Baghdad, Iraq
Kathy Kelly
Voices in The Wilderness

Meeting with our Iraqi friend, Sattar, who struggles now to adjust to the Occupation, we asked him if he has any hopes for the future. “If someone takes you to a far away land, to an unfamiliar city, and then to a street where there are no lights, –if you ask yourself how you would feel, then you will have an idea of my feelings now.”

He told us about a “good” encounter with a US soldier who showed kindness and decency during a ten-minute conversation while Sattar was stalled for two hours at a checkpoint. The soldier apologized for the long wait. Sattar posed a question he regularly asks of soldiers who talk with him: “What are you doing here?” The soldier said he wasn’t sure, but that they’d been told they had come to help Iraqis by getting rid of Saddam Hussein. “You’ve done that,” said Sattar. “Why are you still here?” The soldier couldn’t say, but he thought they still might have some important work to do in Iraq. He and Sattar shared a good moment of civil conversation, something to help balance some awful exchanges Sattar has had with soldiers who have behaved rudely.