Holmes in the Bus in Baghdad
I was reading Sherlock Holmes (A Scandal in Bohemia) in the bus when a desire took a hold of me, the desire of becoming as perfect as he was in observation of details around him, so as I put down the book for a while and started observing the details that surrounded me. Thanks God the speakers were off. They look much better off in the sun. A heel of a shoe has found its role in this bus. At the end of the short story Holmes didn't shake the hands of king of Bohemia although the king had presented his hand. All that Holmes asked for was to guard the photo in his personal belongings, as if he was thinking tha...
Source: psychiatry for all - January 19, 2015 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
My strange dream about Isis
Lately I read some articles in Arabic journals about terrorism. About what is happening in Syria, Iraq and lately, in France. Yesterday I dreamed as if seeing visually an article. If we were living in the ancient times I would be regarded as a prophet seeing a message from God. It was symbolic although I didn't get all the symbols. Here is the dream:"It is in an airport, a child in a wheelchair pushed by her mother, approaches in their walking by hazard a slim talk black man who looks like Sotigui Kouyate.He is so slim and wearing suspenders. The girl doesn't like the suspenders and thought that they look silly so she star...
Source: psychiatry for all - January 16, 2015 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
The Goal of Life
One of my colleagues told me once: "Sami, excuse my remark, but you don't know what you want." I didn't like to discuss that with him, but the bottom line is I think that nobody knows what s/he wants form life. I took the bus today who was there waiting for me? now you already know, I hope. A Virginia Woolf of a kind. And we started chatting. VW: So where are you going today?S: To the University to see whether I can change my place of working.VW: Soooo, that meeaanzzz, you know where you are going to?S: welllll, ... - I looked in her eyes and saw that mixture of cleverness and ridicule so I took a deep breath and...
Source: psychiatry for all - January 4, 2015 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
Lost with Woolf
I took the bus going back home and she was sitting there waiting for me. Who else but Virginia Woolf?She started telling me about that Society she and her friends had held. They were 6 or 7 of young women who thought that the objects of life are to produce good people and good books. Good people are produced by women, and good books are produced by men. Since it is up to women to start this circle of production, those young women thought that they must answer the question of whether men are producing good books or not, before going ahead and produce more men.They went to libraries, galleries, universities, army, and courts...
Source: psychiatry for all - January 4, 2015 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
My Utopia and the Time Machine
I am in the French language class again. We read samples of Utopias. Our teacher asks us to write how our own Utopia would look like. I spend a week confused not knowing how my Utopia would look like. In the last moments before the class is held again and we are ought to present our Utopias I write fast my Utopia. It is a village. Agricultural. People travel by the speed of light. And they had a time machine. They can go back in time.Ideas not so well linked. Explanations not perfectly given. The time for our class ends. I go walking and thinking why exactly I thought of Time Machine! Is that really Utopic to me?The ...
Source: psychiatry for all - December 9, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
Reading Iraqi Newspaper
The first pages of all Iraqi newspapers have to be ugly enough to be taken seriously, or to raise itself to the proclaimed level of ugliness needed those days. As an Iraqi I cannot help but to avoid reading them. Although I will put for you some pictures from yesterday’s first pages of Al-Mada Newspaper, without translation. As you approach the end of the journal the pages get more interesting, a little. Here an Iraqi poet writes about what is happening in the USA lately in that young black man being killed and all what followed. Still I don’t find what Yacine Taha Hafudh had written as interesting to me. &nb...
Source: psychiatry for all - December 8, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
Stars We Look At
Since my friend's coming back from the USA and we meet almost each evening and chat. Each time he got something new to show me. Yesterday he brought with him some magazines. Two of the magazines talks about Robin Williams. I like Robin Williams movies. I remember seeing AWAKENING before I knew Oliver Sacks and Dopamine. That was something unforgettable. My friend also brought a book and a DVD about the life of Marilyn Monroe. We talked about Elton John's CANDLE in the Wind, and Lady D, and we were smiling with joy but... But when we saw this next picture of Robin Williams we thought that he was pictured in a cryi...
Source: psychiatry for all - September 19, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
Reading Reader's Digest in Baghdad
A friend of mine came back to Baghdad from Abroad bringing with him some newspapers and magazines. September's issue of Reader's Digest was in my hand while my mesmerized eyes were glistering and saying: "you are holding the latest issue!"After 2003 we started seeing the used books and magazines of the US Army personnel in Baghdad including some Reader's Digest issues, usually from more than a year past, but holding the September issue in Baghdad is such a privilege. I was in a 2-store bus like that one in the picture above. Next to the window Hedy Lamarr is said to have invented the Wi-Fi. I thought that that w...
Source: psychiatry for all - September 16, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
Waiting for the Miracle
Ah I don't believe you'd like it, You wouldn't like it here. There ain't no entertainment and the judgements are severe. The Maestro says it's Mozart but it sounds like bubble gum when you're waiting for the miracle, for the miracle to come. Today's morning was sunny more than usual. I went to work a little bit late. Took the newspaper and went to the bus. In the bus it was so hot. The air-conditioner of the bus was weak. A man from the back seats started a conversation with the bus driver. A conversation that soon turned into a verbal fight. After few minutes of silence a woma...
Source: psychiatry for all - September 4, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
Football
As usual he avoids all videos of violence in his country (his country?) published in youtube.com. He starts listening to songs. In T.V. he starts watching an Arabic Lebanese series named لو (=If), which is about romantic relationships. He chooses to write a new article on an Arabic website about some old paintings about hypnosis. He opens the newspaper less often and prefers to see anything but the first three pages. The other day he liked this picture in the first page of his newspaper. But as he flips the first three pages to that page of culture he found this caricature.As he sees that caricature he remembers tha...
Source: psychiatry for all - July 3, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
Putain
I was training my French language by reading La Putain Respectueuse, and Morts sans Sepulture, in French since I have also the Arabic translation by Suhail Idriss. Both are pieces of theatre written by Sartre. La Putain Respectueuse talks about a prostitute which came down to one of the southern states from New York. She was asked to give false testimony against a black man. She was bribed to do so. The man who was trying to bribe her chose first to sleep with her that night, then the next morning he offered to bribe her so that she give a false testimony. The black man visits her and asks her to give the right testimony. ...
Source: psychiatry for all - June 18, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
Maitham Rathie Caricatures in Al-Mada
Since some time I noticed a new cartoonist publishing clever caricatures in Al Made paper. His name is Matham Rathie. I chose for you these four cartoons that I like the most, if we can use the word "like" in this context !! (Source: psychiatry for all)
Source: psychiatry for all - June 18, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
Turtles Can Fly in Kerbala
Days were separating us from the elections. Politicians were doing their propaganda. Streets were filled with pictures of them. The Minster of Higher Education, who was also a nominee in the coming elections, was on his way to our university in Kerbala. He was to raise one of the biggest Iraqi flags, in a monument that was built lately in the university. We were working that day and the orders come to us to leave or job and go to welcome him. My colleague told me that we are supposed to dress formally. I felt nauseated. I told him that I will not go. I went to the market to kill the time till Hana’a Edward would reach Ke...
Source: psychiatry for all - May 24, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
Labor Day
Like the tree that grows so tallLeaves turn gold and then they fall That same kind of music. That same kind of pictures. American movie direction. American music. American county side. Huge trees. Mountain streams may run and flowClean the sands on which they go Yesterday was the first of May. Before yesterday was the day of Iraqi parliamentary elections. I went and chose the “Civil and Democratic Coalition”. That coalition contains some secular and liberal forces, some individuals, and the Iraqi communist party. Yesterday I started watching a DVD of a movie named “Labour Day”.The summary of the back...
Source: psychiatry for all - May 2, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
Stellet Licht
When the film started I remembered Terrence Malick’s “Tree of Life”. Those scenes from a silent rural area. You can hear the sounds of wild animals crying the song of liberty. Man, on the other side, is bound by traditions he invented to imprison himself. Johan is the father of the family in the film “Stellet Licht” and he is leading the praying. His wife Esther is following the prayer so religiously. Their children are obeying the rules. The younger the children are, the freer they are. The youngest was yawning. Yawning was the most realistic reaction to that Mennonite tradition. Sooner in the film we got the no...
Source: psychiatry for all - April 28, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Source Type: blogs
