Rain over Baghdad: A Novel of Iraq (2 page)

The steward took the bag and I wrapped the long train of my dress around my arm and got on the plane. The passengers cheered and hurriedly climbed the ladder. My eyes filled with tears.

I must confess that I was going to Hatim without fully comprehending my confusion. I was like a bird with its feet tied, unable to
walk and unable to fly. I had met him at the birthday party for my neighbor and childhood friend Salwa. He had just returned from Germany where he had studied engineering. He was a friend of her fiancé, Hashim. When he saw me he said, “I left Germany for one reason: to marry an Egyptian young lady with brown skin and honey-colored eyes and brown hair like you. Would you believe that I’ve just found her?”

I said, laughing, “But I only met you a few minutes ago. Most Egyptian women have brown skin, honey-colored eyes, and brown hair, even if it were dyed.”

“Don’t underestimate my intuition about people.”

A week later I saw him standing in front of me at the Faculty of Arts. He said, “Sorry for not being here sooner. I had to travel to Maghagha. My mother was sick and I didn’t want my younger brother to handle all the responsibility by himself.”

I said to myself, “A Sa‘idi with red, frizzy hair and freckles all over his face. Maybe he is a Sa‘idi from Holland!” I held myself back from laughing at the thought and took him to the cafeteria to drink some tea.

I found myself caught up in his life. He bombarded me with details, saying, “I am a practical man. I face the whole world in an impartial way, but I am partial only to you.”

After a few months we announced our engagement, then he went to Baghdad.

I sat next to an Egyptian engineer who worked in Iraq. He wished me success, then fell asleep. I couldn’t sleep in spite of staying up very late and waking early. Throughout the flight I didn’t think of the marriage or the unknown I was about to encounter in my new life, leaving behind my friends and family and my writing job at
al-Zahra
magazine. I’d had the job during my years in college and now my boss told me, “Send us news and features from Iraq.” I busied myself with the details of the trip, placing my full trust in Hatim. The new city, Baghdad, would be full of excitement. I never suggested to Hatim going back to Germany, which he loved very
much and always remembered with great longing. When he got two job offers, one to Saudi Arabia and the other to Iraq, we both decided without hesitation to accept the Iraqi contract offer even though its pay was half that of the Saudi one. Our thinking was that life in Baghdad was more natural and more civilized. We thought of
The Thousand and One Nights
, of Harun al-Rashid, Zubayda, al-Farabi, Hammurabi, Enkidu, and Ishtar.

The stewardess brought a cake and an Egyptian woman who sat behind me ululated. After a few minutes I found myself facing the open plane door to the scorching heat of a June day at four in the afternoon. I felt I had suddenly stood in front of the open door of a bakery oven. The airport employees deliberately took their time finishing my arrival procedures as I moved from one window to another; each officer held on to my passport, smiling. As I slowly made my way to the exit, I saw Hatim in the midst of his Egyptian and Iraqi friends, waving to me.

On the way to our house his friend, Adel, asked me, “Don’t you have a sister?”

I said, “No.”

He said, “I want to marry your sister or cousin or even your friend, anyone close to you.”

Hatim said, “Today I alone get to make all the requests.”

Adel said, “She’s ours until we arrive at the house. I beseech you, for the Prophet’s sake. I want a bride.”

Whenever Adel visited us afterward, he persisted in his request. One day, a few months later, I welcomed his bride at the airport. His mother had chosen her for him from the girls of the family. He introduced her to me, saying, “This is Nahid.”

October 1980

Destruction

“Al-Dora Refineries and Baghdad Power Company Bombed. Today at 12:00 noon, the Baghdad Power Company and the oil refineries in al-Dora were bombed heavily by the Iranian Air Force. This led to power outages in most neighborhoods of the city, several injuries among the workers, the destruction of the nearby residential neighborhood, the martyring of a number of inhabitants, and the wounding of many, some in critical condition.”

I stared at the television screen and the Cairo TV announcer. I saw the wall of my house lying in ruins and on fire right in front of me. I said to my father, who was listening attentively to the news, “Father, my house in Dora is burning.” He said, “Thank God that you’ve arrived in Egypt safely. War is nothing but destruction!”

My mother said, “Who’s there now?”

I said, “I don’t know. Titi and her two children are here in Cairo. Most of our Egyptian women friends have left Baghdad with their children, leaving behind the men in their jobs. Her husband, Mahmoud, is at work in the factory right now. I think the floor I lived on is still vacant and nobody would be at home at that time except
by chance. Perhaps Abu Maasuma, the gardener. Only God knows. The war broke out nine days after I left Iraq. I’ll call Titi in the evening to inquire about Mahmoud. I’ll also call Tante Fayza to make sure that Ustaz Hilmi Amin is all right.”

I remembered Umm Samira and Umm Tayih, my neighbors in Dora. I had friends in all the neighborhoods of Baghdad. I remembered Anhar and wondered whether she had returned to Baghdad. I remembered the Egyptian peasants in the Iraqi village al-Khalsa and the Murabba‘ Café and al-Rashid Street.

Titi’s voice on the telephone in the evening was sad. She told me about the devastation that her husband Mahmoud described to her on the telephone. Tante Fayza said that Hilmi was fine but that the situation in Baghdad was bad.

Titi and her two children returned to Baghdad a few months later, having made sure that calm had returned. I remembered the letter that she wrote to me as soon as she entered the house:

In the name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate. My dear beloved sister and friend, Nora, my dear son, Yasir, and my brother, Hatim:

I write to you from Baghdad. I hope you receive the letter in the best of health and happiness. Dear sister, I would like you to know that I arrived in Baghdad on Saturday 2/5/81 in the morning after waiting in Amman airport for approximately nine long hours. When I arrived at the house I was totally surprised by what had happened to it. The house was badly hit and one side of it was burned down. You can’t imagine the look on my face when I saw that and imagined how anyone would have fared if they were at home when it was bombed. Of course they surrounded the whole neighborhood and evacuated everyone. They did the same with Abu Gamal’s and Abu Nidal’s houses. Anyway, Nora, it was a harrowing scene. They paid Mahmoud the sum of three hundred dinars for all of our losses. Can you imagine all of the boxes in which I had packed all the household items so that
Mahmoud would ship them if we decided to return for good? The living room set, the fridge and the washer and a vacuum cleaner that Mahmoud had bought and a rug. Mahmoud also said that his monthly salary was in his suit pocket because the house was hit on 2/10/1980. Anyway, nothing really matters so long as we are all alive. They compensated the owners of the house by paying them two thousand dinars, a small sum since the house is old. Not a single window has any glass left. And of course whenever I sit down and look around, I wonder what would have happened to us if we were all there when it happened. My friends saw fire all the way from the Mechanic neighborhood. My colleague, Hizam, remember her? She told me that the flames of the fire extended all the way to the Muthalath area at the beginning of the Mahdi from the direction of the Sayidiya. That was one reason why Atef, the engineer, did not take lodging with us and—can you imagine? - he’s thinking of resigning and returning to Egypt: Sawsan is pregnant after Duaa. Her daughter is quite a darling, just like your daughter, God willing.

I’ve talked too much. You must be tired of reading by now.

Dearest Nora, I went to the market for the first time yesterday. I found a baby outfit for one dinar, would you like me to buy several for the coming baby? I found some baby shampoo for 850 fils and Johnson powder for 650 fils and a heater for nursing milk for 4.5 dinars. I also found Shiku pacifiers for 420 fils each. All baby clothes are about one dinar each. I would like you to know that when I arrived, Ustaz Hilmi Amin was at a conference in Tunis and came back only a few days ago. I have given him the stuff I had and reassured him about Tante Fayza and the girls. The house still needs repairs. I am using only one room on the second floor. I hope that you are well and that the pregnancy is progressing in the best of conditions and that your features get published regularly. Unfortunately we don’t receive
al-Zahra
magazine.

At the end of my letter, in which I have gone on for so long, I send you greetings from Mahmoud, Madu, and Amani. Please convey my
greetings to Yasir and Hatim until we meet again in another letter. I hope to receive your reply to make sure everything is okay.

Your sister, Titi

First Text

Three knocks on the door of memory restored life to days that were lingering as they turned toward disappearing forever. I tugged at the end of the thread of time that used to tame mountains and humans. The days broke loose and came tumbling down on my heart. I tried to stop their ruthless flow and pay attention to what was happening around me, but I couldn’t. Inside of me there was a rush seeking to recapture the flow of the days and once again feel the pleasure of the pain that didn’t contain the moment. I was carrying my suitcase to the airport on my way to Baghdad, not believing that I had indeed left my six-month-old son with my mother-in-law in Maghagha, two and a half hours away from Cairo.

My mother said, “They’re going to forget you if you keep declining invitations to travel like that. Accept the invitation to participate in the conference. Five days will not turn the universe upside down.”

I said, “I am still breastfeeding Haytham. How can I leave him?”

“Take him with you,” she said.

I called the Secretary General of the conference and asked about the hotel where we’d be staying and the possibility of daycare for my infant son during the conference sessions.

After some hesitation she said, “Al-Rashid Hotel, in front of the Hall of Conferences. Yes, we can provide daycare.”

I don’t know how she conceived of the idea. I relied on her consent to convince myself that it was possible for my baby to accompany me. I searched in my memory for the location of daycare centers close to the hotel. I knew the city quite well. I had worked in it as a correspondent in
al-Zahra
magazine bureau for
five years. I visualized the program, the panels I would have to run to attend, the official lunch and dinner invitations I would have to go to. I asked myself, “When was I ever able, during a conference, to return to my house at midday or even midnight? Where would my son be?”

I thought of hiring an Iraqi nanny to come and live with me in the hotel and take care of him in my absence. I liked that solution, but once again I found myself thinking, “Where would such a lady come from all of a sudden? Should I, before the trip, ask for the help of my neighbors, Umm Gamal and Umm Tayih? Or my friends, Rajaa, Ilham, and Titi?” Between my reluctance and acceptance I started writing my paper about educating women after teaching them how to read and write. I asked myself: “What do mature women who have just learned how to read need?” I thought of offering them a program closely relevant to their lives. I thought, “Would the Iraqis accept models from non-Iraqi thinkers?” I remembered the battles I had to go through in discussing with them the absolute necessity of Arab unity before adopting socialism and how I was not at all convinced of the possibility of a union of countries that had not achieved freedom. I wrote a preliminary program on several levels convincing women that knowledge was of the utmost importance.

My life was filled with competing tasks: running to finish my magazine features, taking care of my son, Yasir, who was now going to school, and Haytham, who got a meal of yogurt while I was away from the house. I didn’t need the added responsibility of writing an important paper for a conference organized by the League of Arab States and the Iraqi Women’s Union. Haytham’s laugh was sufficient to settle the competition between writing my paper and taking care of him. And of course he was the winner.

My daily program began at 5:00 a.m. with his first feed. I would go to him in his crib and change him, then leave him to sleep and wake up again at 8:00 a.m. During his nap I would run the washing machine and the dishwasher, cut up the vegetables, prepare breakfast for the
whole family, get Yasir ready for school and send him on his way, put lunch on the stove, then run a warm bath for Haytham in a plastic tub. A spoonful of honey or tomatoes and a good breastmilk meal were quite enough to fill him and give me a sense that I had carried out my duties, for the time being at least. He would protest noisily against my abandoning him in the crib, then would calm down and begin to observe me, his eyes following me so long as I was in his field of vision. When I went out the door he would summon me with real tears and sobs. I would rock him until he slept or sang “Da, da, da.” My getting absorbed in writing without talking to him was always met with revolt and protest. I would say to him, “Clean and full up, what do you want?”

I would stop to play with him a little, then go back to writing. Sometimes he would totally refuse my ignoring him, at which point I would have no choice but to carry him on my thigh while reading or writing, turning him over from time to time or rocking him on my legs until he went to sleep and I went back to what I was doing. When he refused to go to sleep, I would leave him on my leg and try to create a balance between the sentences running away from the blank page in front of me and the pupils of his eyes, which followed my face, wanting me to be his at that very moment. I wanted to belong to him but also to my work and to those women who wanted to catch up with what was happening around them in the big world. It is the child who enslaves the woman, not the man.