Two Old Fools on a Camel: From Spain to Bahrain and Back Again

by Victoria Twead

  “YOU took it!”

  “Oh, for goodness sake...”

  “You STOLE it!”

  “Brent, I’ve been overseas for the past few days.” This was true. Daryna had been away on school business. “How could I take your projector, even if I wanted to?”

  Daryna paused in her story-telling, rolled her eyes at me and flung her arms out in disbelief, knocking over a pile of papers that fluttered to the floor.

  “Did you ask Saeed in Stationery about it?” I asked, helping her pick them up.

  “Oh yes, I spoke to him right away. Of course he hadn’t taken it. Why would he? So off Brent goes, fuming and telling anybody that will listen how the Principal stole his projector. And then the Three Fat Ladies take up the story and spread it around. Honestly! This place!” Daryna was laughing. The whole affair was so ridiculous it was funny.

  The mystery of the disappearing projector was solved a week later. Saeed had taken it upon himself to check every classroom. Another teacher (named Malaria, or Asthma, or Cholera, I don’t exactly remember) had found an unattended projector and borrowed it.

  “I ch-ch-ch-checked the serial number,” Saeed told Daryna, “and it was B-B-B-Brent’s.”

  Brent hadn’t put it in the cupboard after all, and nobody had stolen anything. Daryna was innocent, but few people were ever aware that her name had been cleared.

  Another week began and the usual crowd was waiting in the hotel foyer for the school bus. I glanced at my watch.

  “Jasim’s very late today,” I said.

  “Aw, you know what he’s like,” drawled Andrea. She looked tired, as though she’d not had much sleep.

  “We’re going to be really late,” I said. “I dread to think what my class is getting up to.”

  I could only imagine what Mustafa Kamel and cheeky Mohammed were doing in my absence. They were hard enough to control when I was in the room, but left unsupervised... The hands on my watch ticked round, and still Jasim didn’t appear.

  “I’ll go outside and see if he’s coming,” said Joe, pushing through the hotel swing doors.

  “Where’s Brent?” somebody asked.

  We all looked round. Brent wasn’t there.

  “I saw him earlier,” Ibekwe commented. Ibekwe, from Ghana, taught Biology, and was always the first person in the foyer waiting for the bus. “He went outside.”

  “No sign of the bus,” said Joe, returning, accompanied by a surge of heat.

  “Was Brent out there?”

  “Nope.”

  “Bus? Bus for school? Bus gone!” said Toothy, popping up from behind the reception desk like a jack-in-the-box.

  Everybody swung round to the desk.

  “The bus has come and gone?”

  “Are you sure?”

  “We’re 25 minutes late already!”

  “That’s ridiculous! Jasim wouldn’t leave with an empty bus.”

  “Not empty,” said Toothy, and held up one brown finger. “Not empty, one man.”

  Brent! Brent had boarded the bus and allowed Jasim to drive away without telling him that we were all waiting inside!

  “That Brent! What a moron!”

  “What was Brent thinking? Why didn’t he call us?”

  “What a stupid thing to do!”

  “I’m not walking to school in this heat!”

  The outrage was palpable.

  I shook my head in disbelief and pulled out my mobile phone.

  “Daryna? That idiot, Brent, has let Jasim drive away without us. Can you send Jasim back again, please?”

  We eventually arrived at school flustered and annoyed. Jasim informed us that Brent had told him to drive on and he’d assumed we’d already gone to school by other means. We clocked in, and our cards were punched in bright red ink. I sprinted to my classroom, hardly registering the shadowy figure of Fatima’s mother in the corridor. I was relieved to find Mr. Brewster in the classroom doorway, overseeing my bunch of hooligans.

  “I’m so sorry,” I said, breathless and sweating. “The bus left without us.”

  “That’s okay,” said Mr. Brewster. “Could you pop into my office for a moment when you finish your classes? I need a word with you.”

  13. A Horrible Day and Shopping

  ‘Stuff Ya Potatoes!’

  There wasn’t time to wonder what Mr. Brewster wanted to talk about. I had my lesson to sort and, thanks to Brent, I wasn’t at all prepared. I hadn’t written the day’s vocabulary list on the board (again, thanks to Brent) and I couldn’t do it now. Turning my back on the kids for any length of time was not an option. But I needed to get the class focused as soon as possible.

  “Right, class,” I said. “Please get out your ‘Shiloh’ books and turn to the next chapter.”

  The class groaned.

  “Mees, Shiloh is a stupid book, Mees!”

  “Mees, we don’t want to read about a stupid dog, Mees.”

  Only Fatima sat, her back ramrod-straight, book open, pen poised ready to take notes.

  ‘Shiloh’ would not have been my choice of a class text. It is about a small boy who rescues a beagle, (or ‘bagel’ as most of the class spelled it), and because few of them liked animals, it wasn’t a popular read. I rummaged in my bag for my own copy and couldn’t find it. Impatiently, I turned my bag upside down and the contents spewed out on my desk. No time to tidy it up now, I thought, must get on with this lesson before they start playing up. I ignored the mess on my desk, grabbed my copy of ‘Shiloh’, and began to read.

  I couldn’t really blame the class for not being interested in the story. It is set in West Virginia, a lush green, mountainous place, totally unlike the flat desert that is Bahrain. The text was peppered with unfamiliar American words that needed explaining.

  “What does ‘buckshot’ mean?” asked cheeky Mohammed.

  “Does anyone know?” I asked the class.

  “Does it mean ‘tired’?” asked Zainab.

  “No...but a good try,” I said. “Anybody else care to guess?” I looked round the classroom, but even Fatima shook her head. Huda shrank into herself, terrified that I might ask her.

  I always tried hard to make my lessons lively, so I seized a board-pen from the pile of junk on my desk and quickly drew a big cartoon rabbit on the whiteboard, its paws held up to crying eyes. Then I drew a shotgun, with dots to show buckshot leaving the barrel and landing on the rabbit. I used a red marker for drops of blood, knowing that kids love gore. The shotgun interested the boys hugely.

  I was just calming the class again, when there was a tap on the door. Before I had the chance to call ‘Come in’, the door opened, and Mrs. Sherazi entered, her face fixed in an artificial smile, synthetic black hair cascading over her shoulders. Why was the school owner visiting my classroom? I wondered. The children fell silent, aware that something unusual was happening. Little Huda’s eyes were like satellite dishes.

  I opened my mouth to say ‘Good Morning’, but nothing came out. Mrs. Sherazi ignored me, and came deeper into the room, but not before she’d taken in the disgraceful pile of junk on my desk and the drawing of the gun and sobbing bunny on the board.

  To my horror, a procession followed her: Mr. Brewster, four men in suits, three ladies in abayas and hijabs, and two men carrying photographic equipment. My classroom was so cramped, I was backed up against the window to make room for the visitors. I was painfully aware of the chaos on my desk and the drawing on the board.

  Two of the ladies began firing questions at the class, none of which I understood as I spoke no Arabic. The suited men picked on individual kids and asked more questions. I was relieved that none asked Huda anything, as they would have a long wait for an answer. The photographers’ cameras flashed. Mrs. Sherazi’s fixed smile never wavered, although it never reached her eyes. At last, as suddenly as they’d appeared, they departed.

  “Who were they?” I asked the class, who looked as shocked as I was.

  “The Ministry of Education,” said Fatima primly. “
They are inspecting the school.”

  “Oh! And what did they ask you?”

  “Mees, they ask if we like the school, Mees,” said Mustafa Kamel.

  “And if we like our lessons,” said Zainab.

  “And if we like you, Mees,” said cheeky Mohammed.

  I changed the subject. I didn’t want to hear the replies the children had given.

  At last the end of the day arrived, but instead of meeting my friends at Smokers’ Corner, I had to report to Mr. Brewster’s office. The door was open, and Mr. Brewster and Wayne were chatting and laughing together. Wayne looked at me.

  “Hi, Babe,” he said, then to Mr. Brewster, “I’ll see you later tonight.” They high-fived and Wayne sauntered out of the office.

  I am NOT your babe, I thought, and walked in.

  “Ah, Miss Vicky,” Mr. Brewster began, “I’m afraid I’ve had a complaint from a parent.”

  It didn’t need the Brain of Bahrain to work out who had complained.

  “Fatima, she’s in your class?” he asked, eyebrows raised, as if he didn’t already know.

  “Yes...”

  “Her mother says you are not setting enough homework.”

  “I...”

  “Fatima’s friend is in Wayne’s class, and she’s told Fatima that they have an hour’s English homework every night.”

  “But...” I was fuming. I knew that Wayne ordered his classes to copy great chunks from the textbooks, and I didn’t see the point of that. He didn’t even grade it, he just stamped it with a rubber stamp as ‘Checked’.

  “I set my classes meaningful homework three times a week,” I said, through clenched teeth.

  “Well, could you step it up to every day in future?”

  Great! More grading. Could this day get any worse? (It could.)

  “Oh, the Ministry visit today went well, I think,” said Mr. Brewster, swiftly changing the subject, probably aware that I was far from happy.

  I left before the subjects of untidy teachers’ desks and tragic bunnies could be raised, and went straight to Hawa.

  “You see, I tell you tha’ woman is bad!” said Hawa, rolling her eyes. “She better not try bully me!”

  I believed her. Hawa looked small and delicate but I knew that beneath her beautifully embroidered clothes beat the heart of a cockerel.

  “Hah! Soon we have Parents’ Conference, then we see!” She clapped her hands, bedevilment in her eyes.

  But it was the email that arrived that evening that was the final straw that broke the camel’s back and drove me to call a BWMDC Extraordinary Meeting.

  “dear Ms. vicky,

  Fatima did not understand today your lesson on reported speech. She needs clarification and explaination. Please repeat it tomorrow, and why do you not give a quiz today like in Mr. Wayne’s class?

  Fatima’s mother”

  Thankfully, the Bahraini people we came to know were utterly charming, friendly, supportive people, not at all like Fatima’s mother. When Daryna had a small crisis at the shopping mall, they couldn’t have been kinder.

  Daryna was always beautifully dressed and enjoyed shopping for clothes. One day she was browsing happily from store to store when she suddenly realised she’d lost her handbag. It was black, and contained everything: phone, credit cards, ID, passport, wallet... Panic set in.

  She forced herself to get a grip and thought hard. When did she last have it? She didn’t believe it’d been stolen. No, it was more likely that she’d put it down somewhere. But where? And how would she get back to the hotel with no money?

  She approached a salesgirl behind the counter and explained her problem. Although the girl didn’t know Daryna from a piece of toffee, she insisted on giving her 10BD (approximately £17, or $26) from her own purse, more than enough for a taxi home. Daryna gratefully accepted.

  She thought hard again. Ah, the phone! She made her way over to one of the security guards and told him the sorry tale. Again, the security guard couldn’t have been more sympathetic or helpful. He agreed to keep calling her phone, while Daryna attempted to retrace her steps once more.

  “God bless that nice man!” said Daryna, as she relived the incident. “Do you know, he called my phone about 50 times! Well, about an hour later, I walked into the store where I first thought I’d lost my purse, walked about, and then - all of a sudden - dee-dee-dee diddlededeedee, I heard the familiar music. It was my phone! I followed the melody to the sweater pile, just where I’d been standing two hours before, and there, sure enough, was my purse, ringing! My purse was black, and I’d put it down on a pile of black sweaters. I must have held up a sweater to look at, then put it down on top of my purse. Then I must have picked up my shopping bags and walked away. But everything was there and nothing was missing.”

  “What a relief!”

  “Yes, it was. So I thanked that wonderful security guard and gave the nice salesgirl her 10BD back, and all was well.”

  Shopping was never a problem for Joe and me, because we had a nearby Cold Store, or mini-supermarket. But carrying the shopping home was a problem. We usually had to buy heavy bottles of water, as Bahraini water is unsafe to drink, and lugging it home across the sand, in the searing heat, was exhausting.

  One of the Middle School teachers overheard Joe moaning about it, and interrupted.

  “Hey, I’ve got a cart at home that we never use. A kinda trolley thing, do you want it? It’s just taking up space. You’re welcome to it if you want it.”

  Joe accepted, and the next day she produced the trolley. Trollster, as we christened it, entered our lives. Trollster was a very sturdy trolley and much bigger than we’d imagined. It had a metal frame, four large stable wheels, and folded up when not in use. Joe was looking forward to his maiden voyage.

  “I’ll stock up on everything,” he announced. “We need water, milk, everything.”

  Joe shopping with Trollster

  Joe often went shopping for groceries alone because I was weighed down grading my pupils’ work and couldn’t afford the time. Off he went, pushing Trollster in front of him. All went well as he traversed the sand, and from my vantage point on the 7th floor, I saw him cross the busy road with no problems. Unfortunately, the return journey was much more hazardous.

  Twenty minutes later I watched him exit the Cold Store, Trollster packed with groceries. He pushed it to the kerb, waited for the traffic lights to change and the road to clear, then attempted to negotiate the kerb-stone. Trollster lurched sideways, spilling toilet rolls and cans into the road.

  Colton arrived, looking for Joe, and joined me at the window. We watched the little figure stamp its foot and hurriedly retrieve the fallen items. The traffic lights changed to green and the traffic roared towards him. With just moments to spare, he hauled Trollster back on the kerb. Again he waited for the lights to change and this time reached the opposite kerb without further mishap. He just managed to pull Trollster up onto the pavement before the lights changed and the traffic bore down on him again.

  “Awww... That was tricky...” chuckled Colton.

  We watched as Joe and Trollster bumped across the red-bricked sidewalk, until that gave way to compacted sand. Joe pushed confidently and Trollster behaved quite well until the hard sand gave way to soft. Now Joe was struggling. Shoulders stooped, rear-end raised, he shoved Trollster forward. Then something caught the front wheels. Joe was pushing so hard that he projected himself over the handlebar, headfirst into the groceries. Joe and Trollster fell sideways in a jumble of wheels, arms, legs and shopping.

  “Oh no...” I gasped, hand clamped over my mouth to stifle the laughter.

  “Hey, I’ll go and help him, silly old fool,” said Colton and bounded out of the room.

  Joe picked himself up, brushed himself down and repacked Trollster before Colton reached him. Pushing Trollster through the soft sand was clearly impossible so he tried pulling instead. I watched as Trollster balked and bounced, the wheels leaving deep gouges in the sand. Joe, pouring sweat, b
ald head ruby-red, fists clenched on the handle, was clearly struggling.

  Where are the camels when you need one? I thought.

  Colton, the knight in shining armour, arrived, and together they dragged Trollster home, up the lift and into our room.

  “Trollster hates sand,” Joe muttered.

  “Sir Joe,” asked the Filipino barmaid in Bennigan’s later, “why you look so red? Wha’ you been doing?”

  “Oh, just a spot of shopping,” sighed Joe and took a deep draught of his cold beer.

  ۺۺۺ

  Joe wasn’t the only one with a red face that weekend. Joe was out visiting Colton in his apartment and I was marking assignments at the dining room table. There was a knock on our door, which I opened, and found Daryna holding a white plate with a circle of plump, rosy strawberries, carefully arranged.

  Perhaps I’m wrong, but I think school Principals are rarely popular with their staff. Poor Daryna was placed in a difficult situation. She was compelled to execute Mrs Sherazi’s often eccentric edicts, but blamed for the peculiar rules she was expected to enforce. The Coffee War was a good example, and she lost many friends over that. If people, instead of being poisoned by false accusations from the Three Fat Ladies, had bothered to get to know her better, they’d have found a very sweet lady with the best of intentions. Yes, she made hasty decisions. No, she wasn’t always a good judge of character. But she was one of the most well-meaning and generous people I have ever had the good fortune to meet.

  And that day was a good example. Daryna had bought strawberries, and thought Joe and I might enjoy some. She spent time picking out the most perfect, washing them and arranging them, Martha Stewart-style, on a plate. Satisfied with the arrangement, she crossed the hall and knocked on our door.

  “Hi, Daryna,” I said.

  “A treat for you!” she said, smiling and stepped forward, offering out the plate.

  Unfortunately, her sleeve caught on the door handle. The strawberries hurled themselves at me and the plate clattered to the ground. Had Toothy been at the reception desk below, watching footage from the surveillance camera, he would have had a good laugh.