Nescafe For Refugees
So, like I was saying...I was just out of the urologist's office yesterday. A crisp Beirut morning. I'd tell you all about the urologist visit, his urologist's eyes (they all have that look of having spent too much time at the microscope gazing at uric acid crystals, peering into the future and the past at the same time), but that's not what I want to say. It's more about the parking lot and what happened there. If not for the old dog caretaker in the urologist's building, I would never have ended up there, drinking a Nescafe prepared by a handsome blue eyed Syrian. I tried to drive my car down the narrow way beside the building and into the parking lot behind it but the fool wouldn't let me. Of course, he knew I wasn't going to a urologist...no, people who see urologists are invariably smelly old men like himself. Up the way though, there was a lot and I scraped together six 250 lira coins to pay for a space, leaving exactly four more for a coffee after my visit. At least I wouldn't be giving away any of my husband's hard earned cash to beggars today, unless of course a gypsy stopped me before I reached the Nescafe trolley.
What more to say about urologists than above. This one, referred to me by a Russian 'lady's doctor' was trained in Romania...hmm. Like, my idea of Romania is Dickens at his best. Orphanages and environmental pollution. I have to say though, his hands were warm and office clean, a brand new laptop taking precedence on his too organized desk..another urology fetish. After my visit, after assuring him that I thought he was peachy keen (mentally organizing my self for a first opinion and opting for his as a second), I waited for the delapidated elevator for too long to take me down one flight of stairs, gave up and carefully avoided brushing the oil soaked walls on the way down the marble staircase, avoiding the old codger in the lobby, avoiding his crooked stigmatic stare and noting that he looked a bit prostatish himself and must be grappling with some horrid 'man problem'.
The weather outside had turned wet again, a light rain started and stopped just as fast. It's as if this time of year, the air is made of water and breathing can cause a person to drown. The Syrian at the Nescafe trolley was busy cooking up some tea, 'woosah' or dirty, black, for some local shop keeper and promised me to be back in a hurry after delivering the sixty cent drink half a block away to one of his regulars. A young man showed up and looked me askance, I suppose he thought I should brew him a cup myself, but after establishing that I was slightly better dressed than the average trolley vendor, he waited for the Syrian to return and promptly took his turn before me, in usual Arab style. No ladies first here.
I watched as the water gushed from a cystern kept hot by a kerosene warmer...what do you call those things? A samovar. For sixty cents, an instant coffee from a samovar tastes about as good as a Frappacino from Starbucks over on the Corniche (four dollars worth anyway). He filled the brown plastic cup with Nestles sweetened condensed then, half more with steaming water hot enough to heat the sticky milk to the perfect temperature and ladled a healthy spoon of the sugary brown powder Nestles calls coffee. The Syrian ushered me over to his one plastic table to sit in one of the three plastic chairs under this particular old tree that must have been there for at least fifty years if not more.
A seriously handsome old man was standing on the other side of the wall where the table stood, seemingly waiting for me to take my place. Of course, I knew it was highly unusual (let's say inappropriate) for a green eyed red head to be sitting out there in a parking lot run by gypsies in the middle of a Beirut neighborhood that boasted of being on the green line at one time not so long ago. There's not much left that betrays this green line fact except the collective memory of the residents and a few of the pox marked buildings.
As soon as I lit a cigarette, the old man started speaking in a brilliant English, right away telling me he could also speak Russian, French, Hebrew and English. His eyes though, showed a glint of senility and I felt it best to humor him, to spend some time that I didn't have, drinking my Nescafe leisurely and listening. He wanted to tell me that his life was good. He told me he came from Jaffa. He had five children but all of them were married now and that at sixty years of age he was forced into retirement from the United Nations.
Ah, I thought to myself. A real live specimen from Jaffa. I asked him when he had left Jaffa and he returned quickly "In 1948." Bingo! There must be a story in this. Something to carry to someone else, some bit of wisdom, tragedy or joy. As hard as I tried however, I couldn't get him to admit to much of anything except that he was a Christian and that there was a French lady who sometimes sat here at the Nescafe trolley and fancied him quite a bit. He showed me his UN identification and his resident card for Lebanon with a picture on it of a much younger man, as handsome as one can be on a resident card. Obviously, these two documents were his and his alone and he carried them everywhere. I suppose one could gather that a refugee from Palestine would be very attached to anything officially recognizing their right to exist but the old man didn't relate that at all. Just a beaming pride over his UN card and the fact that he was Eastern Orthodox and lived in Mar Elias. Now, Mar Elias isn't where you'd expect to find a refugee but rather, an original Beirut aristocrat.
Just as I was investigating him for a sign of pathos, a death in the raids on Jaffa, he was investigating me. Perhaps like he liked to do with the French woman whom he confessed to have scorned. Maybe she was after his money I thought to myself. Although he was a charming old guy, he was still an old guy. He asked about my children, my work, my nationality. As usual, I am mistaken for a Russian as they are more plentiful around these parts than girls from Bisbee, Arizona.
I finished my Nescafe and butted out my cigarette on the pavement and barely caught his words, "..if you were to take a walk with me."
Ohhh, now I see. He assured me his family wouldn't catch us. Then, as I got up to leave he pleaded, "You are happy with your husband? You don't sleep with anyone else?"
I guess the moral of this story is to not get your hopes up too high when finding a real live refugee from Jaffa from 1948...because, after all, life goes on. You get referred by a Russian to a Romanian and end up being rebuffed by a crossed-eyed doorman, blessed and loved by a senile UN employee. It's all about Beirut you know.
What more to say about urologists than above. This one, referred to me by a Russian 'lady's doctor' was trained in Romania...hmm. Like, my idea of Romania is Dickens at his best. Orphanages and environmental pollution. I have to say though, his hands were warm and office clean, a brand new laptop taking precedence on his too organized desk..another urology fetish. After my visit, after assuring him that I thought he was peachy keen (mentally organizing my self for a first opinion and opting for his as a second), I waited for the delapidated elevator for too long to take me down one flight of stairs, gave up and carefully avoided brushing the oil soaked walls on the way down the marble staircase, avoiding the old codger in the lobby, avoiding his crooked stigmatic stare and noting that he looked a bit prostatish himself and must be grappling with some horrid 'man problem'.
The weather outside had turned wet again, a light rain started and stopped just as fast. It's as if this time of year, the air is made of water and breathing can cause a person to drown. The Syrian at the Nescafe trolley was busy cooking up some tea, 'woosah' or dirty, black, for some local shop keeper and promised me to be back in a hurry after delivering the sixty cent drink half a block away to one of his regulars. A young man showed up and looked me askance, I suppose he thought I should brew him a cup myself, but after establishing that I was slightly better dressed than the average trolley vendor, he waited for the Syrian to return and promptly took his turn before me, in usual Arab style. No ladies first here.
I watched as the water gushed from a cystern kept hot by a kerosene warmer...what do you call those things? A samovar. For sixty cents, an instant coffee from a samovar tastes about as good as a Frappacino from Starbucks over on the Corniche (four dollars worth anyway). He filled the brown plastic cup with Nestles sweetened condensed then, half more with steaming water hot enough to heat the sticky milk to the perfect temperature and ladled a healthy spoon of the sugary brown powder Nestles calls coffee. The Syrian ushered me over to his one plastic table to sit in one of the three plastic chairs under this particular old tree that must have been there for at least fifty years if not more.
A seriously handsome old man was standing on the other side of the wall where the table stood, seemingly waiting for me to take my place. Of course, I knew it was highly unusual (let's say inappropriate) for a green eyed red head to be sitting out there in a parking lot run by gypsies in the middle of a Beirut neighborhood that boasted of being on the green line at one time not so long ago. There's not much left that betrays this green line fact except the collective memory of the residents and a few of the pox marked buildings.
As soon as I lit a cigarette, the old man started speaking in a brilliant English, right away telling me he could also speak Russian, French, Hebrew and English. His eyes though, showed a glint of senility and I felt it best to humor him, to spend some time that I didn't have, drinking my Nescafe leisurely and listening. He wanted to tell me that his life was good. He told me he came from Jaffa. He had five children but all of them were married now and that at sixty years of age he was forced into retirement from the United Nations.
Ah, I thought to myself. A real live specimen from Jaffa. I asked him when he had left Jaffa and he returned quickly "In 1948." Bingo! There must be a story in this. Something to carry to someone else, some bit of wisdom, tragedy or joy. As hard as I tried however, I couldn't get him to admit to much of anything except that he was a Christian and that there was a French lady who sometimes sat here at the Nescafe trolley and fancied him quite a bit. He showed me his UN identification and his resident card for Lebanon with a picture on it of a much younger man, as handsome as one can be on a resident card. Obviously, these two documents were his and his alone and he carried them everywhere. I suppose one could gather that a refugee from Palestine would be very attached to anything officially recognizing their right to exist but the old man didn't relate that at all. Just a beaming pride over his UN card and the fact that he was Eastern Orthodox and lived in Mar Elias. Now, Mar Elias isn't where you'd expect to find a refugee but rather, an original Beirut aristocrat.
Just as I was investigating him for a sign of pathos, a death in the raids on Jaffa, he was investigating me. Perhaps like he liked to do with the French woman whom he confessed to have scorned. Maybe she was after his money I thought to myself. Although he was a charming old guy, he was still an old guy. He asked about my children, my work, my nationality. As usual, I am mistaken for a Russian as they are more plentiful around these parts than girls from Bisbee, Arizona.
I finished my Nescafe and butted out my cigarette on the pavement and barely caught his words, "..if you were to take a walk with me."
Ohhh, now I see. He assured me his family wouldn't catch us. Then, as I got up to leave he pleaded, "You are happy with your husband? You don't sleep with anyone else?"
I guess the moral of this story is to not get your hopes up too high when finding a real live refugee from Jaffa from 1948...because, after all, life goes on. You get referred by a Russian to a Romanian and end up being rebuffed by a crossed-eyed doorman, blessed and loved by a senile UN employee. It's all about Beirut you know.
posted by Carmenisacat | 3:15 PM
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