Sayyeda Zainab

Hey everyone,

Sorry for the long silence again...I have been pretty busy trying to get my life together here.

Anyway, I should talk to you about more interesting things. So a week or so ago, I was contacted by a journalist who has a fellowship to do work on Iraqi refugees, and she wanted to get some pictures from Damascus, so she got in touch with me and I agreed to take some shots for her. I'll post some of them below here. I agreed to go to Sayyeda Zainab, which is the largest Iraqi refugee community around Damascus. There is another one which is very large--Jaramaneh, where the majority of Christian refugees are. There are more Muslims, especially Shi'a, in Sayyeda Zainab.






The neighborhood is named Sayyeda Zainab after a very important mosque there which holds the shrine of Zainab-bint Ali. For those of you who don't know much Islamic history, Zainab was an important religious/historical figure, especially for Shi'a. She was a granddaughter of the prophet Mohammed and was renknowned for her strength and intellect. She was with the martyred Imam Hussein when he was ambushed and killed in Karbala (in Iraq). From there, she was forcedly unveiled--a huge disgrace for an educated or elite woman, and was marched through the desert to Damascus, and later Kufa. Zainab gave defiant speeches to her captors as well as the people of the cities she was transported to, scolding them for their betrayal. You can look her up (most English entries use the spelling "Zaynab").






The golden domes and sparkling blue minarets now watch over the downtrodden of Damascus--I wonder if it is only coincidence that most Muslim Iraqi refugees are here. But in any case, it didn't suprise me to see that the mosque was very heavily frequented. I think these people can probably relate to Zainab and her suffering--From Karbala to Damascus.






I brought a friend with me from CASA, Cole, because my teachers seemed concerned about me going there alone when they heard my plans. But it actually felt very safe. I got in touch with people from the Red Cross and the UNHCR who told me that these anxieties are common for outsiders, including Syrians, but that the Iraqi refugee communities are safe and don't act aggressively toward visitors or journalists. I wouldn't have gone without knowing Arabic though, that's for sure. I do think that could have lead to misunderstandings.









Souq right outside the doors of the Mosque...





Anyway, so my friend and I started at the mosque for Sayyeda Zainab. I believe that Iran puts money into the mosque and that's reflected in the architectural style, which is fantastic. I had never been in a mosque so crowded with people actively praying--especially considering it was not Friday. It was amazing. The woman's side was absolutely packed-- women were standing, kneeling, or clutching the sides of Zainab's shrine. Some held their hands up to the sky whispering in fervent prayer,some were huddled in groups on the ground weeping.












After leaving the mosque, I was struck by the fact that there was a huge and rather nice hotel right in the middle of this relatively poor area. I decided this must be a pretty frequented pilgrimage spot for Iranians. And I think my suspicions were confirmed when Cole and I kept hearing people come right up to us to inspect us and yell at each other "Do you think they're Iranian?-No I think they are Arab!-You idiot, what are you saying, have you heard them speak a word in Arabic!? No they're Iranian for sure." It was too funny to interrupt them.

We were certainly an oddity, and the only non Syrians or Iraqis around. For the most part this was good, everyone wanted their picture taken. But it was a sobering moment when I started getting questioned by two little boys as they ogled their picture on my camera screen. "Where are you from?" The inevitable question. "We're American," said Cole, "....Sorry..." Their jaws dropped and they looked at us in complete amazement--and fear. We could have declared we were messengers from hell and I don't think they'd have looked more shocked.

The smaller boy immediately slipped his hand out of his friend grasp and took off toward his father behind him. To my suprise, his father took his hand and started coaxing him to come back to me, "Don't be afraid! Don't be afraid! She's not going to hurt you! See? She just wants to take pictures." The father made him face me, and apologized and tried to explain to me why his son was afraid--he seemed to have had a specific experience with American soldiers , but that was all I could get from the father's rapid and impassioned speech. It was my first encounter with Iraqi Arabic, so it was often a little hard to understand.

That was really the first time I felt I had a personal sense of what the American occupation must feel like for Iraqis. When a friendly smile from a 20 something American girl sets a 7 yeard old kid running, you know something is seriously wrong.

After that, Cole and I took off trying to find "Iraq Street" which the U.S. journalist told me was here. I asked my cab driver, who flatly refused the existence of such a place. It was my first inkling of the inevitable frustrations some Syrians must be feeling regarding the encroachment of this huge burden in their home. "This neighborhood is for Syrians, not Iraqis," he said. "I know," I said, "but there is a place people are calling Iraq street now." "Well maybe that's what they call it, but we Syrians certainly don't. I don't know any place here called Iraq Street." After my insistence that someone was calling some place around here Iraq street, he waved his arm toward a heavily crowded street behind him. "Maybe the place you want is that way." And that was the end of the conversation.

After that--a lesson in proper translation. Cole and I wandered around the mosque and started asking for Iraq Street. "Iraq street? Never heard of it..." Iraqi? "Yes, from Fallujeh." Another: "What? Iraq street? No no." Nationality? "Oh, Iraqi."

"No there is no Iraq street," said another. Hometown? "Baghdad." After this repeated farce, I finally got impatient and told one person, "I know there is a street here that people have started calling Iraq street. It's not the real name, but people call it that." "Ohhh!" He said, "You mean the street of the Iraqis??" Yes, ok! Where is that? "Oh, well you're on it."

I should have known. Most places were called "Fallujeh Restaurant," "Baghdad Bakery," etc. There are three main sights you see in this community--food markets, their store fronts lined with UNHCR boxed goods, "travel" agencies (I suspect there's a lot of human smuggling going on under the table), and, lastly, tons of patriotic Iraqi flag paraphernalia. Hats, shirts, belts, everything, with the colors of the flag and expressions of nostalgia or longing for Iraq. I bought a t-shirt that had the Iraqi flag on the front and read, "Iraqi Ana" (I am Iraqi).

The streets are lined with battered cars whose license plates hail from Basrah, Samarrah, Baghdad, Najaf...we had to jump out of the street every few minutes as another giant "tour bus" full of Iraqis came barreling down the cracking, muddy street. But aside from these few implicit gestures toward the desperation that permeates this place, the surface was in the throes of normal daily life. The streets are alive and bustling with women arguing with vendors over the price of sweets on the street. A man dressed in customary traditional costume sells cool tamarind juice to thirsty and rushed passersby. Boys play soccer in a deserted parking lot. People are getting haircuts, men stop to sip coffee and puff argileh on street corners. They sit and watch the world go by, waiting out the stifling afternoon heat.

And I feel that is what everyone has in common here. Sitting, haggling, smoking, playing, praying--they are all waiting.




(More pictures here below)

















The argileh spot on the corner...















Buying sweets...

















The man on the right really wanted to get a picture
with his friend, but the friend was a little reluctant.
















Playing soccer!






"The Street of the Iraqis":





















The argileh man was confused about
why I would want a picture of him.






















I found these travel agency places very intriguing...
Especially posters like this one, which advertise:
"Lebanon in four days." Beirut is only three hours away
from Damascus...

















































And of course no refugee area is complete without its resident sheep.