Stories of the Sahara

by Sanmao

  ‘What’s this for?’

  ‘New clothes for you. Your trousers are faded, your shirt collars are ruined and your socks have holes in them. You also need a decent pair of shoes.’

  ‘I don’t want anything. Let’s fix up the home first, then you can fix me up. Who needs new clothes in the desert?’ And he insisted on continuing to wear his ragged shoes to work.

  I stacked concrete blocks on the right-hand side of our bedroom and put coffin boards on top. Then I bought two thick sponge mats, placing one of them upright against the wall, the other horizontal on the boards. I covered the whole thing with a colourful striped cloth to match the window curtains and sewed it up tightly from the back. It was now a proper sofa. The dark colours were exceptionally beautiful and bright against the snowy white walls.

  As for the table, I threw a white cloth over it along with a fine bamboo curtain that my mother had sent. My loving mother had gone so far as to send me the lampshade made of Chinese cotton and paper that I’d wanted. I also received a clay tea set, while my beloved friend Lin Funan sent me a big bundle of contemporary prints and Mr Ping airmailed me a large trunk full of books. Whenever my father encountered any bizarre posters on the way home from work, he’d also buy them for me. My older sister contributed clothes, while my younger brothers were the snazziest of all, sending a kimono-like bathrobe for José. When he wore it, he looked like Toshiro Mifune – one of my very favourite actors.

  Once we hung up my mother’s cotton paper lantern alongside the flamboyant calligraphy of Lin Hwai-min’s Cloud Gate Dance Theatre, its black background with white characters emblazoned on the wall, our home began to boast an ineffable ambience and mood.

  This was just the kind of home that could inspire you to strive for better.

  While José was at work, I stained the bookshelf a dark brown with some kind of varnish, I’m not quite sure what it’s called in Chinese. The shelf immediately seemed much sturdier than before.

  I often self-analysed. It is truly difficult to extricate oneself from the station in life into which one is born. My home, if a Sahrawi were to look at it, was filled with things I did not need, but I, on the other hand, couldn’t free myself from these shackles. I needed to make everything within these four walls as complex as before. Slowly, I made my way back to the past me, which essentially means I was once more awhirl with sentimentality.

  Whenever José went off to work, I would go to the landfill across from our home to pick up scraps. I brought back and cleaned up an old car tyre. Setting it on the mat, I stuffed a red cloth cushion inside so it became like a bird’s nest. Everyone vied for this seat in the house.

  I retrieved a large glass bottle of deep green and stuck a bloom of wild thorns in it, lending it a feeling of poetic bitterness. I bought a small can of paint to slather Native American-inspired patterns and colours onto various bottles. A camel skull had long been set on the bookshelf. I nagged José to make a lantern out of some iron sheets and glass. I found a nearly putrid sheepskin and, taking a lesson from the Sahrawi, salted it and dyed it with potassium alum. It also became a cushion.

  Christmas came. We left the desert for Madrid to visit José’s parents and returned with all of José’s books from grade school upwards. Our little home in the desert had a scholarly whiff from that day forward.

  I found the desert to be truly charming. On the other hand, the desert didn’t care a jot for me.

  Poor civilised peoples of the world! No getting rid of all our useless belongings.

  ‘This home is still lacking plants,’ I said to José one evening. ‘No greenery whatsoever.’

  ‘It’s not just plants we’re lacking. We’ll never be satisfied.’

  ‘No, so that’s why we have to scavenge where we can.’

  That night, we crept over the low wall outside the governor’s house and desperately uprooted some of his flowers with our bare hands.

  ‘Quick, put them in the plastic bag. Hurry and get that climbing vine, too.’

  ‘God, how did this root grow so damn deep?’

  ‘We also need some soil. Throw in some clods.’

  ‘This should be enough!’ José whispered. ‘We have three plants already.’

  ‘I just want one more,’ I said, still digging. ‘Just one more and we’ll be all set.’

  Suddenly I noticed that the guard in front of the governor’s house was making his way over. Startled out of my wits, I shoved the big plastic bag against José’s chest. ‘Hold me!’ I ordered. ‘Hold me tight. Kiss me hard. The wolf is coming. Quickly!’

  José grabbed hold of me, pressing those poor flowers between us.

  Sure enough, the guard came closer in quick strides, ammunition rattling against his chest. ‘What’s going on here? Two of you sneaking about?’

  ‘I. . . We. . .’

  ‘Get out of here. This is no place for you two to speak sweet nothings.’

  We held each other tight and walked towards the low wall. God, it would be great if we could make it out without losing the flowers we’d stolen.

  ‘Hey, go out through the front!’ the guard barked. ‘Quick!’

  So we slowly escaped, holding each other. I even gave a slight bow to the guard. When I told this story to the old commander of the Legión Española, he had himself a good long laugh.

  I still wasn’t fully content with our home. A place without music was like a Chinese landscape painting without a stream or waterfall. To save money for a tape player, I went on foot to buy vegetables at the Legión Española’s faraway canteen. I felt extremely awkward the first time I went. I wasn’t like the other wives, who barrelled their way through snatching up goods. I waited in line in an orderly fashion. It took me four hours to buy a basket of vegetables, but the price was one third of what it would be at a typical grocery store.

  Eventually I was going there all the time. The soldiers saw how well-mannered I was and felt aggrieved on my behalf. They even gave me a bit of preferential treatment. As soon as I approached the counter, before I even managed to squeeze my way in there, they would openly call out to me over the swarm of big fat rude women: ‘What’ll it be today?’

  I’d hand them my grocery list and, after a while, they’d have it all ready in a box around the back. I’d pay up and head out to call a taxi. Before the car even pulled up, there’d be a strapping fellow in soldier’s garb carrying the box and putting it in the car for me. I’d be home in less than half an hour. There were all sorts of military personnel stationed here, but I only cared for the Legión Española. (These were the desert corps I mentioned before.)

  They were very masculine and hard-working, respectful of certain women who deserved respect. They knew how to wage war, but they also knew elegance. Every Sunday at dusk, the Legión Española’s orchestra would perform in the municipal government plaza, playing classics like The Magic Flute, Night on Bald Mountain and Boléro, all the way up to a finale with The Merry Widow.

  I saved for a tape player and cassettes by going to the soldiers’ canteen. A television and washing machine, on the other hand, never held any appeal for me.

  We started saving again. Our next major purchase was going to be a car. Nowadays you can buy one on credit, but José didn’t want to be a modern man. He needed to pay it off all at once. So I had no choice but to keep walking and wait to revisit this matter in a few months.

  The only shortcut I could take going into town was through two Sahrawi graveyards. Their burial method entails wrapping the body in cloth and setting it in a sandpit, then covering it with an assortment of rocks.

  One day, I was weaving past these rock piles as usual, careful not to step on the bodies in eternal slumber and disturb their peace, when I noticed an extremely old Sahrawi man sitting nearby. Curious to see what he was doing, I made my way over and discovered that he was carving stone.

  Heavens! At his feet were piled nearly twenty statuettes made of stone. There were busts, birds, children, spreadeagled nude women with half of a baby
coming out of their private parts. In addition, he’d sculpted all sorts of animals, antelope, camels… I nearly fainted from the shock. ‘Great artist, do you sell these things?’ I asked, kneeling down.

  I reached out to pick up a face. I couldn’t believe my eyes, moved by the rough, natural look of his work. I needed to have it right away.

  The old man looked up at me, dazed. Something about his expression made him seem a little crazy. I picked up three of his sculptures and gave him 1,000 pesetas. I made off in a rush towards home, having forgotten all about my errand in town. Suddenly he cried out hoarsely, stumbling after me. I held the stones close, unwilling to surrender them.

  Once he caught up with me, he started dragging me back.

  ‘Is it not enough?’ I asked frantically. ‘I don’t have any more cash on me, but I can get you some. . .’

  He couldn’t speak. He just bent down, put two more bird statuettes into my hands and let me go on my way.

  I didn’t have lunch that day. I lay about on the ground playing with the artwork of this great nameless man. Words can’t express the emotions that were stirring in my heart.

  When my Sahrawi neighbours found out I’d spent 1,000 pesetas on these things, they laughed themselves to the brink of death. They thought I was an idiot. I thought it was just a matter of different cultural levels, which made it impossible for us to communicate. To me, these were priceless treasures!

  José gave me 2,000 pesetas the next day. I went to the cemetery but didn’t find the old man there. The scorching sun lit up the empty graveyard. Apart from the yellow sand and piles of rocks, there was nothing there. It was as if a spirit had given the five sculptures to me as a memento. I was overwhelmed with gratitude.

  José patched up the big square hole in our roof not long after.

  To our home, we added a sheepskin drum, a sheepskin water bag, leather bellows, a hookah, a colourful bedspread handwoven by the people of the desert and oddly shaped rocks formed by sandstorms – the locals call them desert roses.

  The magazines we ordered began arriving one after the other. Apart from Spanish and Chinese publications, we didn’t neglect to include National Geographic, of course.

  One year later, and our home had become a real palace of the arts.

  Whenever our single friends had spare holiday, they had no qualms about coming out all this distance to hang out with us for a whole day. For these people without family, I always found a way to serve them lots of fresh fruit and vegetables and whip up sweet and sour ribs. As such, José made some beloved friends who were steadfast in their loyalty and devotion to us.

  Our friends didn’t just eat and run. Whenever somebody’s mother sent jamón and sausage from faraway Spain, they’d always make sure José had some to bring home to me after work. They were all very kind-hearted people.

  One weekend, José unexpectedly came home with a bundle of precious and valuable bird of paradise plants. I took the flowers into my arms very slowly, afraid that the stunning red birds would fly back to paradise if my movements were too rough.

  ‘Manolín sent these to you.’

  They were a gift more valuable than gold.

  Every weekend after, there were more and more birds of paradise blooming and burning themselves in a corner against the wall. José was given them all to bring back home.

  By and large, José’s books were about the wilderness, the ocean and astronomy. He didn’t like investigating questions about human nature. He would still read books about this, but he always said that life shouldn’t be analysed by appearances.

  So he showed great care with the birds of paradise, changing their water, adding aspirin, cutting the stalks that were gradually rotting. As for Manolín’s intentions, he didn’t worry too much about him. Once the burning firebirds entered our home, Manolín refused to come over any more.

  While José went off to work in the mines one day, I went to the office to dial Manolín on a local extension. I told him I wanted to meet him alone. When he came, I gave him a cold soda water and looked at him very seriously. ‘Just say it! You’ll feel much better.’

  ‘I. . . I. . . You still don’t get it?’ He held his head in his hands, looking extremely depressed.

  ‘I had a feeling before. Now I see. Manolín, my good friend, lift your head up!’

  ‘I’m not attempting anything. I’m not holding on to the faintest hope. Please don’t blame me.’

  ‘No more flowers, alright? I can’t take it any more.’

  ‘Fine. I’ll go. Please understand. I apologise most sincerely to you, and also José. I—’

  ‘Pico,’ (I called him by his surname), ‘you didn’t trespass on me. You gave a woman great praise and encouragement. There’s no need for you to ask for my forgiveness—’

  ‘I won’t trouble you any more. Goodbye.’ His voice was so quiet it sounded like silent tears.

  José didn’t know that Manolín had come over by himself.

  A week later, he came home from work with a big cardboard box of books. ‘Manolín sure is strange,’ he said. ‘He just quit out of the blue. They wanted to keep him on until the end of the month, but he refused. He wanted us to have all these books.’

  I picked up a book at random and, lo and behold, found it was called En Asia se muere bajo las estrellas.

  I felt a sudden pang of loss in my heart.

  After this, whenever our single friends came over, I always became very conscious of my words and deeds. The housewife holed up in the kitchen took the place of the main actor of the past, who had been all too eager to squeeze in and chat up a storm in their midst.

  Our home was now comfortably appointed, clean and pleasant. The free girls’ school I ran went on a long holiday.

  I had been teaching the local women for nearly a year, but they weren’t focused when it came to learning numbers. They didn’t care about hygiene, either, or understanding finances. Every day when they came, they would want to try on my clothes and shoes, or my lipstick, eyebrow pencil and hand lotion, or else they’d just pile onto my bed. I’d bought a bed frame by this point, which was such a novelty for these women who slept on mats on the floor.

  My orderly house was thrown into massive disarray whenever they came. They couldn’t read, but they knew more about Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and other famous people than even I did. They also recognised Bruce Lee and were very familiar with the sexiest Spanish actors and actresses. When they found a photo they liked in a magazine, they’d simply rip it out. They’d wrap themselves up with my clothes on underneath and walk off without telling me, only to return the pieces all dishevelled several days later, with the buttons cut off.

  When they came, the house became the set of a disaster movie that they directed and starred in themselves. No need to write a script. A thriller for your viewing pleasure. After José bought a television, I didn’t open the door for them no matter how hard they knocked or how much they cursed us. The television, when we had electricity, was our most direct link to the great big outside world. But I still wasn’t particularly interested in watching it.

  I handwashed our bedsheets innumerable times before José brought back a tiny washing machine. I still wasn’t satisfied. I wanted a white car, like the one in the colour ads.

  I got to know many of the European housewives in town back then.

  I was never one for calling upon others much, but I hit it off with the middle-aged wife of one of José’s supervisors. She offered to teach me how to mend clothes. I grudgingly paid her a visit every once in a while in the apartments reserved for senior staff.

  One day, I brought her a dress to ask for her help with its sleeves, which were giving me trouble. She happened to have a bevy of ladies in her home at the time.

  At first they were all polite to me because I had higher academic qualifications than them. (What philistines. What can an education tell you about a person? What use is a degree?) But then one of those airheads asked me, ‘Where do you live? We’ll come and visi
t you next time.’

  ‘José is entry level staff,’ I replied very casually. ‘Not a director. We don’t have assigned housing.’

  ‘We can still come and find you! You can teach us English. What street do you live on?’

  ‘I live outside of town in the Cemetery District,’ I said.

  An awkward hush fell upon the room.

  The good-hearted wife of José’s supervisor seemed pro­tective of me. ‘Her home is really stylishly decorated,’ she said to them. ‘I never thought that she could transform a house rented from a Sahrawi into something so beautiful, like in a magazine.’

  ‘Never been there, haha,’ said another one of the house­wives. ‘I’d be afraid of catching a disease.’

  I have pretty healthy self-esteem, but their words still hit a sore spot. ‘In my view, coming to the desert and not having to face any material hardship is your own loss,’ I said slowly. ‘An experience you’re missing out on.’

  ‘Desert? Forget about it. You can’t even tell this is the desert, living in these kinds of apartments. Oh, you! It’s too bad you don’t move into town. Rubbing shoulders with those Sahrawi, tsk tsk…’

  When I said goodbye and left, the supervisor’s wife came after me. ‘Come back again!’ she said softly. ‘You must come!’

  I smiled and nodded, then went downstairs and headed swiftly to my sweet white home. I resolved to never move into town.

  This land became a hotbed of turmoil when Morocco and Mauritania both laid claim to the Western Sahara. Reporters from all over arrived with their heaps of photographic equipment.

  They all stayed in the Hotel Nacional, a place that I didn’t frequent for obvious reasons. By then we’d bought a car (my white stallion) and had even less of a reason to stick around town during our time off.

  It just so happened that we were driving back to town one day and, more than fifty kilometres out, saw someone waving on the road. We pulled over immediately to see what had happened. It turned out this person’s car had completely sunk into soft sand and he needed assistance.