The Haj - Leon Uris [65]
The men were able to gather at the café or at a celebration of a saint’s birthday or a wedding or a funeral. A lot of frustration was vented on these occasions. The only time women could gather was at their daily work. Almost every day there was a fight among the women at the well or the ovens. Their language often became more vicious than the males’.
Our seasons were very specific: wet or dry. By March the rains had stopped, and this was the time to prepare the soil, set out new vines, and plant new trees. Getting rid of the winter’s dampness was a huge chore. None of our homes, even the stone ones, were warm enough or dry enough. Many children died of the cough when they were infants. After the rains all the household goods, sleeping mats, clothing, goatskin rugs, and quilts were moldy. These were set on the rooftops to dry while the houses were repaired.
Garden plots were planted and the sheep sheared. Many of the older women still spun wool with hand spindles. The damp wool was discarded from our sleeping quilts and new wool stuffed into them.
By midsummer we were harvesting. When the grain crop came in, a sense of urgency swept over Tabah. Everyone turned a hand to work, except my father and some of the village elders, for we were in a race against rain and the dread of rotting grain. We feverishly sorted the grains, dried them on the roofs, and took them to the threshing floor, working day and night.
Our winter needs in grains, lentils, and beans were sorted on goatskins and stored in the large clay bins attached to the house. Rents were paid with half the crop, and what was left over after personal needs was sold in the souks.
Spoilable crops such as eggplants, tomatoes, and figs were dried in the sun so they could be stored for the winter.
By September we made the final harvest, a communal gathering of grapes. Many were sold to the Trappist monastery at Latrun, a few miles up the road. The monks were crazy, but they made a famous wine. None of them was allowed to speak except the superior.
The village men trampled the balance of the grapes. It was considered to be work too immodest for women, who would have to show bare legs above their knees. The grape juice was boiled in open hearths. At the same time the sheep, which had been carefully fattened on mulberry leaves, were slaughtered and their meat was boiled down to extract the fat. The Valley of Ayalon was permeated with the smells of the fires: the grapes and the sheep fat, and the smoke from them hung low on windless autumn days.
The poorest of our lot moved the goat herds up into the Bab el Wad for the winter. Often wives and children travelled with the men and lived in caves. They paid cave rent and pasturage fees by collecting and sacking goat dung.
When we were all tucked in and awaiting the rains, the women used the time for mending, sewing, and embroidering their fancy dresses. The women of Tabah had a unique geometric pattern of embroidery down the front of their black gowns. Men would repair tools and harnesses, but mostly they would sit around the café, listening to the radio and repeating stories of great courage in battle or greater prowess in bed. Repetition in tales and poetry, repetition in the shapes of our houses, repetition in the music over the radio, repetition in everything was our life.
In the relaxed atmosphere of the wet season many babies were made, new marriage contracts completed, and the subsequent weddings helped alleviate the boredom. That was the time of the year my father took his second wife.
I remember it because the beginning of the wet season was the time the Armenians came to take pictures and the circumciser came and cut off the foreskins of all the boys who had been born that year. They all lined up in one of the rooms in the khans, held in their mothers’ arms. Soon every one was shrieking and bleeding from the pain. Fathers congratulated one another while the mothers soothed the pain with sheep fat and fondling.
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