In temperate climates emotions too should be temperate. Being good at math, addition and subtraction is also an emotion. He begins to make a list in which he enumerates everything he owns and so what can be taken from him. Such a list can be very long, but his is not too bad. In the hotel he is known as a man of few needs. He checks what he brought with him on arrival, what he has done away with - so that he knows it has not disappeared outside his doing - and what he has left. The outcome should bring to light what he’s missing A cat, who suddenly came walking in one day and which he adopted, keeps him company. He calls the cat Oum Kalsoum because she can meow so beautifully. He writes: A hookah (sold) Babu jacket (worn, discarded) Photos of family, friends. Student days. (preserved, in a folder, partly discoloured after being left lying too long in the sun) Cassette tapes of the singers of his youth: the Lebanese Fairouz, Egyptian Abdalhalim Hafez, and the Algerian Warda (some broken, some still in reasonable condition. All still in possession. What would a thief want these for?) A kilo of pistachio nuts (for emergencies. Still in possession) Collected works of Mahmoud Darwisj, Kanafani, Mahfouz. (In possession. A thief does not steal old paper.) These are all things that have no value for a thief here. You cannot sell them. Nobody is interested in them. And yet, looking over what he has written he sees what he is. A man who yearns. But the fact that no one at the hotel will ever mention this to him, greatly surprises him. And so he decides to play a tape of Fairoez, even if only to see what reactions it provokes. Nothing happens. Maybe the music is not loud enough. He dare not turn up the music. He runs his hand over his tie.
In the local pub where he has found a place since his arrival many years ago, he talks to the regulars. It does not occur to him to express his confusion. The impression that they should have of him is of someone who is strong and decisive. A romantic who is able to perform great deeds. And because this is what he has been doing it would be very strange if he told them things were actually slightly different.
Abdelkader Benali
When he was still trying to find his way, he often talked about his homeland to make contact with all those strangers. In this way he hoped to be accepted. He did not want to be a stranger. In addition to this, he remembered well what they had told him at home: “Be an ambassador of your people!” The story would mediate where experience and familiarity were deficient. “My first love was called gazelle. My second was called Warda. My third is this country.”
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