Playing the Moldovans At Tennis (22 page)

My first full day in Israel was spent exploring the city, making phone calls and sunbathing. I basked contentedly as the Mediterranean lapped on to Tel Aviv's pleasant sandy shores and I was warmed both by the sun and the thought of everyone shivering back home in blighty. Then I felt guilty and ashamed. What about my friends in Moldova struggling through a harsh winter with power shortages and an ever-weakening economy? I sent them a loving thought and reminded myself what a lucky bastard I was.

I called all the contact numbers that friends had given me before I left and spoke to a whole host of different answering machines. I did get through to a guy called Yehuda who lived in Jerusalem and who was a reporter and TV journalist whose number had been passed on to me by Arthur. He sounded very interesting and I promised to look him up if I went to Jerusalem. I also spoke to a guy named Johnny who was an English guy who had emigrated to Israel with his wife and family. I'd never met him, but somebody (alas I'd forgotten who) had told me to give him a call since he might be able to help.

'Oh, hi Tony,' said Johnny, brightly, 'Philippa told me you might call.'

Philippa? I wracked my brains to try to think of a Philippa.

Yes, good old Philippa – she sends her regards,' I fibbed.

'She's told me all about what you're up to and I think I might be able to help actually.'

My jaw dropped. I couldn't believe what I heard next. One of Johnny's good friends was a sports physiotherapist who knew the manager of Maccabi Kfar Kana very well. If I wanted him to, Johnny could make some calls and try and set up the game in the next few days.

'Do you really think you could do that?' I marvelled.

'I don't see why not.'

Twenty minutes later it was all organised. We were playing the day after next at a tennis club in a place called Zichron Ya'acov which was not far from where Marin Spynu lived. I really was a very lucky bastard.

I studied the map and planned the rest of my trip. I would visit Jerusalem, then head north to Zichron Ya'acov to defeat my final Moldovan footballer before making the journey south to the Red Sea resort of Eilat. I drank a beer which tasted especially good and looked out across the Mediterranean Sea. My quest was almost at an end.

*

Jerusalem is quite well known. There were a few unremarkable events which took place there a couple of thousand years ago which got it some publicity, but I suppose what really put it on the map was hosting the 1979 Eurovision Song Contest. Who could forget the momentous victory by the host nation with the inspirational song 'Hallelujah? Unfortunately as a result of the musical triumph, people suddenly wanted a piece of this place and they began fighting amongst themselves over to whom it rightfully belonged. I'm lead to believe that the squabbles are still going on – no doubt exacerbated by Dana International's triumphant win 20 years later.

Years before, I had paid a fleeting visit to Jerusalem after leaving the kibbutz, and I had stayed at a weird hostelry for travellers called the Petra Hotel. As I walked into the old town through Jaffa Gate, I saw the very same place and felt it was only right that I should check in there again. It had gone upmarket but only infinitesimally so. It now had a leaflet which boasted that it was the oldest hotel in Jerusalem, founded in 1830. Unfortunately it still had the original plumbing. The leaflet also reported that famous guests included General Allenby (the British general who liberated Palestine from four hundred years of Ottoman rule in 1917), Mark Twain and Herman Melville – the latter, it was claimed, had conceived
Moby Dick
in one of the rooms.

I decided that if my tatty, crumbly, unsalubrious chamber was anything to go by then this was an hotel where guests would be far more likely to conceive stories about whales than conceive any children. There was nothing whatsoever to put you in the mood, unless a leaking pipe which dripped on you when you went to the toilet, a dampness in the air, and a bed that bowed in the middle like a hammock, were the kind of things which got you feeling fruity. Still, it was cheap and I suppose you get what you pay for in this world. Unless of course you're a Moldovan taxpayer.

The Petra was half-hotel, half-hostel with dormitories as well as private rooms and even facilities for pitching tents on its large flat roof. Consequently it was not short of its quota of eccentrics – permanent travellers who have shunned convention in favour of being a bit annoying to people who haven't. They're a harmless enough lot I suppose, but they do feel they have acquired great wisdom along the way and insist on sharing it with you regardless of whether it is appropriate to do so.

I met one such person in the reception area of the hotel. A man dressed as Che Guevara and calling himself Zoraya was playing the guitar and singing one of his compositions, which made frequent biblical references and was totally incomprehensible. When he finished I applauded politely.

Thanks,' he said in an American accent. 'For more information seek the Lord and read his work.'

'Have you got his address?' I asked.

'Yes, you dial H-E-A-V-E-N, and you gotta mean it. You gotta dial the right numbers. Where are you from dude? The United States of Confusion?'

'No, I'm from London, England,' I replied graciously.

'Let's talk about London for a minute – which is how long I want to be there. Stay in Israel man, stay in Jerusalem.'

'Well, I don't want to commit to that just yet, I've only just got here.'

'Hey, what do I know? I'm just a Jewish guy – I'm one of the locals. I gave Moses such a headache he had to take two tablets. Do you want me to do another song?'

No.

'Zoraya, unfortunately I don't have time to listen to another song, I have to meet a man called Yehuda who is going to show me round Jerusalem.'

Tour loss, man.'

'As long as this is my only loss in Israel I'll be happy enough,' I said, getting up and leaving Zoraya looking confused, well,
more
confused.

'See you again, man.'

Yes, that could happen. I'd have to be careful.

Yehuda was a Jerusalemite by birth, immensely knowledgeable and a liberal who was fiercely opposed to the Netanyahu government. His tour was both enlightening and moving. He was proud of his city but was only too aware that it needed to be shared.

'Our problem in Israel,' he said, 'is that we have ceased to view the Arabs as our neighbours. We have begun to treat them like the enemy.'

It was difficult to believe that earlier this century Arab and Jew had lived alongside each other peacefully. Maybe it had been easier then because neither held the reins of power. It wasn't until the British pulled out in 1948 that they began to properly knuckle down to the business of really hating each other.

There was a wise Israeli called Professor Liebovitz,' continued my compelling tour guide Yehuda, 'who summed up Israel's predicament by saying, "No-one ever said that Sweden belongs to the Swedes, but their sheer luck is that no-one else claims Sweden is theirs."'

I think he was right. My knowledge of history is fairly sketchy but I can't recall ever reading about anyone bothering to part any seas to lead any peoples into Sweden. They knew that it was too cold, too boring and the beer was too expensive.

At the Western Wall (or Wailing Wall), that most important existing Jewish shrine where Orthodox Jews go about their worship with an uninhibited zeal, I saw the most incredible sight. One rabbi, in the midst of his gentle rocking motion of prayer, had to postpone proceedings while he dealt with an incoming mobile phone call. To my stupefaction he simply walked around this sacred area talking freely and receiving no admonishment whatsoever from his fellow worshippers. Did he have a direct line to God? Was he receiving important instructions from the Lord or was it his mother asking him to pick her up at the station? I knew this much – if it wasn't a sign from above, it was certainly a sign of the times.

Yehuda continued the tour taking us to the area of West Jerusalem which he called British Jerusalem, incorporating many buildings built by the British during their Mandate which lasted from 1917 to 1948. He showed me where he had walked as a child, where the barricades had been erected by the British troops, where the no-go areas had been and where, in his opinion, Jewish settlers had encroached too far into Arab East Jerusalem.

I felt privileged to be seeing this historic city with a new perspective – seen through the eyes of a Jerusalemite. I was taken in the car to places which only locals knew about – to the surrounding hills which offered spectacular views of a city which was perched at 757 metres above sea level. Jerusalem would truly be a heavenly place if its physical relief could only be matched by some semblance of political relief. I fear that is some way off. Unfortunately, unlike Stockholm, there are too many people within its ancient walls who think that God told them to be there.

That night as I slept in my unluxurious bedroom I had a terrible nightmare. I was at the Wailing Wall in full tennis kit brandishing a racket and ball.

'Oi!' I called to all the worshippers. 'I've got an important match coming up, so does anyone mind if I practise against this wall?'

Since everyone appeared to be nodding, I took it as a 'yes'.

Ahead of me, my father was attempting to paint a line along the wall at net height, while soldiers moved in to arrest us. Orthodox Jews pounded us with stones.

'What's your problem?' I cried. 'Can't a man practise tennis in this country?'

As I was frogmarched away with guns digging into my sides, I saw Arthur laughing mockingly.

'You're not going to win the bet from inside an Israeli jail!' he scoffed.

To my amazement alongside him was the gypsy woman who had read my cards in Moldova many months before.

'Heed my words!' she said. 'Don't play Spynu!'

Then all the soldiers, all the worshippers, and what seemed to be all the people of Jerusalem, began chanting, 'Don't play Spynu!', 'Don't play Spynu!'

I woke up trembling. I gathered myself and slowly established who I was, where I was, and what I was doing here. Easy. I was Tony Hawks, I was in Israel, and I was here to play Spynu. I shivered.

Jerusalem was cold in the mornings.

Zichron Ya'acov must be very close to the dream of the idyllic Jewish settlement which the original European emigrants would have had, its quiet delightful cobbled main street an oasis of peace in a troubled land. However, the problem with this place was that it was too well looked after, too quaint. It had been preened to such a degree that it felt like a theme park, not a real town. I instantly knew it must be a spectacularly boring place to live. A little bit of untidiness is a sign that there is some fun to be had. Years ago I had flown from Barcelona to Geneva and had found one airport slightly grubby with unemptied bins and foggy with cigarette smoke, while the other was pristine with glistening freshly polished floors. In one, the passengers sat around drinking coffee, laughing and joking, and in the other they sat in silence, concerned as to whether that sweet wrapper they'd just dropped might lead to an arrest. One was modern, tidy and efficient and the other was Spanish. I know which one I'd rather be delayed in,
por favor.

Zichron Ya'acov was far too much like Switzerland for me to feel comfortable. According to my guide book it had been founded in 1882 by Romanian Zionist pioneers, one or two of whom I hoped might have been Moldovan in origin. I liked to think so, it leant such a poetic, almost meaningful dimension to my otherwise irrational journey.

Johnny had recommended that I stay in a guest house called Bet Daniel.

'It's more of a retreat than a guest house really,' he had said over the phone. 'A haven for musicians, writers and artists.'

'And now tennis players. It sounds great.'

I asked the bus driver where I should alight for Bet Daniel and he dropped me by a path leading into some woods, and gave me some directions which I didn't even begin to take in.

There's a part of my brain which disconnects as soon as someone begins directions. It can only cope with the first instruction: 'Go straight to the end and then take a left at the roundabout.'

I'd be OK if they left it at that, but the instructions will always continue: Then turn left at the Shell garage, keep going up that road about a quarter of a mile until there is a bend in the road where you'll see a pub called The Rising Sun; make a right-' By this point instead of concentrating on the required data I am focusing on all sorts of irrelevant information. 'His hair seems to be receding rapidly,' I'll be thinking. 'I reckon he'll be completely bald in three years.'

Consequently on this occasion, as a result of having formed an opinion as to whether the bus driver would need to start combing across soon, I got completely lost in the woods. For me it was a surreal moment I was carrying luggage around some deserted woods in a quiet backwater of Israel looking for the guest house which would be the base for my tennis match against a Moldovan footballer. How had it come to this? Should I have paid more attention in physics at school?

Eventually, along the meandering path I had chosen, I met with an elderly gentleman and I asked him if he knew where Bet Daniel was. He shook his head and mumbled in German. Then I did the same with a woman who also spoke to me in German. What had happened? Had the driver made a wrong turning and dropped me in Stuttgart? I passed a beautiful house set back from the trees where a blonde girl was hanging out washing to dry on the terrace. I called to her.

'Excuse me, is this a guest house?'

She stared at me blankly. I tried again.

'Entschuldigen sie bitte, wo ist Bet Daniel?'

Ah, that did it. She immediately rattled off some directions in German, with accompanying gesticulation which gave some clue as to their meaning. I failed to follow any of it, mainly because I was assimilating the information that this girl was boss-eyed. Five minutes later I found myself outside another house talking to another young German girl who also had dodgy eyes. Just like a teacher in an inner-city comprehensive, she had pupils which did their own thing. Surely I couldn't have stumbled upon a strange German religious community where cousins have relationships which involve more than just an exchange of presents at Christmas?

Later I was to learn that these people were from a Christian community who called themselves 'Bet El' (House of God), founded in the Sixties by a woman called Emma Berger who reckoned that God had appeared to her in a dream with instructions to bring some chums over to Israel and wait for Armegeddon. While they were waiting they got on with everyday life as independently as they could. They had their own school, their own factory and their own funny direction for their eyes to point in. Their presence here in these woods made me feel like I was in some kind of weird dream. Even Zoraya, the hippie from the Hotel Petra would have found it unreal, man.

Arrival at the guest house did little to hasten any sense of a return to reality. It appeared to have no reception area, no guests and no staff. I enunciated a loud 'Hello, is there anyone there?' but received no reply. Odd, the lights were on but no-one was home. The way this bizarre day was unfolding, the same could have been said of me. I began investigating the large living room which was dominated by a large Steinway grand piano stationed in a central alcove. The walls were cluttered with portraits of musicians, but one particular frame contained lots of old press clippings which revealed the history of this mysterious residence.

It seemed that it had been built as a retreat in 1938 by a woman called Lillian Friedlander in memory of her son Daniel, a highly gifted pianist. He'd been a child prodigy who as a teenager had been sent to study at the Juilliard School in New York, where the pressures and stresses of studying at this prestigious establishment had proved too much for his fragile artistic temperament and tragically he had committed suicide at the tender age of eighteen. The Steinway had been his piano. I sat at the stool before it, glancing up at the portrait which hung on the wall above. It was of Daniel, playing this very same beautiful instrument all those years before. I began to play an improvisation around minor chords which seemed to flow out of me with a strange ease. Somehow I was being caressed by the soothing ambience that existed in this alcove and I felt a rush of peaceful energy. It was weird. Was Daniel here? Was the music I was making some kind of call to Daniel's spirit?

Then I felt a compulsion to sing a song which I had written maybe fifteen years earlier, somehow knowing that this was the exact moment it had been composed for. Daniel needed to hear it. The words came back to me as if I had written them that very morning.

You hang there upon the wall, the portrait that sits before us all What is it like to be, ignored by so many and noticed by me?

What are your thoughts as you sit there all day, watching us fritter our lives away?

Do you have problems just like ours, or have they been solved in your lonely hours

On the wall

(Verses two, three and four were sung as well. You needn't suffer them.)

My musical reverie was punctured by some applause at the far end of the room, coming from a lady in Wellington boots who addressed me in Hebrew. This really was turning out to be a very odd day. She was one of the few Israelis I had met whose competence in English was on a par with that of the average Moldovan footballer. After a long struggle I managed to convince her that I was not a performer who had been booked to give a concert but a guest who wanted to check in.

'Could I see the manager?' I asked.

'Lo,'
she replied.

Lo
I knew meant 'no', my Hebrew studies having extended as far as establishing that the words for Yes' and 'no' were
ken
and
lo.

I had met a Japanese girl once called Lo and I'd always hoped that she'd marry an Englishman called Ken and go and live in Israel. How splendid their introduction would be to the Hebrew speaker.

Well, they say that opposites attract.

In the absence of the manager, I was shown to my room by the wellington-booted lady whose eclectic clothing left her resembling a fascinating hybrid of gardener, cleaner and South American revolutionary. The room was bohemian, which is a nice way of saying it needed decorating, but I didn't mind. All I wanted to do was some stretching exercises and sit on the bed and get my head together for the big match.

As I stood at the gates to Bet Daniel waiting for Johnny to pick me up and ferry me to the tennis court, I paced around nervously. At the back of my mind I was still haunted by the chanting from the cast of the previous night's nightmare. Much as I tried to get myself in a positive frame of mind, I still felt apprehensive and unprepared.

Johnny never showed, but instead a friend of his called Danny was my chauffeur to the tennis club. Apparently Johnny's wife had been involved in a car accident earlier that day and he was with her in hospital where she was being treated for whiplash injuries. Again the voices in my head – 'Don't play Spynu!'.

Danny's use of words was minimalist, and his manner suggested that he was pissed off that he had been talked into giving me this lift since he didn't really owe Johnny a favour. At the tennis club he announced coldly:

The Moldovan is waiting for you inside.'

I felt like a spy. In tennis kit.

We have booked you the indoor court,' continued Mr Charisma. 'You have it for one and a half hours. Johnny says that this guy plays a bit, so be careful.'

Thanks,' I said, hoping I might get a 'good luck' but Danny only grunted before driving off.

I opened the gate and entered the tennis club only too aware of how the conclusion to my epic struggle lacked any sense of occasion. Having been denied the press interest which could have made this some kind of media event and perhaps even attracted spectators, I was arriving at a sleepy suburban tennis club with an entourage of nil. The only way the world would ever know that this classic confrontation had taken place was through the footage recorded on my camera which I was struggling to carry under my arm, along with a tripod. I was presenting an image more usually associated with an enthusiastic father eager to film his promising child, than a highly talented athlete honed and ready for action. Nevertheless I felt an element of pride that I had even managed to reach this point. There had been times in Moldova when contemplating the possibility of a match against an eleventh footballer would have seemed fantasy-land. Now it was happening. The commentator in my head took over.

'And so Hawks walks on to the court, a heroic figure, his elegant stride and solemn countenance exhibiting a preparedness for an encounter which means so much not only to him, but to us all. Quite some time ago Hawks took up this challenge on the people's behalf. The gauntlet was thrown down and he stooped to pick it up. A duel, and Hawks chose his weapons. Tennis rackets at dawn. And now he proudly strides out before us aiming to record a victory which will show us that we can look forward to a brighter tomorrow, where the smile replaces the grimace, where work feels like play, and where love conquers . . . Oh dear, he's dropped his camera.'

I had too. The photographic clobber beneath my arm had been gradually slipping groundwards but I hadn't stopped to re-organise such was the enjoyment I was deriving from this fantastic glorification of the moment. Back in reality and humbled slightly, I stooped to pick up the camera which fortunately was undamaged, and I made my way into the indoor court.

Marin Spynu was waiting on a chair by the side of the court, easily recognisable as a Moldovan footballer, not just because of his physical characteristics but because, like every Moldovan footballer I had met to date, he looked lost. I suppose the very brief of having to go and meet a strange Englishman on a tennis court was in itself disorientating. I approached him and shook his hand and we exchanged a few words which quickly established that he spoke no English. My Romanian, which had never been anything other than extremely poor, was now rusty as well. Conversation didn't flow. Then I noticed that Marin Spynu had an impressive-looking tennis bag from which he produced two tennis rackets. This was two more than any Moldovan footballer I had played to date. Arthur's words reverberated in my head.

'One of them is bound to be very good.'

Surely he couldn't really be right?

Spynu and I began knocking up. He casually opened with a heavily topspun backhand drive across court which landed within a foot of the base line. I scrambled it back, making full use of the racket's frame. He replied with a deft forehand drop shot employing an impressive amount of underspin.

Oh no! Spynu was good.

He was very good.

Clearly his experiences outside Moldova had involved spending a great deal more time on tennis courts than his former team-mates.

I immediately began to regret that I had not made more preparation for this encounter. The excesses of Christmas had left me with a slight paunch and a lack of fitness which looked set to be exposed in the coming hour and a half. As Spynu stood, poised to make the first serve of the match proper, I knew the size of the task ahead of me. I prayed that he was a player who impressed in the warm-up but made mistakes in a match situation.

The first point did little to suggest that this would be the case. He served out wide with accuracy and power before coming to the net to dispatch a backhand volley with ease into the open court. On the second point his serve was unreturnable. Already, only two points in, I felt an air of despondency creeping over me. He had no right to be this accomplished. However, I fought back well and found some confident passing shots which earned me break points against the serve – but Spynu played excellent volleys under pressure and then found two big serves to hold this first game. It was ominous that he was clearly the kind of player who didn't give points away cheaply – you had to win them. As we changed ends I was a worried man.

Twenty minutes later I was in deep shock. I had lost the first set 6-0. I hadn't played that badly, and four of the six games had gone to deuce, but Spynu had won them all. I was being whipped as easily by this guy as I had been by Pete Sampras at Play Station tennis. I wanted to spin this Spynu fellow around and flick the switch on his back from
very difficult
to
bloody easy.
What was happening right now just wasn't fair. He was sharp, hungry and match tight – and I was a bloke who had consumed too much Christmas pud and had assumed his opponent would be rubbish.