Lucena by Mois Benarroch Read Free Book Online

candies from the grocery store. They opened a file on me and put me in the reformatory. There is where I learned all the tricks of the trade. They brought me a psychologist who didn’t understand a word I said to him. He talked all the time about development and integration into society. I talked to him about my family and Chauen. Once, in Chauen I had done the same thing in a grocery store and all I got was slapped. No psychologist or interrogators. Another time I smoked something I didn’t even know what it was and I was put in jail. So I have a criminal record. In Morocco the Jews never had a criminal record. In that country of bribes there was always someone who would see to it that all traces would disappear. But here in Israel, in the land of the Jews, at age twenty I already had a criminal record. That is why I was not accepted into the army. Then I also could not get a normal job. When I was in Morocco I just wanted to be a police officer. But who can be a police officer with a criminal record? I tried out several abominable Jobs but I very soon decided to return to my friends in jail who taught me how to steal without getting caught. One was called Cami and the other Jojo. All of them were from Moroccan families who had never been in trouble until arriving in the land of the Jews. Those were better times. At night we would pilfer here and there and with the money I would invite girls for a ride in my BMW. Easy come, easy go. Even without doing drugs, the money quickly disappeared.
    Even Sami one day proposed we rob a Kiryat Gat bank. It all looked real easy but we had bad luck because at that moment the patrol car came by. It was just real bad luck. Otherwise I would be here sitting on several million. That’s all. Fifteen years in prison. That is what Zionism is to me. If my parents had known that Zionism would end up like that they would have emigrated to France, or Canada or any other place where I would surely have completed high school, I would have gone to university or at least have studied accounting. The only good thing about this jail is that there is a majority of Sephardim and very few Ashkenazi.
    So, a rotten prison in Israel is better than a forty room house in Morocco? Hurray for Zionism!
    DINNER IN MÁLAGA
    ––––––––
    S amuel hated family meals where his father would ceaselessly say silly things while his mother would laugh, mortified, in the corner. But this time he had to swallow the whole stupid and repetitive discourse of his father, Salomón.
    “So, where were you until two in the morning yesterday Samuelito?” I hope you weren’t getting mixed up with a Saxon girl.” I haven’t brought you back to Jerusalem for that. What do you do all day? Tell me, couldn’t you do a little work? If you were in Israel now you would be in the army, running through the mountains. Although a little azifú might do you some good. Saxon, nowadays one doesn’t really know what to fear. Look, for example, Benchimol’s nephew, the one who was friends with your brother, Isaquito, turned into a queer, a homo and he had the nerve to tell his father. I’m sure that’s what caused his heart attack. He told his father, do you hear me? I’m surprised you are still sitting at the table. I’m sure something’s wrong with you. He told his father that he should be happy that he had discovered his true sexuality and that he was very happy with his queer friend, and a Saxon. I hope at least that they don’t get married in the church. I hope that doesn’t happen to you and that the two years you have spent in Israel will help you to be a real Jew, or at least so you don’t get done from behind like Benchimol’s son.”
    Coti was ready to intervene. “Why don’t you stop talking like that and grossing us out? These days we need to respect homosexuals because they are part of society. Your Tetuán and your stories are over. And your own nephew Mois Hadchuel was also a homo. We are in a democratic