Flip Flop

For the last two weeks I have had trouble starting my car. I'd be running late, rushing to get my daughter to school, my partner already long gone to her job.
Click.
Click click click click click.
"Fuck it."
Click.
"Right mushroom, we're riding our bikes to school today."
"But I don't want to ride my bike daddy, I'm tired."
"I understand pumpkin, but my car is being naughty. It won't start."
Sometimes it did. And sometimes it didn't. For a while it started four, maybe five times in a row. I got careless. I got greedy. I got over confident. I did a big shop at the nearest mall, some three  kilometers from our house.
I don't like to bother my partner, who's always busy with some major project, but I do reluctantly call her  when I have no other option. 
"I can't. I really can't. I've got meetings though to 6pm."
"But the sorbet's melting. And the fish will go off."
"I'm sorry. Maybe you can catch a bus?"
We went back that night. Eventually after numerous tries we managed to start it with jumpers.
But the next morning - a cold clear morning with the first crisp notes of winter in the air, it wouldn't start. And so it went on all of last week, and this one. Sometimes I had to ask the neighbours for help, sometimes perfect strangers.
I saw mechanic after mechanic. Their diagnoses were, to say the least, ambiguous.
"Well your alternator is charging" said one, "it might be the battery, but its hard to tell with these modern sealed batteries."
"Nope mate" said another, "its your started motor. Its sticking. Could be the battery as well. I cant say til' you book it in and we can have a proper look."
"Can you give me a rough idea of what it could cost"
"Mate minimum labour charge is just 260 and 80 an hour after that. If its the battery and the starter then parts will cost you aound 700. Plus GST on that."
"And how many hours do you guestimate?"
"To get the starter motor out is  big job.... have to remove the heat shield, and if the flex plate or flywheel have damaged teeth I'll have to remove the transmission - I'd say 6 to 8 hours."
I was unemployed at the time. Still am as a matter of fact. The car itself was a third hand one I'd picked up for a few thousand shekels. It had looked sparkly and new in the used car lot. I couldn't believe it had done over a hundred thousand kilometers. It seemed to drive fine. The honeymoon lasted two months. Then the horn suddenly stopped working. Soon afterwards the switch for the driver's electric window popped out of its slot and would not go back in. And then the trouble with starting began.
I decided to wait with the repairs. Maybe the car would miraculously cure itself.
But it didn't.
I never knew if I was going to be stuck at my destination or not. I'd take the dogs for a walk at a favourite park, and then, because the car wouldn't start, have to walk home with them - a 40 minute exercise of getting them out of other people's gardens, dawdling, sniffing, wrestling junk food packaging from their mouths that people had carelessly thrown down on the pavement.
Living with the uncertainty took its toll.
I began drinking heavily. I took ice, cocaine, steroids, vitamin pills, heroin, ecstacy , uppers, downers and diaganols. I began eating junk food obsessively, something I had not done for twenty years.
I put on 70 kilos. My joints ached. I had mysterious shooting pains down my right leg. My xcma flared up fom nowhere, and I went though tubes of cortisone cream tying to stop scratching the red and angry skin on my flabby belly. My doctor said she could find nothing wrong with my joints and that I should stop coming to see her every four days. I became suicidal. I didn't form an actual plan but I thought I and everyone around me would be better off.
I ignored my partner or snapped at her. I sat staring at the wall, my brain a heavy mush.
"Sorry sweetpea" I told our daughter, "I'm not feeling very well, maybe you can just play on you tablet instead."
I ignored the dishes in the sink. I avoided looking at the laundy in the laundry basket. The dogs didn't get walked. Other than my partner calling to check in on me my phone never rang, but if it had I wouldn't have answered it.
The days were gray and the nights filled with sleepless worry. I lay in bed next to my snoring partner,  seeing the last of our savings being spent on buying another car. I saw endless hassles tying to sell the lemon I had bought. I wouldn't even get half of what I'd paid for it. I was good at spending money but useless at making it. I imagined being car-less and having to use public transport. Visions of long waits at bus stops or trudging home from another failed job-interview pursued me. This was the beginning of the end. I should never have bought that car. Just one more proof of my incompetency. Scenting weakness, the sellers had taken advantage of me. Story of my life.
"Why don't you speak to Grant" said my counsellor, who I saw off and on, "he's my auto electrician. He's honest."
I went to see Grant. I had nothing left to lose.
"Its your battery" he said, "definitely. Just start the engine again please sir, and rev it a few times.
Yes, no doubt about it. Your starter motor's fine. Its all good. I can fit the battery right now."
One hundred and fifty shekels. That was all. And when I tuned the key the car immediately and obediently shuddered into life. And with it I too shuddered back into life. In that moment a huge burden was taken off my shoulders. I noticed that the sky was blue. Even though it was an industrial area I heard some birdsong. I looked at Grant with adoring puppy eyes and silently wished him a long and blessed life.
As I drove home, wind blowing in my thinning hair, the audio belting out some good times music, I felt reborn. What  a difference a heavy plastic box about 25X10X15cms could make. New energy. New flow. Possibility. To go to wherever I needed to go. It was a simple as that.  I was in motion again, empowered, free to find work and get my life in order
"I'll fetch you from school" I texted my daughter, "how about we take the dogs to Goloolies farm, and get some yummy pancakes there."
And on the way I stopped to get some flowers for my wife. I was maxing out the credit card but who cared? The future was rosy.

Frenemy

Even before they had turned the corner Ella would pick up speed and begin running. The big tan wolfhound cross with the lion-like mane looked fearsome. People with small dogs steered away from her, only to have her sidle up to them and - most times -  give their dog a polite sniff before rubbing herself affectionately against the owner. But now Ella was in full fighting mode, and by the time they reached the green gate her head was down, tail up, teeth barred, and the hair on the back of her neck bristling. The white dog was already there, snarling and snapping and barking almost as loudly as Ella. 

The two of them would lunge at each other through the gate, repeatedly, so that the gate banged and anyone who happened to be in the street turned to stare and see what the commotion was about. This would go on for two or three minutes, as snouts tried to push themselves through the narrow gap at the bottom of the gate. Slobber flew, intermingled with ferocious barking and growling.

"Calm down", he had told her, but she took no notice. Whatever ancient ritual she was tuned into was much louder than his half-hearted command. So he allowed it. Let them work it out of their system, he told himself. Perhaps the fight provided the white dog with the only stimulation it had all day. He couldn't tell. Certainly all its pent-up frustration and boredom seemed to come pouring out when Ella came by, invading its territory and showing no respect.

"Better separate them" said a delivery man who was dropping a parcel off at a neighbouring house. "or they'll kill each other." 

That was hardly possible, with the gate between them, but they did manage to injure each other and themselves.  One time he heard the other dog whimper, a high-pitched yelp, and afterwards there was some white fur on Ella's cheek. Another time Ella managed to cut herself on a bit of wire that was sticking out from a corner of the gate. And a week later the white dog managed to grab Ella's lip and it bled profusely for an hour or so afterwards. It didn't seem to bother her. Pleased as punch, she left the gate and followed him down the street, satisfied with a job well done. One of her big floppy V shaped ears had got folded back on top of her head, and he gently flipped it down, so that, as she trotted along beside him, they flapped loosely, like miniature hairy angel wings. 

He avoided the house the next day, crossing over to the other side of the street. Ella charged across the road anyway, and once again the dogs snapped and snarled at each other for what seemed like a long time as he fumbled with her collar, eventually slipping the lead on and dragging her away.

For a while their daily walks followed a different route. But a month later he absentmindedly set out in the wrong direction, and before he knew it Ella was tearing down the street and the two dogs were at it again. He let them be. For the white dog’s sake. Ella’s lip had healed, and as long as the gate was there they couldn’t seriously harm each other. So the snapping-snarling-barking match again became a daily fixture.

Then one day, Ella charged as usual, long before they turned the corner. By the time she got to the gate, bum in the air and forequarters low so that she could get her snout down to the gap, she should have been met by another snout and some bared teeth. But there was no snout, no teeth, no one to lunge at. Ella barked and sniffed, but no one came. She lifted her head and cocked it to one side, listening. She gave another short little bark, and waited. The bark disappeared into the noise of the traffic, without any answering bark to complete it. She cocked her hear to the other side, scratched at the gate, waiting expectantly.

He walked to the front gate, the house looked forlorn and bare, unoccupied. The shoes normally parked on the front porch were not there. Perhaps the residents had relocated, together with the dog. He hoped so, and that they hadn't just abandoned it. Either way, the snout, and its owners, were gone.

Unchallenged, now sole queen of the street, Ella reluctantly sidled after him. And if a dog can look mournful, she did.
____________

Rubber

It was a cold, clear, night when Ayal, Dror and Shalom 'borrowed' some potatoes. They parked the jeeps in a dark field on the outskirts of Gaza city and dug a hole in the ground. Soon a fire was blazing, and they sat round it, warming their hands and baking the potatoes. Gavriel, who wanted to show his disapproval of them and their stolen food, sat shivering in the dark, a little way off.
A shape emerged from the darkness.
Why don't you sit with us?' it asked.
'I don't feel like it,' said Gavriel, surprised that the obtuse Shalom had even bothered to ask.
'Is it coz of politics and all,' asked Shalom nasally, 'because you don't agree with us being here?'
Gavriel felt a lump rising in his throat. It was the first time his lonely stand had been acknowledged.
'It's because of the way you act. Stealing, humiliating...no wonder they hate us.'
'They've always hated us. My grandfather came from Iraq. He told us exactly what the Arabs did to the Jews there. And what about Ofer Sharabi last week. Kidnapped, hands tied behind his back, stabbed 19 times and left to bleed to death in a cave...I promise you, they don't care if you're a lefty or not - they'll slaughter you just the same.' Shalom drew a meditative line across his own throat, as if reminding himself of something. 'If they want to riot let them riot in their own countries. Jordan. Or Iraq. Or Iran. Or -'
'The Iranians aren't Arabs,' Gavriel interrupted.
Another shape stepped out of the night. It stood there quietly, listening, huddled in its dubon the army parka which rendered its wearer bear-like. Only the red glow of a cigarette tip indicating where its mouth was.
'You should see how they deal with their own,' said Shalom. 'Like in Rafiach. As soon as trouble began the Egyptians brought a squad, no rubber, no tear gas, just live. Killed eleven, thirty wounded. Now they're behaving themselves. No intifada there. But we're shit scared, we're scared what the world will say, we're too soft.'
'You can't just go shooting people,' said Gavriel, wondering how to say it so as not to lose Shalom and the silent listener. 'When terrorists murder one of us, it doesn't make us weaker, it makes us more determined. It's the same for them. If we kill Palestinians, their people turn them into martyrs."
There was a silence.
"Anyway, we're not trying to be like Egypt or Syria or Iraq. We're supposed to be a first world country, not a place where you can just shoot anyone who demonstrates against you.'
Gavriel wondered if he'd overdone it, come across as too much of a bleeding heart. Not that he'd shared  even a quarter of his anguished thoughts.
'What's a first world country?' said Shalom.
'It's a modern country' answered Gavriel gladly, 'an advanced country, like America.'Another silence. A breeze passed them by on its way to the sea. It brought with it an odour of wood smoke, animals, and garbage from Shati refugee camp. The hardy little weeds in the beach soil shivered along with Gavriel. Then Shalom burst out angrily:
'If I were you, I'd worry a little bit more about your own, and less about the Arabs!'
'Don't waste your time,' said Dror's voice, and the glowing ember in front of the cowled figure moved in the air. 'Have you seen how he acts on patrol? Like he's in the middle of Dizengoff. A danger to the guys with him.'
'I'm not,' said Gavriel, his voice sounding unconvincing to his own ears. 'You're the ones who break explicit orders, who take people into the orchards, tie teenagers to the jeeps I didn't join the army...
'They're done,' came a shout out of the darkness, and Shalom and Dror disappeared. 'to be here,' said Gavriel to himself.
The next day they got stuck on the road to Gibalia refugee camp, and had to perform one of the endless tyre changes. The Shebab - Palestinian youth - drove nails through flat bits of metal, and sprinkled these on the roads. 'Ninjot,' the soldiers called them, after the Ninja weapons they had seen in the movies. On some patrols these ninjot caused as many as six punctures.
Gavriel was standing alongside the second jeep, near the radio.
'Take off the spare,' said Ayal, the young lieutenant who used a cigarette holder to smoke his cigarettes, and who was, like the platoon commander Nevo, the son of a kibbutz.
Gavriel hesitated. He didn't want to help out with anything. He didn't care if they reached Gibalia or not. Better to wait out their three-month tour of service in barracks, playing backgammon, or, in his case, reading and listening to music on his walkman. They'd do less damage that way. It was easy to disobey Ayal's command. When you didn't want to do something, you pretended you hadn't understood - a technique much favoured by immigrant soldiers like himself. But they weren't safe stuck here, and besides, he had a strong need to make himself useful. Gavriel looked around in the back for the spanner. Avikam was nearby, tying the punctured tyre to the bonnet of the jeep. He would know where the spanner was, but Gavriel hated to ask Avikam anything. He had seen the ginger-haired soldier grinning as other soldiers held a Palestinian down on the bonnet of one of the jeeps. The Palestinian had earlier pulled a pair of scissors from his pocket when asked to presented his ID, and attempted - according to the soldiers - to stab one of them. Avikam had then proceeded to methodically smash the man's legs.
Eventually Gavriel found the spanner in a box full of rubber grenades and tear gas canisters. The first nut was very tight and the spanner slipped off and fell in the dust.
'What's taking so long,' asked AyaI.
'I'll do it,' said Avikam, 'you can't expect anything from him. He's useless.'
Gavriel handed the spanner over wordlessly. Then he stood back, leaning against the jeep, noting with satisfaction that Avikam was also struggling with the nut. So they thought he was useless, did they? Very well, he would be useless. He wouldn't lift a finger to help them. But years from now he would...
'Answer it,' snapped  Ayal, 'can't you hear they're calling us?'
Gavriel, busy with his thoughts, hadn't heard. He always tensed up when he had to talk on the radio. Sometimes there were unfamiliar words,and he couldn't work out what was being said. He picked up the handset and asked them to repeat. A crackly voice said something which Gavriel found incomprehensible. He hesitated, at a loss what to reply. Ayal snatched the handpiece from him.
'Phosphorus six here,' he said, 'we're on our way. There in five.'
Gavriel stood aside, went back into his golem mode. Let them handle it, it was their affair.
When they rejoined the others, Gavriel saw that a young woman from the Red Cross had attached herself to Nevo. She had white hair and thin pinched nostrils. Probably Scandinavian.
'Some of us,' Gavriel mentally beamed at her, 'are as distressed by all of this as you are.'
Their little convoy, three jeeps and a blue Subaru with a red cross on its roof, moved slowly down the main 'street' of Gibalia. Brown water in an open sewer trickled lazily along besides them. The sun beat down on the soldiers, on the corrugated tin roof held in place with bricks and stones, on the empty street. Some children emerged from an alley, smiled, and waved their hands in greeting. Gavriel, surprised, waved back uncertainly. Then whistles - the Shebab warning each other of the army's approach - began to precede and to follow them. Gavriel lowed the vizier attached to his helmet. They rounded a corner and the first jeep screeched to a halt. At the other end of the street was a crowd of forty or fifty gesticulating youths, hurling stones and insults.
'Shamir fucks his mother,' came towards them in thicly accented Hebrew.
'Arafat fucks dogs,' Dror shouted back in Arabic.
Most of the stones landed short of them, one hit the bonnet of the jeep with a metallic clunk.
'Reverse.' Nevo indicated to the other two jeeps with his hands. He didn't want a confrontation, especially with the Red Cross there. They started back, but the road was now blocked by an old fridge, washing machine, and burning tractor tyre.
'World's best prop movers,' joked the platoon commander, 'go into the houses, get them out to clear this.'
Dror started off.
'Not alone,' barked Nevo, 'you, Gavriel, go with him.'
Unwillingly Gavriel went. They knocked on the first door. No one answered.
Dror began hammering on it with the stock of his rifle while Gavriel stood nervously by, holding the grip of his gun tightly, expecting a molotov cocktail or grenade to be hurled at them from a neighbouring courtyard. Eventually an old lady answered the door. Dror conversed with her in what sounded to Gavriel like fluent Arabic.
'There are no men here,' she told them.
They went to the second house. Again Dror hammered at the door until it opened. This time a young woman appeared.
'There are no men here,' she said.
Dror forced his way past her, and Gavriel followed, uncertain whether to guard outside or come in. The desire not to be left alone decided for him, and he followed Dror into a dirty blue courtyard. Wood smoke and earth and cooking mutton smells filled the shaded enclosure.
'Come here,' said Dror to the four men sitting cross-legged on the floor.
The men stood up to go with them. The woman grabbed hold of Gavriel's sleeve, and sobbed at him in Arabic, spittle flying from her mouth onto his face.. .
 'Don't worry,' he gabbled stupidly, hoping she understood Hebrew, trying to get his sleeve loose, careful not to touch her. He had heard that touching 'their' women made Arabs go absolutely berserk. He backed out of the courtyard, following Dror and the Arab men out through the cramped alleyway. By the time they arrived back at the jeeps, one of the men had slipped away in the confusion. The Red Cross representative was poised to pounce, hoping an atrocity was about to occur, so that she could step in and save the day.
'Vy you don't at least try and look for the people vhich haf built it,' said the woman, 'instead of just dragging these people out.'
The officer grinned and swept his arm in a broad gesture which encompassed the jumble of densely packed shacks, houses and alleys.
'In this?'
'I'm going to report you,' said the woman.
Gavriel listened to them arguing in their broken English. He longed to step in and offer to translate. He imagined even Dror standing by respectfully as he displayed his linguistic skills. Perhaps the red cross woman knew some Spanish, and he could discreetly fill her in, explain the context to her, explain that not all the soldiers agreed with being here.
Nevo ended the debate with a shrug of his shoulders. '
'Get on with it,' he said to the soldiers, 'take their ID's and hurry them up' .
Gavriel 'supervised' the men, two of whom looked rather dangerous to him. He disobeyed his desire to smile at them. It was too late for that. The weight of everybody's expectations - both Arabs and soldiers - prevented it. Instead he tried to make his voice and face opaque, to stop his softness from being observed.
The youngsters were closer now, and their throws were more accurate. Shalom, without being told, loaded a tear gas canister and fired. It landed behind the advancing youths, but the wind took it to them, and it temporanly halted their forward momentum.
'It's dangerous here,' said Nevo to the woman.
He was worried they were going to have to fire on the youths, who numbered about a hundred now, and wanted to get rid of her. 'But you people should take these road-blocks apart yourselfs,' she stubbornly insisted, retreating from the stones.
A large missile - almost a half brick - hit Nevo - who was standing without a helmet - on the ear. He shook his head to clear it and put his hand up to the numb flesh.  When he took his hand away there was blood on the fingers.
'Don't think I haven't seen everything,' said the Red Cross representative, who was looking down at her notebook, busily recording the registration numbers of the jeeps.  Nevo finally lost his temper.
'We're not taking them apart ourself because they may have explosion inside. Now you understand?'
'Oh,' said the woman, outraged, 'and then these innocent people will be killed.'
'It's them or us, lady'
The woman stalked off, her back radiating moral indignation, and got into the Subaru. The Arabs had finished clearing the road.
'If the people who place these roadblock know they're only going to hurt their own then maybe they stop,' Nevo shouted after her, 'stupid bitch!'
The Subaru reversed. Dror fired several rounds into the air.
'Don't shoot live,' said Nevo, 'let's get out of here.'
They scrambled for the jeeps. Gavriel was on the last jeep to reverse. He stood facing backwards, as the yelling crowd, ran towards them. He was the only one with a rubber grenade on his gun.
'Shoot,' yelled Ayal.
Gavriel didn't.
'Shoot already,' shouted Ayal and Dror and Shalom.
Gavriel hesitated, standing up on the back seat, facing the jeering youths.
Shoot fuck head,' screamed someone in his ear.
Gavriel pulled the trigger. He didn't even think to point down, so that the rubber would go towards their feet, not their faces. Then the jeep shot round a corner, and he couldn't see if his grenade had halted them or not. His hands were trembling and his heart: pumping wildly. He felt the adrenalin flowing freely and eliminating all fear. What a strange interesting taste to have thoughtlesly pulled the trigger. It was something new, to witness an action outpacing his endless inner debates.
Gavriel savoured that for a while hunched in the back of the jeep as it careened out of Gibalia. But tomorrow he would certainly go to Nevo and tell him he refused to serve here any longer, that he was prepared - no wanted - to go to jail.
Yes, tomorrow.

The Puddle

Some friends of mine had been house-sitting in Randburg, and decided in the middle they wanted to go off to Malawi.
"It's a cinch," they told me, "the fridge is full of food, there's a great collection of videos and CDs, and besides, you need the change."
I willingly agreed, glad at the chance to get out of my stuffy little flat.
The first night in my new home I got down the wok and made myself a sumptuous stir fry, then sat with my feet up on the Chippendale watching 'Pretty Woman.' After several glasses of carrot juice, a long conversation with Australia, and a night swim in the buff, I began to feel sleepy. I locked the Rottweiler and the house cat up in the laundry, and climbed into my hosts' double bed, content with only a cursory examination of their wardrobes.
As soon as I lay down I became aware of a steady dripping emanating from the bathroom. I got up, lit a candle, and went to seek out the source of the trouble. It was the cold tap in the bath, and I tightened it. The dripping didn't stop, so I figured the washer must be gone. I loosened the tap and the whole thing came off. Water gushed all over me, and onto the floor. I tried to force the cover back on, but the thread had rusted away, and wouldn't hold. I would have to get the Swedish wrench out of the car.
I unlocked the back door, but the security gate refused to open. When I tried to force the key, it snapped off I therefore went out through the front door, and walked around to the garage. It was surprisingly chilly, and the flimsy negligee I had borrowed gave no warmth. I took the wrench from under the front seat, where I keep it for protection. I tiptoed back through the rose garden, one hand holding the wrench, the other modestly holding the nightie from blowing up above my erection. I don't know why—cold air on my flesh always does that to me.
Even before I got to the front door I sensed something else had gone wrong. And indeed it had. The door had blown shut. My warm bed called to me, but I was locked out, with no way in. The windows all had burglar bars, and the Rottweiler, who had somehow gotten loose, stuck his head out and growled at me. I could hear the water in the bathroom. Soon it would begin to soak the bedroom carpet. If I tried to climb in, I faced getting stuck, being shot by a passing patrol of Eagle Security, or savaged by the dog. The only other person who had a set of keys was Salamina, the maid, who stayed in Meadowlands, Soweto.
I got into the car and raced down the M1, before merging onto the M2. In White City Jabavu  I was abducted by an APLA cell, painted black, and coerced into joining them in a raid on a sperm bank. They were all very disappointed when they saw the giant cold rooms filled with little plastic jars. "I thought they kept ambergris here," explained their leader, who sounded a little like old Opperman from Military Intelligence. They tied me to a policeman, and after driving my car into a wall, went off.
After I had stopped trembling uncontrollably I woke up the officer.
"We value feedback from the public," he said, "and certainly if any members of the force have been amiss then we will spare no effort to bring them to brook. However, unsubstantiated allegations are......"
I silenced him with a fifty and continued on foot, arriving at Salamina's house at three a.m. It took some time to explain to the terrified woman that I was not a supernatural winged apparition, but rather a middle aged bachelor with a shredded nightie and a thick layer of black paint. I took a taxi back, looking at my watch every two minutes and cursing the driver at each unscheduled stop. None of the constant stream of passengers getting in and out commented on my rather foreign appearance. Their gaze might rest upon me for a moment, but was then averted rapidly, as if they were very used to seeing strange sights and had become inured to them.
I didn't have too much time to reflect on this because I was busy worrying about the house. The wooden floors and carpets were probably knee-deep in water by now. In Louis Botha, my head was flung sideways into the large bosom of the lady beside me. After two of the drivers had swopped details (the third one just drove off), a gun battle broke out between rival tow truck drivers who had magically arrived on the scene seconds after the accident occurred. I hid under a pile of bodies until the shooting was over. The taxi driver, whistling softly to himself, stretched some plastic across the shattered glass of his Hi-Ace, and then we limped on to Republic road where I disembarked.
Empty suburban streets with their greenery and high walls make a very pretty sight in the pearly morning-glow. I vaulted the garden wall just as the sun was rising. Strangely enough, I couldn't hear the gushing of water within. Only the gentle throbbing of the automatic pool cleaner disturbed the silence. Even stranger was that there was no water seeping out under the front door. I unlocked it, but it wouldn't open. Looking through the lounge window I saw that someone had pushed the grand piano against the door. Eventually I managed to push it back, and enter. The house seemed empty. Absolutely empty. They had even unscrewed the light bulbs and plug covers and taken them. In the kitchen little marks on the tiles indicated where the melamine units had once stood. Someone had scratched "Thlokomelo Nja**" on the side of the piano. The Rottweiler was snoozing on the bare lounge floor, and cuddled up next to it was the cat. Inexplicably angered by this graphic explosion of yet another myth, I did for them both with an AK47 I had taken from the taxi by mistake, and then went to see if the thieves had at least left the lady of the house's underwear for me to try on.
"What incredible monsters" I thought to myself when I discovered the bedroom cupboard had vanished. But my worst fears were confirmed when I walked into the bathroom. They had even taken the puddle.
_________

First published by Peter Esterhuysen (z"l) in a Hippogriff Press anthology around 1993, and subsequently published in "Running Towards Us" a Heinnemann anthology of new South African writing edited by Isabel Baleseiro. 

Kaddish for Kefilwe

On Shabes I decided to follow Jonas. After dropping off the fruit, he turned towards Doornfontein. The houses got poorer and shabbier and I saw fewer and fewer europeans Eventually he stopped at the end of Overbeek Street, a dead-end next to the railway line, and went into a corrugated iron house which looked like it was about to collapse. When he came out. after half an hour, he was riding all funny, zigzagging across the road, and drawing hoots and insults from the motor cars.

It was easy to catch up with him, because he was riding so badly, but I waited till we were almost across Harrow Road before I called his name from behind. He nearly fell off his bike.'Haahlow, Kleinbaas!' said Jonas. Wat doen jy hier?' 'You doing the fahfee round for the chinaman again?'I kept on questioning him, but could get nothing more except comments about the weather. I rode slowly next to him as he sang and burped his way up Observatory Ridge. It took us a long time to get home, but Jonas just parked his bike under the awning as if nothing had happened.

Jonas was the delivery boy, and had been with us for almost a year. He took orders in the basket of his bicycle with the broken left handlebar. I had been doing the deliveries, but they needed someone when I was at school. Martha the amawasha who lived in the back and paid us rent said her brother needed a job. So Jonas came and took over. He lived in Martindale location, but generally slept over on the floor of the shop, with an old blanket thrown over him. This suited both him and tate, especially on the days when deliveries had to be made early.

We stayed in Rockey Street, opposite the fruit shop. When we first came to dorem afrike we were in Doornfontein for six months, and then we moved to Yeoville, which tate said was a rise in the world. That was when I found Spotty. Someone had wrapped him up in a bag and left him amongst the weeds that grew in the empty stand where we met after school for a smoke. There were three tiny dogs in the bag, with swollen stomachs and ribs sticking out, dead, and one still shaking and whimpering and wet from his own piddle. I brought him home and mame said he could stay, but that, like Jonas, he must stay out of the house. Spotty recovered. We gave him milk with dissolved tennis biscuits and when he was stronger 1 went back to Doornfontein, to Wachenheimer's, and got some of the treyf parts they threw away. Spotty grew till he was the size of a large cat. I taught him to do tricks like jump into my arms when I said shpring! He wasn't the only dog who understood Yiddish in Yeoville, but he was certainly the cleverest.

At the beginning of our second winter in Rockey Street, when I was hardly a greenhorn any more, I was coming home from school and Spotty ran out to greet me and got smashed into by a motor car. He gave a terrible high squeal and then twitched and stopped moving. I called Sonia from downstairs and she came down and told me he was dead, and that I should he careful not to get blood on my school uniform. I waited to see if he would wake up but he didn't. We buried him in the back yard, just behind the washing line, and Sonia said a few words. I didn't say anything because it was my fault he was killed. I might have said  kaddish, but I only learnt the words properly later that winter. Jonas said I should have just thrown Spotty in the rubbish because dogs do not have souls. I got very cross with him because of that, and because he wouldn't tell me what he'd been doing in the house in Doornfontein. I was so upset I couldn't study and got an F for my English essay. Mame told me I could do better, but when I asked her how, she couldn't tell me because her English was worse than mine. Mame was not much taller than me, and she had short brown hair and tired puffy eyes. Her belly was swollen, as if she'd taken a watennelon from the shop and was hiding it under her skirt for safekeeping.
I asked her if it hurt to have a baby.
'Yes, it does.' she said, 'very much.'
Why can't people just hatch from eggs?' I asked.
'If the Eybeshter wanted us to lay eggs he would have given us more feathers and less sense.'
'But it's not dangerous?'Kevn evn-hore,' she answered - don't invoke the evil eye — which was her way of telling me to go and do something else.

Mame was always busy in the shop, making sure the things tate forgot to do got done. She would give him  list of things to get from the market in Bree Street. argue with Padayachee, the Indian trader, and together with Sonia make up the parcels for delivery while Jonas waited respectfully outside, cap in hand and barefoot. But when the watermelon under her skirt grew very big she spent less time in the shop. A month after Spotty was killed she told me she could have the baby any time now. I went to bed that night and mame went to the nursing home and never came back.
'Davn mame, said Aunty Zelda. who told me the next morning, iz avek tsum Ebershtn. Your mama's gone to God.'
They buried her standing up. like a sentry, because the Brixton-Braamfontein cemetery was already chock-a-block full with dead Jews, and there wasn't room for any more lengthways graves. Besides Spotty's, it was the only funeral I'd ever been to, so I thought that was the way everyone was buried, and started worrying we'd buried Spotty wrong.

After sitting shive I went to shul every day. Both because I had to say kaddish for mame, and because I had to learn the daily prayers for my barmitzve, only four months away. The Yeoville synagogue was big and smart. Everything was new and gleaming. It smelt of wood polish and of the deep red carpets and velvet covers on the bime. I learnt all the tunes and enjoyed singing along. When I was given the honour of opening the curtain in front of the Ark, before the Torah was taken out of it, the other men shook iny hand and said well done. I felt big and important. It was the same feeling I had as when my friends laughed at one ol my jokes when we were having smoke-ring competitions. But this was even better because this club was organised by the adults, and my father was part of it and Mr Weiler the gabe was part of it and now I was part of it as well.

Jonas said he was pleased I attended shul regularly. In fact, he took it upon himself -along with Mr Weiler - to ensure I mourned correctly. Now that Spotty and mame were gone, he and I spent more time together. We had several things in common. He liked a cigarette, and would roll his own from cheap, smelly leaf while I smoked my stompies. He also took a keen interest in gambling. Of course he couldn't play the horses like tate did, natives weren't allowed to, but he played dice. Although he had never been to school, Jonas enjoyed learning as much as I did. In exchange for me teaching him Jewish and basic civilisation, he taught me one or two words of kaffertaal.
'Ek's 'n Pedi.' he told me. 'Mv naam is nie Jonas nie, maar Kefilwe. Dit beteken "geskenk." My real name is Kefilwe - "gift".'

He also shared other secrets with me. Like the fact that good luck always comes in threes, as did bad. And that meant, he explained, that if there were two deaths in the family, the third would he quick to follow. I spent alot of time worrying who was going to be next - tate, my elder sister Sonia, my baby sister Reina, or myself. I also tried to find out if there was anything that could he done to prevent it.I thought perhaps saying kaddish every day might help. But Mr Weiler said the main purpose of kadish was to raise the souls of the deceased higher, and to publicly testify that the Eybershter's glory was not diminished by our deaths. I said I understood, but actually I thought a prayer which stopped people dying would be more useful than a prayer about God's glory.Another thing that wasn't clear to me why kaddish had to be said in shul. I missed mame most at night, when I was alone in my bed, and she didn't come to say shlof gezunt. That seemed to me to be the time to pray for her, and not in shul where I'd be daydreaming about a certain girl in my class. Night was also the time I had listened to mame singing Reina to sleep. Reina slept with tate and mane in their bedroom. and mame sang her the same songs she had sung to me when I was a baby: 'Raisins and Almonds';  'Sleep my Yankele'. and 'Tumbalalaika':

From where do you get a bit of mazl? 
From where a bit of glik?
The wheel will surely turn again
and bring my good luck tsurik.

the world is made for all people together
from where can I get
just a little bit, a little bit of glik?

I used to listen and join in the chorus:  

tumbala tumbala  tumbala laika 
tumbala tumbala  tumbala laika 

Shul become a duty, then a chore, and finally, a punishment. If I went in the morning, I missed breakfast, and if I went in the late afternoon it meant leaving a game of soccer in the middle. Arid no matter how many times 1 reminded them at shul that my name was now Joe, they still called me Yossele. I grew to hate it so much I even started being angry with mame. If she hadn't died I wouldn't have had to go there. And I had to go. because if 1 didn't, Mr Weilerwould have reported it to tate. But all my complaints were forgotten when my worries about who the third fatality would be were ended. Together with his bicycle. srnile.a dozen eggs, a bagof tomatoes and a pumpkin, Jonas was knocked flying in a head-on collision with a truck and, they told me, killed instantly. Like mame, he never said goodbye, and I never saw him again.'He was a good man,' Martha told me. 'except ..: and she armed someone holding a bottle up to his lips and drinking thirstilv. 'I think the Eybeshter is trying to tell me something: said tate, 'Him and Robinson, what wants payment in full by next week.'

The shock of Jonas's death scared me back into shul. Once again I was first in the synagogue in the morning. 1 stopped telling jokes to the other barmitve boys during the parts we were supposed to be quiet, and I swayed and concentrated when I said kaddish. I thought there would be no harm in including Jonas among the growing number of people my daily prayer was having to guide on their final journey. Spotty, mame and now Jonas-Kefllwe-Gift who had gone to God riding on a bicycle. I did this for a few weeks, and one day, when tate said he'd noticed that I was being more conscientious about attending shul,  I explained that my kaddish had grown to include Jonas. Both he and Sonia looked at me as if I was mad.
'Jonas,' said tate, 'was an employee, not family. And Jonas wasn't Jewish.'
'In case you hadn't noticed,' said Sonia. 'he was a shvartse.
''So what?''
So kaddish is not for shvartses, shlemiel''
"But why is kuddish not for shvartses?''
Because each must stick to his own customs.' said tate, 'that's the way of the world.' Then he added, and because the Eybershter is Jewish'.
'And why is God Jewish?
''Why are shvartses black and toffees sweet? Am I responsible for the way things are?'

With mame and Jonas and Spotty gone, our bad luck was supposed to be over. But it seems Jonas only got it partly right. The grocery shop went mekhule, Sonia had to leave school and start working, and Reina was sent to the orphanage.
'Your tate,' said Aunty Zelda. 'never was a businessman. What he really wants is a big win at the races, so that he can sleep the afternoons with a newspaper over his face.'

I had my barmitsve in November, but my shul attendance didn't last. My visits slipped to once every two weeks, and then to even less than that. I knew I was letting mame down when I stayed away, but when I went I felt even worse. My heart was no longer in it. It bothered me that I wasn't supposed to include Jonas, and anyway, there were more important things to do than looking after the dead with a lot of old men who were close to death themselves. About a week before tate and I moved back to a boarding-house in Doornfontein I got up early to go to shakhres. I don't know why 1 decided to go that particular morning. Perhaps it was to say goodbye to the Yeoville synagogue. I didn't hear much of the service, I was thinking about other things the whole way through. I only woke up when Mr Weiler cleared his throat to let me know they were all waiting for me.

'Yisgodol veyiskodosh ...' I began, automatically.
My lips knew the words, but inside my head things were getting jumbled up. The old men looked at me expectantly.
"Shemei rabah" one of them prompted me. Sanctified and extolled be His great name,
I saw Jonas bicycling up the hill, and in his delivery basket sat Spotty, eagerly sniffing the air. 
bealmah divarah chivrutei
in the world He has made  for all people together
Mame hovered over Jonas and Spotty, with her watermelon stomach, and with each turn of the wheel they all said kaddish together with me. 
in the lifetime of all of the house of  Israel, speedily and soon
the wheel will surely turn again
beyond all the praises and consolations that are uttered
I want my mame back 
and let us say
tumbalalaika 
 _________________________

(Based on incidents in Joe Slovo's autobiography, first published in Jewish Affairs circa 1996)

Into the Woods

The magid of Chelm - famous for his rambling and pointless parables - was a great tzadik, or righteous man. Every now and then he would dissapear for a few days. When he returned to Chelm he was always missing something...an arm, or a leg, or a few fingers, or a portion of his small and shapely nose. Miraculously, after a few days these missing body parts seemed to grow back, and the next time the magid dissapeared he once again had all his wits - and all his limbs - about him. Rumour and speculation were rife about these unearthly haopenings. Some said he ascended to haven and studied Talmud with the Rabeynu shel Olam, the Lord of the World, and the study was so intense it called forth the supernal fire, which burnt this or the other limb off. Others said the tzadik was probably disguing himsel as a peasant, and was secretly attending to the sick and the poor in the nearest large town, Tinitius, which lay some 100 furlongs to the south of Chelm.
Now amongst his chasidim - his devotees - was a man called shmeel, and Shmeel had three sons, the youngest of whom was called Daniel. Daniel was known in the shtetl as being a wild child. He had long curly hair like a burning bush, and eyes greener than the pools of Solomon in the ancient city of Jerusalem. In cheder he would play tricks on the old melamed ( teacher ) who was half blind and suffered from extreme flatulence, particularly on Sundays, when the beans from the shabbos tsholent had not fully worked their way out of his system. Daniel would climb on rooftops and pelt passers by. He would tie the legs of chickens together so that the birds ended up pecking at each other, so frustated were they by their joint inability to reach concensud on which way to move. And no matter how many times Shmeel thrashed Daniel, the high spirited child never seemed to learn the error of his ways. But there was one rule, as far as Shmeel knew, that Daniel had not broken. And that was the rule to never ever venture into the swampy forests that surrounded Chelm. "There are wolves there" he warned his sons, "and murderers abd impure spirits that the Holy One, Blessed Be He, has banished to places where darkness and foulness reign. Better you be conscripted into the Tsars army then step ino the woods."

One day, as Daniel was trudging unwillingly to chayder, he noticed the magid shuffling along a litte way ahead of him, on the muddy street that ran through Chelm. He assumed the magid was going to the talmud torah, to teach the older boys some words of wisdom, He walked on, but to his surprise, when the magid got to the talmud torah he did not stop there but carried on down the muddy street, past the shochet's house and past the small apple orchard of Mr Puleravitz, the wealthiest man in Chelm. On impulse Daniel decided to follow the tzaddik, to see who was sick. His mother loved to be in on the latest shtetl news, and when he bought her a piece of infomation she sometimes rewarded him with a little piece of kichel, or some salted herring which was normally reserved for supper. No doubt the magid was performing the mitzva of visiting the sick, and would soon turn into one of the small wooden shacks that lay on the outskirts of the village, sagging structures that housed the poorest of the Chelmites: the woodcutter and his seven children, the cripple with two stumps instead of legs, and the meshugener spinster Gittel, who talked to herself and who,if she ventured forth from her rickety house,soon attracted a crowd of small boys (led by Daniel it must be said) who took great delight in taunting and jeering at her, until some adult of sound mind and body, such as the shochet or the shamas, chased them away.

But to Daniel's surprise the magid did not enter any of thse houses, but continued past them until the muddy road dwindled into a muddy wagon track, and then dwindled further into a muddy foot track. Daniel stood in a field of beetroot, and watched the magid getting smaller and smaller in the distance. Daniel realised the tzadik was heading straight for the forest, where none of the village children dared enter, and which he too had sworn, on the holy Torah, that he would not go. Reluctantly Daniel turned around and started back towards the cheyder. He knew that he was already late, and that when he stepped into class the old melamed would pick him up by his ears and give him a good shaking, or otherwise make him put out his hand to receive several stinging lashes from the thin birchwood cane that never left the melamed's grip. the thought was not encouraging, and he stopped, and turned round again. He could still see a small dot that was the magid crosing the last open field before the forest.

Everyone in Chelm knew about their tzadik's disappearance, but no one knew where he dissapeard too. Daniel had often heard this discussed by the adults at the shabbos table, through the floorboards, while he was hiding in the cellar, together with the jars of pickled cucumbers and cabbage, in order to escape the wrath of his father. Even the boys at cheyder talked about it and out did each other in their fantastical conjectures about how the magid returned a cripple, and then regained his health and limbs overnight. Now was his chance to be the first to know where the magid went, and what he did there. He would follow him for a while, just a little way, and then turn back to tll everyone that it was not to Tinitius the tzadik went, or to heaven, but to the woods.

Daniel follwed the magid at a safe distance. the magid was no longer shuffling, but walking purposefully and energetically, like a young man, with a long striding gate. So much so that Daniel had to break into a run so as not to lose sight of him. By the time Daniel reached the first trees he had lost sight of the tzadik, but there was a thin path, barely visible, almost hidden by long grass and weeds, that ran between the trees. The forest was not so thick here, and the trees were young and slender, and pale sunlight managed to easily pierce the leafy canopy, flecking the forest floor with parallel bars of light that iluminated leaf litter and small twigs that the trees had scattered around their trunks. Daniel broke into a run, following the path, telling himself if he did not see the magid in the next 500 steps he would turn around and head home, to face whatever punishment was awaiting him. But he had only counted to 370 when he caught side of the magid, still walking quickly, flitting like a black shadow from tree to tree, a short distance in front of him. By now Daniel was panting, both from the exertion and from something that had settled upon his chest - a certain tightness that Daniel would not have liked to call panic - making it a little more difficult to breathe. He slowed slightly, and tried to settle his breathing, so that the magid would not hear him. It was hard to keep the magid in sight, but not get so close that he revealed himself. He did not think the magid would harm him, but he knew he was witnessing something that the magid did not wish other eyes to see. The fanciful stories that he and his friends had told their baby brothers and sisters in order to frighten them did not seem so fanciful, here in the forest. The trees were bigger now, with trunks thicker than Daniel's body, and a light wind had sprung up, so that the leaves murmured and the tops of the trees moved slightly. The bars of light were less frequent now, and Daniel had to keep on shifting his gaze from the magid's back to the forest floor, to make sure he did not trip over the gnarled roots that now frequently crossed the almost invisible path. Suddenly Daniel stood on a dry branch, which snapped with a loud crack, which reverberated in the forest like a musket shot, much louder than the rustling leaves. Daniel froze, certain the magid would turn and see him. But the magid made no indication he had heard anything, and continued through the trees. Daniel hesitated, and then began moving again. They continud like this for what might have been ten minutes or an hour - Daniel was not sure, but what he did realise was that he was slowly getting closer and closer to the tzaddik, until only some thirty feet seperated them. Whether this was because there was no longer a path, and Daniel dared not loose sight of the adult, or because the magid seemed to have slowed a little, he could not say.

Daniel was practised in the art of creative excuses, or what the old melamed called 'sheker vecozov' - 'lies and deceipt'. He was busy rehearsing an elaborate tale of how he had got lost in the woods to tell the magid, because by now his fear of being discovered was much smaller than his fear of being alone in the forest and not knowing the way bck to the path. He had got to within fifteen feet of the magid, and was about to pretend to fall and call out in pain, so that the magid would turn and discover him, when the magid stopped, near a large oak tree, and stood silently, head slightly cocked to on side, as if listening. In the stillness, Daniel became aware that besides the swishing of the branches, there was a quite gurgling of water. The tzadik walked several paces to his right, and then crouched down. Daniel heard the sound of splashing, and then the tzadik stood up and pronounced." baruch ata Adonai, Eloheinu melech haoylam, asher kidshanu bemitvosav vitzivanu al netilas yodayim". Blessed are you, our Lord, master of the Universe, that has commanded us regarding the washing of the hands". Automatically Danil answered amen, as he had been taught to do ten thousand time, and the word was out before he could bite his lip, but again the magid made no movement, and gave not the slightes indication, that he was the only human bing in that part of the forest.

The magid raised the tails of his long kapota, so that they were above his waist, and then sat down, with a small sigh, his back leaning against the large oak. He lifted his hat of his head, and carefully placed it on the forest floor. Then from the hat he withdrew a smallish loaf of, what looked to the hungry Daniel like very delicious, bread. He lifted the bread in the air with both hands. Baruch oto Adonai, Eloheinu melech haolam, he recited, hamotzi lechem min haaretz. Blessed are You, our Lord, Master of the Universe, who brings forth bread from the ground. This time Daniel, who was behind the trunk of a tree less than ten feet from where the tzadik sat, did not answer amayn, but watched as the man broke off a piece of bread with his right hand, and then slowly and thoughtfully chewed upon it. Daniel could not see the magid's face, but he could see his long beard rising and falling as he chewed on the bread. After a lot of chewing, the tzadik broke off another piece, and again began to slowly eat it. When he had eaten a kazayis, the amount that according to the halachah constitued a meal, he began to sing, in a very sweet and melodious voice, birkat hamazon, grace after meals. Adonai oz leamo yiteyn, Adonai yevarech es amo beshaloym...the Lord will give strength to his people, the Lord will bless his people with peace." As the concluding words faded away into the rustling leaves and the faint gurgle of water, the tzadik broke off two large chunks of bread, got up, walked across to the stream, and placed them there. then he returned to his tree, raised his kapota, and sat down again. After a short while he put his hat back on his head. And then sat. And then sat some more. So still was he it looked like he had become a back rock with a grey beard that had rolled to the base of a tree and then stopped there. After another few minutes another sound rose and joined with the forest noises: a loud rasping snore.

Daniel could stand it no longer. he stepped out from behind his tree, and on tiptoes walked past the rebbe. he held one hand over his eyes, adhering to the ancient fiction that if he could not see, then he could not be seen. But he spread his fingers enough to guide him to the stream and not stand on any dry branches. At the stream he bent, snatched up the pieces of bread (were they for the birds? or for the magids supper? then why put them here by the stream where some animal was sure to grab them...?) and shoved them in his pockets. He was about to tiptoe back to his hiding place when he decided to steal a quick glance at the magid. was it his imagination or did he see the magid's eyes snap quickly shut? inadverently Daniel gasped, but the gasp was smothered by another large snore which emerged from the tzaddik. Daniel dared to take another look. The tzaddik's eye were tightly shut, and his head had fallen slightly forward, so that his hat leaned rakishly, exposing the black skullcap underneath it. Daniel paused, then crouched down, as the tzaddik had done, and washed his hands in the stream. he said the blessing in a whisper, then tiptoed back to his tree. There he sat down, said the blessing on the bread and ate the two large pieces. Much much more rapidly, it must be said, then the magid had eaten his. They were delicious, with a sweet and eggy taste that reminded him of shabbos challah. Then Daniel said grace after meals as best he could, although he could not remember all of it. Whenhe had finished he sat listening to the forest noises, wondering what he should do next. He estmated it would be dark in about two hours time, and his parents might begin to worry that he had not returned home. Perhaps he should wake the magid up and confess that he had followed him. A bird squawked somewhere, and the grass a few feet from his foot rustled as something small slithered its ay through it. daniel did not feel very safe. he stood up and moved to the tzaddiks tree. but he could not quite summon up the courage to wake the magid, whose head was now almost touching his chest. So he sat on the other side of the same oak tree that the tzaddik leaned against, and promised himself that whne the tzaddik awoke, he would call out and ask for help. The leaves rustled, th stream gurgled, Daniel's stomach was full, and he was, after all, only an 11 year old child who had walked and run for several miles. His eyes drooped and he fell asleep. For ho long hecould not say, but when he awoke he was not sure where he was. For a few seconds. Then he stood, whimpering, and moved to the other side of the tree. The magid was gone. He was alone.

Daniels's leg began trembling. Is there anyone there, he ventured, his voice sounding thin and tiny in the forest gloom.
"Rebbe? Please, anchuldik, its me Daniel Tanenbaum. I’m very sorry. please don’t be angry."
He waited for a reply but there was none, only the rustling of leaves and the slithering of small or big things somewhere just out of sight.
"Rebbe? Rebbeee? Anyone?"
Daniel began to walk, trying to find the path back in the dim light.
"Rabeynoo shel Olam, he whispered, "please take me home. I’ll be a good boy. I’ll daven in shul and I’ll listen in cheder and I’ll study your holy Torah. Please Rabeynoo shel Olam, I’ve learnt my lesson".
He walked and prayed, no longer sure if he was heading in the right direction. The thought came to him he would be here when night fell, all alone, with who knew what monsters that would tear at his flesh. He began to walk more quickly, the panic rising up from his legs to suffuse his whole body. His blood pounding in his ears, his heart throbbing, his mouth dry, trying to get away from the terror that was eating him alive, he broke into a run.
"Mame, tateh, he shrieked, "helfen mir. mein mame, mameh, tateh tateh, rebbe, please."
He dodged between trees, now convinced something was chasing him.
"Gevald yidden", he screamed, tripped over a root and found himelf hurtling forwards with just enough time to bring his hands up to his face to protect it as he hit the earth. He lay there, panting and trembling. Through the grass he saw something brown, and then he heard a voice. It was the magid’s voice.

Slowly Daniel raised his head. He moved forward a little, ‘til, through the dandelions he could see rough wooden chairs arranged in a circle. In some cases it seemed they had been there so long that the tree trunk had grown right through them, the dead wood and the living wood joined together .
The rebee has his sleeve rolled up, of his left arm, the one he laid tefillin on each day. It looked like he had them on now, for there were black bands running down his arm, but when the rebbe suddenly waved his arm in a gesture of invitation, the bands lifted, formed a small cloud, and then settled back on the rebbes arm. Daniel gazed at the rebes arm in horror and fascination, but his eyes did not linger there long for from the trees various beings began to emerge. Two thin and mangy looking wolves slunk out, and, keeping a respectable distance, some grey rabbits hopped into the clearing. The wolves lay down near the rebee, and rested their great heads on his feet. More animals emerged red foxes, weavils and weasels and snakes and toads. They crawled or hopped or walked into the circle, some draping themselves on the chairs, some sheltering beneath them. There were animals that Daniel had never seen…they looked like big rabbits with a deers face and a long tail, and they stood upright, using their small forepaws to clean their faces . There was ‘a river horse’, which Daniel had read about in his chumash Rashi. It was much bigger and much rounder than a horse…it looked like a balloon with short stumpy legs, and when it yawned it displayed a set of huge teeth. And amongst all these animals was a vaguely human figure, that stood upright, but was much larger than any man Daniel had ever seen. It looked as if someone had fashiond a giant out of mud that was too wet to completely hold its form. On the giants face were the suggestion of two eyes, nose, a mouth, but they drooped and dissolved as he stared at them, so that they were eyes one moment and then just muddy lumps the next.
"Come, join us Daniel" said the magid, without turning around.
Daniel was frozen, unable to move.
A black bear padded in, and behind her two cubs, who frolicked amongst the buttercups that grew at the edge of the circle. And a large pair of jaws and two yellow eyes peered out from the shadows at the cubs. The bear mother noticed, growled, and moved towards the jaws, whose owner decided to relocate. Daniel saw a flash of green and a gnarled and knobbly body, that looked like a piece of driftwood with legs.
The magid stood in front of a shtender, with a book open in front of him. Daniel could see from the way the text as arranged, with a block of text in the middle of the page and smaller blocks around it, that it must be a volume of the Talmud. (In fact it was mesechet chayas hakodesh, the tractate on holy animals, winged apparitions, mythical beasts and train timetables. )
"I trust" said the magid to the animals "you are all well and have managed to find a meal or two. Now who can summarise what we studied last week?"
Daniel heard a sort of low moan and turned to see the mud man raise his arm
"Golem, said the Rebbee, would you like to have a go?"
The golem spoke and it sounded like pebbles grating against each other.
I’m sorry to hear that, said the rebbe, but I do expect you to revise. Take some juniper leaves, and if you can find some wild honey, mix the two together and apply it twice a day. That should relieve the itching. Anyone else?
A tortoise stuck its neck out and indicated it was prepared to answer. Daniel could not tell if it spoke because a Lyre bird, proceeded to make a series of noises that included a grandfather clock chiming, tea being poured from a samovar, the flushing of a toilet, and several bars of the tenor line of Lewandowski’s “Todah veZimrah”
"Good, said the magid, does anyone or anything want to add to that?"
It appeared that no one did.
"Right said the rebbee. "we’re 8 lines down in the Gemarah…please follow with your claws or paws or feathers or feelers as best you can. Now “Rabbah” he continued “argues that the leviathan’s skin was very rough and scaly, like glass paper, and that whoever handles it will lose their own skin. That is the reason he says the tent under which the tzadikim will eat in olam haba is not made from leviathan skin, but rather from the same angora goat hair that was used to make the curtains in the tabernacle.” But his bar plugta, Ravina, brings down a verse from Ezekiel which seems to prove exactly the opposite.
This verse indicates that the tzadikim will not have skin, in the sense we know it today, because “their insides will be like their outsides.” And there is, I must mention a braysa, a non –canonised source, which mentions that the angels have 4 wings, and the outer two are tough, to protect the delicate inner two membranes, and that the ohel will be made from these outerwings."
A couple of dragonflies began to fly around in circles, dive bombing the magid’s face and zooming past Daniel’s ear.
"Of course not", the rebbe explained to them, "no angel will be harmed. The wings will come from a gemach where spare wings are kept should any harm befall the angels' original pairs."
The dragonflies settled.
"Come Daniel", said the Magid without missing a beat, and without turning around. "None of our friends will harm you, come sit and learn a shtikkel Torah. When we return to Chelm I will explain to your parents I borrowed you for an important ….…an extremely urgent matter of pikuach nefesh, life or death. No harm will come to you, I promise" ( bli neder).”

Cautiously Daniel rose from his hiding place. A 100 eyes, some beady , some brown, turned to look at him. He could not walk at first. He had pins and needles in one leg, and had to wait, holding onto a tree for support, while the blood returned – agonizingly slowly – to his calf and foot.
"Come sit here, said the magid, indicating a free chair next to a pig. Some bats hung upside down from the seatback, and the tortoise lay underneath another one, nibbling on something green.
Daniel hesitated.
"You can stand if you like, or hop onto a branch." The Rebeee pointed up to where two owls sat, their big eyes swiveling to look at Daniel as if he were a possibility for supper.
“Take off your shoes. if you'd like.Make yourself comfy”
Daniel noticed the rabbis feet were bare – or rather foot was bare, the other foot was not fully visible, as it was inside the mouth of a wolf, who lay contently on the ground in front of the magid, and chewed on the tzadik’s foot.
Daniel’s voice came back. "Your foot, rebbe", he choaked out, "the wolf’s got your foot."
"My what?" said the rebbe, "come closer, I can’t hear you."
"Your foot", said Daniel weakly, stepping cautiously into the circle, between a donkey and a beaver, neither of whom looked too dangerous
"Ah my foot, yes", said the magid, "the wolf is hungry. And she needs milk for her pups. they have not eaten for a few days. No matter….So what," he continued, "does Rabah do with this verse from Ezekiel. Surely he knew the verse?"
Daniel ws close enough now to realize that the tefillin on the rebbes arm were mosquitoes, who had arranged themselves in a spiral down his arm and onto his hand. The hand appeared almost black, so many mosquitoes were upon it.

To be continued ....

sheker vecozov they said.
bobba mayses


TO BE CONTINUED