I Sweep the Sun Off Rooftops (5 page)

She remembered the second night with her cousin in the tent. She had walked for three days to reach him. She and her mother were supposed to take turns on the donkey, but because her mother had agreed to the difficult journey despite her frail constitution, Almaza insisted that she ride all the time.

The second night he had made sure they were all asleep in their tents, just as he had done the first night, but he hadn’t approached her in the same way: she didn’t hear the beating of his heart before she felt his hand; he didn’t strike his nose with his clenched fist when he saw her breasts, which were permanently in his mouth the second night, except when he snuffled around between them a little, then lifted his head to ask her an irrelevant question.

Almaza forced herself to shake off the images of the tent, to break free from the pervasive odors of her cousin-lover’s body, and reimmerse herself in her recollections of the days following the weddings of female relatives and neighbors, when she had been shocked by the way they looked—as if someone had scooped the froth off a drink and left the flat, stale, lifeless liquid. She was shocked too by their empty eyes, which only ever lit up at the sight of their wedding dresses. These outfits reminded them of the days of their engagement, when they were waiting for a new, delightful, unknown page to be turned as they wove the cloth and embroidered it with bright colors. Even this sight lost its appeal as the colors faded, and they were too bowed down by the cares of home and children to look anymore.

The young man was interfering, and drawing her away from these black clouds, wearing down her obstinacy, en
treating her to accept. Perhaps she should. Perhaps he wasn’t like other men. He had followed her there and he was trying his best to persuade her. But he was raising his voice, declaring that he would marry her even if he had to force her, for she had pulled him halfway out of the well, then cut the rope. His exasperation seemed to be starting to equal his infatuation. He had made up his mind and he wouldn’t go back on his decision. He shouted across to her aunt, who was still smoothing out the banknotes as if they were tobacco leaves, and asked her to help him force Almaza to marry him. He wanted to teach her a lesson, so that she wouldn’t go playing with fire.

Playing with fire? No, she had been waiting for the fair and preparing her whole being for the sake of this special feeling, this intimacy with an unknown man for two and a half days, so that she could preserve the image and the memories for a whole year, close at hand like winter stores, which she could bring out when she needed them. She could recall the warmth and excitement like a breeze laden with an intoxicating perfume. She could bring back the touching, the whispering, the way they had looked into each other’s eyes, or danced, with their shoulders brushing in time to the music. She could remember the music, the food, the noise, the sweets they had bought, and, above all, the men’s longing eyes as they followed her, thinking only of the woman, which at that moment was her. They poured
out their lives into her eyes, her breasts, her waist, her bottom.

That was the only part she liked: the varying faces, the sinewy hands, not the reality of the characters behind them and the troubles they brought, which were the lightning conductors taking hold of the flash and snuffing it out.

Ingrid cast a glance
over the luggage piled up in the hall and hurried off to fetch a scarf to cover her blond hair. After a moment’s thought she changed it for another, not because the color didn’t match what she was wearing, for she rarely paid attention to her appearance, even at home. It was just that here, she always had to be sure that her clothes were suitable: that they had long sleeves, didn’t show her cleavage, didn’t cling to her body, and covered her knees.

She settled on the thick scarf to deter stray lice. According to Souad, they adored blond hair for its novelty, and craved the taste of a scalp fragrant with shampoo and clean water, but Ingrid minded more that they were stubborn and vicious and bit through material in search of food, and warmth in winter, or shade in summer, briefly resisting the shampoo especially designed to eliminate them, before succumbing to their fate.

Ingrid sat on the window ledge that she had appropriated as a seat, looking out over her little garden and the road. When her eyes had once more grown accustomed to the wild plants and the dark gray paving stones that had been laid in place of soil, because of sandstorms, she transferred her gaze to the shop across the road, which she had thought was derelict when she first moved into the house. She had even thought Sanaa was an abandoned city as she looked down from the aircraft at the barren mountainsides, the houses scattered over the vast expanses of empty land, and the lookout towers the color of sand. What she saw convinced her that her mission here would be extremely simple. This country appeared to be ideal—virgin territory, not yet visited by people with different religions and world philosophies to debate and defend. But as the aircraft landed, the earth split open and up sprung a city that was a riot of sounds and colors, and of customs she had never encountered before.

Ingrid looked at her watch: Mahyoub was late.
Only
an hour late; that was nothing. She had grown used to waiting for people for hours. She was even mentally prepared for people not turning up on the right day at all, perhaps even arriving several days later. Time lay like a swamp, and people had stopped winding their watches long ago. This used to annoy her at the start. She had tried to fight it without success, not giving up hope until she had finally acclimatized herself to the way life was here, and begun to understand how a traveler relied on luck to move from one area to another. By that stage she was able to picture the empty, winding roads that appeared to lead only to more dust and more bare hills, and where there was rarely another vehicle in sight. Problems with transportation had themselves played a part in her becoming friendly with Souad, Mahyoub’s sister. Ingrid and some other teachers from the school where she taught had set out to visit the village closest to Sanaa as a first step toward discovering what lay beyond the city.

Like the rest of the staff, she had spent the first month after her arrival skating on thin ice, treading on eggshells. When they ventured beyond the protective embrace of the city they felt as if they were at the edge of an abyss and were relieved to encounter two men hitching a lift. As a result they were guided for nothing to the village that was subsequently to become the focus of Ingrid’s life and change
her from a European woman into one who wore Yemeni clothes, baked bread on an outdoor clay oven, spoke Arabic and hennaed her hands, a custom she was told went back to the Prophet Muhammad, when he wanted to differentiate women’s hands from men’s.

Ingrid used to notice one particular woman who always came into the shop opposite her home in Sanaa. She began to identify her by the colored cloth bag she carried, as all the older women veiled themselves in an identical fashion: the sheet hanging down either side of the head and the soft black silky material, patterned with red, covering the face. This cloth bag never left the woman’s hand. At the beginning Ingrid was certain that she came to beg, as people like her shopped at the local markets, not in these expensive shops, which were patronized mainly by foreigners and government employees. How naive she must have been to believe that this woman was suitable territory in which to sow the first seeds of her mission! She actually went up to her and invited her to her house and the woman went along with her at once, as if she’d been expecting her. Once inside the house she wandered around the room and finally came to a stop in front of the mirror, where she spent some time examining her reflection in amusement. Then she went over and patted the sofa, picked up an ashtray and viewed it from all angles before returning it to the table, stared at the
photos of Ingrid’s family, and felt the curtains. She went into the bedroom and sat on the bed and bounced up and down like a child. She drank a glass of cold fruit juice in one gulp, and then seemed content to gaze at Ingrid’s face, not understanding a word of the other’s attempts to talk to her in Arabic. Ingrid was afraid that this opportunity would slip through her fingers and hurried to fetch the woman a picture of the crucified Christ. The woman drew her breath in sharply, putting a hand up to her mouth, but her attention was distracted by the knitted tea cosy. She mumbled a few words and seemed to be asking whether Ingrid had made it and laughed again, pointing at the teapot, apparently finding it strange that it should have a cover at all. Then she smiled broadly at Ingrid, nodded her head as if to say she’d be back again soon, and went out the door. Later Ingrid discovered that she came to the shop only to curse the cigarette display, because her daughter’s husband had left her for another woman and he used to buy his cigarettes there. It was then that Ingrid realized that her task was not going to be easy, as she would need excellent Arabic in addition to trying to understand the culture of the country.

Many months had gone by, in the course of which Ingrid believed that she had begun to be able to understand the people’s mentality and decipher their behavior. But whenever she went deeper below the surface, she lost her
way inside their compact heads, intelligent eyes and smiling mouths.

Mahyoub’s car finally came in sight and he drew up and got out, but instead of returning her enthusiastic greeting he stood talking to the owner of the shop. She tried to attract his attention by waving her hands about, but he ignored her until she opened the window and called to him to help her out with some of the luggage.

Usually it was made up of bundles of cuttings from European magazines, small cheap mirrors, paper, pencil stubs, tins of food and packets of cornflakes, but today it included far more important items: a sewing machine, a sterilizer for babies’ bottles, boxes of tools, secondhand cooking pots and matches.

When they had finished stowing them in the backseat of the car, which was buckled from a previous accident, Ingrid climbed into the passenger seat. She was worried because she was sure that Mahyoub wouldn’t give the load in the back a second thought, but she soon became more concerned about his unsmiling face and abrupt way of talking. The day before, a truck driver from the village had passed on a message from Souad to say that Mahyoub would give Ingrid a lift to the village. This had surprised her, as she hadn’t forgotten his hostile attitude toward her the last time she visited them before her trip back to Denmark. She had
introduced the head of her school to the men and asked them to invite him to spend a few days there while she was away. They had agreed with a collective nod. their cheeks bulging with qat, all except Mahyoub, who, to her astonishment, had asked why he should be invited. She had grown used to their impeccable hospitality and the way they agreed to all her requests even if they did nothing further to carry them out. She felt herself flushing, but answered: “So that he can get to know you and understand your culture better.”

“You mean he’s coming to inspect our dandruff and daggers?” he mocked.

Then he had asked why she kept her head covered when she wasn’t a Yemeni, or even a Muslim, and held out some qat leaves to her, inviting her derisively to chew qat with them. The other men had silenced him and the oldest man present had risen to his feet in anger, his eyes blazing and threatening violence.

Ingrid felt heavy, as if her luggage in the backseat were weighing her down, making her tongue-tied and even restricting her freedom to breathe. She guessed she felt this way because she couldn’t talk to Mahyoub; she wanted to ask him not to drive so fast around bends and not to crowd other cars, but she couldn’t even bring herself to ask after his sister and everyone in the village. Her spirits lifted when
a haunting song came through the crackle and interference on the car radio but she didn’t feel at ease with him like before. Besides looking morose and talking in monosyllables, he drove recklessly and sighed and grumbled and gave her mutinous stares.

Her feeling of awkwardness was justified. After some time, Mahyoub gestured toward her head scarf, saying in bad English, “Either you’re bald or your hair’s gone gray, Ingrid.”

“Maybe,” she replied. “And it shows respect.”

This time he actually touched her scarf. “You don’t have to respect the car,” he said, “or me.”

And suddenly he was pulling the scarf from her head and allowing her blond hair to fall onto her shoulders. It was thick, and the color of the sun. While she was still recovering from the shock of this unexpected behavior, he shouted, “Now I believe! Glory be to God! Now I believe, Lord!”

She was even more confused, impressed by the emotion and sincerity of his words, yet outraged by his boldness. But she recovered quickly, attributing his behavior to childishness rather than male cunning, and felt justified in this view when he warned her not to let her hair down in front of the village women or they’d be jealous and cut it off while she was asleep.

She tried to divert him, as she had done in the past, by teaching him some English, the language that he saw as a
passport to a better life. She asked him to construct sentences with a verb, a subject and an object, using conditional particles, negatives, and past, present and future tenses. This made her feel that she was being useful, but she also derived pleasure and amusement from the examples he gave her, which were at once strange and simple. She remembered some of them: “I will not tell anyone my secret even if my head is separated from my body and my limbs are cut off.” “I have an aircraft.” And he wouldn’t leave that sentence there. The blood had rushed into his face and he had refused to continue the lesson, shouting, “I have an aircraft! I have an aircraft! And yet I let myself rot away here.”