1.
If you knew you were going to die in three months, where would you want to live, except with me? When asked, I answered, in a village in the Himalayas. I don't know why I gave this answer. To enter into a detachment process of separating myself from my life and surroundings in advance, or out of the desire to see the landscape changing before my eyes in the clouds and fog every day on the mountain.
I like the unpredictability of nature. And I like the miracle of human life. When the turmoil of extreme unrest settles inside me, there is a documentary on Netflix that I watch occasionally. Fourteen Peaks—Nothing is Impossible. It's not that the 'nothing is impossible' type of motivation affects me at all. Since I know that life cannot be captured by the possible and the impossible, in fact, it cannot be captured by anything. In an endless game of chess with oneself, the opponent is life. It's not like there's a better documentary about the Himalayas or mountaineering.
Still, I like it when a mother of a near-death person comes back from a coma and from the hospital she goes back to Manaslu Base Camp. Or when the Chinese government closes it at the end of the year and opens Mount Shishapangma in Tibet for just six days at the last minute. I think what a trick life plays, just holding onto the hope of these inevitable miracles. In fact, everyone knows that these things will happen, they are bound to happen, the clouds will part, the planets will get in a neat little line, and everything will become obvious. Just because you don't know when and how it will happen, you have to pretend that it happens miraculously.
Still, I like any miracle. It seems that even if everything is washed away, there must be something. But without the pretense of relying on something divine, that courageous life seems better. In a life where, looking into the eyes of that opponent in an endless game of chess, one can say, like the ancient Persian fable Afrasiab, I will go hunting, dye my horse's tail with henna.
One night, when the voice of a blind beggar floated through the hotel window, this world is not good, this world does not know how to live well, I thought, I know, what's new! That he is blind, that's all I imagined, otherwise who would sing like this on the street at noon! But I was sure that he was a beggar. The glory of begging and sacrificing ego like this does not come unless you are a beggar. But deep down, I also knew that there was more beyond what floated, that the world's knowledge does not end there. The world knows more, more, it does not reveal. That unspoken thing has to be rescued, like looking into the eyes of that eternal opponent called life in a game of chess, perhaps it is a matter of courage.
If I had to go to such a rescue, I would have wanted to go to a house in a hill station, where from the third-story window you could see that before the rain came, everything was covered in white clouds and before dusk, the entire city on the hill lit up together. During breakfast, a jazz-flavored instrumental music played there, Rose, Get-up, Stand-up. And in the middle of the night, dawn broke in some land eight thousand miles away…
2.
I was turning over the pages of my old passport, looking for when I had gone and when I had returned. I was looking for the history of my border crossings. There, between the square seals of Arrival and Departure, shining like an inevitable sign of time, my eyes were caught on the year, month and date. And those dates were holding me with such magical power that I couldn't take my eyes off them no matter how hard I tried, as if those dates were making me face a psychological challenge like being put in front of a firing squad, as if I wouldn't be able to get out of this moment if the memories of those arrivals and departures didn't keep roaming through my head.
A stamp of December 1st was in one place. Departure. While waiting for boarding, I met a man with a cut on his forehead. That man, sitting next to me, borrowed a magazine from me and turned the pages, told me that he was a member of Anwar Kongo's group. Anwar Kongo had directly participated in the communist genocide in Indonesia on behalf of the group.
I couldn't even hear what else he said after that. Because my brain couldn't process more than half of the information at that time. Because, I knew then that this man, sitting next to me, with a cap on his head and a white shirt on, had participated in a mission to kill people, a festival to kill people with the coldest of minds. I remember, along with many other things, in detail, the more detail you can see it all before your eyes, he said, how he killed six people in a row in fifteen minutes, at most fifteen minutes, one evening—‘My maximum number in the shortest time.’
After that, I saw the fear in his eyes, every moment and every second that fear was spreading throughout his body. He knew, he knew for sure that this fear would haunt him for the rest of his life, haunt him very closely, breathe on his neck. That man, that man from Anwar Congo’s team, asked me that night, at that largely empty airport, is it all coming back to me?
Everyone knows, that’s how it’s supposed to happen, that’s how it happens. What you do comes back to you.
That day, on that 1st of December, I got his call right then. It was morning in that time zone and he had just gotten out of the car. There was a red lorikeet sitting in the bush in front of the house. And he was calling that bird, that red lorikeet, and telling me about it, telling the lorikeet—say hi to it.
3.
…So that Sunday night, when the car stopped at the end of an alley, Chapel Street was in front of me. What time was it? Five past twelve or ten past twelve.
After three days of weekend fun, everyone had gone home. And after midnight, Chapel Street was as deserted as any street in the city of Koh Kaf, shining only with lights.
In the meantime, a man walked past me. Wearing a bright orange jacket, holding a JBL soundbox, which again had different colored lights flashing and going off, and some Arabic or Lebanese music playing loudly!
I envied this man's indifference, this confidence. It was not like I wanted to mock the corporate confidence in suits and ties that I had seen for years. Pure envy—if only I could.
If only I could walk around with a portable soundbox like this, with JBL lights flashing in different colors, and the song would keep playing on it—Here is my pearl, here is my barrister, in the end he can do me in the High Court, I am a sinner, he is the bailiff...
By then, we had entered the only shop that was open. As I was sipping from the glass, which tasted like half vinegar and half beer, my companion had almost hypnotized a black and white cat roaming around on the counter. Stopping all excitement, the cat sat there. And like any animal, my sixth, seventh and eighth senses and body hairs became alert in the presence of this cat.
A group of gay and adolescent girls had entered there. Suddenly, noticing the cat, the girls took its picture over my shoulder. Then I also took out my phone and asked the man on the other side of the counter, is this your cat? He smiled and pointed behind me. I turned my head and saw a man with tattoos all over his biceps and triceps, probably Ukrainian, sitting there, calmly looking at his cat.
I said, is this your cat? He shook his head once. I said, he is beautiful. He smiled. I asked, can I take his picture? He said, no, holding that smile.
I was finishing my glass and preparing to leave, when, from behind, he called me. He said, ‘I said no, but you can take a picture.’ I really didn’t understand, so I asked again, sorry? He said the same thing again, ‘I said no, but you can take his picture.’
As if, he had deliberately given me a chance to respond. I didn't miss it, I said, no, it's okay, I'm good, I'm perfect.
It was already late at night. My seatmate and trusted driver, with all his anger, was taking out his anger on the Ukrainian owner of the cat and blaming the incident on his history of racism. Why didn't he let those white girls take pictures of his cat, while he didn't let me just because I had brown skin!
I didn't want to hear these racist words anymore. Because racism doesn't apply to me. Someone is allowed to hate me for my color, for my race, for my religion, for my nationality. As long as I don't physically hurt him, I'm okay with it. Besides, it was already late at night, and the check-in options for all temporary addresses, including Airbnb, were closed. I was just worried about rest and an address.
Then I suddenly realized that he didn't let me take pictures of his cat, it's not about me. The white girls didn't ask him, I asked, so he didn't let me. It's not racism. It's love. It's possessiveness. It's his right over his cat. There is no love without possessiveness.
4.
A moment before I came out, I stared at the very end, at the blurry portrait of me visible on the glass wall on the other side. What was visible there, the navy-blue T-shirt, the creases of my forehead, the water bottle in my hand—I don't know. What song was playing there, I can't even hear it anymore.
Inside my head, I was still listening to it many times the night before—of love hurt by the light of dawn/ Kamlini covers her face/ Does the sky remember the song of the world?
While listening to the song sung by the earth near the sky in my head, I suddenly saw a cat looking at me intently from the seat next to me. The cat's owner was a couple, sitting facing each other with the cat sitting next to them. Just as I was about to ask what his name was, the girl called the cat—Raymond. And he turned his head away from me.
Three days ago, that day too, it had been raining outside for a long time. Perhaps realizing that I would get up, since there were no other empty tables inside, the waiter had brought an elderly foreign woman to my table. And acting polite, she was asking, "Will you get up, sir?"
As soon as I said yes and got up with my things, the elderly woman asked me, "Did you enjoy?"
As I was coming out after saying "I am living, you can take the seat," I thought, "What did she ask me to enjoy!" What was she supposed to enjoy by sitting there? A terrible fear was working inside me, was she supposed to enjoy it? Is it supposed to be enjoyable to be surrounded by fear and rage, a violent storm that cannot be controlled despite a thousand attempts?
A word still rings in my ears, hitting me repeatedly with great force. Hostage!
As I come outside and get soaked in the rain, I try to silence the word.
To save myself from this word and all the violence in the world, I think to myself, The Prison is Not Out
