The American Granddaughter (4 page)

How can I make her understand that I’m stronger than she is? That I pity her naïvety and lament her rancid, Stone Age nationalism. I won’t allow her to write about me. I’ll tell her, in all honesty, that I nearly die laughing at her passion for slogans, her blindness and her grand sense of mission that turns her novels into rowdy demonstrations chanting pre-written slogans. Long live this. Down with that.

I’m not going to play along. Let the writer go to hell!

I’ll even incite Rahma against her. My grandmother is a wise woman who doesn’t fall into traps that easily. She wouldn’t be comfortable in the veil of a Virgin Mary or the
galabiyya
of Amina Rizk. She’d refuse to leave her own nationalism in the hands of a writer who’s mired in the worlds of revolutionary coups and nationalistic parties, and made them her own paper trumpet. No. I won’t let my grandmother hand over my grandfather’s history.

Oh God, I intersect with that history so much, yet we diverge, too!

It is my history, whether I like it or not. It was mine even before I was born. I am its legitimate child, no matter how foreign I may seem. How dare she, that gullible writer, think that I’ll just hand over my inheritance to her, even if that inheritance is nothing but a tattered piece of nationalism, good for nothing, a handful of coins in a currency that went out of circulation a long time ago?

VII

At the rhein-main military airport near Frankfurt, I took out my laptop and wrote the first email to Calvin since leaving Detroit. ‘We are at the airport in Germany. The smell of beer that fills the transit lounge made me think of you . . . please don’t drink too much . . . and don’t worry about me . . . don’t forget to water my plants . . . and if I’m gone too long and you decide to love another woman, make sure she’s not an Iraqi this time . . . you’ve suffered enough for one lifetime!’

We’d flown to Germany in a civilian plane, and from there the military aircraft that were constantly coming and going took charge of our transportation to Iraq, each plane taking as many passengers as its space permitted. For the first time in my life I boarded a plane from its backside. For that’s how the C-17 opens, from behind. Its mouth is wide like the jaws of a shark. I was contemplating the aircraft, and thinking about having my photo taken next to it, when a strong hand pushed me towards the steps. Where were the seats? It was a huge and ugly cargo plane with connected benches along its walls. Our bags were piled up in the middle and secured to the ground with belts to prevent them from sliding. Even those were nothing like ordinary luggage, but just khaki-green canvas bundles with long zippers. Looking around me, I counted twenty-nine individuals sharing this shitty, exhausting flight. Five of us were women. They’d given us yellow earplugs to block the roaring noise of the plane, but they only worked to a certain extent. We couldn’t hear each other throughout the five-hour-long flight, so we flew in a silence that was charged with anticipation and anxiety. Every now and then someone would make a hopeful attempt to dispel the tension by forcing small talk, but they were like actors in a silent movie, their voices lost to the roar of the engines.

We were each given a lunch box. I opened mine and found a sandwich, a bag of crisps, a Coke and a cookie. We ate like savages. As soon as we finished, the captain announced that we were going to refuel mid-air, and warned us that we might experience an uncomfortable feeling. The fuel plane mounted ours and remained there for about half an hour. There was severe turbulence as soon as the two planes touched, and I started to feel sick. The title for this movie could be
Damsels in Distress and Helpless Knights
.
None of us was trying to play Rambo. That was another movie altogether. I was terrified the fuelling might cause the plane to explode, but it went okay, and, more importantly, I didn’t throw up. I wasn’t alone in letting out a sigh of relief when that episode was over. We exchanged smiles, as we were too paralysed to shake hands.

Eventually we arrived.

Despite the anxiety and tiredness, I was overtaken by a strange sense of transcendence as soon as we entered Iraqi airspace. I imagined I could smell the blossoms of Seville oranges on the garden trees and the delicious scent of the smoke cooking
masgoof
fish. This state lasted for only a minute or so before the headlights of the plane were switched off and we were hovering over Baghdad, preparing to land. I felt the terrible injustice of this darkness. The blinds had to be closed as well, blocking the city from my view completely. With all these precautions, I remembered my mother’s fears as she read about the missiles that targeted planes trying to land in Baghdad. If she were here she’d tell me to pray.

Holy Mary. Please let us arrive safely, oh sweet Maryam.

When the plane finally landed, and the roar of the engines stopped, it was like I’d suddenly gone deaf. I got to my feet, feeling like a granite statue that had just come to life, then lost my balance and fell back onto my seat. I got up again and followed the others off the plane. As the huge back door was slowly lowered, my eyes panned like a camera from left to right, trying not to miss anything of those first moments. But all I could see was something like a red curtain that was covering the door of the aircraft from outside. It turned out to be a sandstorm that was unlike anything I’d seen before. I kept trying to pierce this sea of redness with my eyes but felt my eyelids contract with the effort. It was hard to explore the hellish landscape in which we had landed because we couldn’t see further than our feet. On top of that, and despite the heat, we were wearing our woollen winter uniform because the aircraft hadn’t been fully air-conditioned. Instinctively my hands reached for the thick collar of my jacket and pulled it up over my face to protect it from the sand. For a moment it was as if the whole of Iraq was gathered in the piercing smell of that storm. The smell was familiar, as was the heat of the wind that whipped our faces. The Egyptian Nadia was shaking, and Rula was coughing as if she was about to die. I reached over and thumped her back to help her breathe, like I was somehow responsible for what happened to her. This was my country, Rula was my guest, and her wellbeing was my duty.

This movie should be titled
The Delayed Return
.
The protagonist returns to the country she left fifteen years before, not as a visitor to her birthplace but as a soldier in the battlefield.

Oh Mary, Holy Virgin, take my hand.

VIII

We were out of the plane. Soldiers came and unloaded it mechanically. We hung about looking for whoever was there to receive us. For as far the eye could see, the runway was lined on both sides with boxes – provisions, tools and construction materials. The soldiers untied the bags and threw them on the waste ground of the airport. We each had to find our sack and pull it aside. Because they were all the same shape and colour, I’d written my name with a thick black pen on the cloth. I had two other smaller bags: a backpack and a shoulder bag.

I walked for a distance of no more than thirty metres, carrying two bags and pulling the third, until my shoulders felt like they were about to dislocate. As I stopped to catch my breath, I heard Nadia Bayoumi utter the very Egyptian expression, ‘This night is blacker than sixty tons of tar.’ I turned to look at her teetering on her high heels and leaning on an African-American soldier who was helping her with her bags. Why wasn’t she wearing her boots? To me she sounded like she’d just stepped out the Egyptian movies they repeated on TV, because that was the only place I’d heard such language before. I wasn’t certain people actually talked like that in real life.

I drew in a deep breath that filled my lungs with sand and continued my crawl to the airport hall. The glass of the windows was broken and shattered on the marble floor. We heard it splintering under our heavy boots as we walked over it. In every corner of the big hall were American soldiers hugging their helmets and sleeping, lost in dreams that I couldn’t begin to imagine. They didn’t look like their sleep was broken or disturbed by anxiety or nightmares. They seemed to me, whose back was about to break from pain, as if they were lying in the arms of their lovers after a night of hot sex had sapped their strength. They slept unaware of the tremors that shook the city and of all that awaited them as soon as they opened their eyes tomorrow. Tomorrow was a mysterious word in the glossary of war. It wasn’t really a useful label for anything. The sleepers were soldiers who’d arrived here before us. There were others still to come after us.

Baghdad Airport, which used to be called Saddam Airport, was our first stop in the perpetual waiting for transfer to our postings. Each day brought buses and helicopters that would carry the happy sleepers away. There were two soldiers, a man and a woman, sitting on broken benches by a rickety table with a computer and slips of paper, going through the names of the new arrivals and their joining-up posts. Being used to playing the ringleader, I led my group towards the registration table and told the soldiers that we were interpreters just arrived from Detroit, so where did we go? The woman said we were to wait for the representative of IntraTrans, the company that was contracting us. His royal highness hadn’t arrived yet.

Exhaustion impairs rational thought, and the sight of the sleepers around us was kind of inspiring. But there weren’t enough corners for all of us, and everyone around me started complaining in Arabic and cursing the company and its father. ‘What kind of mess is this?’ ‘Where the fuck are they?’ ‘They just brought us here and forgot about us?’ At some point I just pushed my big bag towards the wall, lay down with my back against it, took off my jacket, threw it over my head and slept till morning. Despite the conditions of my impromptu nap, I had a strange dream.

I’m knocking on the door of my Grandfather Youssef’s house on Rabie Street, wearing a violet wedding dress. Violet isn’t really my colour, but dreams don’t leave us the luxury of choice. My grandfather opens the door, and it’s the most natural thing, despite the fact that I know, in the dream, that he’s dead. I ask him, ‘When did you get back?’ He replies, ‘I came back two days ago. I didn’t want to miss your wedding, Sanaa.’ He gets my name wrong, and I don’t correct him. I don’t tell him that I’m Zeina, or Zuweina, as he used to call me. But my Grandmother Rahma appears behind his shoulder and says, ‘This is Zonzon, don’t you recognise her? The little darling got married while you were gone, and here she is returning to us now that she’s widowed. My poor child.’ I cross the garden gate and approach my grandfather, bending over his hand to kiss it. He pulls his hand away and, with that, completely disappears from the scene. At the same instant, the colour of my dress turns to black, and I stand there face to face with my grandmother, exchanging looks of sorrow in the cinema-scope of my dream.

IX

The morning is beautiful, even in the devil’s house, so how couldn’t it be beautiful in Baghdad?

I didn’t yawn when I opened my eyes, and I didn’t feel thirst or hunger. The sandstorm had passed and the sky was clear. I said to myself that this bright sun was all I needed. But soon restlessness returned and clung to my head like it was part of the lining inside my helmet. I couldn’t wait to get to the final destination and take my clothes off and wash the sand and sweat out of my hair. We kept going around in circles, standing up until we were tired, then sitting back down on our bags. Finally an officer approached us. A handsome young major, although back then I still couldn’t identify the different ranks. It was only later that I learned that the leaf that looks like a flower on the chest indicated the rank of major. He yelled, ‘Anyone here from IntraTrans?’ We leapt up and called those missing from our group to join us. They put us on a bus and took us to one of Saddam’s palaces near the airport. As soon as we arrived, Nadia Bayoumi started complaining, ‘Major, I was promised I’d be sent to interpret for our divisions in Kuwait City.’

‘No,’ he replied, ‘your work will only be here in Iraq.’

The palace was deserted and in ruins. Broken stones were scattered in the halls, which we crossed like ghosts doomed to eternal perplexity. We ended up in a hall overlooking an artificial lake where, we were told, Saddam used to fish. The garden that was supposed to be a paradise on earth had turned into a swamp full of mosquitoes, a jungle of weeds and grass taller than me. This place had witnessed the end of the world.

We used plastic sheets made from the same material used for refugee tents to set up partitions, dividing the hall into different sections for men and women. Then we were given metal camp beds that we opened and slept on. It was hot and the bugs flying in from the stagnant lake sucked our blood. Still, I was happy to be sleeping in a bed.

In the afternoon the company’s representative finally arrived. Where were you, man? He was apologetic as he welcomed us, went over our names and informed us that we’d be staying in the palace for a few days. We were to await instructions with regard to the assigned locations for the different members of the group. Well, there was no rush. All I was really after was a way to send my emails to Calvin and Jason.

I spent the day in the women’s section and enjoyed the makeshift shower that would later turn into a fondly remembered luxury. The shower consisted of a curtain behind which you stepped, when your turn came, with a bar of soap and a jug to bathe with water that we filled from a big container. I learned how to pile my dirty clothes under my feet and tread them clean as I showered. Bathing and laundry combined. Soon there’d be no end to my multitasking abilities.