السلام عليكم
ترجمة قصة " الصغير يذهب إلى المخيم " وهي إحدى ست قصص قصيرة من مجموعة " أطفال غسان كنفاني"
The Child Goes to the Camp
By
Ghassan Kanafani
Translated by
Hasan M. Abu Khalil
It was war time. War? Did I say war? No, it was more than war. It was the continuous struggle with the enemy. That said, during war, a breeze of peace may blow; allowing the fighter to catch his breath. To rest, relax, to allow him a brief respite. But during the hostilities, he is always only a gunshot away. During hostilities, you need a miracle to get through two gunshots without getting hurt. And so it was, as I told you, a time of continuous hostilities.
I was living with seven hot tempered brothers, and with a father who did not love his wife, maybe because she had borne him eight children during those hostile times. My aunt, her husband and their five children were also living with us, along with my old grandfather who, whenever he found five piasters whether on the table or in the pocket of one of the many pairs of pants hanging up, he would take at once to buy a newspaper. And as he did not know how to read, you know, he had to confess what he had done so that one of us could read the latest news out loud to him.
At that time; let me tell you that there was no conflict at that time in the sense you are imagining, no, there was no real war. Actually, there was no war at all. The thing was that we were eighteen people from all age groups living under one roof. None of us could get a job, and hunger, which you only hear about- was our only concern. That is what I call hostile times. It is the same, you know. We used to fight to get food, then fight to distribute it among us, and then we used to fight after that. And whenever a peaceful moment prevailed, my grandfather would take out his carefully rolled newspaper from between his clothes, looking at us all with his small eager eyes. This meant that five piasters had been stolen from someone’s pocket-supposing that someone had five piasters of course- or from somewhere, and then a quarrel would take place. My grandfather would hold tight to his newspaper while facing the raised voices with the patience of an old man who has lived long enough to listen to all kinds of discord without finding anything worth responding to. And as the clamor died down, he would hand the nearest boy the newspaper –he didn’t trust girls- while still holding on to it so that it wouldn’t be snatched away from him.
We, Issam and I, were ten years old, and he was a little bigger than me, and still is. He saw himself as the leader of his brothers, my cousins, exactly as I saw myself the leader of my own brothers. After several attempts, my father and my aunt’s husband finally found us a daily chore that we could do together. We were to carry between us a large basket and walk for about an hour and fifteen minutes until we reached the vegetable market in the afternoon.
About the vegetable market in the afternoon, you don’t know what it looked like. The shops were about to close at that time of day, and the last trucks were loading what was left of the vegetables and leaving that crowded street. Our mission, Issam’s and mine, was easy and difficult at the same time. We had to find whatever vegetables we could to fill our basket with, whether from in front of shops, behind cars, and even from the stalls if the owner was taking a nap or was inside his shop.
They were hostile times. You cannot imagine how the fighter can keep dodging two bullets all day long. Issam used to fly like an arrow to snatch a torn head of lettuce or a bunch of onions, or even to grab an apple from between the wheels of a truck about to move. My role was to hold off the devils, I mean the other children, if they tried to get hold of an orange in the mud that I saw before they did. We used to work all afternoon long. And we, Issam and I, used to fight with everyone; the rest of the children, the shops owners, drivers, and even with policemen sometimes. The rest of the time we would spend fighting with each other, Issam and I.
They were hostile times. I am telling you this because you can’t know. In such times, no one can be virtuous, and no one is asked to be so. It would be funny to ask anyone to be so in such times. To earn your living in whatever way possible is a remarkable victory or virtue in such times. Alright, let’s say when a man dies, virtue dies with him, isn’t that so? Ok then, let’s agree upon one thing. In hostile times your first priority is to realize the virtue, to stay alive in the first place. Other things come in second place. And since you are continuously living in hostile times, then you have nothing that comes in second place. First, you have to finish the thing that comes in first place, and it never finishes in such times.
We, Issam and I, had to carry the basket together, once it was full, and make our way back home. That was the food for all of us for the next day. Of course, Issam and I had a deal to eat the best of the basket on our way back home. It was an unspoken deal that we never discussed or announced. It just happened. That is, we worked together in those hostile times.
Winter that ill-fated year was so cold, and we were carrying a very heavy basket, I will never forget how heavy it was. (It was as if, during battle, you fell down into the trenches to find a comfortable bed there.) I was eating an apple. Before that, we had gone out through the market gate to walk down the main road. We walked for around ten minutes, weaving through people, cars, buses and in front of shop windows without speaking to each other at all (well, the basket was too heavy and both of us were busy eating ) when suddenly…
No. I cannot describe it. It’s something that cannot be described. It was as though you were only a gunshot away from your enemy, unarmed and sitting within the circle of your mother’s arms.
Let me try and explain what happened. We, Issam and I, were carrying the basket as I told you, and there was a policeman who was standing in the middle of the road. The street was wet, and we almost had no shoes, they were so worn out. And suddenly I saw it. Maybe I could see it because I was looking at the policeman’s thick sturdy boots, but anyway I saw it. I could see a part of it under his shoe. I was about six meters away from it, but I could tell that it was more than one pound, from its color maybe.
In such situations we don’t think. Maybe it has something to do with instinct. I don’t know if the color of paper money has anything to do with instinct, or if it is more to do with that savage strength, crime, and the ability to strangle someone in an instant. That instinct lies deep inside every one of us. But what I know for a certainty is that when a man- in hostile times- sees paper money under a policeman’s shoes, he shouldn’t think, especially if he is a carrying a basket of rotten vegetables and only six meters away from it. And so I acted, I threw away what was left of the apple I was eating, and let go of the basket. Issam must have swung when I suddenly let go of the heavy basket, but he had seen it just after I did. So I burst forth toward it with all the unknown power that would force a unicorn to make a random attack. I butted the policeman’s leg with my shoulder, who stepped back alarmed. I also lost my balance, but I didn’t fall down. In that moment I saw it, it was a five pound note, and I grabbed it as soon as I saw it before falling to the ground. And in less time to stand than it took me to fall I was up and running.
The whole world was after me. The policeman’s whistle, the sound of his heavy boots hitting the ground, Issam’s cries, car horns and buses, peoples’ cries…I am not sure that they were all chasing me. No one can guess. I was running, confident that no one on earth or beyond could catch me. With the mentality of a ten-year-old boy I took a different path. Maybe I thought that Issam would lead the policeman to me. I don’t know, I didn’t look behind me. I was running and running, and I don’t remember that I ever got tired. I was like a soldier that flees the battlefield of a war he was forced to fight, and he has only to keep running to turn his back on the world.
I reached home after dark, and as the door was opened to let me in, I found what I had felt deep down inside I would find. The seventeen creatures in the house were awaiting my return. They quickly but carefully examined the expression on my face, as I examined theirs with my foot firmly to the ground and my hand grasping tightly the five pound note in my pocket.
Issam was standing between his mother and father and he was angry. I realized that a quarrel had taken place between the two families before my return. I took shelter near my grandfather who was sitting in the corner wrapped in his clean brown robe looking impressed with me. He was a wise man, a real man who understood the ways of the world. All he wanted from the five pounds was a newspaper, but a big one this time.
I waited, resigned, for the quarrel to break out. Issam of course had lied and told everyone that he was the one who had found the five pounds, and that I took it from him by force, and that I had even forced him to carry the heavy basket of vegetables all by himself the whole way home. As I have told you before, these were hostile times. No one cared whether Issam was lying or not, it was pointless. Not only did Issam lie, he was sure no one would care about the truth. To top it all off he shamed himself by saying for the first time in his life that I had hit him and that I was stronger than he was. Anyway, none of that mattered except for the main issue.
Our fathers were thinking of other things. Issam’s father wanted to take half the money, and my father wanted to take the other half. They knew that had I managed to keep all of the money it would have all been mine, but had I given up any part of it, I would have lost everything, and they would have shared it between them.
What they didn’t realize was what it meant for a child to grasp five pounds in his hand during hostile times. I addressed them all in a threatening way; it was the first time in my life I had ever taken such a tone of voice with them, and said that I would leave home forever if they tried to take the money. It was mine; I stressed, and mine alone.
You can guess what happened next. They were outraged! Any familial affection disappeared and they all stood against me. But I was ready to face the worst, so when they all started hitting me I didn’t defend myself, although I could have. Instead I stood with my hand in my pocket grasping the five pound note tightly, although it wasn’t easy to avoid their accurate strikes.
My grandfather was eagerly watching the argument at first, but when the fight began to look serious he stood between us and allowed me to hide behind him. He suggested a settlement. The adults had no right to the money he said, but that I was obliged to take all the children out of the house on a sunny day somewhere they could all spend the five pounds together.
At first I stepped forward to object to his suggestion, but I saw something in his eyes that made me stop. I didn’t understand what he was trying to tell me with his eyes, but I felt that he wasn’t telling the truth and that he was begging me to keep silent.
A ten-year-old boy, you know, especially during times of hostility, can’t understand things (if he has to understand them) as much as an old man like my grandfather. But that is what happened. Grandfather wanted to get his newspaper every day for a week, and was willing to help me however he could to get his wish.
That was what we agreed on that evening, but I knew that my mission wasn’t over yet. I still had to protect the five pounds every moment of the day and night. I had to hold off the rest of the children against their attempts to steal it from me, and I had to resist the attempts by my mother to persuade me to give it up. She told me that evening that with five pounds we could buy two pounds of meat or a new shirt for me, or medicine for emergencies, or a book for me if they decided to send me to a free school next summer. But her attempts were futile; it was like asking me to wipe my shoes clean while dodging between two bullets.
I didn’t know what to do, but for the next month I managed to hold the children off by making all kinds of false promises. They must have known that I wasn’t being honest, but did not accuse me of lying. Virtue did not exist in that kind of situation. There was something else that took priority: it was the five pounds.
My grandfather saw what was going on, (when you are as old as him you don’t miss much), and as the weeks passed he began to worry that he had lost his chance to get the newspapers he wanted in return for the role he had played. As more days passed everyone thought that I had already spent the five pounds and that I was trying to trick them by keeping my hand in my pocket. Grandfather knew I still had the money though, and one night tried to take it out of my pocket while I was sleeping ( I went to sleep fully dressed in those days) but I woke up and he backed off and went back to sleep without saying a word.
I have told you before, these were hostile times. My grandfather was sad because he did not get his newspapers. He wasn’t sad that I had not kept an unspoken promise. He understood what it meant to live in those hostile times, and he never blamed me for my actions in all the years he lived with us.
Issam too got over his anger. He was a hot tempered boy, but deep inside he knew exactly what had happened. We continued our daily trips to the vegetable market together, although we used to talk rarely and fight less. It seemed as though a wall had separated us. Issam was still living in hostile times, but I was breathing a different kind of air, and Issam had no idea what it was like.
I remember I kept the five pounds in my pocket for a complete five weeks. I was preparing myself to find the right way to get out of those difficult times. But whenever I came close it seemed to me that that was the way to go back to those hostile times and not the way out of them.
How can you ever understand this? Keeping that five pound note was infinitely more precious than spending it. Keeping it in my pocket was like holding a key that would enable me to open the door to the way out of those difficult times. But whenever I got closer to the lock, I could smell the scent of a different, longer lasting kind of hostility. It was as though I would be starting all over again.
What happened next is not important. One day Issam and I went to the market and I ran to grab a bunch of vegetables that dropped in front of the front wheels of a slow moving truck. Except at the last moment I slipped and fell down beneath the cab of the truck. I was lucky; the wheels of the truck didn’t run over my legs. It stopped just as they touched my leg. I regained consciousness in the hospital. The first thing I did at that moment, as you must have guessed was to put my hand in my pocket to look for the five pound note. But it was gone.
I think that Issam must have taken it when he was with me on the way to the hospital. He never said that he did and I never asked. We would look at each other and somehow understand. No, I wasn’t angry that he took advantage of the situation by taking the five pounds while I lay bleeding. My only regret was that I had lost it.
You will never understand. They were hostile times.
March, 1967
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