Working for the Future
The weather is cooling off, but the political arena in the midterm elections just keeps getting hotter. With highly contested seats opening up in Michigan, including the governor’s, our legislative lineup may look a whole lot different come January. The Chaldean Chamber’s Business Luncheon gave us a taste of debate, with panelists from either side of the political aisle highlighting their own party’s achievements and casting blame for the things that didn’t get done in the last term.
Finger pointing and excuses are all too common in politics, and countries overseas are not immune. Political unrest in the Middle East is now status quo but leadership in the Chaldean American community is taking steps to ease the hardship and enable individuals to succeed, both professionally and personally, in the villages they have left in the Nineveh Plain.
Iraq isn’t the only place facing hardship. Our state’s woes won’t end with the election. All across the country, there’s an affordable housing crisis unfolding and wreaking havoc on the industry. But it’s not all bad news. The close electoral races only mean our voices are being heard. Being heard or listened to is something that everyone desires, from the candidates to the voters.
Recently Southfield gas station owners had a desire to be heard when they received ordinance violation notices from the city asking them to bring their outside storage inside. Although the code prohibiting storage of propane tanks and ice coolers has apparently been in place for years, it had never been enforced. One earlier attempt to enforce the code had been tabled at the city council level, but this time, store owners turned to the Chaldean Chamber for help. Our re-engaged CNTV crew headed by Cal Abbo and Michael Nafso covered the story.
Our cover story features a much broader type of assistance, from helping set up policing agents in Iraq to igniting the local economy, helping entrepreneurs, and creating a brand name, “Made in Nineveh.” We are excited to bring you more of that in the coming months, with makers like Maryam Qasha who is featured in this month’s Economics and Enterprise section for her homemade rosaries.
Baqofa is the village in the frame this month; a tiny one-kilometer town just north of Mosul. It’s amazing how similar these villages all looked to my untrained eye when we began spotlighting them, and how different and unique they all seem now! Hopefully, my eyes weren’t the only ones opened by the ongoing photo essay.
Playwright Heather Raffo hopes to open some eyes with her play, “Noura,” about a middle-class Chaldean wife and mother living in New York. The play, workshopped in Dearborn, details the struggles of interfaith relationships and the constant battle to belong but not become like everyone else.
In this issue, Family Time showcases some new holiday happenings that may become future family traditions, we celebrate an extraordinary basketball coach, and Dr. Miri teaches us a little bit about making Mesopotamian music. Although our archival photo is magnificent and we hope for many more submissions like it, we are firmly entrenched in the future, whatever that holds.
The very best to you!
Sarah Kittle
Editor in Chief