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For me, June marked the first month I don’t dare leave the house without a hijab, or headscarf. I don’t wear a hijab usually, but it’s no longer possible to drive around Baghdad without one. It’s just not a good idea. (Take note that when I say ‘drive’ I actually mean ‘sit in the back seat of the car’- I haven’t driven for the longest time.) Going around bare-headed in a car or in the street also puts the family members with you in danger. You risk hearing something you don’t want to hear and then the father or the brother or cousin or uncle can’t just sit by and let it happen. I haven’t driven for the longest time. If you’re a female, you risk being attacked.

I look at my older clothes- the jeans and t-shirts and colorful skirts- and it’s like I’m studying a wardrobe from another country, another lifetime.

From Baghdad Burning

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I realized how common it had become only in mid-July when M., a childhood friend, came to say goodbye before leaving the country. She walked into the house, complaining of the heat and the roads, her brother following closely behind. It took me to the end of the visit for the peculiarity of the situation to hit me. She was getting ready to leave before the sun set, and she picked up the beige headscarf folded neatly by her side. As she told me about one of her neighbors being shot, she opened up the scarf with a flourish, set it on her head like a pro, and pinned it snuggly under her chin with the precision of a seasoned hijab-wearer. All this without a mirror- like she had done it a hundred times over… Which would be fine, except that M. is Christian.

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I have reservations about Baghdad Burning (the blog) but it is riveting stuff.

I'm getting the sense that this blog is quite significant, as in, one of those important things I should read.... what a championess.

[ 13 September 2006: Message edited by: West Coast Greeny ]

Is that kind of like a writerette? Or a lawyeress? Just curious.

It also tied in with another story where apparently some Iraqi militants actually started specifically targetting the unit involved with the rape slaughter of the family, and were nocking them of one by one.

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Originally posted by Michelle:
Championess?

Is that kind of like a writerette? Or a lawyeress? Just curious.

Excellent article, writer, thanks.

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Originally posted by West Coast Greeny:
Okay, that ISN'T a word according to the moderatette. (Makes mental note)

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[crap - how do you link directly to a post again? It was this thread.]

[ 14 September 2006: Message edited by: Stephen Gordon ]

I've seen this question on several discussion boards and blogs, and have been wondering myself. So, I phoned her publisher. Just heard back:

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Thank you for expressing your concern about Riverbend. You have not been the first to contact the Feminist Press asking about her; like the staff here, many of her fans have been desperately concerned about her welfare. Unfortunately, we do not know her whereabouts or her state of health, since she has not answered our attempts to contact her. We are hopeful, however, that she is relocating and that is why she has not been able to write.

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This has been the longest time I have been away from blogging. There were several reasons for my disappearance the major one being the fact that every time I felt the urge to write about Iraq, about the situation, I'd be filled with a certain hopelessness that can't be put into words and that I suspect other Iraqis feel also.

It's very difficult at this point to connect to the internet and try to read the articles written by so-called specialists and analysts and politicians. They write about and discuss Iraq as I might write about the Ivory Coast or Cambodia- with a detachment and lack of sentiment that- I suppose- is meant to be impartial. Hearing American politicians is even worse. They fall between idiots like Bush- constantly and totally in denial, and opportunists who want to use the war and ensuing chaos to promote themselves.

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