Read Online East of the West by Miroslav Penkov - Free Book Online
Authors: Miroslav Penkov
Ads: Link
me once, “what it is like to have crabapple mash for brains?” I shook my head, mortified. “Read English books, my son, and find out for yourself.”
The first few years after my grandmother’s death, he stayed in his native village, close to her grave. But after Grandpa had a minor stroke, my father convinced him to come back to Sofia. He arrived at our threshold with two bags—one full of socks, pants and drawers, the other of dusty books. “An educational gift,” he said, and hung the bag over my shoulder and tousled my hair, as though I were still a child.
Every week, for a few months, he fed me a different book. Partisans, plots against the tsarist regime. “Grandpa, please,” I’d say. “I have to study.”
“What you have to do is acquire a taste.” He’d leave me to read but then would barge into my room a minute later with some weak excuse. Had I called him? Did I need help with a difficult passage?
“Grandpa, these are children’s books.”
“First children’s books, then Lenin’s.” He’d sit at the foot of my bed, and motion me to keep on reading.
If I came home from school frightened because a stray dog had chased me down the street, Grandpa would only sigh. Could I imagine Kalitko the shepherd scared of a little dog? If I complained of bullies Grandpa would shake his head. “Imagine Mitko Palauzov whining.”
“Mitko Palauzov was killed in a dugout.”
“A brave and daring boy indeed,” Grandpa would say, and pinch his nose to stop the inevitable tears.
And so one day I packed up the books and left them in his room with a note. Recycle for toilet paper . Next time he saw me, I was reading The Call of the Wild .
From then on Grandpa listened to the radio a lot, read the Communist newspaper Duma and the collected volumes of his beloved Lenin. He smoked unfiltered cigarettes on the balcony and recited passages from volume twelve to the sparrows along the TV antenna. My parents were concerned. I was truly amused. “Did you hear, Grandpa,” I asked him once, “about the giraffe who could fly?”
“Giraffes can’t fly,” he said. I told him I’d just read so in Duma , on the front page at that, and he rubbed his chin. He pulled on his mustache. “Perhaps a meter or two?” he said.
“Did you hear, Grandpa,” I kept going, “that last night in Moscow Yeltsin fed vodka to Lenin’s corpse? They killed the bottle together and, hand in hand, zigzagged along the square.”
There was something exhilarating about teasing Grandpa. On the one hand, I was ashamed, but on the other … Sometimes, of course, I went too far and he tried to smack me with his cane. “Why aren’t you five again?” he’d say. “I’d make your ears like a donkey’s.”
It was not the teasing but rather the sight of me hunched over an abridged edition of the Oxford English Dictionary that finally drove Grandpa back to his native village. When my father asked for an explanation, he could not let himself admit the real reason. “I’m tired of looking at walls,” he said instead. “I’m tired of watching the sparrows shit. I need my Balkan slopes, my river. I need to tidy your mother’s grave.” We said nothing on parting. He shook my hand.
Without Grandpa to distract me, I focused on my studies. It had become popular at that time for kids to take the SAT and try their luck abroad. Early in the spring of 1999 I got admitted to the University of Arkansas, and my scores were good enough to earn me a full scholarship, room and board, even a plane ticket.
My parents drove me to Grandpa’s village house so I could share the news with him in person. They did not believe that phones could handle important news.
“America,” Grandpa said when I told him. I could see the word dislodge itself from his acid stomach, stick in his throat and be expelled at last onto the courtyard tiles. He watched me and pulled on his mustache.
“My grandson, a capitalist,” he said. “After all I’ve been
The first few years after my grandmother’s death, he stayed in his native village, close to her grave. But after Grandpa had a minor stroke, my father convinced him to come back to Sofia. He arrived at our threshold with two bags—one full of socks, pants and drawers, the other of dusty books. “An educational gift,” he said, and hung the bag over my shoulder and tousled my hair, as though I were still a child.
Every week, for a few months, he fed me a different book. Partisans, plots against the tsarist regime. “Grandpa, please,” I’d say. “I have to study.”
“What you have to do is acquire a taste.” He’d leave me to read but then would barge into my room a minute later with some weak excuse. Had I called him? Did I need help with a difficult passage?
“Grandpa, these are children’s books.”
“First children’s books, then Lenin’s.” He’d sit at the foot of my bed, and motion me to keep on reading.
If I came home from school frightened because a stray dog had chased me down the street, Grandpa would only sigh. Could I imagine Kalitko the shepherd scared of a little dog? If I complained of bullies Grandpa would shake his head. “Imagine Mitko Palauzov whining.”
“Mitko Palauzov was killed in a dugout.”
“A brave and daring boy indeed,” Grandpa would say, and pinch his nose to stop the inevitable tears.
And so one day I packed up the books and left them in his room with a note. Recycle for toilet paper . Next time he saw me, I was reading The Call of the Wild .
From then on Grandpa listened to the radio a lot, read the Communist newspaper Duma and the collected volumes of his beloved Lenin. He smoked unfiltered cigarettes on the balcony and recited passages from volume twelve to the sparrows along the TV antenna. My parents were concerned. I was truly amused. “Did you hear, Grandpa,” I asked him once, “about the giraffe who could fly?”
“Giraffes can’t fly,” he said. I told him I’d just read so in Duma , on the front page at that, and he rubbed his chin. He pulled on his mustache. “Perhaps a meter or two?” he said.
“Did you hear, Grandpa,” I kept going, “that last night in Moscow Yeltsin fed vodka to Lenin’s corpse? They killed the bottle together and, hand in hand, zigzagged along the square.”
There was something exhilarating about teasing Grandpa. On the one hand, I was ashamed, but on the other … Sometimes, of course, I went too far and he tried to smack me with his cane. “Why aren’t you five again?” he’d say. “I’d make your ears like a donkey’s.”
It was not the teasing but rather the sight of me hunched over an abridged edition of the Oxford English Dictionary that finally drove Grandpa back to his native village. When my father asked for an explanation, he could not let himself admit the real reason. “I’m tired of looking at walls,” he said instead. “I’m tired of watching the sparrows shit. I need my Balkan slopes, my river. I need to tidy your mother’s grave.” We said nothing on parting. He shook my hand.
Without Grandpa to distract me, I focused on my studies. It had become popular at that time for kids to take the SAT and try their luck abroad. Early in the spring of 1999 I got admitted to the University of Arkansas, and my scores were good enough to earn me a full scholarship, room and board, even a plane ticket.
My parents drove me to Grandpa’s village house so I could share the news with him in person. They did not believe that phones could handle important news.
“America,” Grandpa said when I told him. I could see the word dislodge itself from his acid stomach, stick in his throat and be expelled at last onto the courtyard tiles. He watched me and pulled on his mustache.
“My grandson, a capitalist,” he said. “After all I’ve been
Similar Books
