Driving Mother Crazy , as published in the anthology According to ADam

Driving Mother Crazy, Abeer Elgamal (Egypt)

Driving Mother Crazy

Abeer Elgamal (Egypt)

“Watch out, Mummy! Watch out! He’s breaking your mirror,” Nora screamed. A smashing sound deafened my ears as I woke up terrified but grateful that the accident was only a dream. I felt like a small helpless animal being hunted by a large brutal one. Our black Lancer had turned into a rabbit being chased by a vicious dark wolf, intent on biting off the creature’s left ear before devouring her.

I did not know how much I hated driving until I had that dream. Driving through Cairo traffic is a nightmare, a circus in which you perform without training. I spend half my days driving my twin teenagers Nora and Ali to private lessons, tennis coaching, doctors’ appointments, and outings with friends. Driving not only strains my back and neck, due to the hours spent sitting in the car in streets like clogged arteries, but it sucks all my energy, shatters my nerves and raids my dreams.

A woman driving in a male-oriented society triggers all kinds of reactions that men would normally repress in other situations. Whether they admit it or not, most men believe women should stay home to make kofta [meatballs] or mahshy [stuffed vegetables] and leave the outside world to them. Since they cannot afford it, men express their innermost feelings in malicious forms toward women in the streets, and women drivers get the lion’s share. That surely doubles the risk of my daily journeys with the twins.

In my dream I was driving the twins as usual, but we were heading to two different places at the same time. I kept driving back and forth on the same road, Tareek al-Nasr, never reaching either destination. One moment I was going toward al-Mokatam, where they were supposed to have a private lesson, and the next I was heading in the opposite direction, to al-Ahly club, Nasr City. I drove in my cautious, or rather “slow,” manner, as my kids describe it. As it did in reality, my driving triggered two contradictory reactions in the twins, according to the destination I was heading. When I drove toward the club, they shouted, “Faster, Mummy, go faster, we’ll be late for training.” But when I went in the other direction, to the private lessons center, they were kind enough to support my lame driving, “Take your time, Mummy; the teacher is never on time.” 

Usually, Nora is never silent on our drives; she bugs me about one thing or another and interrupts my desperate attempts to focus on the road. She is continuously planning some event or other: a surprise birthday party for a friend, an outing to the mall, a color festival, a paintball battle, or a sand-boarding day. She is practical and clever enough to figure out that the best time to discuss the details of any of her projects with me is when we are stuck in the car. At home I am always busy, but in the mandatory prison which is our battered, shark-faced Lancer, there is no way I can escape her. Sometimes I listen and sometimes I scold her, telling her I need to focus on the circus going on around me or we won’t make it to our destination. 

The other day Nora declared, “Mummy, we have to be there before five. It’s the deadline for onsite registration.” 

“There, where?” I said stupidly, as I maneuvered to avoid a sure attack from a minibus aimed at my mirror.

“Mummy, don’t you ever listen to me?” 

“I do, sweetie, I do all the time. Where do you want to go? Is it tomorrow?” I tried to soothe her.

“Nooo, it’s on Friday. We’re going to the tennis colony for the championship.”

“And where is this colony?” I endeavored to sound patient and looked quickly at Ali through the front mirror, hoping that he might object to Nora’s plan, but he was immersed in his BlackBerry chat as usual.

“It’s on Ismailia Road, thirty-five kilometers away,” she said.

I flinched at the thought of driving amid the wildest trucks and buses on the Cairo-Ismailia road. Gathering up my courage, I attempted to reason with her. “We don’t have to participate in every tournament; let’s restrict ourselves to the ones in the city. You know I hate to drive on highways. What do you think, Ali?” I tried to enlist his help by glancing at him again in the mirror.

“Eh? What did you say, Mum?” he inquired in his absent-minded way.

“You are being a zombie again. Why don’t you leave that thing and join the conversation? I asked if that colony tournament is really important.” I was starting to get really nervous.

“I don’t want to go. If she goes I’ll take part only to be with her.” He said in that casual manner that plays on my nerves.

I was happy to get his support but angry that he was letting his sister down, as he always does when she needs him. I promised Nora I would think about it and tell her my decision when we got home. 

Ever since they were in kindergarten, Ali and Nora did everything together. He was the lazy one. He wanted things just as much as she did, but did not exert any effort to get them, letting her fight the battle for both of them. He played the king and she was the minister who had to carry out his plans. To me, it was neither fun nor fair: it enabled him to sit back and relax and let her do the dirty work, just like most women do in real life. It was neither a game nor child’s play as everyone around me insisted; it was a life-defining experience that would last forever. On most days she would carry both her own and his school bag from class to the school gate where I waited for them. He would often run to give me a hug while she trudged behind with the bags, and it made me crazy that she did it voluntarily and he took it as his lawful right as king. Every time I intervened to prevent his early male dominance and her submission, I regretted it because both of them have accepted their roles without hard feelings and everyone accused me of endangering their bond as twins. My husband believed I worried too much about a matter that meant nothing to anyone but my own “disturbed” mind which detected gender differentiation in every small action. 

I did my best to accept their relations the way they were since they were both happy. Meanwhile, a question kept buzzing in my head: “Why can’t their bond work the other way round?” I dared ask my husband once and he simply asserted that it was the most natural thing in the world for the girl to “serve” her twin brother and that in time they would switch roles when he became a man. “Honey, you are the only one who is trying to swim against the tide; just leave them alone to manage their own business,” he wrapped the entire matter up in his usual nice cool manner that left me speechless. 

And I tried to leave them alone, but not all the time, though. Once, when they were in grade five, they went too far and I had to intervene. They were doing their finals when Ali gave Nora his exam sheet to answer for him before she did her own. The teacher, who had been my student in college, was furious and called me, and I rushed to the school. It was not the act of cheating that upset us so much; we were more concerned about Nora’s self-denial at such an early stage of her life.

“That’s it. I can’t leave the twins alone anymore and you have to help me fix their relationship,” I told my husband angrily that day. But, of course, I had to do it alone. I kept nagging them about the importance of cooperation, and the need for mutual give-and-take, but nothing worked. I tried to be discreet and never accused Ali of negligence or dominance, but it seemed that neither of them cared.

That night, after the dream, I decided I would not drive to the colony on Friday. I would take the day off – off housework, off the twins, off driving. “Dad will drive you there safely and spend the whole day with you,” I broke the news to them. I had delegated the chore to my dear husband. Let him swim against the tide for once.

محاولات فى الترجمة الأدبية





Dear readers,

 

This is just a tiny attempt at translating a couple of compelling Arabic lines.  If you are not interested in the translation, you will not regret reading the original.

 

من شعر الإمام على بن أبى طالب رضى الله عنه و أرضاه:

لدواؤك فيك وما تبصرُ  . .   و داؤك منك وما تشعرُ

و تحسب أنك جرمٌ صغير  . . و فيك انطوى العالمُ الأكبرُ

 

Within thyself thy medicine and thy maladies dwell

Thou art the cosmos, not but a cell.

 Another attempt:

Reach within, find your own medication … look deep, you inflicted your irritation

Of God’s world you are a manifestation… though you think yourself with no vocation.

 Which rendering is more expressive of the original

Which one is more literary in style?

Your suggestions are most welcomed.

 

Glitter

Glitter

by Abeer Elgamal (Egypt)

 

Edited by Beryl Belsky

 

 

Snip, snip, snip…. “Voila! What do you think, sweetie? Do you like your hair?” I ask the bride as I add the final touches and spray some glitter on her curls. I fight a compelling urge to scratch the back of my hand.
“Marvelous, Rasha, you are a real artist!”

The bride’s relatives begin another round ofzarghroutas. Joyful as the sound is, for me it is also torturous, mixing in my mind with the click of my scissors as they work their magic on the hair of yet another customer. Pain creeps up my spine like a spider. It marches up and down until I feel the ache at the back of my neck. I wake up to the thanks of one more satisfied customer, one more stylish haircut, more of the snipping sound that causes more aches and pains, that haunts my dreams and defines my daily existence. It is part of who I became some twenty years from that day: the hairdresser, the owner of one of the biggest salons in Cairo.

Crunch, crunch, crunch, followed by the thump of thick chunks of braid hitting the marble floor – those sounds still pierce my ears like poisoned spears.

Can I open my eyes now, Sister?” I pleaded.

“Not yet,” she replied in her scolding manner.
I wanted to know why she was angry with me all the time. Did she ever love me? My victory is hers, too; did she not want to be rich and famous and beautiful like Madame? She handed me down her clothes, her shoes, and here I am achieving her dreams.

My heart sank at the sound of the scissors devouring more chunks of my hair. My right hand itched badly; it still does when I am afraid; it does all the time. I had a sudden urge to touch the back of my head but I knew Sister would not let me; she might even slap me just for trying. The night before, as we curled up under Father’s bed, she hugged me and whispered into my ear like good friends do. That was the first and last time I felt I really had a sister who cared about me. She told me that every day she sneaked up to observe the hairdressers as they styled the customers’ hair. Since the owner of the salon did not allow her to go near her clients, she wanted to try her skill on my hair. My blond hair: long, shiny and soft, the pride of poor Mother.

But it was okay to cut it off. Mother suffered every month when I washed it. Braiding my hair must have strained her hands and neck after a long day of working in two or three houses. Mother never complained, but I could sense her aching bones and hear her yawning; mother yawned all the time. She said she loved my hair and that it reminded her of her own when she was young, before she gave birth to nine girls and lost some of it with each one. Mother was pregnant again because Father wanted to have a boy. She will lose more hair.

Sister said ladies paid a hundred pounds to get their hair cut and that I was lucky to get it for free. They are all stupid, she thought. Then she had to get the broom and collect the hair from the shiny floor that she had swept earlier in the morning. Sometimes she brought home some detergent in a little bottle and used it as a perfume. It smelled so clean; it made you feel like you had just had a long bath with Lux soap. You felt like Mona Zaki or Yosra, all glowing and perfumed. The smell made you feel like a wealthy lady from a big house with a huge balcony full of flowers.

We sneaked out right after Mother left at dawn, and took four minibuses to get to the salon in Nasr city. She said the woman who came to clean with her was sick and that it would just be her and me until the other girls came at noon. I hid under the building and Sister went to Madame’s apartment on the tenth floor to get the keys. She opened the big lock and heaved up the metal gate, which disappeared miraculously inside the wall. In front of us stood the gleaming glass doors. She used a smaller key to open them. We slid inside and she fastened the latch from the inside and turned on the lights. I was startled; hundreds of little lights buried in the ceiling began twinkling like tiny stars. I had never seen real stars because the sky above Manshyet Naser was always dusty because burning garbage caused a smog over the whole area, reaching Al Basateen [a huge graveyard where poor families built shacks for shelter] where I lived. I guess the smog never went away;  I just don’t go there anymore, not after Mother died and I took my sisters to live with me. The big lights on the mirrors were more like suns, shining with warm yellow rays. I thought I was in heaven. The shiny black marble floor reflected the lights and the smell of cleanliness made me feel pure like a piece of cotton. Sister said there was magic in that place. Ugly women came in the door and when they left they were transformed. Sister said I was prettier than Madame herself, and her daughter. She pointed to a huge photo of the daughter’s wedding; she looked like a princess with short hair and a tiara, in a fantastic dress with a long train stretching behind.

“Choose any chair, ya bet,” Sister ordered.

The chairs were soft purple leather, rimmed with silver; they could move in all directions with a gentle touch. She said the seat in the middle was the one Madame used for her best customers, the ones who paid thousands and gave my sister five or ten pounds in tips. She swore one of them always had stacks of money lying in her open bag under the chair. Back then, one stack would have solved all our problems, could have moved us from the one room we were crammed into and given Mother a day or two of rest.

I thought Sister was lucky to be in this salon for most of the day, wearing that nice clean uniform, surrounded by beautiful things and watching ladies as they got prettier. But she never was; she was angry and resentful. She believed people treated us like insects; they wanted us out of their sight, buried in the cracks like cockroaches. She was banished all day to the inner rooms, to clean the bathrooms after each use and was only allowed to come into the salon after a haircut in order to sweep the floor. “The look of us bothers them; we are gross and dirty. But our dirt is on the outside while they are dirty inside, all of them are,” she said.

I still thought Sister was lucky to be in the salon all day, smelling that beautiful clean aroma and looking at those sparkling mirrors. She said that when the other girls came to work, they played beautiful music and laughed with the wealthy women as they did their hair or cleaned and painted their nails. She said some women even stripped naked and the girls would scrub their bodies with Moroccan soap and wax their private parts. Then Madame would order Sister to clean the bathrooms after the women showered. It was dirty work, she claimed. When I saw the bathrooms I knew she was exaggerating. They were gleaming and spotless. Sister wanted to remain in the salon and learn everything.

I did not believe everything Sister told me. I knew she hated those women and she hated Madame, too, although she gave her ten pounds a day. That was a lot of money, 300 per month. I said she should be happy and grateful but she believed it wasn’t fair; she worked hard all day and Father took the money in the end to smoke hashish. She said one day she would have her own salon and it would be bigger and cleaner that Madame’s. I still don’t know why she hated Madame so much. She hated the women Mother worked for, too. She went to help Mother before she got the salon job. Then there was an “accident” and mother swore she would never take her to any of the houses again. Mother heated a spoon and burned Sister’s  thigh. I didn’t see it happen; I was with other kids watching a burial nearby, waiting for the traditional alms to be distributed by the dead man’s family, when I heard her scream. I ran to see what was wrong and missed the handouts. When I came in Mother was crying; she swore to burn Sister’s face next time if she took anything that did not belong to her. The next morning, Mother returned the ring to the woman she worked for and apologized. But she was kicked out for good. The woman said we were a family of thieves. When Mother came home without money that day, Father beat her. He said he would kill us all if she did not bring money for his smoke every day. Since I slept by Mother’s feet, I heard her cry most of the night. I stroked her feet and she stopped crying. She said Allah would help her because of me. She said I was as pure as cotton and that Allah would never forget us. Mother prayed five times a day, in the morning before she left and four other times when she returned in the evening. She said the women did not allow her to pray. They thought she just wanted to have a break from work. I prayed with her when there was enough water to cleanse ourselves before prayers. She said I couldn’t pray without being tahara(pure).

Snip, snip, snip.

Sister divided my hair into four parts and fastened each with a big pin that Madame used for her best customers. She saw the girls do this every day and had learned to do it, too. She said I had to close my eyes while she worked. I wanted to see myself in the mirror and learn how to cut hair as well, but she said she wanted to surprise me with the style that Madame’s daughter had. She said I was more beautiful than all the women who came here, and that I must find a wealthy man to marry me when my period started. She wished she was as beautiful as me. She looked just like our father: she had his dark coloring and his thick curly hair, so she used a headscarf to cover it.

“Open your eyes and look!” Sister said proudly.

I wanted to cry; my stomach churned as it did when I was hungry. I swallowed hard as if that would stop the tears or make me feel full. I was not hungry; Sister had bought me foul (fava beans) and falafel on our way. The sight of my hair scattered on the floor made me feel dizzy; the sight of customers’ hair lying on the floor still does, every day, whenever I give them haircuts; every single day I feel the same as I did on that day. I still have an urge to scratch my hand and I cannot help touching the back of my head, as I did that day on my badly shaven head.

“I look like a boy!” was all I could utter then. Sister said that the cut was called à la garçonne and gave a vicious snicker. Mother would surely heat the spoon again for my sister, and probably for me, too. But she did not. She just cried and hugged me that night as we slept. She said she was sorry she had to leave me alone in the house and that I did not have to cut my hair with the fish scissors. She was afraid my hair would not grow again. She said that hair has a soul and it gets sad when it is cut badly. Mother never knew my sister did it; I hated to see her punished. Each time she was beaten, my bones ached; sometimes I got bruises like hers. I loved my sister, I always will. I wish she had lived to see my glittery salon; I had achieved her dream.

المترجمة 7

بالطبع راى يعرف الكثير، كيف لا وهو مؤرخ للشرق الأوسط، ومحاضرفى سياسة الدول النامية؟  هوعلى دراية تامة بالصحراء و الشعوب، يعرف أن معظم الأسماء العربية تحمل بين طياتها معان معروفة. بعد صدور كتابه الأخير وهم التهديد الإسلامى أشار إليه الإعلام بالبنان ’كخبير فى الشئون الإسلامية‘.  كلما أطل على شاشات التلفاز فى مقابلة ما، أو استشهد أحدهم بجزء من كتابة كرروا هذا اللقب البغيض إلى قلبه. كم كره هذا اللقب؛ كيف يمكن أن يصنف الناس بعضهم البعض بمثل هذه الحدة و يختصرونهم بهذه السذاجة؟  سمرتعمل مترجمة فى نفس القسم الذى يعمل به، تترجم العديد من النصوص التاريخية و مقالات من الصحف العربية. أما الآن فهى تترجم مانيفستو سياسى: البيان الرسمى "للنداء"، تلك المجموعة المتطرفة من جنوب مصرالذى طلبه منها راى. النسخة التى تعمل عليها مكتوبة باليد، و مصورة تصويرا رديئاً و مليئة بالأخطاء الإملائية، علاوة على كونها مبقعة بآثار الشاى و ما تراءى لها أنه فول مدمس مهروس مع الزيت.  سهرت ليلة الأمس محاولة فك شفرة البلاغة العربية فى النص إلى اللغة الإنجليزية ، تداعب خيالها فكرة أن بإمكانها أن تشتم رائحة الفول ... آه كم تفتقد الفول المطهو بالطريقة التى تعودت عليها منذ زمن بعيد، ممزوجاً بالكمون و زيت الزيتون. جاهدت تستدعى تلك الرائحة لعل أن يشتت هذا إنتبانها فلا تستغرق كثيرا فى التفكير فى المقابلة المرتقبة مع ’راى‘ فى اليوم التالى ولا تتوقع منها الكثير. 

According to Adam: Short Story Anthology

This is a collection of Short Stories written by authors from all over the world.  It contains my first printed story "Driving Mother Crazy".   I hope you all get it and tell me what you think.  It is available on Amazon and Barns and Noble and other  online shopping sites. 

CreateSpace -  https://www.createspace.com/5069591 and

 Amazon - http://www.amazon.com/According-Adam-Stories-Writers-Drawer/dp/1502972204/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1417762849&sr=1-1&keywords=According+to+adam

Abeer Elgamal

المترجمة 6

           "لم أره حتى بلغت السابعة" كان هذا ماقالته لراى مستخدمة "حتى"، فهى لم تستطع بعد أن تتصالح مع هذه الحقيقة، كأنما تود الإعتذارعن مرور سبع سنوات من عمرها بدون طارق. فى أوقات أخرى، إعتادت أن تعيد ترتيب حياتها بشكل أفضل ، أن تتخيل بداية مختلفة لها، أن تتظاهر أنها و لدت فى وطنها السودان، أكبر بلد إفريقى، تحديداً فى مستشفى الأخوات للولادة ،على يد راهبة ذات رداء ابيض. كم أحبت أن تتخيل وجود طارق فى المستشفى منتظراً خروجها للحياة بفارغ الصبر، متشبثا بيد أمه أمام باب غرفة الولادة.  ليتها ولدت فى الخرطوم، ربما كانوا سيختارون لها إسماً مختلفاً، إسماً أكثر شيوعاً. حتما كانت عمتها هى من ستختار الإسم، فعمتها أمرأة قوية ولها رأى يسمعه الجميع.  "سمر" كان إسماً لا يتكرر فى المدرسة أو فى الجامعة، لم يكن أحد فى احتياج لإستخدام إسم عائلتها أبدا عند التحدث عنها، فلم يكن هناك مجال للخلط بينها و بين غيرها. عندما قابلها ’راى، لأول مرة سألها :"هل تنطقين اسمك كما يُنطق فصل الصيف؟" . "نعم، ولكنه لايحمل نفس المعنى". وبما أنه أراد أن يعرف المزيد، استطردت تشرح له : " السمر هو الحديث مع الأصدقاء ليلا، وهذا ماكان يفعله البدو فى الصحراء فقد كانوا يتسامرون بأناة تحت ضوء القمر، بعد انتهاء أعمال اليوم و بعد أن يهدأ قيظ النهار."

المترجمة 5

   أما ذلك السائل المتذبذب صعوداً و هبوطاً داخل بلورة الالم فى حركة تحاكى حركة الزيت فقد هيأها نفسياً لتلقى سؤال "راى" الذى ترقبته طويلا عن طارق. "هو ابن عمتى" أجابت،  "ولكنى قضيت سبع سنوات من عمرى دون أن اقابله ، فأنت تعلم أنى وُلِدتُ هنا و لم تعد عائلتى إلى بلادنا إلا بعد بلوغى السابعة". 

كانا يجلسان معاً على مقعد فى غرفة تملؤها نباتات الصبار بمختلف أشكالها و أطوالها مصطفة مثل طوابير من كائنات غريبة عن كوكبنا، مخلوقات ترتدي اللون الأخضر بشتى درجاته و ظلاله، تحيطها الرمال من كل جانب. تقف جميعها منتبهة، منصتة لحديثهما. كل شئ فى الغرفة يحاكى الصحراء، حتى الضوء بدا مختلفا كأنما صنع خصيصا ليعطى إيحاءً بجو الصحراء المائل للصفرة.