He was affable and funny, and so when he asked me out after the meeting, I agreed. Then, I quickly realized I was in no position to go out with anyone and called it off. In hindsight, it worked out for the best. There was the age difference, and there was also the fact that he wanted us to watch movies on VHS at his mother’s house, where he still lived.9 I may have been naive back then, but I knew when I was dodging a bullet!

  It might have been the weed, but after that night, I also began to rethink my “nice, preppy girl” image. After years spent trying to fit into mainstream society, I had finally succeeded—which was now making me an outsider in this society of misfits. For the first time, I felt like the most vanilla person in the room. Everything about me was soft—my musical tastes, my clothing, my demeanor. I was just a nice girl, and while there’s nothing wrong with that, I began to see the value of having some edge.

  By the spring, my parents had agreed to let me move into the dorms—for just one semester. I planned to make the most of it. My new roommate, Pam, was an African American girl with a dry sense of humor. We got on like a house on fire, to use a phrase that’s not typically in my lexicon. She quickly became like a sister, helping to ease the sting from my Charlie heartbreak. We were also inseparable and complemented each other wherever needed—if I was too quiet, she would snap me out of it; if she was obsessing about an exam that she was convinced she was going to fail, I would talk her through her anxiety until she was centered and calm.

  It was one of the best friend dynamics I’d ever had since returning to the States from Saudi Arabia. I reflected on my good fortune—that I had only moved into the dorm during the second semester when Pam just so happened to need a roommate.10 Once again, my philosophy that life eventually works out if you’re patient and let things be was being confirmed. There will be an answer, just like Lennon and McCartney had written.

  But then one day, the switch in our dynamic was flipped.

  I suppose it might have been building up for a while. There was that one time I failed to heed the apparently universal signal of a red tassel hung on the door—“Go away, I’m entertaining a male visitor”—and inadvertently cockblocked her. Worse, I’d barged in with my mother who’d made an impromptu stop on campus and wanted to see my room. In my defense, it was a Saturday afternoon, not the prime amorous hours of nightfall.11 I later apologized, and things went back to normal … or so it seemed. Perhaps we weren’t quite as sisterly as we once were. Gone were the depth, the jokes, the familiarity. When I tried to talk about it, she brushed it off, and my eighteen-year-old Arab pride caused me to not press further.

  Then Pam’s cousin came to visit from Detroit.

  As soon as Carla walked into our room, she stopped cold, visibly upset by a photo I had tacked to the wall. It was a fashion magazine photo of the singer Prince. He was wearing a teeny-tiny minidress with fluffy tulle sleeves and neckline, showing off his hairy chest and hairy legs. He wore long yellow gloves and black stiletto heels, and he stood proudly, beaming into the camera. The photo was definitely intended to make a statement, and Prince knew how to deliver shock value. I don’t remember what exactly appealed to me about that photo, except for the fact that Prince looked like he didn’t give any fucks, and I was working on becoming that kind of person.12

  But Carla didn’t share my sentiment. She was shocked, and she didn’t hold back.

  “You have a black man in a dress up on your wall.”

  “Well,” I said, “I just think it’s cool.”

  “You think it’s cool to ridicule him like that?”

  “ … What?!” I was taken aback. “No! I just like the photo!”

  “Because it’s a black man looking a fool!” she accused.

  “No! Because he’s expressing himself. This is—no!”

  I was struck dumb. Back then, I wasn’t skilled in the art of continuing a conversation in the face of potential conflict. I would get defensive and run away—and that’s exactly what I did. I turned my back on Carla, walked over to my bed, and put up a big show of stuffing my books in my backpack and getting ready to leave the room.

  Understandably, Carla was even more pissed.

  “Yeah, walk away, white girl.”

  Shocked, I tried to tell her I wasn’t white, but she snorted in outrage. “It’s okay, Princess! Just go back to your sorority!”

  I was momentarily transfixed by three words I’d never heard being used to describe myself: white, princess, and sorority. A year before, my aspirational inner preppy girl would have been thrilled at these designations. And in that moment, I was caught in those old feelings—for a minute. Then I came to my senses and realized it hadn’t been meant as a compliment. For the very first time in my life, I’d experienced a taste of my privilege of being able to pass as white. It didn’t matter that I’d felt like “the other” in America my whole life; I was capable of white passing, a privilege Carla did not have. It was a very strange reality to face.

  If I had been sensitive enough at the time to the cultural baggage Carla was bringing up,13 perhaps that incident would have changed me. Perhaps it would have been the tipping point that allowed me to finally let go of my perpetual need to fit in with the white majority. Perhaps I would have immediately recognized it as an important and sobering lesson in my path to self-discovery. But my eighteen-year-old self didn’t see it this way. I had not yet learned about the concept of intersectionality. Let’s just say I wasn’t very graceful in the face of this attack. I shut down and mumbled, as I kept shoving books into my bag, “I don’t have time to argue with someone who’s pigheaded.”

  “Oh. Now I’m a pig?! The vilest animal to your people?” Carla spat.14

  I didn’t know what else to do, so I just walked out, my heart racing. It was my first antagonistic confrontation with a casual acquaintance. By the time I returned to my room that day, I found that all my furniture had been rearranged, pushed into the middle of the room, and my pictures removed from the wall. It was the first mean act I had ever experienced, and it freaked me out. I left again and quickly went to my friend Deb’s dorm and used her payphone to call my mom. Thankfully, Mom refrained from saying anything to the effect of “I told you living in the dorm was a bad idea. Come home, immediately.” Thank God for small mercies. But she did suggest I get myself out of that situation.

  If I had been a stronger person, I might have dug my heels in and refused to leave. If I had been more open, I would have tried to discuss the issue and come to an understanding. But this was the first time I had experienced hate, and it hurt. Back then, I really, really, really needed to be liked. And I was used to being known as the “nerdy weird girl,” not the “racist bitch.”

  I went to the housing office, only to be told it was too late to trade rooms since there was only one month of school left. And it felt like failure to move back home, so when the housing office told me there was a single room downstairs in the basement usually reserved for housekeeping, I jumped at it. It was actually a very nice room despite the fact that it didn’t get any sunlight. But at least I could sleep without worry.

  But before I moved, there was another thing I did that I’m not proud of …

  The day of the move, I enlisted the help of my “fobby”15 Iraqi cousin Omar and our family friend Delia, a tough-looking Saudi woman who was the complete opposite of what you’d expect a Saudi woman to be—tall with stiletto heels, a spiky mowhawk, chain earrings, and tight miniskirt. She looked like a majorly badass Tina Turner.

  I merely wanted their moral support while I got my stuff out and moved on with my life—but both Omar and Delia insisted that I “send a message.” I was still pissed at Pam’s cousin (who had already gone home by then) for touching my stuff, so I agreed it was not the time for me to turn the other cheek. Omar and Delia showed up with their heavy Arab accents, leather jackets, and dark sunglasses, which they kept on for the duration of the move. They acted cordially to Pam, asking how she was and so forth, but it’s hard to appear cordial when you’re wearing sunglasses indoors. Delia picked up a couple of Pam’s textbooks and looked at them for a long while. Neither Omar nor Delia smiled. Every now and then, they would say something in Arabic to each other and then to me, while looking in Pam’s direction. It must have been a disconcerting (and stereotype-perpetuating) experience for poor Pam to have two Arab heavies invade her space like this. It was over in twenty minutes, and I never spoke to Pam again—though she did tell a mutual friend of ours later that she was sorry about how things had gone down with her cousin.

  So Pam, if you’re reading this, I, too, am sorry. I’m sorry that your first experience with Arabs was so horribly unpleasant. I’m sorry I relied on stereotypical traits of my people during my move. I hope you’ve had happier and more enriching encounters involving Middle Easterners since then.

  And I want you to know that I’m no longer scared of conflict. Nowadays, I take time to resolve issues and differences. I’ve learned to value meaningful conversations to clear the air.

  And I’ve never had to use the Arab Family Thug method again.

  _______________

  1 Eventually, they did allow me to live in the dorms during my second semester—and only my second semester. The experience ended badly and led me to living in the janitor’s quarters for the remainder of the year. But that’s another story I’ll get to shortly …

  2 Apparently, Mom and Dad had learned about American college life from watching the movies Animal House and Private School for Girls.

  3 It wasn’t lost on me that they tended to be men.

  4 A term that, during the eighties, had not yet been invented but totally applied to my situation.

  5 I guess that’s what cowards did in those days. Today, they wouldn’t even have the balls to break up with their partner face-to-face. After a month of silence, they’d probably send a screen grab of their new girlfriend’s texts, prefacing it with: “This is what U need 2 Know.”

  6 We drove because it would look suspicious if we were just parked.

  7 I was convinced that if I opened my mouth, words would come out backward like that dwarf in Twin Peaks, and everyone would know I was stoned.

  8 Formerly a clean-cut banker named Roger.

  9 My editor just pointed out that it’s strange that a former banker still lived in his mom’s house. I’d like to point out that after he changed his name from Roger to Seraph, any semblance of normalcy should have already gone out the window …

  10 Her old roommate had gotten pregnant, and it’s a drag having morning sickness in a dorm bathroom. She moved out.

  11 Plus, I was distracted by the prospect of my having left incriminating items lying around the room, which would cause my mom to insist I move back home.

  12 A person who DGAF, not one who wears minidresses with unshaven legs. Though, I guess if I truly didn’t care, I would wear whatever I wanted.

  13 “Woke,” in millennial speak.

  14 At least she was aware I was Muslim.

  15 Slang for “fresh off the boat.”

  20

  I-raq Star

  College was also the first time I experienced discrimination for being Iraqi.

  It was August 1990, the day after Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait. I was at London’s Heathrow airport, coming back home to Lexington after a six-week study abroad program. Though I have an American passport, my birthplace of Iraq is stamped in its pages—which meant I was subjected to questioning and a thorough luggage search by the customs official.

  HIM: (as he rummaged through my suitcase) Have you had contact with anyone from the country?

  I’d just visited my uncle and his family in Cornwall, so, technically, yes. But I was sure he meant anyone who had more recent ties with Iraq.

  ME: No.

  HIM: (finding an adaptor plug set I was bringing home) What’s this?

  ME: An adaptor plug set.

  HIM: What is the purpose?

  ME: It’s for a hairdryer.

  HIM: Where is the hairdryer?

  ME: It blew up … uh, died—uhhm! It stopped working, and I threw it away!

  For the next several minutes, he combed through my suitcase with the skill of a parent checking their child for head lice. I stood still, trying not to fidget and praying that he wouldn’t pay too much mind to the two hardcover books in Arabic that I’d wrapped up in a pair of very loudly striped jeans. The books were written by my uncle, a philosopher, and were gifts for Dad. And did I mention they were in Arabic? The last thing I needed was the customs guy to think I was bringing home pro-Iraqi propaganda.1 I held my breath as he rummaged, and after what seemed like an eternity (but was only five minutes), he let me through.2 It was nerve-racking, and the first time something like this had happened to me in my adult life. If only I’d known how many more detainments in airports there would be over the next two decades with the second Iraq war and post 9/11 …

  The fact of my homeland didn’t factor again into my life until the following year, during the air strikes of Operation Desert Storm. A girl in my Law of the Press class made an off-hand comment: “We should bomb those people.” I remember thinking clearly: those people are my people. Sure, I hadn’t been directly discriminated against, but the subtle microaggression hit hard. I wanted to punch her in the face,3 but at the same time, I was too nervous to speak out lest I be targeted for a hate crime. It turned out her fiancé had just been sent to Iraq; she had been acting out of emotion and fear instead of hatred … but since fear and hatred are just one notch away from each other on the dial, there’s still no excuse for a comment like that.

  I was sitting in broadcast journalism class when the United States announced we were invading Iraq during Operation Desert Storm. Someone had turned on CNN, and there was the news and the headline. I excused myself to the ladies’ room, where I locked myself in a stall and burst into tears. I had never felt so isolated and fearful because of where I was from. Even though I was an American citizen and technically could not be kicked out of the country,4 I hailed from a place we were at war with. I didn’t want to hear any ignorant, racist diatribes from my classmates and the people I considered friends. Dammit, I had finally found my “place at the table” and felt comfortable being truly me. I wasn’t thrilled about the possibility of losing it because of the inconvenient political climate in my former home.

  Luckily, that war was contained, and the US got out quickly … which of course led to destabilization in the region, making the situation worse. Saddam renewed his efforts, and after the horrific attacks of 9/11, we invaded Iraq once more in 2003.

  By our second war with Iraq, it was apparent that the Iraqi people weren’t horrible coconspirators but, in fact, victims themselves. Once again, I was treated differently for my heritage—but this time with sympathy and much curiosity. Between the years of 2002 and 2005, whenever I was at a dinner party and the subject of my heritage came up, I would notice the expression change on the face of the person I was speaking to. They would instantly become deferential and sympathetic, as if they had just been informed I had a terminal illness. Sometimes they would even whisper the word, as if it were too taboo to say out loud, “This is Ayser. She’s … Iraqi.”

  During this apologetic phase, most of the people I talked to were saddened by what the US had done to my country and seemed almost ashamed to be Americans. I felt the need to tell them that most Iraqis had initially welcomed the invasion to get Saddam out, but that it was the resulting devastation and anarchy in the country that really upset us. Then, they would cluck sympathetically and suddenly announce, “I see someone I need to say good-bye to before they leave; be right back!”—and they’d never return. It was a fun game I enjoyed playing at dinner parties in the early 2000s—seeing who could leave the conversation quickest or least gracefully.

  Which brings us to the political situation today. As I write this, it is 2018 and Donald Trump is president. Currently, a Muslim ban is being upheld by the laws of this country, disallowing immigrants from eight countries to enter US borders. At this writing, Iraq is not on the list, but, as many of us have found, the policies of Trump’s administration change daily.5 And it does make me think about my parents. My mother, who is part Iranian, has been wanting to visit Iran, where many of her relatives reside, and I would love for her to do that. But we have to consider if it is worth it when the target is on her back.

  In 2011, we took Dad to Irbil, in Iraqi Kurdistan, to visit my uncle who was living there at the time. I found the local Iraqis to be some of the nicest people I know. The US had just pulled out and left them to their own devices. They were a country busy rebuilding after the ravages of Saddam’s gassing of the fields in 19886 and then the two wars—Desert Storm in 1991 and Desert Shield from 2003 to 2011. It was surreal to be there. My uncle’s villa stood on land that had previously been gassed by Saddam during the chemical attack targeting the Kurds. During construction of the property, it was apparently a regular occurrence to find human bones and remains on the site. For my parents to see a place that had once been green and vibrant and where they used to go for vacations as kids, but that had now become a beige wasteland, must have been a heavy emotional experience. It was even for me.

  With all the pain, losses, and waste of time brought on by the war, the fact is Iraq is at least finally becoming recognized and normalized in the US. I no longer feel weird or apologetic about telling my fellow Americans that I’m from Iraq. Plus, one of the few good things about Iraq becoming a household name here is that people are no longer mispronouncing it.

  It’s “ee-rock” or “ee-rack,” not “eye-rack.” You take the little victories.

  I’m proud to be an ee-rocky American.

 

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