Barefoot in Baghdad Read Online Free Page B

between the border and Iraq’s capital. Coffee shops in Amman were filled with stories of travelers who had never made it to their destinations. Highway robberies, once punishable by death under the Saddam regime, were common. What’s more, the primary bridges into the city had been bombed, making travelers depend on alternative routes. Although the Saddam regime had been toppled from formal power, the Baathists now controlled the peripheries around Baghdad. Everyone knew they were in charge of all civilian traffic into the country.
    The most dangerous travel in Iraq was the journey I was about to embark on.
    To make matters worse, I was traveling into Iraq with Zainab Salbi, an icon of women coping with war and its aftermath. She had founded Women for Women International in 1993 in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and since then the organization has opened offices in such war-torn areas as the Congo, Nigeria, and Afghanistan. Zainab herself was honored in 1995 by President Bill Clinton for her work in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and she was named Time magazine’s Innovator of the Month and received Forbes magazine’s 2005 Trailblazer Award. She is one of the few nongovernmental organization leaders to be featured on The Oprah Winfrey Show, and she has been Oprah’s guest five times.
    Being around Zainab was intimidating for me. I was constantly filled with self-doubt. I thought, I’ve made a mistake. Look at this woman! She is so calm and in control. This is a woman who knows what she is doing. This is a woman who goes inside a war-torn country to help other women. I’m not this woman!
    While I stood and worried in front of the hotel, Zainab bid her younger brother an elaborate farewell. She hugged him, pinched his cheeks, and hugged him again. I could not shake off the feeling that I did not belong on this journey. It didn’t help matters that the airline had lost my luggage. I clung to my only possession: a messenger bag. The contents of the bag were all I had now: my passport, my iPod, a miniature first aid kit, a book, lip balm, antiseptic wipes, and a small copy of the Koran. The realization made me feel even more pathetic.
    We did receive some good news. A few other SUVs had radioed in to say they would meet us at the border, so we would now be traveling in a convoy of four Jordanian GMCs instead of a single vehicle. Our driver still looked nervous, but as we pulled out of the parking lot, Zainab began to chat with him. Where was he from? How long had he driven the Amman-Baghdad route? Where did he think Saddam was hiding? I tried to enter into my own trance and zone them out. Her voice was far too cheerful for 4 a.m.!
    Zainab began to rummage through the cooler her brother had brought her. “Anyone want falafel?” she asked as she unwrapped a sandwich.
    The driver chuckled. I tried to play it cool and laugh quietly as well, but it came out more as a snort. How could she eat at a time like this? I wanted to remind her where we were going. Baghdad. Into a country that was in the middle of war—no matter what President Bush said.
    She pulled out an inflatable U-shaped pillow and a matching eye mask, which she placed over her short cropped hair that made her look like her brother’s identical twin.
    “I’m going to take a nap,” she announced to the driver. “If we run into any highway bandits or a roaming al Qaeda cell, make sure to wake me up. I don’t want to miss the excitement.” With that, she disappeared into the backseat.
    Now, there was a true adrenaline junkie. Any excitement I had initially felt about going to Baghdad was long gone.
    Playing the role of advocate for the last few months had forced me into a position of offense, and I had not even had a moment to entertain the many doubts and fears that I harbored inside. This eighteen-hour ride gave me plenty of time to catch up.
    ***
    It wasn’t until I reached Baghdad that I began to understand the full extent of the risk I was taking by launching an