Dream dates in Iraq

I WAS in Iraq in 1980 on a teaching assignment with the University of Baghdad. Though the war with Iran had started a few weeks back, it did not seem to have any effect on the day-to-day life in Baghdad. Iraqi dinar was a hard currency. One dinar could get you $3.3.

It was my first visit outside India. Youngsters of today may not imagine how India was in 1980. ‘Imported goods’ used to be a dream possession of everyone. So, an opportunity to visit a foreign country, and that also on a paid assignment to a country like Iraq where expatriates were not only paid heavily, but also were allowed to send home 75 per cent of their savings, was considered to be great luck.

Before my family arrived, I was living in a hotel in a side lane of Sadoon Street, one of the most modern and fashionable streets of Baghdad. It was the date palm season in Iraq.

Previously, I knew only one kind of date which we got in India. This was the type which was exported, as because of its high sugar content, it could be shipped to long distances, and also be stored for quite long. I was surprised to see the large variety of date fruits at the shops. I was told that in Iraq, there were over 1,000 different varieties of dates.

Being a fruit scientist, I wanted to taste as many kinds of date as possible. However, a problem arose. The fruit and vegetable vendors of Baghdad did not like to sell less than a kilogram of anything. The other practice was that customers were not allowed to touch fruits or vegetables for selection, as we did in India. If some customer touched anything, the Arab shopkeeper would lose his temper and start shouting.

A small fruit hawker used to sell fruits at the gate of my hotel. He always used to have four-five types of dates. When I requested him to sell 100-200 gm, he looked angrily at me.

Then I found a way. I explained my problem to one of the hotel waiters. The waiter told him that I was alone, lived in the hotel, had no refrigerator, was a fruit scientist teaching at the University of Baghdad, and therefore very much interested in tasting different varieties of dates which I was seeing for the first time. The waiter then pleaded with the hawker to sell me a smaller quantity.

At this, the hawker agreed to sell me half a kilogram at one time. We then requested him to give me half a kilogram, not of a single variety, but different varieties. The hawker softened and agreed. So I could taste dates of many varieties grown in Iraq.