This is the story of establishing a library in a primary school south of Iraq in a village named Alumayahh. It started when I met my cousin, she works as a teacher before 9 months in a primary school.

I asked  her  if the school contained a library for children, and she said “oh, my, you want a library for them while we haven’t even a good place for to teach them. The school is only 7 rooms, one for the head and all teachers and another 6 is for classes from 1^st class till 6^th class.”

I asked her if it’s okay to visit the school and establish a library for them? She said why not – it will be wonderful to do. I will tell the school head and you can come.

In our department, I told all our students about this plan and also my colleagues. All of them were eager to help, so we started to collect the collection for this library. Many students contributed story and drawing books and also color pens.   I give the school the date for my visit, which was at 20^th April. My student & colleagues were hoping to go with me, but there is no hotel for them to stay because  the school is in a small distant village. Maysan is a city in the south of Iraq, 4 hours from Baghdad by car. Ali Al-Gharbi is a province(constituency) next to Maysan ….the village name is Alumayahh, and the school name is Al Batthaa. I needed 3 hours drive to reach Ali Al-Gharbi, where I spent my night in my uncle’s home.

I woke up early at 20^th with my cousin to start our way to the village. A car comes to pick up teachers so I was with them, then after 15 minutes drive we reached a place close to Tigris river.  We left the car and started to cross the river by canoe – there was 2 canoes and we crossed the river with 4 in each canoe. Our  canoe was heavy because it held the story books as well as us. When we reached the the next bank, we walked about 10 minutes to reach the school. It was amazing to see all the children waiting and wanting to see the new visitor from Baghdad. They come running to say good morning for the teachers and for me. They were so cute children with simple wear. Usually, in Baghdad, all students wear same formal wear in school, but this seemed hard to do in this small village where families who live there are farmers and fishermen - usually they have sheep & cows also chickens …life is different for them, and nice from those  families to send children to school because they almost need them to help at work.

I entered the classes and I talked to them about a library and how much it is important to read something more than school teach us. Books is a new world help us discover the world around us. The surprise was, almost all of them didn’t have any book story in life, so they were very happy and excited to see all these books . I read a story for 1^st class – they were happy and me, too.  I also heard from them some stories they know from grandmothers. They started out shy but then we became friends . When I entered the 3^rd class, the children there are 8 years old. They were having an English lesson, and they welcomed me in English words.  I found them so good and active with their teacher. I asked them some questions and they were understanding and answered in English.

While there is no room for this library, we decided to put it in the head’s room and allow them to borrow it.  A new school will be finished in 6 months. The farmers contributed the area from their farm to build a new school and the ministry will pay for building. I give a gift to each one who had a good degree in lessons (it was colors and coloring book also a storybook) to help them improve and be better.  Almost of them walk 2 kilometers to reach school, and he /she when back at home must help at home with chores – a farmers life is not easy. When I entered the 4^th class, the lesson was about the important of a clean body and how much it’s important for health. We loaned  all of them a story to read and to bring it back the next day to get another one. At the rest time, teachers played football with 6^th class students - it was so nice to see them give time to play with them to be closer .

At the end of school time, when I said bye to children, they asked me to come again next day. I said yes will do…so I stayed one more day with them. On the next day, 21 April, I asked them about what they read?  I felt the happiness in their eyes that made my heart glow with  love for them. When the 2nd day ended, I said bye to the children and promised to come back next year when the new school is finished and will hold so many storybooks and I will bring with me many gifts for those make his/her degree more better. I am proud of those children and appreciate what their teachers  do for them.  Teaching is a message to touch the heart – then you can touch the brain easy….. as I think they do. My hope is to some day see a library in all primary schools in Iraq. Thanks to my colleagues & my students in helping me to establish this small library.

Till next blog….good luck for everybody

-Thana

The formal television channel for Iraq – Al-Iraqiah – has been in existence for some time, but it did not have a library. When they decided to establish a library, they came to our Institute to seek advice and help, and they chose me to help in this job, of which I am proud to do so.

The first step was to meet the man responsible for this work, and we put together the line of work needed. The first thing to do is collection building. This is an area of work I am interested in for my teaching, so I find it a big chance to do this work practically. In past training programs, we have talked about collection building, and the books we received on this I have read and now can try and use in a practical manner.

After one month, Mr. Hassan Al Marawani (a famous Iraqi poet) and I met to start buying books for this library. We went to an exhibition at Al Dar Al Arabiyah at the central library at Baghdad University. We had a good budget and we bought 1,500 books. The books were on subjects like stories, history, poetry make-up, fashion, cooking, etc.

When I told Hassan that we must buy a book on Dewey classification, he said it “was too expensive.” I said “how can I arrange books in the library without it?” He answered that we can put them on the shelves and there is no need for this. The truth: many people find it hard to understand our work as librarians. When I finally got him to agree to let me buy it (I was prepared to excuse myself from the project), I bargained a good price for it (I like to bargain and get good prices for everything).

After a long shopping day for books, I felt good that we had done a good job, and that the work was successful. I will send news about this project for Al-Iraqiah TV in the future – inshallah.

Translation into English from Arabic by Thana, from Abed Al Razaq al Hilaly’s Iraqi Biography 1972, Dar al Nahdah, Baghdad/Beirut.

Al Kermal is the first man who was interested in libraries in Iraq. He was born in Baghdad 1866, and his father was Lebanese and his mother was Iraqi. He worked as teacher for Arabic language in Beirut in 1886 and he studied Latin & Greek language. Then in 1893 he went to Monbileh in France to study theology and returned to Baghdad as a priest.

He was given the management of Al Kermalia school for the year 1894, and he taught both Arabic and French languages in addition to preaching and advisership in church .

He wrote many linguistic and historical articles, one thousand of which were published in Arab newspapers, and he issued a journal named Arab Language in Baghdad in 1911.

He was considered the first manager or librarian to Al Salam library, 1920, which is now the Iraq National Library, and he was one of many people who participated in the establishment of the library by donating many printed materials and also donated money.

He was elected as a member in German eastern community and the Arab scientific community in Damascus, and he was also a member of translation and authorship community & Iraqi publishing for the year 1945.

He has a special library with unique books & publications in criticism, 2500 books & 1500 manuscripts of which were dedicated to the library of the Iraqi National Museum, while the others in foreign languages remained in the library of the monastery (monastery was established by al Keramluen in Baghdad in 1722).

He died in 1947, but he remained in the Iraqis’ memory as a man of culture, and prophet of love between the different religions in Iraq and between Arabic language and foreign languages.

From Thana, a participant in the Simmons GSLIS Middle East training programs

Usually students choose the name of this graduating day. This year for fun they chose to name “graduate and sit at home,” so no work for them. It is true, there are few jobs for these graduates and it will be hard for them to find work. The students are playful and joking and choose funny names for each other on this day. For taller student they choose habeib, he is always responsible for hanging things in our department. The chose Zozo for Zahrah, and Barbie foe Neda, and no one is prettier than Lubna.

It was so nice a day and I am happy to see my students happy. The guys and gals were holding flowers and walking about campus singing and taking pictures. How wonderful it is also to see that our superior students will continue their studies at al-Mustansiriyah University to get a BA degree.

Let them be happy in this place that is full of danger, and we hope for them a good future as librarians, and also hope they can get their aims and start a new way in life. I will always be proud of them.

From Thana, a participant in the Simmons GSLIS Middle East training programs

My initial impression of the USA and Boston was very nice. I met a lot of nice and generous people here -no offense- more than what I had expected (with all due respect). That is because I have seen a lot of bad American movies which describe the people here in a different way (and bad way in many of them). In addition to that, I thought they will not be able to spend that much time that they have spent with us just to make us feel comfortable here.

At the same time, I have very good friends here. However they just shocked me in their extreme generosity and caring even more than what I expected (because they are very busy people and their time is very limited as I know).
The place here is very different from what I expected. I thought that all the buildings here will be very large and tall. It is big and nice (more than the one that we have there in our home). But I used to see very tall towers (in the movies and photos) in the USA. And I thought it will be like this here in Boston.

We have ventured out with some nice people who were sent by the very wonderful and kind Dean Michele V. Cloonan, and some other people from Simmons College. They volunteered to take us out in Boston. They took us on tours to discover the city. We used public transportation, and saw the important places.

We visited the MFA “Museum of Fine Arts”, the Boston public garden, and the historical places in Boston. We went to Boston Public Library and some others colleges in the neighborhood, like Harvard and the MIT which are two of the most famous universities in the USA.

There are a lot of universities and colleges in our neighborhood. In fact, we live in the middle of University community here. One of the things that we did not know was that a lot of the educational institutions that are called Colleges here are Universities!?!. It is a confusing thing. One of the best examples of that is Simmons College. We thought that it is only a College. But it is a University at the same time. It contains many colleges in it. The colleges are called “schools”. Simmons College contains many schools such as the GSLIS (Graduate School of Library and Information Science). It contains also other schools which are: School of Management, School for Health Studies, School of Social Work, and College of Arts and Sciences Graduate Studies. It has M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in it. Some of them have B.A. in it, and others are not (like GSLIS).

For us, we haven’t started our studies yet. But Simmons College arranged an English course for us in the Boston languages institution for 4 weeks. We tried to improve our English language as much as we could before we start the courses.

We hope that we will succeed in that “Insha’Allah”…

Yours truly,
Khairi, Abdulateef Hashim

It has been a very long time from the last training course in UAE in 2006. We were very eager to meet all our best friends here, especially Harvey. We came here to Boston and waited for the day that we would see him again. But unfortunately, we heard some news here that made us sad. We heard that he would come in the next week, but would be leaving Massachusetts to go to another state to start his new job…

The news just shocked us. But at the same time we heard that he got a good job there. So, we were very happy for him, and sad at the same time.

After one week, we heard that Harvey has arrived in the USA. We had been told that he’d like to meet us the next day. We met him, and it was a very nice moment. He was our close friend, so we were very happy to meet him at last.

We had lunch together. We talked about a lot of things. He asked us about all the things that we have done in Baghdad up until we arrived in Boston. Then, he confirmed the news about his moving to another state. He invited us to visit his house the next day, because he had to move out the day after that.

The next morning, he picked us up at the main door of Simmons College’s main building. Before we went to his house, he took us on a nice tour of his neighborhood. It was a very nice place. The natural surroundings there were very attractive. He showed us some historical places where some famous people had lived.

We went to his house. It was a very nice and warm house. We met his wonderful wife there. She was a very nice and kind lady. We had a very nice time there.

When we left Harvey’s house, we went to a market near there. We saw some nice things to buy. We picked out some gloves and a scarf, but Harvey insisting on paying for them. We tried to tell him that we are ok, and that we can afford it. But he refused to listen to us and he paid for them. He is a very nice friend and he says that this is what friends do for each other.

When he got us back to our dormitory, it was a very sad moment. We were almost in tears. He told us that we should visit him some day, and spend some time with him in his new house. He will be in place far away from here, but he said that we can visit him when we have the time for that. We told him that we will do that some day, and that it will be an honor for us.

During the time when we were in his house, he asked us about the computers, and if we had gotten laptops yet. We told him that we were still checking the prices and quality of them. He told us that we should go to see one of the employees at Simmons College next Monday, and she will help us. But the shocking thing was that when we met her, she just asked us about the type and the quality that we need. Then we discovered that Harvey had sent some money to her, and asked her to help buy laptops for us…

We cannot say anything here that could describe the generosity and kindness of this great friend that we have… But all we can say here is… Thanks dear friend Harvey… We will never forget what you have done for us… we cannot pay you back for all the nice things that you have done for us… We miss you a lot already. We wish you all the success in your new job… And hope to meet you very soon Sir.

Yours truly,
Khairi, Abdulateef Hashim

We all hope for this library more progress and success.

Thana

This is Khairi, Abdulateef Hashim – I’ll talk here about the arrival to Boston. After a very tiring trip and lots of suffering, we arrived to Boston. When we arrived to Boston airport (as I have said before), & finished some small paperwork & passport check, we went to the main incoming passenger’s hall & there was something very nice to see, the wonderful Michele Cloonan, the Dean and Professor in GSLIS at Simmons College & her husband Dr. Sidney Berger. When we saw them, all the tiredness & the suffering was just gone & disappeared. When she saw us coming, she just jumped in the air expressing her happiness. In that moment, my tears almost fall down… it was a very special moment to me! This moment made me think about all the difficulties in getting to Boston, but it is best to forget these now.

As I said, it was a very heart warming to see that view. We got out of the Airport & it was my first time that I saw the snow… I have a curiosity to touch it, & I did, because it was just looks like something almost unbelievable to me.
We went to Michele & Sid’s house, where we spent our 1st night there. Their house was very nice & warm, & there we met Sid’s son “Rafe” who is a very nice young man.

In the next morning, Mr. Sid offered us to taste some pancakes that he made. They were very delicious and I said to him “Aashat Eidak,” as we say in Arabic word (or in Iraqi accent actually), which means “long live for your hand.” That is what we say for someone who does something very good. We found that Michele & lots of nice people at Simmons College had brought lots of things & gifts that we might need here, such as blankets, kitchen stuffs, & some other things, which were waiting for us in Michele’s house for a long time …

Next, we went to the Simmons College student’s dorm, where we received the keys for our rooms. We put our luggage in the rooms & went with Michele & Sid to buy some other things that we might need. Later, we got back to the dorms to unpacked our things, & started to explore our new place.

For my colleagues in Iraq & the others who have not been here, I’ll try to describe the dorms for you. Our dorm is a nice building in 4 floors, containing a main sitting room in the 1st floor (which my room is there on this floor) and one group of bathrooms & showers for each floor. The rooms in the dorm are a little small, about 2.10×3.00 M, & contain a bed, a clothes cabinet, a small wardrobe, a reading table & a chair. It has a small window & central heating. It may be a small room, but I think that it is enough. The building that we are in is co-ed (co-educational as they say it here – which means that it contain men & women in the same building). In the basement there is a small computer lab (4 computers) & one printer (connected by network), with internet lines, & it is free for the students here. There is one kitchen for the hall building, & a laundry room containing 6 machines in it (3 washers & 3 dryers). Laundry is not free, you have to put $1.50 in each one to make it work, or you can use your ID which you can put some money on, & it will work like the electronic account cards inside all Simmons College buildings (& also outside in some clothes shops & restaurants in the neighborhood).

The dorm contains also a TV room with TV channels, CD, DVD player & of course some furniture. There is a small reading room too, containing reading tables & chairs. All the lights here ( in the basement) are switched on electronically as you go into the room & are switched off when everybody leaves the room – that is a nice thing, don’t you think!

There is a small restaurant between these buildings which is supposed to serve food for all students here, but it did not open yet, & we have been told that it well be open on the 20th of this month. There is a big sports center here, & a health center too.

There are too many things that we have mentioned here, & I’d like to tell you about it, but I’ll try to talk about it later, because this Blog has become too long already, & I don’t won’t to make you tired or boring here…

So maybe I’ll tell it to you latter, in other Blog “Insha Allah”. For all the people who read these Blogs, & for my colleagues there in Baghdad & Iraq, I say… thanks for all your nice, warm, encouraging messages, & God bless you all, & I asked God to keep all my good colleagues & friends safe, & not forgetting to pray to God for make my 2 families safe, the one which contains my wife, daughter, siblings & mother, & the other which contains the good people in all Iraq, & in the whole world, & to stop all the bad thing that happened there… “Amen”.

Yours truly;
Khairi, Abdulateef Hashim

I am happy for the participation of friends and colleagues by writing my thoughts to you… In fact, I’d like to thank Mr. Harvey Varnet very much for encouraging me today to the need to join with you in my thoughts. This is a pleasure for me and strengthens the resolve to strive to provide a pleasant response to Simmons College and the college staff.

After the trouble of travel and access recently in Boston airport, we found in reception at the airport the Dean Michele and her husband Mr. Sid. That made us feel really that we are between good friends and parents.
And, we forgot all the troubles that we have had to face in our country & in the journey, even at times the sad farewells to friends and family. I also would like to thank and express great appreciation for the efforts of great people such as : Michele Cloonan, Harvey Varnet, Melissa Stevenson, Caryn Anderson, Candy Schwartz, Sheila Murphy, Valerie Foster & Meaghan O’Connor, & for all other people who have been so helpful to us in getting to Boston and Simmons College.

Yours,
Falah D. Rashid

This is Khairi, Abdulateef Hashim, I’d like to talk here about our trip, & what we had faced on it.

After we finished the papers in our University, & all related things, we start the “happy – sad “ times. As you know, as much as we were happy that we had finished all the paperwork & started to think about our trip and making our travel arrangements, at the same time we had to think about what we are going to lose here. It is not too easy to leave our families behind in Baghdad, especially in bad situations in Iraq & all circumstances that we have there. For me it was a very sad time, because (as some of you know) I am a married man & I have a small family contain my wife & my little daughter there. I have a big family too, which includes my mother, brothers & sisters. It was a too complicated thing, & I have been in a big conflict with myself, because I am too worried about leaving both of them (my two families). So, I was so sad in the time that I was supposed to be very happy for my life opportunity, which will make me safe & away from lots of bad things that I am facing every day.

In that time, it started to be a very sad weather in my home. My wife, my mother, brothers & sisters were crying for any reasons related to my trip, & it was a very sad environment there…

Then, after few day of trying we got the plane tickets (because it was the holidays for Christmas & the Islamic Eid). Getting the airplane tickets was not so easy, but we did finally get them & started to get ready to travel. A night before our travel date, the environment in our home become more sad. A lot of friends & neighbors came to say “Good Bye” to me, & you know, there was always lots of tears in these times.

I feel so bad because I made lots of my friends & neighbors, in addition to my family, suffering like that, because we have a very strong relationships between our families, neighbors, & friends. But they all said me don’t be so sad, we are very happy for you, & we will be more happy when we know that you are safe there & away from all bad things that happened here. Some of my family told me that we prefer that you’ll be away & safe so we won’t worry about you so much. It was a very sad long night, & the minutes were just like hours & days…

In the next morning the taxi driver came, & we put our bags in the car, and it was more tears & more sadness. We traveled first to Amman in Jordan. We had bought tickets from Amman to Cairo “Transit” & we stayed in Cairo airport for 13 long hour. Next, we took our plane to NY, & it took us about 11 hours 30 minutes to arrive at JFK Airport. We had tickets reserved in NY (which was already taken care of by the great people here in Simmons College, & that made us more & more grateful for them), & we waited for almost 2-3 hours to take the last plane to Boston.

It was a very tiring trip, & we have suffered a lot in it. But, you know what? When we arrived to Boston airport, & finished some small paper & passport check, & went to the main incoming passenger’s hall, & saw the wonderful Michele Cloonan, Simmons’ the Dean and Professor in GSLIS, all the tiredness & the suffering was gone…

And that is the thing that I will talk about it in my 3rd blog, “Inshallah” as we say.

Here, I’d like to say some thanks, to all the good, kind, & wonderful people at Simmons College, who made our dreams become true, & who have do a lot of things that nobody else has done for us. Thanks so much to Michele Cloonan, & our best friend Harvey Varnet, who were the 1st ones that make the 1st step in all this thing, & to the great team & people here at Simmons College, like Melissa Stevenson, Caryn Anderson, Sheila Murphy, Valerie Foster & Meaghan O’Connor, & for all other people that we may not be aware of for their efforts to make our dreams come true, for all those people I’d like to say:

Thanks, we’ll never forget what you have done for us, & we will be grateful for you forever!

To be continued …

Yours truly,
Khairi, Abdulateef Hashim