by Malka Marom
“Not proper to ask questions,” Azzizah admonishes her grandson.
“I am married to a Yahodi who dwells in the land that El Bofessa came from—ya’ani, the land called Canada,” I reply.
“Better Canada than Australia,” says Abu Salim. “For although the world is round—as round as the moon when full—we are sitting on top of the world, and Australia is at the bottom of our bottoms,” he explains. And even Tammam and her brother crack up.
“Wallah, what a story,” says Mutt between laughs.
“It is not a story,” says Abu Salim. “Dig a hole here a hundred thousand times deeper than a waterhole, and you will see the people of Australia. Canada is also on top of the world, like we are. Or so I heard Hilal tell. Had he travelled to Canada, Hilal would tell of Canada without shame.”
It wouldn’t surprise me if Abu Salim knows what Hilal smuggled to me, but I doubt he will ever ask me. He has asked no questions about my personal life, directly or indirectly, before or after he invited me to visit-stay in his forbidden tents. Such is the breadth of his hospitality—to friend and foe alike. If he is curious by nature, then, like a true real man, he restrains this natural trait also. Or maybe he thinks: know one Yahodi know them all.
“My husband also would not be ashamed to tell you of his dwelling-place, Canada. In fact, the opposite holds true,” I said.
“For your husband is a Yahodi born and raised in Israel,” says Abu Salim.
“No, my husband is a Yahodi born and raised in Canada,” I said.
“But surely your husband lives in Israel many, many years,” says Abu Salim.
“No, like a Badawia, I moved-followed him to his dwelling-place,” I replied.
“Your husband must be a man of honour and good reputation or you would have divorced him to return to your tribal grounds,” says Abu Salim.
“A stranger-woman, be she divorced or a maiden, is free to marry whomever her heart desires,” says Tammam’s brother, Akram.
“Information is power,” says Abu Salim. “And like a gun falling into the hands of an infant, information can kill.”
Kill? Is he talking to me? To Akram? Has Akram corrupted his sister, Tammam, by telling her everything he saw and heard in maq’ads the desert over, filling her head with “wrong ideas”?
“Are you ready?” snaps Abu Salim. God, am I ready.
“A woman-stranger,” dictates Abu Salim, “like a Badu man unseasoned, can but sit and listen in the maq’ad. For it is in the maq’ad that you gather-exchange-gain information—ya’ani—power. That is why a Badu unseasoned—young in age—can never be as informed-powerful as a Badu seasoned old. And even though the young in age have more strength to travel-gather information, even in deserts far, it is the Badu seasoned old who have the information—the power—to decide who to empower—ya’ani—when and where and if to dispatch this young man or that to gather information.”
But at least a young man has the power to decide for himself when and if to relieve his bladder—or maybe Akram steps over the rim now and into the void just to stretch his legs or to fetch from his saddlebag a sweater for himself.
“Akram has never been dispatched to cross borders, gather information anywhere but here in Sinaa,” says Mutt.
“Oskot, yaa-walad—shut up, yaa-child—for information is power,” Jeff says to his brother, and then he turns to me. “It is men’s work to gather information-power. That is why women can never be as powerful—informed—as we men are.”
Akram reappears with a regal abaiah draped over his shoulders, lending him stature, and power perhaps—but not much protection against the cold.
Abu Salim nods in approval, then turning to me he says, “Are you certain your husband would not be ashamed to tell of his dwelling-place, Canada?”
“Wallah, I am,” I reply. “For Canada is a land—”
“Stana—wait—for permission to tell,” Abu Salim cuts me off. “Now, if you are certain that your husband and your father would not object, I, Imsallam Suleman Abu Salim, give you permission to tell of your husband’s dwelling-place, Canada.”
“Ghule—tell—yaa-Nura,” Mutt and Jeff urge me, like grownups.
“Canada is a land blessed with peace and with great wadis that do not run dry in the summer months—”
“Cannot be,” Tammam’s brother, Akram, cuts me off. “Only the Gulf of Suez and the Gulf of Aqaba–Eilat do not run dry in the summer months.”
“Oh, yaa-Akram, the Gulf of Suez and the Gulf of Aqaba–Eilat are but a water jerrican compared to the sweet-water lakes in Canada,” I say, and they all laugh in disbelief, as though I have added pepper to spice up life—all except Abu Salim.
“I had encountered many a lake of sweet water in my young border-crossing days,” says Abu Salim, “and many a great wadi like the Nile, and the mighty Jordan that irrigates your land, Israel.”
“Aywa,” said I. “I knew no wadi more mighty than the Wadi Jordan until I went to my husband’s dwelling-place, Canada. So, imagine how surprised I was to discover that the mighty Jordan is but a narrow stream compared with the great wadis of my husband’s dwelling-place, Canada. I was wearing gold, but still I envied the people of Canada—envied their peace and their great wadis and lakes, but not their winters. For when the winter winds blow in Canada, the cold sears like fire. You cannot go out in bare feet, and some days not even in bare fingers.”
“You mean you wear shoes-boots on your fingers?” says Mutt. The air seems warmed by laughter.
“Bas—enough—or her husband would be offended,” says Abu Salim. “Tell on.”
“The child is not far wrong,” I said. “So very cold are some winter days in Canada that you cannot feel your fingers unless you cover-protect them with what are called mittens or gloves; some are made of wool, others of sheepskin, and some are made of leather like shoes-boots, only softer. And some winter coats also are made of leather, others of animal fur.”
“But why do they not build a fire to keep warm?” says Mutt.
“Because the authorities there in Canada, like Hilal here in Sinaa, like trees more than people,” replies Jeff.
“Laa—no—look at her hands,” says Azzizah. “Nura’s hands have never gathered wood for fire, not because she is lazy, as I had thought, but because there is no wood to gather in her husband’s dwelling-place, Canada.”
“Oh, yaa-Azzizah,” I said, “if all of this vast Sinaa desert were to be covered with trees, one standing close to another, there would not be as many trees here in Sinaa as there are in Canada. For Canada is a land many times the size of Sinaa, a land of a peaceful, yet valiant people who battled in the two World Wars and, undaunted, brave their cold winter lands—and our all-too-hot Middle East as well.”
“Aywa, they serve in the United Nations of all the nations of the world peace-keeping force,” says Abu Salim. “Tell on, yaa-Nura.”
“Aywa,” I went on to tell, not about Christie Pits, as my son would, but as Dave would, and as the Israelis who drop out of the Land: “Canada is a land blessed not only with trees, water, and a people who are peaceful yet valiant, but also with soil that is fertile on the surface and below. Dig below the surface of the land Canada and you will find treasures more precious than silver and gold—”
“Oil,” Tammam’s brother interjected, cutting me off. “Now that Israel discovered oil here in Sinaa, she will never return Sinaa to Egypt for peace.”
“Israel values her sons more than she values oil,” says Abu Salim. “That is Israel’s weakness and her strength. For oil, like glory, comes and goes, but sons from generation to generation tell the story of the oil and the glory that came and went. Aywa, nothing but the story remains of the great Lawrence of Arabia and the glorious days of his English—nothing but the story remains of the Turkish; nothing but the story remains of our own Badu warrior-of-warriors as well. For nothing remains when all
else dies, but the story.”
Like a grain of sand, their family crises—and mine. No matter how it gets resolved, sooner or later nothing remains of it but a story that will be carried in the wind or lie buried in this vast desert that witnessed the journey of the twelve tribes from slavery to freedom. Manna dropped from heaven when they complained of hunger. And when they complained that they were tired of eating manna day in, day out, breakfast-lunch-dinner, a flock of birds dropped from the sky. And when they complained that they were dying of thirst, water bubbled from a rock at the touch of a staff. Such miracles and wonders were performed for these twelve tribes who wandered forty years complaining every step of the way. The Badu have wandered for centuries, rarely, if ever, complaining—Badu like Abu Salim, who has overcome the hardship of this desert, day in, day out, for sixty years or more.
In the words he dictates Abu Salim refers to his story, and, by extension, himself, as a grain of sand. But would he be dictating these words if he saw himself, his story, so diminished; would he share his words with his stranger-guest, a daughter of these twelve tribes, if he thought she would see him so dwarfed by his desert? By his family crises?
The smell of baking pita wafts over from the charred top of a gasoline barrel and silences these thoughts.
“I am hungry-famished.” Mutt breaks the silence.
“Oskot, yaa-walad—shut up. You are whining like a child,” says Jeff to Mutt. “You and I eat proper—after the guests have their fill.”
“No, he is but a child, and one pita is ready,” says Azzizah.
Mutt scrambles over to the cooking fire at the maharama—the place of the women—and Azzizah splits the steaming pita in two.
“Give half to your brother, for he also is but a child,” she says to Mutt.
The fire-circle is cloaked in the smells of family now, of home—fresh-baked bread, fried onions; and tomato paste, tuna and rice casserole.
“Are the dwelling-places in Canada made of leather also, and of animal fur?” says Mutt, his mouth stuffed with pita.
“Not as far as I know,” I reply, my stomach rumbling.
“The dwelling-places in Canada are woven of goat hair like our Badu tents,” says Jeff, eating before the guests.
“Cannot be,” says Azzizah, picking up a second pita from the hot barrel top with her bare fingers. “Cannot be,” she says, “for it takes a woman three years to weave a tent. And Nura’s hands look like they have never even spun wool or camel hair for a carpet-blanket, let alone goat hair for a tent.”
“The dwelling-places of the Yahod in Eilat are made of stone and cement,” says Tammam’s brother, Akram.
“So is Hilal’s dwelling-place, here in Sinaa,” says Jeff. “In Canada also?”
“Aywa,” I reply. “Some dwelling-places in Canada are made of stone, others of cement; some are made of wood, others are faced with glass—”
“Cannot be,” says Azzizah. “Only tea glasses are made of glass.”
“Laa—no,” says Abu Salim. “In Lubnan—Lebanon—there is a city called Beirut. And there I saw dwelling-places faced with glass like our tea glasses. Do they rise as tall in Canada as they do in Beirut?”
“I do not know how tall the dwelling-places faced with glass rise in Beirut,” I reply, “but in Canada they rise almost as tall as the mountain chains here in Sinaa, maybe even taller.”
“So, in Canada also, people live up high in mountain caves, just like us Badu in the cold winter months,” says Azzizah. “Only our mountain caves are made of stone, and in Canada they are made of glass. Sahih—right?” Azzizah asks Abu Salim.
“You reply-tell,” says Abu Salim, addressing me.
“I do not know how to reply,” I say, “for I have yet to see your mountain caves. All I know to tell is that, in Canada, the dwelling-places that rise as tall as mountains are stacked one on top of another.”
“Cannot be,” says Azzizah. “For if Tammam were to pitch her tent on top of mine, her goats would topple my tent.”
“The Badu tribes of Canada, like the Yahod of Eilat, have no goats,” says Akram.
“There are no Badu tribes in Canada,” says Abu Salim, “for, had there been Badu tribes in Canada, El Bofessa would have told of Canada and played cassettes recorded in the Badu maq’ads of Canada.”
“I wish to record cassette of legend-poem-story,” says Jeff.
“Me too,” says Mutt.
“Let Nura work her cassette recorder, for you might break it,” says Abu Salim to his grandsons. “Are you ready?” he says to me, then to his wives, “Utter not a sound. The voice of a woman is not to be recorded—forbidden.”
I couldn’t fall asleep. Tonight, the carpet-blanket is more torture than comfort—a bed of steel wool—steel wool infested with armoured lice and bed bugs; steel wool enwrapping me in the cold night wind, the cold gravel, hard-packed like rock. If there ever was a patch of sand on this plateau, the wind has carried it off, scouring even the cracks and the hollows. The flinty ground is uneven, and, wherever I turn, my bones spark with pain. And the night light—a luminous smile floating among the stars—changes the properties of colour, like black and white film. The two fire-circles are obsidian now—the red of the embers, the white, and grey of the ashes, the black, white, and grey of the smoke have vanished.
The fire was allowed to die when Abu Salim, his grandsons, and Tammam’s brother left this forbidden compound to sleep in the maq’ad. Other than that, the sleeping arrangements are the same. Azzizah sleeps in her tent—or, rather, outside her tent. Tammam’s goat sleeps in Tammam’s tent, and Tammam and her infant, wrapped together in one blanket-carpet only a few feet from mine, sleep outside—on the front porch of her tent, which is also the back porch of her kitchen, and her living room—where the fire-circle was loaded with glowing ashes.
Soon after the ashes cool and blacken, shadows meander out of Tammam’s tent. My heart pounds, until they materialize into a couple of goats. A foot or two from my face they stop to take a piss, then they plunk themselves down, almost on top of my carpet-blanket. I push, shove; they don’t budge. I give up, and, just when I discover that goats are terrific heating pads, they meander back into Tammam’s tent, and Tammam’s infant-girl crawls after them. Halfway she hesitates, almost as if she has remembered that goats are the currency that sustains her way of life but is still puzzled by how highly they are valued. They are sheltered at night in a tent that took her mother’s mother three years to weave, while she is outside, freezing. Little Salimeh wears no diaper, no underpants, no leggings—only a flower-print dress and the sweater I brought her from Canada. The sleeves, too long for her, roll up one hand and slide over the other; it drags behind her like a tail as she crawls back to her mother. Her progress halted by a rock in her path, she rolls over onto her side, then sits up, rubbing her gums with her bare knuckles. Her voice shivers when she whimpers—stops as soon as she hears her mother’s jingle-jangle. Tammam stretches out an arm that opens a tiny crack in her blanket-carpet, and her infant scuttles into it like a puppy happy to be back at her mother’s tit. It won’t be long before she is weaned, even if the drought does not dry up her mother’s milk. Girls are weaned sooner than boys here. Abu Salim believes that a boy should be indulged, so that he will gain a sense of power, superiority, dominance.
“A boy should be breast-fed longer than a girl,” he said soon after supper. “A boy should not be disciplined as much as a girl, lest he be fearful. A girl should not be indulged as much as a boy, lest she be wilful—overly strong, refusing to do what she is told, talking back, doing things without permission.”
“The more wilful a boy, the better,” said Mutt, repeating, obviously, words he had overheard ever since he was old enough to remember.
“A girl also, the more wilful the better,” said Tammam’s brother, Akram.
“So long as she has a soft voice and not too long a tongue,” said Jef
f, frowning like his grandfather, Abu Salim.
“Aywa,” said Akram, “a girl must be soft-spoken but wilful also, or no one will respect her. Yes, a true real woman is a woman modest, obedient, deferential, soft-spoken, and at the same time, like a true real man, she must be strong, courageous, assert herself . . . even against her husband, if he or his blood-kin dishonour her blood-kin or herself. Or she will not be respected.”
Not a sound did Azzizah and Tammam utter before and after supper, when the cassettes were recorded, and when the recorded cassettes were played back. Tammam’s brother explained to his sister that, unlike a human being, a cassette recorder cannot talk and listen, remember and record at the same time. Then he added that the cassette recorder was recording only when the button with the red dot on it was pressed.
Modest-proper, Tammam didn’t tell him that she had transcribed Abu Salim’s cassette recording and knew how to use the machine. The girl-Badawia waited until no button was pressed, and then she said, “I wish to sing flute.”
“Ghanni—sing on,” said Mutt and Jeff, echoing Abu Salim.
“Are you ready?” Tammam says to me. “Cassette-record my flute singing.”
“No!” snaps Abu Salim. “Forbidden to cassette-record a woman’s voice in story, legend, poem, song, drum, flute—”
“But I wish to cassette-record my flute singing only for my daughter to remember my flute singing,” says Tammam as if it was her dying wish.
“Forbidden,” said Abu Salim.
“But you, or my brother, can safe-keep the cassette of my flute singing, play it for my daughter, only for my daughter,” Tammam pressed on. Her mother died birthing her, leaving no record . . .
“No need to cassette-record your flute singing, for Inshallah—God willing—your daughter will enjoy your flute singing for many years to come,” said Azzizah.
“Inshallah,” said Tammam’s brother, looking at Azzizah as if she had the power-knowledge to cast a spell to dispel the rumour, then, still staring at Azzizah, he added, “From gulf to gulf I have travelled, and many cassettes of flute singing I have heard, but not in any cassette, maq’ad, or tent have I heard a flute sung as well as my sister, Tammam, sings flute.”