Somebody pinch me I cannot believe I have actually reunited with my favourite aunt; still cheery but this time her wistful eyes reflect the bewilderment over the calamities that have struck her family. I couldn’t hide my dislike to the new neighbourhood or the fact that I miss their old garden, particularly the jasmine tree, which is almost my age but sadly it’s no longer there to welcome me with its soft fragrance. My cousins didn’t concur with me, they miss their home but it’s now more of a nightmare to them. One of them said she can still hear the loud screams of their neighbour and the gunshots that ended his life, the early premonitions of their own displacement. Theirs is one of the luckiest families living in the militias’ stronghold of Saydiyya, they might be the only ones who left without bereavement.
I was so worn out but so reluctant to take a nap, I didn’t want to miss a moment at this new cozy house; I had loads of laughs and plenty of fun. Despite their heart-wrenching concerns they tried their best to convince me that life is normal and whenever I try to dwell on a sad subject, they change it right away, for them I’m one of the relics of the good old days that they don’t want to be marred by sad thoughts, so I succumbed to their wishes, stifled my goodbye tears and promised to come over more often
Since I didn’t know how to reach my aunt’s house, I had no other choice but meet her daughter at her workplace so that we go together to the new neighbourhood. That workplace happened to be the University of Baghdad. Last time I came to this place was in 1998, when my sister was still a computer science student. It’s good that it hasn’t changed like the now religiously cloaked University of Mustansiriya. It felt so exhilarating to learn that guys named Omar haven’t gone extinct, young and old men named after one of the great leaders of Islam were killed and mutilated in droves two years ago, when humanity lost its face in the new Iraq. My friend was irritated by my comment that more female students in headscarves these days is a bad sign. She mistook it for having intentions to take mine off, which is out of the question, “Back in my university years, only a handful of girls took the decision to abide by the Islamic dress code, which used to be greeted with congrats and pleas for prayers to be just as brave to make the move, but now they do it to have their lives spared, because obviously militias have resolved all their problems and nothing seems to be left but women’s heads,” I explained.
I was chuffed by the sight of a group of students singing along and dancing. “So they do the things we used to do,” I said, only the song was patriotic, had it been my generation it would have been a sappy ballad.
On the way back, three cab drivers refused to pick me up, the last one agreed but didn’t hide his fears “is it ok there?” he questioned. I explained that I wouldn’t take a cab if it wasn’t, he believed me but was tense all the way through until he saw the Iraqi army checkpoint and servicemen all over my neighbourhood. Only then he realized that he wasn’t going to be ambushed by the enemy.
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