Sunday, July 1, 2007
People Change
By Yasmine
We were long-time friends. We were gathering in my house last week. The occasion was the arrival of our dear-friend from Baghdad. Anxious to know how she is, how the situation is sadly deteriorating, we were all asking questions at the same time, while she was answering in her normal radiant manner.
Over cake and tea she was telling us of the hurdles she encounters on her way to and back from work, or going around running basic errands from purchasing bread and milk to filling the car tank with gasoline.
She suddenly, she became silent. She had recalled a tragic scene or incident, or that’s what we collected from the ashen look on her face. She lives like all of us in a residential area of al-Yarmouk district, a calm mixed area like most of Baghdad before the invasion.
Finally, after a long sigh she spoke.
“The first time I saw a corpse lying on the street, a few meters from my fence, I became hysterical and could not go to work, eat or sleep and kept vomiting for two days,” she said.
Ironically, when she saw a corpse lying on the pavement again just a few days before leaving to Amman, she turned her face to the other side and recited verses from the Koran.
While she was telling us this tragic incident, she started to cry. Not over the dead person but for how she had changed to a stone-hearted person. She was saying, “am I a human? A year ago I could not watch blood in a crappy movie,” she said sobbing with red-rimmed eyes “who is this person I am talking about now?”
In an attempt to comfort her, I told her “this is a normal reaction to the abnormal life you are living!” The point is people characters and characteristics are affected by their circumstances.
During the early nineties when the embargo imposed by the international community to punish Iraq was at the peak, and the economic situation was downcast, stealing, robbing and breaking into houses became a norm. Of this anew phenomena in our society I remember at the time I asked my father, a physiatrist, what he made of it. He said “it’s circumstantial depending on the motives behind his/her heinous acts. If the perpetrator was doing it to feed his kids, then he/she will abandon it as soon as his situation improves. But, if he/she is like any other criminal in the world, in this case it is irrelevant to the situation.”
“Then, what if the economic situation stretched?” I asked. He said then it will be a true disaster for everybody.
I went back further in time, specifically to the eighties when Iran-Iraq conflict was at its worst phases. Vivid memories came back to me, of a small incident. At the time I had two toddlers, my husband was serving in the compulsory military service near the borders, while I had to take care of our, baby girl and toddler boy, juggling between a house and a career.
One early morning, the bell rang. The first think that came to my mind was that they came to tell me that my husband died in the battlefield. I sprang out of bed barefooted to the outdoor. To my surprise it was a janitor of a neighboring company, the Italian Nouvo-Pingione.
He said “Madame, once again you have forgot to park your car in the garage. Moreover, this time your keys are still in the car.”
Eventually I realized that the previous day, when I was back from work and striving to get everything back in place with the kids, I forgot the car keys in the door which meant that even my house was unlocked, as usual, because I had the house keys in the same chain. He advised me to be more attentive.
The idea of someone breaking into the house never came to my mind.
This was the Iraqis back then; honest, helpful, and decent. Not the gangsters, looters and thieves that are filling the streets nowadays. Though, this also did not come out of the blue. It is the inevitable outcome of twenty five years of wars, embargo. People change, after all. And that in itself is one hell of a story!
We were long-time friends. We were gathering in my house last week. The occasion was the arrival of our dear-friend from Baghdad. Anxious to know how she is, how the situation is sadly deteriorating, we were all asking questions at the same time, while she was answering in her normal radiant manner.
Over cake and tea she was telling us of the hurdles she encounters on her way to and back from work, or going around running basic errands from purchasing bread and milk to filling the car tank with gasoline.
She suddenly, she became silent. She had recalled a tragic scene or incident, or that’s what we collected from the ashen look on her face. She lives like all of us in a residential area of al-Yarmouk district, a calm mixed area like most of Baghdad before the invasion.
Finally, after a long sigh she spoke.
“The first time I saw a corpse lying on the street, a few meters from my fence, I became hysterical and could not go to work, eat or sleep and kept vomiting for two days,” she said.
Ironically, when she saw a corpse lying on the pavement again just a few days before leaving to Amman, she turned her face to the other side and recited verses from the Koran.
While she was telling us this tragic incident, she started to cry. Not over the dead person but for how she had changed to a stone-hearted person. She was saying, “am I a human? A year ago I could not watch blood in a crappy movie,” she said sobbing with red-rimmed eyes “who is this person I am talking about now?”
In an attempt to comfort her, I told her “this is a normal reaction to the abnormal life you are living!” The point is people characters and characteristics are affected by their circumstances.
During the early nineties when the embargo imposed by the international community to punish Iraq was at the peak, and the economic situation was downcast, stealing, robbing and breaking into houses became a norm. Of this anew phenomena in our society I remember at the time I asked my father, a physiatrist, what he made of it. He said “it’s circumstantial depending on the motives behind his/her heinous acts. If the perpetrator was doing it to feed his kids, then he/she will abandon it as soon as his situation improves. But, if he/she is like any other criminal in the world, in this case it is irrelevant to the situation.”
“Then, what if the economic situation stretched?” I asked. He said then it will be a true disaster for everybody.
I went back further in time, specifically to the eighties when Iran-Iraq conflict was at its worst phases. Vivid memories came back to me, of a small incident. At the time I had two toddlers, my husband was serving in the compulsory military service near the borders, while I had to take care of our, baby girl and toddler boy, juggling between a house and a career.
One early morning, the bell rang. The first think that came to my mind was that they came to tell me that my husband died in the battlefield. I sprang out of bed barefooted to the outdoor. To my surprise it was a janitor of a neighboring company, the Italian Nouvo-Pingione.
He said “Madame, once again you have forgot to park your car in the garage. Moreover, this time your keys are still in the car.”
Eventually I realized that the previous day, when I was back from work and striving to get everything back in place with the kids, I forgot the car keys in the door which meant that even my house was unlocked, as usual, because I had the house keys in the same chain. He advised me to be more attentive.
The idea of someone breaking into the house never came to my mind.
This was the Iraqis back then; honest, helpful, and decent. Not the gangsters, looters and thieves that are filling the streets nowadays. Though, this also did not come out of the blue. It is the inevitable outcome of twenty five years of wars, embargo. People change, after all. And that in itself is one hell of a story!
Dear Yasmine,
What a great entry! Thank you. I don't even know if I can add anything to what you have written here.
Seeing dead bodies of killed people is the worst that a human being could ever endure. Until this very day I still have nightmares of all what I'd seen since the war started.
Two days ago, my mother survived a car bomb explosion in my neighborhood AGAIN! She said "3adi" as if nothing happens. It was the first car bomb last year that hurt her the most. She said these things became like "drinking water."