“We’re still close. You know, I thought the bullying would stop after school. I was wrong. Hasan has always been there for me. He got married last summer.”
“To whom? What does he do now?”
“Their neighbour’s daughter. She and her parents came back from Australia. Quite a rich family actually! He owns a small business. After his father passed he opened kitchen appliance store. It’s a good business. He always looks out for me.”
“He is a good guy.”
“Adam, do you know that I am…”
“A homosexual?”
“Gay.”
“Yes. I knew before I left school. At the beginning I thought you were weak and kids took advantage, bullying you.”
“Would you do the same if you knew then?”
“Do you mean, would I still stop those guys from hurting you?”
“Yeah.”
“I think it goes without saying that you were a trouble magnet. It was a jungle, not a school. They smelled weakness and bullied you. I didn’t like mean kids.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“It wasn’t you being gay that made me take your side. I just didn’t like how they treated you.”
“Do you hate me?”
“Why? Because you’re gay! The answer is no, I don’t hate you. I have no business to tell you what is right and what’s wrong.”
“Do you think it is wrong to be gay?”
“I think it is for you to decide who you want to share bed with. It’s our people that don’t accept it.”
“Yeah tell me about it!”
**********
Before Sami told me about Hasan’s fate, the last I had heard of him was from Edrees in that winter of 2007. It took me few moments to process the news in 2012. “How was he killed?” I asked. Sami smiled before recounting, “His twink friend got him killed.”
“Twink is an awful word. What happened?”
“Do you know the faggot Edrees…”
“That’s another vulgar word. Can you please tell the story without being so fucking judgemental?”
“What the fuck man? Why do you have to be this way? I am just telling you a story you don’t know.”
“My fault…”
“He is a guy who likes to be fucked in the ass…”
“Man, please be respectful. They were both friends.”
“Do you want to know what happened?”
“Yes, please.”
“Edrees has a Kurdish friend. So the Kurdish guy and his brother asked Edrees to join them fishing by the old bridge. After the fishing trip, he went to Hasan’s shop. Hasan knew that Edrees had allowed the Kurdish guys to fuck him. Anyways, he went after the Kurdish guys. The older guy stabbed him in the abdomen. He died on the way to the hospital.”
“Shit,” I murmured as I observed Sami intently with a fury that I couldn't fail to hide. Hasan had known that Edrees was gay; long before I did. Edrees told me so. Sami’s judgemental version of the story didn’t make any sense to me. Edrees’ so-called friends must’ve raped him and thus, Hasan went after them, I thought.
**********
I have the habit of contemplating the evolution of my so-called moral code. I had myself convinced that if I managed to figure what led me away from the sheep, I would be able to influence others and bring them to what I ascribe to be right. Seeing the sickening methods of ISIL executions, of those they label as gay in Ar-Raqqa and Mosel, one could only wonder whether psychopathy is to blame. The Russian thugs’ campaign of humiliation against their gay countrymen suggested some support to the aforementioned notion. If psychopathy was the disease, then empathy might be a remedy. Putting oneself in another’s shoes, allowing a sip of the tragedy of being different, might open one’s eyes to the aggression against that group of people. In the anticipation of that aggression lay anger towards aggressors. And that anger was derived from the exposure to the threat. Yet, the threat was there for being nothing except what you were! Not being able to change yourself would bring frustration to anger. For in the absence of justice, the two states were amplified. And here came the question, what to do about it? Should I call the demagogues the bigots they are! Should I prevent their abuse? Or should I take no action as an action? But no action ain’t an action, my conscience shouted out loud.
It wasn’t only ISIL and thugs; it wasn’t only a Middle Eastern disease; and psychopathy wasn’t its only root. Being a homophobe implied being threatened. The fear of exposure to homosexual people might lead to a number of attitudinal and behavioural responses. The most clichéd was “fight or flight”. One can clearly see the harm the aggressor causes when they choose fight as a means of reducing this anxiety and fear. I was inclined to believe that this kind of emotion was a socio-cultural artefact as the trend was not global. Our value system was at the core of it. I could see that the system was hard to alter. Yet I went further to claim that the equation was not just exposure, value system, and then fear. There were plenty of things between. Our species evolved and such impulses were not initially given by nature. Regulating these impulses might take a while but it was what separated us from the less evolved species.
Chapter 13
From Behind the Telescope
My earliest memories were of me feeling saddened by Fadi leaving for school. It was winter and I was wearing these girly pink gloves that my mother had bought from some thrift shop. I wouldn’t say I had much of a childhood, but however short it might’ve been, it wasn’t the best or worst of times. Thinking about it, my college days weren't much different. I don’t have much to say about them either; except of course for the two tiny scars and that urgent trip back to Ar-Raqqa. A part of me has always been intimate with tragedies, without allowing them to overwhelm and define me. Maybe that resilience was not some inherited willpower; but rather my own evolution, forging me into one who wouldn’t break under pressure. Maybe I have been broken all along.
Absorbed in the scene of Sheila’s cats jumping over each other, I couldn’t help but mutter, “Fuck!” Rubbing my shoulder, she asked, “What?”
“The cat’s brought up some old memories,” I replied.
**********
Awakened by the sound of somebody knocking on my door, I was taken by surprise to see Uncle Khamees on my doorstep. We have never gotten along. As I tried to invite him in, he cut me short, “Put something on, be quick! It is urgent.”
I yawned, confused, “What is…”
“Just wear something, I will explain on the way.”
This cannot be good, I thought rushing to my room. On our way down he harangued me for not getting a cell phone. At first I figured my uncle had some business in Aleppo, he wouldn’t make the trip just to see me, let alone to urge me to tag along with him. It didn’t hit me that some serious shit had happened until I saw Meqdad leaning on his taxi by the entrance. “What the fuck is going on?” I looked my uncle in the eyes demanding an answer. “Nothing, my mother was at the hospital. We couldn’t get hold of you yesterday. She’s not well. They already took her back to Ar-Raqqa. She asked for you.”
“Oh, I am very sorry.”
Studying my uncle’s empty gaze through nothingness between Aleppo and Ar-Raqqa I concluded, she is long gone. Over the new bridge looking down at the Euphrates River my uncle made no sense noting, “Your father needs your support, now more than ever.” My grandmother was old, so however tragic, my father's not likely to need me to help him in grief, I thought. so I suspected it wasn't my grandmother or my father, but I couldn’t figure who it was. When I got out of the taxi my uncle broke into tears, “Sorry, sorry, sorry. Your brother passed.” I heard what he said, but something else caught my attention.
My mother emerged, from the door, faltered and fell to her knees. And all I could hear were her howls reduced to some buzzing sound. And all I could see was her falling scarf, her hands reaching the ground, and the soil covering more of her face each time she slapped her cheeks. I took her hand and led her home as if
dealing with a tantrumming child. My wailing father grabbed my shoulder and I turned to him as my mother stared on and all I could think of was my parent’s pillow talk that summer night when we all had slept in the courtyard.
Their words echoed in my ears, muting their ceremony of grief. Their tears were like waterfalls, landing on my face. I didn’t bother to wipe their pain from my face. All I longed for was that fucking pillow talk. They were like “Fadi is this,” and “Fadi is that.” They couldn’t have been more proud. I kissed my father on the forehead and my mother on her cheeks.
“There are a lot of people who want to pay their condolences,” my moaning father noted.
“I’ll take care of that,” I assured.
**********
“I guess you know that I am not a cat person,” I whispered in Sheila’s ear as I continued, “On a summer night, I suppose it was 2006, I was sleeping at my parents. I was awaked by a strange sound. I figured it was coming from under the table by my mattress. I actually woke my mother up to take care of them! I mean to get them out of the room. Long story short, my mother managed to get a kitten out from under the bed. The mother of the kitten attacked my mother, howling at her. She was forced to put the kitten on the ground; I suppose she got scared. With her mouth the mother grabbed the nape of the small kitten’s neck and scurried out of the room. At that sight, I could see the drops coursing down my mother's face. Tearfully she murmured, ‘Why didn’t I have a chance to save my baby?’ I couldn’t say a word to her.”
Observing me Sheila asked, “How is she these days?” Kissing her on the forehead I replied, “With the conflict and a life of constant loss, the poor woman has never had a break.” With a hand over my face, she added “And what about you?” I thinned my lips, forcing an automatic reply, “I am fine!” She knew that I didn’t want to end the night recounting the tales and aftermath of the conflict.
In light of my distanced telescopic exposure to the mayhem, I refused to plagiarise others’ personal tragedies as my own. There is an authorship in misery that costs more than empathy. Often I’d found myself dumbstruck in failed attempts to simulate that particular unfamiliar dolour. After all, no one takes pleasure in being possessed by a wailing father collecting the decapitated head of his innocent six year old. Even on the hinge of a willing attempt at full empathy with those cursed with such catastrophes, one had to have a superhuman emotional powers. I could not, in any way, claim the ability to relate to those who have been forced to swallow the never-ending bitter and poisonous pills of our inherited misfortune. Yet that excruciating pain in my chest seemed to elicit a state of agony in me, even from far behind the telescope. It could have been my tribal gene amplified by the ripple effect of the falling, moving in me what was left of my humanity.
**********
Tunisia had a spiral effect over Middle Easterners and North Africans everywhere. The revolutionary movement had somehow awakened many to their long-endured abuse. The Tibetan-style one-man protest ignited a burning desire to reclaim a long lost sense of dignity in all of us.
Before the middle of March 2011, I hadn’t even in my wildest dreams thought my people would chant, “Enough!” That said, Tunisia gave me some hope. I thought, I might be able go back one day. I had this fantasy of my mother asking me to come back. Her last words in August 2008 were, “Never come back. I lost one, don’t make it two.”
I understood then, it would break my parents and kill any opportunity my siblings might have, should I get caught. Uncle Khamees had been detained for the fifth time. The forty-seven-year-old had spent more time in the cage than outside; he wouldn’t change it even if he could have spent the rest of his life free. My unlawful actions were not anywhere close to his, not by a long shot. If it wasn’t for that head of Deir Al Zor’s intelligence police, I wouldn’t have raised any red flags. Jamea Jamea was the name of that asshole. He was demoted to that position after the Syrian troops had to leave Lebanon, where he used to “serve.”
During college, then after graduation and even throughout my teaching career in that college, I’d earned some extra cash selling home-made copies of audio disks. There were no copyright laws against it. For some reason, Jamea Jamea hated Rock n’ Roll. He’d led this campaign against those dealing and using that “drug”. He deemed an appetite for that genre as satanic. I alerted my parents that things might go south after one of my clients got detained. With the ordeal of my uncle in the picture, they couldn’t risk it. It was a no-brainer as we concluded that I should leave the country. I didn’t realise the troubles I had caused then. My father had to jump through many hoops, paying the way of my exodus in bribes.
My master studies were completed in June of 2010. A classmate of mine desperately wanted to celebrate my last day in school. Although I hinted that it would be more convenient the following day, I couldn’t change her mind. She said she wanted to watch a movie with me. Deprived of sleep, I couldn’t help but snatch forty winks during the advertisements. Half way through that teen vampire movie, my vibrating phone saved me.
I went all the way down to the parking lot where I lit a cigarette before calling the unknown number back. It was from somebody in Saudi Arabia. I only knew two people over there; an uncle and a friend. Hearing his voice, I realised it was Uncle Hamad.
“Hello my child” Uncle Hamad began.
“Hello uncle, how’re you?”
“Thank god. How were your exams?”
“Good! Today was my last.”
“I know your father told me.”
“Okay…”
“Your father asked me to wait until you had finished…”
“Wait for what?”
“It is more serious than you think.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Do you know Jamea Jamea?”
“The motherfucker!”
“How is your daughter?”
“What?!”
“It’s okay, you can tell me.”
Laughingly I replied, “Why wouldn’t I? If I had a daughter, I would tell you about her.”
“It’s just, me and your father, through a friend of a friend, paid some cash to sit with Jamea Jamea…”
“And?”
“After you escaped, the police confiscated your belongings.”
“Like what?”
“Your computer, books, and documents.”
“I see.”
“They found something on the hard disk, even after you had formatted it.”
“Okay, what is it?”
“There is this opposition website where you wrote some articles.”
“Oh. It was nothing. I thought… I mainly cited some of the hate speeches of the neighbouring mosques. Besides…”
“It doesn’t matter. So are you married?”
“Enough with that. I am not married and I don’t have any children.”
“The report they showed stated that you are.”
“Okay, that’s not right.”
“Is anybody paying you?”
“I earn my money. No uncle, nobody is paying me anything. Can you please cut the foreplay? Please cut to the fucking chase.”
“The report…”
“Yes the fucking report.”
“We read the whole thing. It says that you are married to an Asian American. Initially she was your boss…”
I couldn’t help it but break up in a belly laugh for a moment before noting, “What movie was that? I am sorry, please keep going.”
“It’s serious…”
“Again, I am sorry, but this is hilarious.”
“Your boss worked for the Chinese and Americans and you worked for the Mossad.”
“Is it because my boss was an Asian American? So, she is a double agent! I know all roads lead to the Mossad but a triple agent, that’s something new. China! I am sorry uncle but this is too fucking hysterical.”
“The report continued that you got married to your boss and both of you are paid by foreign agencies.”
“You know you cannot come back.”
“I know.”
“Your father wanted to tell you but he is afraid that his line is tapped.”
“It’s okay. Thank you for letting me know about it.”
“Just one more thing, you are already charged.”
“A shocker, spit it out uncle!”
“You are charged in absentia. The court concluded that your crime falls under ‘weakening the national spirit ’.”
“Do you mean sedition?!”
“I don’t know, it says ‘weakening the national spirit ’.”
“Whatever the fuck is that? I would say very merciful for a triple agent.”
“Please be careful. A few months back your father was arrested. Somebody reported you cursing the regime and calling it Iran state-sponsored terrorism.”
**********
Before the uprising, my compatriots and I often entertained ideas of possible courses of events. Mine were very pessimistic then. “It will take over five years to topple Al-Assad,” I asserted to Kareem. The guy was a know-it-all generaliser. He wanted to assume leadership of our compatriots. He was double my size, but with his high-pitched voice he couldn’t intimidate a fly. Kareem came to the mall once, wanting to walk back home; something Syrians do. We love to stroll. I was tired, but didn’t mind. The way back to our neighbourhood cut through the high-rise buildings, to bungalows, to a dimly-lit area by the beach, and to the darker emptiness between the woods and the highway. By the beach I noticed a band of bikers watching us. I didn’t think much about it and continued on the pavement by the woods. It was there where two bikes stopped, facing us. Two guys on the back of each bike rushed towards us with their machetes. I tried to be diplomatic, and out of stupidity resisted giving them my backpack. As I was trying to talk my way out of it, I held one of the thug’s wrists. With a kick of adrenaline, I found the strength to twist the arm holding the machete, trying to gain possession of it. I hadn’t noticed the rest of the gang sprinting toward us. With two pulling my backpack, I found myself on the ground counting the kicks. All I could do was to save my head from their targeted attacks. If it wasn’t for a nearby vehicle’s startling horns, it would have been more than twelve stitches on my head.
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