Stories of the Sahara

by Sanmao

  ‘Go with the nomads. They are a very friendly people and travel to wherever there is rainwater. This will save you money. I can make introductions.’

  ‘I’m not afraid of hardship. I can buy my own tent and camel. Please help me. I can go right away.’

  The old man laughed. ‘Nobody knows when they might go. Sometimes they stay in one place for a week or two. Sometimes they stay for months. It depends on whether their goats have enough to eat.’

  ‘How long does it take for them to cross the desert each time?’

  ‘Hard to say. They are very slow. Probably ten years or so!’

  Everyone who heard this laughed, but I couldn’t bring myself to join in. That day I walked for a long, long time, all the way home to where I was staying. I’d travelled incredible distances to the desert just to linger in this little town, it seemed. Good thing I still had three months left. I might as well settle down first and then make plans.

  My landlord’s family paid me a visit the day after I moved in. A big group of boys and girls were crowded in front of my door. I smiled at them, scooping up the smallest in my arms. ‘Come in, everyone,’ I said to them. ‘I have snacks for you.’

  They awkwardly glanced at a plump girl who stood behind them. She was truly beautiful, with large eyes, long eyelashes and very white teeth. Her skin was a light brown. She wore a deep turquoise fabric around her body and also covered her hair. She walked over and touched her head to my face, then took my hand. ‘Salaam alaikum.’

  ‘Salaam alaikum,’ I said back to her.

  I liked her a lot. Among this group of little kids, the girls all wore long African print dresses in splashy colours and their hair was done up in a ton of snake-like braids. They looked amazing. Some of the boys wore clothes, while others were naked. None of them had shoes on. A pungent smell emanated from their bodies. Their facial features were all very attractive, even if a bit grimy.

  I eventually met the landlord himself. He was a policeman who spoke excellent Spanish. ‘Your wife is very beautiful,’ I said to him.

  ‘That’s odd,’ he replied. ‘You didn’t meet my wife!’

  ‘Then who was that plump and pretty girl?’

  ‘Ah! That is my elder daughter Gueiga. She is only ten years old.’

  I stared at him in shock. Gueiga looked very mature. I would have guessed her to be around thirty. I really couldn’t believe it.

  ‘Señorita, you must also be a teenager? You can be friends with my daughter.’

  I scratched my head, embarrassed and unsure of how to tell the landlord my age.

  Once I got to know Gueiga better, I asked her, ‘Gueiga, are you really only ten years old?’

  ‘What year old?’ she said.

  ‘You. How old are you?’

  ‘I do not know!’ she said. ‘I can only count to ten on my fingers. We women do not care about our age. Only my father would know how old I am.’

  Eventually I discovered it wasn’t just Gueiga who didn’t know how old she was. Her mother and the neighbouring women didn’t know numbers, nor did they care about their own ages. All they cared about was how plump they were. Plump was pretty here; who cared how old anyone was?

  Within a month of settling down, I had managed to meet many people. I had both Spanish and Sahrawi friends. Among them was a young Sahrawi man who’d graduated from high school, a remarkable feat. One day, he told me happily, ‘I’m getting married next spring.’

  ‘Congratulations. Where is your fiancée?’

  ‘In the desert, living in a khaima.’ (A tent.)

  Gazing at this handsome youth, I hoped he would conduct himself differently from his clansmen. ‘Tell me, how old is your fiancée?’

  ‘Eleven years old.’

  I cried out when I heard this. ‘And you’ve had a high school education? Dios mío!  ’

  This made him pretty mad. ‘What is wrong about this?’ he said, looking at me. ‘My first wife was only nine when she married me. Now she is fourteen, with two children.’

  ‘What? You have a wife? How come you never mentioned it before?’

  ‘What is there to say about women. . .’

  I glared at him. ‘You’re planning to marry your quota of four wives?’ (Muslims here can have up to four wives.)

  ‘I cannot. I do not have the money. Two is fine for now.’

  Not long after this exchange, Gueiga went crying to her own marriage. It was customary to cry on this occasion, but if I were in her place, I’d probably cry bitter tears for the rest of my life.

  One day around sunset, I heard the honking of a car outside my door. I ran out to see who it was and found two of my new friends, a married couple, waving at me from their Jeep. ‘Get in, let’s go for a ride.’

  They were both Spaniards. The husband was serving in the air force around here and had a modern ‘camel’. ‘Where to?’ I asked as I was climbing into the backseat of the Jeep.

  ‘The desert.’

  ‘For how long?’

  ‘A few hours, then we’ll come back.’

  Even though there was sand all around us, they felt the need to break out and go somewhere far away, I guess. We followed the tyre tracks of another car into the boundless desert. The sun was sinking, but it was still very hot. I felt a bit sleepy and my eyes glazed over for a moment. The next thing I knew … wow, just incredible: two hundred metres ahead was a big lake, flat as a mirror, with a few trees nearby.

  I rubbed my eyes. It felt like the car was flying towards the lake as fast as it could. From the backseat, I gave my friend who was driving a smack on the head. ‘A lake, viejo! Do you want us to die?’ I screamed. He ignored me and stepped on the gas. I looked at his wife, who had a strange smile on her face. The car wasn’t stopping and the lake was drawing nearer and nearer. I hugged my knees and let them drive on.

  I had heard that there was a lake not far into the desert, but I hadn’t expected it to be here. Lifting my head slightly, I saw the lake was still there. I hugged myself tightly again and covered my head. The car drove for another hundred metres or so before coming to a stop.

  ‘Hey, open your eyes!’ they shouted. I raised my head and saw an endless wasteland. The setting sun stained the entire land blood red; a wind blew sheets of sand into the air. A horrible, frightful scene appeared before my eyes. Where was the lake? There was no lake. The water had disappeared. And there certainly weren’t any trees. I gripped the car seat tightly, afraid to make a sound. It was like a terrifying story from The Twilight Zone come to life.

  I jumped out of the car, kicking at the ground and then touching it with my hands. It was all real, but how did that lake just disappear? I hurriedly turned to look at the car. The car hadn’t disappeared. It was still there, along with my two friends who were doubled over with laughter.

  ‘I get it. That was a mirage, right?’

  My hair was still standing on end after I got in the car. ‘Pretty scary. How come it looked so close? The mirages in the movies always look so far away.’

  ‘Oh, there’s so much more than mirages. Take your time to get to know this desert. There are weird things aplenty.’

  Afterwards, whenever I saw something, I didn’t dare trust my own eyes and always had to go and touch it. Of course, I couldn’t tell other people that I’d been spooked by a mirage. ‘I’m short-sighted,’ is all I would say. ‘I have to touch things to be sure.’

  I was washing clothes with the door open when the landlord’s goat ran in and ate the only flower I’d managed to cultivate with fresh water. Well, it wasn’t really a flower, but the two green leaves had been growing quite healthily and the goat ate them both up in one bite. I chased it out to give it a good whacking and ended up falling over. Furious, I ran next door to yell at the landlord’s son, Bashir. ‘Your goat ate the leaves that I planted!’

  At fifteen, the landlord’s son was the oldest of the children. ‘How many leaves were there?’ he asked, looking down his nose at me.

  ‘There were only tw
o leaves and he ate them both.’

  ‘You’re mad about two leaves? Why bother?’

  ‘What? Are you forgetting this is the Sahara, where not a blade of grass grows? My flower—’

  ‘Forget about your flower. What are you doing tonight?’

  ‘Nothing.’ I really had no plans when I thought about it.

  ‘I’m going to capture aliens with some friends. You want to come?’

  ‘A flying saucer? You mean there’s a flying saucer coming?’ My curiosity was piqued.

  ‘Yes, that’s right.’

  ‘Muslims shouldn’t lie, kid.’

  He held up his hand and swore that there really was one. ‘There is no moon tonight, so it will probably come.’

  ‘Yes! Count me in!’ I blurted out, feeling excited and scared at the same time. ‘You’re going to capture them, huh?’

  ‘As soon as they come out, yes! But you should wear men’s clothes, local men’s clothes. I do not want to take a woman there.’

  ‘Whatever you say. Lend me a turban and a thick coat.’

  So that night I walked with Bashir and his group of friends for nearly two hours. We reached a place in the desert where there were no lights whatsoever, then sprawled on the ground. It was pitch-black all around us. The stars twinkled coldly like diamonds. The wind hurt like a slap in the face. I adjusted my turban to cover my nose, only exposing my eyes. Then, when I was nearly frozen to death from the wait, Bashir suddenly struck me.

  ‘Shh, don’t move. Listen.’

  Woo, woo, woo, it sounded like the rhythmic hum of a motor coming from all directions. ‘I don’t see anything!’ I cried.

  ‘Shh, don’t yell.’ Bashir pointed. In the sky not far from us, there was a flying object lit up in orange, slowly coming our way. Even though I was focused on the flying object, I was so nervous that I dug my hands into the sand. The strange thing flew in a circle and moved away. I exhaled a big breath. Then it started flying back, still slow, but lower in the sky.

  The only thing I wanted in that moment was for it to go away quickly. Capturing aliens, my foot! We’d be lucky if they didn’t abduct us. The UFO didn’t descend; I lay there, limp and unable to move, for a long time. In spite of the intense cold, I was sweating all over.

  It was broad daylight by the time we got home. I stood in front of my house and took off the turban and coat to return them to Bashir. My policeman landlord was just getting in.

  ‘Hey, where have you guys been?’

  When Bashir saw his father, he ran back inside like a dog with its tail between its legs.

  ‘We’re back!’ I replied to the landlord. ‘We went to see a flying saucer.’

  ‘This kid was playing a trick on you and you fell for it?’

  I thought for a second. ‘It was real,’ I told him. ‘An orange object, flying slowly. It wasn’t a plane. It was very slow and flew low.’

  The landlord contemplated this for a moment. ‘Many peo­ple have seen this thing,’ he said. ‘It has been coming often at night for many years. No one can explain what it is.’

  I felt a twinge hearing him say this. ‘So you really believe what I just saw?’

  ‘Señorita, I believe in Allah. But that thing in the desert sky truly exists.’

  Even though I’d been awake and freezing all night, I couldn’t get to sleep for a long, long time.

  Another night I was leaving my friend’s after having eaten roasted camel and it was already one in the morning. ‘Just sleep over!’ they said. ‘You can go home tomorrow morning.’

  I thought about it, but 1 a.m. wasn’t that late, so I made up my mind to walk. An uncomfortable expression came over the man of the house. ‘We can’t see you home, though.’

  ‘No need to worry,’ I said to them, patting my boots. ‘I’ve got this.’

  ‘Got what?’ he and his wife asked in unison.

  I raised my hands dramatically and, in a flash, revealed a shiny knife. The wife let out a yelp. We all laughed for a good while. Then I bid them goodbye and walked off on my own.

  It was forty minutes to my home, not a long journey by any means. The annoying part was that you had to pass through two big cemeteries on the way. The local Sahrawi don’t use coffins. They wrap people who’ve died in white cloth, place them in the sand and put a stone tablet on top so the dead people don’t sit up in the night.

  There was moonlight that evening. I sang the military song of the local desert corps at the top of my lungs while marching ahead. Eventually I realised it might be better if I didn’t sing, as it would make me an easier target. There were no lights in the desert. Apart from the moaning wind, I heard only my own footsteps.

  The first cemetery emerged crisp and clear beneath the moonlight. I walked past the seemingly endless lines of graves with great caution so as to not step on anyone in eternal rest. The second cemetery posed more difficulty, situated as it was on a slope. To get home, I had to go down a hill where the dead people were densely packed beneath the ground. There was practically no path to follow. Not far in the distance, a few dogs were sniffing here and there. I knelt down to pick up stones to throw at them. The dogs howled and fled.

  I stood on the hill for a while, looking in front and then behind me. I felt scared because no one was around. But if a person did come out of the wilderness, I’d be even more scared. What if something came that was not a person? Wah, my hairs began to stick up one by one. I didn’t dare let my imagination run wild. Once I was almost out of the cemetery, what do you know, there was a shadow moving on the ground before me. At first it was sprawled forward, then struggling up with arms raised towards the sky, then falling back to the ground. A moment later it was struggling up again, then falling again.

  I kept calm and bit my lip, standing still to collect myself. Eh? The shadow was also no longer moving. Looking closer, I saw that it was scraps of cloth around a body. It was clearly something that had crawled out of a grave. I crouched down, my right hand feeling for the handle of the knife in my boot. Gust after gust of strange, heavy wind blew. The wind carried me, in a trance, closer to the thing by a few steps. The thing struggled to rise again under the moonlight. I glanced behind me to assess the situation. It would be an uphill retreat, hard to move fast. Better just to charge forwards. So I hesitantly took a few steps. As I neared that thing, I screamed and quickened my pace, flying past. Who would have expected that when I screamed, the thing also started letting out short screams – ahh, ahh, in a voice that was much more miserable than my own.

  After rushing forward a dozen steps, I froze and came to a stop. It was a human voice! Looking back, I saw a man dressed in local garb, standing there looking panicked and helpless.

  ‘Who are you? How shameless can you be, hiding out here to scare a woman. Have you no integrity?’ I wasn’t afraid now, cursing at this guy in Spanish.

  ‘I, I…’

  ‘A thief? Come to rob graves in the middle of the night, have you?’ I don’t know where I got the courage, but I strode over to him to take a look. What a surprise! It was some kid, not even twenty years old, his face covered in sand and soot.

  ‘I was praying at my mother’s grave. I was not trying to scare you.’

  ‘Still won’t admit it.’ I gave him a shove.

  He was close to tears. ‘Señorita, it is you who scared me. How unjust. You scared me. I…’

  ‘Scared you? If only!’ I found it absolutely ridiculous.

  ‘I was deep in prayer when I heard someone singing in the wind. I listened more closely, and then it wasn’t there any more. Then I saw the dogs howl and run away. When I put my head down to pray again, you appeared at the top of the hill with your long flowing hair. I was scared half to death and you came rushing at me, screaming…’

  Now I was beside myself with laughter, staggering around, stepping above the dead people. Once the laughter subsided, I told this guy, ‘Such a scaredy-cat, yet you come out to pray in the middle of the night. Go home now!’

  He bowed t
o me and walked off.

  I realised that I had one foot on his mother’s left hand. Looking around, the moonlight was gone but I thought I saw something crawling over by the edge of the cemetery. I cried out quietly and told myself to run. I ran all the way home in one breath, bursting through the front door. I leaned my back against it, catching my breath, and looked at my watch. Somehow I had made the forty minute journey in just fifteen minutes.

  Just as my friend had said, ‘There are weird things aplenty in the desert. Take your time discovering it!’ Tonight, I’d really had enough.

  Originally published in Woman’s World #3, December 1974

  A Desert Diner

  It’s really too bad my husband is a foreigner. To refer to one’s own husband in this way undoubtedly seems a bit exclusive. But since every country has language and customs completely unlike the next, there are some areas in our conjugal life where it’s impossible to see eye to eye. When I first agreed to marry José, I reminded him that we differed not only in nationality, but also in personality. Perhaps one day we might even argue to the point of physical confrontation. ‘I know you can be moody,’ he replied. ‘But you’ve got a good heart. Fight as we may, let’s get married anyway.’ So we finally tied the knot seven years after we first met.

  I’m not involved in the women’s lib movement, but I wasn’t willing to toss aside my independence and my carefree spirit. I made it extra clear that I would still do things my way after marriage. Otherwise we should scrap the whole idea. ‘All I want is for you to do things your way,’ José told me. ‘If you lost your individuality and flair, I wouldn’t see any point in marrying you!’ Great to hear such things from the big man himself. I was very pleased.

  As the wife of José, I oblige him in terms of language. My poor foreigner, he still can’t tell the difference between the Chinese characters for ‘person’ and ‘enter’ no matter how many times I teach him. I let him off lightly and speak his language instead. (But once we have children, they’ll learn Chinese if it kills them. He’s all in favour of this idea, too.)