Woman Who Fell From the Sky - Jennifer Steil [114]
I stare at her. “No,” I say. “It is the power cord that goes to this computer.” I tap my Apple.
“Oh. Okay.” She hurries out of the room.
A few minutes later, she is back. “Um, they have to know, is the battery in the package, is it a sexual battery?”
“Zuhra. It’s square.”
She looks at me quizzically.
“I mean, I just can’t imagine how it could be used sexually. Look, the battery has a serial number and an Apple logo. They can look it up online if they want. It’s a standard Apple battery.”
She nods and heads off again but is back a few minutes later.
“Sorry! But they want to know if the chewing gum is sexual chewing gum.”
I despair. “Zuhra! How on earth could chewing gum be sexual? Are these men completely out of their minds?”
“I don’t know!” Zuhra twists her hands together.
She looks extremely distressed to have to ask me these awkward questions. I feel sorry for having put her in this position.
“No,” I finally say. “The chewing gum is absolutely not sexual.”
I feel compelled to explain to her why the police are asking such interesting questions. Mortified, I say that my friend has included this one verboten item but that the rest of the package was completely innocent.
She listens calmly and goes back to the telephone. Moments later, she returns to tell me that customs has determined that everything in the package is sexual. They will not give it to Salem.
I nearly lose it. “Are these men stupid?” I say. “The battery is obviously a computer battery!” I am trembling, despite my dim awareness of the humor of the situation. I cannot believe that the customs officers are about to get away with stealing hundreds of dollars of things from me. No matter how offended they are by the vibrator, there is no reason they cannot deliver my medicine and computer parts.
I start to cry from sheer frustration but quickly dry my eyes when Faris comes in and hesitates in front of my desk. “Jennifer, if you want to receive things like this, you should tell me. I could have had it routed through the embassy. Salem almost got arrested at the airport. I just had to talk to the police to get them to release him.”
I want to dissolve into my carpet. I cannot remember ever feeling so completely humiliated.
“I didn’t know what he was sending,” I say. “All I want is the computer battery and the cord and the medicines that are in that package. I had no idea they would try to arrest Salem. I’m really sorry.”
He says he will try to get those things for me but chastises me for not talking to him earlier, so things could be done “a different way.”
Now everyone in the entire office knows what was in my package. I am ashamed to face them, but I have no choice but to brazen it out. I go about my work as normally as possible, and no one says a word. I don’t even catch anyone smirking. Zuhra comes in my office later that afternoon to tell me that her family supports me. “My sister says it’s unfair, that it’s personal and what they have done is wrong.”
I am embarrassed that she has told her sister but grateful for her compassion. I never would have expected such a response from a conservative Muslim, but my Yemeni reporters are always surprising me.
When I have calmed down a bit, I finish my refugee story. My staff is still being kind, particularly Hadi, who invites me outside to eat with him. He shares his pan of ful and his bread. I am not hungry but I eat anyway, thankful for his gesture of friendship.
A WEEK LATER, I go to Faris to ask if he has made any progress in obtaining my package. He avoids looking me in the eyes, fiddling with a pen on his desk.
“You see,” he says, “the problem is that customs doesn’t have your package anymore.”
“It doesn’t?”
“No. Ah, security has it.”
“Security?”
“Well, apparently your package is now considered a national security threat. And, ah, they are testing the chewing gum.”
“They are testing the chewing gum? For what?”
“For, you know, Viagra or something. Like a sexual stimulant.”
What on earth would I do with a sexual stimulant in this country? I want to say. I am