Short story by MURSI SAAD El-DIN
Translated by HAMDI SAAD El-DIN
(Station on silk road linking turkey & china, magazine)
In Alma Ata (meaning country of apples) We were invited by our Kazakh friend, a poet, to his home.
At the dinner table, our eyes (with his young wife) met and I felt that haunting beauty. The look was a sort of message. A message that contained a unique combination of surprise and beseechement, it was also a message of absolute innocence. I felt that I was in front of a child, unaware of life, sheltered by her parents to the extent of incarceration, seeing no one and being seen by no one, then suddenly like Cinderella, she finds herself in an enormous ball, meeting people she had never been seen the like of before.
The letter was from the woman called Delbar, from Alma Ata, capital of Kazakhstan: "You came from countries we did not know, with faces we had never seen. You may have noticed how I looked from one of you to the other, but then my gaze was attracted to you. I don't know if you noticed these looks but my husband did. He reprimanded me afterwards. I know that Lena told you the story of my marriage and how my poor father sacrificed me, he could not have done anything else.
Perhaps you were surprised, even shocked, by my fears that I was unable to stop. It is true, we are romantic people by nature but our emotions were stolen from us and instead we were given curtains to hide them.
Our love songs were turned into songs about factories and the honour of working. Then you arrived, like a gentle breeze that flows through the flowers sharing their sweet smell with those around them. I shared the beautiful aroma to the extent that I forget myself and my circumstances for the one or two hours you were with us.
After that I started to revolt, and for that he punished me. I didn't care. I lived in a totally different world. In an hour or two you taught me the meaning of life, and more importantly you showed me what I was missing.
Then the changes came, my husband lost his important post and I discovered some horrifying facts about the massacres committed by the gentle poet who recited his romantic poems to you. As you know he was also the party secretary. My husband could not take these changes and feared he would be put on trial. He died, I think naturally but others say he took his own life.
Now I am singing again in the theatres and hotels. I moved to Moscow where I have become quite famous. My favourite song that I always end my repertoire with is the one I sang for you over twenty years ago. I sang "Que Sera Sera", thinking that it was my fate, what will be will be. But my fate changed thanks to you. My messenger from a far away land.
So good-bye my dear friend, or may I say my lover?" ~Delbar
Posted by aprilng
at 9:51 PM WST
Updated: Wednesday, 18 February 2004 9:16 PM WST
