Homecomings

by Yvette Rocheron

  ‘What will you do?’

  ‘Nothing. I’ve long suspected he’s a pretty normal fellow. Honest one day, corrupt the next. Like your city bankers.’

  ‘Touché!’

  As they walk and talk, the river sinks deeper into a channel dug out of the limestone plateau which surrounds Hama; pools swirl around the red and white stones that litter the bed and in shallow places there are patches of green water where young men can take a dip. Khalid runs just a few steps ahead. Should he overtake him? No, Khalid is too jumpy. He catches up though, shoulder to shoulder.

  ‘Zaida is a real treasure. I can see why you’d keep her a while longer.’

  ‘Don’t!’ Khalid stands still, looking daggers. ‘You’re my guest. You shouldn’t take advantage of it. I’ll repeat until my last breath – my daughter is as free as the wind. And I always respect your family. God bless you and Virginia.’

  ‘No offence, officer, no!’ Ian pleads innocence, hands up. Amused, Khalid jostles with him for a few seconds and, after checking there is nobody around, he clutches his arms around Ian’s waist, squeezing the breath out of him. ‘I’ve got you, man!’

  ‘You’re not that strong! But let me tell you something, even if you won’t believe me.’ They fool around for a while, releasing the tension of the previous days.

  ‘I thought my girl was sending daily emails to her mother when she went to the internet cafés with her cousins, so it seemed OK to say let’s delay her trip back. But all they did was play games.’ They laugh at the cheek of the girl. ‘She has no trouble leading us by the nose! Sincerely, I thought Virginia would understand.’

  ‘I’ll stick up for my niece. Quite a bundle of fun. And the stories she notes down are amazing. They come from Abdul, she says.’

  ‘They do. Let’s walk back. There’s no rush.’

  ‘How come your father is a member of the Writers’ Union? Isn’t he a doctor?’

  ‘Retired. He has a collection of poems in print. In classical Arabic. The safest way to publish since nobody reads poetry anymore! Bless him! He likes nothing better than to recite love poems on the top terrace within earshot of our Alawite neighbours.’

  ‘A form of protest? Is that being pushy?

  ‘Could be, but Uncle Omar has no time for it. He’s up to his neck with the regime.’

  ‘They don’t get on?’

  ‘They’re family. Virginia, you know, couldn’t bear Omar. She took the measure of him the only time he came to Leaford. I was a dope, she said!’

  ‘He supports the Al-Assads?’

  ‘That has protected me. He’s not a bad man. Under torture, you, anyone, changes side. You’ve read, of course, about people in Hama being slaughtered. Even today many people from this city aren’t allowed to travel. Sunnis. Shias. That is what I’ve come back to; much worse than I expected. Two or three generations condemned to fear, voiceless. House arrests or disappearances never reported. All done in the name of countering Fundamentalists.’

  Khalid looks around, apprehensive about having revealed too much. There is a dusty-looking man walking fast towards them carrying a string bag over his shoulder. ‘A Coptic Christian from what’s left of our Golan,’ he whispers. The poorest of the poor, deep dark skin, prayer beads, threadbare pants, black front teeth ruined from chewing tobacco. Khalid buys a handful of wizened dates and sends the peddler off.

  ‘Under Bashar Al-Assad, according to the West, you’ve had fewer conflicts with Iran, Iraq and Lebanon. Syria is opening up to tourism. We got our visas quickly. And nobody has arrested me yet.’

  They stride past a large garden restaurant. Waiters set up white plastic chairs under Bedouin tents; thirsty-looking flowers hang in baskets; there is a scorched mini-golf course – the grass looks like cement, dry with neglect. A tourist trap.

  ‘I’d like you to come to Vancouver and meet Clint.’ Khalid is still his brother-in-law. Sensitive, volatile, querulous, full of ambivalences. Like me.

  ‘Alright. When I am allowed to travel. Be sure I won’t court any favours from the Ministry, but nobody survives here long without kowtowing sooner or later.’

  ‘Are you thinking of leaving?’

  ‘I have loads to do – people to contact, international contracts to sign.’

  On a restored stone bridge linking the centre to the park, they contemplate the city.

  ‘Maktoub. I’ll stay until my father’s dying day.’

  ‘You were born here. Tell me more about the place.’

  Hama glorified in its religious orthodoxy until February 1982 when a radical branch of Muslim Brotherhood forced a bitter fight with the militantly secular Ba’athist rulers. In the last-ditch battle much of the old city was destroyed. To the west, a forest of new minarets is cloaked in a soothing light. Prayers and memories point to the blank sky like shards of pain between shabby blocks of flats stacked up against the hills. Khalid turns round to gaze at a more pleasurable view over the other parapet: a string of norias working on both embankments. They watch, mesmerised by the water grinding its way up each wheel in a cacophony that has fascinated people for centuries.

  ‘Listen!’

  They hear a soft singing, then the wood moans and the patched-up beams crack under the effort of lifting full buckets, each wheel exhaling whimpers painful to the ear, full of despair. Then, on the way down, the water gurgles joyfully from the buckets.

  ‘On good days, when the water is low, our poets hear a melody tinkling through the damned town. I can’t. For them, the norias are resilient, like Syria. Joyful and despairing in turn, their voices convey the twinned emotions forming the essence of our humanity.’

  ‘You like living here then?’

  ‘I love it, I hate it. I am in exile in my own country, but also in your country. I love Britain, I hate it too. I was a good husband. She kicked me out. Liking, you said? We live on the edge of a sword. My chauffeur may be bribed, but by whom? I invited you for a jog to warn you both. I’m attending Friday prayers. Don’t make trouble for me. There are people I’m helping. Anything in their favour can go against me. You came at the wrong moment. Hama and Aleppo are tenser than Damascus. I want no trouble. I am a business man. I need a passport.’

  ‘To get back to Britain? What about your father?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘And Zaida in all of this?’

  A smile curls on Khalid’s lips. ‘She has dreams too! And under our laws she is old enough to live with her father. Anywhere. She’s always known how much I love her.’

  ‘Sorry, man.’ Dry mouth, pretending indifference to the threat, Ian rakes his throat to spit onto a paper tissue.

  ‘She’s already pretty clued up. Able to explain her mind to a court.’

  ‘A child!’ Hiding his dismay, he looks away from the city to watch Khalid restlessly kicking a few pebbles into the parapet wall. Ian reaches out to give him a gentle punch in the chest. ‘Come on! What’s up?’

  ‘“Is the tree in the courtyard for me or my neighbour?” A proverb of ours. We all know the answer, don’t we?’

  ‘That’s silly. She isn’t a tree!’

  Dismissive of Ian’s raised eyebrows, Khalid, distracted by his own thoughts, continues, ‘We’re really close, her and me. You’ve seen how well we care for her. And to her, Syria will always be more exciting than Leaford! Sure, there is a whole culture for her to pick at and fit around her. It is what we did, you in Vancouver and me in Britain. In the end, it’s no big deal.’

  ‘What? You’ve just told me you don’t really belong anywhere. Of course it’s a big deal. Cut her off from her roots? Look at you two! You live in fear. Abdul as well. Always watching who you talk to. Zaida won’t fancy that for long. That’s clear already. She can’t stand your chauffeur!’

  ‘Yes, you’re right. But I keep dreaming because… I fear losing her for good.’

 
‘I wish I could help… Even journalists can’t read the future.’

  ‘Ah! Let me tell you! In my country, everyone has dreams – big dreams. Shias, Sunnis, Copts, Kurds, Armenians, Iraqi refugees, Palestinian refugees, businessmen, arms dealers, poets, daughters wanting the moon and sons demanding Kalashnikovs at puberty. If God wills it, our dreams will tear Syria apart.’ He stops, then, urgent: ‘Turn round slowly. Show no fear.’

  Security guards with machine guns block the road. There are two police vans parked on either side of the bridge, lights flashing. There are shouts. A man they cannot really see is being pushed and kicked into the vehicle. More shouts. A senior-looking man detaches himself from the fray and marches towards them, gesticulating orders. Khalid signs to Ian to come forward.

  ‘No photos. Put that camera away. He wants to see our papers and mobiles.’

  Ian glowers at a sudden stomach pain, wishing to send a last message to Clint. He wants to pee. Radio blinking in his front pocket, the officer – fresh-shaved, stout, pockmarked – skims the visa before inspecting Ian from head to foot, cold, scornful of the vulgarity of foreign tourists.

  ‘You no English?’

  ‘Canada.’

  ‘Journalist?’

  ‘Tourist.’

  ‘You like Syria?’

  ‘Yes, yes, I like Syria,’ he exclaims with cynical enthusiasm.

  In a wink, mobile and passport are returned by hands padlocked with gold rings. The urge to piss has gone. Why travel in a country whose street culture is alien to him? He is more shaken by the motherfuckers than he’d like to admit. Will they be his death?

  ‘Don’t say a word! Smile. Let’s move on! Don’t run!’

  Families are drifting back. An ice-cream van shuffles past. Impatient to get away, Khalid grabs him by the arm when a tall guy with a fancy camera and a woman in tow waves to them.

  ‘Do you speak English?’

  An Arab. Handsome and well-off. Ian makes a quick assessment of the man dressed in a linen double-fronted suit, probably an outfit for a wedding. At ease with himself. The young woman says nothing, all smiles, a stunner in a white outfit. Heels, lacy stockings, a knee-high dress. Bright red lips under an elaborate scarf.

  ‘Me speak English. Read book on your king with many many wife. A good man. You know him?’

  ‘Henry VIII was… not a good man.’

  ‘Oh? I see. My wife in French school. You like Syria?’

  ‘Yes, very much.’

  ‘Pour quoi?’ She detaches the first syllable, high, from the second lower note.

  ‘People are nice, very nice. Syria is a beautiful country. We have Syrian friends. Very good friends.’

  The couple laugh.

  ‘Je prends photo de vous avec nous.’

  ‘Oh, non, Madame! Look at my clothes, I’m not good enough. Désolé!’

  They gabble away looking half-offended, half-amused by his reluctance. Khalid snarls, ‘They don’t mind what you look like. They just want you on their photo for good luck. It’s their honeymoon. Get on with it.’

  Resigned, Ian takes off his sweatband and brushes dust from the flamboyant tracksuit, aware of damp patches spoiling the top. The guards have melted away. Free of fear, people arrive for their morning walks. There is no agitation left from the arrest by the benign bridge. Innocent photos are taken, posed in front of the chattering water wheels. The norias bewail, sing or mock in turn the newly married couple who cannot keep their eyes off each other – the foreigner snapped accidentally in their midst and immediately forgotten.

  ‘Don’t tell anyone you’re a journalist, or there’ll be trouble.’

  They walk back across the park where an unruly football game is taking place among frantic skinny-looking adolescents. ‘Listen, they all speak Farsi. Iranians. Trouble, trouble!’ Khalid’s face mists over because Syria is a puzzle without solution. Not a good place for a princess, English or Arabic. He stops walking, rubbing his hands together in torment, eyes riveted to Ian’s, blurting out, ‘I’m afraid, you hear me? They can destroy me, the whole of me, not just physically. They won’t kill me but I’m scared they’ll destroy my self-respect, the humanist core of me. Is that meant to happen?’ He takes a step back, dismissive. ‘How can you understand? Virginia didn’t in the end! But reassure her, since that’s why you’ve come. I won’t let Zaida see me give up my dreams. That’s a fact.’

  There are crippling currents of fears and resignation in Khalid that he begins to understand, together with wallops of generosity and no bluster. How can he really help? That’s what has become crucial to him.

  – 15 –

  Touring Syria

  Though Zaida would have loved a trip to Palmyra to meet the legendary Queen Zenobia, the Al-Sayeds refuse to take their guests there. The same Ba’athist gang who slaughtered 500 Muslim Brothers in the town prison are still in control, they say. Instead, Walid will drive the two families to Qala’at Al-Hosn, to the west of Hama.

  Never looking at the passengers directly, head inclined forward, the chauffeur fusses over them, gesturing to make sure they settle comfortably. The man communicates well, they say, though he has no English to speak of.

  The car looks like a Peugeot, but with a horse as a logo. This is puzzling. Abdul points out the irony.

  ‘It’s indeed based on a 405, but it’s put together in our factory with parts made in Iran. Of course, it is a Syrian car! President Assad drives only Shams.’

  ‘Sham? Meaning “horse”?’

  ‘Not quite. It means “sun” in Arabic. And it’s the name given to prestigious Arabian thoroughbreds.’

  They leave behind prosperous olive groves and irrigated crops for a desert dominated by the rugged Ansariyya Mountain dividing the mainland from the coastal strip. Having agreed not to discuss Zaida’s return until back from their sightseeing, they enjoy the landscape with the innocence of people believing mankind is in charge of nature. The adults admire complex irrigation systems of lakes and canals that protect fertile land from encroaching wind and sand. Zaida, accepting that Palmyra is too far for a day trip, forgets her sulks, and points, amused, at desultory flocks of goats.

  A good hour later, the girl runs from one adult to the other, tugging at their hands up and down the steps of Qala’at al-Hosn, the cavernous fortress built by twelfth-century Knights of St John. Inspired by the panoramic view over the Jebel, Zaida orders her party to sit at a round table made of gigantic stones. The four knights are happy to listen to their lady’s demand. The party decides not to go back to Hama as planned but to stay together for a couple of nights since they are getting on so well. A hotel in Aleppo will be booked. The truce is so solid that they all sign the postcard to Gwen. Virginia’s simply reads: “I wish you were here, Mum.”

  Abdul suggests a detour to a Greek orthodox monastery at the bottom of the hill where he would like to give some money to charity, a monastery dedicated to St George. To his delight, the Franklins look astonished. Throughout the Middle East, Muslims have venerated St George under the name of Mar Girgis, a Palestinian Christian conscripted and later executed by the Roman army; and they have prayed in his churches to warn off the evil of both plague and madness.

  ‘Surely Muslims don’t believe in superstitions?’ Ian asks with a tinge of provocation.

  ‘Tut tut! Is that a good enough reason to ignore a legend? What do you think, my Shaden?’

  ‘Let’s go and see the dragon now,’ says the skittish gazelle, jumping into the back seat.

  ‘Do tell us why you want to go to this place, Abdul?’

  ‘Grandfather trusts the old monks to give the poor his money,’ Zaida is sitting smug as a bug between her grandfathers – they argue too much, that’s the truth – as Walid drives round steep bends to the stone-walled compound of the monastery.

  Why is the car slowing down suddenly on the deserted road to Aleppo? They
have just passed a limestone hill and, scattered at the bottom, a few round huts, the shape of domed beehives, made of burgundy-coloured clay. Walid is letting through another herd of fractious goats – about 20, mostly white and darkish grey; indignant, bleating at the intruders blocking their way to the village.

  ‘You funny! Look at that beard!’ The passengers applaud the silky and long-necked animals hurtling along the Sham. Ian too waves back frantically before settling into the seat, making sure Zaida has enough room to squeeze between her grandfathers. She dreams of a world, he reflects, where East and West merge – unlike her dad, who appears to dread a darker future. What did he let slip? ‘If things blow up here, you and us, will we still be family?’What was that about?

  Zaida is calling them to come back to the car. Oddly enough, she doesn’t trust the adults talking together out of earshot. She interrupts, asks for their attention. She bursts into song and dance and then runs out in floods of tears. She eavesdrops, pulls the strings, fools everyone – why didn’t she send Virginia more emails from that internet café? Quite a darling, though she may be playing up? Why not? He himself was good at playing his parents against each other!

  They are driving through a barren eerie landscape of sand dunes dotted with austere crags mimicking the ruined watchtowers of vast stone citadels. Now and then ghost dwellings hang onto the roadside, wild dogs stumbling out of stone barns. There are also signs of more sophisticated buildings. Villas? Churches? Abdul tells Zaida the occupants of the dead villages have gone to settle along new trade routes.

  ‘Were they all Muslims?’

  Abdul smiles. ‘Mostly Sunnis, I expect, and Byzantine Christians.’

  ‘They really lived together?’ Zaida sounds unabashed. The child feeds on hope. Abdul and Walter exchange a knowing glance above her head, tacitly agreeing that there is no need to highlight the divisions that keep communities apart even when living on each other’s doorstep.

  ‘Christians, you know, are told to care for the wretched of the Earth, but many of us never do. We can’t even love our neighbours! And what about your people?’