America Street by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Epub3
Publisher: Persea

Supposedly we had come to Israel expressly to renovate and rent that apartment. However, so far as I understood, we received very little in earnings from the building and any money we did make had gone, for years, into a bank account in Israel. Exchanging shekels for dollars meant paying a large tax, but apparently most Israelis evaded this problem in the same way.

We visited a little raven of a religious man and sat around a small coffee table protected by a lace tablecloth. The old man set out plates of wafer cookies and a bowl of dates. He poured fragrant coffee for all of us. I put in three sugar cubes and then drank mine in counted sips; it was in a lovely, tiny-flowered cup.

I came to understand that this man was exchanging our shekels for dollars, and that this was all being done on what was called the black market. The adults counted and recounted. I ran my finger across the bumps of the lace tablecloth. In the end it was Shai, with his efficient hairy knuckles, who dexterously collected the bills into bundles and bound them with thick strips of newsprint paper.

Afterward we went and bought toothpaste for me. I loved the toothpaste in Israel because it came in flavors other than mint. I bought a dozen tubes of the orange-flavored kind. The tubes weren’t plastic like at home, but rather a durable metal.

“It’s not so black, the black market,” Shai reassured me when I asked a short time later as we sat in the bright sun at a falafel stand, eating pickles and falafel.

My mom offered casually, “Black market rates are published in the newspaper.” My dad wasn’t even listening. He had gone back to put more shredded cabbage and fried eggplant on his plate. “The government publishes them,” my mom continued. My dad came back to the table with his pita, with extra napkins and an orange Fanta with a straw.

At home, my dad asked me questions like, “Do you say ‘chill down’ or ‘chill out’?” My mom made me do the talking when we ordered pizza. It struck me that, in Israel, my parents made sense, had grace.

When we boarded the airplane for home my mom had cash in a pouch taped around her stomach, a loose sweater pulled over on top. We didn’t declare this on the customs form that I read over and over again with reluctant elation. Uncle Shai, I kept thinking, he knew this about us, he knew everything. My mother’s sweater was orange and at the cuffs the sleeves were fluffy. I wanted to put my hand on her stomach, like she was pregnant.

* * *

A week after the non-collect phone call Shai showed up at our doorstep with Eli at his side. Eli looked like Uncle Shai but less hairy. He wore blue jeans. A thin gold chain decorated his neck. He gave me a disinterested smile, then checked his watch. My mom descended on Eli with compliments and led him into the kitchen where she began to heat up rice with lentils.

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