It was hard for me to get used to my new country. I tried to focus narrowly on the people I loved there, but the aspects of Kuwait that they brought with them let me down. My father’s death left me adrift. Ghassan’s betrayal disappointed me. Grandmother and her incomplete love. Awatif’s weakness, rejection by Nouriya, Hind’s silence and my sister’s fatalistic attitude. How could I approach a country which had so many faces if, whenever I approached any one of them, it looked away?
My spacious flat seemed cramped. Talking to the dumb tortoise grew boring. I put on a coat to keep out the cold and set off headlong into the outside world. In the corridor outside my flat I waited for the lift. The lift door opened and a young Filipino who lived in the flat next door was there, carrying some plastic bags, some of them under his arms and some clutched to his chest. His face was barely visible behind them. ‘Hi, are you the new tenant?’ he asked. I nodded. ‘Before you go, please,’ he said with a laugh, ‘could you get my keys out of my coat pocket?’ I put my hand into the pocket and gave him the keys. ‘Could you open the door please?’ he said with a smile. I turned the key in the lock and pushed the door open. The man went in, leaving me at the door. He disappeared into one of the other rooms while I stood there, looking around the small sitting room. It had soft lighting, wallpaper on the wall, boxes of pastries, soft drinks and the smell of cooking. In one of the corners near the window there was a Christmas tree and a big sign above it saying Happy New Year 2007. ‘What are your plans for this evening?’ the man asked from inside one of the rooms.
‘Nothing,’ I said.
He stuck his head out from one of the rooms. ‘You can come over and spend the evening with us,’ he said. ‘We’ll meet at ten.’
I accepted his invitation and my heart jumped for joy. I said goodbye, on the understanding that we’d meet again at ten.
I hung about in the street. It was about eight o’clock in the evening and bitterly cold. I looked around and then broke off three or four small green leaves. No one had noticed me. I closed my fist on them and crumbled them up between my fingers and thumb until I could feel the sticky sap on the palm of my hand. I brought my hand to my nose, closed my eyes and took a deep breath that filled my lungs with the smell. I opened my hand and the green leaves were still there. I had a close look. Mendoza’s piece of land, the four houses, Whitey the dog, the cocks and the frogs were all there on my trembling palm, fenced in by the bamboo plants. That alone got rid of half the homesickness I had felt in my seclusion. I needed to do something else to cure the rest of it. I looked around. There was a bus stop not far off, but there were some boys there. I waited till they had finished their senseless ritual: they were standing on the pavement by the roadway with stones ready in their hands, waiting to throw the stones at buses as they went past. Buses did go past: some stopped and others went past the bus stop without stopping. The boys kept trying until one of them had a good hit. The windscreen of the bus shattered and the boys took to their legs, disappearing down dark, narrow alleyways.
When the coast was clear, I hurried to the bus stop. There was a blue pole sticking out of the pavement. At the top there was a white metal sign with the logo of the bus company. I leaned against the pole as I waited for the bus. It didn’t matter what number bus it was. I didn’t need to know the destination. The only thing about the bus that mattered was the filthy black smoke that its engine would spew into the air around me. That would cure my homesickness. I closed my eyes and leaned back against the post. One bus after another went past. The thick black diesel exhaust rose in the air. I filled my lungs with it. I could smell the streets of Manila. A bus went past leaving a cloud of black smoke and punching holes in the ozone layer. One of the holes fell from the sky and landed on the ground. From the hole came the noise of car engines and horns. The sound of people speaking in Filipino and English. I stuck my head into the hole. Jeepneys and motor tricycles jostled for space in the street. Buses, trucks and motorbikes. Rain fell on the streets with all the might the clouds could muster. The smell of diesel vanished. The noises receded into the distance. The image of Manila faded, the hole shrank, and there I was – in a Jabriya street, leaning against a post, free of the homesickness I had felt a few moments earlier.
4
I spent New Year’s Eve in the flat next door. Just before midnight, everyone began to count down: ‘Ten, nine, eight . . . three, two, one.’
The sky outside filled with fireworks and lights and noise. Car horns playing various tunes sang for joy. In the room, coloured paper streamers flew through the air. They sang in English and Filipino. People started the new year by wishing each other a Happy New Year and making resolutions to themselves that they hoped to keep. The flat where they had the party was a piece of my mother’s country: the faces, the language, the clapping and singing, the pictures on the television screen, the plates of adobo and white rice, the pastries, the sweets and glasses of home-made alcohol, the topics of conversation and the wishes, the friendly atmosphere . . . and the smell.
There were about twenty of us. The faces varied but they were all Filipino. Their interests differed too but they were all Filipino. Although the flat was in Kuwait, it was Filipino. A bald man in his forties, as soon as the alcohol took effect, started talking about how much he missed his wife and children. A young man with his baseball cap facing backwards asked us to sing along with him for his girlfriend, who was listening to us on the telephone. A girlish young man in a tight short-sleeved shirt and shorts showed off his legs as he pranced around to our songs in a way that made people laugh. A man with a camera wouldn’t stop taking pictures. One man drank reluctantly, cursing the state of affairs that forced him to work in Kuwait and complaining with every sip that he missed the taste of Red Horse, Heineken, Budweiser and the other beers he was used to. Some of them stuffed themselves with food. Others spent the time watching silent images on the television screen. Others formed small circles, sharing food, drink and conversation.
I moved over to the window overlooking the street with a drink in my hand. I watched the young men in the car park outside the building. They were getting out of their cars and coming to the door of the building alone or in small groups. One of them was with a friend, another with a woman. They looked around warily, like thieves preparing for their first burglary. The others noticed I was standing apart and came over to join me. They looked out of the window like me. One of them made fun of the young Kuwaitis. The guy with the baseball cap laughed and kept making jokes about people in Kuwait. The man who had been complaining knocked back the rest of his drink in one swig and spoke angrily about Kuwaitis, saying derogatory things about them. I remembered my father and imagined his remains, draped with the Kuwaiti flag and carried on his friends’ shoulders. ‘They’re arrogant,’ said the bald man. The glass shook in my hand. ‘But the young men here are sexy,’ said the effeminate one, licking his lips. Some of them burst out laughing. The man with the camera defended the Kuwaitis: ‘I’ve been working with them for years. They’re decent people, open-minded compared with people in other countries I’ve worked in.’ The grumbler objected: ‘I worked in Bahrain and the people there don’t make us feel they’re better than us.’ The man in the cap laughed and winked at his friend. ‘And you can buy a drink there too,’ he said. The grumbler got upset and waved his hand dismissively. ‘They’re useless,’ he said.
Listening to them, I felt torn between Kuwait and the Philippines. I hardly knew myself. Ibrahim didn’t think of Kuwaitis in this way. He had never told me all this. ‘All they have is money,’ said the grumbler. The man with the camera pointed at him and said, ‘What makes you angry is that Kuwaitis are really lucky to be born Kuwaiti, and you resent their good fortune.’ ‘Bullshit,’ the grumbler replied angrily. The bald man, the oldest person present, intervened. ‘That’s enough. Happy New Year, Happy New Year,’ he said. The man with the camera ignored the interruption and continued his conversation with the grumbler, who poured more drink into his glass. ‘I
have lots of friends here and they’re not the way you portray them,’ he said. The effeminate man agreed and made an obscene gesture. ‘I have lots of friends too,’ he added.
I downed the rest of my drink and asked for more. Their criticism of Kuwaitis rang in my ears. I thought of my father, Khawla, Hind and Grandmother. The group went on talking a long time. Others joined them and some moved away. I turned to the grumbler and said, ‘Go back to the Philippines if you don’t like it here.’ He looked at me disapprovingly and said, ‘Are you happy to stay here?’ Since I couldn’t work out how to answer, I had to leave the party. I thanked the host and left, rather the worse for wear, thinking about what the man with the camera had said about Kuwaitis being lucky to be born Kuwaiti.
Outside the flat, three young men were waiting for the lift. The landing rang with their laughter. Apparently they had just finished their own party. ‘As-salam aleekum,’ I said as I walked past them.
Making fun of my accent, the man in the middle answered me like Grandmother’s parrot: ‘Salamuuu alekooom.’ With his index fingers, he stretched his eyes into slits, mocking my Filipino features. They burst out laughing. He then made fun of me by greeting me in Filipino: ‘Kumusta ka.’ I don’t know why, but I felt insulted. They started talking to each other in Arabic and roaring with laughter.
I opened the door of my flat. I now felt an urge to insult these people, though I had been angry when the Filipinos at the party next door had maligned them. I glowered at the one who had made fun of my greeting. ‘Sira ulo,’ I said without thinking – Filipino for ‘crazy head’ or ‘idiot’. They looked at each other in puzzlement. Damn! Even my insult took me back to my mother’s country.
I remembered another word. I said it to myself first to make sure I had it straight. Then I pointed at the man in the middle and let it out. ‘Himara!’ I said.
I slammed the door behind me, grateful to Grandmother’s parrot.
5
Kuwait, one year on.
I started playing with the idea of going back to the Philippines and visiting the family house. Although she missed me, my mother was against the idea and implored me to stay in Kuwait longer. I didn’t know whether she was asking me to stay for my own sake or for the sake of the family, which was better off because of the money I was sending them. I gave up the idea of making the journey, not in deference to my mother’s wishes, but because I was sure that if I went home before I had established roots in Kuwait, I would never come back.
Ibrahim promised to help me get a job. I had declined to join him and his friends in their missionary activities because I didn’t know enough about it and I wasn’t ready for things like that. I had only just begun to explore my relationship with God and how comfortable I was with that relationship.
Ibrahim was a nice guy but very simple. He proved to be a loyal friend. Whenever I asked him for anything he was quick to help me. He called me brother and when I asked him why, he said, ‘A Muslim is brother to all other Muslims.’ I was grateful for the way he felt towards me. I never told him I wasn’t yet sure that I was Muslim because I was still feeling my way, but if I did become a Muslim he would definitely have been one of the reasons for my decision. There were three things that I discovered through Ibrahim and that made me sympathetic to Islam and taught me more about it: the film The Message, a book called The Sealed Nectar, a biography of the Prophet, and the fact that Ibrahim treated me well and took an interest in me.
Although the cars are one of the most striking aspects of Kuwait and I could have bought a modest one, I made do with a bicycle, which I bought with Ibrahim’s help. I used to ride it around the neighbourhood and nearby areas. It was a smart black bike. I attached a Kuwaiti flag to the back of it. Although I had seen the flag everywhere – on my first day in Kuwait, when I saw it at half mast near the airport, in people’s hands at the National Day celebrations in February, and flying in various sizes from people’s cars – it didn’t mean anything to me until I saw it covering the remains of that Kuwaiti poet and Ghassan told me that my father’s remains had been covered with the Kuwaiti flag in the same way. After that the Kuwaiti flag had special meaning for me and stirred something inside me.
After I bought the bike I could say goodbye to taxis and their extortionate fares. I could cruise the streets at will and sometimes I couldn’t believe how far I had ridden on my bike. It was extremely hard work but any effort I made to ride my bike was better than sitting in a bus seat, scanning the streets through the window, and leaning forward and putting my head between my knees whenever I caught sight of boys standing on the pavement, braced for the fragments of glass that might land on the terrified passengers if a stone hit a window.
On my first outing on my bike I went to Qortuba, crossing the bridge that connects Jabriya to al-Surra, and then crossing Damascus Street. I rode my bike parallel to the pedestrian street in Qortuba. I was horrified at what I saw near my favourite spot in the narrow lane near the main street, the spot where I used to sit that was full of trees. In the dusty area behind I saw an enormous truck in a chain-link enclosure with barbed wire at the top. It was a flatbed truck with many wheels and it was carrying a large container with a long metal pole sticking out through the roof. Without much thought and without needing to guess I realised that what was going up before my eyes was a mobile phone relay tower. The similarity between this tower and the one that took up a corner of Mendoza’s land left no room for doubt. Strange that the two of them should have gone up in places that I loved.
From that day on I never went near the pedestrian street.
* * *
Apart from its basic function, food was a way of passing the time. If I felt bored, as I often did, I would amuse myself by working in the kitchen.
Life was simple compared with the life of my family in the Philippines. I had a kitchen that was fully equipped with the latest appliances and gadgets without me having to borrow a cent from the greedy Indian moneylenders as my family had done when they were poor, when they had to wait years before buying their next appliance. When I opened the fridge I remembered the story about the time when a fridge first arrived in our house in the Philippines. When I turned on the stove I didn’t calculate the time as Mama Aida did. I watched the small blue and yellow tongues of fire around the metal ring. Sometimes I lit the stove when I didn’t need it. I just enjoyed watching the gas burn. A large cylinder of gas didn’t cost more than three quarters of a dinar. If it ran out, I didn’t have to cook the food by burning wood in the courtyard like Mama Aida. She did that because a cylinder of gas cost more than six dinars in the Philippines, and that was a cylinder half the size of a cylinder in Kuwait. I enjoyed lighting the stove because I felt I was getting revenge on behalf of Aida.
One evening I called a taxi to go to the gas depot near the central market to change an empty cylinder. One of the streets in Jabriya was severely congested. Jabriya is always crowded. But congestion like this, with cars hardly able to move, only happened if there was an accident or a checkpoint. As I expected, at the end of the street there were police cars with lights flashing blue and red. The police were standing by the side of the road checking driving licences and car papers. The taxi driver opened his window and handed his papers to the policeman. The policeman examined them and before handing them back to the driver he asked me for my identity card. I stuck my hand in my trouser pocket but my wallet wasn’t there. I panicked. I pointed back down the street and said, ‘It’s in the flat.’
He didn’t understand me. ‘Iqama, iqama,’ he demanded in Arabic, meaning he wanted proof that I was a legal resident in Kuwait.
Because I’m Kuwaiti and don’t need a residence permit, I said, ‘No iqama.’. Apparently I failed to explain myself. He told me to get out of the taxi. I tried to explain to him but he was shouting at me so rudely that I couldn’t say anything. I took out my mobile phone to call my aunt Hind. I don’t know why her in particular, but she didn’t answer my call anyway. I sent a text message to Khawla, s
aying, The police are detaining me. The policeman pushed me from behind and suddenly I found myself in a van parked on the kerb, packed with migrants who didn’t have identity papers or valid visas. There were Arabs, Indians, Filipinos and Bangladeshis, and me – a Kuwaiti who didn’t look like other Kuwaitis.
The van set off. Some people look frightened and others indifferent. ‘The worst that can happen is we’ll be deported,’ someone said. I told the policeman standing by the van door that I was Kuwaiti. I don’t think he heard what I said. He pointed to the seats at the back and spat out some words I didn’t understand. Terrified, I went back to my seat.
A stunningly beautiful young Filipina who was sitting close by turned to me and said, ‘The weekend starts today so we’ll have to stay in the cells at the police station till the officer comes after the weekend.’
I opened my eyes wide. ‘But I’m Kuwaiti. I don’t need a visa,’ I said.
She smiled. ‘You’ll have to prove that, after you’ve spent some time in detention,’ she said. An older Filipina woman was crying and the young Filipina turned to her.
‘I’ve been working in Kuwait without a valid residence for months after running away from my employer’s house. I have a family that will die if I’m deported,’ said the older woman.
‘If it’s that serious . . .’ said the younger woman. She paused a moment. ‘. . . then you’ll have to make some concessions.’
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