City of Sparrows

by Eva Nour

‘Remember, you’re my cousin.’

  They stopped; the soldiers watched them in the distance without moving. The driver rolled down his window and held out a packet of cigarettes.

  ‘Can I offer you boys a cigarette?’ he called out.

  His previously cocksure voice lost its authority in the wind. One of the soldiers, the youngest from the looks of him, left his post and slowly walked over to the car.

  ‘You again,’ the soldier said.

  ‘My cousin needed a ride and you don’t say no to family,’ the Lebanese man said and adjusted his hunting rifle so it was visible in his lap.

  ‘That’s really nice.’

  ‘How about a cigarette?’

  The Lebanese man lit one for the soldier and one for himself, without asking Sami if he wanted one. The young soldier squinted at him with each deep drag and then flicked his ash in his direction.

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘My cousin,’ the Lebanese man repeated.

  ‘I’m not talking to you. What’s your name?’

  ‘Sami.’

  ‘I feel like I’ve seen you before…Have we met?’

  The Lebanese man started coughing and beating his chest; he leaned over the steering wheel, gasping for breath.

  ‘Damn it, my lungs,’ he said with tears in his eyes. ‘Here, want to try it?’

  The soldier took the hunting rifle and looked through the sight. He turned it on the Lebanese man, then aimed it at Sami, caressed the trigger and finally gave it back.

  ‘How much do you want for it?’

  ‘Well, you know what they say, you don’t sell your children.’

  ‘All right, then I’m borrowing it.’

  The Lebanese man pondered the gun, scratched his knee and nodded.

  ‘Sure, no problem. I’ll come through here tomorrow, I’ll pick it up then.’

  The soldier turned his back and waved them on.

  ‘Fucking prick, thieves, the lot of them,’ the Lebanese man muttered after rolling up the windows.

  Then he lit another cigarette; the smoke made Sami’s eyes water.

  * * *

  —

  They pulled over at a petrol station where an SUV with tinted windows was already parked. How could he be sure it wasn’t a trap? That they wouldn’t take his money and hand him over to the regime? Why would he trust regime supporters when they were the ones who had bombed his home, killed his brother and reduced his hometown to famine and darkness? The answer was simple: because he had no choice.

  The car door opened. A gangly man in tracksuit bottoms and flipflops climbed out. Sami’s heart skipped a beat when he recognized him. It was the same man he had paid to arrange this trip. The smuggler shot him a wide smile.

  ‘Jump in,’ he said and took his backpack.

  They turned off on to a smaller road and the Lebanese man followed so they could split the money and the two cartons of Alhamraa cigarettes Sami had brought. Comet tails of dust swirled around the car on the dirt road. The surroundings were the same, yet everything was different. But his chest was intact and the air finally reached his lungs.

  They had crossed the border into Lebanon.

  40

  THE YELLOW FIELDS stretched out in every direction, sandy and dry under the scorching sun. A tractor was moving over by the horizon, in front of the mountains that rose up like a wall towards the blue sky. The tractor moved back and forth, back and forth, as persistent as an ant.

  Sami thought about his own cultivation on the roof in Homs, about the radishes which would have time to develop tender roots now that he wasn’t harvesting them prematurely. He hoped someone else would find his rooftop garden. That someone else would treasure the vegetables and they wouldn’t grow in vain. The thought of the white and pink buds and their fresh bitterness made his mouth water.

  The smuggler should be back soon with food. He lived in a caravan and had invited Sami to stay with him for the first few days before he could move on. The caravan was stuffy but Sami wasn’t allowed to leave it. It’s too dangerous, the smuggler had told him. Hermel wasn’t like the rest of Lebanon; the militant group Hezbollah had soldiers everywhere and were in cahoots with Assad. The truth was Hezbollah had extended its spiderweb to cover all of Lebanon – from being a Shiite militia it had grown into an organization with its own TV and radio channels and seats in the Lebanese parliament, and ran schools and social programmes.

  Hermel was one of its strongholds. The Bekaa Valley was one of Lebanon’s most fertile areas, with fields of star-shaped leaves and the white petals of a certain type of poppy. To put it plainly, it was the ideal place to grow marijuana and opium, which made Hermel, no matter how unassuming the town was otherwise, one of the Middle East’s drug capitals. Hezbollah held the monopoly on trafficking, and they used the profits to buy weapons from Iran, which were then transported via Syria with the blessing of the regime. Everything was connected in a unique ecosystem.

  The view from the caravan was, however, anything but fertile. Sami contemplated disobeying instructions and heading out to scour the surroundings for green plants. Under the present circumstances, it might be a way to alleviate the tedium.

  His boldness was becoming a hazard. Just because he had made it this far didn’t mean he was invincible. It was tiny details that drew the invisible line between life and death. Unexpectedly finding radish seeds. An alcove in a tunnel. A sniper taking a coffee break.

  No, to leave the caravan was to tempt fate. Sami remembered when one of his childhood friends quit his pharmacology studies and fled to Lebanon. He was caught almost immediately at one of Hezbollah’s checkpoints in Hermel and brought back to Syria, where he was imprisoned for terrorist activities. His friend’s crime: helping to smuggle medicine into the besieged parts of Homs. Two weeks later, his dismembered body was delivered to his parents.

  To make matters worse, the Syrian presidential election was under way, which made Hezbollah especially interested in Syrians fleeing across the border. Their fingers were inspected for blue ink smudges from voting. If they were clean, they were driven to voting stations to give their support to Bashar al-Assad.

  Sami startled at a sound. Not the tractor, which was far away, but the roaring of a car engine. He stiffened and scanned the stony road leading to the camp site. The smuggler had told him to hide if there was any sign of military vehicles or police cars. The caravan was too obvious, so his best option – his only option – was the hill behind it.

  But the engine sound faded. Sami locked the door and pulled the curtains shut, curled up on the mattress and tried to slow his breathing. He had been here for almost a week. He wondered if he was becoming paranoid. Had the roar of the engine been real? A hollow sound rose from his stomach and he tried to quell his hunger with water. Then he lay down again and fell asleep.

  Behind his eyelids, Homs’ streets and checkpoints spread out, lifeless sparrows on their backs with their beaks pointed at the sky everywhere. The scene shifted and he was in a prison corridor full of crushed blood oranges. A whistling sound sliced through his dream, from a bomber or a thousand beating wings rising towards the sky, and he threw himself to the floor with his hands clapped to his ears.

  Sami woke – this time, it really was a car engine. He got to his feet and peered out through a gap in the curtains. A military jeep was approaching at high speed. Dashing from the caravan didn’t seem feasible. He would have to climb the hill and be fully visible for several seconds. Even if he got away, they would find a lit stove in the caravan and know there was a person nearby. He would be as hard to catch as a rabbit in a burrow. Yet, at the same time, was the alternative to give up? He’d rather bolt into the unknown.

  Sami threw the door open and ran out with laces untied just as the military jeep turned into the sandy field. A cloud of dust rose around the car; he squinted in the harsh light. He only managed a fe
w steps before he tripped over a detail, which is to say his laces, and felt a jolt of pain in his knee.

  It was over. This was as far as he would get. After all, a person only has so many lives. He waited, on his knees, with his hands in the air, for the rifles to be aimed at him. A couple of words flashed through his mind: it was his grandmother’s voice, chanting away the pain in his broken finger. Chanted verses couldn’t save him now. And yet, he prayed.

  When the dust cloud dissipated he heard footsteps in the sand and hoarse laughter. Then the reproachful voice of the smuggler.

  ‘What are you doing out here? I told you to stay in the caravan.’

  ‘I suppose this made him nervous,’ said the man with the hoarse laugh, patting the bonnet of the jeep. He was dressed in a military uniform. ‘Is this him?’

  ‘Yes,’ said the smuggler. ‘We’re going to have to do something about your appearance before we leave. Those dirty clothes and that unwashed face won’t do.’

  Before we leave. The smuggler had kept his promise and arranged safe passage through the checkpoints to Beirut. When Sami had composed himself and shaken the general’s hand, he realized there was a woman in the driver’s seat.

  ‘Mariam, my wife,’ said the general. ‘They are less inclined to stop you if there’s a woman in the car.’

  She seemed less than happy to be there. The smuggler went into the caravan with Sami and helped him pack. Sami handed over the money and they said goodbye with a brief embrace.

  * * *

  —

  The Lebanese general was friendly and didn’t talk too much, but Sami didn’t have the energy for long conversations anyway. The general told him it was dangerous for him to be here too, among the Hezbollah. His relative had been shot dead in Hermel a couple of years ago. This was only the second time he had been back since.

  Mariam shot Sami hard looks through the rear-view mirror and said as little as possible.

  ‘Suspicion is our biggest enemy,’ the general said.

  He was referring to the Lebanese and Syrian people, who had been sundered into religious and ethnic groups, but also glanced at Mariam, who frowned.

  ‘This is when our trust is tested,’ he continued, ‘when you have no choice but to rely on strangers.’

  It seemed like he was talking more to Mariam than to Sami. But Sami could see where she was coming from. What did she know about his past? He might be a drug trafficker or other kind of criminal. He might have fought for the jihadists, for all she knew. There was more and more talk about Islamic State now, the terror group that was growing in influence in northeastern Syria.

  Sami met Mariam’s eyes in the rear-view mirror and she looked away. He didn’t know anything about her and the general’s reasons for helping him either – other than that favours made people owe you and an extensive network was hard currency in times like these. None of them had any choice. They had to trust each other.

  They were approaching Beirut. The general rolled down the windows and let the fresh Mediterranean breeze sweep in, along with the smell of car exhaust and restaurant food. There were more people than in Homs, more people than Sami had seen in years.

  ‘Where would you like to be dropped off?’

  Sami told him where Muhammed’s cousin lived. Muhammed had made him repeat the address at the time and though it seemed pointless then, Sami now understood. He thought warmly of his childhood friend. Even though he was dead, he was still helping Sami. This is for both of us, Sami thought. I’m finding a way out even if you couldn’t.

  He didn’t know what he had expected Beirut to be like, but the closer to the centre they got, the further down his seat he slid. On the way to the apartment they passed several checkpoints, where soldiers stood with heavy weapons.

  ‘Make yourself at home,’ said Muhammed’s cousin when at last they arrived at the apartment. ‘Stay as long as you need. Muhammed always spoke well of you.’

  They shared the flat with two other Syrians. Sami was given the sofa in the living room. He unpacked his suitcase and slowly, step by tiny step, started to dare to imagine a future. But in Lebanon? He wasn’t so sure. Anywhere he went the checkpoints appeared, and with them came the threat of being sent back. He wouldn’t be free here either.

  41

  THREE HOT SUMMER months passed during which Sami mostly slept and stayed indoors. He only went out to buy food, or to go to a café across the street that was showing the World Cup. He followed the tournament without any commitment to players or country. It was just pleasant to witness the ball’s journey across the field, listen to the audience’s cheers and sighs, see the winners stretch their arms to the air and think that life didn’t have to be more complicated than that.

  Outside the apartment in Beirut, the sea raged and the waves crashed against the cliffs, but he went down to the beach only once for a quick swim. He folded his clothes, placed a rock on top of them and walked into the surge.

  He enjoyed the wind and salt on his face, the frothy waves rising towards the sun. He threw himself into the water, stood up and dived back under. Underneath the surface, he opened his eyes and picked up stones and shells from among the metal and plastic on the bottom. Afterwards his eyes were red from the salt.

  The water brought back a feeling he had forgotten: the feeling of weightlessness. He soared free in the deep blue. He was part of the sea and the sea was part of him.

  * * *

  —

  It was after his short outing to the beach that Sami realized he had to leave Beirut. He couldn’t stay cooped up in the flat for ever. His money wouldn’t last long and in Beirut he couldn’t work, study or lead a normal life. Even if he wasn’t stopped at a checkpoint, a lot of Lebanese people looked askance at the Syrian refugees streaming across the border. Every third person in Lebanon was a refugee, primarily Palestinian and Syrian. They needed medical care, food and work and the poorest of them lived in enormous refugee camps on the outskirts of the cities. In many cases, they were people from the Syrian countryside, farmers and uneducated people, families with many children and elderly relatives, who couldn’t raise the money to go any further. He had heard about Syrians being attacked for no other reason than that they were refugees.

  With the help of a friend, Sami managed to get from Beirut to Tripoli in northern Lebanon. Again he travelled through the checkpoints with a military escort who called him his cousin, his nephew, his future brother-in-law – he didn’t know any more. Except nameless and paperless, that was who he was.

  Tripoli was a port city at the foot of Mount Lebanon. Calling it a safe place was an exaggeration but it was still easier to live there, farther from the Hezbollah. At least while he looked into the possibility of seeking asylum in another country.

  Something about Tripoli reminded him of Homs. The two cities were roughly the same size, majority Sunni and had similar senses of humour. He missed his hometown, but he realized he had left in the nick of time. A couple of weeks after he crossed the six-lane motorway in the moonlight, the regime forces had reclaimed the city centre. He still hadn’t heard from many of his friends that were left behind.

  * * *

  —

  ‘You need to get out more,’ said Muhammed’s cousin. ‘Working will take your mind off things.’

  ‘But what work could I do?’

  ‘Any work. You’ll go crazy otherwise.’

  He was right, of course. So during his autumn in Lebanon, Sami volunteered for an aid organization working in the refugee camps. The organization arranged activities and offered psychological support to women and children. Once a week he took photographs to document life in the camps.

  The first time he went he had to stop for a minute to take in what he saw: the blue and white windswept tents, spreading out in their thousands. The camp was like a city, with streets and trade going on in some of the tents, and families doing what they cou
ld to gain a sense of privacy and regular everyday life.

  That was where he met Leyla again. He knew she was working in one of the camps and asked if he could accompany her one day. He recognized her just from the way she walked, and when they embraced each other, neither of them wanted to let go.

  ‘Hey, little brother,’ she said and ruffled his hair. ‘I’ve never seen it this long before.’

  ‘The fresh saltwater winds do it good.’

  ‘Looks like it.’

  She had cut her hair short and her features seemed softer, her cheekbones less accentuated. Oddly enough, it was easier to reunite with Leyla than with his parents or with Sarah. Leyla and he had been through so much together. They understood each other without having to explain.

  ‘How did you get out?’ Sami asked.

  ‘The same way you did, I assume.’

  Like him, she preferred not to talk about herself. It was a way of avoiding having to feel. Instead, she told him about the activities in the camp.

  The children painted to keep themselves busy and have fun, but also as a way of dealing with traumatic experiences. The drawings were of stickmen with weapons and aeroplanes dropping pinhead-sized bombs. The children weren’t sad while they were drawing, which made Sami even more sad. Many of them had no memories of life before the war.

  There was painting for adults, too. Most didn’t want their picture taken or to talk about their experiences when Sami was around. But Leyla looked them in the eyes and made them relax, and some seemed to almost forget his presence.

  ‘You can’t take my picture,’ said one woman. ‘But I’ll tell you my story.’

  Then the woman turned to Leyla and began to speak. Her name was Nadine and she was from Daraa. She had joined the protests during the first few days, together with her neighbour Rasha. When people were shot, she went to the hospitals and helped wherever she could. She had no medical training but in time learnt to extract bullets and put on bandages. Soldiers visited her family home and asked: where is Nadine? And her family answered: she’s not here. They came again and asked: where is Nadine? And her family cried and answered: she’s not here.