ummm.......we have Arabic [Big Brother] now. The plot to make the whole world eat and watch the same things is going pretty well, don't you think?

Raed you should have been here today, how could miss out Ashura? Well, you still have 5 more days to get your ass back to Iraq and in Karbala,

We are approaching a very important date in the Shia calendar; this is something that has not been publicly commemorated for the last 25 years. Today is the third day in Muharam, in 7 more days the Shia Imam (saint?) al-Hussain will be killed in a battle that almost wiped out all the prophet’s male descendants but one, Zain al-Abideen. And you ask who was going to wipe out Mohammed’s lineage? It was the Sunni Caliph Yazeed.

Go grab that beer, it is story time again. This is the second part of the [what’s up with those Shia and Sunni dudes?] story.
If you don’t feel like a story scroll down to the pictures.

So I assume you have been reading the blog and already know that the prophet announced before his death that whoever sees a leader in him should see a leader in his cousin Ali. Which the Shia took as a sign that the rule of the growing Muslim empire should be in the hands of the descendants of the prophet. Things didn’t happen like that.

The revolution that was led by an orphaned man to make all believers equal in the eyes of Allah wasn’t gaining much ground with the big rich families of Mecca. If you have read Salman Rushdie’s [Satanic Verses] you’ll see how he hinted at the disgruntlement of the big rich families, they were calling it a revolution of “water bearers and slaves”. This is not just fiction, in a book titled [the political left and right in Islam] – please excuse me for forgetting the name of the author - it is suggested that after all of Mecca became muslin, willingly or by force, the older tribes were not going to allow the rule of this growing institution go to the hands of an unknown, an orphan. This gap between the old and the new power, the author suggests, has always been at the heart of Sunni/Shia trouble in the early days of the Caliphate.

Four Caliphs down the line, as we get into the Ummayad period, things are getting more and more decadent and. When Yazeed comes to become Caliph in Damascus he wants to make sure that there will not be anyone from the Prophet’s family to contest his right to the throne. He sends someone to kill al-Hussain, the next in line of Imams.

In the mean time al-Hussain is getting messages from Kufa/Iraq telling him that they support his cause and wish he would come to Kufa and lead the believers there. Seeing that he has no choice al-Hussain moves to Iraq. He takes with him all his family, the prophet’s family and followers of al-Hussain i.e. Shia. It is a small entourage since he is expecting the help of the Iraqis in Kufa. 72 men with their women and children.
Before he arrives a messenger is sent to check things out in Kufa, the messenger is a family member. The first day he arrives all the city prays behind him, a sign of respect. The Sunni Caliph sends his envoy to warn the people of Kufa from following this man. When the messenger comes to pray the next day, no one from the city is in the mosque and when he is killed and hung from a minaret no one from Kufa rises to avenge his death or bring him down for burial. Bad sign for the Shia on their way but with no wireless internet the word doesn’t get to al-Hussain. He doesn’t know that those people who have pledged support are all hot air. He falls into a trap.
Surrounded for 10 days, his few followers try to protect him and die one after the other. Zain al-Abideen was too ill to fight and this saved him from death. The story of the battle has been told on the blog before, will dig into the archives and post a link and some of it.

After this event Islam was split into two for ever. And the Shia have lamented the death of al-Hussain since then. Every 10th of Muharam, the first Islamic month, is a day of deep mourning for Shia. He is seen as a symbol of Shia struggle and the story with all its gory details gets told and re-enacted every year. There is also a deep sense of regret for abandoning al-Hussain in his most difficult hours, hence the flagellation.

Why do they start 7 days before the actual day of the death? That is because so many of the Imams died on that day there is no chance to commemorate all their deaths in one day. The laments on each day tell the story of one of the Imams building up to the big day on the 10th of Muharam. The day of Ashura.

The scenes I saw today are things I have never seen before, my mother and uncles would tell me about them but the event was banned. I, my mother and cousin will be going to Karbala for a week. I hope I will be able to take pictures and blog from there. This is of such significance to Shia in Iraq this year it should not be missed. You said freedom of expression? Well, this event is going to test the boundaries of this freedom. You can bet your ass that the Sunnis will see this year’s Ashura as a provocation and you can bet your friend’s ass that the Shia will use it to provoke. Poking the hornets’ nest is a very close image. So we be there wearing black and a pious beard with a camera in hand.

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About today’s pictures; they were taken in Baghdad, Kadhimiya district. The processions took place near the Imam Kadhim shrine. I had a video camera in my hand and although it is nifty and has a place for a memory stick to allow for still photos I forget to press that button. If you want to see the really interesting stuff you will have to wait for the film which will hopefully air on Newsnight, besides you need to hear the sound of the drums and those metal chains going down.

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As always, click to see big.

Main street in Kadhimiya, leading to the shrine. It has two gold domes.

The child of al-Hussain was killed at that battle as well that is why there will always be a procession of kids.

the entrance of the Kadhim shrine.

these are called Hodej, they will be lighted up with candles at night.

mysterious blogger turned Reuters journalist. G doing what he does best: scrweing up my shot. He should get [young Iraqi journalist of the year] award, you should see his photography.

this thing is called a Zirengi, I have no idea what it symbolizes but every group of lamenters has one

sometimes they looked worried, sometimes they lookes bemused, but in general the american soldiers managed to keep a low profile at this event.

I am concentrating all my efforts on growing a beard these days. I read on a web site somewhere that if I sit in total darkness with little balls made of aluminium foil stuck in my ears it will grow faster. I have been giving it a try for a week now, it is not working. I sit in front of the mirror for hours willing my beard to grow.

Happy Islamic New Year Y'all

Now, go easy with that non-alcoholic champagne.

The first time I got an email from an American soldier in Iraq I wasn’t sure how to react. These days I read a couple of US soldier blogs and a couple even send me emails every now and then. I was answering one of them from [Mr. Somewhere-in-the-north-of-Iraq] when I decided later to post it on the blog. So here it is. And on a more personal note; No [Mr. Somewhere-in-the-north-of-Iraq], it doesn’t bother me that you are “one of the American occupiers?” because I don’t think of you as an Occupier, I know you would much rather be home and you are stuck here because someone said this is where you should be.

This is what he wrote:

What's the right answer?

Is it to have driven Saddam out (which requires a war), but with a truly United, worldwide coalition, along with a master-plan for the post-war? Is there another way to have removed Saddam? Or should he have been left in power, isolated from the international community, and basically allowing the maintenance of the status quo? Although I know most of Iraq wanted him gone, is it realistic to believe that Iraqis would have pushed Saddam from power? I think--but don't know--that Saddam had consolidated so much power over the masses that it would have been impossible for Iraqis themselves to deal the death knell to his regime (that would pass on to his progeny)? Basically, should the issue of Iraq been left 100% to the Iraqis from the beginning (no war)?
On another note, is America too powerful? Doesn't it usually do good things with its power, or does it screw up as much as it helps?

He doesn’t believe in easy small talk does he?

It is pointless to debate what should have been done. There was a war almost a year ago and we have to deal with its consequences, there was time for debate much earlier. The powers that be made their decisions, whether right or wrong, at that time. I am a very pragmatic person, Raed’s nickname for me was [Salam the PragmaPig] I deal with the shit as it happens, never a moment of regret – well almost. But for the sake of debate…….

[Dear readers, please give me a chance to empty my mailbox before flooding it with hatemail, otherwise your passionately written critique will bounce]

What annoyed me most in the whole build up to the war was the act the US administration put on, the way they seemed almost surprised at how much of a baddy Saddam has been and how it was time to slap him on the hand and wash his mouth with soap for all the bad things he has done. The various documents that were produced to show how much of a bully he has been on the international playground were treated as if they were so new and startling. That was just silly. What the US administration didn’t put in those records and documents was the extent of its own involvement in building up this monster and now that he has grown bigger than they thought he could they thought it was time to get rid of him. You ask is there another way to have removed Saddam? Well yes but that would have involved something the US administration didn’t see necessary at the time. It should have happened right after the first gulf war. The scene was set and all the players were ready to play there part in Iraq. More than two thirds of Iraq was out of Saddam’s control. There was a sense that people have achieved things for themselves, truly proud revolutionaries not the scared people who had to be helped by an outsider they are now. But what did the US administration choose to do? It pooped on them; it allowed Saddam to start a persecution of Shia that was so extreme; it left the country with deep scars that will take a long time to heal. Even the political situation would have been easier to handle, the rift between Shia and Sunnis wasn’t as big as it is now. The country still had its secular educated class, which now is all over the world having turned to political and economic refugees trying to escape the claws of Saddam and the difficult economic situation in Iraq after the war and the sanctions.
But as I said it is no use crying over spilt milk, we have to deal with what we have now.

You say “Or should he have been left in power, isolated from the international community, and basically allowing the maintenance of the status quo?” well, that is exactly what the Bush administration chose to do at the time, isn’t it? But that policy didn’t just isolate Saddam but the Iraqi people and gave him more power over the destinies of Iraqis, we became so dependant on a government that wasn’t at all fit to take care of us.

Anyway, all that doesn’t matter now. Saddam is gone, thanks to you. Was it worth it? Be assured it was. We all know that it got to a point where we would have never been rid of Saddam without foreign intervention; I just wish it would have been a bit better planned. Does this mean that I will be wearing a (I [heart] Bush) t-shirt? NO, because I don’t believe there is any altruism in politics and the way he sees the world scares me.
What I do really and sincerely hope for is that the day you and other soldiers and US civilians here don’t have to stay behind those high concrete walls isn’t too far away; and that you feel safe walking in the streets without those hard and heavy flak jackets, so that we can sit and talk about these things in a Karrada Street tea shop.
There are many challenges Iraqis have to face now, so please stick around a bit longer and try helping us get thru them. One of the more serious challenges is the fact that Iraq has become a sort of an open playground for many political and religious factions who are using Iraq as a fighting ground.
So there you have it [Mr. Somewhere-in-the-north-of-Iraq], and by the way you never told me whether you had a blog or not.

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This post was created with the assistance of Asian Dub Foundation in the CD player and the great coffee I got as a present form my new Blog friends in my mug
Pax
Out

The Wise Oracle of Gotham asks:

"Mister President, can you give us the names of three National Guard Service colleagues who served with you between May 1972 and October 1973?"

She would have also liked to ask whether he has ever snorted coke?
Blame her for making me think that Kerry might be able to be the superhero who will save the universe. I do think Iraqis should worry about the presidential elections in the USA, it is scary how much influence someone sitting so far away has over the destiny of a nation.

You live in this place for most of your life and you think you know most of the religious festivals and traditions in your country, right? Wrong.

I walked thru Karada street last night only to be surprised by men standing in the middle of an intersection giving away sweets and candy to people in cars and a couple of kids with what was supposed to be fireworks. Karada (which is a predominantly Shai neighborhood) was full of signs congratulating the Shia nation on the occasion of the Eid al-Ghadeer (Eid is a religious celebration). Not wanting to look like an idiot I took the candy, shook hands with the nice gentlemen and ran home to my in-house Shia expert, my Mom.
She gave me the strangest answer ever: “oh yes, Ghadeer, of course. You have to go find and kiss 7 [illwiya]s. It will bring you good luck” – illwiya is a female descendant from the family of the prophet – kids when your parents give you strange answers try Google. Her sister was a bit more helpful; she suggested I go take a look at the Final speech made by the Prophet Mohammed before he died (the Farewell speech). But I still didn’t get it, there is nothing in it that would make the Shia so especially happy. Unless there is something my school textbook is not saying. As I said; try Google.

It turns out that the Ghadeer thing is the best way to explain the Shia/Sunni schism in a nutshell. Sit comfortably, take a sip of that beer and get ready for a story.

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It is the year 10 according to the Muslim Calendar; the prophet has just finished his first (and last) pilgrimage to Mecca, to the house of Allah. On his way back he announces to the 100,000 Muslims following him on that pilgrimage that he has just received a message thru the heavenly Information Highway. They stop at a small pond called Khumm (pond in Arabic is Ghadeer, which makes it Ghadeer Khum). The prophet delivers his last speech to the congregation, starting with saying that he fears he will not meet the faithful in this place next year, somewhere in the middle he says the following:

I am leaving for you two precious things and if you adhere both of them, you will never go astray after me. They are the Book of Allah and *my progeny, which is my Ahlul-Bayt.*.

So with that his family, his descendants were given a free Divine upgrade so to say. But it gets better, later in that speech he also says:

Whoever I am his leader (Mawla), Ali is his leader (Mawla). O' Allah, love those who love him, and be hostile to those who are hostile to him.

And presto you have a schism, you see there were others who had their eyes on the quickly growing thing that was called Islam and they were not going to give that over to this young Ali just because he was the Prophet’s cousin. As I pointed out earlier their full name was [Shi’at Ali] which means the group of Ali. They were the people who have and are still trying to assert the right of the Prophet’s descendents to lead the Muslim community. And Eid al Ghadeer is a big thing because they plaster the streets that bit from Muhammad’s speech “Man Kuntu Mowlahu fa haza Aliyun Mowlahu - this Ali is the mawla of all those of whom I am mawla”.
This in a nutshell is the start of the split in Islam. Hope you enjoyed the story.

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On the long list of things that I have not seen or experienced before the fall of Saddam I can now add a new item, Eid al-Ghadeer. Happy Eid al-Ghadeer to you all.

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There was one sign that was so creative in what it proclaimed I thought it deserved a picture

It says “Ali the talking book of Allah”. Imagine that!

Two FunFacts about Eid Al-Ghadeer:
-Funfact 1: Everey year right after the Haj ceremonies the Saudi Government make sure that the pilgrims from Shia nations are on the move and not anywhere near the Ghadeer where that speech took place. Just imagine it, A celebration of Shia legitimacy in a Sunni country; we can't have that, can we now?
-Funfact 2: The thing about kissing seven [Illwiya]s for good luck.... I was wondering why the streets of Karrada didn't turn into a kissing fest when I was told that my mind was filthy: girls kiss girls and the boys kiss boys.....on the cheek. My mind is not filthy....excuse me now I have to go find 7 boys to kiss.

Shamless self promotion.
The coolest cover the of the book has to be the Japanese edition and a Polish blogger told me about a site that sells the Polish edition.

Update: A reader from Brazil sent me a link to a sitr selling the Brazillian edition, they seem to have chosen a starnge format.

Yesterday was Raed's birthday, did you wish him a good one? I bet you didn't, shame on you.

The plan was to spend 5 days in Sulaimaniya, cousins 4 and 5, my brother and I. To go to the north of Iraq for Eid, but at the first day of Eid we saw those horrible attacks in Erbil and decided it would probably be better not to go. The plan was to go there take pictures and blog, well the plan fell flat on its face and I will have to do this from my bedroom in Baghdad.

I have a confession to make, well not really a confession, it has been on the blog before but the issue was never properly addressed. Part of outing yourself is to have [The Thing] out in the open and face it head-on.

I have been standing on the wrong side of the fence concerning the Kurdish issue. Even before the war, when people were theoretically discussing future models of Iraq the idea of a federal state made me feel a bit uneasy, the thought that the Kurds might not like us Arab-Iraqis at all was always brushed away.
I needed to hear someone talk about the issue form a very Arab-Nationalistic point of view to realize that I am not looking at the other side at all. The Arab nation is a myth that many Arabs still believe in, the main problem with that point of view is that it forgets the diversity of traditions, culture and races in the so-called Arab world.

The way I saw it was, the Kurds HAD to stick to Iraq, the bonds, the ties, "Kurds and Arabs united" and all that. Well, it is all bullshit. It is actually Arab Iraqis who seriously need to beg Kurds to stay along for the difficult ride the rest of the country is going to go thru the next couple of years.
The Kurds have been thru this and an almost working democracy and governing system has emerged after 13 years of self rule. We will be the unwanted load on their shoulders. We should be grateful if they agreed to stay within the boundaries of Iraq as part of a federation.

The discussion about the Kurdish issue gets you the weirdest reactions from people; it is at points like an atheist and a believer discussing the existence of a deity. There is simply no answer and tempers will flare, people will get angry. And as we have seen in the past this is an issue that could lead to civil war.
A federal state is not an option it is a necessity, there is no way around it. A federal state along "geographical lines" - as some people describe it - will not work; it will be along ethnic lines.
You say "it will rip us apart"? Mmhhm, yep it will. But it is a necessity.
You say "no it will be fine"? I say look at the signs, even before we are declared a federal state ministries are becoming tiny experiments for how the future will look like. To get anything; a job, a promotion in a ministry where a Shia minister has been appointed you better be Shia. Not only that but it would be favorable if you were a member of the same party.
Ministry of oil is shia, Ministry of Communication is also shia but Dawa Party, and it makes all the difference if you get the right references. Now imagine what would happen if we had a three part Iraq, do you really believe that a Sunni from central Iraq could really get a job in southern Iraq? Wouldn?t the Kurd rather have another Kurd working for him because he just doesn?t trust Arabs (I have experienced this when I was working with journalists, my presence was silence inducing the moment they realize I am Arab).

But we have to go the way of a federal state, time will heal the wounds and we will learn our lessons, just as long as we can stay within this political entity called Iraq. What it means to be [Iraqi] has to change. At the moment I am kind of worried that our fellow Kurdish blogger might be offended if he were called an Iraqi. To have a post titled: [how to finish off racism in a racist country like Iraq ...some Kurdish thoughts] isn?t a good sign, is it?

My new computer background image says: "Re-examine every thought and concept you have".

A couple of months after the war ended the US army started blowing up UXO’s (unexploded ordinance – it took me forever to figure out what those three letters meant). They issued a warning saying that explosions on the top or half hour were controlled explosions. Just so that we wouldn’t freak out.
Almost half a year later I still look at my watch every time I hear an explosion. I noticed my cousin does the same thing. You wish and hope that this is one of those “controlled explosions” even when I am not really sure the US army is still blowing up ordinance at those times.
I was woken up by an explosion today, opened my eyes and looked at my watch, it was 20 past eight. Went back to sleep wondering if this is going to be big enough to make the news, there are too many of them to mention the whole lot. And around 11pm there was another explosion, very close. You look at your watch, and think oh dear.

Two days ago I spent the night at my apartment instead of staying over at my parent’s. I don’t go there too often anymore; it is too close to the “green zone”. Too much gunfire at night. By now almost every Iraqi can tell the difference between a Kalashnikov (what the so-called resistance is likely to carry) and the sound of the machine guns US troops have.

The constant reminders that it is not over yet.

It all becomes a mess the moment the poor traffic policeman decides to take a break, one of the main features of post-war Baghdad are the amazing traffic jams.

The cool thing is the moment it gets too crazy someone will jump out of his car and do the policman thing, waving his arms around and shouting, or the newspaper guy will volunteer.

In a simple small room with blue mattresses laid on the floor to sit on, Ayatollah Sistani, one of his sons and an assistant met a group of Sunni university professors, tribe leaders and dignitaries. During the 3 hour meeting not one single verse from the Quran was recited, he expressed his fear that federalism might lead to the fragmentation of Iraq and said that if the elections had to be delayed for legitimate reasons he will endorse the delay. My father came back from this meeting quite awed.

In preparation for the transition of power to Iraqi hands there have been numerous conferences and discussion groups, starting at neighborhood levels and going up to more specialized discussions. This has been going on for quite a while and I know that he (my father) was invited to a couple of them to talk, I read one of the papers he wrote on forms of representation, he’s a caucus type of guy. Which kind of makes sense in the current situation, the country is not really ready for a direct one vote per citizen type of thing. Security issues and fraud and the lack of experienced people to monitor the elections come into play.

Anyway, after a couple of those meetings a group of Sunni participants were invited to go and talk to al-Sistani. My father didn’t tell me the [what and how] because he knows I’ll blog it, (my family used to tell me things before they knew about this bad habit I have). But he came back quite impressed saying things like “you wouldn’t find a more secular Imam” which is of course an oxymoron, but it could have been the fact that it was late and he had nothing to eat the whole day. My mom sat with her hands crossed giving him the [ha! So what did you think you’ll meet? A raving lunatic?] look – just I case you are new to this, my father is a non-praying Sunni, my mother is a praying Shia (a Sistani shia) and I think the Quran is a very boring novel.

Apparently there is another meeting planned but no one is telling me when. What impressed my father was the fact that Sistani is much more moderate than the media portrays him. He is very flexible about the way these elections should look like, and sees no problem in them going along in stages. He is also ready to endorse a postponement of these elections if there is no agreement on how they should take place. What he does mind is any form of intermediate stage, if it didn’t work out at the planned time we should keep the status quo until we find a way. He said something along the lines that increasing the Governing Council from 25 to 250 will change nothing, and if the Americans move what they have in their left hand to their right hand it is still in their possession. Basically, either do it right or don’t, which sounds reasonable.

Another interesting thing he said is that Allah gave people the capacity to govern themselves and no one has the right to take that privilege from them, he doesn’t see Iraq as a theocracy like Iran.
All in all a bit confusing. So is he hard-line Shia or not? And why, after staying out of the political game for so long, has he become so central?

More importantly; how can I get that [I’m a blogger] stain out of my clothes? My cousins stop talking when I come into the room unless I swear I won’t put it online.

It transmits on 107,7 FM in Baghdad, which really is at the end of the frequency range of most radios, some don’t even go that far. The station-breaks on it have people sounding like the Simpsons saying things like “I haven’t had so much fun since Afghanistan” – this is such bad taste, it’s hilarious. The DJ’s call each other Sergeant So-and-so, which freaks you out the first time you hear it, I thought I was listening to something I wasn’t supposed to.
But to give the people there credit, the music is much better than the seriously annoying pop stuff on SAWA. SAWA Iraq is different than SAWA in the rest of the arab world, yes we are special. In case you are wondering SAWA is the new American propaganda tool instead of [Voice of America]. They lured our young with music and then they started messing with their brains using Sawa. It is very pop-y la-di-da-life-is-ok type of station, the messages must be subliminal or something [note to self:start recording the broadcasts and then listen to them backwards, specially that britney/madonna thing because they play it so often]. I think it will spawn a TV station as well, there are already people with SAWA TV tags running around.

I have been tuning to AFN IRAQ much more often than the radio we Iraqis are supposed to be listening to. They played Rage Against the Machine’s testify:

Im empty please fill me
Mister anchor assure me
That Baghdad is burning
Your voice it is so soothing
That cunning mantra of killing
I need you my witness
To dress this up so bloodless
To numb me and purge me now
Of thoughts of blaming you

It is a bit scary to have a military radio that plays this song here in baghdad

Anyway, it is very interesting radio. It is so very American it gets disorienting. And the little public announcement things in between songs are almost Monty Python-esque if they weren’t meant to be dead serious. Example:

[Sound of vehicle, a humvee I guess, in the background]
Female voice: I am really tired I haven’t slept well last night. Ooh look…can you hold on to my [some weapon or other] while I take a picture of this.
[Sound of snoring]
Female voice: Is sergeant (so-and-so) still sleeping? He had a tough night.

Darth Vader voice: Being on military convoy is a serious situation, always wear your seat belts, maintain speed and distance. And always stay alert.

There are little Arabic lessons thrown in here and there to “learn the local language and be part of the world around you”. Today’s words were Hello, Good morning and Good bye. I would have thought that after a year here we would have moved to a bit more complex vocabulary.

And there are also reminders to military personnel to keep the classified information they have to themselves since “We *are* in a war here.” Sweet sounding DJ Courtney made sure we remember to remember by playing Nickelback’s “this is how you remind me”.

Now if there only was a way to convince them to stop playing all that Bruce Springsteen and AC/DC and play us some B.R.M.C. and Rapture.

Start your week with THE WACKY IRAQI. well it is the middle of the week for us here, it doesn't make a difference for him he is still wacky.

Long post alert, you will not be quizzed on it and there are no prizes for reading the whole thing. I just had to get all this off my chest

Salam Pax: The Clandestine Diary of an Ordinary Iraqi

Don’t you just hate that title? To start with I would never use a word like clandestine, and what is wrong with [Salam Pax: The Baghdad Blog]? It gets worse, the German title is [Let’s Get Bombed; greetings from Baghdad]. We did have a talk about these things but being the novice I am and sitting so far away from where all that was happening left me with a title like [Let’s get bombed], dear oh dear.

So why does this come up? It is because Ihath found the latest costumer review on the Amazon site not fair [thanks Ihath, Raed showed me the email you wrote him. The Gibran quote really got to him]. What the reader/reviewer doesn’t like is the Ordinary Iraqi bit, he pins all the usual little flags people have always pinned on the little Salam Pax voodoo doll they have: “Salam Pax is not an ordinary Iraqi by any stretch of the imagination. He's gay, irreligious, western educated, and has spent half his life outside Iraq. This is an ordinary citizen of Iraq? I don’t think so.”

Since I don’t really have much to say today other than the weather is really horrible, we will have one of those flashback episodes TV shows always have when they run out of ideas.

Yes, let’s go back to the days when the blog really was, ahem, clandestine. Let’s dig deep into the archives and pull out part of a post dated 29th, October, 2002:

One more correction, neither I nor Raed are "regular joes". Actually most regular joes would look at us suspiciously. I have spent half of my life out of this country and had to be taught how to re-grow my roots by someone who isn't even Iraqi by nationality, he just loves the place (thank you Raed). We both have a distrust towards religion and have read the "Tao Te Ching" with more interest than the Quran. And we both have mouths which have gotten us into trouble. The regular joe would be more inclined to beat the shit out of us infidels, oh did I mention that I am a pervert as well?? The way I look at men makes them feel uncomfortable.

Just to prove that I have never said that I am your regular Joe.

The other little bit I would like to grab out of the archives is dated 21,December, 2002. It is from a longer letter written to Raed:

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 in Amman 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.

The whole [where are you standing] question did bother me a lot, hence the “shame on me”. Lately I have decided that there is no shame in this.
I’ve am reading Hanif Kuraeishi’s [The Black Album], there is a paragraph which rang all the bells

These days everyone was insisting on their identity, coming out as a man, woman, gay, black, Jew – brandishing whichever features they could claim, as if without a tag they wouldn’t be human. Shahid, too, wanted to belong to his people.

And Salam wanted that as well. When you get pushed into a corner because of a name and a place of birth you try to make the best out of the corner you have been pushed into. And believe me being pushed into the corner labeled [young male of Middle Eastern / Muslim origin] hasn’t been much fun lately. But since it is all you have you dig deeper into it and hold on to it. The current western world view has antagonized a huge number of people, the West wasn’t that interested in dialogue. We were simply labeled as Muslim terrorist.
One of the more amusing results of this has been my friend’s G arrest by American soldiers while he was on a job for an American Newspaper. He was given the head-sack and an angry soldier shouted at him “it was you [your type] who attacked the world trade center”. Now this is funny because G. is so pro-American it gets to me sometimes, he is Christian (but he hates it when you tell him that because he really is “agnostic”), so why did the soldier accuse him of attacking the World Trade Center? Because he had a Muslim looking beard and looked “of mid-eastern origin”.

That’s beside the point, what I want to say is that we seem to have lost the middle ground. When I met Ted Koppel the first time he said that he needed a cultural interpreter. And this is exactly what this blog and the rest of the blogs in the Iraqi Blogosphere, in all its variety, has been providing. The things the reviewer saw as negatives, “irreligious, western educated, and has spent half his life outside Iraq”, are really the basis for the common things between us. You and me, we have this dialogue because of them. In a world growing apart by the day it is absolutely wonderful to find that everybody can go on about the food they like on an Iraqi blog [check out the comments] and for a moment forget all the politics. This reminds us that we *do* have things in common and not everybody is out to cut the others throat.
I do not feel ashamed of standing in the middle anymore; actually I am proud of it. The Iraqi Bloggers show that we *can* talk. You think some of us are too ungrateful and critical? Habibi at least we are talking about it, you really have not met the people who are really truly unhappy with the whole situation here.

BUT… we are still playing the [dominant/subordinate culture] game. We write in English to communicate with you, we try to establish links and reference points very much relevant to you.
The respect I have for Persian Bloggers is immense; they were able to create a dialogue among themselves which they sometimes share with the rest of the world.
One of the aims of the whole war in Iraq thing was to create “a model democratic state in the area”, I tell you it will not be Iraq because it will only be skin deep, look towards Iran for a democracy that might not be exactly what the USA wants it to be but there will be a deeper understanding of it among the people.

OK, this post is way too long, would someone please wrap my hands in duct tape and burn the keyboard.

Just in case you are interested it took me the exact length of CD1 of the Deep Dish/Toronto mix to write this blog. They are Persian by the way; I told you they had potential.

Tell you a little secret: A lot of issues can be solved using the following ingredients:
- Chocolates (something nice, like a packet of maltesers)
- A little Poem (stolen from someone who can use words much better than you)
- Copy of Newsweek (latest issue)

well the last item is optional. Yes he is OK, and will go to Amman for a week with his brother he changed his mind, he will stay for another week before going.

So do I at least be the first on-blog break up?
No. it is not funny.
Raed?.........

Raaaaed?..................
I stood at your door for an hour, I knew you were inside, but you wouldn't open.
do we have t do this in public? answer my emails at least.

It was a special day.

Here I am, drinking vodka alone at 3 in the morning, in the house of my family. One year ago I was staying in Amman, waiting for my visa to go to Saudi Arabia to marry my first love and ex-fiancé, I was finishing my studies for Masters Degree, and I was working as an architect in a small engineering office.

I will not exaggerate and pretend this is my first jump between my parallel universes, because I had previous heroic hyper jumps in the past.

But this year witnessed two jumps.
Jump raed jump jump jump

The first was on the 19th of Feb. of last year, when I decided to leave my work, my house, and to leave heba and come to Iraq.
Why?
She didn’t answer my calls, so I pushed the disappear button.
This is when everyone starts to wonder “where is raed”

I came to Baghdad, I was completely destroyed, without energy, sleeping all the day and night waiting for war to happen, to conceder it the as the “reason” for my miserable life. The war started and explosions helped me forget the rest of my feelings towards heba.

War stopped, and statues were pulled in a dramatic way.

My national feelings pushed me to start something that can make the world see how bad this war was, so I started working on a massive scale survey on war casualties, for months, going on trips to the nine cites of the south weekly, and establishing a huge network of volunteers, monitor them, designing the survey forms and administrating the data input procedure.

More than 4000 injured, more than 2000 killed, just from civilians, all with full documentation and details about the time and place of incidents, and their addresses. My American partner was supposed to publish the results, but she didn’t.

After we finished the survey, I started establishing another network of volunteers .. Emaar .. in the nine cities of the south and Baghdad. 100 volunteers were the result of one month selection period that I met around 1500 persons in, around 30 of the 100 were girls, working all together in teams to identify small problems in the neighborhoods and implementing micro projects depending on the local people’s contribution, to give them more trust in themselves and to market the political idea of giving Iraqis the chance to rebuild their countries by themselves.

Meanwhile I had a romantic story that was getting more serious day by day, and making me a worse person day by day too.

After the UN explosion, fund raising started being impossible, and our only funding agency stopped to fund us for political reasons.

My private life was falling apart in parallel to Emaar, slowly and painfully.

Even working with salam, for the BBC, and writing stuff on this blog wasn’t making me comfortable. For many reasons.

Today was a special day
I stood in front of everyone in the NGOs meeting, and told them “I’m sorry to announce the death of Emaar in 9 of the 10 governorates that we used to work in” We still have work in the marshes of Nasrya.
I’m tired, and I cant knock more doors
The team of Nasrya are arranging themselves without needing me for support.
Good for them

Emotional wise.
I erased her phone number from my phonebook, preventing other stupid attempts of going back.
Why?
Because she cannot say good morning. I want her to say good morning when we wake up.
But she can’t.

Salam:
I’ll stop blogging here. Without swimming in the mud of details: you are not the best partner in the world, and I’m not the best blogger too.

I emailed the Jordanian University to tell them I’m not going to resume my masters degree studies. Its way too complicated for me now. I’ll take my diploma certificate and stop.

And I emailed a friend in London telling her about my great achievements of today.

I burned out myself. Wzzzzssssss……

Today was a special day, but this Russian vodka made it better.

Jump jump jump
:”)

Iraqia (the Iraqi Media Network TV) made a very strange decision tonight; it is right now showing the full state of the union speech. And they are going to have a panel discussion about it later on as well.

Does this make us the 51st state? Does it? Eh? Does it, does it?
Do we at least get effort marks for that?

Dear editors at Iraqia, the state of the union speech is a news ITEM, an important one for the future of Iraq but still an ITEM. Give us the highlights, I don’t need to watch the whole thing, unless we *are* the 51st state. Are we? Eh? Are we, are we?

There was one moment in the speech that made me smile; I was too busy eating my chicken kebabs to pay attention to the whole thing. But at the point where Mr. Pachechi stood up I could only think that I really wish you [the GC] more luck than Karazai.

Saddam's two older daughter are looking for a country other than Jordan to host them. link to article in al-sabah, Arabic.

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The article says that Jordan informed the two women that if they wanted to stay in the country they will have to respect the host country and not to get involved in politics. Oh shock horror! what politics, why can't they just keep their mouths shut and stay out of it. If they were planning to play hero they should have stayed with daddy. Their mother and younger sister Halla are in Syria and placed under house arrest of sorts apparently, Raghad and Rana don't want to go there. I bet the shopping experience in Damascus isn't as exciting as in Amman, with so much money in your bank accounts you would want to go somewhere to spend it, right?
My suggestion, go to Beirut shut up your mouths by stuffing them with drugs, ditch your phony Hijabs and become club-sluts at the BO-18 (scroll down for the pix).

On a related theme here is nice article about clubbing in beirut [For 15 years, Lebanon endured a brutal civil war. Now it's just learning how to party], I raelly can't wait for another 15 years, they should put this as a priority on the Iraqi reconstruction fund issues: Clubbing in Baghdad