Following Abdul Rasul came a large container of his belongings, crammed with books as well as the pieces of Georgian-style furniture that were to adorn his quarters at the Deer Palace. He set about building a tennis court at the back of the house so he could continue with his game, and entertained the household with his gramophone and his new records.
Before long he was offered the post of Financial Controller at the Ministry of Finance, then headed by his father’s friend Rustum Haidar. He threw himself into his new work with passion. His political career had begun.
An eligible and appealing young man from an influential family, Abdul Rasul didn’t lack for female admirers, who made themselves known to him through a series of intermediaries. His time abroad had given him an air of confidence and a charming insouciance, especially with women. He had an ease about him that many Iraqi men lacked, having had little interaction with the opposite sex. News of her son’s many admirers soon reached Jamila’s ears, as young ladies accompanied their mothers enthusiastically to her Wednesday qabuls. These were the perfect venue for matchmaking and bride-hunting.
In early summer Bibi would throw lunch parties. These gatherings were jolly affairs, and included men and women, affording the young people ample opportunity to flirt. Sometimes the guests included teachers, who were mostly recruited from Lebanon and Syria during Abdul Hussein’s time as Education Minister, as there were still insufficient numbers of locally trained Iraqi teachers – a situation which was being addressed with the founding of a teachers’ college in 1923. Abdul Rasul was always a hit at Bibi’s parties, flirting with ease and confidence.
Walking in the garden down by the river one day, Bibi was struck by a wonderful idea. Her attention was drawn to the jizrahs or small islets, the mounds of rich earth that popped up in the middle of the river in summer. While the jizrahs were highly sought-after spots on which to grow garden vegetables, Bibi realized that they would also be wonderful places on which to entertain. She soon began hosting parties on them.
These events required the entire household’s participation in order to transport furniture and cutlery, umbrellas, the various dishes and drinks, and obviously the guests themselves, out to the jizrah, where one of the farmers would skilfully grill the renowned local delicacy of simatch masguf, carp with a spicy tomato filling, on an open fire.
King Faisal’s son, Crown Prince Ghazi, came with several of his friends to one of the parties for Bibi’s Baghdadi ladies. The Prince was a friend of Hadi’s younger brother Ibrahim, who still had rooms at the Deer Palace but was now in the army. The young gentlemen kept at a respectable distance from the crowd of ladies, but they were nevertheless an exciting distraction for them. One of the bolder girls recruited Bibi’s pretty daughter Thamina and drew a heart on her palm. She then signed her name underneath and asked Thamina to show it to the Prince. Thamina duly did so, to the amusement of the men.
Abdul Rasul’s return to the household signalled a period of even more activity at the Deer Palace, as a new crowd of young men began to visit him, staying till the small hours as they painted their visions for Iraq with eager words. Inspired by his experiences in Europe, Abdul Rasul encouraged Bibi to attend concerts deemed acceptable for women with his sister Shamsa, and even to go out without her abaya, then an unheard-of act among Muslim women. On this last point, Bibi would protest in mock horror and call him mad, although she too secretly wanted to throw off the garment. For all her reprimands, Bibi liked her brother-in-law very much; he had become the personification of modernity for her. She even forgave him when he teased her about the fact that she always seemed to be pregnant these days; at the end of 1928, some months after his return, she had given birth to her sixth child, a son called Jawad.
In late 1929, about a year after his return to Baghdad, Abdul Rasul started to complain of bad headaches, poor vision and bouts of dizziness which left him immobile for hours at a time. This caused much worry in the family, and several resident European doctors came to the Deer Palace to examine him. With the help of the Baghdad hospital’s new x-ray machine, the doctors all gave the same diagnosis: he had a brain tumour, which explained the deterioration of his eyesight, hearing and balance. They recommended that he consult specialists in Europe, particularly in Vienna and London, who had greater expertise and the resources with which to treat such a case.
Abdul Rasul’s illness had come upon him so suddenly that its severity was not at first fully absorbed by his family. Jamila shrank into herself, and while it broke Abdul Hussein’s heart to see his son suffer like this, he summoned all his energy and money to organize a party to travel with him to Europe.
From Baghdad, Abdul Rasul flew to Beirut, accompanied by Hadi and two friends who had some knowledge of English. The next day they boarded another flight to Marseilles, then took a series of trains to Vienna. Abdul Rasul’s situation was deteriorating so quickly that his brother had to nurse him constantly, helping to feed and bathe him. Hadi felt enormous pain as he watched his brother wither before his eyes. Abdul Rasul tried to put on a brave face. He had reacted to the original diagnosis calmly, and his stoicism surprised his travelling companions.
In Vienna, a biopsy confirmed that a cancerous tumour was causing Abdul Rasul’s symptoms. Radiation therapy would be futile, the doctor concluded. In his opinion, the only treatment would be a very dangerous operation to remove the growth. Otherwise Abdul Rasul would die in a matter of months.
Already unable to see or hear properly, Abdul Rasul had begun to retreat into his illness, speaking little and complaining even less. Desperate, Hadi decided to consult the other doctors who had been recommended in London.
He waited until Abdul Rasul was well enough to travel again. The train journey across Europe felt endless, and Hadi spent insomniac nights in their sleeping compartment, terrified of losing his brother, who lay quietly on the lower bunk bed. The burden of responsibility weighed heavily on his shoulders as he desperately prayed for Abdul Rasul’s recovery.
In London Hadi knew he could rely on the support of Iraq’s Ambassador, Jaafar Pasha Askari. Some years earlier, when Jaafar Pasha had been King Faisal’s first Defence Minister, he had asked Hadi to help recruit young men from Kazimiya for the First Battalion of the Iraq army, which he had successfully done. Now Hadi looked to him to return the favour.
However, their stay in London was harrowing for Hadi and his companions, as Abdul Rasul continued to slip away before their eyes. The opinion of the London doctors was that, although the chances of success were slim, surgery to remove the tumour represented the only possibility of saving him.
The telegrams Hadi sent to his father at the Ministry in Baghdad were brief, and always ended with the words: ‘God willing, he will be well.’ It was as much a supplication as a figure of speech. What could he say that his father didn’t already know? He tried to block his mother out of his mind, because he knew how devastated she was at her son’s unexpected illness, so he simply wrote her a few lines, sending Abdul Rasul’s greetings and asking her to keep praying for him. Abdul Rasul duly underwent the operation.
The news came suddenly, as bad news always does. One cold day when Hadi and his friends entered the ward to visit Abdul Rasul, the matron informed him with regret that his brother had died earlier that morning. Hadi didn’t need a translation to understand what had happened, and a sensation of nausea hit him that was so overpowering he nearly lost his balance. One of his friends held his arm and guided him to the nearest chair, then asked a nurse for a glass of water, which he held for him to drink. Hadi sat frozen in anguish, repeatedly muttering the familiar saying, ‘Inna lillah wa innah ilayhi i raji’un’ – We are from God and to him we return.
Eventually Hadi asked to see his brother. Abdul Rasul’s eyes were shut, his head was bandaged and his face was pale. Hadi collapsed over him, sobbing and holding his cold body tight. He had hoped against hope that his brother would recover, that he was simply too special to meet this fate. He couldn’t imagine a world without
Abdul Rasul. Their lives together flashed before him: their childhood in Kazimiya, playing with their horses and racing each other over the open fields – the images were endless.
The next few days passed in a daze as Hadi’s travelling companions arranged the formalities, with the help of Jaafar Pasha at the Iraqi Embassy. There was no question of leaving Abdul Rasul behind; he had to be brought home, and that could only be achieved by boat.
The hardest task for Hadi was to inform his parents of the terrible news. He decided it would be best to telegram one of the British advisers at the Ministry, Somerville, who could tell Abdul Hussein in person. When the telegram arrived at noon on the day after Abdul Rasul’s death, Somerville went straight to the Minister’s office. Abdul Hussein was standing by his desk, ending a telephone conversation, but one look at Somerville’s face told him all he needed to know. His car was summoned and he was helped into it by Somerville and his driver Karim, who drove him home quickly.
At the Deer Palace, the rooms echoed with howls of grief when Jamila heard the news. She changed forever that day. Her interest in life vanished, and she continued to exist merely because she could not die. Soon the entire house was weeping, the women beating their chests and wailing loudly, overwhelmed by the catastrophe that had hit them. Bibi thought it wiser to send the younger children to her mother’s home in Kazimiya, away from the tears and hysteria. Before long the house was overrun with people who had come to share the tragedy with the family, and tents were set up in the garden to receive the thousands of visitors, many of whom had travelled from distant places, who came to pay their respects. Professional male orators recited the Quran in its entirety as custom dictated, while female readers did the same for the women, who grieved separately. Cooks were hired to produce enormous quantities of food, rice and stew on a daily basis.
The journey back from London – by train via Paris and Marseilles, by boat to Beirut and then by car to Baghdad – took two weeks. It felt like an eternity to Hadi. When he and his friends arrived in Baghdad he was barely recognizable, having lost so much weight since he left three months earlier.
The burial took place in Najaf, inside the shrine of Imam Ali. This was a huge mark of respect and honour for a young man who had carried the dreams of his entire community, and the ceremony was attended by all of Iraq’s prominent men, the women staying at home as tradition decreed. Iraq’s most popular poet of the time, Mulla Abud al-Karkhi, recited a panegyric in which he lamented Abdul Rasul’s lost youth and potential.
The funeral rites lasted forty day and nights. After that time had passed, the cool yellow corridors of the Deer Palace rang out once more with the sounds of children’s voices. However, there was one set of rooms that remained locked: the library and bedroom that had belonged to Abdul Rasul. Only his father had the keys to these rooms, and they were only ever opened to be dusted. Everything in them remained otherwise untouched. Until their deaths, Abdul Hussein and Jamila sent food every Friday to poor families in Kazimiya in memoriam to Abdul Rasul’s soul.
14
Bursting Energy
Hadi’s Growing Empire
(1931–1933)
ALTHOUGH ABDUL HUSSEIN had always imagined that Abdul Rasul would be the son to follow him into politics, after his brother’s death Hadi extended his interests into that arena, and by late 1930 he had been elected a Member of Parliament for the town of Diwaniya.
At a party held by King Faisal in early 1931, Rustum Haidar introduced Hadi to an English visitor. The man was a partner in Andrew Weir & Co., a British company that had had a strong presence in Iraq for several years, and he was looking for an Iraqi agent to source wheat and barley, which – along with a special type of rice called amba and dates from the south – were Iraq’s most important agricultural exports. Hadi seized the opportunity, opening an office on Samau’al Street which would eventually become the home of the Baghdad Stock Exchange.
His office was opposite Rashid Street, one of the most important commercial and financial centres in Baghdad, which was mainly inhabited by Iraqi Jewish merchants, accountants, bankers, clerks and translators, flourishing under the continued patronage of the British and assisting them as local advisers in the new Iraqi state. The buildings on Rashid Street were made of brick, mostly two storeys high. Many had columns at street level, sheltering the entrances of the buildings. Rashid Street was always busy, with cars and small trucks, horse-drawn carriages and old donkey carts moving in both directions.
From his office window Hadi enjoyed an uninterrupted view of the bustling street below lined with cafés, warehouses and shops. Samau’al Street was always congested, partly owing to the mobile food sellers who ambled along with their heavy wooden carts, selling boiled green beans in summer, turshi pickled vegetables or abiadh wu baidh – boiled egg and mango pickle sandwiches – all year round. People from all walks of life passed by: the effendis in their Western suits, men in Bedouin dress with daggers in their belts and yashmaks on their heads, mullahs with their black or white turbans, men of the city in their traditional Baghdadi dress of long shirt and waistcoat over trousers. The women concealed their bodies under their abayas, and sometimes wore a pushiya made from stiff gauze which covered the lower half of the face. Unlike the black abayas worn by Muslim women, those of the Christians and Jewish women were often brightly coloured and embroidered.
Samau’al Street, Baghdad.
Seated on the corner, small groups of peasant women in long dresses sold fresh buffalo gaymar out of clay urns. Most striking were the yoghurt girls, walking down the street in the mornings with several round wooden trays of yoghurt carefully stacked and balanced on top of their heads. They wore long, colourful dresses which they tied with thick bright belts. Many wore anklets. Most had dark kohled eyes and tattooed faces which were visible as they made their way slowly but skilfully, balancing their goods. They always walked together in groups for fear of being harassed or even kidnapped.
The street was a sea of shades and sounds. Although there were specific food markets, farmers would sometimes spread their pomegranates or vegetables on thick rice bags on the ground along the roadside, shouting out to advertise their wares to passers-by. Even louder was the male yoghurt seller, who was usually hunched under the weight of the brass container he carried on his back. Advertising the much-prized Arbil yoghurt from the north, he clacked the glass cups he carried as he walked through the streets and alleyways.
Hadi’s office was called ‘Offees Abdul Hadi Chalabi’. It was in the Middle Iraq Daftardar building and was managed by Yusuf Zubaida, a talented and loyal Baghdadi Jew. He was a tremendous help to Hadi, particularly when it came to communicating with the nearby offices of Andrew Weir & Co. Hadi’s task was to source grain and transport it to Weir’s ships in Basra, 10,000 tonnes a shipment. He soon found himself with 90 per cent of the country’s grain export on his hands, and he also exported the barley and cotton that grew on the lands between the two rivers, from the north of Baghdad extending all the way to Basra.
It was partly due to his good relations with the people in the regions where the grain was grown that Hadi’s elaborate network functioned so well. He had agents throughout the country, from Baquba, Mosul, Hilla, Kut. The deliveries that came from the north by train were stored in the sif, grain warehouses, that Hadi built near Kazimiya and later also in Basra, where the grain would be inspected by his employees and repackaged for the journey south to Basra.
Hadi would often stay up late with his staff to greet the train from the north at the station, much to Bibi’s irritation and worry. She would berate him, complaining, ‘What are you going to do – count every grain? Why can’t you sit still just for a minute?’ Then she would pout and add, ‘I have to sit here all alone; what kind of a life is this?’
Eventually he would explode, ‘You really have no idea, have you?’ Then he would storm out.
Very soon anyone wanting to sell grain came to Hadi, as he was the most active buyer. To encourage the developm
ent of agriculture he started to extend credit to growers in order to enable them to purchase seeds and machines. His children saw him only fleetingly, as he was always busy. Even when he came home late and tired in the evenings there were always guests to entertain, constituents to attend to, people waiting to see him in the dawakhana.
One day in 1932, among those waiting outside the house was a mukhtar, the head of a nearby district where Hadi owned land. The man was accompanied by a young girl. The mukhtar asked Hadi to protect her from her father, a tribal chief, who had sworn to kill her because she had broken his word by marrying a man she loved from outside the tribe. He explained that he could not think of a safer place to hide her than with Hadi Chalabi. Hadi agreed that the girl could stay at the Deer Palace while he and others sought to convince her father to forgive her and give his approval to the marriage.
After a month the man declared that his daughter could come home and be married again in front of him. However, some months after she returned to the district he came to her house and shot her and her husband dead. He showed no remorse when he was taken to jail, because he had not forgiven her for the humiliation she had inflicted upon him.
Bibi was deeply shocked by the incident, and reproached her husband for believing the man. She took the girl’s murder very personally, but could only vent her anger by criticizing Hadi’s handling of the matter. In turn, Hadi was beginning to lose his patience with her. ‘How was I to know that the girl’s father would harm her, after all these months?’ he yelled.
Late for Tea at the Deer Palace: The Lost Dreams of My Iraqi Family Page 17