by Igiaba Scego
It was pitch black. I could barely see my hands. The taxi entered an industrial neighborhood. Everything was closed and funereal. “It can’t be this place,” I said to myself. I looked at Lucy earnestly, but she was distracted. Her hand was resting on the squirt’s back. In his ear she was whispering a poem by Nizar Qabbani, the poet of women. No! We’re lost and that’s what you do? Recite poems in a stranger’s ear? Lucy, wake up, we’re with two strangers in an industrial park! It’s like that film on the Circeo massacre, The Herd. They’ll stuff us in their luggage. I’m scared!
But our cabby, a guy with a very sweet face, kicked his brain into gear. He had an epiphany. One of his uncles, who was married to an Algerian, lived in the area. “He’ll know!” and then he said, “I think he lives on Via Othman.” We trusted him (did we have a choice?). Basically, the uncle lived on a Via Othman, but it wasn’t the one we were looking for. The uncle also had an epiphany. I was concerned. The story was prolonged yet again, for almost another hour.
After wandering endlessly, we saw a mirage: a blonde girl with a short skirt. “She’s an angel,” I said to myself, worn out by then. “She could show us the way to paradise.” She was a Norwegian, and I learned later that her name was Michi. She showed us that we had been near Via Othman Al Bahri for hours. We’d just gotten turned around.
When I saw the cottage that was destined to be our home for a month, I grew worried. Shouldn’t there be rooms like in a hotel? Lucy and I had each asked for a single. As soon as we entered, a handful of shocked faces watched us curiously. They were all seated around a table like in The Last Supper. There was even someone who looked like Jesus Christ. Among the women, many could’ve played Mary Magdalene’s part. Dan Brown. The Holy Grail. The sacred feminine. I was going mad. Fuck, give me a bed, any bed. I’m beat, destroyed, and I reek. I smell like rodent crap. Help!
A lanky blonde came to meet us. There was a hint of Russian about her. She said something to us in Arabic, then switched promptly to English. She seemed to have come from Oxford. A pristine, noble accent. I was bowled over. My senses came back for a few seconds, but my exhaustion was greater. I was taken in by that Made in Serbia blondness. The lanky woman accompanied us to our room (it should’ve been a single but it was a triple) and tried explaining something to us. Who could understand her? She gave us some bars of soap and sent us to bed. A woman in the room was snoring loudly.
I just woke up. Coffee, cockroach, and general stupidity. Soon I’ll go take the placement test.
Ahlan wa sahlan. Hello, little girl, this is Tunis. Welcome to an unknown place.
THE REAPARECIDA
Enrico Calamai has given me a passport to leave Argentina in half an hour—not a minute more or less. I’d gone to the Italian consulate in Buenos Aires with one of my brother Ernesto’s friends. Her name was Clara. She was pretty, one of those marvelously pure girls who it would be good to marry. Clara’s face was spotted with freckles and her eyes were huge. All of her fear was in those eyes. She was also a political activist. Like my brother, like Flaca and so many others, she’d turned her back in the villas miserias of the suburbs. Her politics consisted of giving a hopeful smile to those who had less in life. Clara wasn’t Argentinian. She was Uruguayan. It was obvious. She was more pragmatic and sensible than us. She calculated the incalculable. We didn’t know how to do this. Things happen and overwhelm us without warning. We Argentinians always have an astonished smirk painted on our faces. We grope around like newborns in the dark of life. Clara had moved to Buenos Aires for good, and for a while it was going well for her. Her story was uplifting. It was suitable for the vita of a martyred saint. She’d met her husband, Miguel, in a cantegril near Montevideo. They were happy. They made plans. They wanted to open a school for the underserved, and she would graduate with a degree in philosophy. But there was no time to plan that now, nor any for philosophy.
Miguel was taken early. He remains a desaparecido to this day. Clara wasn’t with her husband when he was kidnapped in a Ford Falcon without a license plate. She was warned. They told her: “Don’t come back home if you want to save your neck.” For months she lived in hiding. By chance, I met her on a road in the Boca quarter. I remember that it was one of those cobblestone streets. The Italians had laid them down. Now, in many neighborhoods, they’ve been ripped back up. If you happen to go there one day, hija, maybe you can see them in San Telmo or Barracas.
I didn’t recognize her right away. She’d lost weight. She spoke gibberish and reeked of menstrual blood. She had been reduced to a larva. What could I do? It was a strange time for me. I’d left Carlos six days earlier. I spat in his face, shouted my frustration at him, my hate for him—for his smell, his uniform. I shouted what I hadn’t been able to say for three years. I said the unsayable and took pleasure in his injured pride. I spat and screamed for hours. He was motionless in his uniform, indifferent, chilly. His coldness threw me off. I’d been his lover for three years. He’d stuck his crooked penis in every orifice, he’d rested against my chest countless times, and now he didn’t say one word to me?
Oh, Hija, how I long to tell you that my behavior, the decision to leave Carlos and insult him, was due to a metamorphosis, an honest rediscovery of my political path, an awareness of the terrible Argentinian situation. Oh, how I long to tell you that, finally, my pride as a sister, citizen, daughter, and woman was rebelling against the system. I long to tell you that I finally understood that man was depraved, an assassin, that he was merely an infamous swine. I long to tell you many things, hija, but unfortunately I cannot. It wouldn’t be true. I’m ashamed to admit the true reason behind my separation from Carlos. Still today, after many years, I feel dirty. Yes, Carlos was what he made me feel: filthy. I felt at home in his slime. I’m afraid I even liked it.
Jealousy was the real reason. He betrayed his wife with me, and me with numerous other women. I knew I didn’t have Carlos’s body exclusively. I wasn’t the only one to tickle his genitals and sink in his liquids. In Buenos Aires there was a long list of hens he’d been entertaining himself with. I certainly shared him with the tortured. Inflicting torture on the montoneros was the activity that excited him most, absolutely. He told me one evening. He loved using the picana on the kidnapped. He felt his intimate parts tingle every time those poor bodies sizzled. He felt a sensation that went beyond a mere orgasm. He felt ecstasy and lust.
“Torturing,” he told me one night, “makes me feel like God.” From that night on, he always lit a cigarette after sex like they do in bad B-movies. He’d tell me about his day at Esma. It was odd hearing him talk about torture. He used the same benign tone housewives use when they prepare the grocery list aloud. I wondered why he told me about his business. He had a military ban. He wasn’t supposed to leak anything. He told me, sparing no detail, about every second in that house of horrors. I know the building’s layout, the names of the “greens”—the soldiers—and those they captured. He told me many names. I unconsciously listened for Ernesto. I wanted to help my brother, and I don’t know why I allowed myself to be taken from behind like a mule. I was bewitched. I’m not sure if I can call it love. Carlos didn’t deserve to live. He believed he was loved. I felt squalid beside him.
And yet in those first six days of separation, I felt his loss like oxygen. I also felt the loss of his voice zealously singing Oh, juremos con gloria morir as he made me his. I walked to avoid thinking. Buenos Aires is a city that’s dead inside, but it comforts me nonetheless. Its beauty soothes the flurries of my heart. I met Clara during one of my Buenos Aires pilgrimages. I couldn’t bring her home, it was too dangerous. I advised her to hide. I would bring her something to eat later. She squeezed my arm. I was shocked, I remember. She was weaker than a child. With deceit and quick adjustments, we were able to clean her up a little. It wouldn’t last long, I knew. Esma was around the corner, and if it wasn’t Esma, it would be El Banco or Olimpo—torture centers spread across the country. Sometimes I had dreams that I ended up in there. I embraced
Ernesto again and confronted Carlos with his picana. He would’ve tortured, perhaps even killed me. But I would’ve left unchanged. I felt dirty and lousy. I missed Carlos. I was ashamed for not thinking more of Ernesto. My mother was right when she said, “No mereces que te llame puta.” I had no dignity. A good whore at least keeps that. What did I have?
Calamai was the perfect solution. The Italian vice-counsel was a handsome man. He had a Mediterranean charm that made him more desirable for a late evening date. He must’ve been very gentlemanly with women. Despite his timidity, it was clear that he’d had many. For a moment, the young thirty-something man made me forget the rotten apple I’d gone to bed with for three years. His reticence, the elegance of his gestures, let me glimpse another world for the first time. Until then, I’d revolved around Carlos. After that day at the consulate I knew that I should’ve revolved around myself. It was a eureka moment. All it took was looking a clean person in the eye. It was like taking an injection. In little more than thirty minutes, we had our beautiful Italian passports.
I remember nothing of the trip. I only recall the end. Clara and I said a warm goodbye at the Leonardo da Vinci airport. I never saw her again. I wonder if she’s happy today.
In Rome, I went to live with the Martino Brezzi family. They were distant cousins of my father. They welcomed me like a daughter. They knew about Ernesto. They were scared for me. My mother hadn’t tarnished my reputation for the rest of the family, but she should have. When I think about the Martino Brezzis, my stomach aches, not just my heart. The Martino Brezzis were legitimate communists. They believed in human rights, they railed against injustice. There were five of them: Leonardo, the head of the family; his wife, Marta; and their kids, Liliana, Luciana, and Lorenzo. All of them were little. I slept in the same room as Liliana, a very diligent girl. I had ghastly nightmares and feared contaminating an innocent fifteen-year-old with the wickedness that engulfed me.
The Martino Brezzis lived in a popular neighborhood of Rome, San Lorenzo. To avoid thinking about mis pesadillas, my nightmares, I went strolling in the Verano. That monumental cemetery was my salvation in those first months in Rome. I didn’t want to see the glory and splendor of the city. No Forum, no Piazza Navona, no Colosseum. The pomp reminded me of Videla. When I passed by, I closed my eyes. I traversed Piazza Venezia like someone blindfolded—Benito Mussolini had spoken from that balcony; I couldn’t stand it. I thought of Carlos and his corruption, Ernesto and his purity. Only in that cemetery was I able to be myself. I’d choose a tomb at random, then I’d start shouting as though I were possessed. I yelled, I cried and thrashed. It was only appropriate that people should lose hope. I’d thank the deceased in the grave I’d borrowed. It helped me like nothing else did.
San Lorenzo was fundamental to my survival. On one street in that neighborhood, Argentina came back to me in unexpected ways. I came across Pablo Santana. He was one of Ernesto’s group. They’d gone to school together, worked in the villas miserias together, fought for the same things together. I don’t know why, but I had taken his kidnapping for granted. Never, ever would I have imagined meeting him on Via dei Sabelli with a bag of groceries in his hand. My Hola was a whisper, nearly a sob. He threw his bag on the ground and crushed me in an embrace as wide as that of Christ the Redeemer. He held me tightly. A couple of people thought he and I were in love, crazy for one another. It was merely the pain of being Argentinian that united us. On Via dei Sabelli he gave me the lay of his new life. He explained that he too had left thanks to Calamai, and said, “They nearly caught me. I still don’t know how I got away from the Ford. It was parked right there waiting for me.” As we spoke, he sometimes disengaged. In those semi-dark moments, he was remembering Ernesto and all those who were no longer there. “I wasn’t able to save Pilar. They took her at a friend’s house. She was four months pregnant. Our child would’ve been born by now.” When he spoke of Pilar, he didn’t wish to think of her as dead. I said little or nothing. I made him talk. We set an appointment for the next day at Cafra, on Via dei Serpenti. “I have a surprise for you,” he added.
I didn’t return to Via dei Serpenti again until just a few months ago. It was my base in Rome at the end of the seventies. I was always there. Later, I tried to forget that street. Too many layers of pain. I went back for a dinner with my editor. I might have invited you to come with me, I don’t remember. There’s a good Indian restaurant there. The samosas are spectacular.
In the late seventies, Via dei Serpenti was the meeting place for Argentinian exiles. We were sad ghosts. Cafra was there, the anti-fascist Argentinian center. We denounced the crimes of Videla and his lackeys. From there, the exiles sought to show the world—and especially Italy—what was happening. It was a world of many colors teeming with intellectuals, activists, and students. Videla would’ve classified it as a den of subversives, and perhaps some Italian political parties would’ve tried making us appear that way. But we were united. There were some magazines circulating in that period. I liked El Debate, a Marxist magazine.
We were strange subversives. From our perspective, no one could call us Marxists or communists. Those were the Years of Lead in Italy. People who challenged the system also challenged bourgeois garb. Ripped suits, preposterously long hair, record-length beards and moustaches, women’s bodies on display. In Argentina we were different. Sober. Chaste. No parka. No lace-up boots. No bangs. No miniskirt. We were ladies and gentlemen. Ties, jackets, a few bowties, skirts below the knees, short hair. Ernesto was like this, with never a hair out of place. He had a briefcase, too, which made him look serious, like a businessman. “What a model,” I hooted. “You look like a Wall Street CEO instead of a bum.” He smiled with his eyes and said, “That’s exactly what I want, to be like someone on Wall Street.” A lot of people thought like Ernesto. Opposition wasn’t a suit to be worn, but a way of life. Ernesto wanted to do it, not show it.
Even in exile no one lost this habit. They were exceedingly serious on Via dei Serpenti. No excesses, no colors, nothing extravagant. Entering that hole-in-the-wall on Via dei Serpenti, I realized how much suffering had been caused by those medal-decorated soldiers. Everyone had tense, long, tired faces.
I didn’t see Pablo on the first day. I looked for him. I asked for his whereabouts. A twenty-two-year-old boy told me where I could find him. He was cute. He had the same obligatory crease on his forehead. He was tense like the others and stood in a corner with a guitar. He had very short hair, and you could already discern his eventual baldness. Neither of us lingered on pleasantries. He didn’t ask for my first or last name, nor did I ask him. He did show me a photograph, though. There he was, a little younger, around fifteen, with four other people. One girl and three boys. He told me their names. I remember them still. Osvaldo, Roberto, Raúl, and Sofia. He didn’t know anything about them anymore. They were his siblings. He said nothing else to me, only that despised word. Chupados. The swallowed up. Osvaldo, Roberto, Raúl, and Sofia, vanished, probably dead without a burial, without a tomb, without a last goodbye. He showed me the photo, then he started to sing. It was typical in those years to show photos. It happened all the time. At every meeting, every party, every outing, at funerals, baptisms, marriages, birthdays, at parent-teacher conferences, at passport appointments. Everyone went around with a stack of photos to show other exiles. They looked at old faces in black and white and sobbed in silence. I remember telling someone about my strolls to the Verano. A couple of girls followed suit. I ran into them every Wednesday afternoon. Every time we saw one another, we shook hands. Our hands were always freezing, even in August.
That first day on Via dei Serpenti I remember singing Bob Dylan with the sad boy. We made a mash-up, which lightened our moods. Since that day, I’ve become a fan of old Bob.
I loved tango the most, though. Gardel was the only master of my heart. I liked his discretion. In Buenos Aires, they said he never took advantage of his conquests or betrayed people’s trust. A real man, a good soul. Mother, though, lik
ed Ignacio Corsini. It was the same story as River and Boca. She was with Boca in response to me, while I rooted for River. Likewise for Corsini. She sang, mixing his songs with her fado to spite me since I loved Gardel very much. Corsini was one of the greats, but not like Gardel. I perceived human limitations in Corsini’s voice that Carlos didn’t have. Corsini was also a charismatic man full of pathos. It pains me to think that I spoke ill of his melodious voice. Mother made me lose my temper. She would never admit that I, her daughter, had good taste. When she thought no one was listening, I heard her croon Gardel’s “Cuesta abajo.” She was like that with me. She wore a stone mask.
Tango was my first love, but not my only one. On Via dei Serpenti I was introduced to Dylan. I didn’t know then that he’d be the craze of a lifetime. I would find out soon enough.
And yes, Flaca comes into the picture.
In the late sixties, Dylan had an ugly infatuation with country music. His fans couldn’t stand him anymore. He became vapid. He made albums that didn’t leave a mark and a few were passé. His fans wanted the moxie of his early years, the roughness, his standoffish relationship with power. No one had the courage to tell him. Dylan’s face, which was always somewhat sulky, scared people. He wanted to play his music. He didn’t care about his fans. Crucify me, it doesn’t make any difference. The boy was stubborn. I happened to hear him in Milan some time ago. I no longer recognized the songs. Dylan was a part of me. I’d become honest because of his songs. I wanted to sing them and remember my voice from a former time, purify it, maybe. Robert Allen Zimmerman did his own thing. He hadn’t become Bob Dylan for nothing. A little guy of about twenty looked at me wryly. He may have noticed my disconsolate face. “Bob never sings them the same,” he told me. “He changes everything live. He doesn’t repeat the message like a halfwit. Every concert is an event. Different and the same as itself. Pure coherence, goddamn!” The twenty-year-old was exalted. His eyes were red from nervous anticipation. He was like a mystic at his first sacrament.
