We went out into the yard, and I was invited to sit at a small table in the center of the garden. The Engineer poured me a glass of homemade wine.
According to The Engineer, since the local vines grow seven hundred meters above sea level, they have unique characteristics that give the wine its special, refined taste.
I told The Engineer I was a journalist, and I also spoke about my friendship with Kalman and the strange terror attack.
After that, we reached the purpose for which I had come: a newspaper interview. By virtue of where we were sitting, I began the interview with questions about Israeli architecture. First of all, The Engineer claimed, there was no such thing as Israeli architecture, but rather, only a collection of imitations of several famous international architects popular among the younger generation.
The topic of conversation soon broadened, and The Engineer began to make some harsh claims against architecture in general. He forcefully claimed that, in fact, the construction sector had not made any essential technological change since the times of the pharaohs and ancient Greece.
“Think about it,” he said. “The industrial revolution, which changed the nature of technology in every sector, simply passed over the construction industry. Take, for example, a car or a plane. The level of technology and design in vehicles has progressed in huge strides. But in construction—look how primitively we live. For example, if we compare the door of your car with the door of your house, we will see a simple door made by a carpenter, even more basic than the door of pharaohs in Egypt thousands of years ago. But if you look at your car door, you’ll see a high level of technology and design, as it resists air pressure and includes speakers, electric windows, computerized locks...”
I had definitely touched on his favorite subject.
“The absurd thing is,” he continued, “the cost of one square meter of your house is far greater than the cost of a square meter of your car.”
When I innocently asked how to mass produce houses, he answered me enthusiastically that forty years before, he sent the idea to a competition in Japan.
“Imagine a kind of pillar looking down from a great height. On its topmost extremity, there is a crane, and along its length, there are kinds of plugs that follow international standards and provide everything—water, electricity, air conditioning, drainage points, and so forth. Connected to these plugs, via the crane, are cubes that are like storage containers. In this way, this pillar is essentially like a large corn husk. Each ear, each cube or storage container, is created by a different manufacturer and has a specific function—kitchen, bedroom, bathrooms, living room. Of course, your financial capabilities dictate the number of these units that will make up your home.”
“That really is an amazing idea!” I admitted in all honesty.
“Imagine,” The Engineer took his theory a step further, “one day, something in the kitchen that was manufactured by a particular company specializing in mass, sophisticated production gets broken. The crane takes it down, and in its place, it installs a kitchen you purchased from a different company. Imagine, also, for example, you go on a trip, but you really like your bed and your clothes. You can take down your bedroom and connect it to your car so it can be towed, and then you can drive to a hotel that was built in the same way, and then you can reconstruct it there exactly. That way, you can have your own favorite bedroom at the most distant hotel.”
The Engineer took a sip of wine, and I could see the wheels of his mind turning as he imagined those pillar houses.
“This is only one example of the possibilities of how the industrial revolution could have changed the entire construction industry and put it on a par with the rest of the world’s development,” he concluded.
“But,” I tried to inject some journalistic objectivity into the conversation. “Some architects would claim this kind of revolution would make all of the houses the same.”
“Bullshit!” roared The Engineer. “Look at the cities around the world. On the one hand, there are rows and rows of gray houses that all look the same in a way that’s almost criminal. And on the other hand, there’s a very broad range of cars. What a difference in design! What a celebration of colors and shapes!”
The Engineer had turned red in the face. Since I was concerned about his health, I felt it was necessary to change the subject, and I started to speak to him about what was going on in Israel. Among other things, The Engineer recalled an article he wrote in the Haaretz newspaper before the Six-Day War, a war that was, in his words, “A resounding military victory, but a definite ideological and ethical failure!”
At that time, he was working as a young architect at an architect’s office that was preparing the outline of a plan for the southern region, based on the three principles.
A halt in construction in Israel’s fertile area, meaning the Sharon and the Shfela regions
Scattering the population among areas where agricultural production is particularly costly, meaning the Negev and the mountain slopes
The creation of a green strip along the seashore, preserving the beaches, and turning them into a tourist attraction with a green agricultural basin.
“It was Ben-Gurion’s dream to populate the Negev, beginning with the thought of building three major cities in the Beersheva-Arad-Dimona triangle, and creating commercial and industrial centers among them. The plan also included transferring the airport from Lod to the Nevatim region, along with the aviation industry and Ta’as, a military Israeli weapons manufacturer, and many other companies would doubtless move south in their wake. The plan was so realistic that we even located a site for Ta’as, and we outlined a location for the runways in Nevatim that would prevent noise pollution.” The Engineer smiled, as he recalled the past. “We brought in a special professor who found out there were significantly fewer fogs in Nevatim than in the Lod region. An additional plan we prepared then was a naval channel from the south to Ashkelon, reaching as far as the banks of the Dead Sea, with nuclear power stations along its length, and a waterfall into the Dead Sea, which would have balanced the salty water. There was also to be a channel going northward from Eilat, facilitating the creation of a port in the Ayalot region, including an airport, to prevent any pollution in Eilat Bay. All of these beautiful plans got as far as receiving government authorization, but then the Six-Day War broke out, and everything was shelved.”
A moment of silence passed between us. In my mind’s eye, I could see the channels, ports, and industries, and for a brief second, I could visualize the flourishing Negev. But then The Engineer’s voice cut into my thoughts.
“The planners, with the help of the architects with their small-mindedness and big ideas, busied themselves with the Shfela region and the coast, and they turned it into a block of concrete and asphalt, from Nahariya to Ashkelon.”
His nostrils flared and trembled with his anger. “An overcrowded, polluted area. The wonderful coast the whole country would want to enjoy became polluted and vanished. Entrepreneurs built projects and marinas for the pleasure boats of those who got rich quick and wanted to get away from here before the state’s ship sank!”
Despite his fury, The Engineer remained sitting in the same position, without moving any of his limbs. Only his facial muscles twitched, showing his distress.
“Look at Switzerland,” he continued. “There hasn’t been a war there for nearly seven hundred years, and see how that country looks after itself. Money doesn’t break its community leaders or its architects. They would never contaminate the air of the Alps. In fact, it’s the opposite. They subsidize the farmers to preserve the view, but they would be prepared to go back and manufacture agricultural products in times of emergency, if external supplies couldn’t get in. What amazing planning and forethought! Where are we, and where are the Swiss? We are completely dependent on external supplies, agriculture has almost been destroyed, and all of the systems are corrupt from top
to bottom.
“Getting rich quick is the only ideal, even though everyone knows it’s at the expense of the destruction of the state.”
The Engineer took a deep breath and poured me a shot of a clear alcoholic drink.
“That’s enough,” he said. “We need to relax. Taste my homemade grappa, Grappa del Nonno, made from fruits of the forest.”
I was enchanted by the grappa and the view, but I wondered about the name del Nonno.
“Ah,” The Engineer smiled. “My oldest granddaughter could never say my name properly when she was a little girl, and she used to call me Nonno. Since then, that’s what everyone in the family calls me.”
The alcoholic beverage continued to find its way down our throats, and we sank into a kind of quiet, dreamy reverie, chatting about inconsequential things.
Gradually, a strong, friendly intimacy developed between us, until I allowed myself to broach the subject of Kalman and his strange death.
Now rather merry with drink, The Engineer said to me, “Listen, my friend. I’ll tell you a story only I know about, and my role is to preserve it for future generations.”
A large question mark arose inside my mind, and I waited to hear the whole story.
3.
It all began one dark night, about a week after a catastrophic earthquake in Pakistan. A delegation from Israel, which included its acclaimed, experienced rescue unit, flew into Islamabad after after permission was obtained from the local authorities.
The team included a senior architect who seemed to be particularly experienced. His white beard and clear brown eyes gave him a somewhat-aristocratic appearance which greatly contrasted with the darkness all around, the background of destruction, and the shards of concrete and pieces of collapsed walls and ceilings. The Engineer called out to his team, telling them he intuitively sensed there was a living person within the ruins. He gave orders organizing the team and its methods, and everyone waited a long time until the essential generators began running.
The Engineer jumped into the fray. He ran among the ruins, lifting everything he could and moving things out of the way, helping the rest of the team, until it happened.
“There’s a sign of life! Hurry!”
Suddenly, a delicate white hand with long, narrow fingers appeared amid the ruins. It was the hand of a young girl. The hand was still warm. The Engineer went into overdrive. He cleared and moved everything he could away from the spot where he guessed the survivor was located. It seemed to go on forever, until eventually it became possible for The Engineer to take her still-warm body under the arms and drag her out of her concrete trap.
The young girl was naked. Apparently, her clothes had been left behind in the ruins. Her body, reflected in the projector light, looked like an ancient statue of Venus in all its glory. Again, there was a stark contrast between the terrible destruction and darkness and the indescribable, heavenly beauty of the young girl and The Engineer’s white beard. At that critical moment, a steel beam dislodged by one of the cranes fell and hit the back of The Engineer, who was shielding the girl’s body.
Seemingly from out of nowhere, blankets and stretchers arrived. The girl was placed on a stretcher, her body covered with army blankets, and next to her, The Engineer was placed onto the stretcher as he mumbled instructions to the team he would be leaving behind.
In the makeshift tent of the Israel Defense Forces clinic in Islamabad, a doctor from the delegation examined the girl, inserted needles and tubes, took X-rays, and analyzed the results. His conclusion: in order to save her, she had to be flown to Israel immediately with for treatment.
The doctor also suggested The Engineer be flown back to Israel. The Engineer asked in a weak voice if he could call his second-in-command, and in a series of whispers, he assigned him to head up the rescue team.
A local ambulance was called. The stretchers were loaded onto it, and it raced to the airport to catch a Karnaf plane that had unloaded more members of the delegation and some equipment a few hours earlier and was due to take off again.
Long minutes passed while the ambulance driver convinced the guards at the checkpoint of the military airfield to allow them entry. The ambulance was only able to approach the airplane, its engines already running as it waited for takeoff, because the base commander had intervened. The stretchers were quickly loaded while The Engineer held up the IV bags in his hands as if praying for the girl’s safety.
With a powerful roar, the airplane began its ascent into the darkness for a long five and a half hour flight.
During the entire time, in the huge and almost empty space inside the airplane, The Engineer prayed to his God. “Please save the young girl in the stretcher tied to the ceiling of the transport plane.”
Leila woke up when the light penetrated the room through the slats of the blinds. She felt a warm, loving hand holding hers. The Engineer looked like someone from out of the Bible, with his white hair, several days’ worth of stubble on his cheeks, a small beard, and kind eyes. His whole demeanor was relaxing to Leila and projected a kind of security she had never encountered before.
Leila was a first-year medical student at the University of Islamabad. Her uncle, who singled her out as the most intellectually gifted member of her large family, paid for her tuition. She was chosen to leave her remote village to learn in the big city and live in her wealthy uncle’s home.
Leila’s favorite language was English, thanks to her English mentor, Carol. Carol taught literature at Cambridge University until she moved to Pakistan, the result of her love for a Pakistani doctor whose family had pressured him to return home.
Leila’s uncle hired Carol as a kind of chaperone for the young Leila. Carol managed to find some English books in the university library, and she taught Leila very formal English with various literary classics, including the British accent.
When the earthquake occurred, Leila was on the outskirts of Islamabad, on her way back to her parents’ home in the village. She had not visited them for several months, as she had struggled to keep up with the heavy volume of her academic studies. Then, the earthquake occurred, destroying her entire world.
The Engineer smiled at her. Everything about him exuded kindness.
“Good morning,” he said in Israeli-accented English.
His accent was strange to her, but out of politeness, she made no comment on this, but simply tried to answer in her weak voice, “Good morning. Where am I?”
“In Israel, in hospital,” he answered with a smile.
The word Israel jolted Leila into complete consciousness. Hatred for Israel had been imbued within her since childhood. She had always learned Israel was the source of all of the suffering and pain in the Islamic countries, and it should be eliminated, and of course Israel should be reviled and hated.
In a calm, relaxed tone, The Engineer told the young woman everything that had happened to her since the earthquake in Pakistan, even including the political authorizations obtained for flying out the Israeli rescue team. He told her how she was pulled out of the ruins, how she was flown to Israel, and the various operations and treatments she had received up until now, the fourth day after her arrival.
Leila sat up, crying, “And what about my family? My parents? My brothers?”
The Engineer held her hand as he told her, “I don’t know, but the doctors here have assured me that in another few days, you will be able to be discharged and can fly back to Islamabad. In the meantime, I promise you I will find out what happened to them, and if they survived the earthquake.”
At this time, The Engineer was almost sixty years old. He was married, and was the father of two children and the grandfather of three cute little granddaughters. Since his arrival at Ben-Gurion airport, he hardly moved from Leila’s bedside during his convalescence, but he amazingly recovered from his own injuries without any medical assistance, only by concentrating on this
young woman.
Due to his previous acquaintance with the hospital director, The Engineer was able to get him to promise not to tell anyone he had returned to Israel, including the members of his own family. He was given the uniform of a hospital porter and a white hat, and he hoped no one would recognize him.
The Engineer’s wife and children were sure he was still in Pakistan, and as agreed, his wife continued calling him on his cellular phone every morning. She thought he was answering her from somewhere in Pakistan, even though he was actually speaking to her just a few kilometers away from their home in the Judean Hills.
Leila recovered quickly, but her convalescence involved, as expected, a lot of pain and great effort. The Engineer remained by her side. He helped her every step of the way, supporting and encouraging her without a moment’s rest. He even used his connections with the hospital director to get a private room for her that was isolated from the general area.
The Engineer slept on a mattress at the foot of Leila’s bed, and he only dozed off once she had fallen asleep. He would wake up, all of a sudden, the moment she opened her eyes.
As Leila recovered, she became more alert during the daytime hours, and they would hold long conversations. At first, these were polite chats, but they soon moved onto the Middle East crisis, Islam, Judaism, Israel, the Americans, and every other related topic. The Engineer told Leila his personal beliefs and opinions on what was going on in the Middle East. These were thoughts he hardly dared raise in front of his family and friends. He took Leila back in history, to the period preceding World War II, when the British ruled over the Middle East. At this time, the international and wartime industries began to understand the importance of oil as almost the only source of energy in what were then known as the industrialized countries. Without oil, there was no industrial productivity, no military or vehicular transportation, nor airplane flights.
A Universal Storm: A Gripping Thriller Page 3