Danube-Networkers
The stranger at the Brunnenmarket
Text: Lieselotte Stiegler
Translation: Eva Linton
Like every Saturday I go to the Brunnenmarket at the Yppenplatz. I love this multicultural market in the 16th district in Vienna. It is just 9 o’clock in the morning and I am already in the crowd between the market stalls. Here you don’t have to talk about integration: you hear and listen to it at every corner. I try to find with my trolley a free path, while my glances are happy about the colourful hustle and bustle. In front of me I see a yellow poster with the sickle of a blue moon.
ESMA SULTA- carpets and toys
Animal figures made of porcelain, patterned bed covers with big rose leaves, skillets next to parfum with golden tops are all mixed on the shelves and on boxes in front of the shop. I squeeze through the red plastic chairs in front of the entrance and stop in front of the open door of a hairdresser.
“RÜYA COIFFEUR”. On a box at the door handle I can read the handwritten price list: cut and shave only fifteen euro.
On a wooden bench there sit three men, passing the time with a loud discussion about the waiting time, while Ismail Rüya shaves really concentrated the face of a costumer. I get the smell of after shave into my nose, mixed with onion smell of the Kebab place on the other side. In front of the jeweller’s Turkish women press their faces against the shop window. Alternating they point out the big selection of watches and rings - 40% redgold with free engraving. If you stroll a couple of metres along you reach the LOCANTA-OASIS. You can’t miss the yellow entrance door with oriental mosaics, over that is written: home cooking Sebzeli Köfte.
Right next to the shop is the Austrian colleague: Bio Viennese burgers. His entrance is smaller significantly. He evens that fact out with a broad green awning that hangs up to the middle of the street and where stands written in big letters the speciality he offers: SAUERKRAUT. You have to be really careful at the herb stalls that you don’t mix up the dry fruit with the bird food.
“Today everything is really cheap, two pineapples for just one euro!”
The voice belongs to Düskün who gets most of his fruit and vegetables from his home country. Turkish women form a crowd around his market stall, are laughing, chatting, looking at the prices and are checking carefully each piece of fruit before they pit it in their shopping bag. I am standing right next to them. There I feel a pulling at my skirt. I turn around and see big, dark eyes. “Have you got some change for me?” I hear this voice in correct German. Her hand is still holding my skirt with the other she is holding on to the pram, in which a boy and a girl are fighting over a piece of apple. “Only a couple of euros for my children”, she says. I look into a beautiful, significant face with a nice gesture she pulls a strand of dark hair under her headscarf. She puts the pram on the side between two market stands. I start looking for my purse but an indescribable feeling hinders me to give her money.
“Ignore this gypsy. She should go back where she comes from. Just lives here on our costs and then you are also bothered by her through begging for money,” a man is screaming next to me and is making a gesture towards the woman. I wince and feel the anger. Before I can answer him, she bends towards me:” I am Yerma. I am from the Kosovo.” We make our way out of the crowd. “Like that we will never get rid of you”, I hear the man screaming. I take two apples out of my handbag and give them to the two children who are still fighting. She pushes the pram next to me and talks about her escape from the Kosovo.
“They raped all women that they could get a hold on, not depending on their age. My mother hid me for weeks in the basement of a bombed house. But they found me one day and...”
There are no questions, no answers to this brutality towards women. I shake her hand, see her glance with that she looks at her boys. She stops in front of a house entrance. From the bells are hanging cables and the windows in the basement don’t have glass anymore. “We live here. Do you want some coffee? There is only my mother at home, my brothers and my husband are out looking for work. Please, come!”
I am embarrassed that I hesitate for a moment and hold the door for her. The flat is on the ground floor. Yerma pushes the pram through the entrance door that is unlocked which leads straight to the kitchen. It smells like cold cigarette smoke. “Sit down!” She pushes me onto a chair where you can see the armrests are being torn. On the kitchen table are cartons with left over pizza, onion rings and dried left overs from white bread. “Why do you speak German so well?” I ask her. Yerma tries to start the stove. “I hope they didn’t turn off the gas again. I have learned German in the evening school. Do you think that I speak well? At least one in our family should be able to communicate and I love to go to school. My husband only agreed because he realized that it is necessary.” From the room next door there is a whimper. “I have to look after my mother. Some days ago she left the hospital. There is no hope the doctors said. She has great pain.”
While I am waiting for her, the door is pulled open and four men come into the kitchen. They look at me without greeting. One takes a bottle out of the fridge, the other one stumbles over a children’s car, swears and throws it angrily into the corner. They disappear into a room left of the kitchen. “My husband and my brothers are always in a bad mood when they come home.” she apologizes. She gives me a cup of coffee. In the middle of the table there are payment slips, bills and forms. “Can you help me fill them in?” she asks me. She grabs a sheet of paper where there is written the amount of 2000 euro on it, just an unreadable signature on it from the cemetery administration. “My father passed away three months ago. We paid for the grave with the money from his brother. We also pre-paid the grave for my mother, in case she..” She puts her hand over her eyes before she continues. And now they want the same amount again. I don’t get any information over the phone. Can you call for me?” She puts an old mobile phone in front of me.
“Cemetery administration. Walter Fritz, good morning. How can I help you?” “Good morning. Isolde Meier calling, I would like to get some information about the payment confirmation for two graves of the family Zagoriz.” “Can you spell that?” His voice sounds some levels deeper. While I am spelling, he interrupts me.
“Zagoriz Murad? I remember this case. They wanted two graves, one of them for the mother who hasn’t passed away yet. But we are not allowed to put her in her husband’s grave. Religious reasons? Ridiculous, they always have exceptions, these foreigners. It is terrible that you speak up for this gypsy I have to tell you that Madame....”I speak up for them because I am their friend. Please look for the paper of confirmation now.” “Of course Madame but that is not possible today.”
He stretches out the word “Madame”. Rejection, a not understanding is in his tone of voice. I can imagine well what he wants to say and that he just doesn’t do it to not be called a racist. He is an excellent Austrian clerk. “Why can’t you print the confirmation out? That cannot be a problem.” “I can’t find the name Zagorwak in the computer, there must be a mistake and actually my colleague is in charge of that family. He won’t be back from his holidays for another two weeks.” “Zagoric Murad he is called. Do I have to spell it again or should I talk to your supervisor, Mr. Fritz?” “Fitz is my name, dear Ms. Meier”, he answers with an angry voice. And tell that family that are your friends that we will mail the confirmation tomorrow. The fee for the letter they have to pay themselves.” Without greeting he hangs up the phone.
Yerma puts her hand on mine. “Thanks Isolde.” “You are welcome, Madame Zagwowak” I pretend to be the clerk “ Can you spell that”, Yerma answers laughing. With a confident voice she calls her husband and hands him over the children. She wants to come along with me for a while.
In front of the door she stops and looks at me for a long time. Then she takes off her head scarf, takes my cap and puts it on her dark long hair. The red head scarf she wraps around my head. She laughs and takes my hand. At the Turkish fruit market stall she stops, takes an apple, looks at it from all sides and then she gives Düskün thirty cent for it.
