Read Online Hiding in Plain Sight by Nuruddin Farah - Free Book Online

therefore free to do as she pleases.” But Hurdo cut him off, saying that Bella was indeed a free person, able to make her own choices in life, and that no one had the right to impose their cultural or religious dictates on her just because she hadn’t yet attained the age of majority.
    â€œI don’t wish Giorgio to decide her fate,” Digaaleh said.
    â€œWell, if it comes to that, he will,” Hurdo retorted, “because he is her father.” Then she was hung up on him—and not long after, word came from Mogadiscio that he had died. And it wasn’t until many years later, at Giorgio Fiori’s funeral, that Bella heard about this heated exchange, from Marcella.
    Bella has long been of the belief that there are no people on earth more narrow-minded or chauvinistic than Somalis, for whom appearances—the clothes one wears, the way one moves—matter enormously, especially when it comes to women. She recalls too that when she took up smoking and dressing in jeans, the Somalis she met in Rome, or Toronto whenever she visited, found both habits provocative and offensive in equal measure. (Looking at her fingers now, she can still see them in her memory as they were: stained brown with nicotine, as she held a fresh cigarette between them, lighting it with the butt of the previous one.)
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    It was Giorgio Fiori who sparked what would become Bella’s true vocation, for it was in his house that she saw the first piece of art that ever took her fancy—the inspiration for making art herself. It was a carving from the Dogon in Mali—a simple figure with a cylindrical body,rods for arms, broken bits of colored glass for eyes, thrown together as if in haste—that she had glimpsed in silhouette at dusk in the house he rented during one of his intermittent teaching stints in Mogadiscio during her childhood. The natural light was fading and the electric lamps had not yet come on. The carving struck her as the most beautiful thing she had ever seen or held in her hand; she was very impressionable.
    She did not know then that Fiori was her mother’s secret lover, but as she held the piece, admiring its detail, she admired its owner by extension for choosing a work of such finesse. From that moment she began to adore him and to love her mother all the more for the adoration she sensed in her.
    Fiori had other pieces too, which he would show her later. By then she knew that he was her father; speaking in Somali, he told her that he’d kept them hidden away from the prying eyes of the Somalis when he lived there, not knowing what impression the carvings might make on such an unlearned lot. As Muslims, perhaps they’d have accused him of engaging in idol worship. But none of the pieces, much as she admired them, inspired the same reaction as that first piece. She’d wanted to possess it, pure and simple. Of course she could have it, Giorgio said. Hurdo tried to persuade Bella to withdraw her demand, but Bella wouldn’t back down. Hurdo explained that the piece was one of a series and Giorgio’s favorite, and that it would upset the balance if the piece was separated from the rest. Nothing doing: Bella wanted that one and no other. In the end, she accepted a compromise: She could borrow the piece for a month and keep it in her room on her windowsill provided she took good care of it. Bella charged headlong into Giorgio, hugging him and blurting her thanks.
    Each night, Bella went to sleep with the piece in her sight, and it was the first thing she looked at when she woke. It made her feel fulfilled,joyful, satisfied with life. She worked harder in school, earned better marks, and became more purposeful and organized. She volunteered to do the dishes when it was her turn without talking back to her mother. Giorgio couldn’t make sense of his daughter’s infatuation and predicted that it would be no more than a passing fad, like several others she’d gone