NEEDLING

THE RESIDENTS OF ROOM 34

Me and Kamel were wondering about the residents of room number 34. A Turkish couple in their fifties. Every night they leave and don’t come back to the hotel till six or six thirty in the morning. Neither one speaks French, English, or Arab, so there’s no way to communicate with them. Me and Kamel were a bit worried because they’re three days late on the payment of the room and we don’t know exactly what their agreement is with the other day receptionist, who doesn’t speak to either Kamel or me other than the obligatory hello and goodbye on shift changes.

“Every night, he wears a nice suit and has a second one on his arms. Sometimes, his wife stays at the hotel and doesn’t go with him.” Kamel says.
“What does this guy do? Does he party every night?”
“I don’t know. They never come in drunk or anything. But when his wife goes along, she also dresses up to the hilt.”
“They go clubbing every single night, you think?”
“They’re in their fifties.”
“Hey, you know… who knows.”

But then I think about the couple in question. Both short, stocky. His suits are brand new but of another era, so to say, and the dresses she wears I would never imagine her dancing in a night club. They don't fit the profile. I simply can't imagine them clubbing every night, not in what I thinka cub is anyway. The man wears what apparently is a wig, a very black one. Either that or he tints his hair pitch black with shoe polish.

When they came in late this afternoon, I decided to take the bull by the horn and pointed at the computer screen to show him his bill. I smiled and made as many friendly questioning gestures as I could think of. He waved for me to wait a second. He ran across the street were his son or somebody he knows and who paid for their first night at the hotel owns a Turkish sandwich restaurant, and came back with the cook.

The cook in his greasy whites, still sweating from the kebab meat stand looked at me questioningly. He said nothing. He waited for me to start.

“Uhm…” I started. “Your friends, they owe so much money. I’m not really sure how to communicate that to them.”
He nods, waiting for me to continue. He doesn’t translate.
“The way we work in this hotel,” I explain, “is that either they pay from day to day, or they pay several days in advance… if you want to continue paying in cash; or they can give me a credit card and an ID, I take one night form the card to get an imprint, and there’s no problem. Either way, I need some sort of guarantee.”
“Okay, I understand.” Then he explains in Turkish what I’ve been saying, or I presume since I don’t speak Turkish, and turns back to me. “Till what time are you here?”
“19h00.”
“7 tonight?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. I come back around 6 tonight, and I pay for what they owe and for another week. I have to wait till the boss comes back. Okay?”
“Fine, no problem.”

The couple goes up to their room. The greasy cook goes back to his grill. I stay at my reception.

Fifteen minutes later, another man, an older man this time, arrives at the hotel. He parks his beat-up Mercedes station wagon in front of the hotel in the bus-lane and puts his blinkers on. He also is Turkish, and he wants to speak to room number 34. He speaks French with a strong accent, forgetting words here and there. It’s a bit difficult to understand him. I hand him the phone. After he says what he has to say, he hands me the phone back for me to hang up. Then he leans against the reception and we both stare at each other not sure what to say or not say.

He seems like a nice man. He’s obviously waiting for the residents of room number 34 to come down.

“We’re going to a wedding.”
“Ohhh, a wedding,” feigning interest.
“Yes.”
Long pauses while we’re both feeling awkward. I wished he’d go wait in his car or sit on the couch. We try to communicate but it’s difficult. We get a few things across.
“You know he’s a singer.” The older man says. I have to make him repeat that several times before I understand. “A well known singer.”
“He’s a well known singer in Turkey?”
“Yes. In Turkey.”
“He’s very well known?”
“Well… not so much… a little well known. Medium. Yes, he’s medium well known.”
“Only in Turkey?”
“Eastern Turkey, you know. Mostly in Kurdistan.”
“Ohh...”
“He’s sold 450 thousand or 500 thousand cassettes.”
“That’s pretty good.”
“Yes. Not bad. Today, he’s singing at wedding. Extra.”

And so on. I found out little by little that we have a famous Kurd pop singer staying in room number 34, and that every night, from about two till five in the morning, he gives concerts in a concert hall right outside of Paris. I also found out that the older man who came to pick him up runs a sewing shop in the suburbs, that he’s been in France 22 years, has had a French passport for 10, and has lived right outside of Paris for 3. He used to live in the Sentier, but the competition for all textile business was too strong, so he moved out. He does patch-up work, and when he first opened his store, he was the only one anywhere in the neighborhood, but that now there’s two new stores and business has gone way down and things aren’t as good as they were before.

The residents of room number 34 finally came down and took us out of our difficult trial in communication so that the famous Kurd singer could go do a Wedding extra for the next few hours.