He gave me his address and phone number.

When dinner was over, right in front of his colleagues, he kissed me three times, as they do in Switzerland to saygoodbye, adieu.

He came to Morocco three times to see me. We visited three Moroccan cities together: Marrakech, Tangiers,Ouarzazate.

I went to see him in Switzerland twice.

We wrote each other at least Five letters a week.

Here I am on the streets of Geneva. Berne Street. Neuchâtel Street. The Paquis district. The lake. MagnificentLake Léman. France on the other side. I was going in circles.I bought a sandwich from a Lebanese guy, a chicken shawarmawith a very strong, very garlicky white sauce that I can stillremember. I didn’t have enough money to get something todrink. A glass of water would do. And after that? After that:I’d sleep. But where? In a hotel? Impossible, I needed to savethe few Swiss francs I had to pay for using the baggagecheckroom. On the street? Next to Cornavin Station? Insidethe Station itself? I ran all the possibilities through mymind. Go up to someone and ask him to put me up for thenight (I’d seen that done so many times back in Morocco,why not here ...)?

It was already nine o’clock. Darkness completely shrouded the city. The streets of Geneva were empty, worse than Rabat ona winters evening. It was cold now. A crazy idea crossed mymind: go to a sauna and spend the night there. It’s warm in asauna. And a sauna would be open all night, wouldn’t it? Jeanbrought me to one the first time I visited him in the summer of1997. Just where was that sauna? I didn’t remember any more.

So, forget the sauna idea. The street: no other choice. I started looking for a quiet spot, someplace out of the wind, ifpossible. Once again, my steps led me in the direction ofCornavin Station. The building was empty, silent, overlysilent, sinister. The stores in the underground mall had closedhours ago. (In Geneva, everything closes at 7 p.m.—life juststops!) Fortunately, the store windows still had their lights on.

I had a good time looking in them, especially comparing the prices for different items and then converting them intodirhams. I wondered what Genevans were up to at this hourof the night. I exited the Station via the main entrance andlooked up at the windows of houses and buildings. Yes, lightswere on inside them but I felt they were somehow vacant, theSwiss somehow mute. I searched for a human form, somesign, was only met with silence. And the silence in Switzerlandis deep, opaque, deaf, horrible.