by Paulo Coelho
I begin to dress her in the clothes she was wearing when I met her the last time we were alone together, before other men arrived in the city and changed the whole story: embroidered waistcoat, white lace blouse, an ankle-length skirt in black velvet threaded with gold. I listen to her talking about her conversations with the birds, and what the birds have to say to mankind, even though men are incapable of hearing and understanding. At that moment, I am her friend, her confessor, her…
I stop. I don’t want to open that door unless it is absolutely necessary. I have been through it four times already, and it has never got me anywhere. Yes, I remember all eight of the women who were there, and I know that one day I will hear the answer that is lacking, but up until now, this has never prevented me from moving on in my current life. The first time it happened, I felt really frightened, but then I realized that forgiveness works only if you accept it.
And that is what I did.
There is a moment in the Bible, during the Last Supper, when Jesus predicts that one of his disciples will deny him and one will betray him. He considers both crimes to be equally grave. Judas betrays him and, eaten away by guilt, hangs himself. Peter denies him, not just once but three times. He had time to think about what he was doing, but he persisted in his error. However, instead of punishing himself for this, he makes a strength of his weakness and becomes the first great preacher of the message taught to him by the man whom he had denied in his hour of need.
The message of love was greater than the sin. Judas failed to understand this, but Peter used it as a working tool.
I don’t want to open that door, because it’s like a dam holding back the ocean. Just one small hole would be enough for the pressure of the water to destroy everything and flood what should not be flooded. I’m on a train, and the only thing that exists is a Turkish woman called Hilal, who is first violin in an orchestra and is now standing in my bathroom, playing her music. I’m beginning to feel sleepy; the remedy is taking effect. My head droops, my eyes are closing. Hilal stops playing and asks me to go and lie down. I obey.
She sits in the chair and continues to play. Suddenly, I am not in the train, nor in the garden, where I saw her in that white lace blouse; I’m traveling down a long, deep tunnel that will carry me into nothingness, into heavy, dreamless sleep. The last thing I remember before falling asleep is the phrase that Yao stuck on the mirror that morning.
YAO IS CALLING ME.
“The reporter is here.”
It’s still daylight, and the train is standing in a station. I get up, my head spinning, open the door a crack, and find my publisher waiting outside.
“How long have I been asleep?”
“All day, I think. It’s five o’clock in the afternoon.”
I tell him that I need a bit of time to take a shower and wake up properly so that I don’t say things I’ll regret later.
“Don’t worry,” Yao says. “The train will be here for the next hour.”
It’s lucky that we’re stationary: having a shower when the train is in motion is a difficult and dangerous task. I could easily slip and hurt myself and end the journey in the most ridiculous way possible—on crutches. Whenever I get into the shower, I feel rather as if I were surfing. Today, though, it’s easy.
Fifteen minutes later, I emerge, have a coffee with the others, and am introduced to the reporter. I ask him how long he needs for the interview.
“We can arrange a time. I thought I could travel with you until the next station and—”
“Ten minutes will do. Then you can get off right here. I don’t want to put you to any unnecessary trouble.”
“But you’re not—”
“No, really, I don’t want to put you to any trouble,” I say again. I should never have agreed to do this interview; I obviously wasn’t thinking straight when I said yes. My objective on this journey is quite different.
The reporter looks at my publisher, who turns away and stares fixedly out the window. Yao asks if the table is a good place for them to film.
“I’d prefer the space between the carriages, next to the train doors,” says the cameraman.
Hilal glances at me. That’s where the Aleph is.
Doesn’t she get tired of sitting at the same table all the time? Once she had sent me off into that place beyond time and space, did she, I wonder, stay in the compartment, watching me sleep? Well, we’ll have time enough to talk later.
“Fine,” I say. “Set up your camera. But, just out of curiosity, why choose such a small, noisy space when we could stay here?”
The reporter and the cameraman, however, are already heading for the end of the carriage, so we follow them.
“Why this tiny space?” I ask again, while they’re setting up the equipment.
“To give the viewer a sense of reality. This is where everything happens. People leave their compartments, and, because the corridor is so narrow, they come here to talk instead. Smokers meet up here. For someone else it might provide somewhere to hold a secret rendezvous. All the carriages have these vestibules.”
At the moment, the space is occupied by me, the cameraman, the publisher, Yao, Hilal, and a cook who has come to watch.
“Could we have a little privacy?” I ask.
A television interview is the least private thing in the world, but the publisher and the cook leave. Hilal and Yao stay where they are.
“Could you move a little to the left?” the cameraman asks.
No, I can’t. That’s where the Aleph is, created by the many people who have stood there in the past. Even though Hilal is keeping a safe distance, and even knowing that we would plunge back into that one point only if we were standing close together, I feel that it’s best not to take any risks.
The camera is running.
“Before we begin, you mentioned that interviews and publicity were not the main purpose of this journey. Could you explain why you decided to travel on the Trans-Siberian Railway?”
“Because I wanted to. It was a dream of mine as an adolescent. That’s all.”
“As I understand it, a train like this isn’t exactly the most comfortable mode of transport.”
I go into automatic pilot and start answering his questions without really thinking. The questions keep coming, about the experience itself, my expectations, my meetings with my readers. I reply patiently, respectfully, but all the time I’m longing for it to be over. I reckon that the stipulated ten minutes must have elapsed by now, but he keeps asking questions. I make a discreet gesture with my hand, indicating that he should wind up the interview. He looks slightly put out but continues talking nonetheless.
“Are you traveling alone?”
A warning light starts flashing. It would seem that the rumor has already started to spread. I realize that this is the only reason for this unexpected interview.
“No, of course not. You saw how many people there were around the table in there.”
“But apparently the first violinist from the conservatory in Ekaterinburg—”
Like any good reporter, he has left the most difficult question for last. However, this is far from being the first interview I’ve ever done, and I interrupt him, saying, “Yes, she happened to be traveling on the same train, and when I found out, I invited her to join us whenever she liked. I love music. She’s a very talented young woman, and now and then we have the pleasure of hearing her play. Would you like to interview her? I’m sure she’d be happy to answer your questions.”
“Yes, if there’s time.”
He isn’t here to talk about music, but he decides not to press the point and changes the subject.
“What does God mean to you?”
“Anyone who knows God cannot describe Him. Anyone who can describe God does not know Him.”
Wow!
I’m surprised by my own words. I’ve been asked this question dozens of times, and my automatic-pilot response is always: “When God spoke to Moses, he said: ‘I am,’ so God is, therefore,
not the subject but the verb, the action.”
Yao comes over to me.
“Fine, we’ll end the interview there. Thanks very much for your time.”
Like Tears in the Rain
I GO BACK INTO MY COMPARTMENT and start feverishly noting everything I’ve just been talking about with the others. We will soon be arriving in Novosibirsk. I mustn’t forget anything, not a single detail. It doesn’t matter who asked what. If I can record my responses, they will provide excellent material for reflection.
WHEN THE INTERVIEW IS OVER, I ask Hilal to go and fetch her violin, on the assumption that the reporter will stay around for a while longer. That way, the cameraman could film her, and her work will reach a wider public. The reporter, however, says that he has to leave at once and send his interview off to the editorial office.
Meanwhile, Hilal returns with her violin, which she had left in the empty compartment next to mine.
My editor reacts badly.
“If you’re going to stay in that compartment, you’ll have to share the cost of the hire of the carriage. You’re taking up what little space we have.”
Then she sees the look in my eyes and does not pursue the topic.
“Since you’re ready, why don’t you play something for us?” Yao says to Hilal.
I ask for the loudspeakers in the carriage to be turned off and suggest that Hilal play something brief, very brief. She does as asked.
The atmosphere grows suddenly limpid. This must be obvious to everyone, because the constant tiredness that has been afflicting us all simply vanishes. I’m filled by a deep sense of peace, deeper even than the peace I experienced shortly before in my compartment.
Why have I been complaining all these months about not being in touch with the Divine Energy? What nonsense! We are always in touch with it; it’s only routine that prevents us from feeling it.
“I need to speak, but I don’t know exactly what about, so just ask me whatever you like,” I say.
It won’t be me speaking, but there’s no point trying to explain that.
“Have you met me somewhere in the past?” Hilal asks.
Would she really like me to answer that right here, in front of everyone?
“It doesn’t matter. You need to think about where each of us is right now, in the present moment. We’re accustomed to measuring time in the same way we measure the distance between Moscow and Vladivostok, but that isn’t how it works. Time neither moves nor is stationary. Time changes. We occupy one point in that constantly mutating time—our Aleph. The idea that time passes is important when you need to know when a train is going to leave, but apart from that, it’s not very useful, not even when you’re cooking. After all, however often you make a recipe, it always turns out different. Do you follow?”
Now that Hilal has broken the ice, everyone starts asking questions.
“Are we the result of what we learn?”
“We learn in the past, but we are not the result of that. We suffered in the past, loved in the past, cried and laughed in the past, but that’s of no use to the present. The present has its challenges, its good and bad side. We can neither blame nor be grateful to the past for what is happening now. Each new experience of love has nothing whatsoever to do with past experiences. It’s always new.”
I’m talking to them but also to myself. I wonder out loud, “Is it possible to fix love and make it stand still in time? Well, we can try, but that would turn our lives into a hell. I haven’t been married for more than twenty years to the same person, because neither she nor I have remained the same. That’s why our relationship is more alive than ever. I don’t expect her to behave as she did when we first met. Nor does she want me to be the person I was when I found her. Love is beyond time, or, rather, love is both time and space, but all focused on one single constantly evolving point—the Aleph.”
“People aren’t used to that way of thinking. They want everything to stay the same—”
“—and the consequence of that is pain,” I say, interrupting the speaker. “We are not the person other people wish we were. We are who we decide to be. It’s always easy to blame others. You can spend your entire life blaming the world, but your successes or failures are entirely your own responsibility. You can try to stop time, but it’s a complete waste of energy.”
The train brakes suddenly, unexpectedly, and everyone is startled. I am continuing to take in the meaning of what I’m saying, although I’m not sure everyone is keeping up with me.
“Imagine that the train didn’t brake in time, that there was a final, fatal accident. All those moments will be lost in time, like ‘tears in the rain,’ as the android said in Blade Runner. But will they? No, because nothing disappears, everything is stored up in time. Where is my first kiss filed away? In some hidden corner of my brain? In a series of electrical impulses that have been deactivated? My first kiss is more alive than ever, and I will never forget it. It’s here, all around me. It forms part of my Aleph.”
“But there are all kinds of problems I need to resolve now.”
“They lie in what you call the ‘past’ and await a decision to be made in what you call the ‘future.’ They clog your mind and slow you down, and won’t let you understand the present. If you rely only on experience, you’ll simply keep applying old solutions to new problems. I know a lot of people who feel they have an identity only when they’re talking about their problems. That way, they exist, because their problems are linked to what they judge to be ‘their history.’ ”
When no one comments on this, I go on.
“It takes a huge effort to free yourself from memory, but when you succeed, you start to realize that you’re capable of far more than you imagined. You live in this vast body called the Universe, which contains all the solutions and all the problems. Visit your soul; don’t visit your past. The Universe goes through many mutations and carries the past with it. We call each of those mutations a ‘life,’ but just as the cells in your body change and yet you remain the same, so time does not pass, it merely changes. You think you’re the same person you were in Ekaterinburg, but you’re not. I’m not even the same person I was when I began talking. Nor is the train in the same place it was when Hilal played her violin. Everything has changed; it’s just that we can’t see it.”
“But one day, our personal time will come to an end,” says Yao.
“An end? But death is just a door into another dimension.”
“And yet, despite what you’re saying, our loved ones and we ourselves will one day disappear.”
“Never. We never lose our loved ones. They accompany us; they don’t disappear from our lives. We are merely in different rooms. For example, I can’t see who is in the next carriage, but it contains people traveling in the same time as me, as you, as everyone. The fact that we can’t speak to them or know what’s going on in that other carriage is completely irrelevant. They are there. So what we call ‘life’ is a train with many carriages. Sometimes we’re in one, sometimes we’re in another, and sometimes we cross between them, when we dream or allow ourselves to be swept away by the extraordinary.”
“But we can’t see or communicate with them.”
“Yes, we can. Every night we shift onto another plane while we’re sleeping. We talk with the living, with those we believe dead, with those who live in another dimension, and with ourselves, with the people we once were and the people we will be.”
The energy is becoming more fluid, and I know I could lose the connection at any moment.
“Love always triumphs over what we call death. That’s why there’s no need to grieve for our loved ones, because they continue to be loved and remain by our side. It’s hard for us to accept that. If you don’t believe it, then there’s no point in my trying to explain.”
I notice that Yao is sitting now with head bowed. The question he asked me earlier is being answered.
“And what about the people we hate?”
“We shouldn’t underesti
mate any of our enemies who pass to the other side,” I reply. “In the magical Tradition, they have the curious name of ‘travelers.’ I’m not saying that they can do any harm here—they can’t, unless you let them. Because the fact is that we are there with them and they are here with us. On the same train. The only way to solve the problem is to correct mistakes and resolve conflicts. And that will happen at some point, even though it might take many ‘lives’ before it does. We carry on, meeting and saying good-bye for all eternity. A departure followed by a return, and a return followed by a departure.”
“But you said we were part of the Whole. Does that mean we don’t exist?”
“No, we do exist, but in the same way that a cell exists. A cell can cause a destructive cancer to invade an organism, but at the same time it can send out chemical elements that produce happiness and well-being. But the cell is not the person.”
“Why are there so many conflicts, then?”
“So that the world can evolve, so that the body can change. It’s nothing personal. Listen.”
They are listening but not hearing. I had better explain things more clearly.
“At this moment, the rails and the wheels of the train are in conflict, and we can hear the noise of that friction between metals. But the rail justifies the existence of the wheel and vice versa. The noise made by the metal is irrelevant; it’s merely a manifestation, not a cry of complaint.”
The energy has almost gone now. The others keep asking questions, but I can’t reply in a coherent manner. They all realize that it’s time to stop.
“Thank you,” says Yao.
“Don’t thank me. I was listening, too.”
“You mean…”
“Oh, everything and nothing. You’ll have noticed that I’ve changed my mind about Hilal. I shouldn’t be saying this here, because it won’t help her at all; on the contrary, some weak spirit might feel an emotion that degrades any human being—namely, jealousy. But my meeting with Hilal opened a door, not the door I wanted to open but another. I passed into another dimension of my life, into another carriage full of unresolved conflicts. People are waiting for me there, and I have to join them.”
