A Riffians Tune Read online

  It was the first time I truly felt like defying my mother, but knew that I wouldn’t. Instead, I pondered her reasoning and vowed never to be like her. If she were not illiterate herself, if someone had taught her … if she hadn’t fallen under such a spell of conviction, she would know the hafiz is ignorant and illiterate and would go with me, stick in hand, to take revenge.

  A few months later as I sat on the floor with a few other boys, slates on our laps, Brosso pointed to my group and said, ‘You! Go outside and wipe your slates!’

  We scrambled to get outside, gathered around a very small jug and jostled with each other to put our hands into it, each extracting a fistful of water to wash his slate. Everyone pushed and grabbed until the jug broke and shattered on the ground. We all scattered. Crouching on the ground around the corner of the mosque, I cleaned my slate with my dampened hand, then wiped it on my jellabah. With a piece of chalk in my hand, I covered the slate with a white glaze, then, bored with the process, doodled some Arabic numerals on my slate with my finger.

  Hafiz Brosso came out the door, sauntered to a bush to relieve himself, then spied me engrossed in my slate. He walked over to see what I was writing. Finding numbers, he flew into a rage and yanked the slate out of my hands. He hurled it into the brush and boxed my ears savagely. Whip always at the ready, it found its way to the side of my head, above my right ear. Blood gushed from my head and I screamed.

  Brosso, raging and spluttering, shouted, ‘Never! Never write numbers! Not mixed with the holy surah! Get out of my sight before I kill you!’

  I got up, stumbling from dizziness, and ran, holding my head, blood dripping, dripping down my arm.

  At home that night, my father and mother whispered in the corner. I heard my mother say, ‘Hafiz Brosso is too harsh. Jusef has a gash above his ear; he could have been deafened. I hope he can hear.’

  My father answered, ‘He has to learn to do as he’s told.’

  The next morning, half of my face was swollen. My mother put powdered sugar on the open wound.

  ‘I won’t go back to the mosque, Mother. Hafiz Brosso will kill me. I won’t be a good hafiz if I’m deaf or dead!’ I told her.

  ‘Yes, Hafiz Brosso will be gone soon. You can do your work here at home until he’s gone, but then you must return,’ she responded.

  Sitting under a pomegranate tree by the house, I repeated, hundreds and hundreds of times, the same surahs of the Koran until they became a part of me. When everyone celebrated the departure of Hafiz Brosso, and the new hafiz was hired, I returned to find he had come from exactly the same mould.

  I took a small flute that I had made from a reed and played it before the hafiz arrived. Hearing the flute from his home, he rushed to the mosque. He pushed me to the ground, trampled over me and my flute, stamped and kicked me, and asked a boy to hold me. The boy, bigger and stronger than I was, grabbed me by the waist and whisked me off the ground. I wrapped my arms around his torso to stop myself from falling. The hafiz stretched my legs onto a boulder in front of me and whipped them with a stick.

  ‘Music is evil! I’ll beat the devil out of you!’ he sputtered, going red in the face.

  He stopped me from playing music just as his predecessor had stopped my learning about numbers. I laughed to myself and thought, I will never succumb! Music and numbers aren’t evil. I’m paying this price because ignorance is in charge. It’s the real evil!

  Fortunately, I became a hafiz in an exceptionally short time compared to many people. I was given the title Si – a title given only to those who know the entirety of the Holy Koran by heart. In theory, I was as qualified as any of the hafizs but, like them, I was still unable to read or write. The language I spoke was Tarifit, an unwritten language of the Rif region. Of the Arabic language, all I knew was its alphabet after three long years in Koranic school.

  5

  A few weeks before starting my shepherding, I checked out the local bingo club. Old and young men congregated under a tree or squatted against a wall to shelter themselves from the summer sun or the cold winter wind and played bingo the whole day long. Baghdad, the most trustworthy, was the official caller. He thrust his hand into the small hand-stitched bag on his lap, picked out the numbers and called them in a gravelly voice, ‘B1 … N4 … O2 …’ He played the game himself and filled in his own bingo cards. I was thrilled to join the club and leave the mosque behind; I felt a change of status. I played regularly and sometimes won, but mostly lost. Each time an aeroplane flew overhead, Baghdad stopped the call, jumped up, put his left hand to his brow to shade his eyes from the sun and peered nervously at the passing plane. When it had passed and the noise had died down, he sat down and told us that the aeroplane was from ‘Japan! Japan!’ Interrupting the game for aeroplanes annoyed me and provoked anger among the players.

  I soon discovered that bingo was a dull, numbing game, and shepherding was the only occupation facing me. My older sister Rabbia had been waiting impatiently for me to take the reins. She handed me her slingshot and staff and suddenly, I found myself running barefoot behind sheep and cows, across hills, mountains and valleys seven days a week, rain or shine.

  To be a good shepherd took skills I didn’t have. Sheep, cattle and goats were like oil and water. They didn’t mix, had souls of their own and I just didn’t understand them. My first weeks were tiring and frustrating. Sheep needed freedom to graze freely; I kept them close to each other, and so prevented them from searching for food. Instead of being at the front, I stood behind them, which kept them running from me without stopping. Instead of letting them relax, I made them anxious. We were in a battle of wills. They wanted to run free to look for grass, and I wanted to keep them safe, for I knew that foxes were everywhere and could strike at any time.

  Coming out of the house one drizzly morning Rabbia shouted, ‘Wrong! Wrong!’ and called me for my first lesson in shepherding. ‘Never stand at the back,’ she said. ‘Be at the back only when you want to take them into their pen.’

  ‘But they run in different directions!’ I complained loudly.

  ‘Try to whistle and throw stones so the sheep will know you are present. Never be in the middle, for they will run in all directions. Once you arrive at your destination, stand at the front so they never pass you. Know that animals have a simple soul! They appreciate being fed, taken to the mountains, knowing you are between them and the foxes, but they fear being caught and slain.’

  The lesson was hard to put into practice, but with experience I developed a rapport with my animals, and started to be able to predict their movements. Days were long and very lonely but I no longer needed to wake before dawn, which was an improvement. There was no chance of coming home at midday, and the days were very hot, so I took the sheep under a tree to sleep and waited for the sun to cool. At sunset, but sometimes later during the summer, I took them to their pen. Once at home, there was nothing for me to do but sleep or recite the Holy Koran for fear of forgetting it. My mother would come, sit on a sheepskin, listen carefully and rock back and forth. Her presence embarrassed me.

  I learned the skill of how to live in peace with my animals. To protect them from going too far or getting lost, I sat between them and the high hills. Like a demented person, I started to talk to my sheep. Whenever I spoke, they stopped eating, raised their heads to listen and seemed to understand me. If I held something in my hand and called them, they all ran to me. Some of them were so confident that they rubbed against me. I became a part of the animal world and nature. The tree seemed to call me, and the call was so powerful that I was compelled to sit under it and listen to the music of the leaves swishing in the wind. The high mountain, Tassamat, looked like a staircase to heaven. I loved to reach the top and look at the trees, valleys, and the distant sea. I wondered what was behind it all. But despite the peace of nature and the company of my sheep and cows, I felt abandoned and lonely. I thought I had a second soul that was empty and needy, and I didn’t know how to fill it.

  Fooling around,
I found a reed and made a flute out of it. I laboured intently, cutting and burning the holes just so, and lovingly looked upon my finished flute. Chaotic at first, my fingers started to dance to find a tune, and the flute sang, to the enjoyment of myself and my animals. Being in the high mountains surrounded by valleys, the music and the echo of the flute permeated the surrounding area. People from far away could have listened to my music.

  One Friday afternoon my uncle, Mimoun, climbed the mountain and beckoned me. Why is he here? I wondered. Happily, I ran to meet him with my flute in my hand.

  ‘Show me your flute,’ Uncle Mimoun demanded. Proudly, I did. Uncle Mimoun raised it high over his head and smashed it against a green stone. Admonishing me, he added, ‘Playing the flute is neither part of your father’s tradition nor your grandfather’s culture!’ Shocked and surprised, my jaw dropped. Uncle Mimoun acts just like a hafiz, except he doesn’t trample or step on me. They all look different, but at heart, they drink from the same fountain. He has destroyed my flute, my friend and companion.

  I thought I could do without my flute, but soon discovered it had kept me sane and my sheep and cattle happy. Because of my flute, the valley had been more than just a hollow space. As I played, it had echoed my soul and mirrored my need.

  It took me a long time to find another perfect reed. Before I started to make a new flute, I went to Uncle Mimoun’s wife, Mimount, and complained. ‘Uncle Mimoun tricked me and smashed my flute,’ I told her.

  She stood calm and poised. At first, she didn’t understand what all the fuss was about. She knew that I played the flute. She had heard it. She showed real compassion and promised that she would talk to Uncle Mimoun. Like my mother, she had many daughters. To alleviate my anger, she teasingly promised me one of her daughters to marry when I was ready. I felt belittled. I had come to complain, and Mimount was trying to distract me. This was about my flute, not marriage.

  A few months later, my father embarked on a new shepherding transaction. Two neighbouring families passed their goats to me to shepherd. Out of the blue, the number of animals in my care more than doubled, even though goats and sheep didn’t mix well. My life became hell. Early each morning I had to take my animals and go to collect Mr Himo’s and Mr Shabony’s goats. Collecting them was not a big problem, but keeping sheep and goats both safe and within view became soul-sucking. Those goats were devil incarnate. They didn’t stay with the sheep, they didn’t stay together, they climbed anything, cliffs, low trees, onto roofs, they ate everything and they ran fast and far. I needed help. I explained the problem to Rabbia, but she had never had to look after goats, so I was left wondering what to do. The goats kept my mind away from my flute for a while.

  I thought our dog Dargan, being big and colourful, might be a help. I bribed him with some food, and he followed the sheep, just like one of them. It took me about twenty minutes to shepherd them from my house to Mr Himo’s and Mr Shabony’s houses to collect their goats, and then half an hour from their homes to the mountains. During this trip, the dog was an angel. Once we reached the mountains, the sheep, goats and cows all started to graze.

  Just as the animals settled, the dog began barking. He is either hungry or thirsty, I thought, but had nothing to give him. He was an untrained dog. Nothing could shut him up or make him do what I wanted him to do – go after the goats and bring them back when they went too far. His own bark and its echo in the valley excited him. He barked constantly and chased the sheep for fun, making them scatter in every direction. I took him along for a few days, and then decided I was much better off without him. Nothing else that I tried worked with the goats. They never got tired and nothing, not even a high cliff, could contain them.

  One early morning it was cold, misty and damp. The whole landscape was covered with thick fog, and the wind played with it. All the sheep and cows were hunched down, and the goats were hungry. The cold weather and dampness didn’t affect the running mood of the goats. It was only in the late afternoon when I was gathering the sheep and goats to go home that I realised Mr Himo’s big black buck was missing. The buck didn’t actually belong to him – he had borrowed it to mate with his does. I looked around for a long time, and it was getting dark. As I came close to a thicket, I saw several happy foxes playing, jumping around and climbing on each other. To my horror, I found the buck lying dead with his throat ripped out. For a moment, stunned, I was not able to move. I didn’t know what to do, and worse, I didn’t know what I would say to Mr Himo.

  I gathered my thoughts and checked if there were any more animals killed, but luckily there were not. It was my habit to take Mr Himo’s and Mr Shabony’s goats home before my sheep. This time, I decided to take all the animals to my own pen first.

  Alarmed at the terror on my face, my eyes red and puffy, Rabbia asked, ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘The black buck is dead,’ I answered.

  ‘No!’ she said, her hand flying to her mouth.

  I took Mr Himo’s animals home with the bad news. He was outside his house. The absence of the black buck was the first thing he noticed.

  ‘Go and bring the black buck!’ he shouted.

  ‘The black buck is dead,’ I said.

  He exploded in a tantrum, and his wife was worse. ‘Donkey!’ she shouted at me.

  ‘The ass is you!’ I replied under my breath.

  Mr Himo took his two sons with him and went to Tassamat to check for himself. They found the blood and what was left of the buck in a bush, and brought the remains home for his wife to cook.

  Two days later coming home from the mountain at twilight, I was ambushed by his two sons, one my age (about ten) and one older. The younger one punched me in the face. I punched back, and my fist landed on his throat. Instantly, he couldn’t talk and abandoned the fight. I fought with his brother for half an hour. He bit my shoulder; I grabbed a stone and hammered his head to free my arm. It was not a glorious fight for anyone, but Mr Himo wanted revenge.

  Coming down from Tassamat late one afternoon, I was accosted by Mr Himo at the foot of the mountain. As he often wandered the valley, I thought nothing of his presence. He beckoned me with a calm voice. I hurried to meet him, but when I faced him, his face swelled and his eyes bugged out.

  With a long stick in his hand, he brought it down over my head. I grabbed his stick and discovered just how fragile he was, and how strong I was. ‘Shame on you, Mr Himo,’ I said.

  He yanked the stick out of my hand and tried again to hit me. I grabbed his stick before it met its mark. The days of being beaten are over, I told myself. I hurled the stick into the brush and left him behind. He is neither strong nor wise.

  I didn’t report the incident to my parents. I knew it would escalate into a fight and increase the already burgeoning animosity.

  Mr Himo no longer wanted me to shepherd for him. He refused to pay my father for the shepherding already done, and I was glad to be rid of him and his animals.

  As well as keeping my animals safe from foxes, I had to keep them from grazing on other farmers’ land. Mr Ismach was different from Mr Himo. He had no animals of his own and allowed me to shepherd on his land. I was there one day in the middle of August when he arrived at midday with his assistant, Omri, to start crushing a massive mountain of wheat, bigger than a house. The sun was vertical; it created silent music that filled the air and deafened my ears. I listened to it, but I couldn’t write it down or capture it. The heat pressed between the two hills created a colour unknown to me. If I had been an artist, I would have been tempted to try to paint it.

  On the hillside, I heard Mr Ismach and Omri shouting. Forgetting my animals, I joined them.

  I noticed something strange and unusual – it looked – like an earthquake. The entire pile of wheat was shaking. We quaked with fright and backed off.

  Gaining confidence and curiosity, we inched closer to the pile; Mr Ismach with a pitchfork, Omri with a hoe and me with an axe. All of a sudden, a snake with a girth as wide as a barrel, fangs lashing an
d eyes burning, lurched out of the pile toward Omri. He shrieked, yelled and ran down the valley alongside the dried creek bed, but the monstrous snake chased him. Mr Ismach and I followed behind.

  ‘Zigzag! Zigzag to confuse the snake!’ I shouted.

  Deafened with horror, Omri kept sprinting straight. Ismach, old and overweight, couldn’t keep up. With the axe still in my hand, I chased the snake. Headed to his house, Omri came to a steep ascent, which he scaled. The snake followed uphill, which afforded me an opportunity to throw my axe at it. Hit, bleeding and confused, the snake circled. I then pelted stones at it. With Omri still running off, it took Ismach and me the rest of the afternoon to finish it off. Hearing the news, farmers turned up to see for themselves what their valley contained. The monstrous dead snake remained in the dry riverbed for a month and created an enormous stench, which attracted rats, vultures and all sorts of scavengers. The story was told far and wide.

  Baghdad told the bingo club that I had killed the snake, an African rock python, and this was the first time I had ever heard anything good said about me.

  I defied Uncle Mimoun’s wish and managed to find an ideal reed to make a new flute. I laboriously polished it. Playing the flute allowed me to reconnect my feelings to nature. I looked after all my animals well, and counted them at the start and at the end of each day. Farmers heard the flute either in the valley or on the high mountain. I played it all day long, and the music lulled me to dream of a beautiful imaginary girlfriend, Nora, to alleviate my loneliness. I imagined her dancing to my music, but all too soon, the reality of baaing sheep jolted me.

  Mrs Malani heard me playing my flute and told my mother that these were her favourite times to go to the valley and the mountain to search for and harvest medicinal herbs for her clients. I could see her and would meet her in the valley or on the peak of the mountain two or three times a week. I felt it comforting that she was nearby. I sometimes felt compelled to neglect my animals and go and speak to her.