When they give, take; when they kick, run
I got a lot of lessons on how to live my life, back in the day, from a good friend of mine, a Jewish man. He had a business in Bulgaria and I worked for him. He was particularly fascinated by the daily life and the manners of Bulgarian women, which he subjected to merciless analysis.
I have to admit he was right about a lot of things. I didn't realise them until he said them to my face. For example, the fact that my silly behaviour, which I considered the crowning glory of feminine dignity and modesty, was in fact just silly behaviour. What do I mean?
Observation number 1:
Once I mention to him that Bulgaria sits at the crossroads between Europe and Asia.
My boss agrees with me. Only his view of how we are at a crossroads of cultures is far from the traditional one, that the crossroads is geographical. The fact that Bulgaria sits at the crossroads between Europe and the Orient, he says, leaning hard on “the Orient”, shows most of all in the way you, Bulgarian women, are treated. It has taken the worst of both worlds.
I raise my eyebrows questioningly. What's wrong with us? We can cope with life far better than your spoilt fat cats, who have never earned a single shekel in their lives. I didn't say that out loud, because besides supporting his own fat cat, he was, after all, also paying my salary.
“Your men treat you in a completely oriental way,” he ignores my raised eyebrows. “You cook for them, you wait on them and you're always to blame for everything. It's as if you lived in some Muslim country. But you're worse off than them – there the men are AT LEAST obliged to support their women financially. Whereas here you earn money like men and you pay like men. But that's where your emancipation ends. Then, when you get home, it all starts: the shopping, the cooking, the serving, the clearing up and so on. And the whole time, instead of gratitude, someone is shouting at you or nagging you about something. The way you're treated is a combination of the worst of both worlds.”
Observation number 2:
One day he tells me I look very pretty in some dress. I reply with the only answer I considered dignified at that moment:
“Oh, in this old rag? I bought it for 15 leva in a sale.”
Instead of admiration for my modesty, the Israeli's eyes are full of pity. He tells me it's high time I learnt to accept compliments with dignity. To just say “thank you”. And if I say anything after “thank you”, it shouldn't be at my own expense.
“Does it give you pleasure to put yourself down? And not just you – most of you Bulgarian women are like that,” his tone softens. “Come on, let's practise how to take a compliment like a woman.”
My training in becoming a woman involved repeating the same dialogue over and over until I learnt to answer correctly.
Him: Nia, you look very pretty in that dress
Me: Thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!
The wall of exclamation marks above is meant to illustrate the wall of inner effort I was putting in so as not to say anything after “thank you”. Only I know how I managed to hold back the information about my thin, greasy hair, or about the spot I could feel coming up on my chin, which was spontaneously bubbling and gushing out of me like a geyser from everywhere – from my ears too, it felt like. Horror! The man was right!
My behaviour was completely automatic – the moment I heard a compliment, it was as if someone pressed a button inside me and I'd start sharing every bit of dirt on my looks I could think of. Why did I do it? No idea.
Observation number 3:
The Israeli, in his role as my employer, gives me a very big bonus at work. I, being a person who can't even take a compliment properly, let alone money, went to tell him that in my opinion this bonus was far too generous.
I'm no longer sure why I did it – this was more than 10 years ago and I didn't yet have several loans hanging over my head. I wouldn't do it now. Maybe I thought that my modesty would make a good impression on him.
My boss looked at me gently and said:
- “In Israel we have a saying: ‘When they give, take; when they kick, run.’”
So I didn't expect a man who was sincerely working on getting me to stop being so uptight to pull the stunt I'm about to tell you about.
Since the gentleman in question was leaving Bulgaria with his family, he had a plan, before going back to Israel, to tour a few European countries on a family road trip in his own car. The idea was that they would take a plane from Amsterdam to Tel Aviv, and Emo and I would go to Amsterdam and drive his car from there back to Sofia, where it would be sold.
As soon as we arrive in Amsterdam, Emo and I want to try everything this city has to offer, which is mainly: 1. Bikes 2. Red Lights 3. Weed.
That is, me – everything except the Red Lights, and Emo – everything except smoking weed.
It seemed we reached a consensus only on the bikes. We each got a bike for 24 hours, and if we didn't return them on time, they'd take 100 euros per bike off our credit card.
We follow the principle “When in Amsterdam, do as the Amsterdammers do”. Emo's interpretation of this maxim is that we go and see what's happening in his favourite neighbourhood. It's a street of shop windows, and in every window there's a girl. There's a tag with her name on her little outfit. The girl herself is bored, tapping away on her phone while she waits for someone to pick her. The situation is like a nightclub in Studentski Grad, only the chicks in the Red Light District were dressed rather more decently than the ones in Studentski.
“Emil, you've scratched your itch,” I say. “Now let's go and smoke some weed.” I take Emo, who at that moment looked like the man with the most unscratched itch in the world, to a “coffeeshop”. A coffeeshop in Amsterdam is a place where weed is sold legally. Inside it's full of guys with a thousand piercings in their faces and dreadlocks. Against that backdrop – Emo and me, loudly discussing the “menu” laid out on some glass shelves. The glass display only stirred a nostalgic note in Emo for the previous “menu”, which he never got to consume. That one was also on offer in glass windows. Just like on the previous menu, everything here also has its own discreet little name tag. Since I don't understand any of it, I pick a joint purely on how impressive the name sounds. So I order a “Dragon Spirit” for each of us. It sounds right for people with champion characters like us.
The seller knew his job:
“For you two – no Dragon Spirit. From our entire product range, the only thing for you is this,” and he tosses me two portions of some beginners' weed with the harmless name “Morning Dew”.
Emo and I are both pathetic smokers. We're not even worthy of the “Morning Dew”. I've never smoked even ordinary cigarettes in my life and I don't know how to inhale. I choke like a dog. Emo doesn't even try to smoke. He takes a drag or two and starts his usual tirade about what a decent, conservative and patriotic boy he is and how I'm the one corrupting him. Besides, this weed was bringing him down.
I look at him in disbelief, through bloodshot eyes watering from coughing. The man I had to drag by force out of the Red Light District has now decided he's a “conservative boy”?
So he wouldn't get brought down any further, I smoke his joint as well as mine. I wait for it to kick in, but nothing. I waited a bit longer – still nothing.
At some point I remembered that medication works on me with a huge delay. For example, when I was giving birth they had to pump three bags of oxytocin into me before my uterus got going, because one had no effect.
I only remembered this once I'd got on the bike we had to return to the company and was riding behind Emil. And the reason I remembered that I'm an Albanian heating coil when it comes to medication was that, as I rode the bike, everything around me started to seem unnaturally funny. Especially funny were Emo's knees, which kept bouncing out sideways as he pedalled.
About 2 minutes after the photo above was taken, laughter started washing over me in mighty waves, my stomach and cheekbones shaking in spasms. I squeezed the brake on the bike, but it wouldn't listen to me. It wouldn't stop. A loud ringing spread through the central streets of Amsterdam. It was coming from my bike, which instead of stopping was speeding along faster and faster, only ringing. I'd mixed up the brake lever with the bell. Ringing loudly, I slammed into some wall and fell off the bike. I was absolutely fine, it just got even funnier.
I'm fine, people!
Emo found me rolling on the ground with laughter, while the pedals of the toppled bike beside me were slowly winding down. There was no chance of me keeping my balance even walking, let alone riding a bike. My bike was left without a rider. We chained it to a post – that is, Emo chained it, while showering curses on the “stoned hippie”. Because of whom (read: because of me) we were now only going to return one of the bikes on time and get docked a 100-euro fine.
This was one of the funniest things I had ever heard. While I howled with laughter, Emo slung me onto the crossbar of his bike. We had to manage to return at least his bike by 11 (it was now 10:50), and after that, at 12:30, we had to be at Schiphol airport with our luggage packed, to take over the Israeli's car and drive it back to Bulgaria. By “manage” I mean Emo had to manage. I was temporarily out of action.
Emo was riding a bike that wobbled under the weight of my off-centre body, which kept on rocking with laughter on the crossbar.
My husband started complaining that I was very heavy. Time, Emo needled, had left its mark on my body. I should accept the fact that my body was no longer that of a 20-year-old, he droned on like some old auntie, while turning the pedals with enormous effort, trying to keep the bike balanced. (This whole episode takes place when I was 30 and he was 32).
So, a Bulgarian woman may not have been taught to accept compliments with dignity, but practice has brought her up against plenty of passive-aggressive remarks from wannabe machos hit in the wallet for 100 euros. That, even in the state I was in, I could handle:
“My body is no longer that of a 20-year-old, you're right. My body is now much better than a 20-year-old's, EMIL!”
My own wit sets off another burst of laughter, this time a triumphant one. Well, I'm very funny, I congratulate myself. I remind myself that when I see the Israeli, I must boast to him about how I didn't let “macho” remarks slide at my expense. He was very keen for me to learn to stand up for my rights.
About an hour and a half later I had the chance to boast to him in person. In that time we had managed to return one of the bikes, get our luggage and make it to Schiphol. The man, however, was in no mood for my little feminine victories.
He handed Emil the key to his jeep with the words:
- “Just so you know, there's only enough petrol for 50 km.”
- “No problem, there's a petrol station less than 30 km from the airport.”
- “Yes… I wish you luck, you'll need it. Also….. there's one more teeny-tiny problem. The car battery is flat, something's not charging properly. But I've brought some cables, I'll give them to you. You'll find someone at the airport to give you a jump.”
I wished I was still under the influence of the joint, so I could take the situation lightly and with a carefree laugh. But that effect had worn off. The only carefree people were the Israelis, who flew off to Tel Aviv in a little plane full of fuel and electricity. I imagined them laughing merrily as they flew off towards the horizon. We had to fend for ourselves.
Emo is a macho man and says he'll handle it. He asked a Dutchman to give us a jump. The man wouldn't, because in Holland giving someone a jump at the airport was illegal and punishable by a fine.
“How much is the fine?”
“300 euros.”
“If they catch us, we'll pay it for you.” We have no intention of paying his fine, but we reckon there's also no chance anyone will come and fine him for helping people in trouble.
The man agrees to help. Cables start being waved about, some pluses and minuses get clamped. Emo has put me in the driver's seat and makes me turn the key, press the accelerator and say which little lights on the dashboard have come on. I wasn't driving yet back then, but I understood enough to recognise when not a single light on the dashboard had come on. When I pressed the accelerator and the Dutch stranger supplied the power, the Chevrolet let out a half-hearted howl for 2–3 seconds, which was then drowned in nasal grunting noises. We repeated this exercise 5–6 times, because Emo thought I didn't know how to press a pedal. When he came and took matters into his own hands, he realised for himself that there was no way the car was going to start.
No, we didn't have fuel for 50 kilometres. We didn't have fuel for 5 km. We didn't have 5 drops of petrol. And all this universal lack of fuel was combined with a flat battery.
I recalled the maxim of my then boss, the very same one who had pulled this stunt on us. “When they give, take; when they kick, run.” This was a pure case of “when they kick, run”, but how do you run with this heap of scrap metal, all of whose means of getting anywhere seemed to have been deliberately disabled? Evening was starting to fall……
(To be continued)
