The Hungry and the Fat

by Timur Vermes

  “Well, well, now this madcap enterprise is even creating secure jobs.”

  The under-secretary shoots Lohm a fierce look.

  “Don’t look at me like that. I’m not saying it all works. We said there wasn’t a plan, but in less than five minutes we’ve come up with a good reason why someone might be interested in ensuring that they don’t all die of thirst. And we’re not just talking about the drivers of the water tankers – these people have to eat too.”

  “Yes, but they can’t cook. It has to stop somewhere. I mean, they don’t have field kitchens to hand. And wood or camping gas for one hundred and fifty thousand people – that can’t work.”

  “You mean it works for water, but not food?”

  “This isn’t the army we’re talking about! These are muppets in flip-flops. I’m sorry, but that’s the truth of the matter.”

  “So everything’s tickety-boo.”

  “Exactly.”

  “They’re going to die like beached whales.”

  “Exactly. And that’s terrible.”

  “Of course. Really terrible.”

  “We’re agreed, then.”

  By way of confirmation the under-secretary knocks back his espresso. Lohm sips his thoughtfully. The under-secretary once read that you shouldn’t gulp an espresso like a schnapps. But he’s seen Italians do it. Who to believe?

  “The food thing is only one problem. The difference is that making the journey with a people smuggler is far quicker, and a lorry takes you through all those areas where there’s nothing but a road and sand. I’m not saying the Africans aren’t up to it, but they’ve got to go everywhere on foot,” he says to Lohm. “There’s no infrastructure – no villages, nothing. And they’ve got to transport all the gear too. Calling the undertaking into question doesn’t make you a racist. I doubt even the Americans would be able to pull this off.”

  “Alright.”

  “Think about it! One hundred and fifty thousand – no way, José! That’s the size of the U.S. invasion force in Iraq.”

  “Fine, I give up. You’ve won.”

  The under-secretary sinks back in his chair.

  “Thank God. You were making me nervous for a moment.”

  “Good,” Lohm says. “So we’re just left with the images.”

  “Hmm?”

  “The images! Don’t forget this isn’t just a question of logistics!”

  The under-secretary flinches.

  “This isn’t just a mass of refugees perishing somewhere,” Lohm says. “This is a mass of refugees with their own telly programme. Presented by Nadeche Hackenbusch. It’s wiping the floor with the daily soaps.”

  “It’ll tail off—”

  “Yeah, right. People are starving, dying of thirst, the It-girl is flirting with a handsome, sensitive refugee and crying bitter tears – and all this is real, genuine. Go ahead and put your money on the likelihood of it tailing off, but I’ll bet against you any time. Five to one.”

  The under-secretary doesn’t move a muscle.

  “I’m telling you, if they do it right, they won’t just get enough viewers, they’ll get all the viewers. Anyone who like a bit of sensationalism. The compassionate types. The Nazis, because it makes them furious. Because it’s so different – not some star reporter being handed their water after filming—”

  “If they do it right . . .”

  “If I’m not mistaken, it’s like ‘I’m a Celebrity’ but with real corpses and Nadeche Hackenbusch in mortal danger. With that they can’t go wrong!”

  “You’re really enjoying this, aren’t you?”

  “What do you expect? I’m still with the Greens. And for all our fuck-ups, we never believed that sealing the country off was a solution.”

  “One hundred and fifty thousand people are marching to their deaths, and all you’re thinking is: We told you so. Even the do-gooders used to be better.”

  For a moment they are silent. The under-secretary can see right through Lohm. He knows, of course, that hype doesn’t last for years, but solid interest does. He knows what Nadeche Hackenbusch managed to achieve even in the first few episodes at the refugee hostel.

  “She’s giving the refugees a face.”

  “Hmm?”

  “She’s going to give them a face,” the under-secretary says grimly. “And then it’s all over. After that nobody’s going to be able to look at the refugee problem objectively again.”

  “Has anyone ever been able to?”

  “And we’ll find ourselves squashed. Between refugee fans and real Nazis.” The under-secretary shakes his head. “No, it all boils down to that daft cow. We have to pull her out of there.”

  “Oh, great plan. She doesn’t exactly look like she wants to be pulled out.”

  “Have you got a better suggestion?”

  “Sure. Make it look like an accident.”

  “This is no longer a joke!” He looks at Lohm in despair.

  Lohm stops teasing him. “Shall I give you some consolation? It’s not your decision. Ultimately it’s the ministry of foreign affairs’ business. Or your boss’s. But not yours.”

  Sometimes he envies Lohm. His ability to push things to the back of his mind or postpone them. To retreat to the refuge of his job and pretend nothing else exists. Even when the Americans elected Trump. A question mark fell on N.A.T.O., on the entire world order, and Lohm simply attended to his environmental business as if it were just as important as before. As if it made a difference whether you saved or ran over a tortoise in a world where the U.S.A. no longer took part in environmental protection. But if needs be, Lohm can narrow his horizons to the ministry of the environment or the weekend barbecue. He doesn’t make a secret out of this either. Lohm’s philosophy goes something like: “This world produces more and more shit every day. And at some point it will have to surface. My job isn’t to make the shit disappear. My job is to ensure that it doesn’t surface here, but elsewhere. To ensure that it doesn’t surface today, but at some other time. And that’s what I do. I don’t plant apple trees. I shovel shit from here to there and from today to tomorrow.”

  “What happens when you can no longer stop the shit from surfacing tomorrow?” the under-secretary once asked him.

  “I’ll be somewhere else.”

  The under-secretary can’t be like that. He absolutely shares Lohm’s basic pessimism, but he hates botched jobs and considers it a defeat if he has to resort to such measures. It’s something else he admires about Leubl, this love of big, thorough, decisive solutions worth mustering a majority for. In this instance, however, he can’t see a solution.

  He doesn’t have faith in his colleagues at the foreign ministry. Why should they solve the problem? Just to have more television idiots parachuting into crisis areas the very next day, confident that the foreign ministry will protect them if things look dodgy? Their only hope is the geographical distance. The difficulty of providing for and coordinating one hundred and fifty thousand people for months on end. Years. If the whole thing tails off then it’s fine. But he hates this. Not being able to plan. Not being able to make decisions. Just having to wait. This is what he finds hardest. This and the knowledge that whoever does find the right solution will be guaranteed a ministerial post.

  10,000 kilometres

  for love

  Nadeche Hackenbusch and Lionel: the megastar has let her heart decide – now the fate of 150,000 people hangs on the success of this love affair

  By Astrid von Roëll

  We all know the tale of the ugly duckling who turns into a dying swan. This time, however, it’s different. The swan isn’t dying and the duckling isn’t ugly. Rather this is the story of a young, strong woman prepared to do anything and everything for love, thereby conquering the hearts of the entire world. It is the story of a woman radically reinventing herself, finally, finally living the dream that no woman has ever dreamed before. Now Nadeche Hackenbusch has made this dream come true: she has left her husband to accompany the great love you only m
eet once in life, on his way to Europe. On foot and alone. With 150,000 refugees.

  Ten thousand kilometres. It will be a march for the right to life, a march for the right to a spark of hope – and a march for the right to a little happiness. A march full of danger, whose end nobody can predict. Such worry, such uncertainty, both are difficult to bear.

  This isn’t the same Nadeche Hackenbusch we knew only a few weeks ago. When I go to see her, her soft, long hair is tied up in a practical bun. Her long legs are in simple beige hiking trousers (Black Diamond), her Mammut softshell jacket is open, and a plain blue Merino T-Shirt underlines her modest appearance. She senses my astonishment when I look at her slender hands. “Yes, I know, no nail varnish – eight weeks ago that would have been unthinkable. But everything in life can change so quickly. I mean, can you believe it? I can scarcely believe it myself!”

  The painfully fresh memories of the past few days flash through her mind like the recap of a film. It hasn’t even been forty-eight hours since she announced on her show her separation from Nicolai von Kraken, her husband of many years. Rumours circulate, thoughts are articulated that the programme might be extended for a few days because of the Hackenbusch crisis. But on the day for which the broadcaster had scheduled the grand finale, Nadeche Hackenbusch takes everyone by surprise with another announcement. Now, she reveals to a global audience breathless with excitement, she will return to Germany – but not alone.

  “It was a spontaneous decision,” the star presenter says. “A voice in my head told me that things just couldn’t go on as they were.” This voice, can it be any voice apart from the voice of the heart? For – as EVANGELINE readers have surmised sooner than anyone else – the reason for this separation is her amazing new companion, Lionel. The man they call “the soul of the refugee camp”, the determined humanitarian, the young Gandhi of Africa, has taken Germany by storm with his tender honesty and refreshing truths. And what may look like an impulsive summer romance to those viewers who don’t know Nadeche Hackenbusch, is in reality an encounter with an extraordinary man, and magical sparks are flying. An extraordinary man with an extraordinary life story that couldn’t be more grim. He, the tireless helper of the helpless, is an alien from an alien world whose path to our country remains closed.

  Just by looking at Nadeche Hackenbusch one can tell that this ruthlessness is working inside her, working at her, doing something to her. A small wrinkle has appeared between her eyes, a wrinkle that lends her young face an unexpected maturity, a maturity forged by thoughtfulness and anger. It shows the fury of a woman who is not a government agency. A woman who always realises what people need, rather than what they ought to do. “I can’t change the laws made by man,” she says bravely, sweeping a stray strand of hair behind her ear, “but I can fight against their inhumane consequences. And I’m doing this side by side with Lionel. He is the man these people now need much more urgently than anything else.”

  “It was a spontaneous decision”

  She doesn’t tell me outright, but her body language says it all: here the mills of fairness and justice are agglutinating the flour of a truly great love. For it’s not only the people in the camp who need this slim, handsome bearer of hope with his mysterious yet endearing eyes. It is also the woman in Nadeche Hackenbusch who, like a delicate flower, is so desperate for his optimism right now. And how moving it is to see Nadeche Hackenbusch, a superstar across the continent of Europe, sacrificing her own needs as she denies the woman behind the angel. While the eyes of the world focus on the striking mass of people surrounding the young couple, newly in love, on their perilous journey, she puts her own requirements on the back burner. “We’ve got so much to do and see so little of each other,” she says, and only those who’ve known her for longer can hear the faint quiver in her voice that shows how much energy it takes to be Nadeche Hackenbusch in these days and months. For even if Lionel is the one the people trust, nothing happens without her vigour and drive.

  Lionel has stared hunger in the face

  In spite of the priority afforded to helping others, concern about the permanent strain on Nadeche Hackenbusch obliges us to venture a glimpse into her soul. At times of great stress it is dangerous to ignore strong emotions and profound feelings, and so now, in the dusty heat of Africa, the moment has come to ask the question on the minds of millions of Germans:

  What’s wrong with Nicolai von Kraken?

  “I feel sorry for Nicolai,” Nadeche says softly as she wipes sweat from her brow with her forearm. “But he knew that we were never meant to be together for ever. Nicolai needs someone else, he’s still a child. Sure, the adoption, the acknowledgement of my children made him grow up a bit. But what I’ve gone through over the past few months has catapulted me a long way in my personal development and thus put an even greater distance between the two of us. Just compare the two. Lionel is a man who’s stared hunger in the face, who has experience of this continent. Africa is beautiful and horrible, with tigers and poisonous snakes.”

  And what will become of her sons? Keel, for whom shoplifting is finally a thing of the past? And Bonno who’s about to take the major step of starting at St Zwerenz private school? Don’t her two children need her as well? Nadeche Hackenbusch gulps as only a mother can. She finds this hard to answer. It’s one of those rare moments in life when a mother’s duties and affection have to take a back seat too. For Nadeche Hackenbusch knows that without the power of love no angel can be of any help. And 150,000 people cannot choose the right path if she and Lionel don’t manage to stay together for the duration.

  This time it’s not merely a love affair. It’s probably the most important love affair in the world.

  22

  Mahmoud hasn’t got a handle on anything, which means he has to see to it all himself. Mahmoud is assigned with supervising the food and water, and all he has to do is check that everyone pays and that the food and water are of good enough quality. And he’s supposed to coordinate the people assisting him. It all happened so quickly. Sure, when Mahmoud asked, “Are you making me admiral for food and water?”, he might have given the matter further thought. But he was happy to have washed his hands of it. And let’s face it, who could he have brought along in Mahmoud’s place? He mobilised all his contacts, only leaving out the complete idiots. And people can say what they like about Mahmoud, but he’s not stupid. Still, you never know what might suddenly drive a man crazy. It could be a woman, or money, or in Mahmoud’s case an official position. So he hasn’t been able to wash his hands of this at all, because more and more of Mahmoud’s time has been taken up deciding which badge to make for himself. He got hold of an old captain’s hat, God knows where from, and you could ask the same about the epaulettes he sewed onto his T-shirt.

  “Admiral for Food and Water”? How ludicrous is that? Why admiral? Mahmoud was never in the navy. And he’d only swim if you tossed him into the mouth of a crocodile.

  So it’s all down to him again. At least he can be happy that the hierarchy is functioning to some degree. Anyone who’s worked as a people smuggler knows how to make quick checks or to deal with people who haven’t paid. But beyond that you can’t ask for much. He’s only just managed to ensure that for each truck there are one or two people he knows and can to some extent rely on. They’ll let him know if something’s not working. Malaika lends him one of her pink angelmobiles, so he can rapidly access the section of the convoy in question. The thirty minutes it can take them to drive there, thirty minutes in which his mobile often has no reception – these are the times he can most easily fall asleep.

  “We’re there!”

  “Hmm?”

  “Truck 29!”

  Lionel wipes his eyes with a damp hand. He feels slightly fresher afterwards, as if a dog had licked his face. He forces open his swollen eyelids and gets out.

  People have surrounded his car and are beaming at him; children laugh and whoop as if he’s about to pick them up and carry them around with him. At times like th
is he can understand where Malaika gets her energy from, this inexhaustible, terrifying energy. It’s unbelievable how tirelessly she works. But then again it makes a difference whether you’re dashing around the place as the good fairy the whole time, handing out water or medicine or those unusual things that European women evidently harness their breasts with like oxen before a plough – or whether you’re responsible for all the other shit.

  He slips a foot beneath the mudguard over the front tyre. Groaning like an old man, he heaves himself up to get a better view. Beyond all the children he sees Orma waving and making her way towards him through the crowd.

  “They want to talk to you.”

  “Oh God! I told you to get rid of them! It’s always the same thing.”

  “No, this time they say it’s something different!”

  “And you believed them? Really, Orma! It’s the oldest trick in the book!”

  Three figures approach him. A mountain of a man, in his late thirties perhaps, another man in glasses, and a woman he can tell has an excruciating voice just by looking at her. The mountain tries to say something, but the woman pushes him aside.

  “What are we paying five dollars for?”

  Of course. Always the same. Just the tone is different. This woman talks faster than other women. And her voice is higher. Much higher. Sometimes, when playing, children squeal as high as they can, but this woman trumps them all. He had no idea that people could talk at this pitch.

  “There isn’t enough water!”

  “There has to be enough,” Lionel sighs. “And there is enough!”

  “Thirst isn’t everything. We have to wash too, you know!”

  The voice! Like bashing a long, rusty nail into your ear. And then twisting it. Lionel is delighted when his mobile rings.

  “Yo, what’s my favourite hiker up to? How’s it goin’?”