Another great post today from a blogger actually living through the occupation, while providing a perspective that you just don’t get by watching the news. This is where the value of the “blog” really shines, in my opinion, although I do share her concern that even with this open system of communication, there is still an overwhelming apathy that seems to keep the majority of us (Americans) from caring enough to do something about it.
Excerpt:
The wounded in Falloojeh aren’t getting treatment and today we heard about a family with six children being bombed in the city. It’s difficult to believe that in this day and age, when people are blogging, emailing and communicating at the speed of light, a whole city is being destroyed and genocide is being committed- and the whole world is aware and silent. Darfur, Americans? Take a look at what you’ve done in Falloojeh.The situation in Baghdad isn’t a lot better. Electricity has been particularly bad. Our telephone has been cut off for the last week which has made communication (and blogging) particularly difficult. The phone difficulties are quite common all over Baghdad. It usually happens in an area after a fresh bombing. We joke amongst ourselves that it’s all an agreement with the new mobile phone companies, but the truth is that the mobile phones aren’t very much more reliable. For the last couple of weeks we’ve been able to receive sms from abroad (which was impossible before). It’s nice to get a message every once in a while from some concerned relative or friend living far away, especially when the phone starts glowing eerily in the darkened living room.
We spent the last week fixing up the house. Around 10 days ago, there were a series of very large explosions in our area and the third or fourth one took out three of the windows on one side of the house. Riverbend and family spent two days gathering shattered glass and sticking sheets of plastic over the gaping squares that were once windows. We sent E. for the window guy but he was booked for three days. Our window man has become a virtual millionaire with an average of about 20 windows to replace daily.