VIDEO ART: Islam – Peace be Upon You
I have had the pleasure of travelling across much of the Islamic world – these images are from Iraq (1989) & Yemen (2005).
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Category Archives: middle east
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Here I am in Yemen awaiting the verdict by trial under strict Islamic Shira Law. Am facing serious charges of fornication, sodomy and using banned substances. The outcome will be either: 1) Deportation 2) Flogged a dozen times 3) Stoned to death ??? (So pick the right answer and I’ll post you an Arabic-language Koran, FREE; cos I’ve bought a stack in my rush to repent).
Fortunately, the trial of MRP is not that dramatic.
Old city of Sanaá from my guesthouse roof-top
Acquitted … 6 injections in the butt solved what 3 courses of pills had failed to do – relieve my swollen and infected gums around my left wisdom tooth.
The very real possibility of a pulled tooth wasn’t something to excite me – what when they have to smash it from the jaw bone. I have to say that the pain was the worst I have ever experienced in my entire life: from my throat to my ears shrieking tearing that could only be dulled by a week on 24/7 super painkillers (forget aspirin or paracetamol; ineffective). But the best drug of them all was the celebratory beers I consumed that last night in Aden.
Young girl with her version of Barbie
Went to the ’sailors club’ in the old British port on the other side of the Aden volcano. It was discreet. Could buy beer and spirits inside … and there were women there !!! Without veil !!! Somalis mostly, some drinking in the smoky, worn surrounds looking out to the harbour and a supertanker gliding out in the sunset seen from where I sat at front table alone in this empty-ish place. Two Russian sailors, a few Arabs, a barmen, several women – a couple of young black babes and a few very worn out ones milling around, drawing closer to me after my 3rd can of beer.
Then entered a black-draped Yemeni – wow, look at her – eyes smiling and she sat down next to me as the English speaking Somali, Sonia – her in jeans, introduced me to Arwa. Sure she was Yemeni, from Sanaa and once married (probably to an old guy who died – because she was only 16). Anyway, I assumed they were all hostesses serving drinks and smiling at men’s jokes for a tip … but that was not the case.
Jibla: Queen Arwa’s tomb is housed in the (left) mosque
Back in the 11th century in the southern central mountain town of Jibla there was a great and benevolent queen called Arwa, who ruled wisely and justly, built schools, roads, bridges, mosques, made last peace and ushered in a period of great prosperity for her people and even today, she is still spoken of very highly; I know this cos I visited her city and tomb within the mosque some weeks back and now I had this young beauty of her namesake next to me and offering her body.What was I to do; the oblivious.
The Arabian Nights fantasy was not disappointing; mutually ecstatic, one of the highlights of my entire sex life … watching her flip off her black cloth to reveal her skimpy nightie and our embrace of tight-hugged dancing to Arabic music on the TV before we got bed-bound … but I will leave the rest of the encounter to your imagination as it will get too-beautifully pornographic.
It was a very weird situation: a secret taxi in the club grounds left for a secret hotel, checking into the hotel while busting for a piss and her secreted in the side door, her riding veiled in the taxi backseat as me in the front rode across our hot, humid night.
With this steamy incident in mind – theoretically, I could be tried under Sharia Law – as I had joked about earlier but it was not meant to be. Insha Allah.
Ancient mud-skyscapers of Shibam, Wadi Hadramawt
… I am now in the searing desert in Sayun, in the great Wadi Hadramawt – the longest canyon in Arabia where villages of mud-brick tower houses and mosque minarets cluster amid palms and fertile fields running along the vast desert floor, a few miles either side the endless, mighty, canyon cliffs of hard rock guarding against the hostile plateau above and all around.
I came here in a shared taxi – crammed with two women and their dozen kids from Al-Mulkala, the famous Hadramawt region port on the hellishly-humid Arabian Sea coast, five hours, up the mountain pass and then across the empty plateau of howling hot winds, here – where Freya Stark, the lone English woman travelled by donkey to Wadi Hadramawt back in 1935 & 1938 (check her books). My hotel window looks to the white, towered, fortified palace of Sayun, where she’d stayed as a guest of the Sultan.
Looking after dad’s AK-47, Jibla
Wadi Hadramawt has a long history: think the Queen of Sheba stories and the famous frankincense route from the coast of Oman and Yemen across the deserts of Arabia to Rome or over by sea to India and beyond and you’re half-way there.
Amid the branching wadis (dry river beds/ canyons) off mighty Hadramawt hide caves and art dating from the Stone Age and ruins from civilisations that they call the cradle of Arabia : 12th – 1st centuries BC cities that grew very rich from the frankincense that the – entire known – world craved so much.
Today I spoke – briefly – to a old Javanese-descended Arab here as I ate my fried tuna and rice at a local restaurant for back in the middle-AD centuries merchants from Hadramawt had sailed to India, Singapore, and even Java (Indonesia) exposing new regions to Islam and continuing their trade.
And talking of ancient trade: I am mighty glad that “the world’s oldest profession” exists – albeit, small-time & super discreet – here in the lands of Islam. It appears the saying – “people are people”, is indeed true the world over.
Love, flowers & Arabian fantasies – MRP
Having been in a major bus accident on route to Tehran the prospect of another disaster was now looming straight ahead.
He drove like a maniac rushing home to rescue the oven fries he’d left baking by mistake, cutting lanes in an effort to get back before his house caught fire. And if this was the case he’d no worries about pulling the french fries out golden and crisp and not a minute overcooked. But being in Iran I guess this wasn’t the reason why he drove the way he did. I assumed french fries, hamburgers and Coke were no-no’s in Islamic Iran; believing Americana made the locals sick.
Downtown central Tehran
Over the years the media had created a bleak picture of Iran (usually the negative news – and it was this what stuck in my head): a closed society ruled by religion and hostile to the West, obsessed with martyrdom and wrecked by war. A land of crazies.
I felt this might be the case as the taxi driver grinned at me in his rearview mirror and said “Where you want?” Where do I want to go? Shit, he’s already asked me this twice. I realised – too late I’d taken the wrong taxi: the driver didn’t have a clue where I wanted to go. And he drove recklessly – not that I minded; I enjoyed the speed.
We cut lanes blindly, honking our way into gaps and tooting at anyone who did this to us.
Every second car around us was a Hillman Hunter with dented door panels or scratched and patched paintwork. This taxi was also a Hillman “Chariot” (as the Iranian versions are called). But it had no fancy extras -in fact, many were missing bits. Vital bits like bumpers. But at least this rattling wreck had a rear-view mirror – apparently not necessary as my driver used it only to maintain eye contact with me, and something from which to hang Koranic script and beads.
“Where you want mister?” “The Foreign Ministry!” He grinned in the mirror and said nothing. “Visa, you know?” I waved my passport in the air, stamping it with my fist.
From the taxi’s window came my first impressions of Tehran. A dusty-brown-concrete-block city, with L.A. style freeways clogged by cars. The motor-flow looped Tehran like mechanical spaghetti, strangling it like frayed rope. The city choked on its smog. And having arrived in late summer I could barely see the Elburz Mountains; they were hazy and lost, like my driver.
He pulled over and asked directions from a pedestrian for a second time, then we charged back into the traffic.
Iranian drivers displayed skills only seen in the West at demolition derbies. I wondered: Is there a road code here? Vehicles ran the gauntlet at intersections. Traffic lights didn’t work, nor were policemen present. Survival meant accelerate and swerve. And honk!
And continue honking. At one stage my driver got abused by a cyclist – who’d averted a crunching by fending-off our taxi with a hand-barge to the roof. At another intersection three cars circled a fallen cyclist, drivers holding up the flow as they bickered over the blame.
Potential accidents occurred every minute, often three within as many seconds. Scenes so chaotic that it is unimaginable to New Zealanders accustomed to orderly roads.
Motorists in Tehran practiced a road code that I’d seen in other developing nations, like some unwritten but respected motor hierarchy. The King-of-the-Road was the truck and everything
else gave way. Buses threatened cars and big cars fought smaller cars, while scooters – the greatest menace to the pedestrian tended to drive on both sides irrespective of direction, and also weaved along footpaths.
Accident scene abandoned (in Isfahan)
Later as a pedestrian in Tehran I was shown how to cross busy streets. After waiting for a break in the traffic – which never came, an old man grabbed my hand and led me. We dashed amongst the traffic, stopping mid-way as cars whizzed past, then hoping approaching cars would slow, we sprinted across before the gap closed.
After half-an-hour we’d found the Foreign Ministry. The driver left in a hurry as I strolled to the entrance. But a soldier greeted my cheerful “Hello!” with an expressionless, “No. Closed.”
His answer confused me: it was 10 a.m, mid-week. So I asked him again. “VISA, I need a visa extension.” “Closed. Tomorrow.” After some minutes of asking passers-by I found an English speaker. He said it was a public holiday. And whats-more I was at the wrong building – this was NOT the Foreign Ministry … I was lost in north Tehran and at least 5 cm off my out-of-date map.
At a bus stop I couldn’t read the Farsi destinations on the front of each bus. And it was only thanks to an elderly man’s help that I made my way by bus from north to central Tehran. I’d decided to get to Tubkani Square: it had been a struggle to board the crowded, battered surburban bus. And when this bus had arrived people rushed it like sharks to bleeding sailors. The old man grabbed my arm and we ploughed into a scrum of males squeezing through the rear door -three at once. You see, the front door was for women and the bus was segregated into two: women in black chadors in the front half and in the back, crammed the men.
As the bus drove down the tree-lined boulevand towards the concrete smear of central Tehran, the old man hardly spoke, just smiled. He told me when it was my stop. I thanked him, said good bye and disembarked from the crush and onto the hot, dusty streets.
I remember the old man’s words as we’d waited for the bus. “I am happy to be able to help you, he’d said, insisting on paying for my ticket. “I do not see many foreigners in Tehran. Before the Revolution many came here but since then I have seen only three Europeans. I hope your coming to Tehran is a sign that more Westerners will return …”
I’d crossed the West Bank from Jordan to arrive in Jerusalem two days after the second anniversary of the first Intifada – uprising.
Palestinians had demonstrated in the streets and two young men had been killed by Israeli soldiers. This day I stubbled into the riot that followed the men’s funeral.
Soldiers
One, experienced
a mean-looking guy who’d seen fist-fights
riots and wars
He whistles, raising his baton
then barks the orders
Another man in green is nervous
terrified
see his eyes
watch his hand
–shake
finger squeezing an M16
barrel held @ 75 degrees
Warning shots
Pushing, running, shrieking
women, men
Soldiers
Stones
Now, an empty street
of discarded banners
shoes
scarves
and an abandoned coffin.
It happened fast – Israeli soldiers threatened me & my camera if I took photos. Disturbed by the experience, I returned to my guesthouse in Arab East Jerusalem; the owner listened to what I’d just seen – then told me a young-Israeli-female soldier had just been stabbed-dead in the old city.
Illusive peace – Jerusalem, Palestine/Israel, 1989 (c) MRP ART
Extract from story - Hitching to Baghdad:
A cloudless sky overlaps the receding morning grey. On the streets of Rutbah the potholes are puddles and asphalt glossy as I stroll in a dream state: absorbing the very first impressions of my first day in Iraq.
Before Rutbah: hitching the desert across Jordan and Iraq on a gasoline tanker, 1989
I, am, away with it. Still tired. And I don’t even notice the Nissan pick-up slow up beside me. But I soon accept a lift; he speaks no English but lets me out 400 metres later – in the slow centre of town.
I sip sweet black tea outside a basic café and dwell – so this is Iraq, it’s okay – yeah, quiet, people seem friendly, and super-curious for sure. Across from me rows of flat-roofed, sun-bleached, bland concrete buildings border the dusty asphalt mainstreet. Many have a half-completed look, with bricks and rusting steel exposed, awaiting an optimistic additional storey. A few people are out and about but it’s not busy. Shops display modern clothing, Adidas bags and other goods hanging from pinned-back steel doors, where wooden crates and heaped sacks clutter their entrances.
Basically a scene not worth writing about but to bring it alive suddenly – a man balancing a tray of tiny glasses on his fingertips says “You are welcome to Iraq. Most welcome!” “Thank you. It’s good to be here.” And I ask him how much I owe him. “No. This okay, no money.” “No money? Free?” “Yes free for you. You like more?” He replaces my empty glass with another fresh glass of tea then darts between tables, serving others while still shouting out questions at me: Which country you from? Your name is? You are tourist, yes? Where you go after here? How long you stay Iraq, friend?
During this tea talk a hell-of-a-noise emerges from down the mainstreet to be loads of schoolchildren marching and chanting. Three boys lead the crowd holding Saddam portraits. Followed by two lads with a large-scripted Arabic banner. Two girls in camouflage frocks carrying colorful bouquets. Two boys troop flags. The Iraqi national flag flutters limply in the light breeze as columns of school boys – flanked by unsmiling teachers – follow on mass. I see two lads giggle and jostle – to get scolded by a serious man.
I ask the guy standing beside me “What’s this for?” Another man replies “Holy-day” Well, it wasn’t Ramadan (the Muslim holy month), that I did know. I asked him again “A holiday for what?” “Our president, Saddam.” Really? Weird way to spend a holiday.
But I’m intrigued so I follow the parade – since I’m heading out of town to hitch, anyway. On traffic island a huge mural of Saddam’s head and shoulders – in military uniform and shades – dominates the passing kids. Several children call to me and I take their photo.
Pro-Saddam march by school kids in Rutbah, 1989
Soon the parade merges with adults gathered in a parched park shaded by Eucalyptus trees. There on a stage are wreaths of color, more presidential portraits, more Iraqi flags. In fact the entire stage is a parcel of Iraqi tri-colours – of red, white with green stars and black ribbons wrapping everything and everybody, adding an authorative splash of official color to the drab-suited dignitaries seated by the speaker’s podium.
Raspy, amplified Arabic shrieks over the crowd to reach across the street to where I stand watching; not wanting to be intrusive I purposely keep a distance because already I’ve been the reason for too many bewildered stares.
I’m crouched down rewinding my film, about to put a new one in the camera when I gaze up to see many faces staring and pointing over at me? At me !!!
A wildfire ignites before my eyes as Arabs whisper to one another as the murmuring spreads to crackling as more faces turn to stare at me.
The speaker is losing his audience – his words no longer of interest as 100s of Arabs now stare at me. Fuck. Shit. Feeling uncomfortable I leave but before a half-metre a guy in suit-and-tie is beside me, identifying himself as “Security.”
I forget about the million stares on me as he glares down and barks “You have no right to be here! No photos allowed! Why are you here?” “I’m a tourist.” “You have visa?” “Yeah.” “You have permission for camera?” “Whose permission?” “You must have a letter from from the Foreign Ministry in Baghdad” “But I haven’t reached Baghdad yet!”
He thrust his hand forward – “Give your film to me!” “No! I’m not losing my photos of Jordan.” And shoving my camera into my bag I walk away raving madly. “I’m a tourist! I’m a tourist! Tourists carry cameras!” To my surprise he leaves me alone.
The incident makes me uneasy. Time to leave town – quick.
I decide against hitching further and instead backtrack to the bus station where I join three Iraqis in a shared taxi to Ramadi …
In the backstreets of Baghdad, 1989
Travel article 1997 / travels 1989
An elderly Arab calls out as I wander past a cafe, where men smoke sheshas as others sip shay -tea. I don’t know this man, nor he me, but all the same I’m invited to join his street-front table, to drink tea.
His hospitality is typical of my time in Syria.
Forget the television news: the negative represents only 10% of the reality. For sure, the Syrian Government has sponsored terrorism and waged war against Israel, but things are changing and as a tourist you have nothing to fear. And while the Syrian military have dominated government since independence from the French in 1946, the current President, Hafez al-Assad, who seized control in 1970, has in recent years brought stability to this country of 17 million. Syria’s population is 86% Muslim, with a literacy rate around 70%.
Syria is a small country about half the size of New Zealand, bordered by Turkey in the north, Jordan and Iraq in the south and east, with Israel and Lebanon on the south and west. Within Syria lie four geographical regions: a narrow Mediterranean coast, mountains and farmland in the west, but most of the country is flat, stony desert. Forming part of Arabia’s fertile crescent, Syria across the centuries has seen the invading presence of many great civilisations.
Sunset over the desert ruins of Palmyra
The main reason for a visit to Syria is it’s wealth of historical sites. You can spend weeks seeking Hittite sites or Crusader castles along the coast, or exploring the ruins of Mesopotamian, Byzantine or Roman towns in the desert; discover the Ottoman and Arab Muslim heritage amid the mosaic of history in Damascus, whether it be one of the gems of Islamic architecture, the 8th century Omayyad Mosque, or the Mausoleum of Saladin, the Muslim conquer who defeated the Crusaders and retook Jerusalem. In the fertile Orontes Valley you find the giant, medieval waterwheels of Hama and in Syria’s second city, Allepo, you wander back in time amid one of the great markets of the Middle East.
There is so much to see and experience in Syria; it is said there are 20,000 archaeological sites in the country.
Syria’s main attraction – and one of the world’s greatest historic sights – is Palmyra: once an important city on the old Silk Road between China and the West. The ruins of Palmyra are 1800-years-old, and cover some 50 hectares: a great colonnade forms the main artery of the city, passing thru ornate monumental arches, an amphitheatre and small temples to the massive Temple of Bel.
Beside the walls of Bel I watch the sunset on distant desert ridges, last rays showering an orange glint across the avenue of carved stone columns – Roman pillars stretching forever, so it seems; on the other side of the ruins stands a sprawling oasis of date palms, hence the Roman name: City of Palms. The ruins are now deserted, except for an extended Arab family, scarfed wives trailing their husbands and kids, a vendor attempting to sell them a branch of fresh dates.
Ampitheatre of Palmyra, looking to the columns of the main avenue
Palmyra is mentioned in tablets as far back as the 19th century BC, but the ruins originate from the 2nd century AD,when Palmyra’s importance grew as a buffer state between the Roman and Persian empires. From the status as a Roman colony Palmyra gradually evolved into a kingdom, when the ruler, Odenathus, a brilliant military commander, earned the respect and trust of Rome. Palmyra prospered, until Odenathus was assassinated in 267 AD. His second wife, Zenobia, claimed the throne. This action offended Rome (who thought Zenobia was involved in her husband’s death).
Claiming to be descended from Cleopatra, Zenobia was a woman of great beauty, ability and ambition, and it was she who declared Palmyra an independent empire, her army seizing Egypt from Rome’s control. But the desert warrior queen was stopped by the mighty Roman Empire, the city besieged and Zenobia taken alive. Two versions exist of her end: one, that she lived her final days in villa in Rome; another that she fast to death rather than remain captive. Today at Palmyra illegal dealers peddle ancient coins embossed with the face of Zenobia. The legendary Zenobia remains a folk hero.
Preceding her fall, Zenobia founded the town of Halabiyyeh, north of Palmyra and alongside the Euphrates River. The long stone walls that remain today were fortifications constructed by the Roman Emperor Justinian; the Persians later seized the garrison town in 610 A.D.
Intent on visiting these ruins, I set out from the desert city of Deir-ez-Zur in a local bus, to later be dropped off in the middle of nowhere: at a lonely side road winding towards some distant ridges, in an expanse of flat gravel and sand.
After an hour of desert heat and stark silence comes the chug and rattle of a farm tractor and trailer. The driver stops, and offers me a lift. The mighty Euphrates River soon appears: swift, wide blue snaking between barren, honey-coloured ridges, the nearby banks bordered by green fields and the odd mud-brick house.
Locals encountered on the Euphrates riverbank, on route to the ruins of Halabiyyeh
Stopped at his home, Ahmed invites me to drink tea. From two flat-roofed adobe houses – plastered-mud walls the colour of the surrounding desert, cracks and gaps exposing stacked stone, out run kids shouting, excited to see Dad and this stranger.
An elderly man greets me “Ahlan / Welcome”, as he unrolls carpets across the hard-earthen floor. Apart from patterned carpets and cushions, the room is bare, just white-washed walls and two glassless windows beneath a rafter ceiling. The old man keeps smiling; the children talking excitedly – until Dad tells them to sit and hush.
There are two boys and two young girls, the latter wearing tatty floral dresses, their hair brown and tangled (They are too young for chador: black cloth and veils worn when a female reaches puberty). Ahmed’s wife and eldest daughter both wear chador – without veils – when they enter the room, one carrying a tray of thumb-sized glasses, the other a teapot. We sip sugary black tea. The kids giggle, whispering to one another. Ahmed says, “They not seen foreigner before.” (He speaks a mix of basic English and French; many locals speak French: a legacy of the French Mandate over Syria, following the dismantling of the Ottoman Turk Empire after the First World War).
This Bedouin family finds my appearance and clothing strange; boots, Ahmed says, are only for the military. And earrings, well, only women wear these in Syria. But what throws them most is the realisation that it takes at least a day-and-night by Jumbo jet to reach Syria. My hand-drawn map of the world is poor, however they are aware of Australia, and so I settle on being an Aussie. The kids, when Ahmed has explained to them, begin chanting: “Australyee! Australyee!”
Ahmed’s wife and daughter reappear with laden trays, and everyone washes their hands in a bowl of warm water. We then tuck into a communal meal with our right hands (for Muslim custom dictates that the left hand is for the toilet).
Young and old, male and female, Muslim and Christian, together we eat meat stew and leaven-bread. I share my bag of boiled sweets, which are happily munched by all. Following dinner and sweets and more cups of tea, Ahmed asks me to stay the night. This offer is a blessing, because it’s getting late and I’ve still not reached the ruins and am without sleeping bag and warm clothes, intending this only as a day-trip. They provide me a mattress and blankets.
And in the morning a meal of scrambled egg, goat’s cheese and flat bread with sweet tea. I get to the ruins by mid-morning and explore the empty, walled city and climb the crumbling citadel for a great view of desert and deep-blue river.
Walls of Halabiyehh ruins
Leaving Halabiyyeh I get lucky, and hitch a ride back to the desert highway where I wave down a bus but its crammed; a seated man insists I take his seat. Yet again, kindness shown to the stranger, such was my experience of Syria.
It’s dark, 10pm and the hotelier panics at my arrival … so there I am: in a shabby police station to register my presence in Idgir, eastern Turkey near the Iranian border, these two brutish cops – grim like snagged fish – staring at me, as one of them looks over my passport.
MRP @ age 23, Nemrut Dagi, TURKEY, 1989
Glancing up at his colleague, he shows the other cop my photo. They talk. Then come questions. Nationality? Name? Age? Purpose of visit? Occupation? As one writes my responses into their register suddenly the other officer interrupts: “You are hippie or heavy metal?”
What?! I have long hair, leather jacket, flower-embroidered shirt, cut-off jeans, Doc Marten boots, but judging by the way he glares, he disapproves, that they both disapprove of the way I look. I answer hastily, joking but polite: “Neither, I’m a psychedelic groover.”
The term throws them. (Even surprise myself with such a ridiculous response; where did that come from?) But as it happens the answer renews their interest. “What is this?” He pauses. “Psssychee-dell-it?” I invent a definition – avoiding drug and freak connotations.
Satisfied, he returns my passport and replies “Okay, it’s good you not hippie!”
> photos of Turkey
