Beyond Love (Middle East Literature in Translation) (7 page)

I knew my father only through photographs. Most of
them were taken on the river among fishermen-he was
usually holding a fish he had just caught, stretching the
fishing net, standing on the shore. In some of the photos,
he was with my mother. I wasn't nostalgic about him, for
he was simply a picture in my imagination. But sweeping nostalgic emotions still drew me to my mother. I was
still pressed by the desire to touch her fingers, to listen to
her voice, to follow in her footsteps as I used to do in my
childhood. She was a strong woman. She patiently faced
the difficulties of raising me, and after my father's death,
she refused to remarry, although she was still young.
She lived under my uncle's protection for two years, and
when he got married, she lived independently in a small
house with my paternal grandmother, with whom I had
been much closer. My mother was very busy securing our
living, working until she died in a vegetable oil factory.
When she died, I was in my second year of college in the
Faculty of Arts.

My nostalgia was interrupted when the car stopped
at a checkpoint. A soldier who couldnt have been more
than twenty appeared at the window; he stared at our
faces and looked at me. I forced a smile. He didn't search
our belongings and didn't ask for anything. He gave his
signal to the driver to move on. As the car crept forward,
I shuddered. The checkpoint's lights retreated; once again
we were plunged into the night's darkness. I stuck my
face to the window glass. Nothing. The night was endless, and the sky distant-no moon, not a single star. I felt
as though we were in a dark tunnel with no end in sight.
My soul flew ahead of me and over the border blockades,
fleeing as though pursued by a hunter's bullet, going as
high as it could in hopes that the bullet would miss the
mark. Suddenly I was shaking, and my teeth were chattering. I pulled myself together, searching for strength.
The checkpoints were endless: rapid questions and
strange looks ... cold ... fear ... heavy hours ... until we
reached Tribil, the last station.

When the driver asked me to get out of the car there,
I was terrified, and my fear felt like sharp canine teeth.
My throat dried up, and my lips hardened. I gripped
the beads of the camel necklace, hoping that they would
bring me good fortune. But my throbbing heart continued its agitated leaps, one after another. The most horrible moment was when I stood before the passport officer.
He ordered me to wait after he took my passport. I looked
around me; there was no place to sit. Passengers from
other cars had taken all the chairs, and some remained
standing. Exhausted, I leaned against the wall. I tried in
vain to push away the black ideas devouring my spirit,
sinking their talons deep into my heart. I could see the
officers dragging me into a small room and taking turns
interrogating me in the nastiest way. They would drive
me back to the dark face of Baghdad. Then anonymous
hands would grab me and drag me into a basement,
where they would strip me of my clothes and fall upon
me with whips and blows. Before I could scream from the
horror of the anticipated pain, the passport officer yelled,
"Samia Shahine Hassan!"

My heart stopped beating, and I couldn't make a
sound. The call was repeated twice. My heart started
beating again. I panicked as I ran to the window. The officer looked at me angrily. "Are you deaf?"

I couldn't believe it when he handed me the passport.
I wasn't sure when or how I left that office. I was torn
between joy and sorrow as the car continued on its way
to the Jordanian border. I poked my face into the glass.
Dawn had begun to steal in, and although I was out of
danger, horrible thoughts still lay in wait for me. What
if, as often happens, the security officers followed us and stopped the car out of suspicion? What if they found out
about the false passport? Wouldnt it have been better to
flee with a passport in my real name? Were things really
as dangerous as Youssef thought when he had arranged
for this passport? Perhaps. Anything was possible when
our rights were lost and the state devoured our lives little
by little.

The morning became brighter, but the beating of my
heart and my breathing didn't return to normal until
after the car finally crossed the al-Rouwaychid checkpoint. It was early morning, and a light rain drizzled on
the window. I glanced at the black stone fields along the
road and saw skeletons of old cars among the scattered
vegetation. The land started waving up and down, and I
recorded my first day in exile.

WHEN I SET FOOT IN AMMAN, I stretched to my full
length and felt alive. Only a few hours earlier I'd been
shrunken and scared, horrified, overcome by black
thoughts. Getting out of the car was like a new birth, and
I was taking my first steps. I took my bag to the nearest
telephone booth and called Hani. His brother answered
and said that Hani was in Naplouse, but that Youssef had
called from Baghdad about me. After almost twenty minutes, a thin young man arrived, and I went to meet him.

"Are you looking for me?"

"Are you Huda?"

"Yes."

"I'm Hussam, Hani's brother."

We walked to his house. Umm Hani welcomed me
with open arms as though she had always known me.
She was a slightly plump woman in her fifties, elegant and with a silver tongue. She offered me a lemonade and
then led me to another room. "You need to rest after the
fatigue of the road."

I slept most of the day, but when I got up, my body
was still exhausted; fear and the journey's length had
sapped all of my strength. Over lunch, Hussam told me
that he'd visited Baghdad twice, found it beautiful, and
intended to study medicine there.

I stayed three days in Hani's home. With his mother's help, I then rented a small room above a carpentry
workshop. I had to climb 12o steps to reach it, and it overlooked a street crowded with government offices and
trade buildings.

On my first night there, I had insomnia. The landlady,
Umm Ayman, had told me that before me, an Iraqi man
and his wife had rented the place for more than a year.
I tried in vain to forget the two bodies that had shared
the same bed I was sleeping on now-this feeling was to
become part of my exile. As soon as I pulled the blanket
to my body, I would smell a strange odor, a mixture of old
sweat and something like an old, rotten peach. Although
Umm Ayman vowed that she'd washed and sterilized the
blankets, I couldn't help thinking about the breath and
odors of previous bodies. I had been accustomed to perfuming my bed with incense from Najaf every night before
I went to sleep. It's a habit I had picked up from my grandmother; I would burn sticks of incense along with grains
of clove. Holding the censer, I would walk around my bed
so that I could sleep with a serene soul and body. Now,
however, I needed time to get used to the new smells, the
moist walls, the low ceiling, the small window overlooking the street. I came here with a ruined soul and broken hopes, so I had no choice but to adapt. From the first week
of my arrival, I applied myself to exploring the city-its
alleys and streets, its people and markets, its kiosks and
bookstores. During the first three days, Hussam showed
me the chief spots in Amman. Later I found the city's
main library, where I would spend an hour or two reading. I had to resist the desire to buy books because I had
to save what little money I had until Youssef's arrival in
three months or four or five-I didnt know.

THE FIRST DIALOGUE I had with Youssef went as
follows:

"This is Samia." (I gave the false passport name out
of fear of intelligence agents.) "I hope I won't have to wait
long until I see you."

"Don't worry. Just look after yourself."

"I miss you. I miss you all. How is Grandma?"

"She misses you a lot. She suggested renting your
house in Baghdad; if this works out, I'll send you the rent
money."

And the second conversation:

"You'll be getting your permanent identity papers
soon."

"What about you?"

"Be patient a little bit more."

"Can I talk to my grandma?"

"She's not here. She went out with my mum to visit
the Imam al-Kadhim. How can I reach you?"

"I don t know. I don t have a phone. I'm calling with
a phone card."

"A card-what does that mean?" (Of course, no one
in Iraq knew the phone card system.)

"It's a public phone where we use special cards; listen, I'm afraid it will cut off soon. I'll call later."

The third time was different:

"Did you receive your permanent ID?"

"Yes, the papers arrived along with the money."

"Samia, what's the matter with your voice?"

"I just have a cold."

"No, your voice is very sad."

"Do you remember my friend Nadia?"

"Nadia? Yes, I remember her."

"She was killed."

I pulled out the phone card right before I broke into
tears.

NADIA AND I had to go our separate ways at the end of
1993. Her family had to leave Baghdad during the evacuation of those originally from the South who had fled
their homes because of Desert Storm. Of all the cities in
Iraq, Basra had suffered the greatest destruction because
it was the only city along the route for both the lines of
invasion into Kuwait and the lines of defeat coming back
from there. After the death of thousands on the battlefields and along this "trail of death," the defeated troops
who remained alive had returned from Kuwait. In Basra
houses had been destroyed with their inhabitants inside;
those who were able to had fled to Baghdad, Karbala, and
Najaf, thinking that the capital and the holy places would
be safer.

On her second visit to my home on Mount al-Hussein,
Nadia had told me that when her family had returned
to Basra, they couldn't find their house or even their old
neighborhood. Both had been completely destroyed and become a dumping ground for garbage and waste. One
of their acquaintances suggested that Nadia's family register their names on the list of those who had suffered
damages from the war. But other people warned them
that doing so was useless because no Iraqi ever received
compensation. The people of Basra were particularly
stigmatized for their hostility to the regime because
the 1991 uprising had originated there. This meant that
in response to any request for compensation, the intelligence services would unearth files, sources, origins,
and relatives-not to offer compensation, but to find out
whether the requester had any connection with the uprising. Nadia's uncle had been killed in the first days of the
rebellion in front of Nadia's house while he was trying to
remove a corpse from their threshold. For this act, he was
considered against the regime, and the family had to take
refuge with one of their relatives. Then Nadir was hired
as a driver by Hamid Kalla.

AT THE REFUGEE OFFICE, the waiting line only grew
longer and longer. It would organize and dissolve, then
gather and dissolve again. After almost an hour, an
officer appeared and from the bars of the closed door
called some names. He handed people notices that their
appointments were postponed. Some grumbled and
walked away, but a fifty-year-old man standing next to a
woman holding a child said, "Please, I have been on the
waiting list for six months. This is the fourth time I've
been postponed."

The officer continued distributing notices of new
appointments as though hehadnt heard anything. The
man asked again, "Is there anyone I can talk to?"

His question was lost amid the child's crying, and the
officer disappeared into the building without answering.
He also didn't hear my voice when I called him, or perhaps he heard but ignored me. Some women were sitting
on the ground and on the sidewalk. Every one of them
was pondering her suffering. My back hurt, so I sat down
next to a woman with a pale face. She looked at me and
asked for some water from the bottle I was holding.

Any occasion is an opportunity for us to confess to
a stranger; we Iraqis do not need reasons or introductions when our hearts can no longer bear the weight of
our tragedy. Thus, as soon as the woman returned the
bottle, she started to tell her story. "I have been coming
to the Refugee Office for five months now. My daughter
is a medical doctor; she left Iraq before I did, and I have
followed her. She left through the services of clandestine immigration to shorten the time and the troubles of
waiting here. She should have arrived four months ago
in Germany, where her father is waiting for her. He has
been a refugee there for two years. But she didn't wait for
him to send her official papers. She paid a lot of money,
but since then I haven't heard anything from her. She
hasn't arrived in Germany, and she hasn't been in touch
with me."

I asked, "What have they done for you here at the
Refugee Office?"

She bowed her head silently. I looked at her emaciated
face and her dry lips as I listened to her response. "How
should I know? I don't even know the office my daughter
dealt with. I arrived in Amman three days before she left,
and she assured me then that she would arrive safely in Germany. Here I am, waiting. I have lost it all: daughter,
husband, and homeland."

We were eventually admitted to the office. The corridor leading to the waiting room was three feet wide and
paved with dark tiles. The last step up to the main door
to the waiting area looked tortuous, as though to remind
us that the road we were about to take would be endlessly
long and twisted. The only waiting area was too small
for the number of applicants. The children were shouting and fighting over three plastic toys: who would get
to ride the horse first, who would get to crawl inside the
belly of the goose, who would get to play with the blocks.
One of the children snatched some blocks from another,
and a lopsided fight started between a fat little bully and
a skinny, scared child.