Reading Notes

“Return” by Fatima Ahmed
4am
Ms Bopha 60 yr old guide
thin as a young girl
took narrator to bus station
rickety bus
narrow seats
contaminated air –cigarette smoke
lots of children
drowsy
hungry
stingy uncles
Vietnamese Country Side
Stopped at Cambodian Border
To continue, one had to rent a car. Hold on tight. Lots potholes
“Here we dance” –young driver
Fear of rejected travel documents. Broken Khmer. Pray they won’t ask questions
Relief.
On foot, crossed the border. Tears. Fistful of earth. Mekong River
New car. New journey. Towards Neak Loeung to take a ferry. Another journey.
Lots of questions. Stories. Histories.
Narrator was in Cambodia until age 21 when political crisis began and she moved to Somalia. Born in Phnom-Penh. Had polio since she was a child. Bad leg. Now lives in Italy. Married with 3 children
More questions. Excitement
Another car ride and then, finally, home.
Disappointment, less beauty. More beauty. Traveling. Seeing historical sites and towns inhabited by people who had survived massacres.
“Impossible to go to sleep”
last line: “I hadn’t seen it the night before; it had been too dark”
Moral of the story? Things change. Sometimes you must leave your city to really understand it. You cannot see everything in the dark. Things are revealed in time.

“Vendettas” by Carmelo Quijada
Summary: Mulano boy wins literary award and believes it is because of a good luck amulet he keeps near while he writes the story. He even covers the envelopes with the amulet. On the day he is to receive his award, he irons his shirt (something he hates doing) and makes himself look clean and nice. He has worked hard for this. Unfortunately, a pigeon poops on him as soon as he steps outside. On his newly ironed, clean shirt. He is furious. Angry at the pigeons and blaming them for his troubles, he covers popcorn with poison and sets it out for them. After successfully killing one, he makes a trail of poisoned popcorn. The next day, he walks outside and sees a line of cadavers.
“They’re even uglier when they’re dead”

Some Italian thugs see him and trick him into thinking they are tourists asking for directions. When he pokes his head into their window to talk to them, one puts out his cigarette on the boys arm.
He “receive(s) a a machine-gun fire of insults and spits”

In order to save himself, he tells them to meet him at his home the next day and promises to explain everything. However, he is not there when they show up. They demolish everything. He sits in his neighbors’ house across the street and films it excitedly.
“From my position of security, I encourage them to smash everything”

In the end, the boy receives a new home for thirty years (with lower rent) and is reassured by the police that they will protect him. Later, he brings the videocassettes to the police and promises to go with them to bust the hoodlums
Last line: “It won’t be hard”