Yasmeen returns back to her younger self, this time with a new perspective. Can we change our past to change our future?
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The Bird
The Bird sang to himself and lamented about his cage.
He sang so loud his voice startled the wind.
And threw him so far outside his comfort zone
That he had no choice but to fly
It was only then that he realized he was not a caged bird after all.
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The Great Silence
Yasmeen relives her journey in choosing a road to love and processing emotions and releasing them as a means of survival. We hear from Hamada Zahawi, an Iraqi-American and international lawyer and educator, and analyst, and again from Sinan Al-Mokhtar, an Iraqi-American medical professional who shares his reflections on growing up in Iraq and assimilating in the United States.
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Searching for a hero
Yasmeen starts off with a poem that she wrote that was inspired by the film she wrote and co-produced “A Star in the Desert” which follows the life of a young Iraqi boy in Baghdad on the eve of the first Gulf War, as he escapes into a fantastical reality on the search for his missing father.
For more information about the film, you can watch it here: https://www.astarinthedesert.com/
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Fear or Love
Have we done everything we could to avoid war? Everything? Is there another possibility that could exist without the need to go to war?
In this miniseries, Yasmeen shares her honest and open reflection about growing up as an Iraqi-American, a “hyphenated American”. This is not a story about politics, or war. Instead, this is a story about what it was like to grow up as a child of immigrants who fled a country due to political instability.
While this miniseries is focused on her story, she also interviews Iraqis who lived through the Gulf Wars in Iraq and later immigrated to the United States. Many Iraqis are still deeply traumatized from living under a dictatorship, and many are paranoid about publicly sharing their narratives with the world as they’ve been punished for doing so for so many years.
Yasmeen takes us on a journey of her inner inquiry and a reconciliation with her inner child, as she questions her place in the greater narrative of what it is to be a hyphenated American.
Hyphenated Journey is a Hakawati production.
Written, narrated and directed by Yasmeen Turayhi.
Sound design by Karim Beidoun.
Cover design by Aya Mobaydeen and inspired by Sue Turayhi.
Creatives by Gina Abou Hamad.
Special thanks goes to Sinan Al-Mokhtar and Hamada Zahawi for their courage in sharing their stories.
Brasil