The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine

For a better life

Sulfia believed me. She was stupid and wanted to stay that way. She believed in good, and with a whole lot of imagination she was able to interpret Dieter’s regular visits as interest in her, Sulfia — as gratitude for her care, as fondness for the entire family, as interest in my marmalade. His interest in my marmalade was genuine, that much was true. In Germany, said Dieter, marmalade was made quickly, with gelling sugar — sugar mixed with pectin — and ended up an acidic, jellyfish-like blob. Me, on the other hand, I peeled apples and cut them in pieces, poured sugar syrup over them and let the mixture soak, cooked that, let it cool again for hours, and then heated and cooled it two more times. The apple pieces took on a translucent beauty, the sun shone through them, and they left the taste of summer in your mouth.

We ate marmalade with tea because we didn’t have any other sweets. After a conversation about the art of cooking Dieter stood up and went, as if coincidentally, to Aminat’s room. He said he could speak Russian particularly well with a child, that he learned things in a completely different way, especially from Aminat. And that she had a pretty voice and he liked to listen to her, but she stopped singing as soon as she noticed. Only someone as blind as Sulfia could fail to see how much Aminat hated his visits.

I had spoken to Aminat about how tough things had gotten. I told her that we all had to clench our teeth and be friendly to people we didn’t particularly like because it might lead to a better life for us.

Aminat listened to me without looking at me. We had yet to patch up our relationship and get close again. But I could count on her understanding. Every once in a while when I was out and about with Aminat, I would take a detour through the gypsy enclave, a few streets of squalor in the middle of our city. Dirty black-haired children played there; in winter they wore layers of wool shawls over their hole-riddled jackets. They screamed hoarsely in an indecipherable language and threw stones at passersby. I knew that for some incomprehensible reason Aminat thought these gypsy children were Tartars and all somehow related to us. This helped my argument. If Aminat conducted herself well, we would end up in Germany; if not, I assured her, we’d end up in the gypsy ghetto.

Aminat smiled for the first and only time in Dieter’s presence when he announced he would be flying home in three days’ time.

“Already?” I asked, wavering between relief and disappointment.

We waited, expecting him to say something more. Nothing happened. He shook each of our hands, as if we were an official delegation. I looked at his outstretched arm, pulled him by his hand to me, and kissed him three times on the cheek. It would have been better if Aminat had done it. But I was afraid she might also then throw up on him.

When Dieter was gone, Aminat ran up and down the hallway singing: “The foreign asshole is gone, hurray! Finally the foreign asshole is gone, hurray!”

Sulfia went without a word into her room and lay down in bed.

“He’ll be back soon,” I said persuasively, though I had doubts.

Life had too often kicked me in the backside — I was no longer sure of anything.