Nice Bombs

We are in Amman, Jordan. K is trying to recover from some nasty Baghdaddy virus that has kept her in bed and nasally dripping for the past two days.

But let me back track a bit while we were in Baghdad.

First, there was the area , Al-Mahmodia town, that we drove to on our way from Babel to Baghdad. The place where K was a star. Near it there is another town called Iskandariya. The day after we left a bomb blew up in front of the Iraqi Police station killing 71 people (I believe, I will fact check all this stuff when I get home.)

And then later on in the week there was the bomb explosion that literally shook me out of sleep. K and I both looked at each other wide-eyed and fully awake at 7 in the morning. We were frozen anticipating…what? Another bomb is what I waited for. But no, just a massive blast, sharp and with a short echo. It felt and sounded so close. My cousin Tareef came in a few hours later grabbing something from his closet and hurrying to work. I was still lying in bed thinking about what the hell was going on out there. I asked Tareef about the blast and he casually remarked that it was just another bomb. I found out it was a recruiting center for Iraqi men to sign up in the military. It was maybe 4-6 miles away from my Uncle’s house and we had passed it many times. 28 people died and about 80 people were injured. A man from Jordan left a note taking responsibility and claiming that he is targeting Americans and Shia’s.

Was there any point in worrying about this? Either we are dead or we are not dead and we continue.

You Iraqis, the ones living in Iraq, you guys really have had way too much war. I would not be able to deal with the constant terrorist attacks and various questionable bombing incidents. I think it creates strength in some and in others a morbid sense of humor. Others, mostly brush it off.

A joke. Why did they call Saddam our Father? Because he fucked all of our Mothers.

I’m sorry if this site has been down. I’ll check on it when I get home.

At the border of Iraq there were several American soldiers checking cars leaving Iraq for contraband. I interviewed a couple of the soldiers. There is something unsettling about a niave looking 18-year-old kid with a giant machine gun strapped to his chest. It was not a very thorough search of cars. Mostly they were making sure that the border patrols were not taking bribes. And then there was the soap. You see anyone with soap may be hiding ancient Babylonian ruins in them. So no soap! We had soap. Actually they searched two of our bags barely checking anything and let us go (we had about 8 more bags that went unchecked). I asked one of the soldiers why not check the other way around? You know from Jordan into Iraq. And he said that they really had no jurisdiction over those borders, but sometimes they do. Huh? It seems to me that half the problem with these looters, car bombs and Al-Qaeda assholes is that anyone with a car or a donkey can enter Iraq. Anyway, I asked the soldiers how Iraqis have been reacting to them. And the dumb looking kid replied that Iraqis do not know what freedom is. Of course this pissed me off a bit, especially coming from a soldier with a giant machine-gun on his shoulder. What exactly does he think ‘freedom’ is? Although, I have heard this statement from Iraqis as well. To some people they may associate ‘freedom’ with some form of sexual or expressionistic type of gesture. To others, it may be religious. I would say that in a sense the Shia’s feel totally free to express themselves now and consider that a great freedom. It varies in meaning. I wish my Arabic was better but from what I can get a sense of, the press has freedom of speech. But still, there are some that are careful in what they say, I mean they are afraid. But it’s changing. Everyday Iraq is changing. And besides, I think Iraqis have the right to do nothing as a form of expression or personal freedom. I mean just living, working and raising their families in post-Saddam Iraq is an expression by itself. They need to have that right.

More on this later…my thoughts are being derailed by loud children.

I have shot over 45 hours of video. Do you think I have something?
:)

-Usama