The Other Side of War

By Bobby Ghosh

Is life in Iraq better now than it was under Saddam Hussein? Some things have improved: Iraqis have the vote, the right to express their political opinions, an unfettered media, freedom to travel, even something of a consumer boom. But they also have to live with acute shortages of such everyday essentials as gasoline and electricity--and security. And how much better can life be when so many new kinds of death stalk the streets?

For many families in Baghdad, the only way to deal with those dangers is somehow to limit exposure to them. People venture outside only to replenish dwindling supplies of food, cooking gas and fuel for generators. Some Iraqis no longer send their children to school. The only new freedom they can savor is access to satellite television.

Iraqi-Canadian photographer Farah Nosh documented the life of her extended family in Baghdad during a particularly turbulent stretch. In February and March, as the country slid toward civil war, most of the family remained indoors, imprisoned by fear. Nosh's photographs document the daily struggle to block out the violence. Sometimes the carnage seemed a world away; at other times it was all too close. After a roadside bomb went off near the house, family members got a ringside view of smoke and pandemonium from their window.

Iraq's horrors have a way of sneaking past closed doors and the barriers of denial. When Nosh's uncle Kahtan suffered a heart attack one night, the family couldn't take him to a hospital. It was after curfew, and the police said it was too dangerous to provide an escort. Unable to get treatment, Kahtan died at home, another victim of the violence that lurks in Iraq's streets.