Judy continues her story
Taritarat was a mystery land, like Brigadoon or Shangri la, a paradoxical place racked by extreme religion and unrestricted vice. I wondered much about a place my parents had lived that few outsiders had seen for 30 years. Also, now having reached 30, I sought some adventure to distract me from my lost youth. I became obsessed with learning more about Taritarat.
I spoke of Taritarat with Gloria who nostalgically said how much fun it had been there for awhile. "It was really beautiful both the country and the people who were there. All those crazy, bold, sexy people." I asked her how long she'd been there and she said, "Long enough to have ... ," paused and finished, "five years." When I inquired what she knew of the place now, she let drop that she was sure she knew a few folks there but she wasn't sure who. "Maybe, if you are so interested in Taritarat, you should go and see for yourself."
I read everything I could about the place. I spoke to an official of the State Department. He told me that Taritarat was on its "Don't even think about visiting" list along with North Korea and areas of the Middle East run entirely by religious extremists. I managed to find an older woman who admitted to having left Taritarat in the last decade but she absolutely refused to discuss conditions there. When I suggested that I would like to visit and write a story, she said that that was crazy. I'd be better off swimming with sharks or going to visit Mexican drug lords or ISIS fighters.
I told John Dalman about Taritarat and suggested the idea of getting into there. He said that he had vaguely heard of the place and that going there was a fabulous idea. The magazine would definitely publish whatever I wrote after getting back. "Judy, if you pulled that off, it could make our magazine more than a shiny advertising piece and give us a reputation for real journalism. If you really experienced the place yourself, I'm pretty sure you could also swing a book deal."
"I agree," I said, "but I haven't found anyone who thinks I can visit there."
So I went back to Gloria to probe more. "I think you can go there but I don't know, I have not been there for 30 years," she said. "I think I know someone who knows more."
About a week later, I received a call from a John Harpin. Harpin said he was a friend of my mother's and he could get me into Taritarat if I was still interested. We agreed to meet for lunch. I was immediately rather put off by the way he stared at my body without even pretending that he wasn't doing so. Also, he made clear that Taritarat was not a place for visitors who could not deal with very different mores. "You can't just go as a journalist or a tourist, you need to contact someone in advance who is acceptable to the Taritarat government to act as a guide who knows how to broker the three main factions and go pretty much incognito. You would have to pretend to be visiting relatives and expect to wear an abaya whenever you left your room.
Women in particular would face a lot of adjustments. The Wallee are not Muslim at all and trace themselves to beliefs that go back to before Mohammed. The Nubimbi claim to be Muslims but no real Muslims would ever accept them as such. They claim they are descended from a secret prophet, Nubimbat, to which Mohammad imparted esoteric teachings, not mentioned in the Koran or the traditions These teachings require many more rituals, forms of purity and stricter control of women than is required by any real Muslim school or sect.
"In some parts of the country, the laws are so religious and strict that Taritarat makes Saudi Arabia seem like Germany or Nevada. What you would consider to be petty offenses are punishable by death or very long prison terms. Also, the police are authorized to execute justice on the spot unless witnesses volunteer that there is a potentially valid defense."
"If this mission is impossibly dangerous, why are you talking to me about going to Taritarat?" I asked.
"The laws are very strict, but, enforcement can be very flexible in Glaessov and Lbirne," Harpin said. "Officials and policemen in the cities don't go looking for problems if they have been given the routine payment. Even if they find problems, they can become very reasonable. Wealthy persons and their servants are not likely to be bothered by anyone. Indeed, it is said in Glaessov and Lbirne that the law is what the highest bidder says it is."
It was obvious that the idea of going to Taritarat to write about it was about as dangerous as explorer Richard Burton's trip to Mecca in 1853. Even keeping one's head off a chopping block might be expensive. When I told this all to Dalman, however, he encouraged me not to give up. "Stanley crossed half of Africa on foot to get a story no better than this."
But there I left the matter for a month until the idea of the trip was raised from an unexpected direction. After telling Julie and Tony about Taritarat over wine after work, Julie said that while recently visiting a restaurant for the magazine in Mexico she'd met a chef who made what he called "Steak Taritarat. She'd thought it was very good but had never heard of it. She had asked the chef what was in it. She was slightly surprised to learn it involved fishmeal, veal and goatmeat but, as a food writer, she had encountered a lot of unusual foods. What was most unique was the variety spices used that she had not had before.