Shopkeepers are standing in the doorways of their stores watching the crowd and waiting to find out what’s going to happen. The shops aren’t exactly open for business. Almost all of them make do with a small opening, by lifting the metal barrier only partway. That way the shopkeepers will be able to lock up in a hurry if the mayhem starts again. They’re here out of habit, but they came knowing perfectly well that they won’t be selling any furniture or appliances today. One of them, tall and fat, about fifty years old, is standing in the doorway of his grocery store holding a cup of coffee. I walk toward him, and when he sees me he asks from a distance, “What are you looking for?”
“Cigarettes.”
“Don’t have any,” he says, and rubs his hands together to indicate there’s almost nothing left.
The green garbage pails bearing the signature of the local council are fuller than ever. Their lids have been removed and the residents can pile up pyramids of garbage. There are heaps of garbage all around. There’s no more fuel for the garbage trucks. The farther you go up the street leading into the village, the higher the garbage, and the stench grows stronger with every step you take. Big bags of meat and dairy products that have gone bad have been thrown in the garbage or placed nearby. Swarms of flies, as well as cats and dogs, are fighting over the new treasures, more bountiful than anything they’d dared to expect in this village.
3
I soon discover how badly I miscalculated when I decided to take a shortcut home by cutting through the village center. There’s no escaping the putrid smell coming from the piles of garbage that almost block off the little alleyways winding between the old homes in the village center, many of them a hundred years old or more. I try not to breathe through my nose and to take quick little breaths, holding the air in my lungs for as long as possible. What’s happened to these people? The garbage isn’t collected for one day and the village turns into one big dump? Never mind the ones who put out their garbage the day before, thinking it would be collected as usual. The real problem began with those big, ugly women with their heads covered in a kerchief, who just go on putting out their garbage and piling it higher and higher in the doorways. They must think of themselves as people with good hygiene. Why don’t the neighbors take some initiative and clean the neighborhood? Why don’t they move the garbage farther away to the outskirts of the village, for heaven’s sake? What are they thinking?
The children haven’t gone to school today and they’re using the day off as an opportunity to roam barefoot among the garbage pails, playing tag and hide-and-seek. A group of men huddle in an alleyway and surround two village council workers in blue coveralls who have come to deal with the sewage overflowing. The smell grows worse as you get closer. Some of the men cover their noses and watch the city workers trying to fix the problem, but to no avail. I hear one of them say there’s nothing to repair. The village sewage has been blocked from the outside, and they’ll have to wait till the powers that be unblock the pipe. This explanation doesn’t go over well with the crowd and some of them start shouting at the guys in the coveralls, saying they don’t know how to do their job. One of them takes advantage of the opportunity to curse the village council for not clearing the garbage. “Instead of handing over the Palestinian workers,” a large, middle-aged man in a gallabiyeh says, “you should have let them fix the garbage and the sewage. They’re much better at it than you are.” All the others laugh as if they’ve just heard a particularly amusing joke.
The café at the outskirts of the older part of the village is packed. Men of all ages fill the inner room and the courtyard. Many have nowhere to sit and they settle for drinking a cup of tea or coffee in plastic cups while standing up. At some of the tables, four men are playing cards. There’s no work today either, and nothing much to do except wait for the closure to end. The local workers woke up early out of habit, if they got to sleep at all, to check what happened after the West Bank workers had been handed over to the soldiers — hoping to hear they could now resume life as usual. Once they understood that the mayor’s plan had failed, there wasn’t much left for them to do, and a game of cards coupled with some café chitchat seemed like the ideal way to get through another day of idleness.
A group of high school students who’ve gathered at the school decide to stage another march, except that this time nobody is eager to join them. No more than a few dozen people take part. From time to time, one of them tries to lead the others in a refrain of protest cries, but this soon dies out. When they realize that their rally is doomed to fail, the students disperse and head home. They don’t even get as far as the roadblock at the entrance to the village. The old men go on sitting at the mosque, rolling tobacco. At the nearby cemetery the Palestinian workers are digging two graves. In one, they bury the worker that the women had managed to pull back. As for the one on the other side, all they can do is throw his clothing over the fence into the grave. They don’t cry. The burial takes place in silence and prayer.
At the entrance to the cemetery I see the lupinus seeds vendor. I haven’t seen him for years, with his green cart, the same one he used when I was still in elementary school. Nobody knew what his real name was. Everyone just called him Thurmus, the local word for lupinus. He used to show up every day when school got out, equipped with a tape recorder that he’d position next to his big bowl of thurmus seeds, and play his Egyptian songs. Everyone made fun of Thurmus. He looked strange, and his eyes would follow you everywhere. His eyes followed the shoppers even as he was scooping up the warm thurmus seeds from the vat and filling the bowls. He never missed the bowl, even though his gaze wasn’t focused on what he was doing. He’d stare right through you, never smiling, never talking with anyone. I was scared of him at first, and I wasn’t the only one. But everyone bought thurmus from him because it really was the best.
I can see him now, standing at the entrance to the cemetery, his tape recorder playing the same songs, songs which used to be hits and nobody remembers anymore, waiting for the workers to finish the burial rites. Maybe he’ll manage to sell them some thurmus. In earlier times, he’d walk the streets all day, seeking out the crowds, the big events, pushing his green cart. His favorite sales spot was the soccer field. He’d show up not only at the Saturday games of the adult team but at all the practice sessions too, including those for the junior team.
I remember he never missed a single practice, not even of the junior team, when I was playing on it. I wasn’t exactly playing, I was signed up, and I came to every practice, always on time. I didn’t like soccer, but I treated it as another subject I had to excel at. Like math, or carpentry, or religion. The kids on the team said the only reason the coach agreed to take me was that he was afraid my father would get him fired. I could never find a partner when we were supposed to divide into pairs. The coach always had to force one of the kids to pair up with me. I’m not sure I was such a bad player, actually, but I hated those practice sessions, hated coming to the soccer field and hated the kids on the team. I didn’t want to upset my father by quitting. He always said, “Mens sana in corpore sano.” And he’d repeat it over and over again. I remember him telling me once, “Maybe you don’t run as fast as the others, maybe you don’t kick as hard as they do, but you’re smart and you should decide how the game is played.” But that’s bullshit. The best players were the ones who ran faster than everyone and kicked harder than everyone. They never invited me to play in the games that took place in the village. I was always on the bench, a backup, except I never got to replace anyone. But I had a team shirt, with the logo of a cement factory splashed across it. The factory belonged to the father of one of the kids on the team. The kids said they bet my father had had to buy me the shirt, but I didn’t take it to heart. I knew they were just jealous.