Chapter 9 from HMK's autobiographical novel entitled, \"You're No Stranger Here\".
Description
Vocal Characteristics
Language
EnglishVoice Age
Middle Aged (35-54)Accents
North American (General)Transcript
Note: Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and may contain errors.
nine. The old Cyprus is the tallest and most magnificent tree in the village. It sits right behind our house. It is right behind our little garden wall at night when we sleep on the rooftop, I'm in a world all my own With that Cyprus under the night sky. The Cyprus is like a big monster that flexes in the wind. Its head touches the stars, but its feet are stuck in the ground. Sleeping next to Aqua Ball, I asked him, Bob, a natural law. Who planted this Cyprus street? E don't know. Perhaps it was our forefathers who planted it. How old is it? I ask. E don't know what 1000 years. 2000 years? It has been here as long as I can remember. Why hasn't anyone ever cut it down? Why hasn't it ever dried up? Ali Baba says If they cut it, it would bleed from that spot. If it dried up, search would be ruined. Everyone would die. I want to go under at one night and look up through the branches from below. Who's you? Don't ever go under that tree at night. They say it's shade is Bewitched. It makes a person go mad. Every person who has ever gone under that Cyprus tree of night has gone mad. I hear the sound of jackals and wolves crying in the mountains around the village and the howling of the wild dogs. In answer, there is a valley adjacent to the village not far from our house. I hear the sound of a woman screaming and moaning, coming from there every night. They say there used to be a mean woman in the village who gossiped about people all the time. When she got old, she got sick. Her whole body swelled up and got blisters that would pop and emit a bad smell. She would moan from the pain, but she wouldn't die. She wasn't able to move. The Villagers were weary of her moaning. There was no cure for her disease. Someone tried to solve the problem for the Villagers by gagging her and taking her to a valley at night so that the people of the village would be rid of her moaning. But the moans continued for several more days. The moaning grew faint and suddenly silenced when she died. This story haunted and deeply disturbed me I would hear the sound of this woman moaning every night. Does this happen to all old people? I ask No. Most people are good. They disappears suddenly. Pierre Mourad had lived on the other side of the village. It was now a place for pilgrimage and there is a cemetery just below it. The people who live on the other side of the river take their dead and bury them at Pier Murad. Who was peer? Murad, I ask Pierre Murad was a good man. He was kind. He was faithful. It was dear to all. And he disappeared. Forget about it. Who? If you let me go to sleep, you ask too many questions. Baba Nasrallah. Let me just ask one more question and then we'll go to sleep. Okay? When will you die? When will you disappear? You are kind, So you will disappear, right? Baba Nasrallah doesn't answer. He rolls over, turns his back to me and goes to sleep. I think about old, kind, faithful people. I think about the very first old kind person that I loved very much. Gorban Shaw. He was a strange old man with long white hair down to the middle of his back and a long white beard that came down to his chest. His lips were always chapped. He had large eyes, Ah, high forehead and a leathery face. He wore a long white tunic that came down to his ankles. He was skinny but agile and energetic. Every so often he would come to our village. He would always come straight to our house to see Baba Natural Law. He always had a backpack filled with dates, figs, raisins and Candies that he would offer to everyone. He played the flute well, recited poetry and sang songs. When he was in an especially good mood, he would get up and dance. No one knew where he came from or where he was going. He was like the clouds in the sky. He was like the characters and the legends. He would go sit under the shade of the cypress tree, and we Children would gather around him. He would walk from this village to the next and was welcome wherever he went. Everybody knew him. Sakina, Sekou. She was that scary old woman in the village. Her room was near the river. She would wear whatever clothes she could get her hands on any kind of clothing or shoes that she could put on, whether ladies or men's clothing, it didn't matter to her. She always carried an extra shoe in her hand to put on in case one of her shoes got lost or was carried away by the water, which is why they called her three shoes, sacking it or sack in a sec Khushi. She would sit by the river and collect rusted tin cans, wooden baskets, broken containers and whatever the water brought in. She would take thes things back to her room. We Children would gather several at a time and timidly peek into her room. It was full of junk and cats crawling all over everything, and she would sleep in that mess when her eyes would fall upon us. She would throw a piece of wood at us and run after us cursing. I remember all of the old people of the village and count them on my fingers. There was Say it. Abdel Law Haji, Big Cal Hassan, Cal Cobra Mash, Maryam and Sakina Mama. I was thinking that OC Baba and Nana Baba have always been old and must have been born old and would one day disappear and leave me all alone. I start to cry. I weep under the blanket, Ali Baba says. What's wrong with you? Why are you crying? Go to sleep.