Powell speech is around 6pm in Baghdad, the whole family is getting together for tea and dates-pastry to watch the (Powell Rocks the UN) show. Not on Iraqi TV of course, we have decided to put up the satellite dish to watch it, yes we will put it away afterwards until the next event. I don’t exactly like the thought of two months in prison just to have 24 hour BBC (no free CNN on ArabSat which is the only sat we get with our tiny dish).

A quick run thru what is going on in Baghdad before uncles and aunts flood the house. The juiciest bit of news actually happened about a week ago but I was told about it today. A couple of days ago it was rumored that all top officials had their phone numbers changed, well who cares it’s not like I call Saddam every night to chat, but today a friend explained why. Around six days ago the phone lines of the Iraqi air defense units were “attacked”. When you picked up the phone in some of the command units you didn’t get a dial tone but a male voice speaking in broken Arabic. What it said is close to what the infamous email said, don’t use chemical or biological weapons, don’t offer resistance, and don’t obey commands to attack civilian areas and so on. This went on for a couple of hours. Now everyone has new numbers. I have no idea how that is at all possible. I do know that for some rural areas we use microwave signals for phone connections but they can’t be so stupid as to use it for military purposes.
Way to go uncle Sam. This is going to make one hell of a James Bond movie.

The trenches and sandbag mountains I wrote about last week are now all over Baghdad. They are not being put there by the army; they are part of the Party’s preparations for an insurgence. Each day a different area of Baghdad goes thru the motions. Party members spread in the streets of that area, build the trenches, sit in them polishing their Kalashnikovs and drink tea. The annoyance-factor of these training days depend on the zeal of the party members in that area. Until now the worst was the [14th of Ramadan] street, they stopped cars searched them and asked for ID and military cards, good thing I wasn’t going thru that street, I still have not stamped my military papers to show that I have done my reserves training.

Saddam is still meeting officers daily, and we have the pleasure of watching these meetings three times every day. Each batch he meets leaves the place with a 1.5million Iraqi Dinars check and a brand new car. The latest cars to be put in the warehouses I pass by are Toyota Corollas, all white. The warehouse has around 150 of them (we counted the trucks standing outside). It is said that there are a couple of thousand more new cars waiting just outside Baghdad, parked so close to each other when one of them caught fire they couldn’t get to it fast enough, 38 cars burned.

Don’t you just love gossip?

A work related trip to Arbil in the north of Iraq had to be canceled when I found out that if I am going to sit in the same car as a WHO staff member I have to get travel permit from the ministry of foreign affairs, even if it was “local staff” i.e. Iraqi citizen. The permit takes around three days to issue which would have made the whole trip pointless. I really wanted to go. There is no border as such but you go thru an “Iraqi” check point and a “Kurdish” one, and the best way to get thru them without hassle is to travel in an international agency car, but that requires permit from the Iraqis. Bummer.

Door bells are ringing have to go now.

"Players and spectators in the arena
Baffled by our moves and by the world's
We are playthings in the hands of time
Dancing to music that is not our own."
Khalilullah Khalili, afghan poet.

Reader "anya o" sent me those lines.
There are not enough words to express my thanks for all of you. For your kind words, your concern and the help offered.

Diane, having used the words [blogson] and [Salam] in the same sentence, gets to suffer thru all the embarrassing things "blogsons" do: me going on and on about pointless things and frightening her with the thought of me singing "thank you for the music" wearing my best ABBA costume. Thank you.

Jim Henley, man you are fast. And he knows I just have to tell Diane so he sends the email to her as well. Thank you, saying that I have been flattered by your offer is an understatement. Thanks for thinking of me.

Kathy thanks for all the tips and for offering me a blog home. And thank “MommaBear” for me as well.

Al, being the first to throw the (he’s a CIA ploy) thing at me will always give you a special place in my heart. This time he wrote me a poem.
Take it away Al:

Splendor in the Grass

Our ol' buddy Salam, he's a dirty lil' perv
Hussein just can't stop him
Bushy's chances are slim
When he's on a love mission, you know he won't swerve

So our bombs start to droppin' on his city so dear
And the Casbah starts rockin'
While the town folk be gawkin'
In shock as the smoke starts to clear

As the neighbors start looking for their goats most preferred
Past Saddam's charcoaled ass
Follow the bleats in the grass
And find Salam out humpin' the herd

You owe me a new keyboard; my brother spilled his sugary tea on it after he read this now it’s all sticky. Thanks Al

The lady who calls herself “a reader”: thank you, I hope you keep coming and keeping an eye on me.

Emily (I think hawkgirl.blogspot.com) thanks for offering to host my blog.

And finally Jason [shellen.com] from Pyra Labs. I was setting up a blog somewhere else when I got his email. I guess this means I will have to tattoo [blogger 4 ever] on my arm now, maybe right under my [I heart Omar el Sharif] tattoo.

I didn’t post the last couple of days because I wanted to see if they were going to block [blogger.com] as well. If they did that they would have figured out what this is, but since they didn’t it means they are giving blog*spot the geocities treatment. Since the first day internet was offered to the public anything on Geocities has been blocked, later msn communities, yahoo groups, anything on tripod and aol were blocked. The latest additions are livejournal and blogspot. But what happens is that sometimes when you are hopping from link to link a geocities site opens press refresh it disappears, go back and get to the site from the link that let you see the site and it loads again. I have no idea why this is like that but blogspot is the same now. Not that I care. Having had a thousand suggestions from you emailed to me and a techy brother I am now set up with two nifty programs which let me go anywhere I want. This isn’t a state secret, everybody here who wants to use yahoo or msn messengers has looked for things which let you circumvent the proxy, but it’s a cat and mouse game. They know which sites you’re using they block it and you look for another.

Thank you for making the last couple of months just great. for taking the time to read this weblog, to link, write an email or comment. most of you know more about what I feel and think than my family does. for starters none of them know I blog, you do. and Diane just knows way too much for my own good :)
thank you

i knew it. they did something to the firewall.
blogger is accessable but I get an access denied message for all blogspot sites.

time to take a break and maybe look for a new blog home. diane will know if I'll post again somewhere else.
thank you ladies and gentlemen, you have been a wonderful audience, good night.

a car ride to al-mansour to get sandwiches, late at night.
10 new sandbag protected trenches seen on the way. appetite totally ruined by thoughts of who will use them and what will happen along these roads.
maybe exploration journey tomorrow to see what else is being done to baghdad.
I am either angry or scared i can't make up my mind.

Everybody got an email from the Iraqi ISP saying that email and internet services will be irregular and maybe cut off for long periods in the next 48 hours. "Maintenance and improvement of the service", may be that should be translated to "screwing the firewall bolts a bit tighter" or maybe they are just dealing with that weird SQL-Slammer-virus-thingy, Uday's news paper wrote about it today on the last page. Either way it makes posting a test of patience.

I don't watch enough TV, just so that no one tells me I have been hurting the Iraqi average TV time I spent a lot of the last two days watching Iraqi channels. Great entertainment. You see Saddam, in order to prove that he is A-OK, is almost daily on TV. He gets a number of officers and asks them questions which he answers himself. He actually said that the west probably thinks that he can't sleep at night these days and has to take sleeping pills; well you are wrong he sleeps every night very well, because he knows his people "are pleased and happy". Well that explains the feeling I have. So, no sleeping pills for saddam, maybe he can give me his. And to prove how relaxed he is he serves the officers tea, coffee and sweets and drinks it with them *gasp*. Of course the coffee sits waiting until he says something like "well, drink your coffee men no one likes cold coffee" and as if pre-rehearsed they all lift the small cups and take a sip in one single synchronized move, it looked hilarious. There is also a program called “guardians of the nation – humat al watan” which used to be only once a week now it’s every day around 7:30. It is the official ministry of defense program and between announcements to draft reservists or such we get little sketches about evil evil western governments. [They are not shown on the Iraq Satellite Channel so you can’t see them. But you can watch the daily saddam hour]. Latest reservist news? Well, if you were born between 1958 and 1951 you are officially off the hook, no more military service for you boys, and the guys who drew the short straw are 1971 and 1966, you are up next. Probably the worst time to do your reservist training. The possibility of paying your way out of the two months is canceled out because Qusay himself is overseeing the training of the reserves.

in the mean time: Me and the girl from Gotham, we be playin’ Blogger Ping-Pong She has got some You ain’t got none

Jack the newest member in the [shut up and say thank you] club had this to say in the comments to the post below:

“Think about it, where are bomb shelters, duh, in government or large buildings with a GPS coordinate on someone's list. I can't believe after reading some of the articles you posted that you don't think your government wouldn't mind using you as a shield. Just stay in your home, you will be much safer. When someone knocks on your door and says "U.S. Army/Marines", then you can come out. Believe me, your welfare are at the top of our thoughts. Our goal is to help everyone be as free as us. It may sound corny but it is true. We have always come as liberators. Thousands of young Americans have died over the last 226+ years to help others be free. With all you have to offer, you guys should be as prosperous and peaceful as anywhere else. Who knows. Supposedly the beginnings of man were there. Maybe we'll have a new beginning there to show the rest of the world how it should be.”

dear jack
Duh yourself ! since you obviously have not been to Baghdad you are not an authority on where the bomb shelters are. These shelters, I think around 30 of them, were built during the Iraq-Iran war. Yes some of them were part of military complexes but many were built in civilian neighborhoods, they were built during a time when the government would give huge loans to people building shelters in their own backyards and bomb shelters became part of the building code for any public building. Jack that statement is simply not correct.
Has anyone been able to prove that on the night that shelter has been used as a C&C center, that there was anyone of importance beside the obligatory Party members? Bad intelligence? Shit happens? Well you pooped on me buddy, don’t expect me to be all ah-great-america-we-love-you, and your government will be pooping on me some more, now how does that make me feel?
I am not taking any of that “the great liberators – help others to be free” talk because I do not believe there is such a thing in politics called altruism, there are no free lunches and no one does *anything* without some personal motives. So if your government is going to go to war it is not because they are “helping others to be free” it’s because a hundred other reasons and this one just happens to be a nice one to throw to the public. And no, I will not say it’s the oil, because it is not only oil, although it is a nice little extra thrown in.
I think may be you should read this article [Perils of Victory] (link indirectly via eve tushnet, she linked to [looking on the bright side] which had a link to perils of victory), it starts with a quote from Graham Greene’s “The Quite American”:

“He was incapable of imagining pain or danger to himself as he was incapable of conceiving the pain he might cause others” ……. “The consequences will not be immediate” predicts an Arab ambassador at the UN “you might see GIs distributing chocolates in the streets of Baghdad and being embraced – for three months. And then the opposition to the new colonial power will emerge, and to any other clients being imposed as Iraqi leaders”.*

You just make it sound so easy, you know it’s not. But what the hell, after watching the victorious American army march thru the streets of Baghdad you’ll just turn CNN off and look for another show.
Jack, I hope you understand my view, we simply don’t trust the motives of your government. And if that government is going to war with Iraq we are not naïve to think that they are doing it because they want to spread love and freedom. I am not even sure peace and freedom are going to be among the side effects of that war.
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*Diane: remember when I wrote to you about that Sophia Loren movie with that scene? Look, Mr. Arab ambassador has seen that film too, this amongst all things is an image which irrationally annoys me, you told me I was not making sense (I wasn’t) but it still bugs me. Is there a way to at least tell them not to distribute Hershey bars or anything with marshmallow filling?
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was looking thru the comments, Russil I am quoting you here [from the comments]: "But Americans shouldn't say that they're going to war for humanitarian reasons. As you can see, it just pisses people off." thank you. I have always been told to get to the point and not go around in circles. that was my point

well, someone has another raeson to get to baghdad:
"Onto Baghdad!
I want 1,000 tiles, half the blue with the pretty medallion in the middle and half with the little hand.
Onto Baghdad!"
teehee, you are most welcome! you would make the poor guys' day asking for a 1000 tiles.

Those foreigners are all over the place, I think I know what it should be called: War Tourism. betcha they will be out of here faster than you can say ‘Iraqi-peace-team’ when things get a bit too hot.
It must have been a slow day for news people because the Mutanabi Street was full of them, or Iraqis selling second hand books have become important news items. At least three news teams were filming in that crowded street with their Iraqi minders shooing people away from the cameras. Later on I walked thru Al-Rasheed and Al-Sadoon and they were all over. Not news teams this time but the War Tourists, some of them even carrying backpacks which have [Iraq peace team] written on them in gold marker. And I guess we will be getting more tourists soon. Come on, have a couple of days on us. They will be accommodating you in Al-Rasheed Hotel for free and you get the official sight seeing tour, a couple of lunches with people you can tell your kids you met, when they are shown on CNN and you get to be on TV singing “give peace a chance” in front of the UN building in Abu Nawas (don’t miss the excellent grilled fish - masgoof - while you are there, the restaurants have a good view of one of the oldest presidential palaces).
I know they all mean well, but I really don’t think coming here and getting photographed with Iraqi officials is helping their “cause”. Do thy really want to stand up and risk their lives for this regime. If you are so in love with the situation here, be my guest let’s trade places because if it is a “cause” for you, for me it’s my life and the way I have to go thru it.

Al-Muhajaba’s blog brought to my attention an article written by an American-Iraqi jurist, Sarmid Al-Sarraf. Her site isn't loading today for somereason, i would have linked to the post( Here it is, it works now). The article is on a site I can’t access (my new hobby is collecting pages I get access denied messages from) so she kindly emailed it to me:

It is Immoral to Oppose War in Iraq and Not Simultaneously Address Saddam's Crimes Against Humanity

If you ask me I think War is going to happen and the various NGOs are not going to change this. I am not counting on them to stop the bombs falling on my house. So if they are going on marches would they at least check themselves for what they are asking for? I give you another Iraqi, this time a former member of the Iraqi Communist Party now in the UK:

Dozens of nations have chemical and biological weapons. None has deployed them, except Saddam's regime, first against the Iranian forces, later against Iraqi civilians. Governments should be held responsible for such crimes. Ironically, the United States let Saddam get away with no punishment for the actual deployment of chemical and biological weapons back in 1988, but it is now adamant about confronting him for a possible deployment of such weapons in the future. This is the logic of preemption. Yet there is no law, domestic or international, that permits a prosecutor to go after an ex-convict for a future, would-be offense. There is every law to bring a culprit to trial for actually breaching human norms in the first place.

or as Al-Sarraf puts in at the end of the article:

OPPOSE WAR and INDICT SADDAM

but I can see why a lot of these people won’t go for that. Shout this a couple of times and I am sure your organization won’t get travel permits to Iraq. Of course both Al-Sarraf and Jabar suggest solutions which are not as attractive as they think they are, Jabar says:

Here's what I think ought to happen. One, threaten Saddam with indictment. Two, give him an alternative for safe passage at the same time; this may create a crack in the ruling class-clan. Three, send a list of thirty or so of his aides who are persona non grata and demand that they leave the country with him. This ought to convince the rest of the class-clan members that they are not threatened en masse -- only those who were most responsible for the offenses of the regime. Four, encourage this class-clan to oust Saddam into exile and sweeten the deal by offering a mini-Marshall plan. This mini-Marshall plan would be made available provided power was transferred to a civilian, interim government.

And what? leave us with the rest of the “class-clan” to slug it out between them? While the north of Iraq becomes the Free Republic of Kurdistan and the south eaten up by Iran? –before you ask, yes I do have a problem with Kurdish independence. This is Iraq, it lies between the Zagros mountains in the north and the Gulf in the south. We have lived together in the past and we will in the future, just because we have a loony government now doesn’t mean my Kurdish neighbors hate me. If there is one ba’ath party slogan I am prepared to keep shouting after all this is over it is [Kurd wa Arab Mutahideen] Kurds and Arabs United, but I digress. There is of course one argument which would shut me up for 5 seconds. Some of these organizations are doing as much as they can to help, and they would not be able to do it if they weren’t on good terms with the government. Then again I don’t really believe that the result justifies the means, but sometimes compromises have to be made. And maybe I should just shut up and say thank you…but I won’t. I mean thank you for all that has been done but at the moment and in the current situation try reconsidering the human-shields idea.

Eh, whatever. It is too depressing anyway. Let me give you something fun to read:

U.S. Weighs Tactical Nuclear Strike on Iraq

Yes Stefan, I know you told me already. I just didn’t believe it.and thanks for the funny subject line; [time to say goodbye]. I think I will be watching The Day After again, to check for hints on how to survive.

and another inetersting article from the Christian Science Monitor:

As of the specter of civilian casualties, Private Gritz, like many soldiers have no clear answer. “………The Iraqis strap kids to tanks. What can you do?”

Oh god I think Iraqis are a bunch of barbaric animal people, which makes it OK to kill them, because they don’t have feelings anyway. The article is really good; you can feel the reporter running with the soldiers

”Eeeee!” Female clerks held hostage in the post office shrieks US troops storm in.

dear oh dear. This is almost like playing C&C Renegade. I wonder if they will be waiting for the “mission accomplished” line flashing in the sky.

And another read (you can tell I don’t have much work to do besides preparing for Operation Office Evac):

Apparatus of Lies
Saddam’s Disinformation and Propaganda 1990-2003

Say what you want, but every government has its propaganda machine. And if the US propaganda was not so effective certain polls wouldn’t turn out such weird results[I lost the link and can't find it]. But what I find especially tasteless is the use of the Amiryah Bunker as a “case study”. That was a civilian bomb shelter; don’t tell me about the 10 army officers sitting in a room there.

………selected civilians had been admitted to the top floor at night, while the Iraqi military continued to use the lower level as a command and control center

what a load of bull. “selected”? whole blocks of houses in amiriyah were empty after their residents died in the shelter. People would come at night because Baghdad was bombed mostly during the night. Drag your mattress and spend the night there, it had emergency power generators and hot water. Let me tell you something really nasty, when the bombs hit the water tanks in the lower floor burst. You got grilled and smoked upstairs, boiled downstairs. That would put you off bomb shelters for the rest of your life. Nukes or no nukes.

[raed]
as bad as it gets

[salam]
kefak 7ub, hope you're feeling better. and how is that final coming along. the phone got cut off the other day just when I was going to ask you about that. you know I'm a cheap fuck you get one call every two weeks. unless you start paying my phone bills that's all you're going to get.
The latest addition to sites I can't access are all the livejournal sites. I hope they don't get on to blogspot. although if they got livejournal blogger can't be that far away. cross your fingers.

Everyone should go touch Circular John's Belly button.
"but... EEEEWWWW I CAN PUSH IT BACK IN AND MAKE IT POP BACK OUT EEEEEEEWWWW"

Bad bad weather, cloudy skies and having to turn the lights on the moment you wake up because the sun just forgot to rise or something. I am grumpy, having only Travis to listen to at the office is not helping my mood either. How these guys manages to make everything sound so depressing is amazing.
A quick run thru how things are in Baghdad the last couple of days.

- Electricity: two hours off every four hours, my cousin is calling this psychological training for harder times. He spends his two hours in total sensory deprivation, as in no radio, no light no, TV. Only candles and the sound of the rain. While I use my nifty “converter” which basically is a car battery I recharge every time we have electricity, good for light and a small TV (for half an hour, otherwise I drain the battery too fast) and I am re-reading [The ticket that exploded] for the third time.

- Internet: For some reason the ISP does not have uninterrupted power supply for the servers or something because they also go down with the blackouts. I don’t know, but something happens which knocks people off the server in certain areas at a time and does not allow them to log back on until after two hours, which is the scheduled time for a power cut these days. And three more governorates are going to get internet this week, Tamim, Anbar and Salah al-Deen. Happy porn surfing to all.

- The Dinar: It is still above the 2100 per US dollar, last night it was 2275 Iraqi Dinar. And demand is increasing because of the people who are going on Haj. The Iraqi National Bank did respond to the fall of the dinar in a wacky way, they started selling a limited amount of dollars per day per Rafidain Bank branch for 2000 ID. Every morning you would see lines of black-market dollar dealers line up to get the $1500 they are allowed to exchange per person and then go sell it for the inflated price on the market. Made the fat-cat-dollar-dealers richer and did not solve the problem.

- The Rations: the way the ministry of trade has been heaping rations on people is seriously hurting the price of the goods included in the rations. Many families depend on selling part of the rations to support their income. Wheat is dirt cheap now. You used to be able to exchange 1 kilo of wheat for 7 pieces of bread, but since wheat is so cheap now bakers give you only 3 breads. This also goes for the powdered milk. And we have been getting really nasty Egyptian soap. I am sure they wouldn’t wash their tiled floors with it for fear of corrosion, but I guess it is good enough for Iraqis. Another bad deal made in the name of food for oil, and another well connected trader bought an apartment in London.

- The Jordanian Border: there is now a special area in the Jordanian part of the border-point where they keep “unwanted Iraqis” until they find a ride back into the country.
Best way to go to Jordan from Iraq (if you are an Iraqi, that is):
Take a plane; don’t use the much more affordable bus. You have a better chance of getting thru the border if they think you have money.
Book a return ticket even if you plan on staying, see above.
If you plan on coming back use the bus on the trip back and cash in your return ticket.
Either have a visa to another country or give a believable reason that you can’t stay for longer than 10 days, a signed paper from your workplace stating that this is a business trip for so-and-so days is good.
Be prepared to wait for a couple of hours in a room with ten other people until the officer is ready to see you.
Good luck.
Alternatively, go to Syria. They still have their borders open to Iraqis, maybe not for long.

- The Inspections: nobody was paying much attention until they decided to go into those houses in al-Ghazalia district. That got people talking. Documents or no documents the whole thing is frowned upon. If they do this a couple more times the disapproval will not only be from “official sources”. And there also has been talk about the interviews abroad, the idea of taking your family with you if interviewed abroad does not work, define family for me please. Parents? Siblings? Wife and kids? Aunts, uncles? What? And the Iraqi government knows this, pressure can be applied always.

- The Weather: wet and cold, it has been raining a lot and we even had hail. Absolutely no sun.

-Raed [he is not in Baghdad but in case you were wondering why he isn’t posting in Arabic]: After being the only one who didn’t lose it during his aunt’s funeral, which true to our grief loving ways was 3 days for men and 7 for women, has come down with a bad flu and has a project final coming up soon too. But at least he started responding to my emails.

- Mememe: *sigh* whoever invented the term “between partners” is a desperate optimist. I might as well try here:
Obedient slave seeks Master, whip and users’ manual come attached. May need some assembly. If interested email addy above. I can cook and will wash the dishes too if “commanded” to do so.
Oh….and I have changed Beers, I now drink Sanabul instead of Farida. It is quite unsettling to find a cockroach floating in a bottle of beer you were just about to guzzle Down. This is as exciting as my life gets these days.

.........and in the poetry ring, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome DIANE.
she's back, well, I think she is. you would have expected a fanfare or something. but no, just that scary little poem.

Take that you Bush-y emails

I am so excited about what I heard on the radio this morning I can't stop smiling. For the first time the Iraqi government acknowledges the fact the population is not a herd of blind sheep.
In a not so direct response to the e-mail "attack" last Friday night and the anti-government radio broadcasts in the south. [BTW the mail-server was brought back online last night, we all got a 200kb text document about new logins and stuff] the government is airing a public announcement of sorts.
I almost choked on my tea when I heard it during breakfast.
It is set as a dialogue between two men speaking in Baghdadi dialect. The first asks the other if he has been hearing the news and if he knows "Shaku? Maku? [what's happening? What's not happening?]. In a Q&A format the other one starts "explaining" the nature of hostile and unfriendly media reporting, how we should not listen to these things because all they want to do is get to you and undermine your confidence, that all we hear is part of a psychological war. "But what they don’t know" the wise-one says "is that we are of strong character and these things don't fool us". It is quite long I will have to listen to it again to remember all that was said.
The emails, broadcasts and leaflets are not mentioned explicitly but this clearly is a response to them. what is very remarkable is that it never, not once, mentions saddam. They use "nahnu", us the people, "al-wattan" the nation and only once right at the end the wise-one uses "leadership". Very clever. It is propaganda but it doesn't overload you with the typical saddam-ese. It really is the best piece of propaganda I have seen them do.
At one point "the doubter" asks "the wise one" about war, the answer is evasive. He says it doesn't matter whether matters "get hotter or cool down" we should not listen to hostile reporting and believe it. Well, I guess this means I am removing the NY Times from my bookmarks then. I am a good citizen you know.
You can't believe how excited I am about these five or six minutes. They have acknowledged a crisis situation, they have never done that before. And it is not done with speeches directed to politicians abroad but to the people, in a simple story-like way. It's a first. I am celebrating this by not clicking any of my news links and watching Iraqi TV only.
Well….for the next 5 hours at least.

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linky stuff:
I have been getting quite a bit of linky-lovin' from something called [Sensible Erection]. I get an Access Denied screen when I try to open the page, I can only hope the site has chosen me the sexiest Bear in the middle east [link shamelessly stolen from Blee Bloo Blar].
talking of sites I can't access:
milk and cookies, nice name naughty content?
H.E.Y.Y.O.U.I.K.N.O.W.W.H.E.R.E.Y.O.U.L.I.V.E, Mr. site-zapper has you in his sight. Access Denied.

Since my cover blown by Unqualified Offerings, I might as well just give up and tell you what my true mission is, I am here to brain-wash you and get you to join the Party.
I am sure you are wondering what [Baath] means and whether it involves communal ablution ceremonies. The party's name in Arabic is Hizb al-Baa[here you make a sound as if you were choking]th al-Arabi, which means the Arabic Resurrection Party, as in the resurrection of one united arab nation bla bla bla. Nice innit?
So what are you waiting for, I said JOIN!
Don't come looking for me when your enrollment papers come and you get shipped to Damascus not Baghdad. You should have checked whether this is the Iraqi or Syrian Ba'ath before you've signed these papers.

This is a long post, maybe too long, a couple of questions flicked the [verbose-mode] switch. Sorry.

Flash back from an earlier life:
I am just moving in with new flat-mates, I am living with non-Arabs for the first time. We look at other suspiciously whenever any of us is eating. He looks bemused seeing me add salt to my yoghurt while I think how odd, sweet yoghurt? When he saw me eating cheese with honey-melon, he thought that was funny: "melon with cured ham is good, but cheese?" [ewww, ham and melon]. Raisins when found in food would be put aside on the edge of the plate, while my favorite rice recipe is with lots of raisins and almonds. Later culinary middle ground would be found in an Israeli falafel place, they really made the best falafel and would put the strangest sauces I have seen put in a falafel sandwich. It is there where I met the only Iraqi Jewish person I know, he used to work there and overheard me and a couple of Iraqi friends discuss the merits of eggplant salad with falafel. He spoke good Arabic and in Iraqi dialect after that we would get super huge sandwiches whenever he was working. But that is beside the point.
Fast forward to this life:
Former flat-mates have a son and they are emailing me the strangest questions.

Do you think there will be a war, what do people think?
That is a tough one, I can't tell you whether there will be war or not. I look around me and see two governments gearing themselves up for it. Someone wise once said "don't look at what a politician's lips are saying, look at what his hands are doing". What it looks like is War. Slow deliberate moves on both sides. One side is entrenching, in what seems to be constant denial of what has happened 10 years before and very probable defeat, the other side, well, we are hearing the words massive, huge and for the first time since [enter your chosen historical war landmark here] too many times. And what do people think? We need change desperately. The few attempts and people who would have had a chance to do something about the way the government is have been ruthlessly eliminated since the late seventies, by the late eighties Iraq was Saddam-land no real challenger was anywhere in site. After the Gulf War there were a couple of uprisings here and there, none were organized properly. All were quickly and brutally wiped out, not only the people involved but all their families. Change is not going to come from inside, unless the government somehow implodes, for example, saddam's death creating a rush and fight amongst possible successors to take his place and giving other parties/people space to act. I am not holding my breath.

What will happen after the war?
That depends really on what the American government and its allies want to do. I hope we don't fall into chaos. I hope Iraq doesn't split. I don't know. I am still trying to figure out what will happen during a war, because what will happen afterwards looks a bit bleak. Somehow the things that can go horribly wrong are so much clearer than the good things.

What alternatives are there to saddam?
That ties in with the question above. If there was an alternative, a clear credible alternative, everyone would have felt more optimistic and maybe even more cooperative with all the efforts the world is going thru to "disarm and neutralize". It has been mentioned a lot in the western press that Iraq used to have one of the most educated, secular and moderate populations in the Arab world, it still is. Hold that thought. Now look at the so called "Opposition Groups" abroad: nationalistic Kurdish parties, Islamists in all possible colors, and most distressingly the Iraqi National [American puppet] Congress*. These are the alternatives being pushed by the American/British governments as possible successors to the Ba'athist regime. There are other small groups but since they don't serve the future interests of certain governments they don't get a lot of mention. Take the Iraqi Communist Workers Party for example, OK so the name is a problem I can't hear communist or socialist for sometime but they have a spokeswoman who blows me away every time I hear her talk, Nadia abdul Majeed is whose badge I would be wearing if we were having elections, but has anyone heard of her? No. Are we going to? I don't really think so. First they have to do something about the name and second they don't say the right things when they talk about the US, this is important for any party wanting to be on the scene if an American led "invasion" does happen. We had a long discussion about this a couple of days ago, there are no true "alternatives" it is a void.
Let's put it this way; it's the hungry-but-not-knowing-what-you-want-to-eat feeling. Everything either looks bland, boring or moldy.
So what happens is your babysitter [US government] just force feeds you that nasty looking stew [INC].
*why is the INC and Ahmad Chalabi distressing?
well, how about this:

"He's a criminal banker," says Akins, the former ambassador to Saudi Arabia. "He's a swindler. He's interested in getting money, and I suspect it's all gone into his bank accounts and those of his friends."

and this:

Almost no one, not even the INC itself, thinks that Chalabi has any cachet inside Iraq.

or maybe this:

The INC and its backers make no bones about the fact that the American forces gathering to attack Iraq will be liberating Iraq's oil. Unable to restrain himself, Chalabi blurted to The Washington Post that the INC intends to reward its American friends. "American companies will have a big shot at Iraqi oil," he proclaimed.

why does he think that the INC already has right to distibute bounty?
and finally:

Do these strategic realities, and the wide ridicule of Chalabi among Middle East experts, matter? "I don't think their point of view is relevant to the debate any longer," says Danielle Pletka, vice president of the American Enterprise Institute. "Sor-ry!" Thanks to the "entire vast army [of neoconservatives]" who've successfully won over Bush and Cheney, she observes, the INC has something that the other groups lack: the support of the president of the United States.

sorry, but I personally loath the man and his party.

In case of a war, can't you leave the country before it happens?
I could. The question is do I want to? No I don't, this is probably a turning point in the history of this country, I want to be here, I want to be part of it if I can. At this point in my life I care too much about my family and friends to jump ship and go watch it on CNN.

If not will you stay in Baghdad or can you go somewhere else?
We, the extended family all 30 of us have decided to stay in Baghdad. I am sure that the moment things get too hot the government will issue a curfew and people will not be allowed to travel between governorates, at least they will not be allowed to come in or go out of Baghdad.
During the Gulf War the family was separated, all left Baghdad into other cities or rural areas. Keeping in touch was a major problem. And later on when some people thought they could start their own revolution things started getting nasty. This time all would rather stay in their homes, at least to make sure the looting that happened the last time won't happen this time.

there is more but I think this is enough for now.

found this on indymedia.org:

.........
The inspectors came and looked,
And looked, and looked, and looked, and looked.
They looked high and they looked low,
Every place that they could go.
They looked in every hole and crack,
Each drawer and closet, bag and sack.
They found nothing in a trunk-or
Even in my private bunker.
They did not find a single stash
Of weapons of destruction (mass) ...
And STILL you won't get off my a**!
I've done all that I can do.
The rest, dear Bush, is up to you.
Please don't be angry, don't be sore.
We don't need to have a war.
Let's go back to the good old days
When your dad and Reagan sang my praise.
I was your faithful ally then.
Why can't we be friends again?
I say, let's let this whole thing drop.
(My best regards to your dear Pop.)

Daman Asset Management has launched a new investment product - Daman Iraq Opportunity Fund - with a view to providing investors with the opportunity to participate in the international reintegration and reconstruction of Iraq.

well it had to happen.

The fund, with a life of five years and extendable for another five years, is confident of giving out aggressive dividend payout.

so come on what are you waiting for? and it is safe, the fund will return the investments to the respective investors with bank interest rate

_

Poll Results

frankie still says war but you said....   first week of february..haj or no haj, it's going down 29   second half of february. it's warmer. 30   It's not happening till march/april 14   nah....not until next autumn, it's closer to the elections that way 9   what? are you blood thirsty? there will be no war. 9

well february it is then. I wish you could have made up your mind which part of february, hiding under the bed for a whole month without anything happening is not going to be fun.
I still think they will wait until after Haj and Eid, the last plane full of white clad piligrims leaves Mekkah will be followed by the first plane dropping leaflets saying "go for cover, Boom!".

All hell broke loose at the Iraqi ISP. The mail server has been disconnected for three days now. I had no idea what is happening I don't use that email account. I heard a rumor but I have little trust in the service provider, the server always breaks down. But I got confirmation from someone who actually saw that email.
Three days ago an email was sent to all users I have not seen it, but the friend who did receive it says that it was urging Iraqis to give information about weapons stored in their homes, and not to show any resistance in the event of an attack, not to support the Iraqi government. It was written in Arabic and had an address to send information to. The mail was sent at 00:00 and 15 minutes later the mail server was shut down, and is till now.
I guess all mailboxes are being deleted now. But what are they going to do about the people who did download their mail?
I’m trying to find someone who has the email but isn’t afraid to admit that he still has not deleted it.

UPDATE

well the washington post knows :[US Government Starts E-Mail Campaign to Key Iraqis]
so does ABC Online : [US sends Iraqis anti-Saddam emails]
The title of the Washington Post article is not exactly correct, my friend is not a "key iraqi" ,whatever that means. Anyone who downloaded their mail around 12 got that message.

AUTHORITIES BLOCK E-MAIL SERVICE
Iraqis began to receive the e-mails last week, visitors there said. The state-controlled e-mail service is available only to a small number of Iraqis, mainly government officials, senior public servants, academics and scientists.

that is also not quite correct. All you need is an ID a phone line and cash. It's the cash that gets in the way of people getting the e-mail service. and the fact that Iraq is not a very computer literate land. Importing computers is banned by the sanctions commitee, we get smuggled equipment thus expensive. the people mentioned in the article get their service for free, that is what should have been said. while they get it for free we pay an arm and a leg.

Iraqi authorities have blocked the e-mail service access in an apparent attempt to stop the messages from spreading inside the country, visitors said.

too late for that, the whisper is a buzz already, people are talking. everyone wants to see what was that email like.

Me thinks the internet service will be axed soon. we'll see. I wonder if the next step in this geeky game is to hack a couple of official Iraqi sites, future war or what?
If you call the state company responsible for the ISP now they will tell you server is down for maintanance. I really feel sorry for the network administrators, they are probably having their fried balls for lunch now. What could they have done?

The Internet is available in Iraq but many sites are off limits and all foreign e-mail servers are blocked.

we'll have to talk about that. reuters people don't know shit about internet in iraq

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ or maybe we have just been spammed by a bored spammer.
Adnan[adnan.org] thinks we have been spammed too.

Maybe, one day we might even measure global tensions by the amount of politically motivated junk mail circulating around.

political spamming, someone should think of a name for that.

Sorrow is never singular. It always comes in multiples
Raed’s aunt has passed away yesterday. She had to undergo two heart operations in 4 days, and has been in intensive care since the beginning of this year. Raed used to joke about the fact that the only person in his family still interested in political action in Jordan is her, the one with the frail heart. I remember her talking of demonstrations and protests during the events in Palestine last January while the Jordanian government was threatening to use force if the protesters got near the American or Israeli embassies. Everyone in the family would jokingly tell her that if an officer so much as breathed on her she would come back home with multiple injuries.
Raed, I can’t reach you. Your cell phone has been turned off for days and you don’t answer emails. I wish I could be there with you.
Today a colleague at the office came to our house to tell us his son has died of brain hemorrhage this morning. He is one of the senior engineers; his son is two years younger than me. Because he is not Iraqi, the paper work involved in getting him out of the country is surreal. How to explain this to a mourning parent is impossible. I stayed with him the early couple of hours. While others were trying to figure out how to get the family to Jordan as fast as possible, the mother understandably doesn’t want to stay in Iraq.
There is no appropriate response when someone tells you about the death of a loved one or a family member, I stutter and stumble thru formal responses which mean nothing really.
My heart and thoughts are with you Read and your grandmother, who is the strongest amongst you, if she has held it together through all what the family has been through before so will you.

I was looking around for a free online poll thingy to ask the following question: how soon do you think IT is going to happen. a couple of people have been sending me emails saying I should be careful, any day now. and I also agreed with the idea that the proverbial shit will hit the proverbial fan around 3 - 4 february, but I have a new theory. I only missed it because the house of Pax is so religiously not "with it".
It is Haj season soon. Unless the US government wants a couple million pilgrims in the KSA when it starts military action, nothing will happen until after Eid al Adha which should be around the 12th of february. Besides we have al-ash hur al-hurum now (muslim readers help me out here) these are three months in which fighting is Haram.
But if Bush were Dr. Evil he would go and start a war during Haj, provoke Muslims around the Globe into doing something outragous, Gets out his weapons of mass distruction directs them at Mekkah and:

Wham Bam, Bye Bye Islam

starting World War Three. But Bush isn't Dr. Evil and I am a fruitcake with pictures of giant lemons on his weblog.

don't you just love google. here is the poll. get those mouse buttons clicking.

frankie says war. so......what do you say? first week of february..haj or no haj, it's going down second half of february. it's warmer. It's not happening till march/april nah....not until next autumn, it's closer to the elections that way what? are you blood thirsty? there will be no war. Click here to view results

No this isn't a mutant radioactive lemon in my hand, although it could be, it is almost as big as my head. It is a citrus fruit we call Kappat (don't ask I think it's Farsi) fresh from my mother's garden. and no, it doesn't have great lemonade potential because it is practically all peel and kind of dry inside. But the peel can be used to make great marmalade.

Today wasn't only a holiday (the 82nd anniversary of the Iraqi Armed Forces) but the sunniest day we had for a while. And what do I spend it doing? Ordering and arranging the "emergency supplies" in the storeroom upstairs. Now that the Iraqi trade minister has advised us to stock up no one is afraid of being accused of being screwy and paranoid. After spending a couple hours organizing the mess I think we have too much sugar and too little detergents. Back to the store. Boy is that shopkeeper making a fortune from the orders he is getting. I wonder if the Trade minister only gave that warning to empty their full storehouses, because if the war doesn't happen I am dumping all the stuff I bought in front of his house and demand he buys the lot. Pronto.
And in another unprecedented display of care towards the population the government started digging water wells in various residential areas in case of water shortages. In schools, near Party quarters and other controllable places. I am pushing for our own well at the house of Pax, but my father thinks I've gone mad. It's not expensive and they only drill a hole the size of a CD, 30 meters deep and disco! You've got water. Not for drinking of course, but still it's water. I mean it's my back they'll break dragging water back from the nearest well. (Actually I see his point this is paranoid and crazy, forget the well).
They have also called on the Ration Distribution centers to come and collect the rations for May which means we're getting three months' rations in February. Now I am sure they just want to empty the storehouses.

At around 11am I took a break to watch the speech. The first broadcast is always at eleven and they repeat it every couple of hours afterwards. If you are really interested in the content go read it here. It's the usual saddam-ese.

If anyone attempts to intimidate you, the people of Iraq, repel him and tell him that he is a small midget while we belong to a nation of glorious Faith, a great nation and an ancient people who have, through their civilization, taught the human race as a whole what man was yet to know.

The president was never a great orator, if you're looking for great then you have to listen to Mubarak, but this time saddam didn't even shout at us the scary bits. Just the "Da da da" school of oration. No fire. It makes you wonder. How come we didn't get a dictator who just burns you with the heat of his words? At least make me believe in what you say for the 20 minutes you're on TV. Not even that *sigh*
And boy was it heavily edited. Not bad camera transition stuff, but the "wait let's do that again" variety. Mid-sentence cuts. It probably doesn't mean anything but it is distracting.
There was one single inspired moment near the end of the speech. He looks straight at the camera (the rest of the speech he is looking up and down from paper to camera) and says:

The enemy ought to remember the terrible end of all empires that committed aggression against our people and nation in the past.

with long pauses between words, pure drama. Loved it. "al maseer.... al mashu'um..... li kul.... al imbiratoriat...... alti aatadat ala umatina"
OK so it doesn't make sense and I have no idea what he is talking about. What terrible end? All "aggressors" have come and gone with plenty of bounty, from Hulagu Khan to the British. But he scared the shit out of me.

I alway wondered what those leaflets the americans are dropping in the south of Iraq looked like, a friend of mine told me that the one he saw looked in color and size like a $100 bill (I did read somewhere that they dropped leafletrs "printed in green") pretty neat, I can imagine people runing around snatching them from the sky. Pennies from heaven. I wish I knew someone who lives there well enough to ask him to bring me one.
The latest, umm, droppings (sorry that was cheap) were not that good apparently. CNN.com has one on its site. here, take a look. I demand better graphic design. this looks like an ad for kids radio. I would love if they would have The Designers Republic as graphic consultants, that would make these leaflets true collector items. Come on, are you starting an Axis of Bad Taste now ?.

[salam]

Dear Raed
I know you probably won't be able to read this today, I hope by the time you will your aunt will be out of the icu and in good health. don't fall apart. your mom told me you had a fight with H earlier. don't do that over the phone. I am sure she loves you and whatever you or she said was because you both are under so much stress considering the circumstances.
I also want to thank you for being so unpredictable and showing up in baghdad on the 31st, who knows, this might be the last time we see each other for a while. I am very happy you came. you know, checking around I found out that quite a number of our friends and relatives are having guests from abroad spending their christmas week off here in baghdad. ziad is specially happy with his friend's visit (you know the one he keeps telling us is his only real friend ever, I guess we were chopped liver). what? is everybody saying goodbye? It feels like being on the titanic and knowing what will happen to it, so everybody just stop hugging and kissing, I won't die dammit.

[salam]

from this article in the NY Times
If this wasn't so sad it would be beautiful, the electricity went out at the Christmas week concert performed by the Iraqi National Symphony Orchestra. The last time I went was when they were still playing once a month at the Rasheed Theater, now they play at the Ribat Hall, everybody was sad when they were moved out of the Rasheed the Ribat is just an abandoned ruin with bad accoustics. They sounded depressing then and I stopped going. The Rasheed Theater, after the French Cultural Center stopped using it for perfomances of french artists and movies, is rented now for a "commercial" theater group prefering silly slapstick comedies.

salam .. how can i control the ****** font size? tell me some html ""secrits"" (plz) damn it ...

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ÇäÇ ÇÞÊÑÇÍí äÖíÝ ááÞÇÆãÉ 2500 ÓíÇÑÉ áÇÏÇ æ 500000 ÓÇÚÉ ÃØÝÇá ÕíäíÉ æ 2500 ÓíÇÑÉ ÓÇäÌ íÇÈÌ æ 10 Øä ÈåÇÑÇÊ ãä ÇáåäÏ... æ 10 Øä ãä ÈÇßÓÊÇä .. ãíä Ùá ãÇ ÃÚØíäÇå åÏíÉ ÇáÚíÏ¿ 10 Øä ÞåæÉ ÈÑÇÒíáíÉ ÍÊì áÇ äÚíÏ ÞÕÉ ÇáÓíÇÑÇÊ íÚäí ..

Santa claus!!

The Iraqi trade minister Mouhamad Mahdi Saleh announced yedterday that Iraq has signed contracts with french Peugeot and german Volkswagen to buy 10,000 cars for distribution amongst the Iraqi population

my suggestion is that we add 2500 Russian Lada cars. 500,000 Chinese kids watches. 2500 Ssangyung cars [salam: Korean??]. 10 tons of spices from India and 10 from Pakistan....so who else needs a christmas present??? and 10 tons of coffee from Brazil, we don't want to repeat the fiasco with cars.

[salam]: Non-Iraqi readers will not get the Brazilian car reference. In the early eigties the Iraqi State Company for cars imported thousands and thousands of a VW Passat made in Brazil (rumor was that this was part of a clause in an arms deal or something, who knows?). this car was very cheap, it was everybody's second or third car in the house. your bratty kid wants a car? buy him a Brazili (which means brazilian). the problem was it was the worst car you can imagine. not suited for the heat of Iraqi summer it broke down spectacularly, the next batch was a bit better but still rubbish. until this day it is the most common and affordable car in iraq. It is so part of Iraqiness in the eighties there are songs about it. but it is still rubbish. Here is a picture of it and here is someone who thinks its so cool he devoted a page to his pix with it.

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[salam] la2 I tell you what, you write whatever you want in arabic, I will append a translation. ahaln ahlan, made my day.

well .. i would like to announce .. with pleasure ya3ni .. the launch of our arabic ""beta version"" release thank u ladies and gentelman and salams ~

Readying itself for full-scale war, the Iraqi trade minister, Mohammed Mehdi Saleh, said yesterday that everyone in Iraq should have a stockpile of food to last three months.

Panic attack? Well not really. We have been stockpiling long before the trade minister advised us to do so. Prices of everything storable or used for storage have gone up because of that. Powdered milk doubled, bottled water practically disappeared and the price of a 40 liter plastic barrel has gone up from 5,000 ID to 12,000 ID (that I regret not buying a month ago). It is the fact that he said it which is scary; they are not that frank usually.

A convoy of anti-war activists, likely to include dozens of British volunteers, will leave London next month to act as human shields protecting strategic sites in Iraq.

Oh please not again.

"These people will be distributed to vital and strategic installations in all Iraqi regions." said Saad Qasim Hammoudi, an official of the ruling Ba'ath party.

you’re just playing into their hands. I would have understood if they were getting humanitarian aid ready. Medicine, food transportable medical care units, anything but being human shields.

"Nobody is naive enough to believe that a superpower like the US is not going to bomb Iraq because there are peace people there," said Mary Trotochaud

so why are they coming, getting yourself killed won’t help anyone. If you want to help, be there at the border where a big number of refugees is expected, they will be scared, maybe injured and in need of help. Sitting in a power station hoping that it won’t get bombed is silly; we don’t have enough power now. I don’t care if an already defunct power plant gets bombed. Wait at the border with a small power generator and water treatment equipment. that is real help. Their hearts are in the right place and their support is much appreciated, but their efforts should not be abused. We do need you ALIVE.

A week ago Jonathan [The Head Heeb] posted a comment on my letter to raed (somewhere down there) specifically about me saying that I feel like I have betrayed my culture. I didn’t want to write a response at the time because I didn’t want to start another who/where/what thing going on. Been there, done that (hi Al *wink*, hope you are having great holidays). Hoping that everybody is too busy getting themselves into gear for New Year parties I thought I could sneak in a response and hope no one notices until it’s too late.
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You say : “It's easier to talk to people who share one's background and assumptions, but it's more rewarding to understand the rest of the world and to be understood in turn.”
Believe me I know this, I have been rewarded immensely. My life was not only enriched by all that I have been exposed to, but very much transformed. In the comments you wrote “I want to know about the Egyptian soap operas too. It's selfish of me, but I want to be a guest at the party” I don’t think that’s selfish, this is also the reason I read weblogs, even the ones which are very personal. It’s a glimpse into a world which I might have not seen before and usually is, as you said, very rewarding. The feeling of betrayal comes from somewhere else. There was a time when I thought that one of the best things that have happened to me is that I have not been “rooted” anywhere. I felt that I will manage to feel at home wherever I go. Culture, as in my cultural heritage, was not something I could betray because it was not part of how I saw myself.
But this has changed, in this day I am forced to identify myself with something I don’t fully believe in. They see a name, a passport and I am lumped with people and things I don’t think I belong with. Actually when I think about it things haven’t just changed over night, I was probably fooling my self or was a good chameleon. So instead of arguing with whoever I decided to stop fighting it. It is who I am after all, well sort of. The problem was that I found out my brain needed some serious re-wiring; I have major blank gaps and disagree with so much. Which leaves me in limbo. This is where the feeling of betrayal comes from. I can’t fully connect as much as I try. So if I do understand the lyrics Um Kalthum sings (I see you have used the Egyptian pronunciation ‘Kolsoum’) I can’t quote the classical poets whose poems she sings like my cousins do.

One more thing: thank you Ikram for your kind words and understanding. To use an Americanism: you just, like, totally get it. Thanks.
The bit about farsi-blogs is spot on.

Word of the day:
de-Saddamization

as seen on page 34 in the "Guiding Principles for U.S. Post-Conflict Policy in Iraq" report published by the Council on Foreign Relations [CFR]
if you don't feel like reading the whole report just take a look at the last 3 pages, "the three phased approach" the paper suggests is outlined in a chart.
there is another interesting article on that site:
Reconstruction: A Checklist for Would-be Nation-builders in Baghdad After the Fall of Saddam
It is the gist of that 35 pages paper. Some of it sounds like the list my mother would have given my baby-sitter.

Go slow, but steady, on democracy.
Strengthen Ties that Bind.
Mind the neighbors.

no no no wallahi I'm not ignoring you. aslan bil3akis. I called you on thursday around 11:30am, three times. I kept ringing but you didn't pick up. I know you know it's a call from baghdad so why didn't you pick up? I had nothing to do and thought we might chat a bit. I called your brother and talked with him instead.

mmm,, is he ignoring me?

Chena tova you hot pink minx.

The good news first. We are going to celebrate New Year's at my parents place, they are throwing a party and since the house will be a mess anyway I am occupying the upper floor for my partying purposes. Everyone is invited bring a friend, a bottle of whatever you drink and a candle. Make that lots of candles. The electricity situation is getting out of hand.
The last couple of days you were lucky if you live in an area where the blackout is for 5 hours a day only. We have been de-electrified for 7 hours today; the day is not over yet. Some areas in Baghdad have had 10 hours of darkness. And it is not improving. Other governorates are getting half an hour of electricity if at all.
There is an official explanation. They say maintenance. I say Bull. They are probably packing those generators away.
You learn to deal with the scheduled blackouts, you know when they are and for how many hours. But the last couple of days have been really bad. Very erratic, they turn it on and off whenever they like. We just freeze and thaw then freeze again. It has been very cold for the season and it is expected to get colder. The prices of kerosene heaters have gone thru the roof. There is a local factory, state owned, which manufactures these heaters, 130,000 Iraqi Dinars a pop. But buying one requires approval from the general manager. Don't ask. I can't figure why. It wouldn't be called bureaucracy otherwise.
Now take your newly acquired heater and stand in front of the company's building, someone will offer you 200,000 Iraqi Dinars for it within a minute. Look for it in the shops you will find it for 260,000 ID. That's free market economy isn't it? I decided it was cheaper to bring down an extra blanket.

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Because of these sudden electricity blackouts, this is the third time I write this post. I keep forgetting the save button. Not anymore, autosave came to the rescue, every 5 minutes.
A couple of days ago the NY Times published another article by John F. Burns. Does anyone know if there is a photo of him somewhere, because if I see him on the street I really want to tell him how off the mark he can get when he gets carried away. More on that later.

The Iraqi currency, the dinar, had gone into free fall, losing 25 percent of its value against the dollar.

It has been very weird with the dinar the last couple of weeks, it is floating between 2200 and 2300. yesterday at night when I went to exchange my hard earned dinars to $$ it was 2285, and the dealer expected it to go up a bit. Many of the wholesale shops at alshorja and kifah streets stop buying and selling the moment the dinar starts going crazy, which happens often enough. I went to buy a new monitor for my computer (my old one blew a fuse when the electricity came back with a surge, it made a zzzzttt-ppfffttt sound and died) and the dealer had to check for the price of the dollar before selling me the equivalent of $140, it is getting to be that silly.
Burns does suggest a reason:

somebody high in the government had dumped dinars on the market to buy tens of millions of dollars in a few hours.

very probable. But there is another reason; no one wants to hold on to eventually worthless Iraqi dinars. Prices of real estate and cars have gone up very quickly, almost doubling in very short periods, specially unbuilt land within Baghdad city limits. Investment loans with lower than low interest rates are being ignored. No one wants to have money floating around. And get all your gold out of the safe deposits as well. Some of you know the meaning of Farhud in Arabic. If a bomb will hit a bank it will be ‘farhud’ed. I am straying away from the subject. The point is not only high government officials buying dollars like crazy off the market, everybody else is also doing it.
Talking of money, there is a very pressing question. What are we going to do with all the notes; they all have saddam’s face on them. From the worthless 25 ID bill to the newly issued 10,000 ID note?
More from he srticle:

Last month, Uday's wings were clipped when the government suspended his newspaper after it published articles that seemed intended to expose incompetence and corruption in the government.

It is back in print, two days ago I walked into the office and found it on my desk, still being printed with the same smudgy cheap ink. You would think saddam’s son would use good materials.

If anybody but Saddam Hussein himself seems like the perfect totem for all that is past, it is Uday. Yet his posture now is to present himself as the one Iraqis can turn to, should they want a more modern man to lead them out of the dead end his father has led them to.

sorry what posture? Everyone except his closest “friends” know that he is a sick monster. He has already driven himself into a dead end before his father did. Families walk out quietly when he enters a restaurant, he is known to send one of his boys to bring him the women sitting at the closest tables to “join” him. People hate him, as much as they fear his father. So no one is looking for him to lead them anywhere. What a pointless thing to write.

Anyway since it is the season to be merry, here is a funny little story about him: In the early eighties the Iraqi Hunting Club had a new indoor swimming pool built. Quite big and state of the art. They decided to have some sort of a party to announce it’s opening. A nice classy affair. at around eleven Uday comes in with his entourage wearing a white tuxedo and top hat, there is still a photo of him in that tux being printed on calendars but without the top hat, has a couple of drinks, decides that the party is boring and to liven things up a bit commands everyone to jump into the swimming pool, and unleashes his dogs = bodyguards to push people into the pool. Has a good laugh and leaves, A fun guy eh?

Where_is_Salam?

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can i kick u out of here salam?

OooOOoooOomAa sAaaLL !!!! one .. two .. three one .. two one .. here comes THE Raed :*)

The Iraqi "Opposition Groups" have met and made plans for a post-Saddam Iraq.
I feel so much more relaxed now. My future is in good hands. Excuse me while I jump around and celebrate this.

.....According to **opposition members**, Washington wants the opposition to enhance its credibility without growing too independent, so that the United States controls Iraq's political future yet has a legitimizing Iraqi partner ready in the wings in case one is needed after any invasion.

man this is way too funny, the way everyone is so blatant about it. at least try to be a bit discreet. No need for that eh?, just a bunch of stupid arabs there, they won't notice the threads moving these puppets.

There were American officials on hand to monitor the conference, cajoling its leaders in private to meet the goals set by Washington while ensuring that they did not overstep the American-drawn boundaries

how does anyone expect that this is meeting is of any meaning or importance. the whole affair was a mess. the speeches made were embarrassing and the fighting over each party's position in this meeting was even more so (just in case anyone starts having "hey this dude is no way in baghdad, how can he watch and hear this" thoughts. I am risking a hefty $350 fine and possible prison for having sat.tv) . very early on a kurdistani sunni group threatened to withdraw from the meeting if sunni Kurds were not represented in this meeting, but nobody cared because the american organizers of this meeting (headed by Zalmay Khalilzad) had no intrest in that bunch of fools.
The result of the four days was a 25 recomendations document full of hot air dictated by the US (link to document in arabic, could not find a translation of the whole declaration in english). It does say in paragraph two that the groups appreciate, or welcome (depends how you want to translate it) the help of the international community for supporting the iraqi people in helping them end the dictatorial regime and their help in rebuilding Iraq, BUT refuse any political intervention in future iraqi affairs. I say bullshit. Let's assume they are independent enough to make their own decisions, how do they expect that anyone would give them a free lunch?
-Here, let us send you huge military backing, risk the lives of our people, spend huge amounts of money just because we like you.
If you're going to ask for favors, you'll have to give something in return. and that's a mighty big favor you're asking. But since we know they are not really that independent, and everything said in that declaration would have to be approved by the American minders first. that paragraph means nothing just like the rest of the meeting, speeches and final recomendations.

.....several senior members of some of the largest groups said privately that such statements were largely political posturing because none of the opposition groups wants to be seen as an American patsy.

poor deluded fools. seen as patsy? you ARE a patsy.

The only good thing I heard during the 4 day charade was this:

After pressure from the Constitutional Monarchy Movement (CMM), the plans envisage a referendum on whether the country should remain a republic, or restore the monarchy which was overthrown in 1958.

It is not that I particularly like the Constitutional Monarchy Movement (Raed: do me a favor check the link and tell me if there is anything worth reading, my access to it is blocked). The CMM and INC (Iraqi National Congress headed by Ahmad Chalabi) are the main puppets in the american game. see this nice photo of both of them with Under Secretary of State Thomas R. Pickering in 1999 (chalabi in the middle and king wannabe Ali bin Sharif Al Hussein on the right). here is another mugshot of Ali bin Sharif Al Hussein.
In fact Al Sharif Ali's speech in meeting was one of most embarrassing. he is the best example why I say the Iraqi Opposition groups outside Iraq are so out of it. This person who wants to be the head figure of my country can't even speak my language. he stammered and stuttered, pronounced the words as he has never seen arabic before. I was wondering whether he was reading an english transcribtion of the arabic words because they sound so wrong. He has never set foot in Iraq. Was suddenly interested in the future of this country in 1993, no one heard of him or cared about him before that. Anyway, I had a point, this is not it.
I have decided if that Referendum ever happens I will vote for a constitutional monarchy. Beside having acquired a lifetime allergy of the word President. I think a Monarch who doesn't have much say will do less harm than a president who has to fight for his position every couple of years and once there wouldn't want to leave. This might be wrong but somehow I think if we did actually reach a point where we have a multi-party system it will be better to have to deal ministers and opposition groups than a single egomaniac. oh I don't know.. I just don't want to have to say the word President for a while so give us that wimp from the CMM, better still give us Prince Ra'ad bin Zaid bin Al Sharif Al Hussein. That would be good, at least he IS Iraqi and, been living in Jordan not like that Ali, spending his time in decadant western cities and speaks Arabic.

Dear Raed…
I never answered that angry e-mail you sent when I told you I am deleting the site (which was very unsuccessful, blogspot does not erase the archives). You said I was a coward and never finish what I start. You know me too well.
Yes I was scared. I thought that the Reuters and Yahoo France articles were enough to create too much attention. I deleted everything too fast to be able to tell whether that was true or not. But that was not the only reason. I was a bit unhappy about how things were going on the weblog.
Just after deleting the weblog I told Diane that I wish there was another Iraqi blogger. I have done a sort of a mental exercise on how that weblog would be:
To start with it would be in a Arabic, and discuss as little politics as possible, if cornered would be very pro-Palestinian pro-Saddam. Just to stay on the safe side. It would also be filled with quotation from the Quran and Hadith, or maybe Um-Kalthum songs. What I am trying to say is that most “western” readers wouldn’t get it because it would be so out of their cultural sphere.
This mess I’m in really bothers me; with all my talk of anti-Americanism (is that a word?) I still reference their culture, their music, and their movies. I got whacked for saying “fuck you”. I should have said “inachat khawatkum” no one would have understood. Just as most Iraqis don’t understand most of what is being said by Americans. We would have smiled politely at each other and moved on.
I feel like the embodiment of cultural betrayal. The total sell-out, and this is making me contradict myself all the time.
You remember the evening we spent at the Books@cafe when you laughed at me when I told you that I believe I am the product of a Muslim/Arabic culture. You reminded me that just two moments ago I was telling you how happy I was watching MTV Germany and shopping for English books at the Virgin Megastore in Beirut.
I am all the arguments we used to have about us being attachments to western culture rolled into one. This is not the dialogue of equals we used to talk about, I keep referencing their everything because I am so swallowed up by it. Look I have been sending you e-mails in English for the whole of last year, how sad is that.
Shame on me.
You used to anchor me down. All the magazines we used to read: Arabic horizons, Aqlam and the rest. Now I just browse thru them. I am back to Q, The Face and Wired: western trash. And don’t ask when was the last time I read a book in Arabic, I would be too ashamed to answer. Moreover I was getting all those scary questions from the people who read the blog. What do I think about the Kurdish situation? Open letters from Diane, which I was really at loss how to answer.
OK that’s enough. This is as confessional as it gets. Stopping the blog was not about just being scared, I had lost my bearings a bit and needed to re-orient. Don’t get mad at me, the things I said in that e-mail are not as mean as they sound. I least I got you to start blogging here, Maybe a certain blogger will believe that I am not a creation of your wild imagination.

And in answer to Eve Tushnet’s email to me

“…… and to ask whether you would prefer that people here not link to you, or whether you don't care”.

I do care about who links to me. I am very honored by their interest in my weblog and I am very grateful for all the emails I got asking if everything was OK. So as I always answer that question: “link me up baby…I am a total linkwhore”

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some more stuff for Raed:
Remember Zaid? The one who emailed us a huge photo of his graduation. He wears traditional Arabic dress now (Dishdasha, does not touch his ankles because he turned wahabi or something). He doesn’t look the female students he tutors in the face and, get this, wears eye-liner. Black kuhla. Apparently the prophet used to do that. He now has bat-shit for brains, officially. I also saw Fatin the other day, she was so pregnant I didn’t recognize her. Sweet as ever. G. was a fool for letting her slip out of his life like he did. My Mom says hi and asks when is she going to meet Hiba? I ask when are you finally moving to the KSA so that I can go to Amman and date that bald shorty who works at the Books@Cafe without you mocking my lusting after him.

while we are all wondering about what Bush is to say about the Iraqi weapons document. Uday is preparing to have another big party celebrating his escape from the failed assassination attempt in 1996.
This year the party at the Furusia Club will feature Nawal El Zoughbi

by allah it works! i can write in arabic. I don't know what you see but I an sure if you have an arabis enabled OS you'll see beautiful arabic letters. RAED come on get on with it. we'll do an arabic blog. and we will even start our own arabic blogs competition, I will win of course. mmmm blogger i love you.

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I am really jealous.
The First Persian Top Weblogs Competition
this blog won the second prize for blog design it has a a picture of an oriental tea glass. istikan chai dear?
when are we arabs going to have something like that? and why have persians taken to blogging so easily than arabs? why isn't there a single arabic weblog? why?why?why?
Raed dear you should start one today, i promise i will always raed it.

pearls of wisdom from my cousin:

there are three things you can do whenever you like in Iraq:
- get seriously ill
- get arrested
- get exicuted

it sounds better in arabic because it rhymes: tamra9* tatwa8af tin3idim. Cheers

the dollar is going crazy. $1=2280 and a very informed opinion (my favourite liquor store owner Mr. Satan) says that it will probably end at 2300 dinars for a dollar tonight. way too much. it is freezing cold, well 5C. and we are back to 2 hours of black out every 12 hours. and the office turns into a cool box the moment the electricity goes.