One look at Doctor Zerbib would tell you where Big Baba sourced his inspiration for dressing up as a respectable intellectual. Their outfits were almost identical. Tweed jacket, corduroy trousers, striped tie and glasses so far down the nose they’re on the brink of committing suicide. Not forgetting the Bic biros, of course, clipped to the shirt pocket.
The biggest difference between Big Baba and Zerbib, apart from years of studies, was probably personal hygiene. I don’t think our family doctor washed his hair very often. I remember he was forever dusting off his shoulders, so you felt like you were inside a paperweight snow globe, without the fairy tale.
Big Baba liked things that were old and reassuring: my mother, the junk piled up in our garden, his Renault R11 turbo and his black fur karakul. Which explains why nothing in the world could have persuaded him to choose a different GP.
Doctor Zerbib’s surgery was always open, except for Shabbat. He refused to use a computer, he had one of those colonial-style wooden consulting rooms and he had even organised a regional conference about the damaging effects of automated measuring devices for arterial tension.
‘Tfffou! He’s a charlatan, that doctor! People only see 40 Zerbib to get signed off work! Everyone knows that!’
One point to my mother. But that was before the changes to the health benefits system. Patient reimbursements worked differently from then on, Zerbib had the medical insurers breathing down his neck and the era of being signed off work for a fortnight was over. As a result, so many people deserted the practice that, in a matter of months, the average age of his patients went from 45 to 75.
Given the risk of being struck off, Doctor Zerbib became conscientious to a fault. The day he diagnosed my mother as being a hypochondriac, she took against him for good.
‘You’re perfectly healthy, Madame Chennoun! I bet you’ll live to be France’s next-oldest citizen! If God wills it so, you’ll overtake Jeanne Calment and her 122 years!’
‘So, what are you prescribing me? Peppermints?’
‘No, Madame Chennoun, homeopathy. You’re just a little bit anxious. These will calm you down and help you to sleep better.’
‘That’s it? And you’re asking me for €22, Dr Zerbib?’
‘23. It’s gone up.’
‘€23 to tell me I’m hysterical?’
‘I didn’t say hysterical, I said hypochondriac, let’s be clear.’
My mother eventually unearthed a different doctor who didn’t balk at issuing her with a wad of prescriptions, and who diagnosed her with diabetes, hypertension and osteoarthritis.
Thanks to him, she won the ultimate argument for the rest of her days: the state undertook to pay 100 percent of all medical expenses in recognition of her long-term incapacity.
On the bus: ‘Excuse me, young man, could I have your seat please? I’m on 100 percent!’
At the supermarket till: ‘Sorry, but do you mind if I go ahead of you? I’m on 100 percent!’ 41
To my father: ‘Stop getting on my nerves, Abdelkader! I’m on 100 percent!’
Despite all the doubts concerning Marc Zerbib’s competence as a doctor, Big Baba remained his most loyal patient.
Until the day he said to Mina, ‘I’ve got a very bad headache.’
It was rare for Big Baba to complain. Mina gave him some paracetamol and a glass of water and told the children to play quietly. That was when she noticed my father was struggling to raise the glass to his mouth.
‘What’s going on, Papa?’
Big Baba was staring into space.
We rang Doctor Zerbib, who recommended the patient rest up for a few days while we waited on a scan appointment.
But the reality was that Big Baba was suffering a stroke, otherwise known as a cerebrovascular accident. CVA: three letters that conceal a life-threatening emergency.
When my mother noticed that Big Baba’s right arm was swelling up, she remembered hearing from a neighbour about her sister’s father-in-law, who had suffered a stroke back in Algeria…
Long story short, we called the emergency services and rushed straight to hospital.