A Riffians Tune (11 page)

The conductor was watching and eavesdropping. He butted in and said, ‘It doesn't need to be weighed.'

‘I am still going to weigh it,' said his assistant. The relationship between the assistant and the conductor didn't look friendly. The conductor slunk away. The assistant took my case and put it on an earth scale. Fortunately, it weighed less than nine kilos. I noticed French passengers didn't go through the scrutiny we had.

‘Could we all sit together?' I asked.

‘Your ticket decides,' the assistant said, morosely. With no more questions, we boarded the coach. Kamil, Moussa and Samir took their seats near the back of the coach, but beside each other. My seat was further forward. It was, somehow, a privilege because of the double price I had paid. I found myself surrounded by French-speaking travellers. The few Moroccans in the front mishmashed French and Moroccan dialect.

My seat was by the window, with one empty seat beside me. The moment I sat down, a French woman arrived. She was three times my size. Her round face, short hair and black leather jacket gave little indication of her sex. It was only by gazing at her legs and shoes that I was sure she was female. The heel of her shoe looked as thin as a pencil and as high as a ladder. I wondered how she could walk without tumbling on her face.
Can she run if she needs to?
I wondered.

She sat beside me, flashed me a broad smile and said something, but I didn't understand it. As she settled in, she pulled a bunch of magazines from her bag and plunged her head into the middle of one of them. I wished I could do the same, lose myself in reading. I leaned over from time to time to see what was in her magazine, but all I could understand were the beautifully-coloured photos.

It was the first time I had been close to a European woman and the first time I had seen a woman's legs and knees. I admired her sense of freedom and wished my mother were more like her. Looking at her, I was convinced that God did not love me more than her, or that I was going to heaven and she to hell, as I was already in hell. I doubted the veracity of what my mother had told me in Algeria – ‘Hell for them and heaven for us'. Philosophical questions grabbed me, but I lacked words. I had only feelings. Nothing seemed to me to be rational. If it were, my parents would have organised my life and I wouldn't be here. But not everything was absurd; if it were, I wouldn't be wending my way to search for a school, thrusting myself into the unknown.
Neither does it swing from rational to absurd,
I realised
.
A vague guilt seized me. I shouldn't poke at my faith, for it was all I had.

The road from Oujda to Fez was pretty rough with plenty of bends and holes in the road to make some travellers motion sick, and leaving at one o'clock in the morning was unsettling for most. The coach left the station; only a few dim street lights were visible before plunging into full darkness. The light in the coach was switched off, and I felt as if I were floating through the air. There was loud, collective yawning, sometimes with a leader.

There was nothing to see, nothing to talk about. The coach seemed to lose all gravity, and the travellers seemed to lose connection with their heads, which were bobbing forward, backward, right and left. Unfortunately, one girl was very sick over a couple. Harsh words were exchanged, but finally all was settled with dignity. The driver was asked to slow down, but no one knew if he did or not.

Everybody snoozed. The French woman fell asleep and blocked the aisle despite her desperate effort to keep herself awake. I saw her struggling with herself and, without thinking, put my right hand on her shoulder and pointed to the window. In a zombie-like state, she thought there was something I wanted her to see. In fact there was nothing but darkness. As she looked puzzled, I stood up and invited her to take my seat in exchange for hers. She gave me a real womanly smile mixed with French charm and gratitude. She mumbled a few words that didn't make any sense to me.

Happy to exchange, she rested comfortably against the window and leaned back in her seat. That didn't resolve the problem of her overflow. She became uncoordinated, spread her legs and pushed me out of my seat. There wasn't enough space to rest her arm, and whatever space there was, she occupied. I felt like a dwarf. To change her position, she laid her head back and, a few seconds later, her mouth opened wide. She started to emit some amazing noises. They reminded me of the braying of the donkey I had left behind. I couldn't resist my curiosity, and my discomfort forced me to turn and look at her. Her chin was moving up and down like a yo-yo. Her mouth looked deep and dark, but it was lit up by a number of gold teeth in the back of her mouth. To have teeth built with gold meant, to me, that she was rich. In Kebdana tradition, gold was the most important component of a dowry, which was exchanged for virginity.

A massive woman sitting diagonally two rows in front of me kept turning around and peering at the French woman. She could have been Jewish or Egyptian; her clothes were neither French nor Moroccan. She was wearing a long skirt and her head was wrapped with a black cloth, the excess of which hung like a tail down her back and swayed every time she moved her head. Her constant turning around reminded me of a dog wagging its tail.

‘Give her a shake!' she hissed at me. She kept poking her fist in the air, looking at me and grimacing. I thought the passenger behind the French woman would be the first to be disturbed, as she had laid her head back. The Jewish/Egyptian woman was getting aggressive, poking the air and peering at me.

To avoid her constant peering and gesturing, I closed my eyes and pretended to sleep, but mimicking sleep turned into reality. Left with only one third of my seat, I rested my head against the seat in front of me and didn't awaken until I found my right leg paralysed. I screamed lightly, ‘Ow!' My right leg felt dead, completely detached from me, and I had no control over it. A few seconds later, I felt more pain. I had the feeling of being invaded by nasty biting ants devouring my leg from inside. I checked several times to see if my leg was alive. Had there been an emergency evacuation, I wouldn't have been able to save my life.

To avoid my right leg or any other body part going into a coma again, I forced myself to stay awake. Pretending to remain still, I started pushing the French woman slightly and gently out of my seat. Bit by bit, I regained a part of my seat. That was enough to allow me to rest my head against the back of my own seat. I tried to keep myself awake, but in spite of my efforts, I fell asleep again, albeit in a different position this time.

At dawn, I awakened. We were still travelling and the sky had already shaken off the darkness of the night. Some people were squirming and stretching, but others were busy either smoking or lighting their cigarettes. Covered by a cloud of smoke, I felt nauseated. I had never felt or smelled anything like it. I turned, glanced around, and spied a very thin, gaunt man smoking a pipe from the corner of his mouth and held by his back teeth. He reminded me of the family dog, Dargan, grabbing a bone between his teeth and running away, which always meant no one should mess with him. What was erupting out of the man's mouth entirely drowned my head. I felt choked.
Hashish
? I wondered.

The coach seats were like a cluster of volcanoes emitting smoke, but outside everything looked peaceful and perfect. The sky was getting brighter by the second as the sun rose higher and higher. At the beginning, it looked like fresh, unpolluted blood, neither too red nor too pale. As the sun rose, the moon shied away.

The constant smoke disturbed me and kept me from enjoying the morning smile of nature. My wriggling woke the French woman. She suddenly opened her eyes and looked around quizzically as though she didn't know where she was or where she was going. She pulled her wallet out of her pocket and displayed a tiny lopsided mirror in the middle of it. She moved the mirror around, checking her hair and every part of her nose. She leaned down and grabbed a long, fat case from under her feet and put it on her lap. Her case was a mini laboratory, full of all kinds of make-up and colourful things. She proceeded to decorate her face beautifully, starting with her lips, making them a vibrant colour between red and maroon, which immediately changed her looks and age. To smooth the painting on her lips, she licked them like a cat. She pulled out a fluffy brush, like the one barbers used to soap clients' beards before shaving, only hers was slightly smaller and thinner. She dipped her delicate brush into a small jar, pulled out some yellow powder, and brushed her face with it. This was like Hollywood for me. I thought after a sleep, especially in the morning, the first thing to do was to wash one's face to get rid of the dust and the debris of the night, and the coach was particularly full of smoke and dust. I had seen cats using their own saliva to clean their faces and wondered if this woman was less intelligent and less clean than a cat. My jaw dropped when I saw her plucking hairs out of her nose.

Watching the French woman getting covered with pipe smoke didn't stop my worrying. Soon I would be in Fez and homeless. It was a great relief for me when the driver announced a stop.

‘Taza!' he announced. ‘We'll be stopped for precisely three-quarters of an hour,' he added. ‘The coach is not going to wait for latecomers. We have to be in Fez on time,' he warned.

Some travellers shook their heads and others craned their necks and looked around. A few well-to-do looking people grabbed their luggage and brought it down from the overhead racks. Everybody was happy to have a break from the rattling, nauseating coach. The French woman collected everything belonging to her as if it were the final stop. Obviously, she didn't trust anyone on the coach. Curiously, even when the coach was running, she checked all her belongings under her feet and above her head whenever she opened her eyes.

Shortly after the driver's announcement, the coach pulled up in the front of a few small huts on the outskirts of the town. Coffee and tea were served there, and several cars and passengers were scattered around, but there was no toilet. Passengers scuttled around like ants to relieve themselves, but there was no paper, no water – not even a hiding place. For me this was no drama, as I had never used paper or water, just small stones picked up at random from the ground to wipe my bum. I had learned from an early age to run as far away as I could to find a private spot where small stones were available and abundant. It wasn't dangerous during the daytime, but it could be lethal during the night. It was always possible to make a mistake, to pick up a snake or a dangerous spider instead of a stone. My cousin Jamila had picked up the head of a dangerous snake. She had been bitten, and her right hand and left leg had been paralysed for the rest of her life.

Most travellers were enjoying breakfast. An abundance of croissants, eggs, hot tea, hot coffee and milk was offered by the main café hut and street vendors.

‘I want a coffee with milk and a croissant,' I said.

Moussa thought coffee with milk and a croissant was rather extravagant, and the fact that I had thought of it made him somewhat jealous. ‘Why not wait until Fez?' he asked.

Watching Moussa's face, I didn't want to give the impression that I had more money than I did or more than they had, so I passed on the croissant. But Samir was angry and thought Moussa's economising was unreasonable after a long night in a rattling coach.

‘Avoid croissants,' Kamil butted in. ‘Pick a
pain au chocolat
. A croissant is just a bubble of air. You need a bag full of them to settle your churning stomach.'

I didn't know the difference between a croissant and a
pain au chocolat,
but the aroma was appetising. A croissant appeared bigger and fatter than a
pain au chocolat
.

A street vendor threw himself in the middle of us and said, ‘Help yourselves. Pastries, tea, coffee, boiled eggs with salt, pepper and cumin. No charge. All free.' Nobody believed him. We just looked at him in silence. ‘Decide what you want. I will be back shortly,' he added.

He went away, selling his victuals to other travellers. We called a second street trader and asked prices. The first trader rushed at him and shouted, ‘Don't take an order! Someone has already bought their breakfast. I'm just waiting for them to make up their minds.'

Puzzled, the second trader slunk away. We were equally bemused. ‘Look! Take whatever you like! The French woman over there will pay your breakfasts. You can pick whatever you want from my tray. Help yourselves!' he emphasised.

I picked coffee with milk and a
petit pain au chocolat
, and the others did the same. We didn't trust the vendor, were frugal and prepared to pay, but he didn't ask for payment. He went straight to the French lady who had sat beside me in the coach. She paid the bill and waved to us.

We couldn't make sense of her generosity. Because I had sat beside her, Samir expected me to provide an explanation, but I had none.

The stop changed the travellers' moods; what a cup of tea or coffee and croissant could do! Travellers befriended each other, but there were still a few sad faces, although nobody bothered with them. I returned to my seat, and the French woman was already settled. I felt anxious and embarrassed; a woman, let alone a French woman, paying for a man wasn't in my tradition. Before I sat down, she muttered a few words, but I had no idea what those sounds meant.

Sitting beside her again on the jostling coach, looking at her, I didn't know if she was married or not, but I wished I were old enough or in a position to marry her. Her massive heart swallowed my tiny one, but my sweet dream was swiftly drowned by chaotic voices shouting, ‘Bab Ftouh!' and people peering out of the windows.

W
e were greeted by a huge funnel of spiralling dust clouds rising high into the air, enveloping the coach and hiding the gate in a mass of grey. Shocked at what I was witnessing, I turned around to check on my new friends. Samir's face looked old, worn and depressed, with trembling lips. As if a snowball had smashed into his face, Moussa's mouth was wide open, in a desperate struggle to catch his breath. Watching Samir and Moussa drowning in shock and despair, Kamil threw out a lifeline – ‘This is Bab Ftouh, boys!'