Welcome to Middle East Diary

There was the young widow in Baghdad who couldn’t look at the moon because its beauty reminded her of her slain husband. The boy in a Mogadishu hospital who pulled aside a sheet to reveal his tiny torso perforated with bullet holes.

Or maybe the wild Saudi girls who dance on tables till dawn in the underground parties known as “comps” because they take place in heavily guarded oil compounds. The list goes on: the Iranian fashion model who changed her name to Honey, the anti-American Jordanian who works at Uncle Sam Restaurant, the Egyptian mystic who coaxed the world’s sweetest peaches from his patch of salty, sandy land in the Sinai.

This is just a sampling of the colorful, memorable, unexpected characters I’ve bumped into since I began reporting from the Middle East in 2003. These encounters usually didn’t fit into whatever story I was covering at the time, so all those larger-than-life personalities became entries in my journal, footnotes in my memory.

I hope that changes now.

This blog will be dedicated to all those characters who don’t fit into conventional news stories, but whose insights and observations help to make this infuriating, endearing region come alive. I’m not quite sure yet of the tone and format of this experiment – maybe part travelogue, part observations, with lots of links and feedback opportunities.

Iraq, Iran, Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Morocco and Saudi Arabia are just a few of the fabled lands on my “beat.” So, welcome, armchair explorers, thrill seekers, news junkies and Arabists. Send along your insights, travel tips and favorite links on the Middle East. We have a lot of ground to cover in a region that’s dynamic and unpredictable, sometimes dangerous, often heartwarming and always an adventure.

Comments

[shawn mccready]

Impressed with you and your writing, I just thought how much I would love to hear from you at this time in my life. An American whom is hired to go to Cairo soon for one year as an instructor. Vail or not to vail? Any other thoughts for me. I want to fit in as much as possible and avoid complication or conflict.
Thank you for your time.
Shawn