1 · The Motionless Forest
A hum, the chassis humming, the dry grind of tyres against the ground. Pits everywhere, ruts pressed into the earth by trucks weighing several tonnes, trucks from the nearby mines. But the Chinese left long ago. I ask why.
They say—the situation is unstable, society is in turmoil.
I say why leave, you can buy guns, you can keep me on.
To the west is Congo-Brazzaville. Every day I look up at the sunset. The earth has cracked, there is little water on the outskirts of the city, the earth is so dry it cracks. Africa is the outskirts of the civilised world, of course I know that. I just wonder, when can I get out?
The earth on the outskirts, so dry it cracks. The African earth, splitting, merging, splitting, splitting. Brazzaville, the Republic of the Congo. I am in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, in Kinshasa. Two peoples, just the same, people who once shook hands with one another.
We used to love each other, call each other. A call is coming in. Sasha Bernard, she’s calling, she doesn’t often call. Right now, I really don’t want to answer.
The last thing I said to the Chinese was give me a gun, just one will do.
I can aim straight, ten bullets will do, three points in a straight line, I know. Spot check! Report: the eye, the front sight and the target lie on a straight line. Three points in a straight line correct the bullet’s trajectory. Watch the wind direction and speed, keep watching how the wind affects the bullet’s movement. And the stronger the sun, the stronger the glare on the front sight.
The Chinese can afford rifling. Once the rifling in a gun is worn smooth, or has gaps in it, the bullets fly all over the place. Then the gun has to be re-rifled or scrapped.
If they gave me a gun, they’d put in new rifling.
Twenty metres away, there, a bandit, coal ash and skin blending together, the whites of my eyes can see him. Twenty metres away, enough.
“What if there’s a witch? Twenty metres away!”
“Run. Even rhinos won’t go near a witch.”
“Thirty metres away?”
“Forget it, Boss Chen.”
“What about a hundred metres?”
“That’s fine, a witch a hundred metres away won’t have time to open her strange, deadly soul-snatching powder. A hundred metres away, three points in a straight line.”
I can bring both kinds of knowledge together, I’m an excellent gatekeeper, the witch’s black blood sprays out and congeals in the air, meets the coal ash and the drifting dirt, congeals into little grains, won’t splash onto the gate.
The phone is too loud.
The boss is here.
“Hey! Boss Chen, speak up, my phone’s too loud, I can’t hear you.”
“Enzo! Don’t you know how to put your phone on silent?”
She’s calling, forgive me, boss, I can’t. I don’t want to miss it.
My phone has the best speakers on the whole street, plays the loudest music. I play it at home and she can even hear the words: “When you’re sad, sing this song out loud!”
My music is the loudest on the whole street.
She came knocking with her father, she’s mixed race, her father is white.
“When you’re stark naked, which part do you cover?”
That was his first question.
“My heart is burning, beautiful girl, where are you looking out from?”
I didn’t catch it, the phone kept singing in my pocket.
“What’s your name?” two pairs of blue eyes asked me at once.
I counted their long eyelashes. Only when I reached fifty-six—their lashes so far apart—did I speak: “My name’s Enzo, I’m twenty-one.”
In the end I spent forty-seven hours counting from one to a hundred thousand. Old Bernard married his daughter to me. French is strange, the numbers from one to sixteen are normal enough, then it’s “ten plus seven, ten plus eight, ten plus nine”, and after sixty it’s “sixty plus ten, sixty plus ten plus seven…”
“You don’t want to stay rotting in this hot place for ever, do you?” the blue eyes always ask.
Go to France, why go to France? They speak French in the Congo too, no trouble. Sixty black people do sixty people’s work, what if you add ten? Sixty plus ten, sixty plus ten black people can only do forty people’s work. Ten skip work and take another ten with them, and ten more are slacking off.
The phone is still ringing. I don’t want to answer. She tells me not to leave, to stay here. What can an African become? Cheap liberals are the last thing this continent is short of. Cheap suits are best, you don’t mind if they get torn to shreds. When I was little there was only one book at school to read outside class, Verne’s Journey to the Centre of the Earth, a book passed around until it fell apart.
Old Bernard wants me to go out into the world, young Bernard doesn’t want me to leave.
Verne says there is an upside-down world beneath this earth. On the other side of the deep pits in the mines, each pit, seen from that side, is a tall tree. So many pits, there must be a forest underground, and deeper still it must be full of the groundwater we can’t find.
Flowing slowly, flowing slowly beneath South Kivu Province, sometimes falling, like motionless rain. Eight witches have already been burned to death in the witch hunts. The Chinese don’t seem very interested, every morning they stand in the hall for their meeting, on time, like a motionless forest. What are they doing?
Chens and Lis, take me away from here, anywhere will do.
2 · The Waveless Isle
I can’t quite get the hang of Chinese, it’s been years and I don’t know much. A few simple phrases in Chinese, a few simple phrases in English, enough to get by. Or as a colleague says, in China foreigners don’t need to talk.
“Hey, foreigner, hello.”
“Ah, hello.”
“How are you?”
“Fine.”
“Where you from?”
“Africa. I speak Chinese.”
They laugh.
“Foreigners have such a sense of humour.”
“What’s that mean.”
They gesture and shrug at me: “Funny—a sense of humour.”
“I know.”
They grab my hand and study it, rub it, the more they rub the whiter it gets.
“You’re white. How come there are white people in Africa?”
“I’m not white, I’m Arab.”
“White skin means you’re white.”
“All right, all right, all right.”
That’s how I got a job. In a Western restaurant, nothing to do, my job is to play a white person.
A chef’s hat on my head, only one thing to say—when someone complains that something’s wrong, I step out and say just one thing: “How can I help you, sir?”
There’s a big pane of glass in the kitchen. I’m always looking across the sea, not far away, no waves there either. “The glass here isn’t as big as the glass at our restaurant.”
“You’re pretty childish.”
She has short black hair like mine. Chinese people aren’t petite, I only found that out when I came to China. They’re much richer than we are, everything in the books is out of date. Women from the East? Different from us.
I look at her, fascinated. She’s cold, calm.
“I’ll have a martini.” She’s very calm.
“Do you think I talk too much? Let me tell you something funny first, the island across the sea is called Gulangyu. When I first got to China I didn’t understand Chinese, Gulangyu, a colleague translated it on a phone, Kulangsu, I remembered it. Ku-lang-su, remembered it clearly, I saw it every day, always wanted to go there for a visit.”
“Mm, Gulangyu.”
“Kulangsu, I said it to myself every day, always wanted to go. Finally had some time once, called a friend, another foreigner, plays a black person in the park. I said let’s go over there, it’s called Kulangsu, take a taxi, asked a few drivers. ‘What’s that? Never heard of it.’ That’s what all the drivers said.
“Only later did I find out that in Chinese it starts with gu, and you can only get there by boat. Got there and they said 150 yuan, I was stunned, so expensive.”
My friend said: “Don’t understand, don’t understand Chinese, what’s that mean?”
The man wasn’t flustered either, he knew how to use a translation app.
“Then what?”
“My turn, pointed at my mouth, went mm-mm-mm, ah-ah-ah for ages. Pretended to be mute.”
“Then what?”
“Paid fifty less in the end.”
“So where are you from?”
“Morocco, North Africa, Casablanca.”
“Where?”
“Casablanca, you’ve heard the song, right?”
“I’ve heard the song. So it’s a real place.”
“Of course it is.”
“What’s your name?”
“Murad.”
She sighs. The bar lights turn yellow, then red, spots of light on the table, on her face. In the yellow light her lipstick looks dull, her lips dark. It really is a small mouth, as if it wants to say something.
“Clever. I love you. I’ll love you like a Band-Aid, I’ll be your Band-Aid.”
“I have a wife and kids in Morocco.”
“You know, the best Band-Aid stays quietly on your skin. Makes you forget she’s there, until you’re in the shower and feel something hanging off you, and only then do you remember you put a Band-Aid on.”
“Where’d you get that, been watching too much TikTok?”
I agreed in the end, still didn’t know her name, didn’t know where she came from. I asked: “Where in China are you from?”
“Here. My family’s all gone to New Zealand, come with me.”
“Mm.”
I order a glass of tomato juice, the last drink before landing. How did I end up agreeing to get on a plane? She sits beside me, her lips bright red.
“Get some sleep, half an hour and we’re there, Auckland’s pretty hot.”
“Mm.”
“Name?” Customs take us into a small dark room. An immigration officer comes in.
I get by with my halting English.
“Murad.”
“Surname Mohammed?”
“Hey, that’s racial discrimination, not all Arabs are called Mohammed.”
“Sorry, sir. What’s your surname, then?”
“Mohammed.” I hand over my passport.
“Moroccan citizen. Why don’t you have a visa? Sir.”
“I want to apply for asylum, refugee.”
“Your partner’s Chinese, Fujian, that makes things difficult, sir. We’re very strict about entry from Fujian, you know, too many people staying here illegally.”
“I’m applying for asylum.”
“On what grounds?”
“I’ve suffered severe discrimination, persecution.”
“Could you tell me more?”
“They all say I’m white.”
“What’s wrong with that, sir?”
“Now that’s a long story. I hate white people, during the Second World War my great-grandfather opened a grill in Casablanca. An Englishman came in, a white man, he’d only just sat down when a Russian came in too.
“The Englishman called my great-grandfather over to order, wrapping his hand in his coat. Great-grandfather felt something cold, a gun pressed against his side. A quiet voice: keep an eye on him for me, old man.
“The Russian called Great-grandfather over to order too, then a German came in.
“A gun poked out of a trouser leg.
“The German went into the toilet, the Englishman and the Russian got straight up and followed. Beside the toilet was a barbecue pit, and somehow there were three people in it.
“Great-grandfather lit a fire, and nobody ever used the place for a stakeout again. Grandfather came home, Great-grandfather told him to eat more white meat and less red meat, too much cholesterol.”
“So your grandfather ate the three spies?”
“Of course not, sir. They were like passers-by in the dark of night, fish in the sea. After the war, somehow Great-grandfather’s shop caught fire. A hole broke open in the ceiling of the prefab building, smoke spiralled up through it, black and white particles mixed with bone ash. The North African wind came from the Sahara, spread the smoke and dust flat, covered the sky with it. The smoke from the hole was like a tornado. A waterspout, feeding the sea of smoke without end, the wind rose and fell, sometimes there were huge waves on the sea. My grandfather often told me this, people can’t fight huge waves.
“People came to put out the fire, they asked, what happened? My grandfather often said eating too much chicken makes you mute. Great-grandfather coughed twice at the people who’d come to put out the fire, opened his mouth, pointed at his throat, all that came out was uh-uh.”
“All right, that’s enough. And your partner?”
She points at her throat, opens her mouth a few times, makes mm-mm, ah-ah sounds. “I’m very sorry about that, ma’am. You can both enter the country now.”
3 · Sea Gate
Into a Chinese home, red couplets pasted at the entrance, plants and miniature landscapes meticulously tended, light coming through fresh drops of water. It’s Murad’s first time in a Chinese home. The place is like a hermit’s cave. He holds her hand tightly, skin transparent in the afternoon sun.
Back. She’s brought him home.
“Why’ve you brought some whitey home? Does he have a green card?”
Murad is eager to prove he understands Chinese. People say Morocco is God’s overturned palette, every colour, step into a city and all the colours are there. A Chinese home isn’t much different, colourful, just no green card.
There are mountains in the Chinese home, water flowing quietly down them, a faint splashing sound. The sound bothers him, makes him sleepy. In a haze he eats dumplings and several meals of noodles. The running water is like the drone of a plane, that faint humming you hear on board, once you get used to it you can’t hear it any more.
The house is by the sea, step outside and you can see the sea. She takes him out for a walk, looking at the sea. She doesn’t say much, barely spoke on the plane either.
This time he takes the plane by himself.
“I’ve got family mining in Africa. He’s African anyway, let him go and make some money, then come back.”
The sun is fierce by the sea, Murad can’t stay out there, but she says nothing. He turns to look behind him. Her father stands in the doorway, a wooden door painted red, a green jumper. After hearing those words, Murad never went through that door facing the sea again.
When Murad first sees this tall, thin black man, he thinks he looks as though he’s crawled out of the ground, everything about him blends into his surroundings. His pale palms are covered in dust, as black as the backs of his hands, and Murad wonders, aren’t black people’s palms all white?
“French?”
“I speak French.”
“All right, brother, but the Chinese have all pulled out. The mine’s shut, I’ve got nothing to do.”
“Then what are you doing here?”
“Waiting. I want to leave, anywhere will do. You?”
“I want to make money here, wait for my Chinese girlfriend to come and find me. She’ll find me a job, she’s got family at the mine.”
“Got a passport?”
“Yes.”
“Tell you what, let’s make a deal.”
“What?”
“Lend me your passport, I’ll go to Morocco, you can stay at my place. When your girlfriend comes, she can stay too.”
“But the photos are different.”
“Just colour it black, my name’s Murad Mohammed now. You’re Enzo.”
Murad stays, his phone’s speakers are no match for Enzo’s. When he plays music, only he can hear it.
“Bad news comes, my darling, how can I shake this longing?”
“Hey, brother, open up, it’s me!”
“Oh, I’ve tried a million ways, still I haven’t forgotten you.”
“So soon?” Murad opens the door, sees the young black guy planted in the doorway, a mouthful of white teeth showing, still covered in just as much dust.
“How come you’re back after only two days?”
“Oh, our past keeps repeating in my dreams!” Murad turns off the music.
Enzo waves his hand helplessly. “Didn’t get through the door, they took my gun, deported me.”
“Why’d you take a gun into the country?”
“This gun was issued by the Chinese, I’ve got to look after her. I spent months learning this, spot check! Report: the eye, the front sight and the target lie on a straight line…”
Murad cuts him off. “All right, give me my passport back.”
“What passport? Did that happen?”
Enzo pats Murad, says to him: “It’s all right, brother, stay here for now and wait for your Chinese lover, they can do everything right. There are pits here, lots of pits, we can look for the underground world.”
The two of them settle in, quietly waiting for the Chinese to come, any lot will do. Sometimes they play happy songs at home,
the whole street can hear them clearly, sometimes they play sad songs, only the two of them can hear. It’s been half a month, why haven’t the Chinese come yet? Let’s make a call.
“Boss, when are you coming back?”
“Oh, oh, Enzo, can’t for now. Too many witches in your Congo lately, too many witch hunts too, wait till things settle down.”
Try someone else.
“Darling, why haven’t you come to the Congo to see me?”
“The Congo, I’m in the Congo.”
“Where are you? Why haven’t you come to see me.”
The call ends. Call again.
“Hello, hey, where are you?”
“I’m in the Congo, Con—go—, don’t you understand?”
“But I haven’t seen you.”
“The Republic of the Congo, I’ve been here for ages.”
“Hey, hey Enzo, which Congo are we in?”
“The Democratic Republic of the Congo! Not the Republic of the Congo!”
The call ends.
He hangs his head. Ah. Try a text.
Murad: You’re leaving me just like that? You said you’d be like a Band-Aid.
Darling: The Band-Aid washed off in the shower, you probably didn’t notice.
“Brother, looks like she’s never coming back.”
“What am I supposed to do?”
“Something’s wrong, Mura. Think about it, what’s wrong?”
“Huh?”
“Hey brother, the Chinese have so much money, why would one fall for you? A witch’s got you under her spell. Witches all have white skin, think about it, don’t they?”
“I suppose so.”
“Don’t they? Right? Think about it, right?”
“You’re right, she really is white, bright red lips.”
Murad takes a drag on his cigarette, breathes it out hard. “Seems so, yes, wallet’s empty, even my passport’s gone.”
“Ah, once you’re here, there’s really no getting back.”
“Is it smoke and dust covering this continent, or dirt, or witches’ bewitching powder?”
“When will it clear? I don’t know, sea all around, brother, we can’t get out of this damn place.”
Here, I suppose, spring goes, summer comes, summer goes, autumn; autumn goes, winter comes, winter goes, spring. Night falls, moon rises, moon falls, night; dusk brightens, sun rises, daylight, dusk.