July 1, 2022
Fayth Kakos
Fayth Kakos
The land remembers us. On the streets of Ankawa, from the moment your feet touch the ground, you are instantly transported to an alternate reality. In this reality, this little pocket of northern Iraq, there exists a church on every corner, stores and restaurants with signs written in Sureth, and the humdrum of a vibrant daily life that persists in spite of all the hardship and pressure, both internal and external.
For me, Ankawa was a microcosm of what a country with freedom, representation and acknowledgment for our people could look like. That isn’t to say hardships do not exist in Ankawa; in fact, there are many, and most especially at the hands of a government that does not wish for the people to truly thrive there. Much of these optics are a veneer, but what a perfect picture it was in contrast to the Iraq of my imagination, one filled with bombs and war and endless despair. Ankawa is the resilient flower that blooms in an environment, an ecosystem, actively working to destroy it. For that, it was the perfect place to start this journey home, to see a version of Iraq outside of the stories of relatives and to forge a connection with the homeland that only exists within me.
With the help of Gishru, a non-profit organization established in 2012 to connect the worldwide Assyrian diaspora with the homeland, I was able to travel with a group to Iraq this past March. We traveled to Erbil, Dohuk, Ankawa, Sapna Valley, Nahla, Tesqopa, Alqosh, Tel Keppe, and so many other places along the way. On Facetime with my mom back home in Michigan, she exclaimed that I had now seen more of the country of her birth than she had. And I truly saw it all.
I drank coffee in chaikhanas, danced bagiyeh in nadis, spent the night in the beautiful mountains in Nahla, wandered the streets of Alqosh, traversed the mountain to reach the magnificent Rabban Hormizd — no church will ever compare after you see the breathtaking monastery built into the mountain. We visited Assyrian schools with curriculum taught entirely in Sureth. Not only were the children fluent in Sureth, but also English, Arabic, and Kurdish. And though the sites were beautiful, the people are what made the experience. From the woman in Alqosh who eagerly invited me into her house to show off all the traditional clothes and dolls she made by hand, to the pickup volleyball games with the kids in Komaneh (they won), it was very easy to slide into local life. Our group was greeted with a level of hospitality perfected in the region, from the food to the music to the dancing to the conversation. We were welcomed home with open arms.
Our visit coincided with Akitu, the Assyrian Babylonian New Year. We paraded through the streets of Dohuk in traditional clothes representing the different villages that we all hailed from, creating a rich mosaic of our varying subcultures. The parade culminated with a picnic in the mountains, where live music played and people danced, or sat together eating falafel or shawarma sandwiches; if I closed my eyes, I could just as easily be 6,000 miles away, spending a lazy afternoon on Cass Lake with my family.
My trip was incomplete until I stepped foot in Tel Keppe. It’s the village that much of our Michigan diaspora hails from and a point of immense pride and adoration. But after ISIS captured the village in 2014, it was emptied of its Christian population. Even after its liberation in 2017, less than 5% have returned. Most of the houses of the old Tel Keppe families were reduced to rubble, destroyed by airstrikes, desecrated by ISIS. Many of the houses are still stamped with the Arabic character “noon” on the front doors, even my own family’s ancestral home. It wasn’t a pretty picture, but a decidedly realistic one. Yes, it was heartbreaking, to walk the streets that countless generations of my family had before me and see it so altered but there was also a peace in returning home, in setting my feet upon hallowed ground.
Nineveh is our birthright. In this land of our ancestors, I never felt closer to my family, to my roots. It was a new intimacy with the land and its history, with the express knowledge that the things that I was seeing and loving here were not the same as they were before. The Tel Keppe - the Iraq - that I was coming to know was not the one preserved in my relative’s memories. It was irrevocably changed post-2003, post-2014, and that was a reality that could not be divorced from my own personal feelings. But that doesn’t mean the connection is any less valuable. It is from rubble and ash that a future must be rebuilt there, but in order for that future to exist, the diaspora has to be reinvigorated. We have to invest in programs to improve quality of life, to give people reasons to stay. There is no point in rebuilding, funding the creation of monuments, to a community that no longer exists.
Our people have found much success in the diaspora, most especially in America. Our mark on Michigan is indisputable. Though we have planted roots here, we must not forget our people back home. Resiliency has defined us for several millennia, and it will continue to do so, as long as we don’t give up on that potential future. We are a nation of survivors, navigating a difficult and complex political and social landscape. I hope that all Suraye, especially our Chaldean Assyrian population in Michigan, take the time to familiarize themselves with the legacy enshrined by thousands of years of perseverance and endurance.
There is no better way to do that then to look into Gishru for an unforgettable, life-changing two weeks of reconnection. The land remembers us - and now, I too will remember the land.