The driver continued to shout, curse, and threaten, undeterred by the crowd gathering around the car. An old man stepped forward and asked what the trouble was. Raising his voice above the driver’s vituperations, Moeen explained how he came to be where he was and was candid about the fact that he had absolutely nothing to his name. The old man settled the fare, some fifty Syrian lira, and Moeen couldn’t thank him enough. When the old man asked him if he had any relatives in the camp, Moeen told him about his father’s cousins. The old man thought for a while and said that he personally didn’t know anyone by the name of Abbas, but he invited Moeen into his own home. When Moeen politely declined the offer, the old man suggested he could stay in the camp mosque.
So Moeen went to the camp mosque. One of the onlookers at the taxi scene had given him twenty-five lira in exchange for his five Egyptian Pounds, with which he was able to buy himself a can of sardines and two loaves of flatbread. He ate in the courtyard, and then, feeling exhausted, went inside the mosque, found himself a dark corner in which to lie down, and fell asleep.
Moeen lived in the mosque like this for five days, five whole days and nights during which he did not budge, other than to go and buy himself a little food. He had no idea what to do with himself. It seemed to him that he was going to end up being one of those shaggy-bearded beggars, sitting outside mosque doors with a begging bowl at his side.
Then, one day, a man in his forties who had been watching him all this time and sometimes seemed to be on the verge of speaking to him came up to him and put his hand on Moeen’s shoulder. “Listen,” he said, “everybody here knows what happened to you, and the camp’s welfare association has decided to collect some money on your behalf. They’ve done it without telling you, but expect a man to come tomorrow and hand you 8,000 lira.”
“Thank you very much, but. .”
“But, naturally, you wouldn’t know what to do with that much money. I’ll tell you, son, I can get you a passport and a visa to Sweden, as well as a plane ticket. And it’ll only cost 5,000 lira.”
“But I don’t know anybody in Sweden.”
“You’ll meet people. Sweden is a beautiful country, it’s a wonderful place, it’s big and it’s got lots of universities and factories and things like that.”
Moeen thought about it: there was no other way out. I’ll learn the language, he thought, I’ll manage to finish my medical studies somehow, I’ll send money to my folks, and to Mona, and will come back a doctor!
“OK,” he told the man. “I’ll do it.”
The money was handed over to Moeen in a short ceremony with fiery speeches denouncing the “treaty of treason” with Israel and the policies of Arab governments that harmed the interests of the Palestinian people.
Moeen Abbas was overcome with joy: he was leaving, his problems were over.
He thanked his hosts profusely. Choking up, Moeen said he would forever owe the residents of the camp a debt of gratitude, and that he believed the road to victory against the Zionist enemy was now within reach. Then, he left the building and went back to his little corner in the mosque.
On the way there, he met the man and handed him the 5,000 lira.
And then he waited.
Two days later, the man returned with a plane ticket, a passport, the visa and everything. Moeen went to the market, bought himself some trousers, a shirt, and a belt, a jacket, some shoes, and a suitcase in which to put his belongings, as well as a small leather pouch for his passport and ticket. He converted what money he had left into U.S. dollars, with the help of the same man who had got him his things — that very same man handed him the dollars.
Finally Moeen took a taxi to the airport. As he neared the airport he felt both excited and apprehensive: he was the one choosing to travel and from now on, he wasn’t going to do anyone else’s bidding. Entering the airport, he was searched by security men who scrutinized his passport carefully. Everything was OK, but he had arrived at the airport early. That’s what the airline official said, adding that he’d have a two-hour wait until boarding.
So Moeen went to the cafeteria to get a cup of coffee, which he drank standing at the counter. And then it happened. He really didn’t know how, but it happened.
Someone asked him a question, and he turned towards the speaker and got into a long conversation with him about the dangers of flying. He realized it was time to pay for his coffee and go and get the white boarding pass from the Scandinavian airlines desk. When he turned to pick up his pouch, he couldn’t find it. He looked around, bent down and searched on the ground, he questioned the waiter, he asked everyone there if they’d seen his leather pouch. Maybe he’d left it in the restroom. He raced there, going into every stall, looked all over. But he hadn’t even gone to the restroom!
Moeen went back to the cafeteria looking for the man he’d been chatting with. There was no one there. So he searched again.
“Maybe I left it in the camp.” So, he got into a taxi and went back there. He ran into the mosque like a lunatic, searching frantically everywhere. “I know I had it. The security officer examined the passport at the airport. Where could it be?”
Moeen sank into the corner of the mosque, completely stupefied. “I’ve got to go back to the airport and look again. It can’t be. . It must. .” He hopped into another taxi, went back to the airport and ran into the lounge. He was like a man crazed, searching under tables, questioning people, making strange grunting noises. Finally, an airport security officer stopped him. Moeen told him his tale. It was clear from the officer’s expression that he did not believe a word of it. Moeen was just about to resume his search when he saw the officer’s hand reaching for the scruff of his neck.
“You’re just a conman, aren’t you? Let me see your ID.”
Moeen had no ID, he had no papers. He repeated his story, although he didn’t dare admit that the passport was a fake. The officer just gave him a verbal warning and told him to leave the airport building — immediately.
Moeen Abbas couldn’t go back to the camp, no one would believe him. They wouldn’t believe that he’d lost the passport, and the ticket and the money, at the airport.
So he went into one of the bathroom stalls, took off the leather belt he’d bought the previous day, hooked it to the ceiling somehow, climbed onto a toilet seat, put his head through the noose, and hanged himself.
His body was found the next day when the early-morning cleaner came in and couldn’t open the locked door. She broke the lock to find Moeen Abbas’ now-livid corpse dangling from the ceiling, his neck shriveled to the size of a child’s, his body rigid: a hanging stiff, like the ones you see pictures of in the papers.
But how did he manage to hang himself? He must have suffered terribly! Usually, when someone is hanged, the executioner pulls away whatever the victim is standing on so that he hangs. And usually, simply by instinct, the victim’s feet reach for the ground — that is why the victim’s feet thrash in that terrible way — and then the body is stuffed into a white sack and the victim is left there, a pale object dangling from the gibbet.
Moeen Abbas, however, must have cast himself aloft deliberately. He most certainly tried to reach the toilet seat cover with his feet, for that is a matter of instinct, it has nothing to do with one’s will. And his feet must have slipped, either because the cover was wet or, more likely, because of the new leather shoes he’d bought at the souq — the soles weren’t yet worn, and everybody knows how slippery new soles can be. That would also explain the expression of utter horror on Moeen Abbas’ face — he must have reached for the toilet seat cover and grown increasingly desperate as his shoes slipped repeatedly; thus, we could say that he “slipped to his death,” with the belt tightening around his neck until he expired.