“Diane, there is nothing left in me to love,” these are nearly the last words I heard from my Iraqi friend who goes by the blog name of Diva. That was weeks ago and in response to my saying, “remember that I love you and so do your friends around the world.”
She and her mother were leaving their apartment they shared to go and stay with her Uncle after a terrible argument with her landlord. They just had a chance to pick up a few things to take as the space they would now share was small and among the things she had to leave behind was her computer.
She now has a new job, I don’t know what or where as we only had a few moments to chat on instant messsanger and then she was gone.
I first met Diva in November after checking an email penpal site and finding this one woman in Iraq who has listed an address. Didn’t really think I would get an answer, but in a few days there it was, my first email from someone living in Iraq.
I quickly shot back an email to her and thus began a great friendship, that had me calling her daughter and she calling me mother: that is how close we got in a very short time.
I asked her about the situation in Iraq and she sent me back her complete assessment to which I replied how sorry I was about what our government has done in Iraq.
The next email I received from her started out with her saying I misunderstood her, she was not blaming the US, just disappointed. To which I replied that I did not think she was blaming us but rather I was blaming our government.
In a short time, feeling a need to hear her voice I called her and we spoke at length and I found her to be as delightful, charming and intelligent in voice as she was in writing. We would have talked for hours, but the cost was high for the international phone call, so we had to be content with emails and instant messaging after that.
In the beginning she had a job where she could communicate often on the computer she had at work, so many emails were exchanged. Christmas came and went and the emails became less frequent and soon it was pre election time for her and the situation became very grim so she as well as many others stayed in their homes and waited out the election.
Election time became very desperate for Iraqi’s, especially in Baghdad, electricity which had been spotty at best, became almost non existent during those weeks as well and the water stopped running for long periods of time. In Iraq they do not say how long a time they have electricity, they speak of how long they do not. At best it was 6 to 8 hours a day on in broken increments of 1/2 hour here, and hour there. Many instant chats ended suddenly when the electrity would go out or the phone service stopped. Each time I did not know the reason for the disconection and feared the worst, then after awhile iI came to accept this as a fact of life. Power comes and goes, much like life.
All during this time, from the first when I met her I tried to give her some comfort, to find some words of compassion and understanding to share with her to ease her unbearable burden of just having the misfortune to be living in Baghdad. Her most common answer was “Diane, this is Iraq, you, no one on this earth could possibly understand what it is like to live here.”
Diva wrote such beautiful letters to me, I urged her to write for publication or at the very least a blog. At first she said who would want to hear me, a tiny voice in a desperate place. I said, I do and I know others do as well, we want to hear your words, hear your story, we want to know, we want to know the truth of Iraq and the truth of you. After some weeks of this she sent an email one day saying ‘I will do it, I will write, I find I do have something to say and its pouring out of me and I am writing all the time.’
She started a blog and managed to write two entries but none since early April.
If you are interested in hearing her words here is her blog address:
http://intellectualdiva.blogspot.com/
She lost the job that she had and stayed at home for a few weeks to study for tests regarding a Fullbright Scholarship, so she could come to the US to pursue a masters degree in the humanities and then someday a PHD. She took the test and passed with a 593 out of 600 and I was so proud of her.
I am writing this story about her today because I am so worried, I haven’t heard from her for weeks now and everytime I hear of a bombing or death in Baghdad I think, was she there, was she shopping in the market, was she on that street,in that car, was she anywhere near.
There is no phone now that I can call and see if she is alive and well, my emails go unanswered. I fear, always that I will never hear from her again.
Before the elections, when we did not know what would happen and violence was expected we said our ‘earthly goodbys‘, just in case. I told her I was so happy that we had met and grown to know and love each other and I would treasure her for the rest of my life and beyond.
Still I do not want her to be gone from this earth. I want her to be sending an email or chatting on instant messaging.
I want to hear her voice and see her beautiful face, and someday I want to meet her in person, here in this country. I want that damn it! I want her to be alive, to live her dreams, to live her future, to have a family and children and grandchildren, to grow old and wise.
But I fear every day and have since I have met her.
One person, in one country, a wonderful, intelligent person who should have every chance and every opportunity but because of the gross ineptitude of this administration now has to live a life such as this.
“Yes Diva”, I told her during our last chat, “you are loved, you are worthy of love, of course you are, and I shall always love you.”
Please God, keep her safe.
