Page 93 - The Tigris Expedition

The Tigris Expedition
suddenly we could feel the current beginning to drag up river. The
boys lit the kerosene lamps and looked into the water as if they
expected Mohammed’s beer cans to come back from America.
While in action up river, we had eaten only biscuit, but now Carlo
got a primus going, and we all gathered on the benches along the
deck table with our individual mealtime bags, from which we
fished out bowls and forks ready for the steaming spaghetti.
Exquisite. Buonissimo. Wunderbar. Koroshii. Dcilig. Carlo received
I his well-deserved praise in many languages. The men were hungry
and tired. But for the first time for many days we had a chance to
relax.

The last days before sailing had been worse than a madhouse.
Neither garden fence nor guards had been able to keep the curious
crowds away. We had tried to rope off at least the small area around
:
our floating reed mole so that we might have space for our
carpentry work and free access to and from the reed-ship. But to no
1 avail. We had to elbow our way through and with scant success, for
people pulled us back with broad smiles and brutal determination.
j!
Pencils and bits of paper waved everywhere. Nobody realised that
I ' if they did not let us finish the ship our signatures would be those of
a doomed expedition. The Arabs were scarcely interested in our
scribblings at first. Most of them could read only Arab script
anyhow. But when they saw how Russians and Japanese fought for
autographs, they all wanted them before we disappeared. One of
the Aymara Indians was literally dragged away from work to build
a reed-boat model for a German journalist. Three Russian carpen­
ters who volunteered to help us lash on the steering bridge had to
sign as well. No matter what we signed. The smartest would
request a dozen signatures for friends and family. We were not left
room to move arms or feet until we had done them. We signed on
odd bits of paper and on berdi reeds, cigarette packets picked up
from the ground, notebooks, newspapers, family photographs,
postcards of Warsaw and Budapest, pictures of Lenin, dollar notes
: and Iraqi dinars, matchboxes, wallets, passports. The atmosphere
had varied between tragi-comic, desperate and hilarious.
i
As we had climbed up on deck to depart those who had nothing
for us to write on got really wild. I had barely posed to improvise
some words of farewell when a young and muscular Arab climbed
aboard and tore open his shirt in front of me, wanting me to write
on his bare chest. He was pulled away by the men around me only
to be replaced by another young Arab, who clung to my arm and
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