Iraq

I saw a cartoon once from a dogs perspective, in which a human was lecturing to the poor canine, the speech bubble reading,

"...blah blah blah SPOT blah blah blah BAD blah blah blah SPOT..."

Of course, that's exactly how I feel at Arabic Church, when I go upstairs and listen to the sermon. Usually the only word I can pick up is "Pastor Billingsly", the name of the American Pastor at the Church, who it seems to me is mentioned a hell of a lot simply for lack of context. But tonight there were more familiar words than normal, something to the tune of...

"...qakh, qakh qakh AMERICA qakh qakh qakh BUSH qakh qakh qakh IRAQ qakh qakh qakh AKBAR qakh qakh qakh... "

Well, that intrigued me enough that I asked for a bit of a summary from Mr. Mina. He said they were mostly in favour of the whole operation because it was bringing increased opportunity for Christianity to the region. Interesting. Very Interesting. I'll have to think about that for a while.

At the same time... perhaps it's easier to say that now that they're living here. Before you jump on me and say, "How can you accuse others of being hypocrites when you're ten times more of one, never having endured any sort of hardship yourself!?", let me add that Amelia, who did live in Iraq, narrated the following tale to me in English too broken to accurately reproduce... let's just say that it's a cultural experience in of itself. ;) --

"Water like this... the faucet would be like this, but no water. No water come. Before Iran and Iraq no like, before Bush, water. Then Bush come... maybe water. Sometimes. Maybe... one day in week. Don't know. If water... fill (trash can)... use week, clean, cook..."

Good or Bad? Would you rather have Freedom or Water?

Not as if I'm the first person to ask that question, by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm starting to see it...