March 12, 2007
Shakira + Samir = true?
Geert Van Kesteren
While working on a new book about Iraq, I came across this image, taken by a family, only a few months ago in Baghdad. This is, let's call him 'Samir', in his bedroom. His niece told me that Samir loves to listen to Western music. Shakira is his number one favourite.
Posters of Jennifer Lopez, Angelina Jolie, Britney Spears and Shakira are tacked to Samir's bedroom wall in Baghdad, Iraq in this family photograph.
Samir never leaves his parents’ house; he always stays in, most of the time in his room. No one leaves their house in Iraq, unless it is really necessary. Abduction, roadside- or suicide bombs, car accidents, robbery, torture and murder are daily occurrences. The kidnapping business is booming. A year ago, a ransom of between $8,000 and $180,000 was good enough to get your son or father back alive. Today, people pay that amount of money just to collect the body. Areas, villages and regions are ethnically cleansed, a term politicians do not like to use. Showing sympathy for Shakira will not be appreciated by any radical sectarian militia, the mujahedeen or al-Qaeda. Anyone who shows sympathy for America is a target of their rage.
But Samir loves to listen to and watch Shakira. At his age you dream about girls like Shakira. In that dream you talk to her, you gently kiss her while you dance all night. In the second week of last February, Samir awoke from his dream and stepped into the cruel nightmare of war's reality. When American soldiers raided his father's house in search for weapons at noon, a soldier kicked the door of Samir's room open with his boot. On the now broken door, Samir had pinned a larger poster of Shakira and when the American soldier saw this he began shouting in ecstasy, "Guys! It's Shakira! It's Shakira! I want this picture!" Samir is a clever guy and gave his poster away immediately. Then he invited them to play on his X-box, which they did. Three heavily armed soldiers in camouflage and bullet proof vests played his new game "Larry" for about 15 minutes. Then they got an angry call on their Motorola Walkie Talkies. "Where the hell are you guys?" the voice of their commander crackled over the radio. The soldiers took their Shakira trophy, thanked Samir and left.
They say the world becomes smaller and in a way that is true and not true. Most people have no idea what horror on a daily base is going on in Iraq, but on the other hand, yes, the world is small. The Shakira poster was made by Dutch pop photographer Paul Bergen who has been my closest friend for more than 15 years! I had seen the poster before in a shoe shop in Dhaka, Bangladesh and now it saved a young Iraqi boy from a lot of trouble. Being arrested by the Americans is no fun. They put you in an orange overall in a dusty cold jail among others. There you wait about two weeks before being questioned. If you have bad luck they suspect you of doing something wrong and you can easily be kept in jail for several months or even up to two years.
My friend, the pop photographer Paul, was excited. "Dear Geert," he wrote me, "I am honoured to hear that music, my photograph and a good looking girl can bring people so close together in our world. Music and love is what we all share."
I just wish that was true.
Published on the Magnum Blog on March 12, 2007
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