By Yasmine, and Iraqi in Amman, Jordan

A few days ago my friend’s father in Baghdad received a death threat. Although he is 79 years old, his age did not refrain the criminals from pursuing their heinous acts to force him leave the area he had lived in with his family.

Naturally he complied to the threats, even though it did not make sense to him since he was a Sunni in a so-called Sunni area. However, a lot of things do not make sense in the mayhem of Baghdad nowadays. He remembered, he forgot his documents behind . He told his family to go ahead while he went back home, terrified, to retrieve his papers. He walked back in the hot, blazing sun until he found a taxi ..

He went missing for two days. His family did not know whether he was abducted, caught in cross fires, or simply killed in the mayhem of Iraq. Eventually, his body was found in a morgue of a hospital along with his papers. Apparently, due to stress, heat or whatever reason he passed away. The taxi driver took him to the nearest hospital, where his family found him.

“At least we found and buried him” said his daughter. Since this is in the new Iraq has become a privilege. “And thank god the driver was decent enough to take him to the hospital, even though he was already dead.”

At the precession, which took place in his daughter’s house in Amman, Jordan, while I was paying my respect to my friend, suddenly I heard a loud voice of a women wailing “God no ,God no.” She just received devastating news from Baghdad: her five in- laws were all slaughtered accept for a child which managed to escape.

In other parts of the world such news is main news while in the modern Iraq it is not even news anymore. Meanwhile, a woman, who had just arrived from Baghdad, said “Alluh Akbar, or God is great, Baghdad is not Baghdad anymore. It’s hell on earth as if all the demons collaborated against us.”

By Yasamine, an Iraqi in Jordan


Afar from the killing and abducting in their homeland, Iraqis, whether residing in Amman, Jordan or just visiting, have become accustomed to celebrating their joyous events or sometimes sad ones in the neighboring Jordan.

One fine Friday evening, a young Iraqi bride and groom walked the alter in the prestigious hall of the Four Seasons Hotel. The newlyweds were preceded with candles, a shower of rose buds, maskoul –a candy widely used in Iraqi on such occasions, and halahil, or ululating.

The couple took spontaneously to the stage followed by their parents. Everything was next to perfect. The banquet a mixture of Iraqi and European cuisine, the music, ultimately topped by the hospitality Iraqis are renowned for.

Baghdad, once a dynamic city, whose generous inhabitants value their wide circles of social relations, nowadays confine to their houses, or at the most carry out visits to their door –to -door neighbors. Subsequently, if the wed-to-be and their families persist on going through the adventure of a wedding, then they have to follow a certain criteria. The precession has to take place in broad daylight, most probably over lunch, a custom practiced mostly by farmers. Furthermore, it should not take place in a conspicuous area, where it can be an easy target; finally, the guests cant be mixed gender. Only women.

However, even this adventure, has become another extinct leisure that the Iraqis were deprived from after the bombing of the Shiite shrine in Sammarra. Meanwhile the wedding singer, Adil Ogla , also Iraqi, appealed to the audnience with Iraqi songs. The dancing stage was soon full, all were dancing elegantly dressed women, with their off shoulder gowns, or veils, dancing with sharply dressed men.

Eventually, the music slowed down and the beat of drums took off signaling the commence of “Chobee” [An Arabic dance where dancers, traditionally men, stand hand in hand and form half a circle and dance to the tunes.] dance.

Spontaneously, men and women, hand in hand shoulder by shoulder formed one large circle. Sunni, Shiite, Kurd, Muslim and Christian, all joined perform this conventional Iraqi folk dance.

“You turned the clock back four years, ” a middle aged women, who just arrived from Baghdad, told the groom’s mother. She added with a sigh “Vivid memories came back to me of our celebrations back in Al Rasheed Hotel.”

Al Rasheed Hotel was one of Baghdad’s prominent hotels, where the Iraqis used to celebrate their joyous events, in addition to other hotels and clubs scattered around the capital. Following 2003 invasion, it was taken over by the U.S. forces and only a few know what has become of it now.

At the ladies washroom, Iraqi women bumping into each other started the common conversation, one asks the other are you residing here or visiting?” Um Hussam answered “just visiting, and how about you?” the other replied “I have decided finally to stay in Amman.”

“What about your house did you sell it or rent it?” asked Um Hussam. “Neither” answered the lady, “we left with barely the shirts on our backs, following a death threat.” Then with a sigh the lady asked “we haven’t met for such a long time, remember our weekly gatherings, God our lives have been turned upside down?” Um Hussam , responded idly “I only see people when I come to Amman , as for Baghdad I do not go out. Every once in a while I go to the doctor and that’s it or to see my sick mother.”

Meanwhile the singer was humming a “mewal” [a slow sad introduction of any typical Iraqi song.] In this song it said “Dearest motherland, good morning, Goodness motherland, reach out to everyone. When shall the smile return to your beautiful face? When shall sorrow abandon your sacred soil? I long to see you smile, just for a day. I long to see you released from grief I long to heal your wounds. Sunni, Shiite, Arab and Kurd embrace them all, under your wing. You’re their, mother and father. Motherland stand high no matter what”. Immediately the mood changed, tears filled eyes, low sobs were heard, cigarettes were lit, and deep sighs were released.

A young lady with a shivering voice said “There is a persisting lump in our throats named Baghdad, it’s in our hearts, we can not take it off our minds no matter how far we go or whatever the occasion is.”

By M.H.Z



It’s a picture I took of a beautiful sunset in Baghdad. I named it “the last sunset” because it was the last one I’ve seen in Baghdad before I left to Erbil, and the next step would probably not be back to Baghdad, may be a place so much far away.

I’ve been thinking: how can I describe this period of time we are going through?

It is the “era of farewells.”

After that, I wondered if any Iraqi hasn’t yet said quite a number of goodbyes to dear and loved ones, loud, or deep in his/her heart. Many Iraqis have made their farewells to Iraq and are not thinking about going back.

In all the texts I’ve read and written, we are reporting, criticizing, attacking, defending, and even dreaming. I keep asking myself and wish so deeply that I can find an answer: “Am I really doing something for Iraq?” I mean, I honestly want to do something, and that’s what made me do this, write my thoughts. People are reading, commenting. Maybe they are convinced, or pissed off. It’s a big community, but is it a real one? Or is it just a virtual community, where at last we push the “Shut Down” button and find ourselves out in the real world, with more farewells to be said?

A small world has successfully been created here, “the Iraqi Blogosphere” as called by many. I talked a little about this through a post on my blog “who are the Iraqi bloggers.”

Can we think of a way to make this virtual world more effective beyond the shutdown button? Maybe if we try and get people to become part of this world, like how Omar did, inviting other writers to put their thoughts on his blog, maybe we can invite other Iraqi people beside other bloggers and make them share their thoughts with us. Try to make this world alive and closer to the real one. We don’t just want to be vague lines in history books for the coming generations. We shouldn’t be a line in a nook or magazine: “the wave of Iraqi bloggers at the century, who shared their sorrows and miseries and happiness in words that recorded the era quite clearly.” Is that what we are? Historians?

I love You Iraq

By Abu Saif, an Iraqi Journalist

A number of religious clerics released a statement and advised people to not eat fish from the Tigris river because they feed on the dead bodies, which the kidnappers kill and throw in the river. Plus, the river is polluted.

Baghdad was famous for its Masgoof fish, which is grilled fish roosted on wooden fire taken from the branches of special plant that grows on the shores of the Tigress, which gives is a special flavor.

Masgoof used to be served in restaurants along the famous Baghdad riverside street, Abu Nawas.

On the same river run the famous and the oldest street in Baghdad, which built at 1906 at Ottoman’s era, called al-Rasheed Street.

At the end of Rashed Street snakes the famous Mutanabi Street, which was built at the same time of Rashed Street. Mutanabi was famous for its weekly bookseller, open air bazaar. It was a tourists magnate. Iraqis, along with foreigners, used to sit and chitchat Shabander Café, which was a meeting point for intellectuals and educated people.

These are some of the sights that you should have seen when you visited Baghdad.

Now you cannot eat fish on Abu Nawas because of the pollution in the river and because half of the street is blocked, and people are not allowed to sit on the riverside because it is across the river from the Green Zone, or at least they shouldn’t because if the Green Zone was attacked, they’ll be suspects.

Mutanabi’s legend was first ruined by the curfew on Fridays. Then a car bomb that destroyed much of the stores and the Shabander Café.

Rasheed Street is also blocked and no one can go there nowadays.

More over, Iraqis who used to welcome you with a smile in these places are all gone and most of them have left the country.

If any one wants to taste Masgoof in these days or any of the Iraqi famous dishes, he or she will find that food in Iraqi restaurants at Syria, Amman or Cairo but of course the taste is different because it will not have the same flavor and it will be served by a desperate displaced Iraqis.

I know about this because,
I was there..

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!