Ways to Lucena

By Mois Benarroch

In one of his major works, Lucena, Benarroch goes from time travel to social comment, which brings to mind the hilarious novels of Kurt Vonnegut Jr. An old odd ancient man is reaching the age of 1,000 years and has to pass his legacy to his great great great grandson, and prepares him for a journey that will last a thousand years. His first days begin in the Jewish city of Lucena at the beginning of the second millennium and ends in Israel and in Spain. He meets his descendant in a hotel in Malaga, while the young adolescent is trying to find his place in life and family, writing science-fiction short stories and fighting with his parents. This novel will take you back and forth from the future and back to the past, into a world of Sephardi Jewry, the inquisition, Mexican Jews, and back to our present day crazy modernity. 


Lucena is an internal exploration of the why of exile.  And it is a modern road peppered with dialogues, poems, tales and various plots and story lines. All this is set under the solemn shadow of a person called Lucena who is one thousand years old.  For the reader who wants to enjoy and at the same time learn something. This is a rich literary cosmos of hedonism. There, in Elí Hoshaana, May God save us, began the dominance of Judaism in Sefarad and ended that of Babylonia. One hundred fifty years a Jewish city; strong and prosperous. The city of faith and true worship of God, not like today.  The city of my ancestors and yours, a forgotten city, neither so important nor dramatic; Not Toledo or Granada, but then, in the eleventh century, it was a Jewish city. And nobody thought it could ever be a city with no Jews.  

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mois Benarroch
• Release date: Jul 31, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393315513

Mois Benarroch

"MOIS BENARROCH es el mejor escritor sefardí mediterráneo de Israel." Haaretz, Prof. Habiba Pdaya.

Book preview

THE INQUISITION

Isaac Benzimra was so very tired. There was work, the children, the wife, tension at the bank, the new car, the monthly payments, the mortgage and everything else. Now he had everything he had ever wanted: a huge chalet on the outskirts of Mexico City, in one of the most prestigious neighborhoods of the city, a new Volvo (he traded in his BMW), a lovely woman after two plastic surgeries which left her breasts like those of a fifteen year old , two fortunate children who studied at the institute, a law firm in the center of downtown. In a word: everything. Everything and nothing was a phrase that constantly knocked about in his brain, day and night without stopping everything and nothing.Sometimes it morphed into "everything is nothing." Day and night, in his dreams, while conferring with a client. What will become of you, Isaac, what will become of Isaac Benzimra? What will become of your life, your wife...your kids?

He wanted to leave it all: work, kids, mortgage, lover, whores' faces, trips to Miami, roulette in Las Vegas, and the fifth-floor office. He wanted to abandon it all. But instead, one day he told his wife "I'm going on a trip to Spain. I've already ordered the tickets. Sunday, after Mass we'll fly to Malaga. I'm going to my ancestral land, Melisa. You have to understand I need to go there to find the meaning of my life, in Granada. In Lucena or in Grenada; I need to understand. I'm going back to the country where all my misfortune comes from.

Melisa Looked at him, worried. She reminded him that he had a very important matter to finalize at court relating to the Lacroft international computer company.

That's right, but I have a partner, don't I? Don't I have a right to a vacation? If I keep this up I'm going to explode, Melisa I'm going to explode! Just then, like a child playing around in school, he let himself fall onto the huge round bed in the center of the bedroom.

We have debts, said Melisa "And if he is the one who presents the case in court he's going to keep most of the fee.Remember the agreement you made with him out of the goodness of your heart, when he didn't have anything? Friend. Harrumph. I would like to see if your friend would help you out if you didn't have anything.

He responded, "There will always, always be money and there will be debts, and banks that will give me loans, and credit cards with a huge credit limit so you can spend more. Do you know how much credit we have with our twenty-five cards? Gold cards, platinum cards, Super American Express, Visa Platinum V. I.P., and what else? I can't remember...Oh yes, the Diners Supersonic. Do you know how much? Two million dollars. Spend! Spend! We know you are a workaholic and you'll work like a dog to pay it off."

You're right. Melisa gave in to the strange scenario into which her husband placed her. I realize you really need a vacation. We'll go to Malaga.

I need to warn you that we're going to stay in a cheap hotel, he said.I'm tired of all this luxury and so many stars. A three star hotel. A cheap one.

You? Are you on the verge of bankruptcy, or what? Melisa was aghast. And you want to go to a three-star hotel? I recall when you were twenty you didn't feel comfortable in anything less than a four hundred dollars a night hotel! Maybe what you need is to see a doctor, to see a psychiatrist, not to take a vacation.

I knew this would happen, said he. I don't want to go to any hotel where they make you go to the casino so they can take your money, or they lick your butt so they can get a two hundred dollar tip. I want something plain, so put simple clothes in the suitcase.

I don't have any plain and simple clothes.

That's easy. Take a hundred dollars and buy a few cheap things that make you look like the wife of a civil servant, not of a famous attorney.

Now that is just too much. Right? Too much. I'm going with my dresses. Not less than three suitcases. I'll start packing. I don't know if I'll have enough time. I'll ask my friend Luisa to help me.

Isaac heard the voice again "Everything is nothing."

Everything is nothing, he told his wife.

Shall I take the red dress? The one with the plunging neckline? What do you think? Oh, maybe that wouldn't be appropriate now, of course, I'll have to go buy some dresses.

Isaac got into his car. He really felt uncomfortable. "Everything is nothing.He turned up the volume on the Rolling Stones disc where they sing Angie.He started singing along, which helped him a bit, but when the song was over he heard it again: Everything is nothing.This time he braked. That time the voice was so much louder than the previous times it didn't seem like it was coming from his head. It was as though someone sitting in the back seat had said Everything is nothing."

When he arrived at the firm, the secretary told him Luisa had called five times already. He didn't care. As usual, he didn't return the call. He had several appointments but he asked the secretary to cancel them. She thought he wanted a little something from her like the last time he had had her cancel all his appointments. Isaac was a marvelous lover. In spite of all the stress, whenever he touched a woman he felt completely free. His hands would stroke the body of a woman so tenderly that she could never forget it. This was something rare among lawyers.

But not this time. This time Isaac shut himself up in his office and didn't speak with anybody. He lowered the blinds to half-mast and even asked the secretary to hold all calls and leave him completely alone. That is how he spent all day Friday: flustered in his office trying with all his might to rid himself of everything is nothing.He lit several Havana cigars. Even though they caused him respiratory problems he could not stop smoking them.

Isaac asked himself: "Isaac, just who are you, Isaac?" When he talked to himself he always called himself by name first. On the one hand, he was sure that all psychiatrists would think him insane, but on the other, each time he heard his name erupting from his throat, it felt good.

Saturday he slept late. He asked his wife to not call him to the phone, even if a good friend should call. His only request was that she fill the suitcase with undershorts so that what had happened in Hawaii would not repeat itself: He hadn't brought enough and no store carried the boxers that he preferred. The most important thing is enough undershorts, He insisted several times.

After eating he had a nap and when he woke, he asked Melisa to order a limousine to take them to the airport the next day. But then he said: Why do we need a limousine? A taxi is fine. We'll be poor for a week. What do you say?

No way, said Melisa.If you want, you can be poor. I'll take the limousine. I didn't marry you so I could be poor. If I had wanted that I could have married Mois the poet. He loved me more than you, and up to now he hasn't even bought a car. He doesn't have any money at all.

Isaac murmured, I'd like to know whatever happened to that addict. I think he was even a queer.

I can assure you that's not true, she protested.He may have been a little off the wall, or crazy, or whatever, but he wasn't a queer.

She added, Some of my girlfriends used to say he wasn't much interested in sex. But, what does that matter anyway? I just had tequila with him. He threw up after he drank the spiked coffee, and I never saw him again.

She smirked, Those gals hated me because he only loved me.

Isaac conceded, OK, whatever you want. Order a limousine, no matter, we'll go in a limo. Whatever."

Isaac wanted to leave it all – money, limousines, wife, children, mortgage, the firm, and the city – even life. But life didn't want to leave him. Life stuck to him like a thorn in his throat - millions of dollars in life insurance – he always thought he was worth more dead than alive, even without understanding the logic of that. Alive, his liabilities amounted to half a million dollars. If he should die his life insurance would pay out over three million dollars. His wife and children would receive two and a half million. Where is the logic in that? Why wouldn't a wife murder her husband if he has life insurance? It would be enough to simply do something to the car so that a believable accident would happen.

Isaac began to think up all kinds of theories about how fifty percent of traffic accidents are homicides. And another, like amount, couldn't be ruled out as suicides. It would seem much more respectable to die in a traffic accident than to put a bullet in one's brain. "Everything is nothing." In fact, he would never consider suicide. In spite of not practicing, he was a believer, and his mother had inculcated his awareness of the punishment for death by suicide and the fear of hell.

Saturday afternoon he slept so much that by night he was not sleepy. At two in the morning he was roaming about the house waiting to board the airplane. The same thing happened to him all the time with trips. He would get very tense before a flight.

What? Aren't we going first class? Whined Melisa. Don't you think this is just too much? Ten hours in flight in...second class?"

Mr. Benzimra, there has been a mistake. Said the company's first ground assistant. It seems there has been an error and you were placed in tourist class.

No, no, there's no mistake, protested Isaac.I asked for it.

But why? Isn't our first class comfortable? enquired the steward.

No, no, it's not that, smiled Isaac.I just wanted to surprise my wife.

Melisa intervened: A good joke. You certainly have surprised me now, mister... She looked at the identification badge on his jacket. Mr. Gonzalez, please fix this situation.

Yes, Mr. Gonzalez.Isaac winked at the other man as is typical between men who share a secret. But neither of the two knew what it was about.

Isaac was tired. His fatigue helped him to sleep throughout the trip. During the flight his wife drank a lot of champagne and ate a lot of caviar. She looked disdainfully at her sleeping husband who did not take advantage of the pleasures of flying in first class.

It poured in Malaga when the plane landed at the airport which begins at the seashore. Rain, what a blessing, said Isaac.

Yes, a blessing, but not while I'm on vacation, sniffed Melisa.

Isaac rented a car and they went to the hotel.

Melisa was disappointed with that hotel which didn't even offer room service.

I like hotels where they welcome you with a bottle of champagne, she declared.

Isaac murmured, I don't really know if you are with me only because of the money or also because of the money. Isn't there anything else that interests you?

Yes, sex with you, she whispered.

He smiled politely. He hadn't expected that response. But they made love. Melisa liked to feel his hands on her body, although now they made love much less than in previous years. That seemed like something completely natural. She was satisfied because she had sexual relations with her husband at least once a week; something which did not happen with her friends who could easily count the number of copulations in a year on the fingers of one hand.

They spent the day in bed.

Tomorrow I'm going to Cordoba, he announced.

Isn't that kind of far away? she replied.

I'm leaving at six in the morning, he advised.I want to get there early. You have to come with me. I'm going to the village of my ancestors, Lucena. Did you know that in the old days Lucena was known as a Jewish city?

But you're not a Jew. You're a Christian! she asserted.

I'm Jewish and Christian, he responded.

I'll stay here, she concluded.I'll spend time by the seaside. I'll do some shopping in Malaga and then rest. Have a good trip.

"At three in the morning both wandered about the room, fully awake as though it were noon.

I had a dream, he related.A strange dream. I dreamed that they were making a lot of genetic modifications in man and that at first they made mistakes and some strange kinds of beings were born. So, to keep them from being seen, they were left in a remote village away from the world. I walked around in that village and saw men with female genitals on the knee, or persons with hands on their ears, others with intestines on the outside, many with only one eye or three legs.... And then I woke up.

Well those are just nightmares, she dismissed.

Once I wanted to be a writer, you know, he reminded her.It was before I started studying law. There are a lot of writers who studied law and later abandon the profession. Maybe I should make my dream a reality and become a writer. It's now or never.

And what would we live on? she quavered.

That's easy, he said reassuringly.I can sell my law firm for at least a million dollars and start writing.

A million dollars spends real fast, she whined.So then what?

It can also spend slower if we learn how to waste less, he asserted.

What good would it do for us to learn to waste less? she hissed.

Then your husband would be happy and could do what he wants to do, he declared."I am fed up with representing unpleasant people. I'm tired of files, I could write a good book with my dream. I can tell a lot of things about the family...a long story, I could be a renowned writer.

I don't think this is the time to make such a decision, she declared."I would like to order a tea, but in this