The Boys From Baghdad High
July 10th 2009 11:47
Baghdad's been in the news constantly since the US led invasion of Iraq some 5 years ago. We’ve all seen the tanks rolling through the streets and heard news story after news story of yet another deadly explosion in the country. Surprise death and ever-looming violence have become to Iraq what shrimps on the Barbie and 'G'day mate' are to Australia. Despite this extreme contrast in stereotypes, a documentary by the BBC shows that the youth of Baghdad, Iraq's capital, are not so different form youth the world over. The documentary The Boys from Baghdad High follows 4 teenage boys in their final year of high school trying to pass their exams and deal with the unsafety that has come to characterise Iraq.
A snippet of the documentary can be viewed here.
One of the things that stood out for me was one of the boys, having not heard from his girlfriend for a few days, honestly fearing for her life. How many of us have feared someone had died because they hadn’t texted in a few days? But this is reality for the stars of the film.
A similar incident involves 2 boys that live only 500 meters form each other but have rarely been able to visit each other simply because it’s not safe to be outside. Going out after dark is also subject to frequent curfews- the government imposed kind- again, for safety reasons.
Still, despite all this, the boys have dreams like the rest of us, one of them wanting to be a singer/song writer, and still face the same obstacles as their peers the world over; exams. One comical moment has one of the boys reading a passage out form his Arabic textbook and asking the camera with a raised eyebrow "what is this language? I swear it’s not Arabic."
The Boys From Baghdad High shows that the youth of this country are not made dissimilar due to their geographic location, quite the opposite actually- they are homogenous in desires and behaviour to the rest of us. The difference lies in the extra struggles war has brought them.
A snippet of the documentary can be viewed here.
One of the things that stood out for me was one of the boys, having not heard from his girlfriend for a few days, honestly fearing for her life. How many of us have feared someone had died because they hadn’t texted in a few days? But this is reality for the stars of the film.
A similar incident involves 2 boys that live only 500 meters form each other but have rarely been able to visit each other simply because it’s not safe to be outside. Going out after dark is also subject to frequent curfews- the government imposed kind- again, for safety reasons.
Still, despite all this, the boys have dreams like the rest of us, one of them wanting to be a singer/song writer, and still face the same obstacles as their peers the world over; exams. One comical moment has one of the boys reading a passage out form his Arabic textbook and asking the camera with a raised eyebrow "what is this language? I swear it’s not Arabic."
The Boys From Baghdad High shows that the youth of this country are not made dissimilar due to their geographic location, quite the opposite actually- they are homogenous in desires and behaviour to the rest of us. The difference lies in the extra struggles war has brought them.
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