Istanbul Was a Fairy Tale (5 page)

The watch might not have been made in Odessa, after all. Nevertheless, in this section of the story, there should be—through all accounts, despite this probability, a feeling that would attach a few people, amenable to friendship, for the sake of that line of horizon that was open to changing borders and probabilities, for the narration of a long history, of a journey—a maker who had tried to shape time according to his own whims. Yes, a maker . . . a maker with glasses, wiser than his age would account for, a maker rather reserved, a maker who told the time with his looks, postures, and words of his own.

For the time of others.

For the time of others.

For those who are obliged and will be obliged to brood over the times that cannot be redeemed.

Tick tock.

Tick tock.

Thousands of, ten thousands of, millions and billions of tick tocks.

Tick tocks like in other stories and lands and worlds of empathy.

There, in that story I have omitted something, there should have figured a watchmaker; a watchmaker who should whisper silently, or as best he can. A maker, that would have enabled us to understand better the time and what we were going through and the things that we allowed to escape in order to live, giving us fair warning by his looks and presence, although from a distance, yet compelling us to reflect on things we would let slip away, so as not to forget to set down the reasons we did, hiding himself between the lines of that story. This might well be someone removed from the stir of society, living in a derelict town, someone who had spent his life among thousands of watches and clocks, who had never left his hometown, who had reached a point no one else could reach in that small world of his, who had discovered all the minutiae, or someone positioned in one of the proud clock towers in big cities, fully conscious of those ancient clocks over a particular period of time, identifying himself as the only hero of an ancient tradition, or someone positioned at a lighthouse illumining a sea rarely frequented, during those interminable nights, interpreting time for us in a different way.

That maker should bear the name of one of my heroes, who endeavored to tell what he wanted to say only through his looks, a figure of my immortal and endless novels.

Alexandria was a tale

The Olga I knew, the Olga I want to revive in my imagination, was a girl from a wealthy family of bankers from Riga who had received a good education, but had the courage to shove away all the possibilities and probabilities that her mother had provided for her by marrying her third cousin with a view to building her own life, or, to be precise, to earning her own living, to the dismay of the people who knew her. In the life she left behind were houses, journeys, and expectations quite different from those that were to emerge later on. This fact is instrumental in revealing to us the inner workings of Olga’s mind, while allowing us a glimpse into what was of significance to her in her day-to-day life. This tale can also be read as a testament to Olga’s resolute march ahead on the idealistic road of revolt, as she risks everything against its consequences. A tale or merely a revolt . . . In time, one would realize that the reason for this revolt was a risky love affair of delirious posture, one of those delusions that people seem never to be conscious of. A secret that might cause a life to assume a thoroughly different aspect in the eyes of others.

As far as I can gather, Olga was one of those women who knew how to abide by her mother’s testament throughout her life, nourishing it with her own values. She was fated to tell another tale with a similar disposition. This was a tale different in terms of its geography, words, voices, and bondages. A mother’s shadow had remained attached to a woman for whom it would be looming over for many years. I would try to follow this vision when the appointed time came. The labyrinths I would run into would soon show me once more the difficulty of turning my back on her. However, a thoroughly different timescale was required for this tale. I knew for certain that it was calling out to me. This call was at the same time the voice of my morbid attachment to fantasies and my enthrallment by them . . .It provided me with new masks which I could borrow from others, as I could not devise my own validation from what I had experienced. What enables us to convey to others the fragments of expectations within us are stories related to the fact that we are living at different times, in different worlds, and in the company of different people.

Mornings dawned with new stories, new individuals, new expectations, and new delusions . . . To my mind, there was an interesting point to that story, narrated to me and to us by Olga, about the woman of Riga. To understand those lives, starting from this point had seemed to me a feasible option at the time. The heroine of this tale of hers was at the same time a woman, who, despite all her endeavor and courage, tried to explain every experience as refracted through an ineluctable ‘Jewish destiny’ that attached her to a life derived from the power of her delusion, and, according to some, just because of this delusion; persisting with it, even in her difficult moments. This attitude, this behavior adopted toward life, would exhibit itself often during those critical moments when a resolution was required to be reached or on the days when clocks struck certain hours, when living by other times necessitated some sort of self-confidence. The concept of ‘belief in compelling necessity’ had a towering importance in this undertaking, a concept worth arguing for. What sort of necessity could direct a young girl from Riga to choose a different path in life? Where should one be looking for that call, in which particular delusion? It’s true that Olga had mentioned an illusion, but of what sort was it? What shortcomings and disappointments had nourished it? Olga could not or would not expatiate on this subject. Probably, the subject had a dark side for her as well. In other words, the woman from Riga may not have told anything to anybody about this portion of her life, neither to her daughter nor to anybody else. This was a probability not to be overlooked, especially if one thinks of the yawning gap between mothers and children. However, I’m of the opinion that at this stage, the subject assumed quite another dimension. Based on sentiments that were allowed to be intuited and that could be expressed and shared only through intuitions, I had concluded that Olga had also planted a seed of delusion in her mother, never to be forgotten or annihilated. When I tried to see the events from such an angle, I found it more amenable and reasonable to conclude that she had remained and preferred to remain reticent about certain experiences she had shared with her mother. With the passing of the years, having witnessed certain deaths, this delusion may have lost its importance to a certain extent. As time went by, one learned how to forgive and became willing to forgive many people for the sake of their deaths. However, Olga had mentioned in that tale, in her tale, the woman from Riga and her mother only
en passant
. It was as if Olga had wanted to take vengeance for certain minor details, either in full consciousness of them or quite unconsciously. This must have been mere spite or an act of defiance against her mother. Personally, I could never learn, though I tried, the reason for this cantankerousness. After all, I was not supposed to understand certain sentiments and fit them into the places they belonged. However, I knew full well that I could at least rely on my observations on a given subject, when I focused my mind on this woman who knew how to impress one by her refined manners and elegance. This conviction enables me to widen the aperture of her tale’s door, left ajar by the teller. When one thinks back to the world of her childhood and adolescence, one is inclined to conclude that her greatest love had been her father; she had been, as the saying goes, her father’s daughter, to the detriment of her relationship with her mother. I can keep track of Moses Bronstein easier in this way, of this self-denying but hopeless father who had tried to give everything to his daughter in order for her to make a success of her life, and who, according to some people, left behind no laudable memories. The story takes us back to a remote past full of different episodes, to the days in which we shall run across that watchmaker, in order to understand better and to attach greater value to certain moments and details . . . The year was 1905. Moses Bronstein had escaped to Alexandria together with his wife with whom he would be sharing a life of adventure, in the hope of providing his four year old son with a better future, leaving behind, much against his will, the pogroms, those monumental deaths, those long nights in which he had to deprive himself of so many things, of that district people esteemed to be of great worth, of a part of his life, a life that could instantly transform itself into a long forgotten recollection, relying on the existence of a few relatives and especially on his profession as a tailor, which, wherever he went, he could practice and thus bring in some money. He had emigrated to Alexandria, hoping that certain disasters might spawn glorious days, with a strength originating partly from what was left from ‘that history’ and partly from the indestructible orientalism rooted within him . . . with the acrid joy that heading for a different life provided . . . experiencing, with heartache, in some deep corner of his soul, the feeling that his exiled state inspired in him . . .

How credible was it and to what extent was what Olga had told her friends about those old days true? To give a satisfactory answer to this question is certainly impossible, just like in the case of other such questions. Yet, taking into consideration all sorts of probabilities, the tale may, if one knows how to concentrate on certain moments of it, leave in one, something indelible. A tale to stand the test of time for the sake of sharing dreamlike visions, worthy to be shared, with all the shortcomings involved, with deficiencies, untruths, and misinterpretations expecting to fit into day-to-day life . . . A tale of Alexandria . . . A tale that Olga added new meanings to with every curtailment of her journey through time, from which she occasionally returned as the years went by, and to which she felt more firmly attached as she moved further into the past. Here was concealed an unexceptional joy, a quest for a feeling of happiness . . . Therefore, the thought that the tale may have been penned differently does not interest me too much. On his deathbed, her father, who was getting prepared to set out for a journey different from his previous crossings, had, after a long protracted wait, said: “A Jew must learn to resign himself to the consequences of being a Jew.” This had taken place during an evening when Odessa, Alexandria, née Istanbul was receding to a distant past. Those ancient streets in those ancient cities, once inhabited, were destined to be occupied again, in an Istanbul of quite different dimensions. Those were her father’s last evenings and were to be recorded despite all difficulties. Olga was to transmit these words of her father to somebody else, years and years in the future, on the occasion of another fantasy on another night when she no longer sustained any belief in those bygone days that had assumed such significance thanks to the warmth of the heart and the sacrifices of motherhood. Certain feelings and words that give meaning to those sentiments can be understood properly and can be better placed as time goes by; usually years after, usually when it’s too late, when the aftertaste of certain separations is magnified by remorse and experience. It seemed that those nights were pregnant with a variety of sentiments which Moses Bronstein believed to be in agreement in every respect with his beloved daughter, the only friend left for him in life. But I know. Olga had always kept within her heart the bitterness of the fact that those nights were delayed. Those belated nights were the expression of something missing, if one ponders upon the charm of that friendship, one can feel renewed and inspired. However, it was a time when father and daughter failed to communicate, despite their cohabitation, despite their reciprocal affection. This was in the nature of family deaths which revealed themselves in diverse fashions. However, eventually, everybody succumbed to them differently, leaving behind very precious things. If I approach the sentiment that could have been shared on those nights in this way, I can understand Olga’s dejection somewhat better. Moses Bronstein’s introversion could certainly be justified. Despite her crestfallen state, Olga was conscious of this fact. Otherwise, she wouldn’t consider her father as a missing, kidnapped friend. It wasn’t so easy. If one considered what he had suffered, one should not lose sight of the fact that her father was one of those individuals who had had affairs with a multitude of people during his life. He had been a wanderer in the first place, a tailor who could narrate the incidents that he had witnessed through his wanderings. He had lived in a variety of cities, in different worlds. As far as his profession was concerned, his fate in it might remind many of that strange feeling of absurdity. He had been a wanderer, obliged to go about nailed with that identity, which might also explain his inability to remain at a particular spot for a long time, and also his tenuous connections with people. Was this a criterion for failure? I doubt it. There were so many people not equipped with such a condition that required other people’s failures to cover up their own shortcomings.

Lives, people, fantasies, and those long journeys prolonged by those fantasies. All those adventures in Alexandria were bound to remain mere dreams, a tale of vestiges, of dirty streets, exotic voices, sounds, and odors . . . Moses Bronstein had lived twelve years in Alexandria with a little woman from Riga whose skill in preparing borsch had no match, who knew how to put up with all sorts of difficulties, who never once dreamed of going back to her former life in her house smelling of onions and cabbage, not only by the power of resolution that her womanly responsibilities gave her, but also thanks to the money she gained from the German lessons she gave that enabled the family to eke out a living. There had also been days of deprivation and yearning which lent meaning to their life that involved diverse perversities about which there was no doubt. Those were the days during which sorrows were blended with acrid joys, poverty fed by hopes, by that historical journey, during which Judaism was conveyed, in a sense, through the calls to prayer of Islam. In those days, the extension of a helping hand by the wealthy cousins who had invited him to the city—just as is the case in different climates and lives expressed elsewhere in colorful details—was possible only up to a certain point. Therefore, those days, partly because of this state of affairs, had entailed, at least at the commencement, minor disappointments. However, as time went by, everything had returned to normal. In other words, that new place had gradually become familiar. Lives left behind were no longer yearned for. Lives, just like objects, clothing, and photographs could be transported in one way or another to other realms. The essential thing was to have a proper understanding of the meaning of this journey. However, as time went by, the health of Moses Bronstein declined and the doctors were unable to detect the cause of his suffering, which was sometimes excruciating. One of the aged physicians had claimed that the cause of those pains could be explained by the change in climate. The body had resisted all those years against all sorts of vicissitudes before finally yielding. To emigrate to a colder climate might be a remedy deserving consideration; to a colder or milder climate; to one deemed to be more clement. If one considers the existence of those who mystically influence certain lives, the old physician’s advice might be interpreted in many ways. It was not easy to decide, to change one’s abode and live in a different land and to cope, in the face of the challenge of a new life after all the struggles, with brand new problems, doubts, and, what are even more important, apprehensions. They had decided to leave for London. However, Olga’s elder brother Jacob, whom she had never had the chance to set eyes upon and who was sixteen years old at the time, had expressed his confirmed opinion about his determination to stay either in Alexandria or in another country. The ordeal they had suffered—certain relations that Bronstein could not reason, despite all his efforts—had matured Jacob, as far as he could tell, before his time. One should be prepared for such hardships and separations in life. They set out altogether on different journeys. They knew this song; they had learned it and they would master it with practice. This separation must have been partly facilitated by this irresolution. One could not foresee the development of things at the start of this new journey. All they could understand was that they were expected to know how to uphold their prospects and to reassert the ineluctability of fate. The family was to reunite some time in the future. They believed, they wanted to believe in this. To cherish such hopes, to believe that life was always possible. Olga had not forgotten. During one of those nights when they had all been together enjoying their belated meeting and referring to those days in Alexandria, Jacob’s father had said: “We had learned the meaning of abandonment, resistance, and deprivation.” It seemed as if a poem was concealed in these words, for the sake of change, a meaningful and original path. A poem that could convey a meaning for those who had been left behind . . . The story relating to Jacob had lingered in him as a puzzle, pregnant with questions and suspicions, in addition to the poetic inspiration that the beautiful paths it had opened had brought about. This puzzle would, in time, assume an altogether different hue, on the day when the tale would have returned to him from somewhere he least expected and with a person he least thought of. The adventure of the Bronsteins had begun on a summer day . . . Those were the days when a great number of people were suffering from the consequences of war . . . Those were the days when the little woman from Riga had a tremendous desire to play the piano.