breaking the ice by pearl

Saturday

 July 14, 2012

Lauren and I went to a “store” to buy cactus silk cloth for our bed covers.

Down the steep cobblestone ally ways of Chefchaouen, blue and white stucco in the late afternoon sun. Down a side street, then turning left at an obscure sign  (in Arabic, which we can theoretically now read),  stepping over a man with a hat pushed over his eyes sunning across the doorstop, and into a the cool of the adjoining rooms. Carpets and cloth were piled high along all the walls and in between, cashmere, silk and an antique hookah.

Up a narrow staircase, and another, an we made it to the roof. Apparently the roof was were the leather goods were kept, sheltered by wooden roof and some elderly window panes.

(We spent 30 minutes haggling and, bags in hand, emerged­)

The sun was beginning to reach the ridge of the mountains, and from far below we heard someone call up in broken English

“HEY! Hey can you open the roof?”

So the old salesman and I went over and rolled back the canvas covering the skylight.

Peering down I could see the man from three stories below standing amongst the rugs, face turned upwards—

“HEY before you come down you have to tell me! How much does a polar bear weigh?”

                “Uh, what? I don’t know…”

“You must tell me!”          

                (This is weird…whats happening right now?)

“I don’t know… maybe 500lbs?”

“WHAT???”

 (Right they do it in kilos… I have no idea how to convert pounds to kilos… is it a 1: 2 ratio?)

“I don’t know, like 500 kilos?

(I mean it obviously depends on the bear… does he think there are polar bears in Washington? cause there’s not…) 
“How much do they weigh?!”

And I hear a faint cry from far down below:

“ENOUGH TO BREAK THE ICE!”