Author of Baghdad Burning describes life post–"Iraqi Freedom."
In 2003, an Iraqi blogger, known only by her pseudonym “Riverbend,” made her first post to her Blogspot-hosted site, riverbendblog.blogspot.com. She titled the blog “Baghdad Burning,” with the legend “Girl Blog from Iraq... let’s talk war, politics and occupation.”
“I’m female, Iraqi and 24,” she wrote in her first post. “I survived the war. That’s all you need to know. It’s all that matters these days anyway.”
Riverbend, we find out over the course of her blogging, worked as a computer programmer until it became too dangerous for women to go to work by themselves — she tells a harrowing story of her trip back to her workplace after the invasion. “The director had died of a stroke during the second week of the war and suddenly, we had our own little ‘power vacuum.’ At least 20 different men thought they were qualified to be boss. Some thought they qualified because of experience, some because of rank and some because they were being backed by differing political parties (SCIRI, Al-Daawa, INC).”
She reports that, at least in her experience, conditions had been better for women before the war; she received pay equal to her two male colleagues and got respect from her male boss. But the situation deteriorated, and not just for her: “Over a month ago, a prominent electrical engineer (one of the smartest females in the country) named Henna Aziz was assassinated in front of her family- two daughters and her husband. She was threatened by some fundamentalists from Badir’s Army and told to stay at home because she was a woman, she shouldn’t be in charge.
She refused — the country needed her expertise to get things functioning — she was brilliant. She would not and could not stay at home. They came to her house one evening: men with machine-guns, broke in and opened fire. She lost her life — she wasn’t the first, she won’t be the last.”
Riverbend’s descriptions of a “once-secular city where women are now afraid to leave their homes without head covering and a male escort” got the attention of City University of New York’s “Feminist Press,” which published Riverbend’s first two years of blogging in book form in 2005.
Since its publication, the book has been nominated for a number of awards, including the Lettre Ulysses Award for the Art of Literary Reportage and the Samuel Johnson Prize for Nonfiction.
It’s easy to see why Riverbend has been getting all this attention. There are very few civilian Iraqi bloggers, and of those, Riverbend is the only female. And Riverbend has a plain, direct style which is very suited to the kind of writing she is doing. In fact, her English writing style is so good that some have doubted whether she was “really” an Iraqi at all. She, of course, is a real Iraqi who spent several years abroad. “I am bilingual,” Riverbend writes. “There are thousands in Iraq like me — kids of diplomats, students, ex-patriots, etc.”
One of the great virtues of the blog is that it gives the English-speaking world an idea of the lives Iraqis led before the war. It is slightly jarring to read about an “elegant neighborhood” now torn up by gunfire. Baghdad is an ancient city, founded in the eighth century, and it has a large share of history and culture. “Iraqis lived in houses with running water and electricity,” Riverbend writes. “Thousands of them own computers. Millions own VCRs and VCDs. Iraq has sophisticated bridges, recreational centers, clubs, restaurants, shops, universities, schools, etc. Iraqis love fast cars (especially German cars) and the Tigris is full of little motor boats that are used for everything from fishing to water-skiing.”
In September of 2007, Riverbend became part of the stream of thousands of Iraqis fleeing for Syria and other countries. “A refugee is someone who isn’t really welcome in any country — including their own ... especially their own.” Riverbend is no longer blogging, but her writings are still available, and are a valuable first-hand account of one Iraqi’s experience of a war that most Americans only see in the most abstract terms.
Riverbend is preaching to the converted: Sam Jack ’11 (sjack@fas).