The sounds of Baghdad in the Morning/Mourning

There is no such thing as silence. Even at 6:00 am the sound of the house is loud, especially at 6:00 am.

The computer hums. The coffee pot chugs. I my fingers tap the keyboard and the mouse. The dog climbs into the boy’s bed and her collar jangles so loudly I expect them to awaken. No traffic noise yet. No bird song this early on a winter morning. No wind today. Fog hangs low to the ground and muffles the distant sounds.

I imagine the sounds of New York City already having started its day, the rush of traffic and yells of people on the streets. I imagine the sounds of my distant Nicosia, and its bright morning light and the cars starting up in the parking lot of our apartment and the grumble of trash trucks and construction noise.

I imagine Baghdad. I spent one night in Baghdad at the British Iraqi Archaeologic School in 1989. The memory is distant, 16 years old now. I flew into Baghdad on the local airline out of Cairo. I was the only woman on the plane. Arabic men and African men, laborers, smoked non-stop in route. They sat me in the most forward left corner seat, right next to the door so that I could be the first person off the plane. When I arrived in Baghdad it was about 2 am and I had been traveling for more than 24 hours. My hosts hustled me off to a bedroom beside a garden, closed all the shutters and left me alone. I remember being awakened at noon the next day, amazed that I had slept so deeply and so long, amazed at juxtaposition of deep silence and high sun.

I remember a garden in spring bloom and lots of quiet. We had to do some paperwork that first day. We drove around Baghdad taking my documents to various government offices for approval. I had to show them my HIV test, stamped by the State Department and signed by the Secretary of State. Of course he did not declare my HIV test valid, only declaring that this was an official piece of paper and that the State California, which had also stamped the document, was an actual state of the United States of America. I watched people who did not talk to me. I spoke no Arabic. Having never even listened to Arabic before it I could not even make out individual words. Arabic sounded more like music than speech to me then. It was illegal for Iraqis to ‘fraternize with foreigners’ so the only people who talked with us were business people, government clerks, and other foreigners.

I remember Baghdad as a quiet ordered place. People stood patiently in line for their documents. I don’t remember traffic disorder. Everyone was neatly dressed, well fed, comfortable. It was a city that appeared proud of itself. Not wealthy, not opulent, but clean and cared for, tidy.

Now, the news wires feed us images of disorder and array. The Baghdad I experienced has long disappeared after so many years of sanctions and war. This mornings lead is a picture of a bombed school. Shrapnel, random metal, armored soldiers are the norm. I imagine the perpetual noise of metal hitting metal. The awful scrape and scream that means something bad is going to happen. I imagine noise that is a stew of fear and tension and anxiety. I feel my belly grip as I imagine the sound of Baghdad today. I don’t imagine that anyone can sleep soundly there anymore.

I say a prayer this morning for all the people of Iraq. I remember the tension and anger from our own election this fall. Our election was divisive but not violent. No one threatened us for going to the polls. I did not worry about bombs at my children’s school. I did not worry that the car driving up in front of the county courthouse polling place might explode. We were tense but safe. I did not worry for my life. I say a prayer for peace and quiet in a land where we have brought violence and fear.