is fascinating to see the world beyond Iraq prepare for the World Cup. Receive e-mail photographs of people waving flags and banners supporting either team. Oh! Here we also have flags and banners-drilled black banners all over Baghdad, announcing deaths and wakes. The flags are all of one color, usually black, green, red or yellow-representing a certain religious party or political group.
A friend owns a shop in Karrada had a little problem with a certain flag last week. Karrada was one of the best shopping in Baghdad before the war. It was the area to which you were when you were a shopping list unrelated, such as shoes, a potato peeler, pink nail polish and a dozen blank CDs. You could be sure to find everything you need in less than an hour
Immediately after the war, SCIRI, Da'awa and other parties have opened offices in the area. Stores that previously exhibited Garments and posters of women with make-up, adopted a more subdued picture. Soon, instead of photographs of charming women advertising Dior perfume, shops put pictures of Sistani, looking half-alive, shrouded in black. Or pictures of Sadr, grim and dark, and almost certainly not smelling like Dior.
This friend owns a small cosmetics shop where he sells everything from bars to paint lips headscarves. His apartment is located just above the premises, so that when you look down from the window of his room, you can see if someone is at the door. G. inherited the shop from his father, who was selling Sewing instead of cosmetics. The store has been in the family for twenty years. Before the war, his wife and her sister going, getting the most persuasive sales duo known in the history of cosmetics (proof of this is a garishly colored neck scarf I bought four years ago and has never left cabinet). After the war, and several threats in the form of letters and broken windows, G. began to run the business personally, and, besides cosmetics, introduced a dark line Abbaye appropriate loose headscarves.
The last time I visited G. in his shop was two weeks ago. Since January, the store G. has been the center of some football activities. His obsession with football has gotten to the point of closing the store two hours earlier, and thus E., cousin and other friends can gather for PlayStation FIFA games. These tournaments are basically a group of grown men sitting, driving digital little men running after a ball digital, passionately shouting and insulting each other. If you go to the store trying to buy something during those hours, you risk being thrown out or you just say "Take it, just take it (whatever). Take it and GO! Every World Cup year, G. and his wife joke, only half, to change the name of her only son by footballer of the year. (As a sort of compromise, family and friends have agreed to call his 14 years, "Ronaldinho" until the end of the World)
G.
's cousin, who has lived in Canada about 15 years, recently sent a G a colorful Brazilian flag, great, perfect for hanging in a window. He told us how he was planning to hang right in the center and paint under in big bold letters "VIVA BRASILIA!". E. seemed to doubt while G., excitedly described how she would change the colors of the exhibition, green and yellow to match the flag.
took nearly two days complete before the problems started the first sign of trouble came through a neighbor of G. Passed by the shop and told G. a turbaned young cleric in black, going against the window had turned their attention to the flag. According to Abu Rossul neighbor, the young cleric stopped, gazed at the flag, I note the store name and address and went his way. G.encogiéndose downplayed his shoulders, "Well, it could also be a follower of Brazil ...." Abu Rossul was not so sure, "To me it seemed more the type Viva Sadr! ...
A day later, G. had a visit at noon. A young priest dressed in black entered the store and gave a brief glimpse inside. G. tried to interest you in some lovely headscarves and Abbaye, but was left out of his apparent mission. Claimed to be representative of the Sadr press office was a few blocks away and had a message for G.: the staff of that office was not happy with the window of G. Where was their awareness of national pride? Where was his sense of religion?. Instead of the pagan side of a player could place important photos of Sadr, or, better yet, Muqtada! Why did a foreign flag stuck obscenely in your window? If he felt the need to put a flag, and was the Iraqi flag to be placed. If he felt the need for a green flag, as the window, and was the green flag of "Al il Bayt" ... Democracy is, after all, a matter of having choices.
G. I was not happy at all. He told the young priest would find a "solution" and made peace by donating some shoes cheap man and a cotton T-shirts selling at times. That night conferred with various relatives and friends and, although nearly all advised him to take it down, insisted that he remain in the window as a matter of principle. His wife even offered to turn it into a curtain or bed sheets to enjoy them until the end of the world. He was adamant to keep it.
Two days later, he found they had slipped under the large aluminum outer door a letter of warning more dramatic. In short, told G. and people like him pay @ sy required him to remove the flag or put in a dangerous situation. It costs a little to impress a man like G., but that day had removed the flag and the window was back to normal.
"Meanwhile, Muqtada issued a fatwa against football. I've downloaded, and this is the translation of what he says when someone asks for a fatwa (interpretation from the point of view of Islamic law, n. of t) on the football World Cup.
"Actually my father's position on this topic is not undefined. Not only my father but Sharia also prohibits such activities which keep their fans too busy to pray, keep people in oblivion (the prayer). Habeebi, the West created things to us from completing ourselves (perfection). What do we do? Running after a ball, habeebi ... What is this? A big tall man, a Muslim, running behind of a ball?. Habeebi, this "goal", as it is called ... if you want to run, run towards a noble goal. Follow the noble goals that will complement and do not you stoop. Runs after a goal, keep that in mind and everyone follows its own path toward the goal to please God. This is one thing. The second thing is more important, we find that in the West, and especially Israel, habeebi, Jews, would they have been playing soccer? "You see them play like Arabs play? They keep us busy with football and other things while they have left. Have you heard the Israeli team, curse them, have the World Cup? Or the U.S.? Only other games ... We kept busy with them, singing, playing soccer, and smoking, trash of this kind, satellites used for things blasphemous while they occupy themselves with science etc.. Habeebi Why? They are better than us, not we better than them.
Important Note: The Sharia does not prohibit the football or sports, are prohibited only in Muqtada's dark little head. I wonder what tennis, swimming and yoga ....
I heard the fatwa to him getting emotional about playing football and not know whether to mourn or laugh. Foreign occupation and being part of a puppet government these things are OK. Football however, will be the end of civilization as we know, according to Muqtada. It's fun. Do not look like anything but reminds me of Bush. Two sentences can hardly bind properly and millions of people still believe that his word is law. So when Bush raves about the "beginner Iraqi government," freely chosen "for power, you can look at Muqtada and see one of the beginners. Currently he is one of the most powerful men in the country for his followers
So this is democracy. This is one of the great minds of Bush's democratic Iraq
militia Sadr now controls parts of Iraq. Only a couple of days, his militia with the help of Badr, were preventing women from going to the market in the southern city of Karbala. No women were allowed to go to market and store owners complained that their businesses were suffering so. S Welcome to the new Iraq.
black humor is seeing what we have become and it is also distressing. Muqtada Al-Sadr is a measure of how much we have regressed in these past three years. Even during the Iran-Iraq war and sanctions, people indulged in sports to divert their thoughts from daily life. After the occupation, we won a match against either another and we comforted us @ s mism @ s with "Well, we lose wars, but we won the football! In a country that once celebrated sports, especially football, to a country where the concern is if the players are sufficiently long pants or sports fans will face eternal damnation ... In this we have become.
- posted by river @ 12:05 AM
0 comments:
Post a Comment