Beirut, Beirut

by Sonallah Ibrahim

  But urine pressed on my bladder, and made me abandon my wisdom or fear, so I walked up to the door and started pounding on it with all my strength while shouting and calling out.

  After a while my hands hurt, so I stopped the pounding and listened. I heard footsteps approach. A key turned in the lock and then the door opened up onto a dim electric light, and a young man carrying a machinegun slung over his shoulder, with a cigarette dangling from his mouth that gave off the smell of hashish.

  “What are you knocking for?” he said to me sharply.

  “I want to go to the bathroom,” I said.

  He shut the door without saying a word. I stood there, confused and contemplating whether I should start pounding on the door some more. Soon the door opened again. The young gunman appeared, holding a plastic bucket that he tossed at my feet. Then he closed the door in order to lock it, but I objected, saying: “I want to speak to the person in charge here.”

  “Not my concern,” he replied.

  He pushed me away, then pulled the door closed, and turned the key in the lock.

  I carried the bucket over to the corner that was occupied by the cardboard boxes, and urinated. I felt relief. I resumed pacing the room back and forth, groping about for a little warmth. Then I sat down on the floor in the corner I had prepared for myself. I lay down with my knees bent and my arms beneath my head. I fixed my eyes on the thin strip of light underneath the door.

  I must have nodded off for some time, because I suddenly became aware of a sound at the door. I found that it was open, and a broad-bodied man had planted himself in the doorframe. He had a machinegun in his left hand. Dim light fell from behind him onto part of the floor in the room, concealing his face from me. But I perceived the movement of the machinegun in his hand, gesturing me to come out.

  I stepped outside, and he forcefully grabbed me by the arm. I saw that he was a man noticeably advanced in age, with a head of white hair, although obviously endowed with bodily strength. We walked along a long passageway lit by a single electric lamp, and with two other doors opening onto it. The smell of the air, the heavy dampness coming from the walls, and the tiled floor made me feel that we were below ground.

  We went up a steep staircase to another passageway, this one flooded with the warmth of strong light from fluorescent lamps. The floor was covered with colorful linoleum. The passageway was long, and at the end of it hung a flag next to a photograph I couldn’t clearly make out.

  My escort came to a stop in front of a door and knocked on it. Then he turned the handle and pushed me in front of him. He entered behind me and closed the door.

  I was struck by the heat coming from the radiator on one side of the room. I saw that I was facing a desk, behind which sat a heavy-set, rough-lipped, clean-shaven young man. He was talking on the phone with his eyes on a color television screen that rested on top of a wooden table beside the desk. He was wearing a short-sleeved shirt with the top buttons undone, revealing thick hair on his chest and arms. The hair on his head was fine and black, carefully trimmed and parted on the left.

  I couldn’t understand anything he was saying on the phone because he was speaking French in a low voice. I directed my attention to a piece of cloth hanging on the wall above his head with a colorful cedar tree embroidered on it. On another wall there was a piece of paper with a line of Arabic written on it in a substance like liquid gold: “Of the repositories of knowledge in the world, their treasures are from Lebanon. Of the languages of nations, their most beautiful letters come from Lebanon. Of the Seven Wonders of the World, their greatest legend comes from Lebanon. The tree of eternal life selected for its everlasting abode a mountaintop from Lebanon. The Son of God was baptized in water from Lebanon. I wonder: did Adam leave Paradise for your sake, O Lebanon?”

  The young man finished his phone conversation, put down the receiver, and continued watching the television screen for a moment. Then he reached out and turned it off. He directed his attention to several pieces of paper in front of him, among which I recognized the contents of my pockets. He flipped through them with short, plump fingers that had long, manicured nails.

  He addressed me without taking his eyes off the papers in his hand.

  “I can’t find any indication here of your sect.”

  “I don’t understand what you mean,” I said.

  “Your religion,” he asked. “What is it?”

  For the first time, he lifted his eyes up at me, and two cold, yellowish circles looked out from a bloated face with oily skin.

  “Aren’t you going to introduce yourself to me first?” I asked. “And tell me why I’m here?”

  A ghost of a sardonic smile appeared on his lips.

  “You don’t know yet?” he asked.

  “I could guess where I am. But I don’t know why I’ve been abducted.”

  He slowly lit a French cigarette, then explained: “You’ll find that out after you tell me first what you’re doing in Beirut, and where you’re staying. You’re living in West Beirut. Isn’t that right?”

  I nodded.

  “So you won’t tell me what your religion is?”

  “What does my religion have to do with it?” I asked.

  He stared at me for a moment, and then spoke in the tone of someone using self-control: “Religion is the mark of a man. His identity. It’s what determines his relationship to his Creator.”

  “Then defining it is of no importance,” I replied. “Every individual determines his relationship to his Creator according to his religion. And as far as I’m concerned, religions are all the same to me.”

  “That’s not how we see it. For all of its existence, Lebanon has been threatened with annihilation by Islam.”

  “I have another idea of the danger that has threatened Lebanon, and which is threatening it now.”

  “You’re in luck that I want to talk logically with you. It gives me a chance to explain my point of view.”

  I paid no attention to him and went on: “It’s based on you being a majority in Lebanon. That’s a subject for debate. Because there are those who say that Muslims are the majority now. In any case, whether you are the majority or minority, this doesn’t change the nature of the danger that is threatening Lebanon. It’s the same danger that threatens the Arab and Muslim countries and all the states of the third world.”

  He shook the ash from his cigarette into a silver dish on which the white bayonets of three rifles embraced each other, and said, “You’re talking about an imaginary danger. I’m referring to Arab expansion, and that’s a real danger.”

  I laughed. “Where is this Arab expansion? There’s only an Arab nationalist awakening that is uprooting all religions. In fact, some activists in this awakening are Christians, as you know.”

  “They are Arabs. As for us, we are Phoenicians.”

  I looked at him in disbelief.

  “Are you being serious? I’ll say it again: whether you’re Phoenicians or Arabs, it won’t change the reality of the shared danger that confronts all Lebanese, Syrians, Iraqis, Egyptians, Iranians and so on.”

  He put out his cigarette in the gun-ashtray and lit a new one.

  “So what do you think about the oppression that Christians are confronted with in Egypt?”

  I took my time in answering as I thought of a suitable response. He put on a victorious smile and said, “Have you thought about it? Have you considered it?”

  “I won’t claim that there isn’t discrimination,” I hastened to say. “But it doesn’t rise to the level of oppression. Also, part of it is artificial. The other part is a legacy of the past. When we imposed secularism on the state, we put an end to all trace of it.”

  “What I’ve seen in Egypt is just the opposite of that. It’s a profound and historical oppression. And it’s also growing.”

  “This is what I meant when I said that a part of the existing discrimination is artificial. It’s what Islamist groups are practicing and calling for. I myself have heard one of these
fanatics say that Pope Shenouda is more dangerous to Egypt than Begin is. In that regard, he is entirely in agreement with you. You are allied with Israel against your fellow countrymen.”

  He shrugged. “You can’t blame a drowning man for asking the Devil for help.”

  “How do you know he will really help you? That he won’t seize the opportunity to devour you?”

  He laughed derisively. “Will he devour a corpse that foreigners have squeezed the life out of?”

  “You mean the Palestinians? Their presence in Lebanon is what protects you from the Israelis.”

  “No one protects Lebanon from anything. Our weakness and our neutrality is our weapon. So long as we don’t attack anyone else or threaten them, no one will put us in harm’s way.”

  “Do you really think that?”

  His cheeks flushed red. But he continued to hold fast to his outward calm.

  “What matters to me is your admission of the actual oppression of Christians in Egypt. It makes me happy that we are in agreement on that point.”

  “On the contrary,” I replied. “We are not in agreement at all. There really is discrimination. But you oppose it with reverse discrimination, while I oppose it with the complete elimination of religious division. During the fighting in 1975–76, there appeared among you a movement to remove religion as a category from identity cards. That’s what we need. Secular states, not religious ones, where the place of the individual is determined on the basis of his ability, not on the basis of religion, family or tribe.”

  “You mean, abolishing sectarianism?” he said disparagingly. “That’s impossible. The end of sectarianism means the end of religion.”

  “I don’t think I can persuade you to come around to my point of view,” I said, with a note of weariness. “What I’m asking of you now is to give me my papers and my passport and to let me go.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Just like that?”

  “Yes, just like that.”

  He let out a short laugh. “I didn’t expect that you would get bored of our hospitality so quickly,” he said.

  I followed his lead, saying: “What hospitality? I haven’t eaten a thing all day. The room is cold, with no bed, blankets, or light. There isn’t even any water to drink.”

  He feigned interest and turned to the old man who had escorted me, saying, “Is this possible? No water?”

  The old man muttered something about how he would get me some.

  “Unfortunately, today is a holiday,” the young man said to me with a malicious smile. “Shops are closed. Our warehouses are, too. But we’ll make everything available to you tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow is Sunday,” I said. “Everything is closed as well.”

  “That’s your bad luck,” he said coldly.

  He nodded to the guard, who came up to me, grabbed me by the arm, and led me out.

  Chapter 22

  My bad luck was confirmed when the following day arrived without sunlight. I kept my eyes on the skylight, waiting for light and the warmth it would bring. But the sky stayed dark. Soon rain was pouring down in torrents. Drops of it scattered across the skylight, and then collected beneath it on the floor, in a small puddle.

  I resisted the cold by continually moving. I avoided thinking about what could happen to me at the hands of the Phoenician and his men. From time to time, I put my ear to the keyhole. But I couldn’t pick out a single sound that revealed that anyone except myself was there in the building.

  After some time, there came to my ears the sound of footsteps approaching and stopping at the door. The door opened to reveal the young man who had brought me the urine bucket the day before. On the floor, he put a tray that had on it a loaf of white round bread, a paper carton of milk, and a cup of tea with steam rising from it. He had hardly turned away before I hurried over to the tray. I held the cup of tea in my hands and savored the warmth of its contents. Then I turned to the loaf of bread and milk.

  The paltry meal only compounded my desire for coffee and cigarettes. But I distracted myself by walking and jumping, and by a series of waking dreams. From there I quickly moved on to making big plans – a stage known to every prisoner after a period of confinement. I worked out plans to quit smoking and drinking, develop an exercise regimen, live near the ocean, and double the number of hours I spent writing.

  Darkness was about to fall when I set about propping up my corner with more cardboard boxes, and then I coiled myself into a ball and my eyes succumbed to sleep.

  I entered a deep, uninterrupted slumber that I didn’t emerge from until dawn. I watched the light spread out without leaving my place. But soon enough I moved when the sun’s rays fell on the wall next to the skylight and spread out over it in the shape of a rhomboid heading toward one of the corners below. I stood under the sunny rectangle, looking for a little warmth. Its area gradually expanded, and I was able to put my hair in it, then my forehead, my ear, and my eye.

  I enjoyed the warmth spreading on my face, and then my chest. I spent the following hours between the patch of sunlight and the door. Muffled sounds, coming from different directions, were penetrating through it. Several feet passed by it without stopping. But I didn’t lose hope that the person who carried the tray would be here at any moment.

  The sun’s heat reached its high point, and then began to recede. I amused myself for a time by hunting a fly that had settled on yesterday’s tray. Finally, I heard the sound of the key turning in the lock. The door opened to reveal the old guard.

  He gestured to me to come out, and I obeyed. I had hardly stepped outside the room when I sensed the presence of someone else. Before I could make out his face, a cloth blindfold was put over my eyes and tied around my head. Then a hand on my back pushed me and I walked forward, stumbling. One of them grabbed my arm and pulled me through a long passage. We went up a set of stairs and continued walking. Then we went down a long staircase. It seemed to me as though we were taking the same route as the first time. My idea was confirmed when I sensed that we had gone out into the street.

  There was a car motor running nearby. A hand pushed me forward toward the source of the sound. Then it pushed down on my shoulder, and forced me to lean over. My leg bumped against a metal edge. The next moment, I was settling into a car seat between two guards.

  The car set out at a normal speed. A little later it doubled its speed. Then I smelled the ocean. I heard one of the people sitting with me say, “Here.”

  The car stopped; no one moved. The one sitting to my right lit a cigarette. The sound of the lighter being flicked was repeated a few times. Then the car filled with cigarette smoke. No one said a word.

  The silence was total. We seemed to be in an out-of-the-way place. I thought I detected the sound of a car at a distance. I listened closely. Some time passed before I could make out the sound. Gradually, it began to grow louder, until it came to a stop near us. The one sitting on my left moved to open the door next to him and got out of the car. His footsteps receded, then disappeared. A little later, he came back and ordered me to get out.

  He grabbed me by the arm as I stepped outside. He walked several steps with me, then stopped. Then he let go of me. I heard the sound of his feet moving away in the direction we had come from.

  My heart pounded violently. I thought about putting my hand up and pulling off the blindfold, but I didn’t dare. Then I heard the car I had come in start its motor. I thought about running, or throwing myself on the ground. Then I heard the car take off in the distance.

  Several heavy, unhurried feet approached me. A hand reached up to my blindfold and removed it. I blinked several times before I could make out the man who was standing in front of me. He was heavy-set and elegantly dressed, and wore sunglasses.

  He touched my arm with his hand, pointed me to a black American car standing at a distance, and said: “This way, please.”

  I walked beside him in a daze. We reached the car and he opened the back door, stepping aside so I could get in. Then he cl
osed the door, walked around the car, and proceeded to get in on the other side.

  There was a young man wearing similar glasses sitting beside the driver. As for the latter, I only saw one side of a bald head covered by a cloth cap.

  “Where are we going?”

  No one bothered to answer me. I understood what they wanted and kept silent.

  The car passed through semi-deserted streets surrounded by demolished houses. Then the view changed, as we traveled through a high-class neighborhood that hadn’t suffered much destruction. Then after fifteen minutes, the scenery of ruins returned.

  The sun had set by the time we headed to a sloping street leading up to a large building on a hill. Electric light radiated from its windows. We rode alongside a high fence made of iron bars. We slowed down in front of a gate guarded by soldiers, on top of which was a brass plaque declaring it to be the Ministry of Defense for the Republic of Lebanon.

  The soldiers raised the barrier to let our car through. It crossed the entranceway and turned toward the right. Then it stopped in front of a flight of ascending marble stairs.

  My escort left the car, then gestured to me to follow him. We went up the marble stairs, followed by the other man who had been sitting beside the driver. We passed through a wide door to a large hallway crowded with soldiers and civilians. We went up another flight of stairs, and walked along a long corridor between two rows of closed doors. Finally, we slowed down and stopped in front of an office. My escort knocked on the door and went inside, while I remained outside with his colleague.

  A few moments later, the man came out and gestured to me to come in. Then he closed the door behind me.

  The office extended to the left of the entrance to where an enormous wooden desk stood. Behind it sat a short, elegantly dressed man. The man stood up and put out his hand for me to shake, saying: “Welcome, sir. A pleasure to meet you.”