Boys of Baghdad high ( A.K.A fortune part one)

Anyone heard about that BBCiplayer thingy? It’s this online thing which lets you watch any programmes that you’ve missed. I was on the BBC website and saw the advert for this programme called Boys from Baghdad high, basically four boys from Baghdad (the capital of Iraq) were given a video camera to film their everyday lives. The concept seemed really interesting and I wondered why I hadn’t heard of it, then I realised it was probably aired at some ridiculously obscure hour in the morning. So I turned to BBCi player to watch it, it took about 12 mins to download and it was ready to go. This isn’t really a review of the programme it’s just my feelings on the programme which went from one extreme to the other!

The programme followed four 18 year old boys Ali (a Kurdish Sunni Muslim), Hayder (a Shia Muslim), Anmar (a Christian) and Mohammad (Half Sunni and half Shia (at the time I was a bit confused at this, it was later revealed that his dad was a Sunni and his mum a Shia)) The boys are all good friends and we follow them in their final year of high school in 2006, which coincides with when Saddam got captured and executed. What affected me the most about the programme was how the war had affected their everyday lives. Their revision is interrupted by gun fire, their new year celebrations come to an abrupt halt as a car drives past shooting random bullets, Anmar’s Christmas sermon is overlooked by a gaping hole blown in the wall of the church, Mohammad’s happiness at hearing the safety of one friend is interposed with the news that another of his friends have died. You smile with them as you watch them doing the everyday things that teenage boys do, yet you find yourself crying at the things they go through which no teenage boy should have to go through. One particularly touching scene was when we learnt that Ali was going to move to Kurdish Iraq as it’s much safer there, we see Mohammad and Ali messing about in the garden knowing that it was probably the last time they see each other. Another thing which struck me was one of the boy’s mum saying something along the lines of, “at least when Saddam was alive we had a leader, no matter how bad a leader he was, now there’s no one”.

One of the other reasons why I totally loved this programme was because it made me realise how damn lucky I am, I mean the only thing I have to deal with when revising is my brother coming in my room at random intervals asking for the laptop, when I leave the house I don’t have to worry about being killed, when I say goodbye to my friends I don’t have to contend with the fact that I may never see them again. It made me feel truly and utterly grateful for everything God’s given me. It made me recall to mind the saying “look to those less fortunate than yourself rather than those more fortunate”, It really does make you appreciate what you have rather than be envious of what you haven’t got.

(by the way i've put fortune part one in the title, the reason why will become clear in fortune part two...)