Somar Kreker is a movie junkie. He loves cinema for the space it allows people to reimagine the worlds in which they live. As a teenager, he dreamt of opening a film club in Damascus, where stories of ordinary and extraordinary lives could be brought to the big screen. But of all the possible impediments interrupting his vision, an Arab Spring erupting in the West Asia North Africa region and in Syria specifically, was the least expected.

Without warning, Somar found himself witnessing his fellow countrymen and women redrawing their lives, not in scripts, but directly in front of him, in the streets of Al Zabadani, Al Hameh and Qudsaya. The son of proud pan-Arab nationalists, raised on tales of revolutionary Arab leaders like Gamal Abdul Nasser, Somar joined the ranks of peaceful demonstrators, learning — city after city — to see his country in a new light.

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An op-ed by author Ahmad Saadawi, writer of the novel Frankenstein in Baghdad, published in March 2013

 

An Iraqi saying claims that those who endure one day just like the next have been dealt an unfair hand in life. During the 1990s, when I was in my 20s, this saying was frequently invoked. In those stagnant times, it seemed nothing ever changed, so much so that looking back, I can barely differentiate between 1997 and 1998.

Those days came to an end 10 years ago today, when United States forces invaded Iraq. The contradictions that had been contained under Saddam Hussein burst forth into the open. Lives were uprooted in the process. It is no surprise that, a decade later, some people find themselves yearning for the '90s.

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