“Mama what did they say?!” he asks worry spreading across his face. I smile at him.
“Our train is late!” Tankie jumps down slowly and before I know it he is standing next to the black woman. And touching her hand.
“Tankie!” I call out. He runs back to me. I smile at the woman, embarrassed. The woman looks up and smiles politely.
“How are you?” I ask in her direction. I pronounce every word slowly. I like talking to foreigners. Then I’m not too self conscious about my English. “gut”58 she responds in German while fiddling with a brown paper bag that she is holding. She seems surprised that I’m talking to her.
“I’m sorry” I tell her pointing to Tankie. She smiles.
“Macht nichts!”59she says and almost sounds apologetic. I watch her from the corner of my eye. There is something so vulnerable about her. For a moment I’m overcome with strong emotions. I think of hugging her and telling that it is OK. Life is OK. But I don’t. What if she thinks that I’m crazy?
“You are nice” I say. She looks up vacantly and then I remember that schön in English can mean both nice and beautiful.
“You are beautiful” I tell her but she only smiles wryly.
A green haired Punk comes and sits next to Lukas who looks at me helplessly.
The black woman removes a colorful headscarf and busies herself tying it. First she ties it tightly and then loosely. I look around fascinated by the diversity. I wasn’t aware that there are so many ways of tying a headscarf.
A few moments later, I hear footsteps. A train has arrived and people are alighting and boarding. The black woman looks up at the announcement board and quickly jumps to her feet. She grabs her bag and runs off to the train platform. “Tschüs!”60 we both say simultaneously.
And then I see the brown paper bag. I quickly grab it and follow her to the platform but as I reach, I see the train pulling out.
A lot of things flash through my mind. The first one is to take the next train and bring her the brown paper bag. But then it occurs to me that I wouldn’t know where to alight at.
I look inside the brown paper bag. It is a bunch of papers or documents that are neatly arranged and a small red purse. On the cover are the names Maria Kotoko. I think of leaving it exactly where she forgot it at but I somehow can’t bring myself to do it. So I do the only other thing that seems logical. I approach the cops walking leisurely around the train station.
“You saw the person who forgot it?” The cop asks in a bored tone.
“It happened very fast!” I say defensively.
“That’s OK Madam. There is a name on it. I’m sure we will find her” he says finally. For a moment I stand there feeling proud of myself. Proud of the fact that I have helped a poor African woman get back her lost documents.
Philister Taa
Germany, 2010, Coming Home
On that cold September evening, I went to Aldi as usual after coming back from work. The place was crowded with people trying to shop as much as possible, as Monday was going to be a holiday. Most of them had shopping carts full of things. I, on the other hand, carried the things I bought just like that. I didn’t need a cart because I passed by Aldi every day anyway. Every single day. I bought bits and pieces. Whenever I realized that I didn’t have salt, I went to Aldi. If I came back and realized that I didn’t have a matchbox, I walked back to Aldi. On a good day, I went to Aldi as often as ten times. It was like a home away from home.
The two men standing in front of the building that housed my apartment didn’t catch my attention at all. Neither did the green police van that had bars of metal just like the ones in prison.
I walked past them all the time thinking of the sauerkraut that I was carrying. I loved sauerkraut. Served with a white sausage and ugali, it was the most delicious food I had ever eaten. It was a pity that no one had yet thought of becoming rich and famous using this recipe. Maybe I should apply to take part in the TV show Das Perfekte Dinner and prepare it, I thought happily. I took the key and attempted to open the door. But it was already open. I made a mental note to let the caretaker know that the door downstairs was broken again. I was quite sure that the Somalis living in the right end corner had something to do with it.
“Philister Taa,” ‘a voice called out. I froze. The last time I heard that name was almost twenty years earlier. I turned around and realized the heavy police presence for the first time. Two of them walked towards me. The younger of the two spoke first. He had blond hair with streaks of white. “Sind Sie Philister Taa?” he asked. There was urgency in the way he asked it. As if he couldn’t wait for the answer. I looked him up and down while contemplating what to say. My gaze met his partner’s gaze. We sized each other up. There was something very hardened and threatening about the way he looked at me. It was as if he were daring me to deny it.
“How did you… ?” I asked, shaking. At the beginning I had thought every single day about this day. After a while, I forgot. It was tiring to constantly think of an oncoming disaster.
“Come with us!” he said with finality.
“I need to take a sweater!” I said dryly, attempting to get into the house.
“Come with us right now!” the older cop reiterated. “You have a flight to Kenya in three hours. We can’t waste any time! Besides, you are a criminal. We don’t negotiate with criminals.”
The flight back to Nairobi was one of the most mortifying experiences of my life so far. I was ushered into the airplane by the two uniformed policemen. My hands were chained in some heavy metal. I wanted to protest that I wasn’t a criminal but lacked the energy. The stewardesses who met us at the entrance wore green-and-cream uniforms. I later learned that it was an Ethiopian Airlines flight.
“Good evening, madam,” she started in that polished way only known to airline crews.
Before I could respond, she saw the chains and the cops behind me. I saw her mouth widening in shock or surprise or whatever one one feels when faced with such an incident.
We passed her and walked slowly through the plane. An old man saw the chains on my hands and made the sign of the cross quickly before turning to look out the window. I realized that the rest of the passengers were not any different. As soon as they saw the chains, they looked out the window or pretended to search for something from their hand luggage. A small boy saw the cops and yelled excitedly in German. ‘Polizei!’
The younger cop looked at him and grinned. It was a grin loaded with pride. It occurred to me at that point that he enjoyed being a cop. Unlike many people, I included who never got to realize their dreams, he was living his dream.
We sat at the back of the airplane. I was sandwiched between the two cops. I was still holding the sauerkraut from Aldi awkwardly between my chained hands. I wondered what my friend Tamaa Matano would say when she saw me. The thought struck me both with pleasure and dread. I had let her down. I was not rich like I had promised her. I had not built a gorofa as I had hoped. I wasn’t only older but much poorer than when I had left. At that point it occurred to me that I had not informed anyone about my trip back to Kenya. It had taken at most two minutes for the cops to haul me into their van and drive me back to the airport. That was definitely not enough time to carry anything let alone to inform anyone. In the twenty years I had lived in Germany, I had never seriously thought of going back to Kenya. The reasons for that were legal as well as financial.
“Where do I go?” I asked abruptly. It was slowly dawning on me that I might not know anyone. What if Tamaa Matano was dead? From what I gathered, the life expectancy in Africa was pretty low. Some claimed that it was a miracle for an African to live up to forty years. I tried to remember Tamaa Matano’s age. She had to be exactly or just about as old as me, which was almost forty.
Both cops turned their heads to face me. It was as if I had asked the most ridiculous question that they had ever
heard. Simultaneously, they responded:
“To prison!”
In normal circumstances I would have burst out laughing. Their response was so natural that one would have thought that going to prison was the nicest thing that could befall one.
“Prison?” I repeated the question nervously.
“Of course. You are a criminal and that is where criminals belong,” the younger cop started with a thick Bavarian accent.
“I am not a criminal!” I protested, my voice trembling.
“That is a case for the Kenyan courts. For the meantime, you will stay in prison,” the older cop stated.
“Kenyan prisons, I hear, are very…” the younger cop started before bursting out in laughter. He laughed so hard that his chest began heaving violently. I stared at him sullenly, feeling sorry for myself.
“Anyway, it would have been better for you if you went to a German prison,” he finished before wiping tears from his eyes. Tears of laughter.
The older cop looked at his colleague and then at me. I could see that he was torn between agreeing with his colleague and rebuking him. The rest of the flight was thankfully without any incident.
Eight hours later, we arrived in Nairobi. At the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport. The day was sunny and everything seemed dry. I wondered if it had rained in the past six months. I was hungry, and I hoped to reach the prison soon enough in order to eat some lunch. My companions seemed busy. They had a lot of paperwork to finish. They were involved in heated conversation with some officials, whom I assumed were Immigration officials. I waited silently, sitting on a new red couch that still had plastic covers on it.
They had unchained me as soon as the plane touched the ground. There was no longer a risk that I could run of the plane and drop down somewhere in Europe. I was in Africa where I belonged.
After what seemed like an eternity, they both turned and walked towards me. I stood up, in anticipation of my trip to jail.
“Good luck and good-bye!” the older cop said in a sympathetic voice. I watched him, not understanding what he was talking about.
“You can go and find your relatives and start a new life,” he continued calmly.
The reality of what I was faced with suddenly dawned on me. Their job was done. I was no longer their responsibility.
“What about the prison?” I demanded. I was counting on going to prison and trying to figure out from prison where Tamaa Matano was. The other thing was that I was hungry and I needed something to eat.
“You are lucky you don’t have to go to prison. The Kenyan prisons are too full,” the younger cop said. I could see that he wasn’t completely pleased with that development. I was also not happy about it. In fact, I was furious. They both looked at me one last time, the older one in obvious sympathy and the younger one with a mixture of relief and satisfaction at delivering me back to Africa and disappointment at my not landing in a Kenyan jail.
For the first time since that fiasco began, I burst into tears. The Immigration officials looked at me sympathetically.
“You are not the first one. You will survive!” a fat woman behind the counters said in my direction while simultaneously talking on her mobile phone.
But of course, she had no idea just how bad my situation was. My life in Germany had ended abruptly the previous evening, and now the only thing I had to my name was my purse with seven Euros and thirty-five cents in it.
I walked slowly out of the arrivals terminal and was met by a huge number of people waiting for their loved ones to arrive. And taxi drivers. The taxi drivers looked at me without any interest. It was clear that I wasn’t the only deportee that they had ever come across. None of them asked me where I was going to, perhaps very aware that I could not afford their services.
Irmtraut
Kenya, 2010, Philippe’s Visit
I lay next to Philippe and watched him sleep. He looked peaceful, and I thought I could even detect a smile. I had achieved it. I had made Philippe so happy during this trip that I was willing to bet that this was going to be a regular in our calendar. There were suddenly going to be emergencies that had to be sorted out by the CEO himself in Nairobi, I thought happily. I was awakened from this sleepy daydream when he grabbed my hand playfully. For someone who had looked like he was totally asleep a few seconds earlier, he was quite alert.
“I ordered room service. Coffee will be here at exactly seven thirty,” I murmured in his ear. I knew that Philippe was a coffee junkie, and I was going to spoil him as much as I could.
“Seven thirty African time?” he asked with a smile. “I am afraid that might turn out to be ten thirty a.m.” We both laughed. That was what the management consultants had drilled into our heads during the global intercultural training sessions. Africans were never to be trusted to arrive on time. Apparently the clock in Africa moved slower than in the rest of the world.
“Why did you do that?” he asked, still holding my arm.
“Do what?” I asked feigning surprise.
“Shouldn’t we just go to the restaurant?” he asked.
“OK, be my guest!” I answered happily. I was going to show him the fresh fruit and the samosas that I absolutely loved. These were some kind of Arab-Indian-Kenyan specialty. We walked out into the corridor and took the elevator downstairs. I was keen on giving him the impression that I loved it in Africa, never mind the incidences with the shit on my face and the car rental fiasco.
In the elevator, we met the laundry man. “Good morning!” he said with a smile.
“Good morning. How are you today?” I responded. Philippe looked at me, amused. This routine continued. Pretty much all the personnel greeted me as if we were long-lost buddies. I responded enthusiastically. I didn’t mention to Philippe that it had always annoyed me that they almost always wanted to talk to me. We sat down, and a waitress whom I recognized as Kanini walked up to our table.
“Madam, today we have passion fruit juice, the one you like!” she started with a smile.
“Thank you, Ms. Kanini, I will take a glass!” I said. I turned to Philippe, and before he could say anything I started talking. “And he will take coffee and a glass of passion as well!” I said.
Philippe started to protest. “I don’t know what that passion thing is so…” Before he could finish, we saw a black man in a jeans jacket approaching our table. He looked furious.
“How long is it taking you to serve us?” he asked Kanini.
“Sir, I will be with you in a minute!” Kanini said in a surprisingly firm voice.
“They’ve just come and you serve them before us?” he prodded.
“Sir, I said I am coming to your table,” she said again. I watched this exchange pensively.
“No don’t bother. I am not going to eat in a racist restaurant!” he said and signaled the lady who had been sitting at the corner table. They left in a huff, but then the man came back and I thought that he had forgotten something. He walked up to us.
“You are lucky to be white!” he said and turned to leave.
Philippe and I stared at each other for a moment.
“What was that about?” he asked finally.
“I don’t know,” I answered feeling confused. The more I thought I understood Africa and its people, the more I realized I didn’t.
Later that day, Philippe left for the airport.
“There is something I have to tell you before I leave,” he whispered in my ear. We were seated in a taxi.
“Right now?” I asked giggling. I couldn’t remember the last time things had been that easy between us.
He looked hesitant for a second. I was sure he was going to tell me what I had suspected the whole time, that he was going to come again probably the following week or at most in two weeks’ time. I saw him attempt to open his mouth. “Wait until we are alone!” I
whispered. We arrived at the Terminal 1 for the international departures at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport. I was surprised to see that the airport was quite beautiful. Contrary to my arrival when everything had looked dreary, this time around everything looked bright and welcoming. We walked in and checked his luggage in. As a first-class passenger, Philippe was ushered into the VIP lounge. I went along even though I was not traveling. Those were some of the perks of traveling in better classes.
A few minutes later, we were alone. Philippe took me in his arms and kissed me. I felt dizzy. There was no ounce of doubt in my mind that I was in love with him. Deeply in love.
We sat down, and he held my hand. I felt so much joy that my eyes welled with tears.
“Listen, I am very glad to have you,” he started. “I am very glad to have us.”
I smiled shyly, the way I suspected would-be brides smiled when they suspected that the guy was going to pop the big question. But I wasn’t that naive. I didn’t want him to marry me. It would be enough if he just wanted to continue being with me. I thought about it for a second and wondered if that was a sign of my low self-esteem or if it meant that I was a highly independent woman. The lines were hazy, and I was bright enough not to believe the chest-thumping bullshit preached by some feminists.
“Tell me, you know you can tell me anything,” I said softly and almost believed it. The reality was that I hated it whenever anyone confessed anything to me. I hated the burden of sharing some supposed secret.
“You seem to really like it here, Irmtraut. You look wonderful. It is as if you have undergone some kind of rebirth,” he said softly, and I felt my knees crumble in excitement.
I smiled up at him, and even though I felt knots of doubts in my stomach, I suppressed them. I still didn’t know what to think of Africa. It had so far been a very interesting experience. But “interesting” had many faces, and it was certainly not a synonym for “good.”
The Outsider(S) Page 14