Comics…….
Comics are my oldest and best un-real friends. Our friendship started when I was only three years old, my dad had purchased me a comic book of European origins where it introduced me to the adventures of a doctor and his family in the wilds of Africa. I couldn’t read, but my parents kept reading me this issue time and time again every single night before I went to sleep. I still have a couple of its images in my memory.
Then my lucky stars got our young neighbor to study painting. He was a teenager who collected comic books, and he was going through the period, most comic book collectors go through, when he felt he had outgrown that stage, and started giving me a couple of issues every time he wanted me to stay out of his studio. His name is Hazim. Now he is a known comic book artist in the middle east.
The comic books he gave me carried the adventures of my all time favorite super hero: Superman.
The years go by, and my love toward comic books never changed. I was born in Iraq, and collecting comic books in Iraq was not an easy hobby. Iraq’s governing regime considered comic books as an extreme luxury Iraqi kids could live without. That was Saddam Hussein and his Baath party regime. Comic books were rare items, they showed and disappeared like bubbles. Collectors like myself depended on sniffing for a source here and there in the black market (being smuggled with people coming from Syria, Egypt, Lebanon and Kuwait) or simply trade them within our “community”!
I will never ever forgive Saddam and his regime for that. Still it was a good chance for me to get introduced to comic books coming from all over the world, 99% of them were translated in Arabic. From the US we got titles like Superman, Batman, The Flash, Turok (The original dinosaur hunter!), Little Lulu, Bonanza (and the Lone Ranger), Tarzan, Disney (Mickey, Donald, Goofy, etc.) and in the mid 80s we had Spider-Man, Hulk, and a couple of other Marvel characters. There were many European publications (Tin Tin, Asterix, Lucky Luke, ….) and even a few local comic books made in the Arab countries (Majalatee, Al-Mizmar, Sameer, …etc.). The only good thing about that was the knowledge I gained of many world wide comics publications and characters, something to brag about in front my American friends now and then!
It was 1977 when my mom and I went to visit England. It was my first time to know how far away I was left behind from the rest of the world when it came to my favorite hobby. Just because my total lack of knowledge of the Marvel Universe, all the eight comic books I purchased were Marvel titles. The next time we visited the UK was in 1979, I was older, wiser (!) and financially ready (have been saving for 2 years!). I went back to Baghdad with a cool collection of Marvel and DC titles including Brave & Bold, Iron Man, Captain America, Daredevil, Legion of the Super-Heroes, JLA, Avengers, Defenders, ...... of so many.
I sold my collection for the first time when I started my teenage years, it was out of pure stupidity. The money was spent on a Commodore 64 computer, Ray Ban sunglasses, T-shirts and a eau de toilet. I realized how foolish that was when I was almost graduating college. I started collecting again, with a vengeance, and money I earned through work. I built another collection and extended my knowledge in the comic books world. I wrote to DC (I still have a letter from Jeanette Khan accompanied by a subscription list!), I contacted Mile High Comics (reading their printed catalog was my only true joy during the 18 months I spent in mandatory military service), and finally a couple of Comics Buyers' Guide I received from my friends in the US. This collection was huge and an impressive one, which I had to sell when I left Iraq a couple of years later.
I traveled the middle east, Europe and then settled in the USA. Through all the past years traveling, my only companion was comic books. I can relate each period of my life for the past 20 years to the comic books I read and collected. They were the friends who were always there. They gave such a calming feeling each time I turned their pages, evoking tender feelings inside me, my longing to my family (it has been 15 years since I last seen my parents), the sparkles of imagination, the excitement of following the events and adventures surrounding characters I have known for more than 30 years.
I sold my collection again when I went through my divorce. A collection of thousands of comic books went away to pay a tiny part of the divorce lawyer’s fee.
I started collecting again 3 years ago. I got Kaylee, my daughter, into reading comic books. She started her own collection of Tiny Titans, Supergirl: Cosmic Adv. of 8th Grade, Little Lulu (Dark Horse TPs) and a couple of other titles. Like my parents did with me, I read her right before she goes to sleep, hoping that she would have the joy I had and still have for 40 years.
