All Russians Love Birch Trees (17 page)

Neither of us said a word. Ori tried to look me in the eyes. I drank my beer.

“Care to dance?” I suddenly heard myself ask Elisha.

“Are you serious?”

I nodded and went out onto the dance floor. Elisha followed. Instead of air-conditioning they used an irrigation system. A fine curtain of mist hung over the dance floor in the back of the room. Our clothes were immediately soaked. I felt his breath on my face. I kissed him. His lips opened.

Ori called just a few hours later. I had started looking around for something he might have forgotten in my bedroom this afternoon. Nothing lay on the floor except my bra, which I snatched up. But it was too late for prudishness and so I tossed the bra back on the floor. I picked it up once more when Ori said he wanted to see me again. I was so dumbfounded that I agreed. After
his call I wrapped myself in a thin blanket, went up to the roof deck and spent the next few hours staring out at the sea, peacefully rolling back and forth.

I lived on the top floor of an old Bauhaus building. I had gotten the apartment through my job and had signed the lease, sight unseen. It was an annex on the roof, barely insulated and with bad wiring, but it had two small rooms and a deck. My bedroom windows were open most of the time and looked out onto a two-star hotel. The windows of the hotel were open as well, showing different people doing the same things day after day: beach, shower, sex. Couples never showered together. It was always one waiting for the other to finish. Often the one waiting leaned on the rail of the balcony and looked into my bedroom. Vacation guests have no shame. They stare straight ahead, eager to satisfy their curiosity. Men who travel alone have a tendency to take pictures of women who live alone in their bedrooms. I put a bar stool in front of the deck railing to get a view of the sea. The planes were flying so low that I could’ve thrown tennis balls at them. But mostly I preferred to aim those at the hotel guests. I sat on my deck or my bed, smoking pot, unsure how long I would stay. Maybe forever, maybe just a few months. Decks in Tel Aviv were worth a lot, and the neon sign of the hotel at least offered a point of reference.

4

Work was cozy. My employer was a German organization that kept up with Israel’s political situation and supported a few peaceful NGOs. In its Hebrewized English version, our mission was called
Arab-Hugging
. The organization—like many others—had perfectly integrated itself into the conflict. If the war was over tomorrow, we’d all be out of a job. No more bragging about living in a war zone to potential sexual partners in the bars of New York, London, Paris, or Berlin.

The team was small and no one worked particularly hard. Our day-to-day was divided as follows: read the newspaper, answer e-mails, drink coffee, e-mails, lunch, coffee, e-mails, online newspapers, kill
the remaining hours. If I was actually working for a change, I translated correspondence and contracts that dealt with social injustice and
the conflict
. Then I went out to the street, sat down in my favorite cafe on Shenkin Street and ordered freshly squeezed orange juice. My coworkers always had lunch together, but I avoided them and at some point they accepted that I’d rather be on my own. The few lunches I’d joined had been quiet exchanges of well-thought-out opinions on protests and the latest political developments in between bites of chicken-fried steak and mashed potatoes.

A translator was the last thing this organization needed. In truth, a good computer program would have been more than sufficient for their needs. But of course I didn’t mention that. My skills as an interpreter were needed only on the rare occasions that we had visits from German guests or requests from the head of the office, and even then I never had to prepare.

The assignments as an interpreter were nice field trips to the West Bank, past piles of trash and unsupervised children. I constantly had to ask the kids in Arabic for the way, because our driver, who had immigrated only two months ago from Siberia, was using a Russian-speaking navigation system and could read neither the Arabic nor the Hebrew street signs. Seen through the windows of an air-conditioned
bulletproof jeep, the West Bank was beautiful. Even a bit like Greece, with the hilly terraced landscape, the olive trees, and the bumpy roads. After a while, though, we passed the deserted checkpoints, road signs in English, Arabic, and Hebrew. Those always came shortly before the Jewish settlements, which were as alien in the landscape as a UFO. In general, these work trips had the feel of a scientific excursion to an amusement park.

Mostly we drove to Nazareth. My colleagues—leftist white Israelis—were full of praise for Nazareth. They always said
gorgeous town
and
amazing food
, but that was just their political correctness kicking in to keep up the good mood. Nazareth was one big disappointment: a small town with lots of problems and a big street market. It also boasted a gigantic church with a much higher spiritual than artistic value.

From time to time I accompanied a German delegate to her meetings in Jerusalem, which took place either in some random committee of the Knesset or in a hotel lobby. There I whispered in her ear whatever her colleagues had just said in English about the weather. With my next breath, I whispered a potential English answer into my delegate’s ear—for example, a compliment on the air-conditioning. In almost all cases, my delegate took my suggestions and repeated them
in a horrible accent. But at least it seemed authentic that way. Often I was haunted by the voices and facial expressions of my delegates for the rest of the day. I was sure that Windmill had intended this job as his revenge. But for the time being, I was content.

5

The asphalt smelled of rain and was just as gray as the sky. I was waiting for the bus to Jerusalem. On Friday night everything shut down—the Shabbat was holy and no work was permitted, without exception.
The seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, holy to the LORD. Whoever does any work on the Sabbath day shall be put to death
, it says somewhere in the Torah, if I recall correctly. Because everything would lurch to a halt in an hour, the Tel Aviv bus station was packed. The rain was really pouring down by now and travelers pushed into the humid concourse. Across from me was a young woman in uniform, painting her nails. On the chair next to her lay a small purse and a machine gun.
To her right was a man in royal blue shorts wearing a white yarmulke that was affixed to his ginger curls by two big hair clips. Behind me, two Thais of indeterminable age were having a loud conversation. The bus pulled up and all of us got on. The air inside the bus was hot and stale, the windows fogged from the inside. As on most Israeli buses the mood was tense. Everybody watched everybody. Women and children were mostly innocuous, as were older men. It was mostly the young guys who might strap on a bomb. Every hint of a paunch was suspicious.

On the seats in front of me a couple in uniform sat down. She was taller than he, blond, slender, and meticulously made up. He had an alert, intelligent gaze and a heavy body, which he maneuvered gracefully along the aisle. She laughed at the little stories that he whispered to her in Russian. After every comma, they kissed. I was so jealous that my heart ached. I couldn’t remember ever laughing that hard at anything Elisha told me, and for that, I felt I’d done him an injustice.

They were waiting in front of the bus terminal. Ori ran toward me. He hugged me and gave me a brief kiss on the mouth. There was a lighthearted and trusting quality about him, that of somebody who had not yet been
betrayed. Maybe it was his age. He was twenty-two, had just finished his military service, and was under the impression that life meant well for him.

“So glad you could make it,” Ori said. “This is my sister, Tal.”

Tal extended her hand and I shook it a little longer than necessary.

Ori took my bag, slung it over his shoulder, and waved over a cab. I kept looking back over to Tal. She had long dark-blond curls and green-brown eyes that reminded me of sandpaper. And in her face I saw something that was in mine, too, and it didn’t bode well.

We ate in the old town. En route we saw Orthodox Jews dressed up in shiny coats and furred hats for Shabbat.

The restaurant was big and simply furnished, light marble tiles on the floor and walls, a lot of flaked-off fake gold and small plastic flower arrangements on the tables.

Our waiter was a scraggy man with a thick mustache and golden canine teeth. Reluctantly, he wiped off the table with a not-quite-clean cloth and then threw menus down in front of us. When I thanked him in Arabic and asked about the homemade lemonade, his eyes lit up. Ori and Tal were just as surprised as the waiter. He asked whether I was a 1948 Arab—a
Palestinian who had remained in Israel after the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. I said that I wasn’t. His long, bony, reddish face looked at me questioningly.

I caught Ori’s puzzled glance. And so did the waiter, who, obviously amused, asked me where I was from. He spoke the extremely soft and almost songlike Palestinian that I loved so much, because it reminded me of Lebanese and therefore of Sami.

“From Germany.” In this situation this seemed like the easiest answer.

“My cousin is living in Germany. Beautiful country. But people don’t learn Arabic there?”

“I studied it.”

“That makes sense. With your classical Arabic you sound like a newscaster.” He laughed.

“What choice did I have? At the university we almost exclusively studied Fusha. Only very rarely were there classes on ‘Amia, the dialects,” I said, defending myself.

“And which dialect did you pick?”

“Lebanese,” I said, and I could feel myself blush.

The waiter smiled at me. “And your husband?” he asked me.

Ori raised his right eyebrow questioningly.

“I’m not married. I’m an interpreter.”

“Hebrew–Arabic?” he asked.

I shook my head. “I translate Russian and French.”

The waiter nodded. “French. Very romantic, but useless. The dessert is on the house.” He patted Ori’s back and headed to the next table.

“You speak Arabic?” Ori asked.

“Yes.”

“Why?” asked Tal.

“What do you mean, why?”

“You speak Arabic, but no Hebrew. That’s strange, isn’t it?”

“What use is there in learning a small language like Hebrew? If I can have a UN language instead?”

“Your Arabic isn’t bad at all,” Ori said. Tal leaned back and crossed her arms.

“You speak Arabic?” I asked Ori.

“Only what I learned in the army. But they don’t want to hear that.”

Tal rolled her eyes. Ori saw it and I could see him trying to keep his composure.

“A friend of mine is fluent in Arabic. His Arabic is better than that of most Arabs,” Ori said.

I swallowed hard.

“But only because he works for the secret service,” Tal said. Her dress was shiny black-blue. Gold jewelry glittered around her neck and in her hair.

“As did I,” Ori said.

“Then you should know what happens there.” Tal held her breath for a moment, beside herself with rage.
Ori shot her a hostile look. Tal leaned back in her chair and continued, “But you spent your military service in front of a computer. You weren’t out there. You don’t know the first thing.”

The waiter now looked over contemptuously.

“Fine. You are the only fighter in the family. Are you accusing me of not having been in a combat unit? Should I have lost a leg for the country? Or an arm? Would you have preferred that?” said Ori.

Tal got up and left, slamming the door.

“Can’t we have a single conversation without it turning into a negotiation over Zionism and the entire history of Israel?” Ori leaned on his elbows.

“I’m going to check on her.”

“Go ahead. Leave me here all by myself.”

Tal was standing in front of the restaurant, smoking. I joined her. A group of Orthodox Jews hurried past, their hats covered with plastic bags to protect them from the rain.

“I don’t glorify them. I think our culture is fundamentally different from Palestinian culture. Women don’t have any rights in Arab society and there’s a lot of other shit going down there. What I care about is my country. I love my country, but not its current state. I want to live in a free, democratic state.”

“OK,” I said.

We smoked in silence. The sun lowered in the sky—a rapid succession of pink, orange, lilac, purple, and then the absence of light. As we went back inside, Tal’s hand grazed my bottom.

That night I stayed in Ori’s apartment. I told him that sleeping with him had been an accident that would never happen again. And then I told him about Elisha and said that I couldn’t recall Elisha’s face in the dark. Ori listened patiently, without saying a word. After I was done, he gave me a long hug and left the light on in the hallway. Once he returned, he held me and said nothing and that felt so good that for a long time I couldn’t stop crying. I cried because it felt good. I cried because then he pulled me closer. I cried because he wasn’t embarrassed by my tears. And I cried because he wouldn’t leave until I stopped. When the tears finally ceased, Ori fell asleep immediately. Exhausted. By me. I got up, left him a note, and went home.

6

A week later I was invited over to Tal’s for dinner. I hadn’t planned on going but then I was too nervous to cancel.

Besides, I had spent the morning with Hannah and Aunt No. 13 at Yad Vashem. Following the elaborate and devastating visit, Aunt No. 13 invited us for coffee and cake. In the air-conditioned cafeteria of Yad Vashem she told us about the renovations at her house that started with the purchase of a new TV (the same that my Great-aunt No. 7 had recently bought). Unfortunately, the TV didn’t fit on the wall, so she’d had a window bricked up and put it there instead. Furthermore, she had seen a nice parquet on discount at the
hardware store and had bought it right away. Except that it wasn’t quite enough to cover the floor (Aunt No. 13 was a little cheap) and now it was sold out. She had to buy a different kind that looked like the other one, but later it turned out that the new kind was slightly thicker than the old one. Now she was at a loss. The Arabs who worked for her said she’d have to redo the whole thing, but Aunt No. 13 accused them of being jihadists. And now, she said, she could begin telling Hannah and me about my grandmother’s escape from the Germans. I quickly told her I knew the story already, as I feared we might never leave Yad Vashem.