I've started posting the chapters of Resolution 786. I'll post each successive chapter roughly every 3 or 4 days. Here's Chapter 8:
To: United Nations Human Rights Commission, New York
We pray your assistance.
The white mans body found at Jinja Dam past week could now have a solved death. A Nile Hotel servant lady in Kampala was promised her name to be secret to explain of the many dangerous happenings at the hotel.
During first days of November this scarred lady speaks that a lorry brought many extra prisoners to Nile Hotel, one being white. She remembers him as to she was ordered to clean all things around him urgently as to leave completely no signs.
When arrived, Army officer called Kireka directed the white man to a lift which took them to room 311. They went together. There Kireka said in a very long way that President Amin was to investigate the Israel event at Entebbe Airport, especially as to Kenya’s help. Kireka said to the white man he was a Israel spy. The man said no. Kireka said to the man he was a Jew, at which he said yes. Kireka said to the man he lived in Nairobi, at which again he said yes. Kireka said the man help Israel people in a aeroplane when it escape from Entebbe. Quiet was the white man. Kireka said what happened at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport in Nairobi? Then he hit the white man very hard. Kireka said what is your work in Kampala. The white man said to buy sugar. His whole work was to buy sugar. Three hours they talked sugar, aeroplanes, Entebbe, Israel, with Kireka hitting the poor man when the talk was wrong. Two hours alone, Kireka questioned the papers in the fellows pockets, his money belt and his shirt. The poor lady servant sweeped around his chair and picked all papers before the man was taken to room 326 for evening sleep.
Next day Kireka and one more big officer had the white man in room 305, a room very hard to clean for its many devices on the floor. The white man was told to remove his pants and shoes and shirt and was beaten very much by the new big officer, all the while Kireka was talking again for aeroplanes and sugar and Entebbe. His blood was too much difficult to clean from that room, room 305. Then Kireka said he would kill him if he did not confess to helping enemies at Entebbe. He showed the white man a telex he said the man sent to Israel embassy at London that admitted his spying. Kireka then laughed and dropped the telex on the floor which added to the poor ladys cleaning time.
The poor white man was next whipped until bleeding again. A electric thing was turn to on and became redhot which was put on his legs and privates. The man was then saying things the servant lady learned from Sister Mary when she was little, the Lord is my Shepard, he said. Kireka himself, not the big officer, put salt and red spice on the white mans whipping cuts at which he again spoke as Sister Mary. Kireka told the man a suggestion that if he got Shs 750,000 he would be released. But the white man and all his mess was all cleaned completely and again at Nile Hotel or even Kampala his face she did not see.
The good peoples here request all readers to see with open eyes. The voice of thy brothers blood crys to you from the soil. This mans voice is only sound to your ears from the mouth of a hotel servant lady who is herself afraid and living very dangerous. But this one was a white man and since a white man maybe you will now listen.
We pray that the good people will see.
Milton Otanga
Kampala, November 1976
Monday, November 28, 2011
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Bone of My Bones [Chapter 7]
I've started posting the chapters of Resolution 786. I'll post each successive chapter roughly every 3 or 4 days. Here's Chapter 7:
Thirteen years ago, Albert Hueghlomm had limped into the spotless and new emergency admissions room at Mulago Hospital in Kampala. The hospital had been built only a year ago, in 1962.
“Can I help you?” asked the admissions nurse. Her English labored under a heavy African accent.
“Yes. I’ve hurt my knee.” Hueghlomm came around the desk to show her his injury. He placed a delicate palm over his knee. His heavy pants were tattered and bloody. The skin around his knee was torn, raw, soaked red. He grimaced slightly when he looked down at the wound.
“How?” the nurse asked.
“I fell off my motorcycle,” he said, adding in triumph, “The motorcycle’s OK.”
“Please sit,” she told him. “I’ll get someone for you.”
Albert Hueghlomm sat and waited, looking over the bare white walls. Across the room, a woman gently rocked and breastfed a baby, her back to Hueghlomm, her heavy, rounded shoulders hunched forward, cradling the infant. Her soft cooing soothed the air. A bare chested old man slouched asleep at the furthest end of the room, snoring lightly. He had contorted his wiry frame so that his whole body fit into the chair, his feet and legs folded up in front of him. A brand new burlap bag lay beside him, his thinly muscled purple-black arm threaded through its looped handles.
“Sir, please come back with me.”
Hueghlomm looked up from his chair. The woman in front of him wore a white nurse’s uniform. She had a light brown complexion and straight black hair that gently tipped the top of her soft, thin shoulders. Hueghlomm stood gingerly. The woman’s eyes were darker than he’d ever seen, the brown around each pupil almost as dark as the pupil itself.
“Can you walk or should I get a wheelchair?” she asked.
“I can make it…a few yards, at least.” He wanted to be brave.
“What happened?” She was making conversation, putting her patient at ease.
“Fell off my motorcycle.”
She gestured into a side room. He turned in and sat on the examining table.
“I didn’t tell you to do that.” Her look was stoic, all business.
"Sorry.” He slipped off the table, grimacing as he put weight back onto his injured leg.
“Please remove your pants. I’ll be able to check and treat your injury better.”
She turned and began to pull gauze and sponges and antiseptic bottles and forceps and plastic gloves and many other items and devices from a white cabinet drawer. Each of the objects made its own tap as she placed them onto a metal tray. She turned to Hueghlomm, metal tray before her, and examined his bared, bloodied knee.
“You can bend it?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“I’m going to wash it. This will sting.” She was right.
Grimacing, Hueghlomm finally noticed her Indian accent. He made clenched conversation to keep his mind off the antiseptic bite. “You from India?”
“Pakistan. Raised in Uganda. How about you?”
“Israel. Raised in California.”
“Hmmm,” she was thinking. “Pakistan and Israel — countries created to accommodate religions.” Her sponge washed a stream of water and blood off his pasty, white knee and into a metal pan below. She looked over the cleaned wound, leaning close. “More blood, less cut,” she concluded. “I’ll put you together, Humpty Dumpty.” She looked up at him and smiled. He hadn’t guessed that she could.
“Can a serious person have a sense of humor?” he teased, being careful not to tease too hard. After all, she was filling an anesthetic injection and threading a needle for stitches.
“Our fall from the Garden of Eden wasn’t a complete one,” she explained, moving the anesthetic needle towards his knee. He watched her delicate hands guide the tools skillfully. She inserted the needle into the flesh around his wound. He grunted softly, teeth clenched. She spoke while slowly pushing anesthetic into him. “A merciful God let us take two gifts with us — the ability to laugh and the ability to fall in love. Whenever we do either of those things, we’re closer to the Garden.”
She removed the needle from his knee and placed it on the tray — “Click,” it said. She smiled at him. “So I laugh every chance I get. Now let’s wait for the injection to do its job.” She noticed his embarrassment, sitting before her with his pants off, injured, helpless. She found his vulnerability endearing, attractive.
“You don’t like jewelry?” he asked out of nowhere.
“Why?” She was surprised by the question.
“Whenever I see Pakistani women around the bazaars, they’re always wearing so much jewelry…lovely gold jewelry. But you aren’t wearing any,” he said.
“Just because they like it, it doesn’t mean I do.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I hope I didn’t offend you. I wasn’t generalizing, just wondering.” He looked down, quietly awkward.
Noticing his discomfort, she obliged an answer. “The most I’d ever wear would be a ring, a small one, with bright, pretty stones.” She ducked her head slightly to peer at his face, to see if her answer had relieved his awkwardness.
Hueghlomm shook his head in a politely restrained, stilted acknowledgement.
The anesthetic began to take effect.
“My brothers drive motorcycles,” she shared, watching his face.
“Really?”
“One of them races at Nakivubu Stadium.”
“So do I!” he blurted, suddenly animated. “I never win…but I love to race.”
“I thought I’d seen you somewhere before. You’re the European chap who walks around the stadium smiling before the races. I wish you’d be more careful on your motorbike.” She smiled at him.
He noticed her small forehead and high cheekbones. “There’s a small scar underneath your eye,” he said, feeling bad for her. “What happened?”
“We had roosters behind our house in Karachi when I was a little girl, maybe seven or eight years old. I got too close one day and one of them tried to pluck my eye out.” She moved her index finger underneath her eye with a slashing motion and squinted in disapproval. “I don’t like angry things, things that need to show dominance.”
The anesthetic had fanned away his pain. Albert Hueghlomm’s muscles and tendons relaxed. He suddenly felt that the day’s chase and toil had ended, that he was at home, resting. He tilted his head back and allowed himself to see her whole face at once. She was beautiful.
Thirteen years ago, Albert Hueghlomm had limped into the spotless and new emergency admissions room at Mulago Hospital in Kampala. The hospital had been built only a year ago, in 1962.
“Can I help you?” asked the admissions nurse. Her English labored under a heavy African accent.
“Yes. I’ve hurt my knee.” Hueghlomm came around the desk to show her his injury. He placed a delicate palm over his knee. His heavy pants were tattered and bloody. The skin around his knee was torn, raw, soaked red. He grimaced slightly when he looked down at the wound.
“How?” the nurse asked.
“I fell off my motorcycle,” he said, adding in triumph, “The motorcycle’s OK.”
“Please sit,” she told him. “I’ll get someone for you.”
Albert Hueghlomm sat and waited, looking over the bare white walls. Across the room, a woman gently rocked and breastfed a baby, her back to Hueghlomm, her heavy, rounded shoulders hunched forward, cradling the infant. Her soft cooing soothed the air. A bare chested old man slouched asleep at the furthest end of the room, snoring lightly. He had contorted his wiry frame so that his whole body fit into the chair, his feet and legs folded up in front of him. A brand new burlap bag lay beside him, his thinly muscled purple-black arm threaded through its looped handles.
“Sir, please come back with me.”
Hueghlomm looked up from his chair. The woman in front of him wore a white nurse’s uniform. She had a light brown complexion and straight black hair that gently tipped the top of her soft, thin shoulders. Hueghlomm stood gingerly. The woman’s eyes were darker than he’d ever seen, the brown around each pupil almost as dark as the pupil itself.
“Can you walk or should I get a wheelchair?” she asked.
“I can make it…a few yards, at least.” He wanted to be brave.
“What happened?” She was making conversation, putting her patient at ease.
“Fell off my motorcycle.”
She gestured into a side room. He turned in and sat on the examining table.
“I didn’t tell you to do that.” Her look was stoic, all business.
"Sorry.” He slipped off the table, grimacing as he put weight back onto his injured leg.
“Please remove your pants. I’ll be able to check and treat your injury better.”
She turned and began to pull gauze and sponges and antiseptic bottles and forceps and plastic gloves and many other items and devices from a white cabinet drawer. Each of the objects made its own tap as she placed them onto a metal tray. She turned to Hueghlomm, metal tray before her, and examined his bared, bloodied knee.
“You can bend it?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“I’m going to wash it. This will sting.” She was right.
Grimacing, Hueghlomm finally noticed her Indian accent. He made clenched conversation to keep his mind off the antiseptic bite. “You from India?”
“Pakistan. Raised in Uganda. How about you?”
“Israel. Raised in California.”
“Hmmm,” she was thinking. “Pakistan and Israel — countries created to accommodate religions.” Her sponge washed a stream of water and blood off his pasty, white knee and into a metal pan below. She looked over the cleaned wound, leaning close. “More blood, less cut,” she concluded. “I’ll put you together, Humpty Dumpty.” She looked up at him and smiled. He hadn’t guessed that she could.
“Can a serious person have a sense of humor?” he teased, being careful not to tease too hard. After all, she was filling an anesthetic injection and threading a needle for stitches.
“Our fall from the Garden of Eden wasn’t a complete one,” she explained, moving the anesthetic needle towards his knee. He watched her delicate hands guide the tools skillfully. She inserted the needle into the flesh around his wound. He grunted softly, teeth clenched. She spoke while slowly pushing anesthetic into him. “A merciful God let us take two gifts with us — the ability to laugh and the ability to fall in love. Whenever we do either of those things, we’re closer to the Garden.”
She removed the needle from his knee and placed it on the tray — “Click,” it said. She smiled at him. “So I laugh every chance I get. Now let’s wait for the injection to do its job.” She noticed his embarrassment, sitting before her with his pants off, injured, helpless. She found his vulnerability endearing, attractive.
“You don’t like jewelry?” he asked out of nowhere.
“Why?” She was surprised by the question.
“Whenever I see Pakistani women around the bazaars, they’re always wearing so much jewelry…lovely gold jewelry. But you aren’t wearing any,” he said.
“Just because they like it, it doesn’t mean I do.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I hope I didn’t offend you. I wasn’t generalizing, just wondering.” He looked down, quietly awkward.
Noticing his discomfort, she obliged an answer. “The most I’d ever wear would be a ring, a small one, with bright, pretty stones.” She ducked her head slightly to peer at his face, to see if her answer had relieved his awkwardness.
Hueghlomm shook his head in a politely restrained, stilted acknowledgement.
The anesthetic began to take effect.
“My brothers drive motorcycles,” she shared, watching his face.
“Really?”
“One of them races at Nakivubu Stadium.”
“So do I!” he blurted, suddenly animated. “I never win…but I love to race.”
“I thought I’d seen you somewhere before. You’re the European chap who walks around the stadium smiling before the races. I wish you’d be more careful on your motorbike.” She smiled at him.
He noticed her small forehead and high cheekbones. “There’s a small scar underneath your eye,” he said, feeling bad for her. “What happened?”
“We had roosters behind our house in Karachi when I was a little girl, maybe seven or eight years old. I got too close one day and one of them tried to pluck my eye out.” She moved her index finger underneath her eye with a slashing motion and squinted in disapproval. “I don’t like angry things, things that need to show dominance.”
The anesthetic had fanned away his pain. Albert Hueghlomm’s muscles and tendons relaxed. He suddenly felt that the day’s chase and toil had ended, that he was at home, resting. He tilted his head back and allowed himself to see her whole face at once. She was beautiful.
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Yours, Fatima [Chapter 6]
I've started posting the chapters of Resolution 786. I'll post each successive chapter roughly every 3 or 4 days. Here's Chapter 6:
Deeply hurt, navigating through a twisting whirlwind of grief and loss, Fatima Hueghlomm strove to do what she believed was right. She contacted Albert Hueghlomm’s family in California to notify them of his passing. At first there was anger, anger at Fatima’s tasteless practical joke. Anger morphed into abject disbelief, incoherent questions, demands for official confirmation. A flurry of frenzied phone calls ensued, giving distressed voice to fury, rage, accusing incredulity. All the divergent passions that accompany loss, the many branches of loving relations that had been broken, that had perished — all burned together in crackling embers, leaving behind an ash heap of dull regrets and suffering remorse.
Fatima’s beloved husband was no more — yet she realized that Albert Hueghlomm was much more than her husband. He was a son, a father, a brother, an uncle, a friend. She wanted to honor those many relationships and her husband’s family, people whom she knew only through occasional telephone calls and one brief visit to America. She asked them their wishes.
Albert Hueghlomm’s family wanted him buried in a Jewish cemetery outside of Los Angeles. Fatima agreed, asking that the plot next to her husband be reserved for her. She and Adam would attend the funeral.
Dora Hueghlomm, Albert Hueghlomm’s mother, told Fatima to select the inscription for her husband’s headstone. Fatima complied, quoting the inscription in a short, tear-soaked note —
Dear Mother,
“It is from Allah that we all come and it is to Allah that we all return.” No one can ever love Albert as much as you. I am a very close second.
Yours,
Fatima
Deeply hurt, navigating through a twisting whirlwind of grief and loss, Fatima Hueghlomm strove to do what she believed was right. She contacted Albert Hueghlomm’s family in California to notify them of his passing. At first there was anger, anger at Fatima’s tasteless practical joke. Anger morphed into abject disbelief, incoherent questions, demands for official confirmation. A flurry of frenzied phone calls ensued, giving distressed voice to fury, rage, accusing incredulity. All the divergent passions that accompany loss, the many branches of loving relations that had been broken, that had perished — all burned together in crackling embers, leaving behind an ash heap of dull regrets and suffering remorse.
Fatima’s beloved husband was no more — yet she realized that Albert Hueghlomm was much more than her husband. He was a son, a father, a brother, an uncle, a friend. She wanted to honor those many relationships and her husband’s family, people whom she knew only through occasional telephone calls and one brief visit to America. She asked them their wishes.
Albert Hueghlomm’s family wanted him buried in a Jewish cemetery outside of Los Angeles. Fatima agreed, asking that the plot next to her husband be reserved for her. She and Adam would attend the funeral.
Dora Hueghlomm, Albert Hueghlomm’s mother, told Fatima to select the inscription for her husband’s headstone. Fatima complied, quoting the inscription in a short, tear-soaked note —
Dear Mother,
“It is from Allah that we all come and it is to Allah that we all return.” No one can ever love Albert as much as you. I am a very close second.
Yours,
Fatima
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
He is Gone, Chapter 5
I've started posting the chapters of Resolution 786. I'll post each successive chapter roughly every 3 or 4 days. Here's Chapter 5:
“Adam.” Fatima always pronounced her son’s name in its Arabic form, with an “Ah” sound at the beginning. She held back sobs as he drew close. They were together, alone, in the echoing family room of their large Nairobi home.
“Mom?”
“Your Daddy is gone,” she said in her characteristic Pakistani accent, tears streaked down her face.
“I know. Kampala. For work.”
“No, Adam. He is gone,” she repeated, whispering, more insistent.
“Mom?”
No answer.
“Mom?”
“I’m sorry.” She held him, cupping his head against her chest, sobbing.
“Adam.” Fatima always pronounced her son’s name in its Arabic form, with an “Ah” sound at the beginning. She held back sobs as he drew close. They were together, alone, in the echoing family room of their large Nairobi home.
“Mom?”
“Your Daddy is gone,” she said in her characteristic Pakistani accent, tears streaked down her face.
“I know. Kampala. For work.”
“No, Adam. He is gone,” she repeated, whispering, more insistent.
“Mom?”
No answer.
“Mom?”
“I’m sorry.” She held him, cupping his head against her chest, sobbing.
Saturday, November 12, 2011
Judaism and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Chapter 4
I've started posting the chapters of Resolution 786. I'll post each successive chapter roughly every 3 or 4 days. Here's Chapter 4:
Albert Hueghlomm was flat on his back in jeans and a tee shirt, lying in the African sun on the cement floor of his garage. He was pushing the black rubber top of a wire onto a brand new spark plug. He spoke to his son while finishing. “You want to be sure that,” he stopped and strained underneath the motorcycle, “you’re properly seated so that,” more strain, “you catch the spark.” He finished and looked up at the wire, gently wiggling it to make sure that the connection was good.
Albert Hueghlomm had a round face with a prominent nose that held up a pair of black-framed glasses. His dark brown hair, parted on the side and barely touching his small ears, stood out against his pasty white complexion. He was of medium height and build. He spoke to Adam without looking at the boy, “Did you see the spark plug that we took out?”
“Yeah, Dad.”
“It was worn and corroded,” he said. “Did you see the old plug’s tooth compared to the new one that we just put in?”
“Yeah, Dad.”
“That’s why I had to kick the pedal so hard and so many times before the motorbike started last week. It wasn’t getting a good spark…to make the petrol fumes explode…and start the engine.” He looked over at Adam, “See? Everything’s connected. If you just look and think, in the end it all makes sense.”
Adam continued to watch his father work in the morning light. He wore a light blue football shirt, a new pair of red flip-flops and his favorite gray shorts. He had his father’s facial features and his mother’s light brown complexion. Adam enjoyed helping his father by handing him the tools that he needed to make the repairs and he had always been fond of his father’s impromptu lessons on internal combustion engines. He was a child full of curiosity, intrigued with learning. His mother often boasted to the other wives in the neighborhood — her son had started to speak before he was a year old, communicating in three languages in broken but full sentences. By the time he was six, Adam spoke fluent Punjabi with his mother, English with his father, and colloquial Swahili with the servants and locals.
Fatima seldom discussed her biggest concern about her son, and then only with her husband. Even at a young age, Adam had never used his language skills to create human relationships. Instead, he used language as a tool for data collection and analysis. She knew well his inner warmth and care. She had seen it often in how he took a tender interest in the habits and welfare of the local wildlife that frequently visited the perimeter of their home. But she had never seen him express or demonstrate that kind of overt warmth with humans, not even with his father or with her.
“Dad, I don’t want to be alone tomorrow,” Adam said.
“You won’t be. Santina will be with you.” Santina was his babysitter. His father continued, “And Mom will be back the day after I leave.” His mother was completing Umra, the smaller Haj or Muslim pilgrimage, that year, away at Mecca. “I hadn’t planned on leaving, but there’s a chance for a big sugar buy in Kampala at a good price. I should make this trip.”
Albert Hueghlomm looked at his son, realizing that his explanations hadn’t assuaged the boy’s concern. He tried another approach. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll bring back an Action Man from Kampala.” Action Man was a toy that Adam had asked for a couple of weeks ago, a plastic soldier with moveable limbs.
“OK.” Adam accepted the consolation. “How did Action Man get that cut on his face?”
he asked his father.
“Being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” said Albert Hueghlomm.
“Why didn’t you go to Mecca with Mom?”
His father didn’t reply right away. “I’m not allowed,” he finally said, and then stopped and wondered if there was any way to explain why to a child. He gave up and stammered, “It might not be safe.”
“If it’s not safe, why did you let Mommy go?”
“It’s safe for her.”
“But you’re bigger than her so it should be even safer for you?”
“I didn’t mean that kind of safe.”
“Isn’t there only one kind of ‘safe’?”
“There’s a lot more to what words can mean…and sometimes a lot less.”
“Then what good are words?”
“Adam,” he said and then stopped, his frustration growing.
Adam pressed, “You’re leaving. Mommy’s gone. Words don’t mean anything. And all I have is Action Man.”
“Adam,” Albert Hueghlomm’s tone was starting to become angry. He felt flustered by his son’s characteristic inquisitions and he had a lot to do on short notice to prepare for tomorrow’s trip to Kampala. “I’m sorry, Adam.” His tone softened as he caught and controlled his paternal frustration. “I’m sorry.”
Sensing his father’s annoyance, Adam let the issue drop.
Albert Hueghlomm knelt and placed his tools back into their box, wiping his hands on a shop rag, now smiling over at his son. “Hey, I know something you can do for me one day.” He stood and walked to Adam, continuing to wipe his hands on the rag, a wistful smile on his face. He leaned down to Adam lovingly. His cologne was a mixture of sandalwood and spicy tones of musk. His eyes sparkled like Christmas lights as he spoke. “One day I want you to go to Jerusalem and say a prayer for me. I’ve never been. I’ve always wanted to.” He stood straight and tossed the rag on top of the closed toolbox, smiling broadly, becoming more and more pleased with the thought of his son making a pilgrimage to the Holy City on his behalf.
“We have Jerusalem now, you know,” he beamed proudly.
“Who had it before us?” asked Adam happily.
The circumstantial irony froze Albert Hueghlomm in place.
Albert Hueghlomm was flat on his back in jeans and a tee shirt, lying in the African sun on the cement floor of his garage. He was pushing the black rubber top of a wire onto a brand new spark plug. He spoke to his son while finishing. “You want to be sure that,” he stopped and strained underneath the motorcycle, “you’re properly seated so that,” more strain, “you catch the spark.” He finished and looked up at the wire, gently wiggling it to make sure that the connection was good.
Albert Hueghlomm had a round face with a prominent nose that held up a pair of black-framed glasses. His dark brown hair, parted on the side and barely touching his small ears, stood out against his pasty white complexion. He was of medium height and build. He spoke to Adam without looking at the boy, “Did you see the spark plug that we took out?”
“Yeah, Dad.”
“It was worn and corroded,” he said. “Did you see the old plug’s tooth compared to the new one that we just put in?”
“Yeah, Dad.”
“That’s why I had to kick the pedal so hard and so many times before the motorbike started last week. It wasn’t getting a good spark…to make the petrol fumes explode…and start the engine.” He looked over at Adam, “See? Everything’s connected. If you just look and think, in the end it all makes sense.”
Adam continued to watch his father work in the morning light. He wore a light blue football shirt, a new pair of red flip-flops and his favorite gray shorts. He had his father’s facial features and his mother’s light brown complexion. Adam enjoyed helping his father by handing him the tools that he needed to make the repairs and he had always been fond of his father’s impromptu lessons on internal combustion engines. He was a child full of curiosity, intrigued with learning. His mother often boasted to the other wives in the neighborhood — her son had started to speak before he was a year old, communicating in three languages in broken but full sentences. By the time he was six, Adam spoke fluent Punjabi with his mother, English with his father, and colloquial Swahili with the servants and locals.
Fatima seldom discussed her biggest concern about her son, and then only with her husband. Even at a young age, Adam had never used his language skills to create human relationships. Instead, he used language as a tool for data collection and analysis. She knew well his inner warmth and care. She had seen it often in how he took a tender interest in the habits and welfare of the local wildlife that frequently visited the perimeter of their home. But she had never seen him express or demonstrate that kind of overt warmth with humans, not even with his father or with her.
“Dad, I don’t want to be alone tomorrow,” Adam said.
“You won’t be. Santina will be with you.” Santina was his babysitter. His father continued, “And Mom will be back the day after I leave.” His mother was completing Umra, the smaller Haj or Muslim pilgrimage, that year, away at Mecca. “I hadn’t planned on leaving, but there’s a chance for a big sugar buy in Kampala at a good price. I should make this trip.”
Albert Hueghlomm looked at his son, realizing that his explanations hadn’t assuaged the boy’s concern. He tried another approach. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll bring back an Action Man from Kampala.” Action Man was a toy that Adam had asked for a couple of weeks ago, a plastic soldier with moveable limbs.
“OK.” Adam accepted the consolation. “How did Action Man get that cut on his face?”
he asked his father.
“Being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” said Albert Hueghlomm.
“Why didn’t you go to Mecca with Mom?”
His father didn’t reply right away. “I’m not allowed,” he finally said, and then stopped and wondered if there was any way to explain why to a child. He gave up and stammered, “It might not be safe.”
“If it’s not safe, why did you let Mommy go?”
“It’s safe for her.”
“But you’re bigger than her so it should be even safer for you?”
“I didn’t mean that kind of safe.”
“Isn’t there only one kind of ‘safe’?”
“There’s a lot more to what words can mean…and sometimes a lot less.”
“Then what good are words?”
“Adam,” he said and then stopped, his frustration growing.
Adam pressed, “You’re leaving. Mommy’s gone. Words don’t mean anything. And all I have is Action Man.”
“Adam,” Albert Hueghlomm’s tone was starting to become angry. He felt flustered by his son’s characteristic inquisitions and he had a lot to do on short notice to prepare for tomorrow’s trip to Kampala. “I’m sorry, Adam.” His tone softened as he caught and controlled his paternal frustration. “I’m sorry.”
Sensing his father’s annoyance, Adam let the issue drop.
Albert Hueghlomm knelt and placed his tools back into their box, wiping his hands on a shop rag, now smiling over at his son. “Hey, I know something you can do for me one day.” He stood and walked to Adam, continuing to wipe his hands on the rag, a wistful smile on his face. He leaned down to Adam lovingly. His cologne was a mixture of sandalwood and spicy tones of musk. His eyes sparkled like Christmas lights as he spoke. “One day I want you to go to Jerusalem and say a prayer for me. I’ve never been. I’ve always wanted to.” He stood straight and tossed the rag on top of the closed toolbox, smiling broadly, becoming more and more pleased with the thought of his son making a pilgrimage to the Holy City on his behalf.
“We have Jerusalem now, you know,” he beamed proudly.
“Who had it before us?” asked Adam happily.
The circumstantial irony froze Albert Hueghlomm in place.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
All Those Babies, Chapter 3
I've started posting the chapters of Resolution 786. I'll post each successive chapter roughly every 3 or 4 days. Here's Chapter 3:
The Nairobi streets dozed under a blanket of moonlit night by the time they started their drive home. Albert Hueghlomm drove, his wife to his left, sitting in the black leather passenger seat. Adam sat in the back of his parents’ comfortable car, a white Corsair.
“That was nice of Marty and Rachel,” said Fatima.
“Yes it was,” her husband agreed. “Thanks for coming tonight. I haven’t been to a Passover Seder in a while. They did a good job with it.”
A block of streetlight moved through the car, lighting Fatima’s face for a moment. It brushed across her husband softly, over Adam, and then quietly stole away, stepping outside through the back window.
“Mommy, I didn’t like it,” said Adam, staring into the dark.
“Jewish food isn’t spicy, Adam,” said Fatima. “We’ll get you something spicy at home.”
“No, the seder,” Adam mispronounced it see-der.
“What about the seder?” his father asked, curious. He glanced for Adam in the rearview mirror, finally finding his young eyes.
“The dead babies at Passover,” said Adam, staring back at his father. “Why did Allah kill all those Egyptian babies? Why do we celebrate the killing of babies?”
No one answered. No one said another word.
They drove home quietly, swimming through the peaceful African night. The tires crooned a soothing hum as they swept across the cooling asphalt, a thin sheen of evening dew forming on its smooth, black surface. A forest of enormous trees zipped by on one side, a dark, surrounding rim of thick trunks and wide, floppy leaves hanging like elephant ears, dimly lit in the silvery shadows of moon. Blocks of streetlight took turns coming into and out of the car, sweeping over them like an endless caravan of silent, faceless nomads. Adam watched the side of his mother’s face. The light did a sultry dance with the shadows around her eyes and nose.
The Nairobi streets dozed under a blanket of moonlit night by the time they started their drive home. Albert Hueghlomm drove, his wife to his left, sitting in the black leather passenger seat. Adam sat in the back of his parents’ comfortable car, a white Corsair.
“That was nice of Marty and Rachel,” said Fatima.
“Yes it was,” her husband agreed. “Thanks for coming tonight. I haven’t been to a Passover Seder in a while. They did a good job with it.”
A block of streetlight moved through the car, lighting Fatima’s face for a moment. It brushed across her husband softly, over Adam, and then quietly stole away, stepping outside through the back window.
“Mommy, I didn’t like it,” said Adam, staring into the dark.
“Jewish food isn’t spicy, Adam,” said Fatima. “We’ll get you something spicy at home.”
“No, the seder,” Adam mispronounced it see-der.
“What about the seder?” his father asked, curious. He glanced for Adam in the rearview mirror, finally finding his young eyes.
“The dead babies at Passover,” said Adam, staring back at his father. “Why did Allah kill all those Egyptian babies? Why do we celebrate the killing of babies?”
No one answered. No one said another word.
They drove home quietly, swimming through the peaceful African night. The tires crooned a soothing hum as they swept across the cooling asphalt, a thin sheen of evening dew forming on its smooth, black surface. A forest of enormous trees zipped by on one side, a dark, surrounding rim of thick trunks and wide, floppy leaves hanging like elephant ears, dimly lit in the silvery shadows of moon. Blocks of streetlight took turns coming into and out of the car, sweeping over them like an endless caravan of silent, faceless nomads. Adam watched the side of his mother’s face. The light did a sultry dance with the shadows around her eyes and nose.
Sunday, November 6, 2011
The Old Man from Nairobi, Chapter 2
I've started posting the chapters of Resolution 786. I'll post each successive chapter roughly every 3 or 4 days. Here's Chapter 2:
Adam Hueghlomm was eight years old and on school holiday. Every morning he would wake, wash, and put on his favorite gray shorts and red flip-flops. The cool Nairobi air always tasted full of blossoming vegetation when he climbed down the cement steps at the front of their house. A tall, black wrought iron fence surrounded the property. By sunrise, the street outside the gate came alive with dusty cars and busy walkers. The vegetable lady regularly passed along a couple of hours after daybreak, strolling on the gravel sidewalk, her booming voice announcing the day’s produce while she carried a heavy basket atop her head, its content brimming with shiny green, yellow, and red spheres and cones.
Adam’s mother, Fatima, came down the hard steps, drying her hands with a dark blue dishtowel along the way. She wore a long, loose cotton skirt with a gentle floral pattern. Although far from tight, her long-sleeved yellow top held her thin form more snugly than her skirt. Her straight, shoulder-length black hair shone in the morning sun, bouncing softly around her light brown neck as she walked, a burst of color moving against the gray cream of the house.
Fatima shouted over her son, at the vegetable lady, “Aye, aye!” Her husband loved spaghetti and tonight she would make the sauce with fresh tomatoes.
The vegetable lady stopped immediately outside the wrought iron gate, “Ah, mama need vegetable this day.” Her words carried the heavy soak of a Swahili accent. She lowered her basket from the top of her head and held it below her waist, grasping it steady by two side handles, tilting it towards Fatima. She invited Fatima forward with a broad smile, lips stretched across a pristine set of bright, clean teeth.
Fatima leaned into the basket and picked over the day’s produce, culling out the best tomatoes of the lot, picking up this one or that, turning each around in her thin hands, running discerning eyes over the skin, gently pressing her fingertips into the firm spheres, testing freshness. The vegetable lady watched patiently, mentally tallying her total sale. Fatima made her final selections and placed the chosen tomatoes into the blue dishtowel, holding it like a miniature hammock. She began the bartering ritual, wanting to save every possible shilling, more on the basis of principle rather than need. Adam caught fragments of the Swahili conversation.
“These look like they were picked yesterday,” opened Fatima, a subtle British accent woven through her words.
“Noooooo, no, no. They were picked todaaay,” countered the vegetable lady, her words stretched in African inflections, her dark face nodding no, gently.
“But they’re bruised and the skin isn’t tight. They must be from yesterday.”
“The skin is very tight, good lady.” The vegetable lady tilted her head, mentally selecting the most compelling images for her next sentence. “My old, old mother work soooo hard. She pick these todayyyy, no matter how much her back hurrrrrting.”
Fatima decided that she would pay the asking price today, but she continued a token negotiation so that she wouldn’t be branded an easy mark in future transactions. “Yesterday they seemed bigger.”
“Same plant, same plant. Same size.” The vegetable lady nodded her head gently from side to side and made little clucking sounds with her tongue.
“OK, OK. But only because I know you,” said Fatima.
“Madam will like these tomatoes,” said the vegetable lady, smiling, her mind rolling numbers behind her eyes like a cash register.
Paper, coins and tomatoes changed hands.
Amid the bartering, Adam watched the old man on the other side of the road. He was shuffling down the sidewalk, the same as every day, bobbing along, his face the color of eggplants, his torn, dusty khaki pants crinkling and uncrinkling in cadence with his shuffling gait, a mud-caked burlap bag clutched close to his bare, ebony chest.
Fatima and the vegetable lady parted, exchanging smiles, bidding each other goodbye in Swahili, “Kwaheri!” The vegetable lady continued moving down the road announcing and hawking her produce, “Mboga safi na fresh kweli-kweli.” Fatima turned and hopped back up the cement steps, blessing the tomatoes in Arabic along the way, “Bismillah.”
Adam stayed on his side of the unlocked gate, watching the old man. The man had just gotten to where a side alley met the road. He dodged quickly into the hidden path, the same one he vanished into every day. Circumstances fused with curiosity, creating an enticing opportunity to discover the old man’s secrets. Adam buckled under the heavy weight of temptation. He turned sideways and slipped through the gate, glancing back from the corner of his eye at the cement steps to make sure his mother wasn’t looking. Outside the home compound, he stood on his side of the road, waiting for traffic to subside. When it did, he moved forward and across the road, walking in a quick, stilted gait.
Adam turned into the side alley and moved down the hidden, red-soiled path. A blanket of stillness nestled around him. He listened to the sound of gravel crunching underneath his flip-flops. Blossoming African weeds loomed taller than him, beautiful, on both sides of the path. Then he saw him. Around a gentle curve and a few feet off the path, the old man stood with his shiny, thinly muscled purple back facing Adam, his legs slightly apart, burlap bag crumpled on the ground beside him. He was peeing into the weeds.
The gravel stopped crunching. The tall weeds disappeared. Adam stopped thinking. He followed his limbs, walking closer. The old man grew bigger. He had one wrinkled, leathery palm resting gently on his hip, the other in front of him guiding a yellow stream into the weeds, its parabolic curve visible through the thin space between the back of his legs. The button on the old man’s rear pant pocket hung by a thread and was caked in dried blood. He cleared his throat noisily and gasped a parade of deep breaths. His lungs sounded like old newspapers fluttering helplessly in a strong gust. The yellow stream made a final lurch into the weeds like a falling rope. The old man smelled like sweat, urine and salt boiling together in a teapot. He bent his knees and hunched to one side to pick up the muddy burlap bag. He suddenly turned to stone.
Adam froze, icy fear.
Slowly, almost without moving, the old man’s onyx head turned towards the little boy until his tilted visage locked eyes with Adam’s. His wrinkled, leather eggplant face slowly broke into a bright ivory smile, squinting black pupils like bottomless wells drilled into the white snowfields of his eyes. And it was his eyes that then invited Adam to come look into the mud-caked burlap bag.
Adam pulled forward, a reluctant puppet on a horizontal string. The old man’s stance and expression remained unchanged, his wrinkled coal hands holding the dirty burlap bag open by its two frayed loop handles. Adam craned his neck to peer inside. Nothing. No, wait…he heard a faint, muffled tweet, tweet, tweet. He stepped closer, gazing to the bottom of the bag. A gang of bright yellow chicks scurried about inside the bag alongside a worn and sunburned copy of the Quran.
Adam looked back up at the old man, still hunched around his own ivory smile. The old man thrust a deep gaze into Adam’s eyes, silently asking him what he thought of the content of his bag. And then his squinting, ivory-framed eyes grew together into one large eye that absorbed his forehead. Adam blinked and the old man’s face became an enormous dark pupil reflecting scenes of war and death and pilgrimage, like a speeded up old movie reel, oscillating and rushing scenes that eddied into one final peaceful tableau of the giant black cube in Mecca — still, deserted, quiet, bathed in soft blue moonlight.
Adam screamed. He turned and ran, his heart beating hard inside his throat, rushing blood that clutched at his windpipe until he almost couldn’t breathe.
He lost one flip-flop forever.
He never followed the old man again.
Adam Hueghlomm was eight years old and on school holiday. Every morning he would wake, wash, and put on his favorite gray shorts and red flip-flops. The cool Nairobi air always tasted full of blossoming vegetation when he climbed down the cement steps at the front of their house. A tall, black wrought iron fence surrounded the property. By sunrise, the street outside the gate came alive with dusty cars and busy walkers. The vegetable lady regularly passed along a couple of hours after daybreak, strolling on the gravel sidewalk, her booming voice announcing the day’s produce while she carried a heavy basket atop her head, its content brimming with shiny green, yellow, and red spheres and cones.
Adam’s mother, Fatima, came down the hard steps, drying her hands with a dark blue dishtowel along the way. She wore a long, loose cotton skirt with a gentle floral pattern. Although far from tight, her long-sleeved yellow top held her thin form more snugly than her skirt. Her straight, shoulder-length black hair shone in the morning sun, bouncing softly around her light brown neck as she walked, a burst of color moving against the gray cream of the house.
Fatima shouted over her son, at the vegetable lady, “Aye, aye!” Her husband loved spaghetti and tonight she would make the sauce with fresh tomatoes.
The vegetable lady stopped immediately outside the wrought iron gate, “Ah, mama need vegetable this day.” Her words carried the heavy soak of a Swahili accent. She lowered her basket from the top of her head and held it below her waist, grasping it steady by two side handles, tilting it towards Fatima. She invited Fatima forward with a broad smile, lips stretched across a pristine set of bright, clean teeth.
Fatima leaned into the basket and picked over the day’s produce, culling out the best tomatoes of the lot, picking up this one or that, turning each around in her thin hands, running discerning eyes over the skin, gently pressing her fingertips into the firm spheres, testing freshness. The vegetable lady watched patiently, mentally tallying her total sale. Fatima made her final selections and placed the chosen tomatoes into the blue dishtowel, holding it like a miniature hammock. She began the bartering ritual, wanting to save every possible shilling, more on the basis of principle rather than need. Adam caught fragments of the Swahili conversation.
“These look like they were picked yesterday,” opened Fatima, a subtle British accent woven through her words.
“Noooooo, no, no. They were picked todaaay,” countered the vegetable lady, her words stretched in African inflections, her dark face nodding no, gently.
“But they’re bruised and the skin isn’t tight. They must be from yesterday.”
“The skin is very tight, good lady.” The vegetable lady tilted her head, mentally selecting the most compelling images for her next sentence. “My old, old mother work soooo hard. She pick these todayyyy, no matter how much her back hurrrrrting.”
Fatima decided that she would pay the asking price today, but she continued a token negotiation so that she wouldn’t be branded an easy mark in future transactions. “Yesterday they seemed bigger.”
“Same plant, same plant. Same size.” The vegetable lady nodded her head gently from side to side and made little clucking sounds with her tongue.
“OK, OK. But only because I know you,” said Fatima.
“Madam will like these tomatoes,” said the vegetable lady, smiling, her mind rolling numbers behind her eyes like a cash register.
Paper, coins and tomatoes changed hands.
Amid the bartering, Adam watched the old man on the other side of the road. He was shuffling down the sidewalk, the same as every day, bobbing along, his face the color of eggplants, his torn, dusty khaki pants crinkling and uncrinkling in cadence with his shuffling gait, a mud-caked burlap bag clutched close to his bare, ebony chest.
Fatima and the vegetable lady parted, exchanging smiles, bidding each other goodbye in Swahili, “Kwaheri!” The vegetable lady continued moving down the road announcing and hawking her produce, “Mboga safi na fresh kweli-kweli.” Fatima turned and hopped back up the cement steps, blessing the tomatoes in Arabic along the way, “Bismillah.”
Adam stayed on his side of the unlocked gate, watching the old man. The man had just gotten to where a side alley met the road. He dodged quickly into the hidden path, the same one he vanished into every day. Circumstances fused with curiosity, creating an enticing opportunity to discover the old man’s secrets. Adam buckled under the heavy weight of temptation. He turned sideways and slipped through the gate, glancing back from the corner of his eye at the cement steps to make sure his mother wasn’t looking. Outside the home compound, he stood on his side of the road, waiting for traffic to subside. When it did, he moved forward and across the road, walking in a quick, stilted gait.
Adam turned into the side alley and moved down the hidden, red-soiled path. A blanket of stillness nestled around him. He listened to the sound of gravel crunching underneath his flip-flops. Blossoming African weeds loomed taller than him, beautiful, on both sides of the path. Then he saw him. Around a gentle curve and a few feet off the path, the old man stood with his shiny, thinly muscled purple back facing Adam, his legs slightly apart, burlap bag crumpled on the ground beside him. He was peeing into the weeds.
The gravel stopped crunching. The tall weeds disappeared. Adam stopped thinking. He followed his limbs, walking closer. The old man grew bigger. He had one wrinkled, leathery palm resting gently on his hip, the other in front of him guiding a yellow stream into the weeds, its parabolic curve visible through the thin space between the back of his legs. The button on the old man’s rear pant pocket hung by a thread and was caked in dried blood. He cleared his throat noisily and gasped a parade of deep breaths. His lungs sounded like old newspapers fluttering helplessly in a strong gust. The yellow stream made a final lurch into the weeds like a falling rope. The old man smelled like sweat, urine and salt boiling together in a teapot. He bent his knees and hunched to one side to pick up the muddy burlap bag. He suddenly turned to stone.
Adam froze, icy fear.
Slowly, almost without moving, the old man’s onyx head turned towards the little boy until his tilted visage locked eyes with Adam’s. His wrinkled, leather eggplant face slowly broke into a bright ivory smile, squinting black pupils like bottomless wells drilled into the white snowfields of his eyes. And it was his eyes that then invited Adam to come look into the mud-caked burlap bag.
Adam pulled forward, a reluctant puppet on a horizontal string. The old man’s stance and expression remained unchanged, his wrinkled coal hands holding the dirty burlap bag open by its two frayed loop handles. Adam craned his neck to peer inside. Nothing. No, wait…he heard a faint, muffled tweet, tweet, tweet. He stepped closer, gazing to the bottom of the bag. A gang of bright yellow chicks scurried about inside the bag alongside a worn and sunburned copy of the Quran.
Adam looked back up at the old man, still hunched around his own ivory smile. The old man thrust a deep gaze into Adam’s eyes, silently asking him what he thought of the content of his bag. And then his squinting, ivory-framed eyes grew together into one large eye that absorbed his forehead. Adam blinked and the old man’s face became an enormous dark pupil reflecting scenes of war and death and pilgrimage, like a speeded up old movie reel, oscillating and rushing scenes that eddied into one final peaceful tableau of the giant black cube in Mecca — still, deserted, quiet, bathed in soft blue moonlight.
Adam screamed. He turned and ran, his heart beating hard inside his throat, rushing blood that clutched at his windpipe until he almost couldn’t breathe.
He lost one flip-flop forever.
He never followed the old man again.
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