School children mentioned in the article who threw rocks at four humvees as they drove by their school (photo: Cathy Breen)

By Cathy Breen
Amman, Jordan
Tursday, March 10, 2005

Dear Friends,

Last night I ran into two Iraqi men that I know. They had recently arrived from Baghdad. We were stunned to see each other after so many months. One of the men is a trusted and beloved young friend. I have been to his family home, know his widowed mother and several of his family members. He is like a son to me.

We sat and spoke for a long time. I want to relate some of our conversation. Sadly, I cannot use their names as it would put them at too great a risk.

How are people doing; how are they managing? I asked.

“It is getting worse day by day” was their response. The aunt of one of the men suffered broken legs and her husband was killed when a U.S. tank crushed their car. The other lost an innocent friend to U.S. bullets.

“After 7:00pm (at the latest 8:00pm) most of Baghdad is closed down and very dangerous…” My young friend related how he had lost track of time while in an internet cafe. When he left the cafe, he found the streets deserted. No taxis, no buses. “A horrible deep silence” he said. “If you would drop a needle, it would make a loud noise in your ears!” He was terrified and walked along the street close to the houses, thinking that if he were to be fired upon he would bang on the doors or try to leap over a wall.

“Syria is the problem. Syria is where those weapons of mass destruction are, in my view. You know, I can fly an F-15, put two nukes on ‘em and I’ll make one pass. We won’t have to worry about Syria anymore.” Rep. Sam Johnson (R-TX) Texas Republican Congressman: “Nuke Syria”

Two young men in green sports suits walking past us. With a shout of joy and a spontaneity so characteristic of Theresa, she asked them if we could take a picture. IRAQ was written in white letters across the backs of their sports suits. They smiled and agreed. (photo: Cathy Breen)

By Cathy Breen
Damascus, Syria
Sunday, March 6, 2005

As we sped along in a taxi service toward Syria, I tried to take in the beautiful desert landscape, periodically dotted with sheep and tents, while also giving my attention to Gabe who was between Theresa and myself in the backseat reading to us about the history of Damascus. No longer a “multi-task” person as I was in my younger years, I’m afraid I surrendered more often than not to the scenery. I kept thinking “I can’t believe we are on the road to Damascus!”

Cluster Bombs - Digital photograph, 2003 by Christopher Holden

By Cathy Breen
Amman, Jordan
Tuesday, March 1, 2005

Dear friends,

SUICIDE BOMBER KILLS 115 is the headline in today’s Jordan Times newspaper.

“Scores of dazed residents searched for loved ones amid the dying and wounded, enveloped in smoke from a suicide car bomb which killed 115 people in Hilla, south of Baghdad, on Monday. Iraqi security agents were forced to fire shots in the air to disperse the growing crowd sucked in to a scene of carnage where 148 were also wounded when the bomb ripped throgh those waiting by a medical centre for a physical check so they could be hired by the government.“

Last night as several of us (5 Iraqi friends, Anna and myself) gathered for dinner at Anna’s apartment. There was a moment of silence and intense grief when someone mentioned this particular suicide bomb. News of this nature, although it has become commonplace, is still met in this part of the world with horror and dismay.

Abu Zayneb was among the guests. We had heard about this dear man from Kerbala through Sheila Provencher of CPT. She thinks very highly of him and considers him like family, so much so that she addresses him as “uncle.” A mechanical engineer by profession, he works as a high school teacher in Kerbala where he was born and raised. In Amman for meetings, he appeared at our hotel the other afternoon quite unexpectedly looking for Kathy and myself. Sheila had sent him to us.

By Cathy Breen
Amman, Jordan
Feb. 18th, Friday

It was nighttime in Amman. The setting was a hotel coffee shop where Kathy Kelly, myself and two others were to meet with two doctors (psychiatrists) from Baghdad. They were coming for a workshop on how to deal with traumatized children. They were late in arriving due to shooting on the road from Baghdad to Amman. The project involves the training of primary school teachers, many of whom come from conflict areas outside of Baghdad, to help them alleviate the stress of war for the children.

The shooting incident on the road led to other stories about recent killings of their friends and other civilians by U.S. soldiers on the highways and at the checkpoints in and around Baghdad. Some of the survivors are now in their care as patients.

By Cathy Breen
Voices in the Wilderness
Baghdad
October 28, 2003

Death in the Background

This morning I can taste the dust in the water. But I prefer tap water over bottled water which I tried the other day and actually found distasteful. The dusty taste makes me think of a beautiful poem by Li-Young Lee which I want to share with you. Actually I want to hear it again myself. It is called From Blossoms.

From Blossoms comes
this brown paper bag of peaches
we bought from the boy
at the bend in the road where we turned toward
signs painted Peaches.

From laden boughs, from hands,
from sweet fellowship in the bins,
comes nectar at the roadside, succulent
peaches we devour, dusty skin and all,
comes the familiar dust of summer, dust we eat.

O, to take what we love inside,
to carry within us an orchard, to eat
not only the skin, but the shade,
not only the sugar, but the days, to hold
the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bit into
the round jubilance of peach.

There are days we live
as if death were nowhere
in the background; from joy
to joy to joy, from wing to wing,
from blossom to blossom to
impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.