The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine

Not my baby

Rosenbaum and Sulfia’s daughter was born at exactly the same time that I succeeded in prying free a new apartment for the old Rosenbaum couple. To do so I had pounded down the doors of many different government agencies, shoved the paperwork concerning old Rosenbaum’s head injury in front of countless officials, handed out pounds and pounds of chocolates from Sulfia’s stockpile, and finally called Kalganow and demanded that as chairman of the union he fulfill his fatherly and grandfatherly duties. From all of that emerged a one-bedroom apartment which had nothing of the old grandeur of the Rosenbaums’ previous apartment, but which could be occupied immediately. Other victims of the explosion had to wait much longer for new accommodations. But they didn’t have Rosalinda on their side.

It wasn’t very big, but I considered that a plus: if things ever took a turn for the worse, Rosenbaum would think twice before beating a path for his parents’ place. I knew that a lot of young fathers had such thoughts when a newborn arrived. I was only too happy to help the Rosenbaums pack their things back into sacks and boxes.

The new baby was undoubtedly a Rosenbaum. It was even bald like the father. It was a heavy girl with a big head. They named her Jelena. Lena. This child wasn’t mine. It belonged to everyone. It was very ugly.

“I hope she improves quickly,” I said the first time I saw her.

Everyone agreed except Aminat, who screamed at me angrily, “How can you say something so mean about my sister?”

Aminat of all people had immediately taken the new baby into her heart.

Sulfia and Rosenbaum wanted to put the crib in their bedroom, where it belonged. But Aminat insisted that her sister sleep in her room at night. Everyone was opposed, myself most of all: if anyone needed their sleep, it was nine-year-old Aminat. But first Sulfia and then Rosenbaum gave in. The crib was carried into Aminat’s room.

Now my daughter Sulfia had a complete family. She had a husband who cooked a different porridge every morning and in-laws she worshipped. She had a big, exceptional daughter and a little ugly one, though the latter did come with a real father. She even had a cat.

I didn’t take care of little Lena. I already had a granddaughter, and for the Rosenbaums Lena was their first.

They were odd. They came by constantly and rocked the bald-headed, goggle-eyed child. They made sure the refrigerator and soup pots were always full. The old Rosenbaum woman washed Lena’s diapers and the young Rosenbaum ironed them on both sides.

Old Rosenbaum slowly became a bit more clear-headed. Sulfia put Lena in Aminat’s old yellow stroller, covered her with a pillow, and old Rosenbaum pushed her through the park. If it had been my child, I would never have let her out with a brain-damaged old man. Sulfia seemed to share this thought at least at some level, because when old Rosenbaum was out in the park with Lena, she often stood at the window and watched. There was a good view of the park from the ninth-floor window.

Unlike Aminat, Lena was perpetually sick. She had bronchitis and diarrhea and allergies to everything under the sun.

Must have been the Rosenbaum genes.

I had often noticed that things I wished for frequently came true. A sign that God was with me. Occasionally He overshot the target, but that was only because I’d failed to formulate my wish precisely enough.

It came to pass, for instance, that a great many Jews were returning to their historical homeland during these years. Everyone knew somebody who wanted to emigrate to Israel. Even the Rosenbaum family, to whom my daughter now belonged, began to prepare to flee our country.

I found out one evening when I came by to check on Aminat’s homework and fingernails. Sulfia sat in the kitchen crying, and Rosenbaum paced back and forth in the kitchen waving his hands as if swatting a swarm of mosquitoes. Aminat was playing in her room with little sniffling Lena.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

They were going to emigrate in three months.

“It’s not so bad,” I told Sulfia. “It’s nice and warm there.”

I was assuming that Aminat would stay with me. What would she do all alone among all those Jews? I’d heard that in Israel there were sandstorms and that they didn’t even have a proper alphabet.

“We will come visit,” I said.

“Who is ‘we’?” asked Sulfia, training her bunny-rabbit eyes on me.

“Aminat and I.”

“Ah,” said Rosenbaum.

Sulfia covered her face with her hands and groaned.

I was prepared to let Sulfia move far away with her new Jewish family. But Aminat emigrating was out of the question. Aminat was my child. I was happy that Sulfia had Lena now. Aminat was older, prettier, healthier. Aminat would be fine without Sulfia — she had me.

The situation was clear. I figured I could now move into Sulfia’s apartment. Three rooms for me and Aminat, with no roommate and no cleaning schedule for common areas. It was a pleasing prospect. I just had to be careful not to let Klavdia get her hands on my two bedrooms. I was sure she wouldn’t tell the housing authority I wasn’t living in the communal apartment anymore. Because then they would reallocate the rooms in a blink of an eye, and the new neighbors would never be as nice, as friendly, and as helpful as I was.

Sulfia looked worse and worse (if that was even possible). I told her she needed to eat more vitamins. She’d need them in Israel. Books — all labeled ulpan — lay strewn about their apartment along with brochures such as “Welcome, New Citizen.” Once I caught Aminat with one of the books in her hand. I went to take it away from her and said, “You don’t need that.”

She clutched the book and wouldn’t let go as I tugged on it from the other side.

“Papa says I should read it,” she said.

Suddenly she was calling Rosenbaum “papa.” It was like earlier, when I had to stop her from calling every male stranger on the street “papa.”

“You don’t need it,” I repeated, and succeeded in ripping the book away from her. As I did, the cover made an unpleasant sound. I placed the book as high on the shelf as possible so she couldn’t reach it.

I went to Rosenbaum, who was reheating noodles from the previous night in a frying pan, and asked, “Have you told Aminat yet?”

“What?”

He looked at me through his thick glasses with a friendly look on his face.

“About Israel.”

“Of course.”

“So why should she read those crazy books then?”

“Because it’s good preparation.”

“For staying here?”

“No,” he said in a friendly tone. “For emigrating.”

“Aminat’s not emigrating,” I shot back. “Did you not understand that? Aminat’s staying here, with me.”

He shook the pan back and forth and busily stirred the noodles. Before he answered me, he reduced the gas flame and turned his face, red from the heat, toward me.

“Aminat is coming with us. That was clear from the start.”

“But Sulfia. . ” I gasped. It felt as though someone had slammed my head against the wall. “But Sulfia!”

“For Sulfia,” said Rosenbaum, dividing up the noodles onto four plates, “it was never a question. Believe me.”