The bespectacled woman pushed one arm through the revolving gate and waved at me. Her voice was plaintive. It was midday and the sun seemed to be reserving special fury for her, in her black abaya, her face looking exhausted. She called out to me for help.
I had no idea what she was saying.
I don't speak Arabic, but because of my dark complexion (and perhaps my unshaven chin), nearly everyone here assumes I am Iraqi. When I say salaam aleikum to someone it often triggers a cascade of enthusiastic Arabic, followed inevitably by an awkward silence on my part and then a look of confusion, if not disappointment, from the other person. I can't help but feel that I am constantly letting Iraqis down.
This is never truer than when I'm in the Green Zone, where my American passport and press card get me - if not all the access of the U.S. military-issued badges - access that most Iraqis don't have. Today, after finishing an appointment in the U.S. military press center, I approached one of the exits and saw the bespectacled Iraqi woman looking forlornly at a Ugandan security guard, who could offer her only a blank stare. I guessed that she was, like many of the Iraqis who come to this entrance, asking about a migration application. When she saw me, her eyes brightened. She began speaking excitedly.
"I'm sorry," I said. I don't speak Arabic - one of the few phrases I know.
Her face fell. Even the Ugandan shot me a confused look, and when I dropped a few bits of Kiswahili I thought he might have a heart attack. I showed him my passport.
"But you look Iraqi!" he said. Then he had a hundred questions.
"So you live out there?" he asked, motioning beyond the tall, chalk-colored blast walls that ring the security perimeter - along with so much of Baghdad. He looked surprised, and it was just another reminder of how insulated the Green Zone is from the rest of Iraq, even seven years after the U.S. invasion. (Our office is in a guarded compound surrounded by blast walls too, although we venture out into the city most days.)
When I finally got outside, I found the Iraqi woman huddled under a slab of concrete in a makeshift waiting area with a few others.
"American," she said, pointing at me.
"Where in America?" said a middle-aged man in a suit. It was her son, who emigrated to Seattle after the war began and had come here to try and get a visa for his wife. They had been apart for several years - he in Washington state, she back here in Baghdad - and had no children yet. They wanted to start their family in the United States. He introduced me to his friend, an Iraqi who lives in New York, who had come here to wait with them. They had arrived at 7 a.m. It was now nearly 2 p.m. and his wife was still inside and out of reach, having surrendered her cell phone at the gate.
Now it was I who had the questions. These men had been away from Baghdad for several years. What did they think of the place now? Was it better, safer now that most of the U.S. military has left? What about the Iraqi political stalemate? Where did they live? Did they have electricity at home?
"Baghdad is maybe a little better," the man in the suit said. "But not very much better."
I wanted to press him on that, but then I heard my name being called. I turned around. My ride was there, stopped on the side of a road choked with traffic. I said a quick goodbye and headed back to the office.
