Shariah: Shariah, #1

SHARIAH

Copyright

Shariah 2ND Edition

ISBN: - 9781370090518

Published by Ray C Bradbury

E-Mail: raybradburyauthor@gmail.com

Text & cover page copyright Roy Bradbury:

Creational non-fiction:

No part of this book may be reproduced, copied, stored or transmitted in any form without prior written permission from the publisher.

Some parts of this book are works of fiction; some are based on true stories. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination and some have been replaced with fictional ones to protect the person’s identity. Any resemblance to a certain person, living or not, actual events, and locales is entirely coincidental. This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. It may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author, editors, researchers, copyright holder, publisher and contributor

SHARIAH

R.C. BRADBURY

Also by R.C. Bradbury

                                          SHARIA

                                              NGO

JAK

       Poetry from the 27 Club

                                   Me and Gunga Din 

True Dawn

DEDICATION

For Christian John

SHARIAH 

KHARTOUM 

(DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE SUDAN)

Chapter 1

I arrived in Khartoum at 10.0 p.m. on Friday night mid-march 1980 on a British Airways 707. Leaving Heathrow airport London earlier that day and travelling in economy class, the company didn’t allow employees to fly business class, only the company directors had the privilege, they had been with the company many years so it was understandable they got the perks that came with the job. Thirty minutes or so from our arrival in Khartoum the purser came through the cabin and told us the aircraft was going to hit some turbulence, bad turbulence she repeated with a sigh, and said the decent into Khartoum may get rough and asked us to buckle up tight and prepare for landing.

      On our decent to land the pilot was obviously having a bad day. He couldn’t land plane on the runway because of the terrible storm that was swirling around. The aircraft was up and down like a yoyo in very bad turbulence and many of the overhead lockers had sprung open and all kinds of objects were falling out, and they were falling on the people who were unfortunate to be sat in aisle seats. 

     I could hear a loud grating noise; it was coming from the outside of the aircraft and it sounded like the grinding of teeth. But I couldn’t put my finger on what it could possibly be and where it was exactly coming from. I was sat in a window seat adjacent to the portside wing and I assumed, and hoped and prayed, that it couldn’t be one of the turbo props fins grating against the metal housing that kept them in situ. I was thinking that would be a serious issue if those fins collapsed, because it would be bad news for everyone on board.

Many things were spinning around in my mind as they do when in these situations. I thought it could also be raining outside and that could possibly be the noise I was hearing, but it definitely wasn’t because the noise was too loud. 

    I put my face close to the window but I couldn’t see very far through the glass, because the tempered plastic material it was made of was misted up. Apparently, and unbeknownst to all the passengers on board there was a very bad sand storm blowing around outside and dust was being sucked into the props, which accounted for the loud grating noise.

   After descending and trying with difficulty to land the aircraft our pilot couldn’t make it so up we went again, and then down again for another try, to no avail and up again we went once more. At the third attempt at our decent it was very chaotic inside the aircraft and many of the passengers, mostly women and young girls were screaming and crying loudly through the fuselage. 

   It was also very hot in the aircraft because the cooling system had broken down, and I couldn’t stand up to check if the air vent above me was open or closed because I was strapped in and I had to keep my seatbelt on. I was covered in sweat and scared, more of the overhead lockers that were springing open and the objects that were falling out, and hoping they wouldn’t injure anyone, the aircraft was thrown around constantly and it was rocking from side to side. It seemed like the pilot had lost control and we were in trouble, deep trouble, and the majority of people on board started shouting we are going down. I too thought we were going down going to crash but we were lucky and unexpectedly we landed with a big bump.

   I thought the running gear, the undercarriage of the aircraft would show anytime through the floor before the pilot came to a stop, he had hit the runway so hard.

We had arrived at last in the Sudan.

   As they opened the forward doors of the aircraft to let us disembark a solid blanket of intense heat wafted through the fuselage and it was as hot as a furnace inside. I stood and grabbed my hand luggage from the open overhead locker, fortunately it hadn’t fallen out onto anyone. Thinking about it, it couldn’t have anyway because it was very heavy. I then made my way to the front of the aircraft, albeit slowly. Most of the passengers were still in shock and couldn’t walk properly and looked like they were intoxicated. I followed them as they filed through the door and down the steps that had been placed outside. 

   There was no access to the terminal at Khartoum airport from the aircraft and you had to walk three hundred metres to get to it, and there was no bus to take you there.

It was very hot and humid outside and I could see there was a thick blanket of dust on the ground. I couldn’t see if there was a concrete or asphalt strip under our feet because the topography as far as I could see looking away from the airport looked like a heap of sand dunes. There were small mounds of sand scattered all over the runway that looked like mole hills. Thus, the bumpy landing we had just endured.

   A sand storm was blowing around the airport and it was picking up all kinds of objects and throwing them into the air, and dropping them like tornadoes do in tornado alley in Texas. A Khamsin wind, a devil wind as they are known, blowing south, south east, and the heat was unbearable. I had never encountered anything close to this kind of temperature in my life before, only in a sauna back home. I could feel the heat burning through my bones it penetrated so deep, and I wondered to myself how did the local people survive it?

   We disembarked and the passengers walked in line to the arrivals hall, if one could call it an arrivals hall, it looked like a dirty market place with bags of vegetables and bunches of bananas lying around uncovered. There were also many small animals running around the terminal freely. I saw a few rabbits in cages, and there was an Albino one with pink eyes, and all kinds of boxes of goods spread out over the arrivals area. Boxes of apples and oranges, and even dead chickens in open boxes. I saw one guy with a pair hanging around his neck tied by their feet, and they were still alive flapping their wings. 

   The dead ones in the boxes probably died with the heat it was so intense. Some of the small animals were walking on the belt that carried them from the outside to the inside of the terminal, when it moved that was, which was intermittently, and some of them were hanging off it. I was wondering if they had ever heard of quarantine in this country? it was hectic to say the least.

   It took me more than three hours to clear customs and they checked everything. They even asked me to take my shoes off so they could check my feet. I thought they were going to maybe trim my toe nails but that was wishful thinking on my part. But I had never heard of customs wanting to look at one’s feet.

   I had to open up the three bags of luggage I was carrying for inspection and they checked every one of them in detail, and this was the reason it took three hours to clear customs. They rummaged through every single item I had picking up my clothes and dropping everything in a pile at the side of my empty cases, and then they told me to re pack and go because everything was ok. It was so thoughtful of them and I wasn’t impressed. I then proceeded through an open area to immigration and to passport control.

Good evening sir and welcome to Khartoum the officer at the desk exclaimed politely.

   Thank you and good evening too sir I repeated.

   How long will you be staying here?

   Two years’ sir.

   In broken English, he replied, oh really, your visa shows only one month so how can you possibly stay in the country for two years?

   I realized I had made a mistake and corrected myself hoping he would understand; and he did he was a nice guy. I had to be polite it always works. My stay will be for one month initially and after this period expires I have to apply via my company to immigration to stay here for two years.

   Why do you want to stay in Sudan for two years you come from a nice country? England has a black passport I see with a crest on the front of it and it looks very nice, and you have very green soil there in your country I have seen photos in magazines, but only black and white on our TV.

   I considered that they probably didn’t have colour televisions yet in Sudan.

   Here in Sudan you can only see brown soil you cannot see green soil sir, he meant sand and grass, unless you go to South Sudan because it is always raining there and very green all year around.

   Yes, I need a change of scenery it is too cold in England I repeated, and I like hot weather.

   Yes, it very hot here but you will get used to it after a while. 

   Are you sure I asked?

    Ok one month you get young man and have a good time in our country.

   Thank your sir,

   He stamped the passport.

   If you need an extension of your visa you can go to immigration in Khartoum, and you can go and see my brother Sadik and he will fix it for you, but you must take some Sudanese pounds or dollars to pay for the visa. Sadik will accept both but he likes dollars better, do you know what Sadik means in the English translation?

   His English was not too bad he just had to learn how to adjust some of his words, but he was understandable.

   No I said.

   It means friend, you go and see him in immigration and tell him his brother Kamal told you to go and see him, here is my card and you can show it to him and please don’t lose it.

   I looked at his card it had a green background with the Sudanese government crest in the top corner, a light-coloured silver badge with a coat of arms. I put it in my top pocket thinking I may need help from him one day.

   I will have to see your brother some other time I told him because I will go to Port Sudan tomorrow morning, so I will only stay in Khartoum for one night.

   Okay he repeated, but when you arrive in Port Sudan, if you get there this week which I think not possible you can go and see my cousin Hussein, he lives there, and he likes the weather there because it is more humid.

   Why he liked the weather there if it was more humid I couldn’t for the life of me understand why?

I cannot get there this week I asked him, what do you mean? I don’t understand, and I couldn’t work out what he meant. 

   You will not get there tomorrow it’s impossible, but when you do you get there please see my cousin he works in the Port Sudan immigration department, he also takes Sudanese money or dollars but like Sadik he likes dollars much better, everyone here as you will see likes dollars.

   Don’t we all I thought. I was wondering how many Sudanese pounds to one-pound sterling or to one dollar because I hadn’t checked the exchange rate out yet.

    I had some Sudanese pounds I had been given back in the UK at the office for a float but I had no idea what they were worth.

   Thank you and I hope to see your cousin Hussein soon, and goodbye and thank you once again for all your help.

   I went towards the outside of the terminal building dragging my suitcases, intermittently looking for a trolley, but there were no trolleys available and the few spare ones that some people had managed to get hold of were carrying animals and boxes of vegetables on the top of them.

I had to pull two of my suitcases outside and leave them there and go back in for the other one and it was a struggle.

   I had a lot of weight in them because I was carrying spare parts for the company mechanic, it was very expensive to air freight goods over to the Sudan from the UK so the staff carried them in their hold luggage or hand carried them, and that is the reason none of my goods fell out of the overhead lockers on the aircraft during the bad turbulence we had previously encountered, they were too heavy. I assumed not paying air freight for the spares paid for the flight for the employee, very smart on the company’s behalf.

   One could take twenty kilos or even more in hand luggage in 1980 because they never checked. I once carried forty-five kilos in two hand bags into the cabin of a KLM aeroplane and stuffed it in the overhead locker.

   I walked fifty metres or so to where the taxis were all lined up, old Toyota corollas and coronas most of them and all coloured green. I was instantly attacked by swarms of guys in white nightdresses with white skull caps on their heads, and every single one of them were wearing sandals or flip flops. They were grabbing at my luggage and offering to carry my suitcases and get me a taxi. That’s what the dress sense appeared to look like at first sight, men in nightdresses and very unusual. I had never seen a guy wear clothes like these, only Indians on television, Indians from Asia, not red Indians from the West.

   I enquired why they were wearing these kinds of outfits and what were they, and they told me they kept out the heat because they had a lot of air inside them, and they said tight clothes were not good and the clothes they were wearing were called a Dishdasha. I was forewarned about these guys, these dodgy taxi drivers back in Bath at my office in the UK by some of the staff that had been out here, a few tips from the management you should remember.

   I eventually managed to get a taxi in the frenzy with people from all walks of life running around in circles, it was a crazy scene, it was like a scene out of a Charlie Chaplin movie but they were not moving so fast. Just the opposite because people didn’t move fast in Sudan and the pace of life was slow, very slow.

Things didn’t get done today or tomorrow, they got done when they got done, in time.

   I could see some guys walking around with goats and sheep by their sides with various coloured ropes tied around their necks, inside and outside of the airport terminal. One goat had a bag hanging from his neck with an electric cable in yellow and it had Arabic writing on it. The goat had his nose inside and I assumed he must have been eating his breakfast. Some guys were carrying chickens in bags, live ones, and there were ladies with babies slung over their shoulders hanging in hessian type sacks with small holes cut in them where their feet protruded through. I guessed this was for ventilation, and none of them were wearing socks.

One chap I noticed who stood out among the crowd, and so had everyone else it seemed as everyone seemed to be staring at him, was carrying a small monkey of about a foot or so in height on his shoulder. The monkey was carrying a small green rucksack tied to the end of a small bamboo cane with a pink ribbon in a bow, probably his monkey nuts were inside it, and he had a pink collar around his neck to match that was tied in a knot like a neckerchief.

Suave monkey real Suave I thought.

   It reminded me of a Clint Eastwood movie I saw many years before but I couldn’t remember the Monkeys name?

   I eventually got a taxi after a lot of hassle and a hundred arguments over the fare.

I told the driver an old Genobi, a grey-haired gentleman with a long grey beard hanging down on his chest, and I could see scars on his face he had three cuts sliced across each cheek, he told me he was a southern gentleman from Juba the capital in the South of Sudan, to go to the Araak hotel downtown Khartoum where the company I had been employed by had my room booked for the night, and only the night I hoped.

   We were chatting away to each other about our respective homelands and his English pronunciation was excellent. I was amazed how good it was he had an accent that sounded like someone from Windsor a town close by London, posh very posh indeed.

I asked him how he got the scars on his face?

   He answered me, this must be your first trip here in Khartoum Sir? 

I said yes why?

   Oh, nothing important, but please note during your time in my country you will see many people like me from the south of the country with tribal marks on their faces we have them cut onto our faces as children. Most of us tribesmen are cut like this, and the particular marks we have inscribed across our cheeks distinguishes us from other tribes in the south, some have scars cut across the face vertically, and some have them cut horizontally, in various different ways for various different tribes.

   You must visit South Sudan it is very beautiful because of all the rain we have there, there are all kinds of beautiful trees and plants that you will never ever see in the North of Sudan in Khartoum, or anywhere else for that matter. Living in the South is like living in paradise believe me.

   Your tattoos are very different to the tattoos we have back home I told him, we don’t have them on our faces and we don’t have tribes, that is unless you can call people in the county of Yorkshire or Lancashire tribes. Maybe we should start a new fashion in the UK?

   There was no air conditioning in practically any of the cars in 1980 in the Sudan and most people in Khartoum had no idea what an air conditioner was, and one can only imagine the heat in the taxi even with the windows rolled down, just the two of them and the heat was overpowering.

   We had been travelling for some ten minutes or so when the driver abruptly stopped at traffic lights, odd looking ones with the orange symbol in the middle missing. I was thinking to myself at the time this seems more logical than our system back home and all one needs is red or green surely, why put the orange symbol in the middle.

   I looked up at the street sign on the corner of the junction it was illuminated by a tall lamp hanging over it and Shara Jamboriah was wrote on it in English with Arabic writing underneath. I was trying to make out what all the squiggly writing in Arabic may be there for and then I then realised it meant the same as the sign in English, it was the name of the street. I couldn’t imagine the British government putting Arabic language under our street names? Well not then, not in 1980, but maybe now?

   Something startled me and I heard a banging noise from both sides of the taxi, very odd I thought and looked to my left and then to my right.

   I could see two guys outside the cab standing close by the doors, two very tall very dark Sudanese dressed in dirty off white Dishdashas and they looked like a pair of mechanics who had just come from their evening shift. They had lines of grease or oil running down the front of the nightdresses they were wearing, in all kinds of patterns. In less than a minute they were grabbing at the door handles and banging on the doors, and trying to pull them open from each side of the cab like two men who had gone wild.

   What is happening I asked the driver?

   The old taxi driver, Hadji was his name he had informed me just before these two potential thieves had attacked me via both the doors of the cab, pulling at the handles with their hands and using their feet for leverage at the same time, had recently been on a pilgrimage to Mecca to perform the Umra and now he was Hadji. 

   This is the title Muslims get when they have done the trip to Saudi Arabia to the Grand Mosque in Mecca to attend the Haj and pray to the black stone. The eastern cornerstone of the Kaaba which was venerated in the year 605 A.D. by the great prophet Muhammad, five years before his first revelation and the great pilgrimage which all Muslims should do if they can afford it during any period during their lifetime.

   He had locked his side door and also one of the back doors, but the back-door drivers side was open and one of the thieves was inside the cab trying very hard to grab me and pull me out of the car with both of his hands, he had hold of the bottoms of my Levi 501 jeans and he had his fingers in my turn ups for grip.

   I pushed myself back onto the seat grabbing the handle of the door behind me and the wind-up window handle at the same time. As tight as I possible could with both my hands to get into the best position to get away from him because he was still coming at me leaning over into the cab, and the way his inflamed glassy bloodshot eyes were looking directly at me I thought I was heading to heaven, or maybe another direction.

   I had him in my sight though perfectly and I tried to relax a little and lay down and flattened myself out onto my back, and then I let him have it with the full force of the heel of my left foot into the middle of his face pushing him back out of the car, and watching as the blood spurted from his nostrils down his off white Dishdasha, and some of it onto the bottoms of my levis and the car seat. That will teach you I screamed, you bastard. I then closed the door of the cab keeping hold of the handle and told Hadji to put his foot down and go.

   The guy must have wondered what had hit him, maybe a truck or something similar I had kicked him so hard. I had gained my black belt second Dan a few years previously after seven years of hard training at a local martial arts school back home and one of these crooks was certainly not going to get the better of me no matter how big he was, unless he had a gun that is. 

   I was very handy with my feet.

   I wish I had been as good at football because I certainly wouldn’t be in the back of a taxi in downtown Khartoum. 

   The taxi driver put his boot on the pedal and accelerated away as fast as he could with the car skidding and throwing dust and grit up behind us. I looked through the rear window and could see the tall southern guy holding his nose and wiping it on the sleeve of his Dishdasha, and he didn’t look amused with the blood running down his white dressing gown. I had definitely busted his nose and he was very sore and hurting and he was surely in pain, and I guessed that he wouldn’t sleep too well.

Chapter 2

We will go to the police station said Hadji its nearby and its better we immediately go to report crime.

   I repeated no we are not going to any police station we are going directly to the hotel. There was no way I was going to any police station I was ready for a sleep I was knackered. It had been a long trip and with the delay I had in Khartoum airport it was now very late and I was tired, and it was very hot and humid which wasn’t making life easy, and around forty-two degrees and the middle of the night. 

Only god knows what the temperature would be in the morning once the sun came up.

   Ana asfa giddan, ana asfa giddan I could hear coming from the old Hadji in the front seat.

What is that you are saying Hadji I asked?

   It means I am very sorry sir, very sorry sir, have you been in Khartoum before?

   No, it is my first time, and is it always like this when you get in a taxi that thieves attack you.

   No, he said it is never like this, and this is the first time, it’s very unusual because I have never seen this happen before sir, especially with foreign man. It is a very bad thing that just happened, we need Shariah law in our country but our government do not approve.

What is Shariah Law I asked him?

   It is a law laid down by our great prophet Muhammad during his time on earth, and you can read it in the Quran if you learn Arabic and you can learn many things from the great book. Some Muslim countries around the world have Shariah law but not all, it is a very strict law that prevents thieves from committing crimes, because if they do commit crimes the court can order the chopping off of hands and feet of the thieves, well most of them.

   Chop off the thief’s hands and feet what do you mean? It sounded barbaric to say the least.

The Shariah court passes the sentence to chop off the hands of the thief if they steal, and you will learn more about this when you have been here a long-time sir that once we get Sharia everything will be better and everybody will be happy.

   Oh, I see Hadji you learn something new every day. Maybe we should introduce this law into the Houses of Parliament in England and get the peers to change the constitution and sort some of those bad guys out we have in our country, including the shady politicians.

Houses of Parliament sir what is that?

Never mind Hadji it is a long story.  

I told him I was going to Port Sudan the next morning.

   Oh, Port Sudan is very nice he said and it is next to the sea, my family live near Port Sudan they live in a town called Suakin it is about sixty kilometres from there.

   I was thinking about the customs guy in Khartoum airport and that maybe they must all have families in Port Sudan.

It is very hot and very humid in Port Sudan sir said Hadji.

   Surely it cannot be hotter than it is here it wasn’t possible. But I was soon to find out, the heat was similar to the heat in Khartoum but the humidity in Port Sudan was up there in the mid nineties.

   I was thinking if I have anything like the experience I have just gone through here in Port Sudan I am heading back to the UK or somewhere else where sanity lies. I was really very tired, more by the heat than the ten-hour flight I had just had, and I had to be at the airport again the next morning at five o clock to catch the seven-o clock flight to Port Sudan, on a Boeing 737 aircraft that I had heard on the grapevine was probably a very old one, now that should be interesting.

Hadji drove me to the hotel and I checked in.

   I went to my room and took a cold beer from the fridge and drank it in one gulp and went to bed. I fell asleep immediately as I was truly knackered.

   The telephone was ringing and I shook my self and woke up and looked at the time on the small clock on the bedside table, who could that be at 4.0 a.m.? I was in a daze.

   Hello who’s speaking? 

Your early morning call Sir.

Early morning call I don’t understand I repeated. I didn’t know where the hell I was it must have been the jet lag, and I was feeling dizzy. I was looking for my old alarm clock at the side of the bed but I couldn’t see it and I then realized where I was, still in bed at the Aarak hotel in downtown Khartoum.

   I got out of bed and run the shower on cold water to awaken me. I had not had the air conditioner turned on during the night and the room was like a sauna and my body was wet through with sweat. I was perspiring and it must have been the beer pouring out of me making me sweat buckets.

I had my shower and stuffed my sweaty shirt in a plastic laundry bag so the smell wouldn’t get to my other clean clothes mum had put in the bag for me, and then I stuffed it into my case and went down to reception and checked out.

   The girl on reception, a beautiful tall Sudanese young sphinx with a mixture of Eritrean blood, partly from a Sudanese mother and the other part of her from an Italian father she had informed me the previous night when I checked in, asked me, where are you going sir?

I explained I was on my way to the airport to catch a flight to Port Sudan I have a job to do there working for the sea ports corporation, but if you wish I can cancel it and stay here with you and take you out tonight.

   There was no comment and I kept mum.

   Oh, I see well we will see you back here in about two hours.

   I am sorry I said I don’t understand what you mean, you will see me back here in two hours?

She replied Mafi mushkila, no problem take care and see you soon.

   I thought she couldn’t understand what I had said, and it was probably my Yorkshire accent. I went outside to get a taxi but there were no taxis in the vicinity of the hotel, it was very early in the morning and most of the people were up for their first morning prayers at five a.m. including the taxi drivers and they were heading to the mosque.

   There was no way I was going to go looking for one at that time of morning, not after the previous night’s experience with the two southern gentlemen who had tried to rob me. I was concerned I would get attacked again by a bunch of thieves, a bit like the Bronx I reckoned this place must be on face value, so no way. I was thinking about the law that the old Hadji had mentioned, the Shariah one that administered corporal punishment and the chopping off of limbs. I had to look it up and maybe write a letter to Maggie Thatcher she would probably consider it.

    I asked the bell boy to go and find me a taxi for a small tip, and eventually after twenty minutes or so and much concern that I would miss my flight, one arrived. I gave the bell boy his dollar tip, a couple of Sudanese pounds.

   The first thing I did once I got inside the cab was lock the four doors, the taxi driver turned around and was gibbering away at me in Sudanese verse asking me what I was doing locking the doors, he couldn’t understand why I locked them. I said don’t worry about it just drive directly to the airport. He had no idea of the previous episode I had encountered earlier that night.

   The traffic was light and the roads were quiet and we arrived at the airport about thirty minutes later without a hitch, on the way the driver drove through red lights. I asked him why? and he told me all taxis did so during the night. I told him about a guy called Hadji I knew that does not drive through red lights but I wish he had last night.

He looked in the mirror at me and scratched his head.

   We arrived at the airport and it was pandemonium outside and inside the terminal. I had never seen anything like it the place looked like a war zone not an airport.

   Eventually after a nightmare of trying to squeeze my way through hundreds of Dishdashas and animals I got in the queue for check in, but I don’t know why because all the local people were queue jumping and walking in front of me, and they had no idea what waiting your turn meant. According to their belief it was a free for all first one to get to the front first one to board, if we didn’t get in line at school you got hurt because we were brought up to be polite and get in line or we got thumped, but that certainly didn’t apply here. I had to remember when in Rome.

   I finally got to the check in desk for Port Sudan after approximately two hours of queuing and arguing with queue jumpers to get there. 

I asked the girl on the desk if the flight was on time? And I heard a few chuckles from behind me, and she smiled at me and said the flight is delayed sir and the flight will not go today.

   You are joking surely, I raised my voice I was annoyed, please tell me you are joking with me and please tell me I can get another flight today even if I have to wait in the airport terminal for a later one. I can