bulging arm muscles as they settled into their seats. Mr Zulman waited until they were seated comfortably, adjusted his woven skullcap and began to speak:
“As we learnt last week, the Israelites were slaves in Egypt. Pharaoh made them work day and night building his magnificent city. The slaves made the clay for the bricks with their bare hands until their fingers cracked and bled. They groaned in despair as they shuffled along with their backs bent, straining to carry their heavy loads. When they paused, the taskmasters who were hired men to oversee the slaves would beat these tired, starved people. Every day the slaves would weep bitterly and pray that they would be delivered from their endless torment.”
Mr Zulman took a breath, stood up and the four children looked up at this colossal man. Even Talia was listening as his words painted pictures in her head of the suffering slaves.
“Pharaoh is the symbol of the force of darkness. Let us go beyond ourselves and think of that darkness spreading its long fingers, gripping the world in the form of harsh rulers who inflict pain and suffering on poor, starved tormented nations.”
Mr Zulman stopped for a moment realising he had probably gone a bit overboard with his description.
He continued but this time more simply:
“Taskmasters represent people who carry out evil acts. Even in our own lives, there might be a person who makes our life a misery every single day so that we don’t even want to go to school, or perhaps there is a difficulty within ourselves that we struggle with continually.”
Mr Zulman spread out large sheets of crisp, white paper on each desk while the students sat in silence, thinking about Mr Zulman’s solemn words. He laid out paints in an array of colours and sat down, waiting for them to begin.
“Think about what I have said and just paint whatever comes into your head. Anything goes!”
Mr Zulman noticed that Maha was looking at him in confusion. He felt a pang of guilt at having being caught up in his own descriptions without having considered Maha’s English skills.
“What I am saying, Maha is that like the slaves, we may have experienced sadness in our lives or we might still be feeling pain within ourselves, even today…” Mr Zulman’s voice trailed off as he saw the flash of anguish in Maha’s eyes and he regretted having asked her to revisit her past.
He added quickly, “Only if you want to, Maha.”
She looked into the distance for a moment then carefully picked up a black texta and began to draw.
Talia, who was usually the last to begin any task, had already started painting. Talia loved art and knew that while she struggled to write down her thoughts, she could easily draw her ideas since pictures just seemed to pop into her head. She drew an oversized teacher figure bending menacingly over a little girl seated at her desk. She drew the teacher with an ugly mouth and protruding eyes. She dipped her brush in the brown paint and began to paint the little girl’s brown curls falling across her face. She stopped for a moment and surveyed the scene on her paper. She picked up a thin paintbrush, dipped it carefully into the emerald green paint and started to paint the hair ribbons as if trying to tie back the stubborn curls. She continued to draw carefully but no one could see the face of the girl with teary eyes as she stared sadly down at the book in front of her with the letters jumping all over the page.
While the others followed Talia’s lead and also began to paint, Emma sat frozen in her seat. She stared at the blank white paper in front of her, which seemed as empty as her life. Why did I even join this class? she wondered dejectedly. “Fingers of darkness!” she repeated Mr Zulman’s words to herself with disdain, “he speaks like a man straight out of the Bible. I am being punished for being happy!” Emma looked over at Simon’s painting. She saw that he had drawn a little boy with red hair whom she immediately identified as Simon himself standing dwarfed between two tall people, a woman and a man with large gaping, shouting mouths. She watched intrigued as he dipped his brush into the red paint and spread it onto the boy’s face. The face was curdling with anger. She could feel the misery as he drew their outstretched hands pulling the boy apart.
Emma sat despondently in the quiet of the classroom. Her eyes fell on Maha’s sheet. To her shock, she saw no colour at all. Maha was using only black paint. Emma watched as Maha drew a large room with row after row of beds against the pristine white paper. Emma was not sure what it all meant but she had to turn away, while her empty paper stared back at her accusingly.
At last the bell rang for morning recess. For Emma, the last thirty minutes had seemed like an eternity. She sprang from her seat, took one last regretful glance at the untouched white sheet and made for the door. The others followed her out of the classroom and although it was still early in the day, they felt the mounting heat. As they were about to pass the office building, Simon whispered to the others, “Let’s climb to the rooftop to eat our morning tea.”
Talia and Maha hesitated. The rooftop was out of bounds to the students. Having just started at a new school, they didn’t want to break the rules. Emma, in all her years at the school, had not even considered the possibility of climbing to the rooftop. They looked uncertainly at the staircase encrusted with flakes of rust. Simon looked around and urged them, “C’mon there’s no one around, follow me!” They reluctantly followed him, quickly climbing the creaky stairs while constantly glancing over their shoulders.
As they stepped onto the rooftop, they were immediately rewarded by the soft, cool breeze that swept off the harbour. They stood for a moment enjoying the view of the sailing boats which looked like white frozen dots on the still water. While the others sat down, Maha shaded her eyes and stood motionless staring at the Opera House. She squinted and thought that it looked like a huge sailing boat billowing in the wind while wisps of cloud hovered above and she almost expected it to sail away into the distance.
“Maha!” she heard Emma call and she turned and sat down beside them.
They opened their brown paper morning-tea bags while Maha opened one of her two lunch boxes that her mother insisted on sending with her each day. Her lunch boxes were always a source of fascination for the other children. The three friends cast inquisitive side glances into the box. Today there was flat bread filled to overflowing with neatly chopped salad. The smell of garlic was overpowering but that did not diminish their curiosity.
Maha, sensing their interest and having been taught the importance of sharing, offered her food to the others. “Would you like some?” she asked, handing over her lunch box.
“Sure would! Let’s swap,” replied Simon eagerly and he and Emma offered their chips, muesli bars and apples in exchange. As they bit into the pitta bread, they were quite taken aback by the sudden hit of spicy hummus but munched away happily, enjoying the tingle on their tongues.
“Once had felafel on Bondi Beach with my dad,” Simon told Maha, while wiping the dripping hummus off his chin with the back of his hand.
“Really?” said Maha with some surprise while thinking that it was very strange that her country’s food was sold near a beach in Sydney. She bit gingerly into the muesli bar and immediately liked the sweet taste so early in the morning. Talia reluctantly declined to exchange her morning tea. Her mother had placed her on a special diet with the start of her new school. She knew that it was supposed to help her concentrate and she was not sure if Maha`s food fitted into her new diet, so she miserably ate her fresh fruit while watching the others intently with envy.
Tuesday Afternoon
Whenever
