The Assassination of the White T-Shirt
Today, unusually, the four of us sat around the coffee pot, with the man alternately bringing the dallah closer to the fire and moving it away.
The elder said, “What’s wrong with you, Abu al-Rijal? Why are you wearing your shoes and the dallah’s shoes?”
The expert replied, “Leave the dallah alone, Hajj. Look at Wa’adi’s face; he looks like someone carrying towers on his head.”
The man let out a sigh rising from his left lung and said, “Ah, my friends... Before I came to you today, I opened the cupboard to look for a t-shirt dear to my heart, soft to the touch, which I bought before my wedding. I searched for it, but unfortunately, I couldn’t find a trace of it; it had evaporated.”
The elder laughed and said, “Evaporated? Oh, my poor Abu al-Rijal, are you still living in the age of innocence? The t-shirt was forcibly abducted and conscripted into the Fat-Burning Forces. Go to the kitchen and you’ll find the frying pan lying on top of it, while it laments its fate.”
The young man, wiping tears of laughter from his eyes, said, “Let me tell you the scenario that happened. The mother of the children took advantage of the fact that you were asleep and snoring. She tiptoed into the room, opened the cupboard, and pulled out the t-shirt without making a sound, in a full-scale intelligence operation aimed at polishing porcelain and ceramics.”
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The man slapped his hands together and said, “The tragedy is that I went to the kitchen to search for it, pretending to look for ginger, just to see the disaster. My little heart can’t bear it if our esteemed lady is holding scissors, cutting the sleeves of my t-shirt.”
I asked her, “What has come over you, woman? This is my companion through life!”
She replied confidently, “My dear husband, your belly has grown, and nothing covers it anymore. The kitchen, oh my distant tribes, deserves to cover it. It’s a shame to leave it in the cupboard doing no good. Today, chandeliers were polished in it, and perhaps it will bring blessings back to the house.”
The disabled man burst out laughing: “They killed your companion and turned it into a cleaning rag—what a disgrace! I swear, we are a people with no solution except giving the t-shirt a strange life cycle. It begins its life fragrant with oud and roses, ends up in the living room, then falls ill in the courtyard, and is buried in the kitchen.”
He added, “And in its final days, the maid uses it to wipe oil and ketchup, and to clean air conditioner filters, until it forgets that it was once a t-shirt.”
The elder smiled, rose to his feet leaning on his cane, and said, “My friends, I declare from this spot that the white t-shirt is the unknown soldier in every household. It enters the cupboard with its dignity and honor, and leaves it in its old age as a cleaning rag.” He paused for a moment, then said, “Therefore, from today, I advise you all: each of you should watch over his t-shirt. Don’t go to sleep and leave it to its fate. The kitchen commandos know no mercy.”
Everyone burst into laughter, and each began checking the t-shirt he was wearing, fearing that this gathering might be their last before execution.
The wealthy man said, “Tweet... tweet... tweet... tweet. Pull yourself together, little chick.”
At that moment, the call to the noon prayer rose to our ears, delivered by Sheikh Zaghloul.
A Kuwaiti writer
