Fleeing Baghdad for Yethrub
This post is contributed by Dr. Diane Hassan, author of “Angels Among Us Even in Iraq”, who is currently participating in “On Loan at You Served” as a guest blogger.
Saddam sent all the male doctors to the front with the soldiers and all the females had to go to the village or the bomb shelters. I was preparing to leave Baghdad and go to my sister-in-law’s home. She lived in Yethrub, which was a small village about five minutes from the largest airport in the Middle East Every military installation in Iraq surrounded her home.
My husband wanted me and Mohammed to leave Baghdad, he did not know what would happen. Everyone felt a coup against Saddam would occur, after all America was near by to help. Hashim felt if I were in Yethrub, I would be close to the Turkish border. I could escape to Turkey and the Americans would help me. Everyone wanted to leave Baghdad, because they were afraid Saddam would use gas on the Iraqi people and say America did it.
I was packing a few things to take with me. I did not know if I would ever see my home again. How could I decide what to take with me, something that I did not want to loose in case my home were hit. I decided on my microwave oven that I had just bought in the Duty free shop. There were very few, maybe four or five microwave ovens in Iraq. My microwave was a symbol of my life in America, a symbol of an easy life, a reminder of Freedom.
My husband took me, Mohammed and my microwave to Yethrub. My neighbors came out to say good bye, they wanted me to remain in Baghdad with them, they felt if I were near by they were safe after all it would be my relatives in the sky and relatives don’t kill relatives.
As Hashim turned on to the main street, I saw numerous cars with all their household goods on the roof, people filled the street going to the market on the main street where we lived. We passed gas stations that had long lines of cars waiting. Due to the mass number of people leaving Baghdad, we moved slowly, until we reached the highway to Yethrub.
We arrived at Hashmia’s ,Hashim’s sister’s home about 7 p.m. She was preparing for us. She had one room with mats on the floor and the one window in the room was sealed with tape. She hope this would be sufficient if Saddam threw chemicals over our area. Hashim said good bye and returned to Baghdad. He stayed in Baghdad and would come to Yethrub from time to time to check on us.
We were alone now, me, my son Mohammed, my sister-in-law, Hashima, her two small sons, Amar, Mohammed’s age and Ali who was eight years old…We had our dinner, everyone had their mats, Mohammed had a sleeping bag, we settled in for the night . Everyone slept, but me. I remained awake watching a Glen Ford Movie, and praying the planes would not come.
Nothing could prepare me for what was about to happen….
