Melodies Under the Palms: Memories from the Iraq I Used to Know

By Salma Ajo

The main objective of this book is to introduce the Iraq I used to know, and bring about a different perspective to a country that has been so harshly portrayed by the media. The reader will be taken back to a time where Iraq was filled with culture and diversity, and experience what it was like to grow up in the region of the Fertile Crescent. The true beauty of such a wonderful country will be brought to light and its vast history will leave readers in awe.

It is my hope that this book will raise a new level of awareness and bring about feelings toward a culture that seems all but gone forever. Although the Iraq I used to know is longer such, my memories will make sure that it stays with us for eternity. I am pleased to share my personal experiences and feel readers from all backgrounds will enjoy them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Oct 24, 2015
• ISBN: 9781496966605

Salma Ajo

Salma Ajo, Ph.D. is Executive Director of Action Net Psychological Services PLC. Serving Tri-county for Mental Health and Substance Abuse. Since 1995 she has changed,touched and empowered many lives suffered from mental illness and legal problems. Dr. Ajo, has 12 years Experience at Henry Ford Health System (Maplegrove) in West Bloomfield, Michigan. During her tenure Dr. Ajo as inpatient substance abuse therapist, couched and empowered hundreds of lives and their families. Since December 2011 Dr. Ajo joined ACCESS, bringing to the Organization her expertise to start a program in Substance Abuse and Addiction. She hoped to make a valuable change that impact on perspective clients and their families. Dr. Ajo was born in Basra, Iraq and Immigrated to the United States in1971. She continued her studies in Michigan, earned her Bachelor from Oakland University, Rochester MI, major in Human Resource Development and minor in Psychology, Master Degree in Clinical Psychology and Pd.D. in Clinical Psychology and Education. Her first language was French, she is fluent in Arabic, Chaldean and English with some French. Dr. Ajo, was involved in the political field in Oakland County. She was elected as Commissioner for the West Bloomfield Parks and Recreation Commission in 2004. In 2008 was appointed by Governor Grandholm to the Michigan Arab/Chaldean Advisory Committee. She is also been appointed by the Oakland County Commissions for the advisory Board in 2011.

Book preview

AuthorHouse™

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.authorhouse.com

Phone: [phone]

© 2015 Salma Ajo, Ph.D. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse   11/18/2015

ISBN: 978-1-4969-6662-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4969-6661-2 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4969-6660-5 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015903967

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Warda LLC, Corporation.

Contents

Dedication

Introduction

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapetr 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Book Review

Dr. Salma Marougy Ajo, author of the recently released book Melodies Under The Palms, is the founder of Action Net Psychological Services, specializing in the treatment of alcohol and drug dependence. She was a Board Member of the Michigan Red Cross for over 10 years, and served on the Board of the Arab and Chaldean American Advisory Commission by appointment from Governor Jennifer Granholm. Dr. Ajo currently has a private practice in Farmington Hills, MI and treats clients with various types of addictions. This book was many years in the making, and Dr. Ajo discusses the motivations that contributed to it.

When asked about the inspiration to write this book, I often think back to my days as a graduate student. My thesis and dissertation work were filled with personal experiences related to the topics at hand. Colleagues often suggested a book to be something I should strongly consider writing in the near future, particularly one based on my background and life experience. The thought of writing this book was always there, I was just waiting for something to get me started. That something would be the Iraqi invasion of 2003. As an individual who grew up in Iraq, I was devastated to see the state of my homeland, and feared everything I knew and experienced would be gone forever. I often dreamt of taking my children back to Iraq, however, that seemed unlikely to ever happen.

The main objective of this book is to introduce the Iraq I used to know, and bring about a different perspective to a country that has been so harshly portrayed by the media. The reader will be taken back to a time where Iraq was filled with culture and diversity, and experience what it was like to grow up in the region of the Fertile Crescent. The true beauty of such a wonderful country will be brought to light and its vast history will leave readers in awe.

It is my hope that this book will raise a new level of awareness and bring about feelings toward a culture that seems all but gone forever. Although the Iraq I used to know is longer such, my memories will make sure that it stays with us for eternity. I am pleased to share my personal experiences and feel readers from all backgrounds will enjoy them.

Dedication

I would like to dedicate this book to my family who showered me with their love, blessings and support.

With all my love to my husband Ramzi Ajo, for your never-ending love, support, and patience during the hours I put into this book enforced what I already knew; your confidence in me! Thank you for taking over at home and giving me the opportunity to accomplish all of my educational goals. Completing this book is a tribute to everything we stand for.

To my children: Faris, his wife Asil and their amazing children Christian and Grace. My son Mahir for always being there for me. My youngest son Ramzi Jr and his wife Shennel, who recently welcomed their beautiful daughter Hailey Rose into the world. You are all are a constant reminder of the beauty and joy of childhood and growth. May we continue to grow in our relationships!

To my parents (may God bless their souls) who provided me with the best gift of healthy childhood and allowed me to grow to be the person I am today.

I also owe a great deal of thanks to many of my friends who have supported and encouraged me throughout the years of writing this book. Thank you for the confidence you instilled in me.

Finally, and most importantly, I would like to thank all the American Soldiers for their service to this wonderful country of ours during the war on Iraq. My heart also goes out to the innocent Iraqis who suffered unbelievably during the invasions bombings unleashed upon them. May God bless them and their families.

Memoir

Introduction

Two major issues motivated me to write this book. (1) I felt overwhelmed with some speakers, politicians and journalists who introduce themselves as specialists in the Middle-East affairs with minimal knowledge after a short visit to these countries especially Iraq and they believe that they have the expertise to make decisions about these countries. I have the truth, knowledge, and the experience living in the Middle East, not only living in Iraq and visited most of the Arab countries such as Kuwait Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Palestine, Egypt and Morocco. We visited almost every one of them as I was growing up, plus I identify and understand the different dialogues spoken in every Middle Eastern country. As you will be introduced to me through this novel you will find interesting and an eye-opener to my experiences growing up in Iraq, the neighboring countries and the discovery of my childhood and how I was exposed to for instance to speaking, reading and writing multiple languages.

So, I decided to write about the Iraq I used to know before the 70’s, the Iraq I knew before we moved to the United States which is not the same Iraq I knew then. Growing up with loving family and most important it was a safe environment and children were innocent. It was a true example of it takes a village to raise a child. So I decided to put my experiences into action, the experiences and challenges from my childhood toward my adulthood and to the present time. I believe that my unique upbringing and the courage to accept the changes that I was faced with is an example of growth and resilience to continue to be grounded with my strong upbringing values, looking at life in a logical way, understanding my own culture and trying to continue to be the person that I wanted to be and fulfill my dreams.

My journey was not a smooth there were some bumpy roads along the new path however, with faith, courage and commitment guided us in the right path that we decided to take and we were willing to overcome all obstacles. I do not regret the change that we devoted for our dreams to come true. Our strengths were we were both knowledgeable with the English Language, we were young and able to adapt to the new situation and bounce back and finally we were positive within our acceptance to our new life.

Moreover, for years I knew deep within my heart I am missing something I have not seen in Michigan. Until one day we were visiting San Diego, California and I saw a flowering plant that I recognized with a strong fragrance took me years back to my childhood, I did not know the name of the flower. So we visited a nursery to search and I found it and the tag labeled it as Arabian Jasmine. At this point my childhood memories guided me to write a book for my children and grand children and all the Iraqi children who will never have the chance to see the Iraq with the memories that they will never be able to experience of growing with the Iraq I used to know.

Chapter 1

Early experiences of Basra

Information is pretty thin stuff unless mixed with experience.

~Clarence Day- The Crow’s Nest~

image001.jpg

I t is an early June at the crack of dawn in Basra. A cool breeze brushes lightly against my face. I am four years old. I pull the cover tightly and try to sleep more and enjoy the morning cool weather as I lie on the flat roof and I want to make-up for the lost sleep of the night before because my grandmother was telling us old stories while she was baby sitting fo r us.

All homes in Iraq use the flat roofs to sleep on in the summer because it is cooler than indoors. Our roof and my grand parents’ roof were connected through a storage room and we could go back and forth to each other’s house. After my grandmother makes sure that everyone is asleep she will go to her own bed on the roof over the house. Before the sun is up, singing birds wake us. And they keep on singing waking up the late sleepers. Usually I would stay asleep the longest since my bed was in an area that was hit with the sun last. Then I would sleep until the sun is up and the air became warm. Then my sleep is interrupted and I would go downstairs for breakfast.

My mother would have prepared breakfast for us as soon as we wake up in the morning. Traditional breakfast consisted of freshly baked bread from the neighborhood bakery, Khubus was a large round flat bread baked in tanoor a flat deep open grill. The process of the other bread called Samoon needs a different bakery called firin, which is a flat open grill. For breakfast khubuz or Samoon were baked fresh daily and delivered to the home early in the morning. Every family kitchen had dibis (date molasses) and homemade jams made with seasonal fruits served with Gamer (buffalo clotted cream).

Gamer is made out of the cream on the top of unpasteurized milk delivered by the milk woman who raises water buffalo and sells the milk. Sometimes she sells ready made Gamer, butter and cheese made from water buffalo milk. My mother would boil the milk and keep it in the refrigerator over night and the next day. It would form a thick layer of about one inch of cream on the top.

The next morning my mom would skim the cream that forms on the top of the milk and serve it for breakfast with home made jam from the fruit of the season and debis (dates syrup) served with the khubuz and samoon fresh from the neighborhood bakery. It was the best breakfast with Ceylon sweet tea and hot milk added. In addition to the traditional breakfast on special days my mother would make French toast that she learned from the English women she had met through my father’s business associates.

We some times had home made Gamer (similar to Devonshire Cream) and seasonal jam/debis for breakfast. Food was purchased fresh and bought on a daily basis. Lamb and chicken are bought on the day it is going to be cooked. The Iraqi cuisine is the healthiest food you can imagine and we learned to eat in moderation even with our favorite food. It was expected to eat at home for all daily meals and mothers were expected to have a hot meal fresh cooked on the table where the family sat and enjoyed lunch, the main meal together.

Restaurants were available in Iraq, for people who came to town or single men with no one to cook for them. Seasonal fruits and vegetables were available for each season; winter vegetables were different from the summer ones. It was expected to have fresh food since canned or frozen foods were unheard of at that time.

Iraqi traditional cuisine goes back to the Mesopotamian era and was developed from ancient times in Chaldea, Sumer, Akkad, Babylonia and Assyria. It is considered the oldest cuisine. The food has been enhanced with different spices that were introduced to the country when Baghdad/Iraq was invaded by several nations. The location and the richness of the cuisine’s resources became the center of the Abbasid Caliphate during the Islamic Golden Age while Europe was in the dark ages.

Muslims and other scholars from many parts of the world came to visit, live and study in Iraq, which gave the Iraqi cuisine new flavor for its food. This is most commonly seen in the superior use of different spices (e.g. saffron, cardamom and curry used by Iraqi cuisine in comparison to other Arab cuisines.)

Iraqi cuisine has been influenced by all the neighboring countries and has much in common with, Persian, Turkish, and Indian cuisines. With the Ottoman control Iraq and consequent influences of Turkish cuisine history, the Iraqi cuisine has been deeply influenced not only by its fertile land between the two rivers, Euphrates and Tigris, by neighboring countries. National dishes reflect all these influences.

I am still astonished today when I think back at all the changes I have witnessed in my lifetime, remembering also the stories that I had heard from my grandmother and my aunts. As a child I was born and raised in Basra, south of Iraq, the only port after the Arabian Gulf

I am the second oldest child of five siblings; three girls and two brothers. My mother had a girl after me who died as an infant when she was diagnosed with malaria. Basra was surrounded by rivers, canals and wetlands, encouraged mosquitoes and sometimes caused a common epidemic, malaria disease for Basra’s residents.

I was born and lived next door to my grand parents from my mother’s side. My family was a traditional Chaldean/Catholic family where dad worked and mother was a stay –at-home mom. She made most the decisions at home, including discipline. My mother was the second oldest daughter, who was the first to get married and that was against the norms in the Iraqi culture at the time. Normally, the older daughter gets married first.

My mom had four sisters and four brothers. It seemed to me then that I had several mothers including my grandmother and aunts who took care of us. When my grandmother cooked our favorite food, we were always welcome to go next door to eat with them.

I lived as I grew up, a simple life with love and affection, where children were treated as children, to be seen and not to be heard. There was a lot of discipline at home, and equally the same at school. The rules were alike. We lived accurately, they old saying that, It takes a village to raise a child. That was how I felt then and now. Girls learned at early age to act like young ladies and the same applied to the boys who were to behave like young gentlemen. Children respected and listened to their elders and adults respectfully took care of the young children.

I remember my grandmother’s stories when she would put us to sleep as our parents went out for the evening. Her voice grew up and down as she told the stories as we were falling asleep. Quietly, she would leave for her own bed next door on the flat roof with a brick wall that divided the two homes and a small room that was used to connect the two homes. This also used as access/ divider and a door to get in their house, into ours. My memory of my grandmother is a big part of my childhood.

One of my grandmother’s stories was about how parents were strict with their daughters especially at the time, when a girl was engaged: she was not allowed to go out with her fiancé alone. Always family members had to accompany her. My grandmother told me a story about a couple who were engaged and the fiancé one day wanted to take his fiancé to the movies. Her father was upset and he responded to his daughter’s fiancé that he had no daughter to go to the movies and cancelled the engagement. My grand- mother stated that the couple finally did get married two years later. Friends intervened to resolve the conflict influencing the father to let the couple marry.

Our grand father loved us and cuddled us, giving us lots of attention when we went to visit. When he was sitting by the radio and listening to the news, we knew that we had to be very quiet. One thing we learned from my aunts was that my grandfather never hugged them or even acknowledged them as children, held them or kissed them while they were growing up. But he was different with us, the grand children to whom he gave special attention.

I remember that my grand father was a very well known person in Basra. He was a manager of the Othman Bank and because Basra was small we knew our neighbors and almost everyone in the city. We learned to whisper when speaking in public because we did not want others to know our business. Most people knew each other by first name or the family name.

I was told that my grandparents from both sides were the survivors of the Turkish Armenian/Christian genocide in 1915. However, my grandfather from my father’s side, after surviving the Turkish genocide heard along the way that there was a village in north of Iraq with mainly a Christian population which encouraged him and other members of his community to travel and find a home there and live there. He settled in Telkaif, a small village in the north where most of the Chaldeans came from. He eventually was married and fathered three sons.

My maternal grandparents used to work on the farm and my grandfather’s sister who was not married lived with them to take care of the children. One day their parents were late at the field and it was getting dark. Their uncle, who was their mother’s brother, went with other men from the village and found them dead. He brought them to his house and informed the police. He did not want the children to see what was going on. (My cousin gave all the information to me when I started investigating my father’s background).

According to my cousin, since his father was the oldest, he knew what was going on within his family. Catered to his other brothers including my father, being the youngest his parent’s death was not explained. My cousin continued to inform me that our grandparents from our grandmother’s side of the family took care of the boys and gave them their family name to protect them from cruel people who might mention the past to them.

This was an immense tragedy for my father’s family. My father and his two brothers were taken by their aunt and uncle away from the village and headed south to Basra. This was done to escape growing up in the same village, and hearing different stories about their parent’s deaths.

My father’s uncle had heard that the Brits (British) were in Basra and there were plenty of jobs for him since he needed to take care of