frost. And then … then it got up on its hind legs and opened its mouth so I could see its pink, coarse tongue. And it said, “Pardon me, but do you have the time?” Get it? The cat was talking to me!’
Sami laughed and asked what he’d been smoking. But there was no question the soldier was serious; he had a wild look in his eyes and his hands were shaking.
Nocturnal spirits or no, the soldier was sent to the clink for abandoning his post.
‘My advice is simple,’ their commanding officer said when the soldier was released. ‘When a cat asks you for the time, just answer her. Tell her the time. But whatever you do, don’t leave your post.’
Sami slept in double layers of clothing and thick woollen socks at night. In the morning, they blew smoke rings and pretended they were from cigars. The temperature was below freezing almost year-round up in the mountains, but on some spring days their bodies thawed in the pale sunlight. Like nocturnal insects, they would all turn to the sun and stare into the blindness.
During one drill, in a frosty field, Hussein rubbed his hands together and said, ‘A cup of tea or coffee would really hit the spot right now.’
Sami looked around and said: Sure. He walked over to the flatbed truck and pulled out a handful of cables they used for the tents, which he twisted together with a few thinner cables to stabilize them.
Bill watched in shock. ‘Have you lost your mind?’
‘Put the kettle on the ground here, with the cable there. Then we’ll lift the other end up with two sticks and touch it to the powerline.’
‘Do you know how many volts are in something like that? You’re going to fry like a piece of charcoal.’
‘Fine, so don’t then.’
An hour later, even more cold and hungry, Bill suggested they try again. Hussein and Sami balanced the stabilized cable against the powerline. It took them less than a second to get the kettle boiling.
Days and weeks passed, darkness fell and ice water was poured on their backs. From time to time soldiers had to be brought to the military hospital after passing out or not being able to feel their feet. I choose this, Sami thought. I choose this and it won’t kill me.
After the initial training period, they got some time off. He counted down the days until each small break. He could endure the physical punishments tolerably but some things were harder to deal with than others. Like one particular sergeant. The sergeant had an arrogant way about him and enjoyed insulting them during training. They were weaklings. Vermin.
‘I could put a bullet in the back of your heads and no one would care. I could fuck your sisters and little brothers.’
Sami was just getting up from doing push-ups when the world went black and he lost his balance. A foot between his shoulder blades and the sergeant’s scornful voice: ‘Eat shit.’ White lightning shot through his body. Sami got up slowly and groggily, braced himself and kicked the sergeant so hard in the stomach that he fell headlong on to the stony ground.
In the barracks, several people patted Sami on the back and laughed at the whole thing. Except Hussein, who shook his head.
‘They’re going to punish all of us.’
The next night, they lined up as usual, dressed only in their underwear. It was cold, well below freezing. This time their instructor was present to personally oversee the evening’s punishments. A few people bent down to start the push-ups.
The instructor held up his hand. ‘No. Tonight, we have a different task for you.’ He wrapped his scarf around his neck, pulled up his leather gloves. ‘It’s very simple. Tonight you are to stand still.’
A numb feeling spread through Sami’s body. Stand still? He had expected some sort of consequence after the kick. For them to pull him out of bed in the middle of the night for extra punishment. For them to send him to the clink, even though soldiers weren’t supposed to be sent there during their basic training.
At the same time, he figured the sergeant was ashamed. The instructors were supposed to demonstrate good morals and serve as an example for the new soldiers. In order to explain the kick, the sergeant would sooner or later have to admit that he had broken the honour code of the army by insulting the recruits’ families.
Sami had almost started thinking of his kick as a nightmare, as something imagined, a cat standing on its hind legs asking the time. But now, with the instructor right in front of him, the event acquired a crisp clarity. After a few minutes, he began to understand the severity of the punishment. Because standing still was much worse than moving around. Doing exercises made the b
ody warm and gave the mind something to focus on instead of the cold.
After a few minutes, his teeth started chattering uncontrollably. He clenched his jaw but the shaking spread through his body. After half an hour, he couldn’t feel his legs. After an hour, he heard a thud, then another. Sami didn’t dare to turn to look, but out of the corner of his eye he saw soldiers dropping around him. They fell and stayed down. Their hands were claws in various shades of purple. Only after some time did the instructor signal to the medics to take them to the military hospital. Bill managed to stay up, as did Sami. Hussein seemed unperturbed by the cold, but when they got back inside their barracks he wrapped himself in all the clothes and blankets he had.
The next morning, the ground was covered with glittering ice crystals, the tussocks of grass stuck up like spiky hedgehogs. Fourteen people were in the hospital with frostbite. The others were woken up to begin the day’s drills as though nothing had happened.
16
WHENEVER SAMI HELD a new pen, he would assess its weight. See what kind of nib he was dealing with: wide or thin, straight or diagonal. It was the pen that inspired the writing, not the other way round. In the beginning was the word, his mum used to say. He pictured instead a golden pen, the original pen that wrote the world into existence, that drew light in the night of the universe.
Quite unlike the pen in front of him at this moment, which was barely usable. Sami moved the broken-off felt tip across the paper. A broken line of ants, a parade of grasshoppers. The sergeant held up the notepad and studied it in silence.
‘What’s your name, what’s your number?’
After almost six months of basic training, Sami and the other recruits were about to be split up. They continued to perform the same drills but noticed they were watched less meticulously than before.
One day, a jeep had pulled up to where they were doing their morning workout and a sergeant had climbed out. If anyone were to draw his face, lead pencil would have been the inevitable medium: grey eyes, placed close together, a thin moustache and a thin mouth. Outside of the army, he would have been someone you found in an office, in some unassuming bureaucratic post. But here everyone looked up when he cleared his throat. The sergeant had come from a military base outside Damascus and he was looking for someone with good handwriting. Since the military base in question was the core of their division, where the important decisions were made, it was a place most people wanted to be. Most of all because administrative work was a dream for the soldiers. Being there meant not being in active combat, not getting punishments. And certain perks could be negotiated, too.