As a result the remainder of my notice period simply flies by and before I know it I'm unemployed. I had never thought it possible I would end up in such a situation in Switzerland. But after six years’ continuous employment I now find myself having to sign on for the dole. Going down to the unemployment office is something I find really hard. But contrary to all my expectations they treat me really courteously and kindly. They tell me I have to wait two months and then I'll be entitled to eighty per cent of my previous salary. They won't however take into account the expenses I received for my car so I'll have to pay the leasing company's charges. But I'll get by OK as long as I just cut a few corners. I'm more confident now that I'll get a job again soon, although I'm not sure just what it'll be. It does seem to be particularly bad luck that the job market has dried up at the moment. I put a new ad of my own in the paper but that turns out to be an expense that brings nothing in.
Once I've got over the initial shock however and my reaction to it, I find myself enjoying the opportunity of seeing more of Napirai. At lunchtime, I spend ages cooking something nice for the two of us and listening first-hand to all her stories of what went on at kindergarten. Previously I only heard all of this, second-hand, if at all, from her childminder. I take care, however, not to lose touch with her either and whenever I get interviews I take Napirai to stay with her as I'm still hoping to find a new job soon. But my hopes start to fade after two months on the dole and I can feel myself slipping into lethargy.
It's around this time that one of my friends gives me the address of a fortune teller. Even though I don't really believe in that sort of thing and certainly can't afford the expense, I go to see her in the hope of finding out something about what I'm going to do with my life. She turns out to be about seventy years old, living in a tiny old house, with a garden and window boxes full of gnomes. Just the sight of them makes me smirk to myself as I bend down to get through the door into a low-ceilinged living room decorated with photographs, artificial flowers and lots of other kitsch.
I sit down opposite the old lady at her kitchen table, filled with curiosity about what's going to happen next. Obviously I'm skeptical about the whole business but I tell myself I can't dismiss something I've never even tried. As I sit there laying out cards on the table, a ginger cat comes and settles itself on my lap completing the image of a witch's cottage. As I place the cards one on top of the other the old woman starts explaining what they mean. Even though I've told her nothing about myself she says she can see that I live alone with a child and that's not going to change any time soon. Well there you go, but I haven't come to find out about my love life. What I want to know is where and how I'm going to find another job.
She keeps looking up and then down at the cards and then pronounces sagely that I've led a crazy life somewhere abroad and that it's still dominating my life. She looks up at me and asks if I write a lot of letters or if there's any other way in which I'm trying to come to terms with my past. I tell her briefly that in fact at the moment I'm writing down the story of my life in Africa with my child's father. ‘So, are you going to write a book?’ ‘Yes, but I don't know if I want to publish it,’ I tell her perfectly honestly.
She listens to me but not very attentively as far as I can make out, while she shuffles the cards again and tells me to start laying some of them out again. Then all of a sudden, she bursts into life and says: ‘I can tell you one thing: you have to keep on with what you're doing and publish the book. It will be a great success, yes, even way beyond the boundaries of our little Switzerland.’ I laugh with her at this but say: ‘Maybe, maybe, but that's a long way off. What I want to know is what sort of job I can do in the immediate future?’ ‘Everything will be fine,’ she tells me, ‘just don't rush into anything. Take your time.’
Driving home I think to myself that that hasn't got me very far. She just might be right about the book, wouldn't that be nice? But I've got to finish it first. Every evening when Napirai has gone to bed and I've got time to myself, I plunge back into my memories and try to pin them down on paper. It's become a compulsion as much as a ritual. When I get home the first thing I do is call Hanni who's been reading what I write as I go along. I tell her what the fortune teller said and she thinks it's wonderful and laughs: ‘I've been telling you that for years. You wait and see — they'll end up making a film out of it.’ We both laugh at that. She says she's missed not seeing more of me, either at work or privately. The trouble is I hardly go out at all any more as I need to keep count of every franc to avoid ending up in debt.
After three months on the dole I eventually get a new job, even if I'm not absolutely sure about it. Even so it's better than queuing up every Friday at the benefit office with my unemployment certificate in my hand. It's a company that sells haircare products to big shops and chemists. Before long I realise that I have so many customers to get round that if I want to do the job properly I can hardly ever get home before seven o'clock, which means I see my daughter for an hour a day at most. I have hardly any time to eat properly, least of all at lunch and before long my mother's telling me I'm starting to look ill again. My nerves are so bad that I give up the job even before the end of the probationary period.
Apart from anything my evening writing routine is taking more out of me, not least because I feel I'm going through some of those experiences again, both physically and. psychologically. By the time I've finished writing about one of my severe bouts of illness I'm actually feeling seriously ill and run down. Then there are other occasions when I have to give up writing because I'm in floods of tears. Every now and then I actually give it a break for an evening or two to gather my strength again. It's been eight months now but I'm gradually approaching the end, even though I'm not exactly sure where the end should be.
James's most recent letter says thanks for the photos of Napirai. Mama and Lketinga were very upset when they saw them; they miss us both so much still. He encloses a picture of Lketinga's new wife. I immediately recognize her as someone who as a little girl used to come into the shop often to buy sugar or maize flour. She was very quiet and relatively inconspicuous. I'm pleased for the two of them and particularly to hear from James that Lketinga has given up alcohol completely. He says he'll send me a picture of their new baby later. It's a little girl, ten months old already. But his long letter contains bad news too. Lketinga's older brother's wife, Mama Saguna, has had a lot of health problems and has been in hospital now for three months. She can't come home until they've paid the hospital bill and on top of that they owe money to the Somalis for a makeshift ambulance service to take her from Barsaloi to Wamba. I can imagine it really must have been a matter of life and death, because a patient has to be more dead than alive before they even think of a hospital. I know from my own experience that first of all they'll try every type of traditional medicine. James says my mother-in-law has now got his brother's five children and their newborn living with her and none of them have enough to eat. James asks me once again to send some money to help them, which upsets me a lot, primarily because now that I'm unemployed I haven't even enough money to get by myself. Instead I ask my older brother and Hanspeter if they can spare some which both readily agree to.
Otherwise being unemployed again no longer bothers me so much. While I was back at work I realised that I want to try something completely new, something more demanding. At thirty-six I'm still young enough to do some further education. I spend every day poring over the newspapers for opportunities.