Salem

The first morning we came out of our rooms, Mother informed us that Salem, the gardener working outside would be taking us to school on his bike. Salem was hoeing when we finished breakfast. He had piled a huge mound of dirt in to corner of the ditch that surrounded our house making a dam and had dig out dirt from some areas of the ditch. It looked like he was opening a channel into our yard.

When I came outside with my stuff for school, he put his huge funny looking hoe (it was very wide at the bottom and rose up like a spike that pointed to the sky on the other end) into the storage room off the garage and got his bike out. He directed me with hand movements to sit sidesaddle off the front bar of his bike and Kirk clambered onto the rear of the bike. I tried to get comfortable but it was not. The bar hurt my rear and I kept readjusting. Trying to get my mind off the bar, I pointed to the ditch, the dam and to him and asked “what are you doing”. Salem grinned at me and said a long string of words that almost sounded like one word. I listened very carefully and I was surprise that I knew one word “maya”. I asked again, but Salem just shook his head. We rode in silence along the main road to the palace off Golf Street which was my school. I had been told by my mother that they were still building the school out in the desert but it would not be ready for a year or so. In the meantime we would have an old palace for a school.
When we arrived I got off the bike. My rear end hurt and I was very stiff. I rubbed my sore spots while Salem laughed. “People here laughed a lot” I thought, “especially at me…..’-
I pointed at the ditch, at Salem and said “Maya”. Salem used his hands to communicate some meanings….”Ba’ad aMadrassa” he said moving his hands around and ended with pointing at the palace. “Ba’ad aMadrassa” he said again and held up 3 fingers. I still did not know what he said. A teacher stopped. “He said ‘After school’ at 3”. I nodded to Salem and held up 3 fingers and followed the teacher into the school. Salem called out “maasalama” (goodbye) and rode off.

School ended and I waited for Salem at the front gate of the Palace. He arrived on his bike. Wrapped around the front bar was a huge bundle of cloths so thick it could be a small quilt! I laughed. Salem spent the day rigging his bike for me. I got on and we headed back in the direction of home. As we got closer he pointed to the ditches that ran alongside the yards. Every house area had its own little mini dam. When we got the the corner of the road, he took me over to a cement well. He talked and pointed in different directions, but I got the idea that this was the measurer and connector of water. From this main well he could direct the flow down any street. It seemed that every garden was measured for so much water. But why?
I looked into the concrete well, heads of toads dipped and hid in the water. It was full of tadpoles and had a musty smell. Salem touched my shoulder and motioned …come. I got back on the bike and we were off again. We followed the little ditches for a while and then Salem left the small roads and went down the main road and into the town of Maadi.
It was hot. Salem was working up a sweat but he just kept on smiling. It must be nice to be that happy all the time. As we went into the town I pointed at the only grocery store that had an English sign, “Gomaa”. I held up 5 piasters. Salem shook his head and pointed forward. Whatever it was we would get there soon. We crossed the railroad track and kept on going right up to the highway. Salem as we crossed the highway he pointed at it and said Corniche…and then he pointed to the river and said “al Nil”.
We sat on the fence under a huge ugly tree that looked like it had roots hanging off the branches. Salem bought us a coke and a package of plain cookies. We munched on them in silence staring at the faluccas sail up and down Nile River. It was huge. Finally Salem pointed down below us “da shaduf” (this / shaduf). There were men using a bucket attached to a pole hauling water up to the bank. They were irrigating the land. The land along the Nile was divided into a mini grid pattern. Each one was a separate garden for a separate man. Everyone shared the water and the work it took to get it. I finally realized that the water needed for our gardens came from the river thru a very simple irrigation system. He just had to open the right channels for the water to get there. Salem pointed at the sun and then to the bike. It was time to go home.