Poetry in Baghdad

by Adrienne Wilson on

Every time I hear Baghdad mentioned in the news my face and stomach both turn to sour. The American death tolls, the Iraqi death tolls, Bush, politics, etc. All of it makes me want to holler. Can the world get any worse? Surely, but I’m in no mood to discuss politics tonight. Instead I’m going to point you to this NPR piece on poetry. No, wait, not just poetry, but poetry shared in what they call the “Freedom Tent” in Baghdad so I suppose they’ll be some politics involved after all, but not from me.

Organized by the women’s Freedom in Iraq group, the goal is to bring Sunni’s from Madaan (a violent neighborhood in south Baghdad) together with Shiites from Sadr City to open up and share poems filled with both hope and grief. The environment is peaceful and the energy is the same. What would the world be like if it were always the way things went in the Freedom Tent? Who knows? Still, I have always loved poetry and the words from within insiders in foreign places. The pauses, winding of the words and the words themselves always have a different feeling and ring to them. Kind of like gun shots and the pitter-patter of children’s feet running down dark Baghdad streets to find shelter. The pause in the poet’s poem – the brief moment in time when the violence has ceased.

If you’re into news, arts, and culture – check it out.

Iraq Skier

by Erik Olsen on

We’re just about through with ski season, but let me call your attention to online travel magazine Stellar, which is running a rather unusual series by Bob Dedic called Miles From Home in which this avid skier from Colorado ruminates on family, fighting and the joys of hitting the powder.  The magazine series is really quite good and comes with a ton pf photos. I haven’t read anything quite like this about Iraq, an odd mixture of outdoorsiness and, well war.

Word for the Travel Wise (04/24/06)

by Adrienne Wilson on

Anyone out there know whether or not
Lonely Planet co-founder, Tony
Wheeler returned from Iraq? If he hasn’t just yet I’m betting a slew of loyal Lonely Planet readers will jump on
the bandwagon and book flights to the country once he does. I found only two Iraq blogs where he notes his arrival and
explains that his travel is non-related to any death wishes. In fact he is spending his time in the Kurdistan region
where life in the country tends to be pretty tame in comparison to war-torn Baghdad. For those wishing to follow in Mr.
Wheeler’s footsteps here’s a little Kurdish lingo lesson for the day.

Today’s word is a Kurdish word used in Iraq:

jiyan – to
live

I plucked this word off of Wiki’s
Kurdish word list simply due to most people’s pessimistic thinking that a trip to Iraq automatically equals an
untimely death. Obviously this is not true, however one should proceed with extreme caution and do their research
before jetting over to the area. Learning Kurdish online won’t be easy, but here are a few resources you can use: My Language Exchange (find a pen pal looking to exchange
the Kurdish lang for your native tongue), Wiki (Kurdish lang
background and short word list) and this Kurdish Language
and Linguistics site.

Daily Lives of the Iraqi People

by Karen Walrond on

The BBC is currently featuring stories of daily life of Iraqis on its website. 
However, unlike most reports of Iraq which are written by journalists, these accounts are actually in the words of the
Iraqi people themselves.

The accounts were all taken on April 7th, and include everything from the expected
("We are afraid") to the beautifully mundane ("I’ve been farming all afternoon, and looking after the
sheep. I am very tired!").  Really beautiful way to get a glimpse of everyday life in this country that is
usually featured in the headlines for horrifyingly violent reasons.

(Photo from the BBC feature "Life in Iraq:  Your
pictures")

Citizen Penn

by Erik Olsen on

I’m
about a week behind on my New Yorker reading and so was pleasantly surprised this week to find last week’s issue had a
rather informative and interesting profile by John Lahr on Sean Penn. Now, I’m no celebrity worshipper. I honestly,
deeply believe that our fascination with celebrity is both absurd and harmful. Absurd because we are placing such lofty
value in people’s whose compensation (in the form of money and status) is completely incommensurate with their
societal contribution. Harmful in the respect that we are largely distracted from more meaningful aspects of the human
experience by spending so much time and caloric output on worrying what Brad and Angelina are up to.

Now,
with that as a rather ridiculous, if contradictory, preface for this post, let me say that I did find the article on Sean Penn rather interesting. Penn, you might
remember has been traveling the world…or at least certain dangerous parts of it…to show us the other
side of these places, the happy faces of the Axis of Evil, and it certianly is nice for him to have himself
photographed walking among the people. He penned, if you’ll pardon the pun, a series of articles, some 12,000
words total, for the San Francisco Chronicle, some of which we discussed here.
Now, despite my cynicism, there is value here, because Penn holds himself out as a kind of citizen of the world, a
purveyor of higher truths, and he is one of a few celebrities who really tries of leverage his status to heighten
public awareness of issues that lie outside of Hollywood. Now whether that is a good or bad thing is another issue.
Whether we should in any way trust that Penn possesses the smarts or experience to be the one who alerts us to the
world’s ills is a fine question to ponder. So you just go ahead and do so. But I think you will find the article here
pretty fascinating, as Penn comes across as a rather complex character. I can’t positively say I like him, but he
intrigues me.