Turbulence Read online

  Office life equaled private life. All our friends were from the office too. We organized barbecues on my terrace, and watched TV and original movies Jaime brought back from New York—since all movies in Spain were dubbed in Spanish. We played Super Mario Brothers on the Nintendo and saved the princess in the wee hours of the morning.

  DAY SIX

  I have to go to the bathroom. To excrete, to be precise.

  “Eeeew!” Helen would say. She never goes to the bathroom in front of her boyfriend. I do.

  How am I going to do this? First I have to move away from my spot, away from my sacred foam balls. I drag myself uphill on my back, just using my elbows. Ouch, ouch, ouch. I hope it will be easier and less painful to come back down afterward. Now I have to lower the borrowed pants. I open the zipper. I start pulling them down. That hurts! So much! I can’t believe the pain in my hips. I want to stop but, oh, sense of decorum! I can’t just do it in my pants! No matter what! I pull the pants down slowly, lifting up my hips a bit. What pain! I see in my underpants that I got my period. Of course! When it rains it pours. Just when you think you had it all!

  I do what I have to do, though the pain is almost unbearable. Oh those twigs! I use leaves to wipe my bottom. Civilized at a most agonizing price! Well done! I move back down to my spot. On my back, on my elbows. I am exhausted.

  I wonder what my parents are doing. My brothers, my sister, my friends. Are they sleeping in their warm beds? Taking a shower? Eating at a table? How easy for them to drink water, to just open the tap.

  A centipede crawls over my legs. I just stay still. We share this space. He is one part of the jungle; I am another.

  The rest of the day becomes one big blur. My mind goes still. I am no longer thinking not to think of Pasje. I am just hanging in there; I have become one with my surroundings. It is as if I am living through the trees. The more I have been looking at them, the more beautiful they have become. It is as if I am inhaling them. My belabored breath seems to expand my hurting chest with an energy that makes me light-headed. In a good way. A liberating way. It helps me escape the pain. As if I am out of my body. Whereas I was first forcing myself to focus on the beauty, then I am in it. I am one with everything around me. With the beauty. With the dead. With the process of decay, death, and rebirth. It is wonderful. Before I had to recite the names of my family members and friends to recall their love for me, my love for them. Now it just feels like I am in a bed of love. Or some kind of love frequency is in the air. Or rather, I am in that frequency, on that wavelength, moving within it. Back and forth to an even higher state of mind, in some kind of perfect harmony with my surroundings. It is a beautiful, pleasant frequency, which I would not mind staying in forever.

  MADRID, CHILE, VIETNAM, 1987–1992

  Pasje was thrilled about my move to Madrid. He liked trading. The idea of me trading. He would understand when I said, “Oh, I’m in the middle of something; I’ll call you back,” and then forgot to do so. He would call again. Always. “You’re just like Joe,” he would laugh, a reference to his best friend who was a stock trader. He would sound proud of me. Very proud.

  He also loved the money and the freedom that came with the new job. I could easily combine business trips with visits to Chile. Or we would meet halfway across the globe in New York.

  We became very good at sharing our lives over the phone. We would talk at length at least twice a day. With the five-hour time difference, I would wake him up. I would whisper tender words in Dutch from behind the trading desk, or say them more loudly if I had managed to find an empty conference room. In turn he would talk me to sleep from his office. Often we would chat between six and seven p.m., when his lunch at his desk coincided with my dinner at my desk. And we spent all our vacations together. I knew his life. He knew mine.

  Pasje’s assignment in Chile was meant to last two more years. After that we were going to make a serious effort to get stationed in the same place. London or New York seemed most feasible. My new boss often hinted that she could transfer me wherever I wanted, when the time was right.

  We were not in a hurry. A life together was only a matter of time. Didn’t we have our whole lives in front of us?

  • • •

  “Flipper, they offered me Vietnam,” Pasje said on the phone. “To set up two local branches. I get to build them from scratch. I might even become the general manager if I do well.” He sounded excited. “It is a huge promotion. I have always been interested in that region. And Vietnam is such virgin territory. It’s a great challenge.”

  And so our future together took another detour.

  DAY SEVEN

  Days have passed. I don’t think I am losing track; I just have to add the nights! So it is the sixth or seventh day?

  My head is light. The plants around me are radiant. I do not feel the pain any longer. I am both out of my body and close to my body. I have left, but I am present. When I open my eyes, I see the plants shining in the sunlight. When I close them, I see golden lights and a golden center. A big glowing ball, like a late-afternoon sun setting. But this ball has no setting. It is all-encompassing. Both dark and light, and all colors. One big mixture of colors. Yet I can distinguish every single color. They have a golden overtone. Darkness is mixed with brightness, the day with the night, everything with nothing. I feel as protected as I possibly can be. I have surrendered myself completely. To the trees, the leaves, the crickets, the ants, the centipedes, life. Or is it to death I have surrendered?

  The jungle cacophony has become a symphony. Of silence. I belong without past or future. I am within the moment. A timeless moment of ecstatic freedom. A moment that gives me peace, unity, and joy. A moment within something greater than my own life. I am the moment. I belong to life itself! To the universe. To God. I feel connected in a miraculous and unified and beautiful way. No divisions, boundaries, or separation, but innate unity. I am seeing the secret. I am the secret.

  But then, suddenly, I hear the sound of cracking wood. I see something move in my peripheral view. I turn my head slightly and try to focus my eyes. It is a man. A man? Am I dead? Is he the one taking me? Some version of Peter? No, he is real! He is here! I put more effort into sharpening my vision. It is a man! On the other side of the ravine. I can clearly see his face. He wears an orange hood. He is dressed in orange. He is staring at me. I shake off my altered state of mind as much as I can, trying to come back to practical, rational awareness. I try to find my voice. It comes out soft and croaky: “Hello? Can you help me?”

  I try again. It comes out stronger now, I think. I hope. “Hello? Can you help me?” He doesn’t move, just stares at me. Louder now: “Hey there! Help me! Help me!” I scream louder and louder, but he stays motionless. “Can’t you see I need help?” I am getting angry now. “Do something!” I plunge right out of my pleasant wavelength, right back to earth. Literally back to earth, as I become aware of the ground I am sitting on, the painful little twigs. I have to get out of here! This man can help me. He should help me. I scream and I scream. I start cursing in all languages I can think of: pendejo, Schweinhund, eikel, salot! He won’t move a muscle. He just stands there, staring at me, without even blinking, for hours.

  Who is he? What does he want? To watch me die?

  Then he is gone. As phantomlike as he appeared. Was he a phantom? Did I make him up? But then, why should I have? I was happily minding my own business before I saw him. Too happily perhaps. Slowly drifting away to another world. Now I feel the pain all over again. And the discomfort. Oh hell, what a discomfort it is! I focus on the jungle again. When dusk comes I force myself to go to sleep. Clear my mind of thoughts about the man. Perhaps I was just hallucinating.

  VIETNAM, SUMMER 1992

  Pasje moved to Ho Chi Minh City in April 1992. He was one of the first to set up offices for a foreign bank in Vietnam, a communist country that was still trying to find its way out of perpetual war. Only a year earlier there had been armed conflict at the Cambodian border. Pasje had turn
ed into a pioneer.

  He was assigned a helper by the government to inform him about the dos and don’ts. And also to check up on him. Mr. Hung was his driver, adviser, and go-between, all in one. But Mr. Hung had clear priorities: he was a government watchdog, and the government came first. Mr. Hung himself came second, Pasje third. Pasje understood that was the cost of doing business in Vietnam and remained on friendly terms with Mr. Hung, even when it meant having to rent an office away from the center, a property owned by a relative of Mr. Hung’s. With the help of only a young trainee named Carola, he managed to get both offices in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi up and running by October, just before a delegation from the head office was due to visit.

  His days were chaotic, and often the phone lines were down. He would send me faxes, though. Sweet and loving, asking me to please be patient. Saying that he was busy fighting bureaucracies, both in Vietnam and within his own bank.

  We saw each other in Holland for just a week in late June. We spent most of our time with our friends cheering the Dutch soccer team in the European championship. Our summer vacation was yet to come, so we thought.

  Pasje was still negotiating his contract with the head office in Amsterdam. They were suddenly making waves. We were treated as a couple while I was in London, but we had to be legally married for them to pay costs such as plane tickets for us to visit each other. That was no problem; we wanted to take care of that. But we had to be physically together to tie the knot. Moreover, in Holland there was a six-week waiting period to get married, so Pasje would have to be there twice. But because Pasje had not yet signed the contract, he would not be allowed to participate in the general managers meeting in August in Holland. He was over his ears in work, so we decided he would stay in Vietnam and I would visit him in September instead. Then one of my best friends in Holland decided to get married in September. She was pregnant and happy, and asked me to be in her wedding party. How could I say no? Now Pasje and I were looking at October—but in October Pasje would be busy hosting the delegation from head office. I didn’t want to be in the way. So we finally settled on November. Five months to go. The longest we had been apart in thirteen years.

  How I missed him that long summer, as it turned into fall. At the wedding his absence was palpable. When it was time for the bride to throw her bouquet, she came over to me and placed the flowers in my hands. I made a face. Everyone applauded. It was evident I was going to be next.

  At my friend’s wedding, Amsterdam, September 1992

  DAY EIGHT

  I am woken up by the sun rays on my face. Is it day seven or eight? I might have lost count. Is it Saturday? I think I am supposed to move into the jungle today! I have been distracted by the orange man. Where is he? I immediately look to my right. There he is again! Standing some fifty yards away from me, framed by the jungle growth. Or is he squatting?

  I decide to study him first, before making a fool of myself again by screaming into a void. I try to make out his face. It is a beautiful face. Definitely human. Native, I believe. Medium-dark skin, brown eyes, straight black hair. Staring at me, emotionless it seems. He is dressed in orange again. Bright orange. Official orange, like those plastic things on the road. Those cones they use when they do construction. His hat is pointy. Like Paddington Bear’s. An orange Paddington Bear. Pasje bought me that bear in London, a small one. That was five years before . . . Pasje? By now every part of my mind is groggy. I decide again that I must be hallucinating, making up an imaginary friend. But I do scream at him anyway: “Hello!” It actually helps to scream and focus on the man. Hallucination or not. He pulls me back into the real world, out of my dreamy one.

  I think a few hours have passed when I notice he has disappeared again, just like the day before. Gone. Disappeared into thin air. Thick air, I should say! I revert to my tranquil state of mind. My beautiful wavelength. Hang in there.

  It seems there is a golden veil over my brain. I am overwhelmed with warm energy. My every cell seems filled with it, yet each cell has no boundary. I am aware of every single cell as well as its endlessness. My eyes seem to have moved behind my brain. My brain seems no longer relevant by itself. It is connected, plugged into this giant glowing ball of energy. And love. Big, effortless love, without any object.

  THE HAGUE, TOKYO, HONG KONG, VIETNAM, 1992

  Saturday, November 9, 1992: Jaime and I flew together from Madrid to Amsterdam. The next day he was going to New York to visit his sons, as he did every two weeks. I was going on to Tokyo to call on our Japanese clients before visiting Pasje in Vietnam. Finally. For the very first time since his move there in April.

  We went out with my brother in The Hague and stayed at my parents’. It was only the second time Jaime had met them. My mother was her usual warm hostess self; my father loved to pick Jaime’s extensive brain, on subjects ranging from religion to food and politics. Jaime stayed in my former room on the top floor, which was unused since all my siblings and I had left home. I slept on the first floor, in a little room near my parents. It was cozy to be close to them.

  At the breakfast table my mother confessed she had not quite trusted Pasje’s advice that I wouldn’t need any shots for Vietnam. She had consulted our family doctor and had arranged injections for me at the airport. “Just go to the first-aid office. They know your name,” she said.

  “What do you mean they know my name?” I answered. “I don’t need injections! We’ll only be in the city and on the beach!”

  “It’s a cocktail,” my mother continued, patiently. “It includes tetanus.” Aha, tetanus, my mother’s hobbyhorse. “We’ll take you to the airport early tomorrow; then you cannot use your usual excuse that you are running late.”

  I protested: “But I don’t need them! We are going to a beach! We are not going to go hiking in the jungle or anything.”

  But my mother got her way as Jaime made me go to the nurse’s office at the airport.

  • • •

  I had been in Tokyo before, but I still felt out of place. Even though there were more signs in English now, something in the collectiveness of the Japanese made me feel excluded.

  My sense of alienation was not at all due to Numachi, the head of our Japanese investment bank. Tommy, as I called him, went out of his way to accommodate me. He consulted me constantly. What did I want to see, what did I like to eat, and what did I need to buy?

  We had developed this special relationship over the three years we had worked together. He would wake me up regularly by calling between two and three in the morning, asking me to price packages of loans the Japanese banks were selling. My accent was probably as incomprehensible to him as his English was to me. We had managed to overcome many misunderstandings, a quite costly confusion of tongues. And we both had learned to survive in Spanish, in a culture so different from our own. It had created a bond. I could even make Tommy laugh, not just giggle.

  Compared with my open, lighthearted, freethinking attitude, Tommy was serious and timid, keeping everything close to his chest. He worked harder than anyone I had ever met. He worked nonstop, and he did not really need to. He came from an affluent family. “We Japanese Buddhists believe in hard work,” he said, “In Japan we work our way to enlightenment.”

  I tried to read up on Buddhism at my hotel. I had found The Teaching of Buddha in my nightstand. On top of the Bible. Each page was printed in Japanese and English. It looked really interesting. For later, I thought, and sneaked the book into my luggage, breaking the eighth commandment in the book underneath it.

  With Numachi, Tokyo, November 1992

  Tommy watched over my itinerary, from morning till night. Minute by minute. When I went missing, he sent Jaime a fax describing my last actions before leaving Japan. Step by step. Seven pages long. As if he was warding off my death by revisiting every move I had made while I was still alive.

  • • •

  From Tokyo I flew to Hong Kong for two days, to visit just a couple banks. I had dinner with an ex-colleague from
ING Bank. We had plenty to talk about: we had both studied in Leiden, he used to live in Willem’s frat house, and he had gone through the same management trainee program I had.

  The next day, Thursday, November 12, I would be flying to Ho Chi Minh City at five p.m. I only had a breakfast meeting, so I would have the rest of the day to myself in Hong Kong to shop—what else?

  I took the crowded ferry to the Stanley Market. It struck me how loudly the Chinese spoke on their mobile phones, even in a confined space. And how many mobiles there were to begin with! In Spain my mobile was still a novelty; people looked on in admiration. The Dutch would often disapprove when I used it. They should see and hear this crowd, screaming into their phones all at the same time.

  I really liked Stanley Market the few times I had been there before. Now it was enough to buy a couple of the white silk T-shirts I wore daily to the office. I wanted to return to the hotel, pick up my bags, and go straight to the airport. I wanted to fly to my Pasje. So I took the ferry back and checked out of the Mandarin three hours early. I had never done that in my whole life. On the contrary, I usually made many last-minute shopping detours, even in the taxi on the way to the airport. Often I was so late I had to run to the gate to make the plane. Not now. I was going to see my Pasje after five months. The longest I had not seen him ever.

  When I got to the check-in counter and handed my ticket to the attendant, she became flustered.

  “We have been trying to contact you all day! The flight is leaving four hours earlier,” she said, checking her watch. “Now, in fact.”

  She frantically got on the phone. When she hung up she told me to put my luggage on the belt. “You are lucky. They will wait for you.” She handed me the boarding pass. “Please hurry! There is no flight tomorrow. You are so lucky!”