Boualem Sansal - Harraga

‘But he wasn’t a minister when I told him.’

‘You told him before the amnesia, that’s good, and then the baby was thrown out with the bathwater.’

‘What?’

‘Never mind. So, given your choices were coming to Algiers to beard him in his ministerial den, committing suicide or going back to your douar where your father would likely cut your throat, what did you decide?’

‘To go to Morocco, to Spain.’

‘And that’s how you met my idiot brother, there you both were down on the shore looking for a likely boat. And viva España !’

‘Now where am I supposed to give birth? I don’t have anyone to sign for me.’

‘Sign what?’

‘Everything… the paperwork… and what about money?’

‘And you think that in Europe no one has to sign anything?’

‘Sofiane said it was dangerous to be a harraga in my condition. At the Moroccan border, they shoot at people and you have to dive into the ditch. He told me to come to you.’

‘And now that you’re here, we’ll make the best of a bad job.’

‘…’

It’s three o’clock in the morning and still the night drags on. Three times the hall clock has tried to make its presence felt but these are troubled waters, even a ghost would struggle to make itself heard. This is no country for rational people. Not that I have been rational recently, things have been moving too fast.

Chérifa passed out, arms folded, mouth agape, legs likewise, drunk on laughter and Turkish delight. I know, it’s her way of dealing with things and now that I know her secret I find her a lot less indecent.

Secret is a bit of an overstatement… the whole story is a cliché! Older man seduces girl, refashions her to his taste, keeps her as a little indulgence for his business outings, then tosses her overboard with a bun in the oven. A well-worn tale that just keeps repeating itself.

It’s a cliché I experienced myself — minus the bun in the oven — so I can hardly cast the first stone. I was the same age she is now, I’d just arrived at university, my hair still in schoolgirl pigtails. Like her, I was swept off my feet, like her I got to go to the ball, like her I waited patiently for my Prince Charming to call and like her I was tossed aside once I’d been used. I had my studies to take my mind off things, all she has is her carefree madness to keep her sane. Later, just as the brainwashing sessions were beginning, I found out that my Romeo was the Party bigwig assigned to keep the university under surveillance. This was his hunting ground, his personal fiefdom, the university chancellor licked his boots, the professors kissed his hand, those students who already had one foot on the Party ladder organised a guard of honour for him. He was handsome, his patter was slick, he only had to click his fingers and they would have hurled themselves from the highest tower. I felt privileged, all my girlfriends were infatuated. He and I talked of a bright future together, promised to help each other out, to marry our fortunes. Then, when the new academic year began, my mentor took his pick of the new students. It was his routine, he was exercising his droit du seigneur . This was the year of the blonde. The lucky girl had a shock of flaxen hair and about as much common sense as I had had in the year of the redhead.

Thinking about it nearly twenty years later, it sounds stupid, but at the time, it felt like the end of the world. At seventeen, coming straight from the bosom of a family, you never do anything by halves; you fall head over heels and it feels like dying.

It was not so much this incident that led me to this solitary life. There are the things that, day by day, slowly blacken and decay, sucking us into their quagmire logic, turning our stomachs and our hearts. The things that howl, that violate and slaughter. The things that smack of duplicity, the stifling atmosphere, the maddening charade. And above all, there are the unshakeable truths, the fearsome certainties, those dank prisons that engulf, demean, stultify, annihilate and vomit up fanatical mobs bent on nightmare. Then there is everything else, everything that is lacking, disappearing, crumbling, futile, mind-numbing. The monstrous showdown between those who exploit with a jerk of the chin and those who suffer with heads bowed.

Why would I want to be on such a ship? I am better off on my raft, I drink water, I watch the sky, I listen to the wind — everything is perfect. If sometimes I gnash my teeth, and if sometimes my flesh grates on my bones, it is simply a reminder of my failings.

The clock has just whirred four times. How time flies.

At this point, I am tormented by indecision, not knowing whether to sleep or wake.

Dear God, what a week! Like a marathon crossed with an assault course. The maternity clinic, the blood tests, the chemist and then straight on to the shops, the flea markets, the bazaars, the souks . The usual unpleasant encounters. Everywhere and elsewhere, restless hordes thronged the streets while droves of snorting old bangers charged the crowds and mounted the pavements. We were caught up in an end-of-the-world scare which turned out to be a dummy run organised by people with too much time on their hands. It’s enough to give anyone a migraine. A race against the clock in the morning, a race against the clock at night. Taxis, buses, stairs, more taxis, more buses, more stairs. And in between, the endless standing around in the sweltering heat. We were offered free travel and personalised stops on the route 12 bus, which was a relief. Intimately acquainted with every nook and cranny of Algiers, our friend from GAUTA, the master of the good deed, supplied us with useful addresses and even went so far as to drive us everywhere. There was panic aboard the 235, people accusing him of hijacking, of blue murder, of favouritism, but the passengers all heartily approved when the gallant admiral, hand on his heart, explained his plan: ‘Hey, they’re my family, I’m taking them home, are you people Muslims or what?’ A quick stop at midday to grab a bite, delicious morsels dripping with grease, coated in sugar, teeming with bacteria. Algiers seems to have one food stall for every inhabitant, but no one to sweep the streets. Dying of starvation here would take some doing, but it’s not enough to eat, people need dignity. It’s beyond me: the more dire the poverty, the more cheap eateries there are, and the more people snack! The haggling alone is enough to make you abandon all hope. This, I realised, was the much-trumpeted free-market economy in action. All the albatrosses, the white elephants, the turkeys and the shiny gadgets manufactured around the world are offloaded here where people scrabble to buy them, despite the fact that the people here have no jobs and don’t know where their next pay packet is coming from. I wish some armchair economist would leave his comfortable sitting room and explain it to me. And spare me the nonsense about oil revenues and all that malarkey! The prices here read like science fiction. The swindlers make them up as they go along. And, God, their beady eyes! They specialise in exploiting people who are down on their luck, so my well-groomed appearance didn’t help. Stallholders quoted us the sort of prices they reserve for the wealthy and the well-heeled. We moved on to the next stall double-quick only to be greeted by the same nightmare. It was Catch-22. Chérifa is impulsive, she wants everything and she wants it now! If I hesitate, she sulks and stamps her feet. She doesn’t care about my purse or my health.

And, dear God, her taste! The colours, the patterns, the fabrics, it’s enough to make you throw up. The girl is a disgrace. And she has a terrible temper. Even though she’s an expectant mother, she’s still determined to be quirky . Luckily for me, I have an old feudal law to deal with such eventualities: she who pays, decides.