Shake Off

by Mischa Hiller

  “I’ll talk to the man,” I said to Ramzi, who was polishing his designer glasses, “but I’m not sure that having a family means the struggle is over.”

  Ramzi snorted and raised his thick eyebrows. “The struggle takes many forms, my friend. There are many paths to the same destination. Some are more effective than others, like being more engaged with the real struggle instead of sneaking around like thieves.”

  It sounded like something Ramzi had read or heard someone else say. I wasn’t sure how to deal with this. Ramzi hadn’t expressed such reservations before. I concentrated on practicalities; I had a job to do, and so did he.

  “The case will be picked up when you make the crossing on Sunday. It’s the usual procedure: you’ll leave the case in the taxi to Ramallah and pick it up on the way back.”

  Ramzi sighed and shook his head. “You guys don’t know what is happening on the West Bank, or in Gaza. That is where the real resistance is taking place. Perhaps you should pay a visit to Gaza and see for yourself.”

  I said nothing, but I doubted whether a nice middle-class Christian boy like him had ever been to the Gaza Strip.

  “They’ve been throwing stones for two years, but it hasn’t changed anything,” I said.

  Ramzi looked at the floor briefly then took a deep breath. “I’d like to speak to the man myself,” he said.

  I shook my head. “That’s not possible.” I wasn’t even sure if Ramzi knew Abu Leila personally; “the man” was just an expression we used to indicate whoever I reported to.

  “Then tell the man that I’m eternally grateful for all his help and everything, but this may be the last time I deliver for him.” He didn’t raise his eyes to look at me until he had finished. I was sure he wouldn’t be talking like this to Abu Leila’s face. I gave him the ticket to the luggage deposit office at Euston Station. He glanced at it then looked at me.

  “Not man enough to bring it yourself?”

  It was my turn to take a long breath. I counted to five in my head and told myself he was emboldened because he’d worked up the courage to say what he wanted to say and didn’t know when to hold back.

  “It’s the way things are done, Ramzi,” I said.

  “What’s in it anyway?”

  “Just papers,” I told him.

  He shook his head again. “You people outside the Territories won’t make a Palestinian state by playing these games. You don’t play games with the Israelis.”

  “There’ll be something to bring back. Just make sure you use the same taxi driver on your return,” I said.

  We shook hands, and Ramzi kept hold of my hand. His palm was clammy, which it hadn’t been when we’d met. His other hand gripped my wrist and he leaned forward, holding my gaze with a pleading look. “Please tell the man what I’ve told you.…My wife is having a baby.”

  “Congratulations,” I said. “The money to pay for your trip is in the case.” I had to shake off his grip to escape. I suspected, despite my clothes and mastery of language, that Ramzi could tell that I was a refugee-camp boy, born and bred, and that he looked down on me.

  Nine

  I had boarded at The English School in Nicosia in Cyprus for two years after leaving Beirut in 1984. It was in the middle of Nicosia, but set in a wood so you wouldn’t know it was there. I had to sit some English exams to get in, to show that I could cope with the lessons because they followed the English curriculum. We had to learn Modern Greek too, along with our other lessons, and once again I threw myself into this task as if my life depended on it, because I wanted to catch up with the other students and not to stand out. I shared a room with Jack, a pudgy boy whose English father and Greek mother traveled constantly on business. He told me how he had been in boarding schools since he was seven, and was vague when it came to what his parents did. We developed an unspoken agreement whereby I asked him no questions about them (and deflected other people’s) and he asked none about mine, beyond knowing that they were dead. He mocked my constant reading, and often sat jabbering away at his desk in our room as I tried to absorb information from books. He filled his mouth with the biscuits and cakes his parents sent instead of the postcards and letters that other children received. I picked up a lot of English expressions rooming with him, which served me well once in England. He would come out with things like, “This island has gone to seed since the Turks invaded,” or “Has the cat got your tongue, Michel?” or, when showing me one of the pornographic magazines he hid under his mattress, “Look at the jugs on that! I’m putting her in my wank bank.” Or, rather optimistically, and when homework got in the way of sneaking into town, “That’s scuppered our plans to get laid.” All of which I asked him to explain to me. Sometimes, when waiting for him to fall asleep so I could rock my head, I’d hear him sobbing into his pillow and I’d lie still until he’d finished: I myself was done with crying.

  “Are you a shlomo, Michel?” he once asked me while I was reading. I had shaken my head, not sure what he meant. “A kike, a yid, a Jew?” I shook my head again. “Then why are you always reading about the bloody Holocaust? Let’s go out and rustle up some skirt.”

  He was right, I was becoming obsessed. Reading Primo Levi’s account of his time in Auschwitz, I was struck by his understated and matter-of-fact description of his terrible ordeal. I’d read a few other accounts, as Jack had obviously noticed, but most of them screamed at you hysterically and you had to close your ears to it—one account I’d read even turned out to be invented, and it wasn’t the first. Primo Levi whispered these things to you, and if you’d survived a tragedy such as I had you knew that it rang true. It whispered to you afterwards, usually at night, because that was when there was nothing else to drown it out. Except maybe Esma, or rocking your head, or, as I discovered later, the magic of codeine.

  The idea that Fat Jack (as he was known) and I could get anywhere with girls was laughable, but the fact was that girls found him quite charming. By my first summer in Nicosia my Greek was good enough to communicate with the locals. So, in the afternoons (we were finished by 2 p.m.) and at weekends, we went to the beach, although with women we were bumbling and (as Jack would have said, had we been self-aware) cack-handed. Then we discovered that holidaying English girls were a better bet than the locals, less prudish, and keen to escape from their parents getting drunk by the pools of the many hotels and villas along the coast. They were looking for fun: they knew they’d be gone in a couple of weeks and wanted to pick up experiences not available at home. So we chatted up these pale, gawky, bony teenagers, but then they’d get drunk and ride off on the back of scooters in their bikinis, holding onto bronzed shirtless locals who took over from our fumblings. By the end of the holidays these girls sometimes looked different, sometimes scared, like they hadn’t been ready for what they’d done, but mostly smug, like they knew something you didn’t. When they left their white skin was burned a painful-​looking red, helped by the constant application of palm oil. I never managed to go with any of these girls (I found them simultaneously silly and scary) but enjoyed being on the periphery of the beach parties and disco evenings.

  Abu Leila would visit once a month, posing as my uncle. At that time he passed for a smoking, spectacle-wearing Semitic version of the popular TV detective Columbo. After he had received a progress report from the principal we would go into Nicosia and he would buy me whatever I needed, be it Levis or books or Adidas trainers. Then we’d drink coffee and chat and he would tell me how well I was doing, although I already knew it. He was proud that my English was now better than his, and I was keen to impress him.

  During one such visit he said, “I would like you to study German.” And I enrolled for it without even asking him why.

  My time in Cyprus was happy enough in the sense that I had nothing to worry about and I had grown used to my memories, although I still couldn’t get to sleep without the head-rocking. What had happened in Sabra, to my family, had become a part of me. They say that a personal tragedy fades over time
, but that is just a lie to make you feel better. What happens is that it becomes suffused into your system, more integrated into the everyday fabric of your life. It is like homogenizing the cream into the milk, rather than it sitting at the top of the bottle: the cream is still there, you just can’t see it.

  Occasionally, however, I was violently reminded of it. One night, after sitting our final exams before graduation, I was in bed reading a book Abu Leila had given me, an account of a Jewish boy’s experience in Poland (Falenica, I think), and for a minute I thought I was reading my own story. He too had been sitting down to dinner when the Germans had come for him and his family and taken them outside. He too had survived by using the same means I had. I got up, dizzy and sweating, and had to open the window to keep from hyperventilating. Jack, sitting in his bed drinking cocoa, shouted at me to close it.

  “I knew all that fucking reading would make you ill,” he said. I had to wait three weeks until Abu Leila’s next visit so I could show him the pages about Falenica from the book, and he had just nodded without reading it.

  “I know,” he said. “That’s why I gave it to you.” He sighed. “No suffering is unique, Michel,” he said. I needed to know what he meant and how these things could happen again and what had happened to the boy and whether you could be normal after such a thing, but Abu Leila had just lit a cigarette and taken the book from me. If I am to be honest, a part of me also hated that Jewish boy. I hated him for the very reason that Abu Leila had pointed out—because he had taken away the uniqueness of my experience.

  That was when he chose to tell me that I would be going to West Germany after I graduated from The English School. It was all part of the longer-term plan, he explained, although the plan itself was only revealed to me bit by bit, as it unfolded, like watching a TV soap opera in which you are the star. He must have seen the confusion in my face for he said, “Things will become clearer in Berlin.”

  Ten

  I flew back to West Berlin a week after giving Ramzi the case. I’d received a postcard from Abu Leila—the scene on the front told me where it would be (East rather than West) and the numbers in the message told me when.

  The plane flew low along a narrow flight path over the German Democratic Republic. It had to execute a steep turn over West Berlin to get into position to land at Tegel, as they had limited space in which to maneuver to avoid flying over the east of the city. This was great if you were on the right side of the plane and liked a good view of Berlin, but for me it was just a reminder of the fact that we were in a large and heavy machine twisting and turning in the sky, taking the mechanical structure to its limits. I closed my eyes and clutched the armrests.

  I preferred certain aspects of West Berlin to London. Although not literally under siege—you could take a flight or train out anytime—it was certainly surrounded by the GDR and this gave it the feel of an island. An island of capitalism in a sea of communism. The highest building in West Berlin, the Europa Centre, had a revolving Mercedes star on it, to remind people in the East what was important. The East had the television tower, to remind the West what was important; you could see it from nearly everywhere. It wasn’t difficult for people to go to the East; they did it all the time as tourists, although they had to be back by midnight. Of course very few people could come from the East. The main thing I liked about West Berlin was the Kreuzberg suburb, where I would sometimes go for a faint taste of the hustle and bustle of the camp—you couldn’t get the same atmosphere in London as the Arabs were wealthier there.

  After clearing passport control at Tegel I took the bus to Zoologischer Garten Station, which drug dealers and prostitutes used as their office, then walked to where I had booked a cheap room, in keeping with my student status. I washed and went out again, walking to the center and mingling with the other tourists to bore any possible watchers.

  My first time in Berlin was a shock to me after Mediterranean Cyprus. Too many people contained by a wall that kept the West out of the East, or the other way around, depending on who you listened to. Initially I had found it cold and lackluster, the buildings too big and overwhelming. I was enrolled at the Freie Universität to study English language and literature, and of course German. This choice was made by Abu Leila, based, he said, on the recommendations of my teachers at The English School in Nicosia, who spoke highly of my linguistic abilities. At one point I had asked him whether I shouldn’t learn Hebrew, thinking it would be useful. But he had just shaken his head and I hadn’t pushed it.

  I stopped at a falafel stand run by some Egyptians. I ordered a large sandwich and stood at a table on the pavement, washing it down with Coca-Cola. I watched people go by. West Berlin attracted refugees, exiles and the dispossessed from all over the world. They congregated in this besieged city, smoking, drinking and agitating in the Berlin bars. Berlin was famous for its large number of bars and I made a point of never visiting the same one twice, particularly if I had picked up a woman there.

  I did once have a relationship, with a student in my first year at university. I remember her with affection, a short Romanian girl with dimples and black curly hair. Her parents had managed to escape Romania the year before. She made me laugh, and I lost my virginity to her (Esma and I never had a chance to go all the way). But a month into our relationship, Antanasia or Atanasia (I can’t remember her exact name) wanted to know more, asking the kind of questions you would expect someone to ask after dating them for four weeks. I would sneak her into my room at night, as no visitors were allowed to stay over, and we would share my single bed. At the time I was living in a large anonymous boarding house in Wilmersdorf, as Abu Leila didn’t want me staying with the other students in university-appointed accommodation. I shared my floor with Polish migrants, exclusively men, who spent every night drinking and talking into the small hours. Antanasia would light a candle to make love by and would always end up sitting astride me; that’s how she liked to do it. After she’d caught her breath she would start asking me questions—who were my parents and where did I go to school and what were my plans after university, and she would trap me underneath her, sitting on my chest and pinning my arms down like Esma had done that time. At first she would try cajoling and tickling answers out of me, and I would pretend to plead for mercy to avoid telling the lies I’d rehearsed with Abu Leila. On one of these occasions, after a couple of weeks of this, she got off quickly and, with her back to me, started to get dressed, not even bothering to wash herself in the sink.

  “I feel sorry for you,” she said in German, blowing out the candle and putting on the harsh main light. “It would be nice if you could be open with me, if you could be honest.”

  I could see that she was angry. “I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings,” I said.

  “I’m not hurt. I’m sad. I’m sad for you because you cannot be close to anyone.”

  “There are other ways of being close,” I said. I’m not sure what I meant but she probably thought I was talking about sex because she just glared at me, with her heavy brows creased together. I never saw her again after that, except in passing on campus or during the odd class that we shared. She did slip me a note a few weeks later that read: “I hope you find what is in your heart.” She had drawn a small broken heart at the bottom of the page, like oversized punctuation. That was the last time I’d had a relationship that lasted more than a week.

  The next morning I took the S-Bahn east to Friedrichstrasse—the only crossing into East Berlin that foreigners and diplomats could use. Diplomats had their own channel, and I’d used it occasionally when I needed to cross for long periods. The East Germans would let you through without stamping your passport if they were expecting you, provided you gave them the correct password. That’s how I went to Potsdam and Beeskow to do some training, or once for three months to Moscow via Schönefeld Airport in East Berlin. This time I was just going across to meet Abu Leila, so I went across as a tourist.

  The station on the GDR side at Friedrichstrasse was a maze
of corridors. A couple of hundred people were queuing, most of them tourists going across for the experience of being in a communist country for a few hours. Abu Leila didn’t want the East German Intelligence Service seeing us meet—although he fretted equally about other PLO people—​so I did the tourist thing for an hour, then walked east from the television tower, crossing Karl-Marx-Allee into a residential area. Fewer people were around and I wandered dilapidated shop-free streets until I reached a faceless residential block. I went through a courtyard and up to the first floor, where I rapped on a door. An elderly North ​African–looking woman opened it and let me in silently. She pointed into the living room and disappeared into the kitchen from where the smell of cooking was wafting. I went through to see Abu Leila sitting at the coffee table playing Patience under a blue haze of smoke. The main light was on and the shutters were closed.

  Eleven

  Abu Leila and I embraced and kissed cheeks. He held me at arm’s length and appraised me.

  “You are looking well,” he said.

  I had often wondered whether he had a daughter called Leila or whether “Abu Leila” was simply a nom de guerre. It was not the kind of thing I could ask him though. I’d once asked him which town he came from in Palestine and he’d thrown me an irritated glance, even though it was a usual question for any compatriots meeting abroad to ask, particularly Palestinians.

  We sat on drab, hard-edged furniture with thin cushions. Abu Leila didn’t look well. He had rings under his eyes that matched his grey stubble. His suit was more creased than usual and he looked shrunken, like an old man. I felt a fleeting swell of fear, fear of what would happen if he were to die.