ihath

Let me tell you the story of my experience attending Hussieniya (a lament for the death of Imam Hussien performed by Shea muslim sect every year). The year was 1995 and I was living in Galsgow, Scotland. My husband and I became good friends with a religious Iranian couple, K. and S. Both become incredibly excited when they heard that I come from a shea family and decide to invite me for a Hussieniya held at a mosque in Glasgow by the shea community living there. I have never attended a Hussieniya before. I have read about it in books though. While living in Kuwait, the shea performed such ceremonies in secret to avoid prosecution from the government. I would sometimes hear other girls whisper about it to each other in school. Since my father is very secular we were not involved and hence my knowledge of various shea ceremonies was restricted to things I have read or heard from other people. Nothing like exploring your religious roots in a foreign city that has absolutely nothing to do with it.

On the day of the Hussieniya, I decided that I would wear hijab the whole day and not just during the period while at the mosque. I thought it would be an interesting experience, to see how people would react to me when I was wearing a head scarf, a long skirt and long sleeves. That was the first time I wore hijab in my life. On that day, I placed my daughter in her stroller and did grocery shopping, went for a little stroll in the park and walked around the city center. Everywhere I went, there would be another woman wearing hijab who would walk towards me, smile and whisper “Salam Alaikum sister”. I would smile back and say “Salam Alaikum sister”. Glasgow, has a large immigrant community from Pakistan and many of them are religious. I never noticed how many hijab wearing woman were around until that day. I felt like there was this whole sisterhood action going on, I must confess that I enjoyed that aspect of it. I didn’t enjoy the way people looked at me in the neighborhood grocery store though. I went to the CD store and asked the person attending the shop if he had a CD for “Ani Defranco”, he was so shocked it took him several seconds to finally respond. He probably didn’t think that a woman wearing hijab would know who Ani Defranco is. I must confess that I got some guilty pleasure out of surprising him like that. I am such a trouble maker.

As the time to the Hussieniya approached, I started to feel nervous. What if I do or say something stupid and offend everybody at the mosque. What if people can tell I am not religious and kick me out of the mosque, all sorts of dark thoughts like that started to cross my mind. Then I remembered a book I have read a year earlier “Guests of the Sheik

: An Ethnography of an Iraqi Village by Elizabeth Warnock Fernea”. Elizabeth Warnock Fernea spent the first two years of her marriage in the 1950s living in El Nahra, a small village in Southern Iraq, and her book is a collection of stories about life of a western women attempting to adapt to living in super conservative society. Her husband is an anthropologist and instructs her that she must learn about the lives of the women since as a man he has no access to that world. Many of the village woman befriend her and help her adapt to the local customs. In her book she describes in vivid detail many Hussieniyas and other Shea processions she had attended. I thought to myself, if an American Christian like Elizabeth can go through it, so can I. At the mosque, I meet S. outside, she complements my proper hijab. She seems happy to see me dressed like that. Later on she told me that she was worried I would show up wearinh jeans and t-shirt. We go into the mosque together. The women are sitting on one side and all the men are setting on the other, everybody is sitting on the floor, and kids are running all over the place. I sit down in the middle of the crowd and seat my daughter next to me. On the other side I can see K. with the men, as soon as he sees me he jumps up and runs towards the women’s side, something he is not supposed to do. He looks at me with amazements, he tells me that my hijab is very proper and tells me that I look great. This is so out of character for him, K. is a super demure, shy and modest person. Usually he would never looked me straight in the eye. When he talked to me he would look away according to muslim modesty customs. But now he was staring straight at me with a big smile on his face, he looks like he can’t believe that the jeans and t-shirt girl can be transformed to proper hijab girl. His wife instructs him to go back and sit with the men. Which he does promptly.

The Imam starts telling the story of Imam Hussien, his voice is melodic and sad. Once in a while he breaks down into crying. People around me start crying. Something very surprising happens next, I start crying too. I think I am overcome with group hysteria. My daughter looks surprised.

daughter: Mommy, why are you crying?

ihath: I don’t know.

daughter: Why are these other people crying?

ihath: They are sad because somebody very important died long time ago, his name was Imam Hussien he was the grand child of prophet Muhamad.

daughter: Who is prophet Muhamad?

ihath: Shh! (I don’t want people to know that my daughter doesn’t know who prophet Muhamad is). I will tell you about him later. Here are some crayons and paper to play with.

daughter: Ok! (she looks happy with the crayons).

I make a mental note, I must tell my daughter the story of prophet Muhamad and afterwards about Imam Hussien. She should at least know about it. After a while some of the people start swaying from side to side and hitting themselves on the chest. The hitting is symbolic, I myself stick to crying. I have read in books about precessions where people would beat themselves until they bled, I have read about chains, rocks over the head, but non of that happens in this place. Just gentle hitting over the chest, nothing too dramatic. This lasts for a couple of hours, then everybody moves to another room where food is served, everybody eats and then sits around chatting. All the Iranian shea are on one side, and Iraqi shea are on the other. Maybe it is the language barrier thing. I end up chatting to two older Iraqi women who tell me about how much they miss living in Iraq and why they had to move abroad. A fairly sad story.

The next day, I got up to go to work, I wore a dark suit, short skirt, white silk blouse and a colorful silk scarf. Panty hose and black shoes. Makeup. I looked at myself in the mirror, I looked professional, as in “get out of the way aggressive woman on the move” professional. I went to the office and said good morning to my co-workers.

good morning

good morning

hello

hello

how do you do?

Nobody called me his sister on that day.

My friend told me that he is planning to go on a year long trip all over Europe in order to “find himself”. I told him, what if you find yourself and discover that you don’t like what you find? You will have to spend many more years wandering around aimlessly until you lose yourself again. I didn’t tell him that I was speaking from personal experience.

I remember vividly the first time I walked into UBC’s bookstore, UBC is a university in Vancouver. I was 19 and had just arrived to Canada. So many books, so much variety. I wandered around for hours, picking up books and reading a little from each one. I didn’t buy anything on that day because there was so much I wanted to buy. Later on I discovered the main library. Its not that I haven’t been to a bookstore before, I have been to many, It was the variety of the books that struck me, the fact that I could read about anything I liked, left wing, right wing, any religion, any philosophy, any perspective. I wanted to absorb it all. I spent my first year at UBC in the library, not doing my computer science home work, those I would do in hurry in the computer lab, but reading books about history, philosophy, politics, religion, literature …etc. And then I decided I would read about the middle east, I thought I understood the middle east very well, since we studied our history and Islam at school for 12 years, I was curios how it was described in English by English speakers, lets see what these foreigners say about us.

As a kid growing up in Kuwait, I was taught in school that we the Arabs are the best nation that god has created on planet earth. For we have spread our fair religion all over the world out of the goodness of our hearts. “Futuhaat”, they were called in our text books, liberations. We liberated the Persians, Turks and many other nations, we salvaged them from darkness. And who can revile our strong family values, beautiful language and our plain goodness. I used lay in bed at night feeling sorry for all the people that were born non Arabs. How unlucky for them.

Back at the main library at UBC I found a publication that held an in depth reporting of current events in the middle east. I opened the publication randomly somewhere in the middle, the article was talking about terrorist attacks at Kuwait University that blew up the Cafeteria building in the Kuwait university Campus. The fact that the building was destroyed way no surprise to me, I was on the campus of Kuwait University when the building fell, we all ran over and saw the rubble of the destroyed building. The fact that it was done deliberately was. The respectable news reader that night told us that the building fell as a result of structural flaws and that construction materials were being stored on the roof which led the building to collapse. We all believed the respectable news reader person on TV, I didn’t doubt his words not even for one second that night. I was there in person and had no idea of what was going on around me, whereas people half way around the world were privy to the information about what happened that day. I have been lied to, what else have I been lied to about?

I started to read about the early history of Islam and realized that the Persians and among other nations that we colonized by us, where not very appreciative of our liberation. They didn’t like being enslaved, forced to learn Arabic, converted to Islam by intimidation and being treated like inferior human beings. In Kuwait Persians were called “Ajam”, it turns out that this word originally meant “the dumb animals that can’t speak properly”. You see, the Persians tried to adopt Arabic but would speak it with an accent, so the Arabs called them dumb animals. Later on, Persian was adopted as the official language in Iran, instead of Arabic. O! those Persians are so ungrateful for their liberation. Shame on them.

Ignorance is bliss. How I long for those days when we were the good guys and the bad guys were them. And you could feel good to be part of the we and not the them. That first year in UBC, I would lay awake at night feeling sorry for myself wishing I wasn’t born “us”, I didn’t want to become them, I just didn’t want to be “us” anymore.

“I want to live a life of integrity”, is what I wrote one day on a piece of paper and hanged on a plastic tree. I was on vacation in Edinburgh, Scotland. While walking around the city, I noticed a big sign announcing a Yoko Ono exhibit. Since I had nothing better to do, I decided I would check it out. The exhibit was not very impressive; many pictures of Yoko and John. Several of the exhibits were titled “John and me”. Ok! I get it, she was married to a super famous guy, but show us something about Yoko. There was one piece, that wasn’t about John, the wish tree. In one corner of the gallery, stood a white plastic tree with many braches. On a small corner table, long pieces of paper and pencils where placed. The idea being that each person would write a wish and hang it on a tree branch. The wish notes forming the tree leaves. I stood under the tree surrounded with everybody’s wishes. One woman wants a man to notice her. A young man wants to pass his final exams; another wants to win a million dollars. What did I want? What did I wish for?

At age 27, I had it all. Good health, loving husband, healthy and beautiful daughter, rising career as a computer programmer, and decent looks. While no millionaire, I lived comfortably. While all my friends’ complained about how hard the dating game was, I came home everyday to a husband that I love and respect. While some women struggle with infertility or early pregnancy, I had my daughter exactly at the time that I had planned. So why is it that just a few weeks earlier, I told my husband that I needed a vacation. I need a vacation from everything I told him: “I need a vacation from my job, vacation from being a mother, vacation from being a wife”. I don’t know why I chose to go to Scotland for this mission, I just felt drawn there. As I read the wishes of other people, I realized that I had lots of what other people wished for. Yet here I was standing under a fake tree feeling broken. “What is wrong with me?”, I thought to myself “Why can’t I enjoy what I have?”. As I wrote my wish, tears welled inside me, I dashed out of the gallery before anybody could see me.

When I arrived in Edinburgh, I took off my watch and never put it on for the whole duration of the my vacation. In the morning I would wake up, have breakfast and dash out, leaving my map of the city in my room on purpose. I would wonder around in the streets of Edinburgh at random, not knowing where I was or where I was going to. When it rained, I would keep walking until I would find a coffee shop, I didn’t want to carry an umbrella, so I would sometimes get wet and then dry out while walking again. This was the first time that I enjoyed getting lost in a foreign city, usually I feel panic when I am lost. Wondering around not knowing where I was, in a city where nobody knew me. Nobody looked at me, nobody talked to me, I spent my days in delicious silence. Nobody wanted anything from me. I had nothing to explain or justify. I was a nobody. I was lost. I didn’t have to rush home to prepare dinner. When I would get tired, I would just get a taxi and give him my address.

There is one advantage to spending a couple of weeks living inside your head, you start noticing all the garbage that is going on in there.

During this aimless wondering in Edinburgh, I came across a proper English tea house. Nothing, like embracing the traditions of your former colonizer. I ordered sandwiches and tea, the sandwiches were rather bland but the tea was delicious. Across from me sat two elderly women in their 80, enjoying their afternoon tea. Both were dressed up, flower print dresses, proper hats, delicate purses, grey hair. They were chatting about something trivial and gossiping about somebody. One of them was wearing tons of make up, hot red lipstick and blue eye shadow. The conversation inside my head went something like this.

…

Look how silly she looks.

I wish they would stop yapping.

Does she realize how silly she looks with that red lipstick.

Who the hell does she think she is, the Queen?

Listen to how stupid their conversation is?

Look at that silly hat!

….

Stop!

Stop!

Stop!
….

What is wrong with me?

Why do I even care about her lipstick?

Why do I notice such stupid things?

Why don’t I just enjoy the meal in front of me and forget the other stuff.

….

That was the day I realized that I have to lose myself, being lost in a foreign city for few weeks was not enough. I need to get lost completely. I rarely ever wear my watch these days. I keep hoping that one day I will lose track of time.

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The best part about having a blog are all the wonderful emails I get from the readers. Here is a particular one from somebody who asked to stay anonymous

Beautiful and inspired!

I am an American, and feel much the same way as you felt (feel?). I am torn. I love my country and my heritage. I do not like being "them". I just want to be "me". I was against the war, but am strongly for finishing what we started. I want a free Iraq. I don't know why it matters so much to me, but it does. I was against the war without even knowing much at all about Iraq or its people. I didn't know about the mass graves, and had never heard of Saddam's two sons. I was against the war because we hadn't finished Afghanistan. I was against the war because it would cost more American lives and would cost more money than my country could currently afford. I had and still have many friends that have lost their jobs, and their homes because of our economical problems. I now believe that I was selfish for not wanting the war. Well, not the war, I would never WANT a war, but for Iraq, I don't see anything else that would have succeeded. Everything else had been tried. But I did not protest, I didn't even talk about it. I kept my thoughts to myself. Once the war started, I decided I needed to learn more about Iraq and the situation. At least try to understand and find a real reason to be against it. So I devoted all of my spare time to reading everything I could find about Iraq and its history. I learned. I continue to learn. Now, Iraq occupies my thoughts almost every waking minute of the day. I want us to prove the world wrong, and rebuild Iraq, restore peace, and restore their dignity, and then I want us to quietly leave, taking only the physical things that we brought with us, and nothing more. Why do I want this so badly? I don't know. All I know is that it is one of the most important things to me, that I have ever wanted. Is it as simple as American pride? I don't think so, but maybe it is. I don't know. All I know is that I care about Iraq and her people, and I want her to be a beacon to the world that no matter how bad things get, there is always hope. It drives me crazy that when people ask me why I feel this way, all I can do is look at my feet mumble "I don't know". I know it is important, and I know that the entire world will benefit, if nothing else but for the stability and the success of a major and vital Islamic nation to remain Islamic but also be truly free and democratic. Sitting here in my comfortable home, I still don't know why I should truly care as much as I do though. When the rest of the world is so violently against us. Could we be wrong? How can so many countries be wrong, and only we are right? And still I remain torn.

I have my own personal troubles, that depress me. I am married to a wonderful woman, the same woman I married 20 years ago, I have 3 children, all of whom were born exactly when we chose them to be, I have a good job, and a beautiful home. Troubles that everyone has. Raising good children to be responsible adults. The troules of a hard job. The troubles of sometimes not being able to afford something I want, right then and there. I am always able to afford the things I need. I am not rich, but I am not poor. I am perfectly in the middle, which is the best place to be for me. Money does corrupt, and that would conflict with my wish.

I just wanted to write to you to say that I wish I could get physically lost too. Unfortunately, I can never do what you have done. If I leave to get lost, my family will suffer. I envy you for that. I have the same wish that you placed on that tree, and struggle to live that wish every day. As I grow older, the world has changed for me significantly. It is no longer black and white. It is now a million shades of gray. It has become so very hard to distinguish right from wrong, good from bad, charity from greed. And I remain torn, with my watch firmly strapped to my wrist.

I write many times a day with a woman in Iraq. You know her, but I will not name her, out of respect for her privacy. We have much in common, but even more that is not. When I complain about my own troubles, I feel guilty and it depresses me even more. What are my troubles compared to those of the Iraqis? She and I have become very good e-mail friends, and we have even spoke on the phone several times. She has such a lovely, laughing voice, in spite of her troubles. It is oddly comforting when I think about that. Writing to her is my way of becoming lost. It forces me to live in my head, and sort through all of the garbage that has been collected in my attic over the last 41 years of my life.

I wanted to write to thank you for your entry. It gave me a little bit of perspective on things. I read all of the blogs every day, including the many others that are now springing to life. Often I read entries about the negatives of Americans, and while I can't say that I like it, I can say that I honestly do respect it. And, as I said, I read them all every day, hoping for a new entry. It is another opinion and view of us, written by the blogger, and I cannot argue with that. I can only hope that in the end, we are able to prove to them that they were wrong.

Maybe that is why I care so much about Iraq? To show that we are not the greedy, selfish monsters that much of the world now views us to be. Is that selfish? Is that pride? I don't know. But I think it is more than that. I think it may even be as simple as wanting Iraqis to have what I have, or at least for them to have that choice. Why should I care about that? I don't know. It's complicated, I'm torn and I'm so very very tired. It is exhausting to care so much, but not be able to actually do anything to help, except read blogs, and write e-mail. While I have great hope for the future of Iraq, I am completely depressed by it all. Three short years ago, I was oblivious to it all. The US was still considered to be, for the most part, a nation of good. Now, my entire nation is as torn as I am. Lines have been drawn in the sand. People either care about Iraq or they don't. They either think we are doing the right thing, or they don't. They either trust that our president is doing what is just and good, or they don't. There is no longer a middle ground here. And it worsens every day. Now.. often I feel like I am a leaf caught in a stream, one minute gently being carried along, and the next, violently pulled along, bouncing off of everything in my path. All the while knowing where I want to go, and where I want to be, but having no control over the journey and the final destination remains hidden in the fog ahead. This must be how Iraqis feel, and when I think of that, it bothers me and I care even more deeply than before, if that is even possible.

I still remain torn, but equally hopeful.

Ma` Salaama, and thank you.

How many times have you heard somebody say “ I am not a racist but,…..”. Fill in the blanks with some mildly racist comment. Examples would be “Those people expect too much” or “They are simply too sensitive”. Frequently I wish I could revise that statement to “I am a racist and ….”. At least it would be honest.

When I was about 8, I became best friends with a girl in my class. We sat next to each other in the classroom and spent many hours playing and chatting. At home I frequently talked about my friend. Several months later, I invited my friend for lunch at my house. We had a wonderful time, playing with dolls and watching T.V. After my friend was picked up by her mom to go home, my mom asked me “How come you never mentioned that your best friend is black?”. I paused, I had no answer, I never noticed that my friend had darker skin than myself. Until my mother mentioned it, it never occurred to me that my friend was placed in a different category than myself. I simply never thought about it. At age 8 I was completely oblivious to people’s race. I can honestly say that at that point I was not a racist because I didn’t notice peoples race. I reacted to people solely based on their personality and behavior. I am not so innocent now. Something happened while growing up.

Don’t get me wrong. On an intellectual level I fully believe that all people are equal and that everybody is equally entitled to all the good things in life. However every once in while a small subtle incident happens where I have to question myself. For example, few years ago I was in San Francisco on a business trip. I was walking around the down town area. A group of 4 young black men where walking past me. They were chatting to each other and laughing about something. I immediately clutched hard onto my hand bag, as if I was afraid they would try to steal it. Later, when I went to my hotel room, I kept thinking “Why did I do that?”. “Would I have behaved the same way if they were white?”. “Did they notice my behavior? Were they offended?”. I know I would be offended if somebody reacted that way to my mere presence. While this is not the kind of racism practiced by the Ku Klux Klan or neo-nazi groups, it is racist nevertheless. It is a more subtle kind of racism. It is subconscious; I don’t do these things on purpose or with the intention to hurt somebody. It just seems to happen and afterwards I ask myself “Why did I do that?”. I call it subconscious racism. When you behave just subtly different in reaction to somebody’s race.

In the Nelson Mandela’s autobiography “
Long Walk To Freedom

”, there is a story similar to mine. Nelson Mandela was traveling all over Africa attempting to raise money and support for the ANC. He was at the airport about to travel from one destination to another; when the pilot and crew arrived. The pilot was black. Nelson Mandela was struck with a panic attack, he was afraid that the airplane would crash. Intellectually he understood that a black person could do any job as well as a white person, its just that in South Africa he had never seen a black pilot before. Nelson Mandela forces himself to board the airplane despite his fear, he arrives at his destination safely. I reached the conclusion that when you grow up in a racist society some of it seeps into your psyche; no matter how much you appose it. Like pollution in the air, it does end up in your lungs.

Rian Malan, is another South African struggling with his own racism. In his book “
My Traitor's Heart

”, he recounts many moving stories. One in particular about a white woman who one day finds a bleeding black man in her own backyard. She takes him to hospital, but the staff at the emergency department ignore the injured man simply because he is black. The woman yells at them and abuses them until they provide him with adequate treatment. The story travels all over town and from then on, whenever a black person is in need of medical care, they show up at her door step, she becomes the ambulance service for the black community despite the fact that she has no paramedic training. She spends many evenings driving bleeding people to the ER and yelling at the staff there to urge them to provide care.

It seems that you can’t ignore racism, you have to face it head on, as long as it is part of our society it is poising all of us. As for me, I haven’t owned a TV set for years, I believe that my TV set was a source of negative stereo types planted in my head. I focus hard on treating each person as an individual.

“I am a racist, but I want to change.”

*****************************************

Here is a letter I got in response to the above post from Hannah. I think it offers a valid counter point of view from the one expressed above. This is an email that made me reflect, maybe the post above is too extreme....I feel conflicted now!. Here is the email.

Hi,

I enjoy your writing very much. Vancouver is my home town, but not
living there anymore.

I've been thinking about the racism thing too. I think the subconscious
racism you describe is just part of the bigger human instinct (or
whatever it is) to categorize things. We need to process all the
information coming at us, and putting it into categories is just what
our brains do.

I think when we first observe something, we try to determine if it is
animate or inanimate, then human or not-human. Then male or female.
Then other things like race, tribe (suggested by clothing styles),
young/old, ... Recall how we all get a bit stressed when see someone
and can't figure out if they are male or female. Or see something in
the woods: is it a bear or a tree stump?

you recount the story of the 4 black guys. Would you have clutched your
purse if it had been 4 black women? For myself (I'm a woman), their
maleness is more important in categorizing them than their colour. If
it was 4 old black men, vs. 4 young black men, would your reaction be
different? You may not have clutched your purse if it had been 4 white
guys, but if those 4 white guys had mugged you, the next time, a group
of 4 white guys approached you, you'd probably have a strong negative
reaction. through experience, I'm not afraid of, or disgusted by,
inebriated older aboriginal men begging on the street. I give them food
or bus tickets, say hello, and tell them to take care of themselves.
However, I'm not sympathetic with sober young white men begging on the
streets here, and inebriated young white men are to be avoided. It's a
complex reflection of all my prejudices.

I don't get too hung up on these reactions in myself. I don't think it
is something to stamp out, even if I wanted to, but I do try to be aware
of how I categorize and prejudge things, what my fear is, and is it a
fear I should listen to. I think we do this to survive, to protect
ourselves, to make quick decisions (fight or flight). We all do it,
prejudging things, categorizing things, in both good directions and
negative directions. Beautiful, well-dressed people are categorized in
a positive way, for example, whether they deserve it or not. People
with glasses are considered more intelligent.

I was in southern US for a few days a couple of years ago. I'd never
been around so many black people before, so it was strange for me.
Especially since many of them were in service positions, and I, the
white person, using these services. everyone down there talked 'funny',
and their manners were different, and culturally things were different.
I did get nervous when black men, in a southern accent would say hello,
how are you, to me, a complete (white, female) stranger. (The white men
didn't do this during my time there.) I didn't know how to interpret
this. Just being friendly ? or something else ...? Can they tell I'm
not from there? is that why they are saying hello to me and not the
other white or black women and men around? I suppose if I had stayed
longer and got accustomed to it all, I would have been better able to
interpret these things and know better how to respond. Being Canadian,
I did try to respond back in a friendly but abbreviated manner, but I'm
sure my confusion/suspicion/fear showed.

Yes, I am a racist, and an age-ist, and a gender-ist and all those things.

10. When you are overcome with road rage at a traffic jam you yell “You bloody Ba’athist!” at the other drivers.


9. You stay awake at night composing the perfect email for some guy called Zeyad.


8. You have taken Arabic classes just so you could check if people translating Faiza are doing a good job.


7. You dial 911 whenever your fav doesn’t post for over three days.


6. You try to impress people at a cocktail party by showing them your "I love River Bend" tattoo.


5. For Christmas, you bought a copy of
"Salam Pax: The Clandestine Diary of an Ordinary Iraqi"

for each member of your family.


4. You have joined ”Zeyad for president of the United States” club.


3. You are able to spell Baghdad without the aid of a spell checker.


2. You force your family to switch electricity on, for only 3 hours a day because you want them to know what it feels like to be an Iraqi.



And the number one sign that you have Iraqi blog fever is ….


1. You have gone to therapy sessions because Salam won’t answer your emails.

*****************************************

Thanks to "M. in M." for feedback and suggestions.

Bin Laden says death to infidels

God is on my side

Convert to Islam and you will be spared

Cover up woman, your skin is bare

How fragile is my faith

Dared to question a message of hate

Deliver me from a sinner's path

Won't want to be caught in this wrath

Allahu akbar

Allahu akbar

Allahu akbar



Bush says you're either with us or against us

America the land of the proud and free

In the darkness of my soul I scream for a hungry Iraqi child

In moments of tenderness I weep for a Palestine in a bind

Rid me of this foolishness

I want to join the proud and free

The label terrorist is too heavy to bear

I will wrap myself in a flag and scream

God bless America

God bless America

God bless America



So what's an infidel terrorist to do

I won't talk about a foreign policy soaked in blood

I won't say you reap what you sow

I won't mention a women's right to an education

I won't contradict the bearded man who tells me how to dress

Oops I said too much already

I repent for my questioning

I will go back to my idle chanting

Men with weapons want me complacent

God bless America

God bless America

God bless America

And .

Allahu akbar

***************************

OK! so I am no poetry wiz but it is my first attempt. Please laugh behind my back.

Most people seemed to like the dress with the sleaves, more mass flamenco one person said. Thank you for everybody who wrote with a suggestion, I will post a picture of the dress once it is made.

Recently Majid from Family in Baghdad sent me a list of funny animated smiley icons. He ended his email by saying "i know .. i am so shallow ... but its funnnnnnyYYYY". Well! Majid I have a confession to make, I am pretty shallow myself. Recently I have been getting several hits from the executive office of the US President, is George Bush reading my website? My husband thinks that it is the janitor surfing the net at night. I have no idea why I find this so exciting, since officially I don't care what the president or his staff think of my blog, but hek! its funnnnnnyYYYY.

***************************

After posting the above poem, the funniest thing happened, several people sent me their poetry. This one is from Liminal Symbol of Shlonkom Bakazay and Iraqi Agora fame. The poem is a reflection of childhood years observing the civil war in Lebanon.



Nine Miles From Beirut

by Liminal Symbol





Machine gun fire and minor bombs combine

To set light flashing in a pale design

Dry skies give faintly coloured clouds a chance

To change their shape through this unearthly dance

Of flames and tracers crossing paths. Whose show

Of bursting hues in quick convergence grow

Then pan to intermittent sharp vibrations.

The festive flickering finds no destinations,




But coarse air that sparks tightly split moments.

Once wiped by light, the dark foments.

My sight relents. The two pupils swell fast,

And at last, silence. My vision recasts.

The arid land resounds with silent pauses,

Disrupting thoughts that make mom clench the vases

Of flowers pulled from primitive plant growth.




The deck that mind's the city's show, betrothed

With that mountain side's steep incline, estranges

Us from the smoke of timeless war that rages

and floats through door's slight break. Norma out-strides

The rolling marbles I recall fondling wet

While cousin Sammy smokes a rolled cigarette.

***************************************

This one is from a woman who tried to write her views on the war against Iraq, she ended up with pages and pages. She decided to write a summary and ended up with the following touching poem.



by Mojave Desert


With God on Our Side; these fools

Plan to stroll into Heaven.



To see visions without looking.

To dream without imagination.

The mirror they forge stares blankly back at them.

The old man with the beard in their mirror.



The man with two sons in their mirror.

Those eyes.

Oh my God, I have pity!

A flood. A final kiss.

Goin' down.

I sometimes think that I am a transvestite trapped in a woman’s body. Right now I am a woman, plain, simple boring. Considering how interesting every other aspect of my life is, wouldn’t it be more fun to be a man that wants to be a woman? Plus transvestites get to wear those super feminine clothes and mile long eyelashes that no average woman would dare to put on. Oh! those high heels and long nails. Even more interesting would be to be a woman that wishes she could be a man that wishes to be a woman. Confused yet?

On other occasions I think, I wish I was a lesbian. I wouldn’t have any guy problems. Plus I could get a wife, now that same sex marriage is legal in British Colombia. I used to work with this guy Ken, everyday he had this yummy lunch packed for him by his wife. Hey! I would like to have a wife like that as well. Somebody that packs lunches for me, makes dinners, takes care of the kids and cleans the house. Hey Ken! Does your wife have a sister? I used to wish for a person like that in my life for years and finally I was able to hire a wife. When my third child was born, I hired a nanny to stay home with the kids. For years my husband rejected the idea of hiring somebody to do house work. It goes against his principles; he thinks that if you hire somebody to clean your house then you are somehow taking advantage of them. I used to rush from work to go pickup the kids from day care and school. Rush home to cook a dinner in 30 minutes or less, while my kids were whining and hitting each other. Then I would have to give them a bath, then help them do homework, then do the laundry, clean the house, prepare for the next day. I would go to bed completely pooped. When my third child was born, I put my foot down, I need help. So I hired a nanny to stay home with the two youngest. What a difference that made to the quality of my life. Now I come home, the house is clean, the kids are bathed and fed and the laundry is folded. I just cruise in and take over and the nanny goes home to her own family. Wow! what a difference. I feel like I hired a wife …. minus the sex. I have to admit that I am in love with the nanny, she is a god sent. I will really miss her when we have to let her go, when all the kids are old enough to go to school. I think hiring a wife is better that marrying a wife, wives are not what they used to be in the olden days and the hired wife doesn’t nag you. So maybe it is a good thing I am not a lesbian.

I am just kidding; I have no desire to be neither a transvestite nor a lesbian. It’s just that being a plain heterosexual woman is hard sometimes.

As a teen going to high school in Kuwait, we had to learn home economics. This was taught to girls only, the boys didn’t have learn this subject in their schools. One year we were taught baby care. I strongly resented the implication that we would all become baby producers and I resented the implication that the young men didn’t need to know any of this stuff. I made it my mission to make sure I learned absolutely nothing during home economics classes and commit small act of sabotage whenever possible. For child care we were given a baby doll that had realistic life size and weight, we were supposed to use it to practice holding and bathing the baby. While the teacher went outside for a little while. I detached the head of the baby doll and placed it on top of the door. When the teacher walked back in, the head fell on top of her head. The teacher was livid; she couldn’t believe that a nice girl would commit an act of such cruelty. “You are going to be a failure as a mother and a wife”, the teacher told me, she was near tears.

In sewing class, I made sure I learned nothing about sewing. We were supposed to make a skirt as part of the class project. I asked the girl setting next to me to do all the work. In return I helped her in math and physics. Why bother making a skirt when you can just buy it at the store. When our project was finished, our sewing teacher handed each of us our skirt with great bride. While getting home in the school bus, I waved my red skirt out the school bus window, much to the amazement of passers by. I finally released my skirt into the heavy traffic where it flew in the air like a balloon. That moment was the only enjoyment I got out of my sewing class.

I found it hard to embrace my role as woman; it is not that I wanted to be a man, it just that being a woman sucked. Can I have choice B please? Everywhere I looked, I saw depressed women. “My kids are driving me crazy”, “My husband doesn’t love me any more”, “I am so bored with being at home all day long”… on and on the complaints would go. What happens to the happy women? Do they all suddenly die when they get to 21 years of age? I looked around and couldn’t find a single happy middle aged woman. Such is the lot of women in the Middle East. In Kuwait it is legal for a man to beat the crap out of his wife; the police won’t get involved because it is his right. A women’s sole purpose in life is to get married and produce babies, women who fail in their mission are looked down on. Women who succeed in securing a husband and producing a baby become mildly depressed and bored house wives at best, and abused at worst. My only salvation was to get an education and be able to work. If I am financially independent I won’t be at the mercy of whomever I marry.

Then I moved to Canada and started to work at a software company, I found that many of my male co-workers were obsessed with my physical features. You see I had something they didn’t have, curves. One time I was talking to a guy who was staring straight at my bosom the whole time. So I bent my head over to one side so that my head was at the same level as my breasts and waved hello to him “Hello! I am over here!”. It is not that I didn’t like having curves, It is just that I wanted to be treated like a person. A bit of dignity please. So I started wearing baggy clothes, no makeup, hair pulled back. I wasn’t trying to be a man, I was only trying to become a Non Gender Specific Entity (NGSE). I thought if I become unfeminine, people would be able to see me as a person. I would wear grey and black trousers, wide t-shirts, and try to look like the generic geek. Unfortunately, my eye sight is perfect so no eye glasses for me. Dooh!

Years of happy non gender specific existence passed when one day as I was working at a small startup company my boss told me that he likes hiring women, because women have a greater sense on intuition and women find creative ways to solve difficult problems. I think he was trying to tell me that I was doing a good job. It was the first time that I realized that I have something valuable to offer because I am a woman not despite of it. Sometimes you hear a kind word and it transforms you. Later on my friend Justine took me to a flamenco dancing performance at Kino Café on Cambie street. The women dancers were wearing colorful colors, tons of makeup, big bright earrings. They were shaking their hips and stomping their feet forcefully. It was captivating, enchanting and a bit vulgar. I was hooked. You mean a woman can be sexy and strong at the same time? Why didn’t anybody tell me that before? Few weeks later I started going to flamenco dance classes. Few months into the class I started wearing a bit of makeup and I decided to put a bit of color into my wardrobe. For this year’s performance, we are each supposed to make a colorful dress; most of the women know how to sew. I wish I paid more attention at the sewing class back in high school; I will have to find a seamstress to help me out. I can’t decide, should I make a dress that looks like this? or like this? Which one do you think looks better? Hey! being a woman is so much fun, why would I want to be anything else. All this hard work and in the end all I had to do is learn to enjoy the things I already had.