From Iraq, With 50 Words for Love

Once, when Nadine Alsaadi was curled up with an English-language romance novel, she noticed that the word “love” was used hundreds of times. Same word over and over: love, love, love.

Alsaadi’s first language is Arabic, and the repetition frustrated her. Love? What kind of love? And in what situation? In Arabic, hubb is the most common translation for love; but there’s also hawa, which is like meet-cute; ishq is intense passion to one’s beloved; and onward to the tune of almost 50 different words for love. 

Alsaadi lived in Iraq until 2003, when her family fled the ongoing violence. For a few years they lived as refugees in Syria before arriving in LA when Alsaadi was 17. “I learned some English back home but had to pick it up full force when I moved here,” she says. “All of a sudden, you’re surrounded by English speakers, so I found myself starting to express myself in English. I even started dreaming in English.” 

And, naturally, reading in English. But it wasn’t the same. “Something that I had been really missing from my language is how many words there are to convey specific meaning,” she says. “A word like ‘love’ … this is such a complex feeling. It can’t be just one word.”

So she switched back to reading literature in Arabic, which she says offers her a deeper engagement in the story. “Once I realized this distinction,” she says, “I started to think, ‘How can I use this in my day-to-day?”

This is how: “I try to use very specific words to get my audience to understand my point rather than using longer sentences to explain the whole idea in general,” says the business litigator.

That insight influences how she writes everything from court briefs to emails. “Just last week, I heard from the managing partner of my firm after I sent an email,” she says. “He read it and was like, ‘Whoa, there’s a lot of meaning in this. I know these are only like six sentences, but I can tell it took you a long time to write.’ And that’s when I realized, ‘OK, so it’s working.’”

Law wasn’t always the plan. Her parents wanted her to be a doctor, and Alsaadi had a mind for math. But in LA, a different path began to form. “There were friends of ours that had also arrived recently from Iraq,” she says. “As I was learning the language, I was helping with all the forms, contracts—even things as simple as calling AT&T.” The more she found herself helping people, particularly when it came to trying to understand and then interpret the law for newcomers, the further from medicine she got. “I was helping people more than I ever thought I would as I tried to understand the system and also address the fear that these people had, having just arrived in this country,” she says. “That’s when I realized I wanted to do law.”

Immigration law was “too close,” she felt. “I didn’t want to share the same story with my clients.” Once she found business law, she was hooked. “I love the learning curve, and the act of telling a story of persuasion. You’re litigating, you’re up against a lot of great opposing counsels, and you’re also dealing with really good people.”

Alsaadi has found a robust Arabic community in Los Angeles. “It is so diverse,” she says. “I have Arab friends, Iraqi friends. I keep close to my roots.”

Recently, she’s been reflecting on the U.S. Constitution. “America has shifted for me lately,” she says. “But I also think that our core values and institutions—chiefly, the Constitution—is going to bring us back to our foundation. I think when the founding fathers wrote it, they thought deeply about it. It’s a document that’s meant to last for a very, very long time. I do believe it’s going to bring us back to the idea that this is the greatest nation on Earth, and if you work hard and you pursue your dreams, there’s a possibility for you to do anything you want.”

Book Case

Alsaadi recommends the following Arabic novels, all of which have English translations:

• I Loved You More than I Should Have (2009), by Atheer Abdullah Al Nashmi. “About a woman who expresses her feelings, thoughts and contradictions in the face of manipulation,” Alsaadi says.
• The Baghdad Clock (2016) by Shahad Al Rawi. “Reveals the hardships of war by following two girls that form a friendship and resilience despite the circumstances.” 
• Palace Walk (1956) by Naguib Mahfouz. “Reflects the social and political setting of Egypt in the early 1900s.”