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171 15 A Tale of Two Exiles Sama Alshaibi A few years back, on the eve of the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, I raised enough money to buy a ticket to travel to Amman in the hopes of shooting a documentary of my return to Iraq, the country of my birthplace. I had just become an American citizen, and my new passport had arrived in the mail, filled with empty pages and the promise of American access. It was a significant moment for me; my first working passport in over a decade. My worthless Iraqi passport is still in my possession. Although it serves no practical use and hasn’t for years, I would not surrender it to the INS agent at my final citizenship hearing. There was something about giving the defunct passport away that meant more than just losing a relic. Surrendering it meant accepting that that chapter of my life had ended, and I would no longer be able to claim my birth country . Even though for two decades being Iraqi meant living blacklisted from my country and branded as part of the enemy in the United States, that identity still held significance for me; it was part of how I learned to survive and grow. My useless passport, a few pictures, and a couple of American bullets I collected as a child in the streets of Basra were the only physical artifacts I had left of Iraq. My passport didn’t preserve memory like my other items, however. It still held out for the small possibility that one day it could be renewed. Even though I was relieved to finally become an American citizen and enjoy all of the access, privilege, and security it affords, I never stopped believing I was an Iraqi. I was 172  Sama Alshaibi forced out of my national identity, and my “Iraqiness” was and still is a central component who I am. I still dream of an Iraq that will one day grant privilege, not hardship, to her citizens and I refuse to let that dream go. I never did go to Iraq. My oldest brother, Usama, had also raised enough money to do a documentary in Iraq. Sibling rivalry reared its head as we tried to negotiate concurrent trips with our father, our personal guide who was also embarking on his first trip to his beloved home after a 23-year exile. It was complicated, trying to figure out what I could or could not shoot so as not to anger my brother, who is clearly the stronger filmmaker. Around the same time, I was offered an opportunity to travel to Palestine and partake in an art exhibition. My mother is a Palestinian, and, throughout my life as an Iraqi, I have been locked out of a relationship to the land and the family members who still live there. Either journey is ultimately a story of return. My identity was rooted in exile, mourning for the loss of Palestine in tandem with the loss of Iraq. I grew up with a double negation of my national and cultural identity. But in both cases, I was determined to visit my family’s homes. It was as if I needed proof, like the passport, that I once belonged to a place, not just an idea. Instead of going to Iraq, I bought a ticket to Tel Aviv. For the next years, I would make this trip twelve times. I found my Giddo’s (grandfather’s) village, the home he was raised in, family members, and the graveyard of my great-grandmother, made close friends, traveled throughout the West Bank and Israel, and insured a future with my restored Palestinian identity in place. For several years, the entirety of my art practice has been about Palestine or the Palestinian exile. I don’t regret the decision to go to Palestine because it created a living identity for me, not simply one of loss and exile. However, that single decision of going to Palestine instead of Iraq resulted in my missing a final window of opportunity to see my birthplace, a place I have been blacklisted from for more than two decades. The sliver of relative peace ended just as soon as it began. I remain an outsider to Iraq, as I have been almost all of my life. I cannot scream loudly about this fact, because how could this matter [3.141.8.247] Project MUSE (2024-04-26...

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