Beste al-Attar......

Onze weblogger in Bagdad vroeg de lezers van zijn weblog om advies. Moet hij vluchten uit Irak, of in Bagdad blijven en daar samen met zijn vrouw een kind krijgen? 



Hieronder vindt u een aantal van uw reacties. We hebben de mails onvertaald gelaten.



Wilt u ook reageren? Mail ons dan.

Anotschka

I don't know what it is like to live in Bagdad in time of war. 

I do know what it is like not to have children.

It is a pain that never goes away and always be part of your life.

Will the situation in Iraq never alter and always be that bad or is there hope for the future?

If you choose not to have children, you condemn yourself to a live of grief. 

If you choose to have children, you comdemn yourself to a life of worries.

(Eventually I got a son. He is now 5 years old. I am worrying sick all day.

Even in very safe countries you can't be sure whether you child will get ill, hit by a bus or kidnapped by a lunatic) 

But I think those worries (although your worries are worse) are sweeter than the bitterness of childlessness.



Kind regards.

Esther van der Ham

Reading your blogs just make me realize the human suffering of the Iraqi people and you in particular.

I just want to wish you strength and courage to make your life worth living, enjoy the thing that you do have and make the decisions that are good for you and your family.

ma'a salaama

Alan

Don't do that, don't get a child please. I was born in the same circumstances as yours, in a civil war. I always have blamed my parents about that. My childhood was a nightmare, just like my youth. Your child will never get the war out of his (or her) mind. Do that when you are sure you can provide your child a normal childhood. Getting a child is a great responsibility; you don't do that just because of somebody's gossips. 

Daniël Boon

Dear Mr. al-Attar,



I've been reading your writings as of the start in March this year. I admire the courage of you and your wife. Personally, I think I would have left some months ago. Time after time I'm flabbergasted to read the often painful and crazy news from a war-torn country.



I was deeply touched by the last entry. I do understand that your wife wants a child. And I share your doubts about how right this should be.

From over here in the safe Netherlands it is all too easy to judge. I have two kids myself and share the daily frights every Western parent has: is it safe for the kids to play in that playground around the corner? Are they up to the challange of growing up in a big city? Is someone bullying them?



But I don't have to worry about suicide bombings, or militia-men running amok. Or curfews. Or lack of electricity and water. Or the kids being able to go to school.



If you both want a child, or even more children, then please get out of this nightmare you live in now. Having a child in Baghdad in the given circumstances means even more and real dangers then you'd have when raising a kid in a peaceful environment.



I do agree that the future is with our children, but like blossom in a bud needs safety to be able to flower later on a child needs stable and safe surroundings. I guess that's quite impossible in Baghdad right now...



So please: first leave Baghdad and find a safe place, get another job if you have to and only then start your family. And live in peace for the rest of your, your wife's and children's lifes.



Kind regards.

Esther

Dear Al-Attar,

 

Follow your heart: if your heart tells you to leave Iraq, leave. If your heart tells you to move to Kirkuk, go to Kirkuk. If your heart tells you to have a baby ... try to have one. With your loving wife next to you, you can handle everything even when it is difficult. Life is too short to be afraid and love is all that matters.

Anonymous

Dear mr. Al Attar, 



Life is short. Is there a way you can combine your needs? You are young and talented. Analyse your situation. Reduce the chance of losing freedom after war (where is safety today and in future!). 



(...) Is there any possibility of finding a job elsewhere? Think about, what have I done in the past and where am I today. You can't change that. More important is what are you heading for tomorrow. Be strong or your wife will notice. Women are worried if their man is struggling. Make your goals and go on. I should think about having children when my environment is safe. No offence, but it's the biggest responsiblity if you have a child. It is not you or your wife to be sattisfied, it is the child who has the right on a protected, stabilised and wealthy future. It is one of God's biggest challenge; what do you care for.  



Anyway, first have goals, then try to have a family. Keep talking to each other is very important (let her know what you are thinking of and ask what she's thinking about-every day!). There will allways be people talking about you and your wife. That's global man! Today it's about not having a baby. When you have a baby it might be about the way you treat and raise your baby.... What's important: you and your wife are one. Don't let anybody between you and your wife. With love you both will overcome. God bless you and all people in Iraq, make us wise and let all of us choose freedom! 



Greetings from the Netherlands 

Diana 

Dear Al Attar, 

Your articles move me, especially your last article. More than any TV-report about yet another suicide attack, it gives an insight in the daily hell you and your loved ones are living in. Give yourself and your wife hope, hope for a better life. Start a family and leave the hell of Bagdad.

Martijn

Dear mr. Al-Attar,

 

I read all your weblogs on the NOS site and I really see and feel the pain and dispair that you and your wife have to go through every day.

 

In your last weblog you asked us what to do. Should you stay? Leave? get a child or not? I can not decide for you and your wife, but I will give you some advice that hopefully will give you some guidance. 

 

I think you should try to get out of Bagdad and find a place outside the capital. A place where it is relatively safe for you and your wife. If you stay in Baghdad you or your wife might get killed. And I agree with you when you say that Baghdad is not the place where a child should grow up.

 

If you can find a place where it is relatively safe, then you can think about having a child. As I already said at the beginning of this letter, I can only give you advice, I can not decide, but whatever you decide to do. Keep one thing in mind:

 

"We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope" (Martin Luther King)

 

With regards to you and your wife. 

May you one day find the happiness that you seek.

HA

Dear Al-Attar,



I am 22 years old and live in the Netherlands for almost 14 years, I live here with my parent and my brother. My uncle, aunt and two cousins also live here, the main reason that my parents moved here were me and my brother. They wanted to give us a good future, one in a free country, and I will always thank them for what they did for me and I think you should do that for your unborn child. Don't get me wrong, I love my country Iran, but my heart beats for two countries, Iran and Holland. The best solution for you and your wife is to get out of Iraq, make a move to Europe.



You have to do it for yourself, your wife and ofcourse if you want to have children, cause I think they will have a good future outside Iraq. In the 14 years that I live here I have visited Iran twice and both times I came back with a sad feeling, because it is a beautiful country, enough people who seek freedom, enough wise men and women, but all broken and I think the situation with the people is the same in Iraq, of course it's not similair, but the feeling you can't say what you feel, you can't do what you want, you can't move without people who watch you all the time. I am happy I'm here, but sad to read your situation.



I hope you will get a better life soon, I hope the best for you and your wife in the rest in the rest of your life.

Kind regards

Mark Schonewille

Circumstances are never ideal. If you want a family, just let it happen and if necessary, you will change the circumstances. 

Joke Meijer

Maybe a child can give you the little spark of hope and joy that you so desperately need. You can teach it not to be like the politicians you hate. Teach it that it has Iraqi blood: a mix of all religions and ethnics that are Iraqi. It will give you another reason to fight for the country you love so much and create a better future. I wish you well and hope for a better future for Iraq.

JM 

With pain in my heart I read the words of your wife. It sounds terrible what she's going through. I am glad for you that you have a job, but life is not only about work. Do you fulltime write for NOS or do you have another job?

 

Is it possible to do your job from Kirkuk, or from another country? What about near countries where they also speak Arabic like Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia? 

 

I believe that if your wife would have a kid, she would be much happier. She wouldn't feel lonely and different from other couples. However I totally understand your position wondering wheter bringing a child into this world is such a good idea at the moment. Do consider that hopefully the situation you're in will get better and that your child won't live in war all his/her life. But you have to be sure you can offer her/him a better life than your own.

 

Myself I am a christian woman, born in Iran. At the age of 6, my family moved to the Netherlands where I grew up. They had lived the revolution and the war with Iraq and had decided to leave Iran. 



I returned to Iran last month and am so very thankful that my dad got us out of there. Even though the war was over and we didn't starve from hunger, I am still very happy to be in a free country (I live in France now where I moved to study and then found a job and boyfriend).

 

I am afraid that if you continue your life like this your wife will get depressed. What you can do is give it 1 year and decide next year what the best solution is. Maybe the situation of Iraq is better, or maybe it's even worse. Do consider moving, even though that is not easy, life is too short to waste it. If you have the courage and all the means to leave the country, I do believe that that would be my advise. You don't have children yet, your wife doesn't work, so it will be a choice that you have to take. Even if it is to move to a calmer place in Iraq or a nearby country. You could always go back. In Dutch there is a saying "Niet geschoten altijd mis" which means a bit like "No risk, no gain".

 

I hope the future will be brighter for you and I pray for you and your wife.

 

Best regards.

 

Boris de Jong

Hello Al-Attar,



So striking and from the heart is your entry today. Should you have a baby in this hell of Baghdad? We are nearly the same age. I am 29 years old, an editor of financial news. You, 28 years old, a... blog writer? A journalist? What is your job, Sir? What is there for you to do in Iraq? 



You ask us whether you should have a baby; whether you should let your wife have one. Looking at what you are and where you stand on Iraq, I would say yes, immediately. Have a baby. Have many! There are many reasons for me to describe, but they all amount to one thing: hope. 



Hope for your wife, who is there with nothing to live for, save your sound return every day. Let her take care of something, give her something to do. It will empower her, and also, you. Hope for your old age also. You won't be 28 forever. One day you might need a son or a daughter to take care of your wife the way she was taken care of. Maybe she'll take care of you while she's at it, haha. 



Hope for Iraq, where thousands of babies are born and raised to be closed-minded, sectarian and short-sighted people. Your country needs visionaries and peace makers. You are a writer; your eyes cross bridges, as does your writing. Raise your kid to cross bridges, to counter those who would keep the Sunni in fear of the Shia, and the Kurd in fear of the Christian. 



Your child, your children, they may die too soon. They may grow up and see terrible things. Then again, they may also grow up strong and healthy, and learn others to build instead of destroy. Your child may die. But having lived and dying young is better than never to have lived at all, I think. 



Good luck in your decision, and good luck and good health to you,



Many warm regards.

Danielle

Dear Al Attar,

Life questions are universal. Here in the Netherlands I really ask myself the same kind of questions. Do I have to stop with my work for a second child or do I need my work so much that there is not space for a second child. Am I selfish to choose for work, Or do I need the extra money really for surviving. Is it realistic to give bird to a child in this world? People shoot people for what? I cannot walk in the dark because of the street gangsters. Any time is it possible that a religion man murder himself at any place. I cannot travel with the train to Amsterdam without thinking is it safe to take the train? 



All people in the world are insecure about the decision of having a baby. But nothing is more beautiful than the moment that you see your baby for the first time and really that is the moment that the world stood still. Trying to make yourself and your wife happy is worth all the risks. Don't let that happiness take away from you. And your  baby needs only your love and than will he or she survive for the time its mend to be on this beautiful planet. 

Pien

Dear Al-Attar,

Your weblog today about your wife touched me deeply………it really must be hell to live in a place like Bagdad at the moment with nothing to do. It's something that we, the people in the West, won't or don't see………..the effect that the war (as I call it) has on the lives of the ordinary citizens of Bagdad and Irak.



But why not make the life of your wife a little easier by starting to teach her how to start the generator?? In my humble opinion it's ridiculous that she doesn't know something that will make the staying at home more comfortable. 



A baby at this time is absolutely not the resolving of the problem of feeling lonely………that's having a kid for all the wrong reasons!!!!! A baby is not a solution but a up growing human being!!! Why doesn't she start some kind of study or course or something like that? That will keep her busy, will lecture her mind, offers distraction etc etc.



I wish you both all the best, kind regards.

Hans

Beste El Attar, 

Doe je vrouw en jezelf een dubbel genoegen: schenk haar een kind en ga weg met haar uit Bagdad. 

Het ga jullie goed! 

René

Dear Al-Attar,



Live your life as good as posible. So move to Kirkuk, find a job and please give your wife a child!



Best wishes.

Rena

Dear Al-Attar, I read about your wife and her feelings about living in Baghdad. It made me very sad too. We have a safe live here in the Netherlands and two beautiful sons. Please try to find work elsewhere! And start a family live with your wife. Make her feel safe. And full-fill her wish to become a mother.

Family is all that matters.



Kind regards.

Karin

Dear Mr. Al-Attar,



Thank you for all your weblogs, they make one better understand what it is like to live in Bagdad now. I really appreciate them.



Your latest weblog about your wife was so sad, I can so understand her feelings. It must be extremely hard to sit there in her house all day and have nothing to do but cleaning the house, praying you come back safely, worrying all the time, and battling with the electricity, the heat and so on. I think taking care of a baby would make her feel important and useful and on the other hand I understand that you don't want to put a life into such a world, but one day it will stop being like that. It must stop being like that.



I so much wish there will be a different world for you one day soon, that people get educated so they learn that religion should not be the reason to kill. That things get back to normal, that there will be no fear and that both your wife and you feel that it is good to start a family. 

Sinan

Hi, I'm a boy from Belgium and I am 16 years old.

I know that I'm still young, but if I was you I would try to get out of that hell.

Maybe you can find another job in anonther country?

Maybe then you can have a little child and your wife will be more happy?

I don't really don't now but I should try so much as I can to get out of that horrible place and start a new, better live, or just try to do that?

  

Greets, peace!

Steven Barg

Al-Attar, you write very well. I find the pieces you write very interesting, and I'm sure other people do too. Could you export the columns you write to other countries in Europe, and try to earn a living from it? Perhaps the people from the NOS have some suggestions for that. That way you don't need your job in Bagdad so much and you and your wife can move to Kirkuk, where life seems to be a little better than in Bagdad.



It's difficult to place myself in your position, and give advice about having a baby or not. Life here is so much safer and easier. But my feeling

says: people are always having children, even under the hardest of circumstances, so why not you? It's the purpose of our existence, isn't it, really? I'm sure there will be extra difficulties for you when the baby comes, but you've handled all other difficulties very well so far, so why not then? And it will give you and especially your wife much pleasure too. 



I wish you and your wife the very best.

Kind Regards.

Albert

Dear Al-Attar and wife, 



I have read your log on the internet (NOS-news Holland) and do understand your dilemma. From our part of the world we see only misery in Iraq, almost every day on the news or in the papers. It is for us so difficult to realise how it would be to live in such an unsafe situation, I think you must love your country dearly to stay in this hell. I asked my very old parents-in-law and they remember they did not decide to get babies during the second world war in Holland for the very reason you are hesitating! 



Isn't it possible to move back to Kirkuk for you and your wife? This would make your wife much happier and there a baby could grow up in a much safer surrounding. Baghdad is no place to raise a child at this moment, I know the comparison between our life's is difficult to make, but I will try to explain from my point of view why I think you should leave Baghdad when you wish to have a baby. 



Many years ago we adopted a baby girl (she is 19 years old now) who came from a country in trouble. We wished her a better future (as also her biological parents did) but she carried her past in her and now at age 19 she has many psychological problems simply because she was born under extreme stress in a country were people were not free. 



Being pregnant in Baghdad would mean stress all the time for the mother to be and also after she/he is born for the baby. This is not a good start in life for a child, believe me! Move to a safer place in Iraq I would say, better for you both and the future baby! 



Good luck to you!