The helicopter was so low it made the car rumble.

The number of people who have changed their names from Saddam to other names have reached 820. Almost daily you see in the official Iraqi newspaper announcements of people changing their names.

The city of Karbala is facing a real problem with the Iranian tourist, all land owners are kicking out their tenants in favor of Iranians renting rooms for much more than a doctor, pharmacist or a barber could pay. The governorate (maybe in the future, the independent state of Karbala) is trying to enforce a rule to stop those landlords form evicting trades.

More and more off-license shops are closing down. In the Ameriyah district where you used to find 7 shops in [Amal Shaabi] and [Munathama] streets now there are non. One shop has been attacked twice and the most recent attack was two weeks ago. A friend of ours who had a shop there has written in big letters on the shop “will never open again” just so that his shop doesn’t get RPG-ed *again*

Tried to get a better internet connection than the one I have, went to DijlaNet. Up six floors on foot only to be told that I have to pay a $2000 setup fee and $400 a month for a 46k/46k connection. right.
I think the dial up thing I have now is just super fine, don't you think so?
The only good thing about getting up that high is having a chance to get a picture of the baghdad skyline from Mansour. Yes I know the picture quality is bad, will start using a better camera.
click small to see big

That monster of a mosque on the right is the unfinished Rahman mosque, one of two gigantic mosques saddam intended to build, I kind of think it will stay in this state for quite a long time because it will need huge amounts of money to finish it. I would have had other ideas about that piece of land in that area, but let's not discuss that since it is a mosque now. it looks like a gigantic space ship. The needle like thing in the middle is the "saddam" tower beside the Mamoun telephone exchange, now a wreck. The dome on the left is the Salam Presidential Palace, also a wreck.

I fought with her again, let’s hope I did leave too much mess and destruction to go back again this time..
pmpm ..
Our problems re-identify the meaning of deja vu

Jumping from one city to another, and from one country to another is not solving my problems anymore.
Anyway..

Word of the day: Privatizing
:”)
I remember myself giving a boring lecture about the socio-cultural changes in post-war Iraq, and since I’m such a bossy_ ego_ centric_ freak it didn’t bother me much to see most of the poor sleepy Italian kids moaning and begging for a break.
That was a couple of months ago. Or was it in October?
Whatever..
“I believe war had two main goals” Raed_in_Action “Destroying the political regime, and changing the economical system” go go go “Crushing the political structure is done, and changing the economical one is still in process” everybody say woooow
woooooooooooooooow
Everybody knew how stupid was the idea of inviting me to Italy, they sent me back to Baghdad on the next plain.

The first step in changing the socialist economical system was bombing some of the [public/governmental]-sector companies, and leaving the rest to be looted and burned in the weeks after. The second step of privatizing is happing at the time, started some weeks ago
but who can tell what’s happening?
No one.
Small companies and parts of the public sector are being sold, some governmental companies belonging to the ministry of industry, some furnaces, some warehouses and stores and some other small places that you can read advertisements about in our new daily newspapers.
but what else is being sold?
No one can tell.

Don’t I sound like a member of the conspiracy-theory-club?
NO I DON’T
I mean .. If you don’t give a heck about private and public crap, I’m sure many people here will care; Iraqis lived their life depending on the governmental sector, maybe they didn’t feel that .. mmm .. yet..

QUIZ OF THE DAY? (With multiple choice facilities)
How much money did an Iraqi spend to get each of the following:
1) (Free?) medical treatment, hospitals and pharmacies and drugs..
2) (Free?) food rations, food food food and food
3) (Free?) education, schools, universities including post-graduate studies..
4) (Free?) electricity, water, petrol, gasoline, loly-pops..

(PICK ONE ANSWER)
(A) nothing
(B) nothing
(C) nothing
(D) all mentioned above

(CONCLUSION)
Wow .. public sector rocks

ANOTHER QUIZ IN THE SAME DAY (its more a fun fact than a quiz, don’t panic)
How much money do Americanos spend every week when they change the security color code from yellow to orange?

(PICK ONE ANSWER)
(!) one BILLION USD / week

(CONCLUSION)
I don’t want to know how much they’ll spend on pink
Feel good .. real good

I met Jo yesterday, she was extremely hyper active and happy!
Unlike me
She was surrounded by a bunch of clowns whom were extremely happy too.
The strange thing that these clowns where real! I mean .. real real clowns as seen on TV, they are coming to Baghdad under the name “Circus to Iraq”. I think Iraqi children will freak out when they meet a clown with green nose and big red mouth.
:”)

How does it feel like when you know, admit and be happy of being a clown?
It seems I’ll have many questions to ask in the next press conference of the GC**.
(mmm .. am I “inflaming passions” against anyone?)
(If yes .. just put me in prison and let another Americana soldier kick me on sensitive places, or let Kilroy tell me more about life)
(bad taste as usual..)
(hohohe)

** mmm .. to de-code numbers of the CG picture.. plz go there
(not recommended)

You should all go read Zeyad's latest post NOW!
Go, what are you waiting for.

sometime between christmas and new year's I went for a walk in karrada and played a game with a tiny digital camera; a picture every 20 steps. some turned out bad and some ok.
click on small to see big.
---------------------------------------------

sat-dishes in Karrada, you can get them in any color you want, bright fiery orange (as in my blogs) seems to be a hit. You have to assemble the thing yourself, manual not included

tiny plasic christmas trees

and a christmas market

Mr. Shoe Shine

not very exciting hotdogs

the attack of persian plastics

The Hearts and Minds article by Hassan Fattah, link provided by Gila, thanks a million.
if that link didn't work try this
Now go read that it is the best thing you can do in the next 15 minutes.

He also has a blog. He is in Jerusalem now.

Back in Baghdad. The boredom of the 12 hour drive from Amman to Baghdad was alleviated by a black BMW which kept following us for almost 40 minutes. Raed and I were on the verge of freaking but kept trying to act as if it wasn’t as nasty as it looked. Getting picked as a target for a carjacking from all the masses of cars going thru the Iraqi-Jordanian border should make you feel special I guess. It is like getting a winning lottery card from Hell.
Anyway; between driving as fast as we can away from our probable carjacker and trying to keep clear of all the military convoys we arrived safely in Baghdad.
My brother and cousin decided to take me out for dinner but since they were worried about going to a restaurant in Arasat (where Nabil’s was bombed) we went to a newly opened place in Mansur. If you are in Baghdad it is worth checking out, it is called al-Samad and really is nice. We sat there for 10 minutes when we heard shooting outside, very close, followed by a police car which stopped to close to the restaurant and a lot of people running in all directions. It was time to ask if we could have our meals to go.

The day we left to Amman was pretty strange; raed said that it felt like one of these special effects in movies when the actors are running just ahead of a huge explosion. He was supposed to pick me up at eight; he was at the other end of Baghdad. While he was driving thru Karrada a bomb explodes in front of the Rahibat Hospital and he gets stuck there for an hour. As we are driving out of my neighborhood we see an Iraqi car run over by and American humvee, the 4 humvee-convoy has blocked the road and the owner of the car stands beside his wrecked car and has his hands on top of his head. Not exactly a great start for a trip. The 30th of December didn’t look good and I wasn’t sure I really wanted to hang around for the 31st. As we were driving out of Baghdad there was another halted convoy, a military car lay on the road flipped on its back, soldiers stood around pointing their guns at passing cars. Do you see what raed was talking about, we just kept going faster.

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Tomorrow the sixth is [the day of the army] a national holiday celebrating the formation of the Iraqi Army, funnily enough this holiday was abolished just a couple of months ago at the first press conference the Iraqi Governing Council gave.
But just as so many things that were done in haste and in the non-existence of a Plan they have brought it back. The ministry of defense was closed down, and everybody thrown out only to be brought back a couple of months later when they [ie CPA] realized that this wasn’t exactly a very clever move. The Mukhabarat was quickly put apart as one of worst instruments the Saddam regime had, and rightly so, only to be put back together first secretly and now not so secretly. The one thing I am still waiting to come back after being thrown out is the “road map” for and Iraqi constitution, but it seems that is ignored.

-------------------------------------------------
There is a great article in this month’s Prospect by Hassan Fattah [editor of Iraq Today]. It is called Hearts and Minds and in it he gives a ten point “bluffer’s guide for the reconstruction of the reconstruction of Iraq”. Absolutely brilliant. You should buy, steal or borrow a copy today.

-------------------------------------------------
Have you been noticing all the talk about Iraq as a federal country lately? Something made me itch every time I heard and Iraqi or CPA official talk about it, first I couldn’t figure out was bothering me, but during the long long drive to Amman I was finally able to put my finger on it. No one asked us what we thought of the idea.
I remember almost a month ago when Zibari (our minister for foreign affairs) talked about federalism and I thought “that’s nice we are starting the discussion finally”. I was wrong it was not a discussion; it was a done and made deal. It got so silly that Kurds and Arabs are having real trouble about the issue, the Kirkuk incident was . I can’t remember anyone asking me what I thought about the whole issue, neither was it put to debate openly. Someone high and mighty suddenly decided that is what’s good for you, and we are going thru the process of trying to fit into that prêt-a-porter federalism. “The Officials” are not discussing whether that system is good for us or not they are way beyond that point, they are discussing into how many pieces Iraq is going to be cut up. Along “ethnic” lines or by governorates.
Have I mentioned already that we were not asked?
Our new temporary head of state, Mr. Pachachi, promises the Kurds that they will get what they want. Which means that they will cut up Iraq into three parts and making sure that instead making sure we all here live together peacefully our ethnic and religious differences get even more accentuated. Yes I know identity is important but you see my father is Sunni, my mother Shia and our neighbors for years Kurds. There are no lines and none should exist, the situation in Kirkuk does create lines and make people choose sides. Although I find the idea of an independent state of Baghdad or Samaweh or Basra a bit funny; it is all one Iraq for me, but I think if we were force fed this federalism without being asked I hope they won’t go for a federal state consisting of Kurdistan in the north, Sunni-stan in the middle and Shia-stan in the south.

Hope you all had a great new year with as few bangs as possible, as you all know ours was quite loud. I am not in Baghdad again, and my mom tells me that new year's eve was like war because of all the explosions.

OK announcement number one: THE MIRROR SITE TO THIS ONE, THE ONE CALLED [dearraed.blogspot.com ie the one without the underscore between dear and raed] HAS BEEN HACKED. THE MIRROR WAS CREATED BY GOOGLE/BLOGGER AND I HAVE NO IDEA HOW TO CONTROL IT, NEITHER HAVE I FOUND A CONTACT US LINK TO WRITE TO BLOGGER, THE BLOGGER FORUM IS TRYING TO HELP.

announcement number two: concerning Faiza's blogs, would you guys please give me a break. she writes too much and too fast and I am supposed to translate all, she has 4 untranslated blogs and she called me today saying there are 8 more waiting to be posted and translated. please have mercy. and some patience