Even more Iraqi blogs

Riverbend introduces two new Iraqi blogs.

The first, The Iraqi Agora, is a group blog with contributions from several Iraqis inside and outside Iraq. Riverbend and Salam have both published posts there, in addition to Liminal (a young Iraqi living in the US) who brings up some interesting and thoughtful posts, his cousin Torshe, and another Iraqi woman, Hurria, who seems to have 'been around'. Riverbend promises that two more Iraqis will join soon. Check it out, definitely worth your time.

The second is Liminal's personal blog Shlonkom Bakazay? Shlonkum means "how are you?" but I'm damned if I know what bakazay means. And he asks Shaku? shmaku?, which literally translates to "what's there? what isn't?" or to put it simply "tell me everything", which is a question commonly asked in Iraq after you greet someone, and as an invitation to conversation, but almost always Iraqis usually respond to it with kulshi maku "nothing".

I guess I went off at a tangent, but I'd like to tell you this joke I just remembered:
The Japanese once invented a super intelligent computer that can recognise and answer almost any spoken question. An American, a Japanese, and an Iraqi were among the first people to test it. The American asks the computer "Who was the first American president?", and the computer replies accurately. The Japanese asked the computer a question about A.I. or something like that and the computer promptly replied. The Iraqi guy searched his mind for a few seconds, then he suddenly asked loudly shaku shmaku? "what's there? what isn't there?", and the computer started to shake and beep furiously, let off a lot of sparks, and then it exploded. Poor thing.

Anyway, I'm happy to hear that more Iraqis are joining the blogosphere, and I've updated the sidebar links.

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Oh, and I forgot to wish you all a happy Eid. And Kul 'am wa intu wa iraqna b'alif khair. Let us all hope that Iraq and Iraqis will be through much better and safer times next Eid.

I for one had lots of fun yesterday and absolutely no hangovers today! Well, maybe just a little fun, as we had the obligatory uninvited jerk at the ga3da, who hijacked the party, consumed most of our booze, and as we say here nach ukht almezza (I won't translate that one ;). But I guess we can put up with all of that, at least it's better than Basrah.