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

by Victoria Twead

  The new apartment was gorgeous. Everything in it, cooker, fridge, microwave, washing-machine, furniture and fitments, was brand new. The kitchen, fully fitted, was roomy enough to include a table and chairs. Two en-suite bedrooms and a separate bathroom, interconnected by a long passageway, led to a vast living and dining room. Comfortable chairs and sofas surrounded a large coffee table and faced a huge flatscreen TV. These, and a big dining table with six chairs, seemed inadequate for the space. The view, from our apartment on the 8th floor, was breath-taking. The beautiful Al-Fateh mosque, the sea, and the distant towers of the Financial District, all were visible through floor-to-ceiling windows that seemed to overlook all of Manama. Acres of smooth marble and wood floors left an impression of sparkling spaciousness. The colours may not have been our choice, but I loved it all. How I wished the Gin Twins hadn’t needed to cancel their visit!

  The lounge in our new apartment

  It was like Christmas as we unpacked all the cardboard boxes revealing brand new rugs, bedding, bedside lamps, cutlery sets, pots, a kettle and much more. We would be living in luxury.

  I needed to buy a few things from the mall, and my journey by taxi took me past the Pearl Roundabout. I was astonished to see, with my own eyes, the tented town. Tents so numerous that little streets had been created, with generators, bathroom facilities, and food for sale. Police and armoured vehicles hung back, merely observing.

  Jake and Colton helped us set up the Internet in our new apartment. Twitter was still busy with pro- and anti-government tweets, and the belief that it was unlikely that the Bahrain Grand Prix would take place. I tweeted rarely, very aware that all tweets were being monitored and identified by the government. We were in a potentially dangerous situation.

  Messages from the British Embassy arrived daily, warning us which areas to avoid, what protests were planned, and recommending that we leave the island. The Saudi troops, tanks and armoured vehicles waiting at the other end of the causeway, were no secret.

  Curiously, we didn’t feel unsafe. We lived close to the school, and our area of the city seemed far removed from the troubles, despite being little more than a few miles from the Pearl Roundabout. Joe and I longed for the normality of our Spanish life, but also felt we were in no immediate danger. And the novelty of the new apartment was wonderful.

  The move saw a shake-up in the rooming arrangements. Young Mohammed no longer had to share with crazy Brent and was a much happier bunny. It was strange but, apart from young Mohammed and crazy Brent, we were unaware of any other conflicts between room-mates. But now other stories were emerging.

  23. Crazy Teachers and a Parrot

  Joe and I, already so well accustomed to each other’s foibles, felt very lucky sharing an apartment. Unmarried teachers had been allocated roommates, and exactly who shared with whom was a lottery. Of course, not every pair would live together harmoniously. A case in point was young Mohammed and crazy Brent.

  But now we heard the story of Ibekwe, the Biology teacher from Ghana, and a devout Muslim, and his roommate, Jeremy. Apparently Jeremy enjoyed one girlfriend after another, each of whom he moved into their hotel apartment. When Ibekwe returned from school and opened the door, he never knew who would be sitting on the sofa watching TV.

  Jeremy drank alcohol, stole Ibekwe’s food from the fridge, and borrowed money from him that he never repaid. He held wild parties and the guests often vomited in Ibekwe’s bathroom. Jeremy had his car washed by Indians but never paid them, and Ibekwe was asked countless times to pay the debts. Jeremy ran up a huge bill at the hotel, the staff assuming it was also Ibekwe’s responsibility, as they shared the suite. This was clearly not a match made in heaven.

  Following the move to the new apartments, Ibekwe was allocated crazy Brent as his new roommate. Everyone wondered how the pair would get on.

  Although we were delighted with the new apartment, the only fly in the ointment was the caretaker. He was a creepy Egyptian individual who we named ‘No-Problem’ as that was his stock response to everything. We avoided asking him for anything, as he would outstay his welcome, bowing obsequiously and refusing to leave, even after being tipped. Neither did we like the way he entered our apartment at will, while we were at school. Like a detective, I set up traps to find out if he’d been snooping around. He had. He even left audacious notes for us on our kitchen table, suggesting we were using the wrong kind of washing-powder, or such like. I don’t think he did any harm, but it was an invasion of our privacy.

  “If the troubles here on the island were sorted out,” I asked Joe, “do you think we should stay another year?”

  As yet we hadn’t committed ourselves or signed the Letters of Intent that the school had issued. However, and in spite of the fact that we were very happy in our new accommodation, I already knew Joe’s answer.

  “Not on your life!” he said. “What? Another year here, when we could be in El Hoyo, pleasing ourselves, eating our own eggs and grapes, and drinking Paco’s wine? Getting up when we want? Doing whatever we like? No, I don’t want to come back here for another year.”

  I agreed whole-heartedly with him, but I also felt another year in Bahrain would make our financial future more secure.

  As usual, I made myself a list, to weigh up all the pros and cons.

  Reasons for staying in Bahrain:

  Money

  Fantastic friends

  Fantastic apartment

  No house maintenance

  School work will be easier next year because we know how it all works

  Hot all year round

  Everyone speaks English

  Free medical care

  Everything convenient, shopping, etc.

  Reasons for staying in Spain:

  No teaching

  No political flare-ups

  Our own house, no intruders

  Our garden

  Get up when we like, please ourselves

  Village life

  Wildlife and birds

  Chickens, our own eggs and grapes

  Paco’s wine

  Peace and quiet, no traffic

  I sighed. My list hadn’t really helped. But my heart was in El Hoyo, however strong the reasons for staying in Bahrain might be.

  But things in Bahrain weren’t getting any easier. One evening, at Bennigan’s, we chatted with a Gulf Air pilot. He told us that flights between London and Bahrain had been reduced from five to just two per week, and that the crew often outnumbered the passengers.

  And, much to Joe’s disappointment, it seemed that the Bahrain Grand Prix would be cancelled. It was estimated that the loss to Bahrain would be in the region of four billion dollars.

  On the 5th March, demonstrators formed a human chain from the Pearl Roundabout to the Grand Mosque, Al-Fateh. They waved 1BD notes as a protest that the King had allegedly sold prime land to his uncle, the Prime Minister, for a paltry 1BD per square foot. Demonstrations took place every day and didn’t seem to lessen.

  Daryna had the apartment next to ours but we were all so busy, we hardly saw one another. One day Joe and I returned from school to find a note pushed under our door. I unfolded it and read:

  “Oops! He’s done it again! Wanna know more? Call next door! He was assaulted by a violent desk! D.”

  I put my school bags down, and shot next door. Who was she talking about? I was pretty certain I knew.

  Daryna made coffee and settled herself to tell the story. As usual she wore her pink fluffy robe with matching slippers. If her staff could see her leisurewear, they wouldn’t believe it, such a contrast it was to the designer outfits she wore at school.

  “Have a cake,” she said, indicating a huge box of cream cakes on the table, ready to pass out to staff at a meeting scheduled for the next morning. “Those things are winking at me, and I have to spend the whole night with them in the apartment!”

  “Who’s done what again?” I asked with my mouth full.

  “Brent!” she said, shaking her head in despair, spil
ling coffee into her saucer. “He’s had another of his ‘turns’.”

  I raised my eyebrows.

  “You know how I’ve taken most of Brent’s classes away from him, because he can’t teach, loses the kids’ work, and they all hate him?”

  “Yes...”

  “And how I have to use him to cover classes when teachers are absent? And how he treats the kids, refusing to shake hands?”

  I nodded again. We knew Brent never shook hands. Colton and Jake had told us how he accepted work from the students. He would take the corner of the paper, between finger and thumb, screw up his face and say, ‘Dirty, dirty...’. As Colton had often said, ‘the man’s crazy and dumber than a box of rocks’.

  “Saja was absent today,” said Daryna. “She’d left all of her lesson plans written on the board, but some bright spark had rubbed them off. I usually get the Hall Monitor to pop in at the beginning of Brent’s lessons, but he didn’t do that today. Anyway, Brent talked about the Theory of Knowledge for a while and none of the kids knew what he was talking about. Four of the boys, who’d obviously heard about Brent’s, er... peculiarities, all got up and approached him at the front. They smile at him and lean on his desk, all holding out their hands for shaking.”

  I nodded again. I could picture the scene. The High School boys obviously thought it was a big joke, trying to force Brent to shake hands.

  “Well, Brent leans back to avoid them, and they must have nudged the desk forward. Brent goes berserk! ‘Don’t you dare threaten me and push desks at me!’ he shouts and jumps up and grabs one of the boys by the throat.”

  “Oh no...”

  “Well, the Hall Monitor rushes in and rescues the boy, who is really shaken. He’s got a red mark on his neck, and I’m expecting huge complaints from his parents.”

  “So what happens now? Brent is totally unstable. Who knows what he’ll do next!”

  “I know! For some reason the Three Fat Ladies and Miss Naima love him. I can’t fire him, only Mrs Sherazi can, and I doubt she will. All I can do is issue a third formal letter of warning, which I’ve done.”

  Quiet, young Mohammed had blossomed since he’d stopped rooming with Brent. In Smokers’ Corner he’d often join in conversations and had even been known to tell jokes, although none of us understood them.

  Sometimes he told us about his life in Lebanon, where his parents owned a Turkish coffee shop. One day, as Rashida snored her way through a free period beside us, young Mohammed told us about his uncle’s parrot.

  Apparently this parrot was smarter than the average bird. His uncle had even trained it to use the family toilet, and taught it never to fly away even with the window open. The parrot would eye the open window and his owner would say ‘No!’ The parrot would feign nonchalance, whilst gradually edging its way around the room toward the open window, until it was scolded again. The parrot would shrug, give up the battle, and toddle back to its cage.

  The parrot also had a fine speaking voice. As soon as it heard a key in the lock, or a knock on the door, it would shout, “As-salaam alaykum”, the Arabic greeting for ‘hello’.

  One particular day, the uncle was asleep on the couch when somebody knocked on the door.

  “As-salaam alaykum!” called the parrot, but the uncle didn’t wake up.

  The visitor waited politely, and when nobody came to the door, he knocked again.

  “As-salaam alaykum!” shouted the bird again.

  “As-salaam alaykum!” answered the visitor, but still nobody came to open the door. The visitor was becoming impatient. “It’s me!” he shouted, “your friend Ibrahim.”

  “As-salaam alaykum,” shouted the parrot, then made a whistle that sounded very much like the Arabic word for ‘Who?’

  Ibrahim, outside, was getting annoyed. “I told you, it’s me, Ibrahim! Now are you going to open this door or not?”

  “Who?” whistled the parrot.

  “Oh, I’ve had enough of this!” said Ibrahim, thumping the door once more with his clenched fist, and stomped away in fury.

  The bang woke Mohammed’s uncle. He ran to the door and opened it in time to see the furious retreating figure of his friend Ibrahim.

  “Ibrahim! My friend!” he shouted, but Ibrahim refused to turn back. It took many apologetic phone-calls and explanations before Ibrahim would speak to the uncle again.

  Tears of mirth poured from young Mohammed’s eyes as he relived the story, and his spectacles misted. “That parrot!” he said, catching his breath. “Do you know, it even bowed whenever it heard the call to prayer?”

  “Does your uncle still have it?” I asked.

  “No,” said Mohammed, shaking his head sadly. “We gave it some cucumber and it died.”

  Rashida woke up with a violent snort and looked at her watch. She yawned and stretched, revealing damp stains under her arms.

  “Is that the time?” she said. “Colton, give me cigarette!”

  Colton obeyed and Rashida left, tucking the cigarette into the groove in the wall for later.

  “Hey, animals are clever,” remarked Colton. “Back in Boise, I had a friend who had this little three-legged dog. We called it Min Min Pin. It managed perfectly okay all the time, but when girls came into the house, it would go all pathetic and wobbly. And they’d say, ‘Awww...’ ’n’ pick it up, ’n’ it would bury its head in their boobs...”

  I laughed all the way back to my classroom.

  Bahrain faded into the background in the news, when a devastating Japanese earthquake took centre stage, but terrible things were still happening on the island. Through the grapevine we heard again of doctors being beaten for attending to protesters, of people hounded and arrested for taking part in the protests, and of police night-raids in outlying Shi’a villages.

  Then, on the 13th March, the school day started normally for us, but would collapse into chaos.

  24. Get Out!

  Something was happening. During my first two lessons I was regularly interrupted by the Deputy Principal tapping on my door.

  “Is Noor here? Her father’s come to take her home.”

  “Omar’s mother has come to collect him.”

  “Can you send Khaled out, please? His mother’s here.”

  At first, just one or two parents arrived, demanding their children, but by 11 o’clock, they were arriving in droves. So many parents turned up at once that Jasim and the security staff were forced to shut the gates. Parents were asked to name their children, one by one, through the bars. We all stood in the courtyard as parents shouted and tried to push the gates open. Saeed took charge and grabbed a megaphone.

  “M-M-Mohammed Y-Y-Y...” he stuttered, but by the time he got to the end of the name, Mohammed Yasr had already been united with his anxious mother. It would have been funny if it hadn’t been so frightening.

  “What’s going on?” I whispered to Hawa.

  “I don’ know,” she said. “More problem. How I buy my chicken for dinner tonigh’?”

  The school was cleared and Jasim drove us home. As we pulled away, I looked out of the bus window to see fresh graffiti scrawled on the outside walls. ‘Freedom’ and ‘Down Khalifa’ was painted in huge letters.

  We were unaware that ugly clashes were taking place at several locations. Protesters had managed to blockade the main roads into the Financial District using anything, including bricks laid out to spell political messages. They burned car tyres on the tarmac which explained the doughnut-shaped marks we had seen when we first arrived in Bahrain. The protesters were fought by security forces who used tear-gas and rubber bullets. More clashes were being reported from Bahrain University. Then police attempted to clear protesters from the Pearl Roundabout, which by now had been occupied for a month, again with tear-gas and rubber bullets. Witnesses reported that thousands of demonstrators converged onto the Roundabout and that the security forces were overwhelmed and had been forced to retreat.

  Another worrying factor was that anti-government protesters were now erecti
ng makeshift checkpoints, particularly at the entrance to Shi’a areas. These were manned by masked men, armed with makeshift weapons, such as ceremonial swords and lumps of wood. It was no secret that many anti-government protesters distrusted Westerners. Britain had handed over Bahrain to Sunni rule decades ago, and the US Fifth Fleet, with the King’s approval, was based in Manama. Therefore, Joe and I, as Britons, and our American friends, were not the flavour of the month.

  Emails from the British Embassy were crystal clear:

  “Following an increase in protests over recent days, confrontations between protesters and police today (Sunday 13th March), and reports of protesters establishing roadblocks, we advise British nationals currently in Bahrain to remain at home until further notice.”

  Don’t leave home? We heeded that advice. The school was located in a fiercely Shi’a area, so, as far as we were concerned, a no-go zone. From our apartment window we could see crude, but unmanned, roadblocks created by overturned dumpsters and bricks. We remained in our apartment that day.

  And at the back of everyone’s mind was the army of UAE and Saudi troops, and tanks, poised at the end of the causeway.

  On the 14th March, our fears were realised. The Saudi army began to roll across the causeway into Bahrain in a slow, sinister, never-ending line. I watched the comments on Twitter and saw the photographs as the armoured vehicles, nose to tail, approached Manama.

  “The Times is reporting that more than 1,000 #Saudi troops have entered #Bahrain”

  “Tanks! Watching #Saudi military arriving. More than I can count. There will be blood. #Bahrain”

  But amidst the terrifying comments, somebody with a sense of humour, tweeted: