Yesterday, I woke up late. I had the day off because my friend O took my Saturday off to see his friend who came back from Dubai.Waking up at 11:30 a.m., I felt so comfortable. The past weeks made me very tired as we were busy covering the referendum, Saddam's trial and the formation of the political blocs' lists of candidates for the forthcoming elections in adition to be fasting for almost a month.
As a typical citizen lives in the 21st century, I went to my computer to check if I received any urgent emails and to see if there is breaking news or not. Of course I discovered one. A car bomb exploded in Basra killing dozens of Iraqi civilians shopping for Eid.
After that I turned on the TV and kept flipping the channels until I found a TV program with a famous female Tunisian singer, Latifa.
Twenty minutes before Iftar, I went to the kitchen. My mother was so busy in making the food. She working alone as my only sister is married and lives in another house now. I tried to help her but by that time, Iftar was ready. I offered to do the traditional salad Iraqis always have: mixed cucumber, tomato, green pepper, and olive.
Watching a comedy on a local channel, my mother asked me if I bought something for Eid. "No," I replied. I did not buy anything as I was very busy. "Why don't you go now?" she wondered. I thought it was a good idea. So I called two of my friends and went to Karrada, a neighborhood considered a big shopping center in the capital.
My friend O, called me while I was there asking me if I watched "The Killing Fields" movie. I decided to watch it after I return back home.
The movie is about a New York Times reporter covering the civil war in Cambodia. Together with local representative, they cover some of the tragedy and madness of the war. When the American forces leave, the Cambodian sends his family with them, but stays behind himself to help the American reporter cover the event. As an American, the reporter won't have any trouble leaving the country, but the situation is different for the Cambodian; he's a local, and the Khmer Rouge are moving in.
At the end I felt that it is impossible the same thing would happen in Iraq. The people of this country are wise enough to understand that we don't need this. We need peace back. Iraq's atmosphere is different and the case is different. If it consisted of only one sect, I think we would have gone through the same. If there are only Shiites here, the Badr troops would do what the Khmer Rouge did and if only the Sunnis are here, the Sunni insurgents would do the same. Thanks be to God that we are a country of different sects, all mixed in relations and marriages and all feel that we will survive. We are wise enough to think about it.
Here is something about the movie:
The movie is about a New York Times reporter covering the civil war in Cambodia. Together with local representative, they cover some of the tragedy and madness of the war. When the American forces leave, the Cambodian sends his family with them, but stays behind himself to help the American reporter cover the event. As an American, the reporter won't have any trouble leaving the country, but the situation is different for the Cambodian; he's a local, and the Khmer Rouge are moving in.
At the end I felt that it is impossible the same thing would happen in Iraq. The people of this country are wise enough to understand that we don't need this. We need peace back. Iraq's atmosphere is different and the case is different. If it consisted of only one sect, I think we would have gone through the same. If there are only Shiites here, the Badr troops would do what the Khmer Rouge did and if only the Sunnis are here, the Sunni insurgents would do the same. Thanks be to God that we are a country of different sects, all mixed in relations and marriages and all feel that we will survive. We are wise enough to think about it.
Here is something about the movie:
The Killing Fields (1984), a remarkable and deeply affecting movie, is based upon a true story of friendship, loyalty, the horrors of war and survival, while following the historical events surrounding the US evacuation from Vietnam in 1975. The authentic-looking, unforgettable epic movie, directed by Roland Joffe (his first feature movie) and produced by David Puttnam (the Oscar victor three years earlier for Chariots of Fire (1981)), was shot on location in Thailand (and Canada). Cambodian doctor, non-actor Haing Ngor, in his film debut, was an actual survivor of the Cambodian holocaust. He was tortured and experienced the starvation and death of his real-life family during the actual historical events revisited in this movie.
The movie's screenplay, by Bruce Robinson, was adapted from Pulitzer Prize-winning NY Times reporter Sydney Schanberg's The Death and Life of Dith Pran from The NY Times Magazine. It was nominated for seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Actor (Sam Waterston), Best Director (first-timer Roland Joffe), and Best Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium (Bruce Robinson) and won three Oscars: Best Supporting Actor (Haing S. Ngor), Best Cinematography (Chris Menges), and Best movie Editing (Jim Clark).
Jonathan Demme's one-man show comedy Swimming to Cambodia (1987), a rambling 87 minute monologue, provides an elaborative account of Spalding Gray's experiences as a bit player (as a US consul) in The Killing Fields during the SE Asia shoot.
American newspaper correspondent, New York Times reporter Sydney Schanberg (Sam Waterston) is covering the secret US bombing campaign in Cambodia, along with American cameraman Al Rockoff (John Malkovich) and English reporter Jon Swain (Julian Sands). After having persuaded his Cambodian assistant, friend and interpreter, Dith Pran (Dr. Haing S. Ngor) to remain behind with him to help cover the story after the communist Khmer Rouge takeover and withdrawal of US military forces, Schanberg unintentionally betrays his aide by miscalculating the situation. They are separated and Pran is forced to remain when Schanberg and other American journalists and Westerners evacuate to escape a life-threatening situation in occupied-Cambodia during the fall of Phnom Penh in 1975.
The movie chronicles unforgettable scenes of suffering endured during the Cambodian bloodbath (known as "Year Zero") that killed 3 million Cambodians, when the courageous and indomitable Dith Pran endures the atrocities of the Pol Pot regime and is captured by the communist Khmer Rouge and punished for befriending the Americans. His struggle to stay alive in the rural, barbaric 're-education' labor camp, his two escape attempts from his captors, and his horrifying walk through the skeletal remains of the brutal massacres in the Valley of Death, the muddy "killing fields," all present potent apocalyptic images on his journey to Thailand.
With John Lennon's tune Imagine playing on the soundtrack, Dith Pran - now finally reunited with Sydney on October 9th, 1979 (according to a subtitle), narrates the last line of the movie, affirming that Schanberg needn't ask for forgiveness because there was literally 'nothing to forgive":
Sydney: (Do you) forgive me?Dith Pran: Nothing to forgive, Sydney, nothing.
The postscript for the movie is provided as a footnote, as the camera slowly pans to the left over the rooftops, and looks out over rice fields:
Dith Pran returned, with Sydney Schanberg, to America to be reunited with his family. He now works as a photographer for The New York Times where Sydney Schanberg is a columnist. Cambodia's torment has not yet ended. The refugee camps on the Thai border are still crowded with the children of the killing fields.
The movie's screenplay, by Bruce Robinson, was adapted from Pulitzer Prize-winning NY Times reporter Sydney Schanberg's The Death and Life of Dith Pran from The NY Times Magazine. It was nominated for seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Actor (Sam Waterston), Best Director (first-timer Roland Joffe), and Best Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium (Bruce Robinson) and won three Oscars: Best Supporting Actor (Haing S. Ngor), Best Cinematography (Chris Menges), and Best movie Editing (Jim Clark).
Jonathan Demme's one-man show comedy Swimming to Cambodia (1987), a rambling 87 minute monologue, provides an elaborative account of Spalding Gray's experiences as a bit player (as a US consul) in The Killing Fields during the SE Asia shoot.
American newspaper correspondent, New York Times reporter Sydney Schanberg (Sam Waterston) is covering the secret US bombing campaign in Cambodia, along with American cameraman Al Rockoff (John Malkovich) and English reporter Jon Swain (Julian Sands). After having persuaded his Cambodian assistant, friend and interpreter, Dith Pran (Dr. Haing S. Ngor) to remain behind with him to help cover the story after the communist Khmer Rouge takeover and withdrawal of US military forces, Schanberg unintentionally betrays his aide by miscalculating the situation. They are separated and Pran is forced to remain when Schanberg and other American journalists and Westerners evacuate to escape a life-threatening situation in occupied-Cambodia during the fall of Phnom Penh in 1975.
The movie chronicles unforgettable scenes of suffering endured during the Cambodian bloodbath (known as "Year Zero") that killed 3 million Cambodians, when the courageous and indomitable Dith Pran endures the atrocities of the Pol Pot regime and is captured by the communist Khmer Rouge and punished for befriending the Americans. His struggle to stay alive in the rural, barbaric 're-education' labor camp, his two escape attempts from his captors, and his horrifying walk through the skeletal remains of the brutal massacres in the Valley of Death, the muddy "killing fields," all present potent apocalyptic images on his journey to Thailand.
With John Lennon's tune Imagine playing on the soundtrack, Dith Pran - now finally reunited with Sydney on October 9th, 1979 (according to a subtitle), narrates the last line of the movie, affirming that Schanberg needn't ask for forgiveness because there was literally 'nothing to forgive":
Sydney: (Do you) forgive me?Dith Pran: Nothing to forgive, Sydney, nothing.
The postscript for the movie is provided as a footnote, as the camera slowly pans to the left over the rooftops, and looks out over rice fields:
Dith Pran returned, with Sydney Schanberg, to America to be reunited with his family. He now works as a photographer for The New York Times where Sydney Schanberg is a columnist. Cambodia's torment has not yet ended. The refugee camps on the Thai border are still crowded with the children of the killing fields.
