Alex Poppe is the author of the new book Breakfast Wine: A Memoir of Chasing an Unconventional Life and Finding a Way Home. Her other books include the novella Duende.
Q: What inspired you to write this memoir?
A: While I was an artist-in-residence at the Atlantic Center for the Arts, Randall Silvis, the master artist for our group, overheard me tell a story about teaching this pilot program for a group of challenging 10th graders—nine boys and two girls, ranging in age from 14 to 18— in Kurdistan, Iraq.
These kids would swerve me from heart-broadening to hair-on-fire and back again on a daily basis. This one kid loved to squirt his cologne to the beat of the music playing inside his head in the classroom. Since I taught them 14 times a week, sometimes four times a day, I invariably smelled like Calvin Klein’s Obsession for men when I’d go home at the end of the day.
When I was getting ready to trade Kurdistan for Germany, the ringleader of the class confessed between peals of giggles, how four of them had paid $1,000 each to buy my midterm from a corrupt school administrator.
Randall encouraged me to write about Iraq for our next workshop. I wrote about the senseless death of my good friend—we’d been on the same flight to Kurdistan in 2011, taught at the same international school in Erbil, and then at the same university in Sulaimaniyah, where we lived next door to each other until 2019—and the special police investigation which followed.
The story went over well in workshop, where a fellow writer suggested I read The Situation and the Story to learn more about essay form. At that point, I was writing creative nonfiction and not so much memoir-in-essay. I took her advice, read that book and a ton of essays and kept writing.
After I had about four or five essays done, I realized I could write a book. Themes of home, what ties and unties us to a place, were beginning to coalesce. The decision to structure it chronologically came later, mostly to ground the reader.
Q: The writer Christine Sneed said of the book, “I was struck again and again by Alex Poppe’s insights and her experiences related to the complexities of living abroad as a single woman, in particular, the gender-based hypocrisies and sexual predation...she encountered.” What do you think of that description?
A: That description is part of the book, but not all of it. Gender-based hypocrisies and sexual predation ribbon through some of the essays, but they also underpin daily life in the US.
Our president, secretary of defense, secretary of health and human services, and an attorney general nominee have been credibly accused of rape, sexual assault, sexual misconduct, sex trafficking, and/or sex with a minor. None of these men have legally lost agency over their own bodies despite being seemingly unable to control their physical urges.
Instead, the political party they represent has worked hard to repeal reproductive rights, thereby denying American women bodily autonomy, and therefore, full personhood. Kurdistan—most of the world—is similar.
At its heart, Breakfast Wine celebrates the resilience of women and youth post-conflict. It shows the incredible generosity and kindness of people in a region that has suffered a lot because of decisions made by the US government.
There’s a Herbert Butler quote that I love and could describe some contemporary geopolitical conduct: “Men grow old and have bored or stupid sons.” I really wish more women were involved in the decision making to enter into violent conflict because they often suffer the repercussions of conflict more acutely than men.
I was always amazed that my students didn’t hate Americans because many of them were 12 or 13 during the 2003 invasion and experienced unspeakable violence at the hands of Coalition forces.
I hope people will read Breakfast Wine and realize that people “over there” are just like us. They want their kids to grow up in safety and security with the opportunity to thrive, just like we do. I hope this book encourages curiosity and empathy for folks being villainized in our current political discourse.
Q: Did you need to do additional research to write the book, or was most of it written from memory?
A: I was lucky because I had a lot of photos, some journals, a blog from the first two years that I lived in Erbil, and social media posts (I remember finding one Facebook post where some 10th or 11th grader told me I should go out with him and his friends because I would have a good time, and another post remarking how the students had asked me if there was a film version of Julius Caesar, and if so what was it called) that helped me remember.
I had also written some creative nonfiction based on student interviews, which I could reference to clarify details. An earlier version of the essay, “All Together Now, Penis!” had appeared in Bust, so I edited and expanded that. Same with “Ode to WhatsApp,” which had been picked up by Medium’s The Startup.
I needed to research the political aspects. Those acronyms get confusing. I also needed to research the muhasasa agreement, bunkering, and the details around the Kurdish Referendum and its resulting 19-hour war in Kirkuk.
I also did a fair bit of research filling in the story about one of Sweden’s most notorious sex offenders who had been employed at the international school and what happened to him after he was kicked out of Kurdistan.
Q: What impact did it have on you to write the memoir, and what do you hope readers take away from it?
A: There were tears. Grief gives nostalgia its bittersweet. Writing helped me process the loss of good friends who had moved or passed on, of a great love lost, being disabused of my remaining naivete.
Volunteering in the humanitarian aid sector gave me a new understanding of displacement, life in camps, how hard it is to leave all you know, but you do because staying is more dangerous.
There were students who disappeared after deciding to smuggle themselves out of Iraq in the aftermath of ISIS. My Yazidi students who found refuge at the university after the ISIS attack on Sinjar Mountain while their families still lived in refugee camps. Adult students in the Professional Development Institute that survived ISIS eviscerating Mosul. Twenty-something students whose families lost everything as ISIS destroyed their communities in the Anbar Province.
And despite these atrocities, life boldly asserted itself in small acts of kindness: daily Facebook messages as my father lay dying in a hospital. In birthday celebrations when the students charge into your classroom with party hats, birthday cakes, and candles. In concern over my health when COVID first appeared and we didn’t understand what it was. “No offense, Miss Alex, but they say COVID is very harmful for old people, and I don’t want you to get sick.”
All of these incredible people taught me about purpose and connection in ways I hadn’t experienced until I had lived outside of my own culture.
I was giving a book event via Zoom today for English majors at the American University of Iraq, Sulaimani, where half of Breakfast Wine takes place. One of the students asked me if people here in the US think they are all terrorists.
I responded by saying I hope people read Breakfast Wine and realize that so much more unites us than divides us. I have experienced exceptional kindness in Kurdistan and Iraq, but also here in my adopted city of Tulsa.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I am working on finding a new job, preferably in a mission-driven organization or in international development, after losing my role as the strategic communications advisor for a USAID democracy and governance initiative. I am also writing fiction again, a longform piece on grief and chosen family.
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: The subtitle is A Memoir of Chasing an Unconventional Life and Finding a Way Home. I was 44 when I went to Kurdistan. I had never been married. I hadn’t gone to grad school yet. I had just started taking writing classes. I didn’t own anything, and I was lost.
Swinging on a rope of unconvention and letting go was the best decision I have ever made. It opened up a new career path for me in international development and writing. It afforded me the opportunity to go to grad school. I made great friends. It helped me grow up in ways I am not sure I would have if I had stayed in the US.
For anyone thinking about making a bold life change, especially in midlife, I want this story to encourage you to do it. I have never regretted this decision.
Thank you for the opportunity to talk about my work.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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