After what feels like an eternity of traveling, I'm finally in Baghdad (Canada (Toronto) -> UK (London) -> Jordan (Amman) -> Iraq (Baghdad)). When I arrived in Jordan, my main priority was to assess the safety of the land route, and to see whether it was feasible for me as a foreigner. As such, I went to some square full of drivers, and tried to get a feel for the situation.
First up were some boys from the "office". They were all dressed in suits, wore fakley shades, and completed each other's sentences. They told me that they would take me in these beautiful brand-new GMC suburbans with special markings driving in convoys of 5 at a time. $150. I told them that gosh, I don't like the idea of being in a GMC suburban convoy. $140. Yes, it costs too much, but the point is that I'm just not feeling the whole suburban convoy thing! $130, but we're making no profit here. No. $120. I said no. $100, but now I'm paying to take YOU to Iraq!
I sat around and watched passengers get onto the cars, and after about the 20th and a few more conversations, I decided that the route is likely sufficiently safe. In the end, I traveled in a beat up Suburban first sold in North Carolina with 4 other Iraqis and a Jordanian driver at the cost of $25. The 10-hour trip was mostly boring, and though I valiantly attempted to stave off sleep for the forty-somethingth consecutive hour, I finally succumbed.
The passport office was a joke, and nobody said anything. They stamped my passport in about 20 seconds, while my Iraqi co-passengers waited for about half an hour each. I promptly fell asleep again when we left, and woke up around Ramady as I heard some discussion about the situation there. While we spoke, I wondered what the big deal was about. Aside from the occasional scorch mark in the road signifying a previously exploded / burned car, there were no signs of anything.
No sooner had I lulled myself into this sense of complacency than I saw the road in front of us slow. A police car had been trying to stop a "gang in a van" (this is how the Iraqis riding with me described it), and was thoroughly unable. They commandeered a civilian 80s Impala, but were still unable to approach the van on account of the heavily armed sniper shooting at them. In a stroke of genius, the police decided to put some cars between them and the van to perhaps persuade the heavily armed sniper to stop shooting. It took no time for us to notice that we were the critical pawn in this game, and were between the police and the van.
The driver slowed our car to a stop, to which the police responded by slowing their cars to a stop. Not to be left out, the "gang" also slowed its van to a stop. The police started to get out of the car and grab their guns (think AK-47, not some handgun). They pointed them at us, and one man waved with his hands that we should keep driving forward, after which he waved another car to come behind us. The driver started to pick up speed again, while the rest of us started to pray. As we approached the van, the sniper pointed his mounted machine gun at us, waiting until we got a little closer before unloading, no doubt. The passengers were more than slightly unclear about the driver's plan, but we were mesmerized by the sniper. His gun was soooo big!
Suddenly, we experienced what felt like massive G forces as the driver spun our car 180 degrees, and accelerated at the police. We traded one heavily armed thug for a bunch of lightly armed thugs, and were now rushing them at close to 100 km / h. They raised their guns and pointed them at the car. 130 km / h. The woman behind me volunteered that maybe they wanted us to stop. Her voice was so serene that it sounded like we were to stop for a speeding ticket or a friendly chat about tail lights. Still, the driver drove on, and after we passed the police car, all of the police officers took up positions facing our car, a few of them dropping to their knees. "They're going to shoot.." I said in English, for my own benefit more than anyone else's.. "they're going to shoot.."
I put on my seatbelt, ducked my head into the seat and made a little prayer while the driver said "by God, I won't stop now. Let them shoot."
The shots never came, and so I raised my head a few seconds later, dusted myself off and took off my seatbelt. None of us spoke of what happened, and we got to Baghdad a couple of hours later.
tarek
Photos:
Wednesday, 16 June 2004: At this point, we were between the police and the van. It was time to turn off the camera and say my prayers.
Wednesday, 16 June 2004: First, we spotted a police car and two civilian cars crawling. We soon realized that they wanted us between them and the car further up, from which one can see a silhouette of a heavily armed gunman.
Wednesday, 16 June 2004: When we slowed behind the police vehicle, a man jumped out and started waving us through. Some of his buddies started to dismount and find their AKs
Wednesday, 16 June 2004: The car we were driving appears to have recently come from North Carolina. The dealer's logo was even on it. The only question, then, is why on earth would it be shipped all the way over from North Carolina to Iraq?
Wednesday, 16 June 2004: The car we were driving appears to have recently come from North Carolina. The dealer's logo was even on it. The only question, then, is why on earth would it be shipped all the way over from North Carolina to Iraq?