Chapter 2. Hospital

Father didn’t notice our arrival. He was half-sitting on the bed with his back propped up on a pile of pillows, his palms resting on the mattress. His head hung helplessly, moving from one shoulder to another. His pale, thin face seemed very tired. His half-lowered eyelids protruded above bony cheeks. Each time he inhaled, his chest expanded with such difficulty and for so long that it was as if he was trying to inhale all the air in the room. When he exhaled, it became hollow as the air was expelled with a loud whistle.

Quite recently, only two years ago – I still remember that time – Father was a strong healthy man. Tall, well-built, wiry, a good sportsman, he taught P.E. at school and was a basketball coach. Sometimes, he took me along with him to his classes. It was clear that his students were somewhat afraid of him. Not only did they not dare to misbehave, but they were very quiet. There was no unnecessary talking. He was a stern teacher, even rude and harsh. If a student disobeyed, he might go over and hit him. He was also like that at home.

I was two or three years old when I first felt afraid of Father. I remember one episode in particular.

It was evening. Mama was putting me to bed. Father entered the room and began yelling at Mama right away, blaming her for something. She remained silent, as usual. He came up to her, waving his hands and cursing. I understood that he was hurting Mama and that he might be about to hit her. I had probably seen things like that many times before, but only then did I understand that Mama was in trouble. I was frightened, very frightened. I began to cry. Mama ran up to me and began to quiet me. Only then did Father stop yelling. He continued to grumble, but without yelling or threats.

I often heard about Father’s difficult personality from our relatives, first of all from Grandpa and Grandma, Father’s parents. Their son’s every word, each little thing, irritated them. The offenses were piling up, their relations were getting worse, and open resentment was brewing. Grandma Lisa knew how to demonstrate tenderness to her son (maybe maternal feelings did visit her now and then, but most of the time she put on a show). But Grandpa Yoskhaim was a sincere man. He always said to a person’s face what he thought about them, and he made no pretenses when it came to his son.

The main insult was an old one. When Father attended the Kazakh Institute of Physical Culture in Alma Ata, his parents supported him throughout his studies. They had a big family, with many children. Their son, certainly, promised more than once that he would help his parents when he began working, but they never saw that help. Their son married, then divorced, then married again – that time to my mama. Everything he earned was spent to support his own family. And now, every time they quarreled, and it happened often, Grandpa remembered that old promise and Father’s ingratitude. “We helped you a lot, didn’t we? Have you forgotten about it? We sent you money every month. So where is your help?” Quarrels, sometimes absurd and groundless, cropped up all the time. It happened only because of my father’s explosive, mean, quarrelsome nature, combined with his mother’s treacherous nature.

It was evening. Father was sitting under the apricot tree. Grandma Lisa came out into the courtyard. She took a seat on the porch, not far from her son, rubbing her lower back.

“Did you eat?”

Father, reluctantly, “Y-yes…”

“What did you have?”

“What business is it of yours?”

“Can’t you just answer?”

Father, angrily, “Listen, just leave me alone!”

That was what Grandma Lisa could not tolerate.

She sprang to her feet, forgetting her lower back, waved her hands, slapped her thighs… and an argument began.

Grandpa used to say over and over to his son, “Nothing but arguments! No one can say a word to you. You’re just like your mother. Who can put up with you?”

And that was true – it was difficult to put up with Father. Only Mama managed to do that, but at what price…

She was a loving woman. She got upset, she suffered, but she invariably forgave the man she loved, the father of her children. On top of that, she was an Asian wife. In other words, just like every wife in any country in this part of the world, she had to endure all of her husband’s whims without complaining, all of his caprices, quibbles, derision, even beatings. Love may have ended, may have been exhausted, but patience, endless patience, remained inviolable.

The Bukharan Jews unfortunately adopted that custom, along with other centuries-old customs of their new countrymen. I don’t mean that it was like that in all Jewish and Uzbek families. Of course, it wasn’t. Take Grandma Lisa – no one dared to hurt her. Grandpa Yoskhaim was somewhat afraid of his wife. And a wonderful harmonious and loving Jewish family lived in the house next door. I often heard their merry voices, their laughter and jokes. It seemed that not only their voices, but the atmosphere of friendliness and peace reached me. Did I envy them? I don’t know, I don’t know. Certainly, I did compare our families from time to time.

There were six beds in the ward, located along the walls in two rows, three on each side. Father was in the one to the left of the door.

Mama sat down on the edge of his bed and put her hand on his forehead. Father opened his eyes slowly.

“During the night… there was… another… attack. They… gave… injection. They… gave… me… oxy…gen…,” he said very quietly, stopping to catch his breath.

I stood at the wooden bedside table at the head of the bed, looking in bewilderment at the dark red dots, many of them, that covered his arms from his elbows almost to his palms.

“I’ve brought you some broth. It’s still hot. Have some,” Mama said, taking out a glass jar wrapped in a cloth. She poured the broth into a bowl and began to feed Father, lifting the spoon carefully to his lips. The aroma of the broth, a very tasty aroma, spread throughout the room.

Frightened, Emma was examining the ward. She couldn’t understand – it was clear from the look on her face – why her papa was here, far from home, in this unfamiliar room with many beds. She was eyeing her father warily – she’d grown unaccustomed to him.

For some time, the intervals between asthma attacks had been growing shorter.

An accidental cold was the reason for that misfortune. Father used to go swimming in a mountain river with his friends. Once, in spring, after bathing under an ice-cold waterfall, he hadn’t dried himself properly before biking back home with his friend. He got bronchitis, which turned into a bronchial asthma, and the healthy person, the athlete, became an invalid. Asthma attacks are a very agonizing thing. During the day, Father would sit on a small chair in the courtyard with his hands resting on his knees. During the night, he would suffocate in his bed just as he was doing now in the hospital ward.

“My little girl…Let me touch your pretty curl,” Father said tenderly, trying to smile. He loved Emma very much. He used to beckon to her as he was sitting on his little chair. He pulled gently at her chestnut curls, hugged and tickled her, repeating a line from a rhyme he had once heard, “My little girl… let me touch your pretty curl.”

Emma smiled, embarrassed, clinging tightly to Mama’s knees and pressing her head against them.

It had grown livelier in the ward. Other patients were awake, some of them making their beds, others shaving. The rustling of newspapers could be heard.

“Doctor’s rounds have begun,” one of the patients announced.

Two women in white gowns entered. I recognized one of them right away. She was a registered nurse who attended to the patients in the ward. We often saw her when we visited Father. The second woman wore a stethoscope around her neck. I had already met her too. They both walked from bed to bed, stopping longer at some of them. Then they approached Father’s bed. Emma’s face shrank as if she were about to cry. White gowns reminded her of injections.

“Oh, we have most of the family here today,” the doctor said, sitting down by Father’s bed. She began examining him. Unfamiliar words could be heard, names of medications. There were many of them. Mama sighed quietly, standing at the foot of the bed and holding the scared Emma by the shoulder.

Chapter 3. Old Town

From the hospital we went to visit Grandpa and Grandma, Mama’s parents. We reached Koltsevaya (Circle) by trolley. It was near Starogorodsky (Old Town) bazaar. From there, we had to walk.

I liked Old Town with its narrow unpaved lanes, low clay adobes, ariks (watering canals) in which water could be heard constantly gurgling. I liked the women’s colorful silk ethnic dresses, the chaykhana (tea house) at the corner of Sabir Rakhimov Street, not far from Grandma’s house. Unlike other tea houses, it wasn’t noisy. Usually, there were only a few regulars sitting on the veranda sipping tea. We knocked hard on the gate since Grandma Abigai’s hearing wasn’t great. Besides, the courtyard was big. Grandma opened the gate. As always, she wore a long dress, slippers and a scarf wrapped around her head.

“Ah, Ester, byee (come on in)!” she exclaimed merrily upon seeing us. “Valera, oh, Valera!” And she covered me with kisses.

Grandma, like all elderly Bukharan Jews, spoke a dialect of Tadjik, sprinkled with words in Hebrew, which had become the native tongue of Central Asian Jews and was considered by some scholars to be a separate language: Bukhari.

Emma and I stayed in the courtyard to play. Just two apple trees and some poplars were growing in its clay soil. It was scarcely lit by the sun. A section of the outer wall constantly collapsed and needed to be rebuilt every year.

The gate slammed loudly, and Grandpa Hanan appeared in the courtyard. He was carrying his big sharpening machine on his shoulder. He was tall but skinny, and that load wasn’t easy for him to carry. On seeing us, he smiled and put the machine down.

“Your mama ai!”