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Iraqi Name Droppers
By Peter Slevin Washington Post Staff Writer http://www.washingtonpost.com/ Wednesday, June 4, 2003; Page C01
BAGHDAD -- For a time in the 1990s, travelers approaching the town of Qurnah at the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers would pass through a checkpoint where Iraqi police would ask their destination. If they answered Qurnah, they would be admonished and told to try again. Iraqis were supposed to call it Saddamiya al Qurnah, in homage to President Saddam Hussein. All over the country, Hussein's government glued his name to schools, neighborhoods and institutions of every description. His image appeared everywhere, from giant murals to the national currency. But now that his government has fallen, Iraqis are renaming institutions with glee. The Bush administration acted first, dropping his name from Baghdad's main airport, Saddam International, now called Baghdad International. The Saddam Hospital in the southern city of Basra became the Public Hospital. The Saddam Children's Hospital in Baghdad was similarly shorn. The impoverished Baghdad district called Saddam City was transformed into several names. Saddam University, which included the Saddam College of Law, has been renamed the University of Mesopotamia. "Changing the names reflects what the people feel," said Naira Ahmed Awqati, a doctor in Baghdad. "They don't want anything to remind themselves of the past regime. But we need to change everything, from the grass roots to the upper-level performance of the ministries." Not only is Hussein's name being erased, so are other ostensibly proud titles he and his lieutenants ordered up. Not 10 days had passed after Baghdad's fall before the imams of the Umm al-Maarik (Mother of All Battles) mosque in Baghdad renamed it Umm al Qurra. They considered making things easier on worshipers by keeping the old name and tacking on a reference to one of the prophet Muhammad's great battles, but thought better of it. "The name connotes war and battle. Islam is a religion that calls for peace," a mosque worker, Shawkat Ahmed Nuaimi, said the other day after photocopying a sheaf of leaflets containing the new name. "What's gone is gone. It's a new era. We want to begin anew." The urge for a fresh start is powerful after a period in which most Iraqis lost friends, relatives, opportunities and hope as Hussein led the country into war and isolation. Young and old alike are eager to think of Iraq in brighter ways after the abrupt fall of a leader whose name inspired fear as much as any other emotion. "I hate the name because everywhere I go, I see it. I want to live my own life," said Ramsin Nicademos, 13, who lives in a modern Baghdad development called Saddam's Neighborhood. The old name also grated on his sister Sergina, 20, a university student: "They used to say, 'Oh, how you must love Saddam that you live in Saddam's Neighborhood.' " Residents quickly ordered a simple, rhyming switch to Salaam Neighborhood, after the Arabic word for peace. Ramsin is also looking forward to changing the name of his school. "I'm tired of the names of presidents," he said. "There are beautiful names. Maybe Freedom School. Or Babylon School, because it is historical and I am from Babylon." Their mother, Victoria Nicademos, 46, said there had been a certain pleasure in living in a privileged community, thick with Baath Party members and civil servants, and named after the Baath Party leader. "He was the president. As a president, he was strong and powerful. We were proud that we lived in Saddam's Neighborhood," said Victoria, a former embassy employee. "But when he began the wars in Iran and Kuwait, I changed my mind." A busy intersection on the western approach to Baghdad from Syria and Jordan has also been the scene of an ambitious renaming ritual. A few years ago, the government erected a massive modern stone sculpture that resembles two rectangular tablets twisting toward each other. The tablets -- some say they are meant to be thick flags -- represent a meeting of Hussein with the Iraqi people. The idea is that he is hugging his people, although some Iraqis used to joke bitterly that it was really Hussein squeezing his people. In honor of the sculpture and the idea, the government formally named the crossroads Al Liqa Square, or Meeting Square. But early last month, as Baghdad neared collapse, the road brought columns of U.S. tanks and soldiers into the city. Thrilled residents and business owners quickly ditched the old name and labeled the crossroads Liberation Square. Yet will the new name survive any longer than the old one? "If the Americans go home, it will have a positive meaning," baker Suad Aziz, 30, said. "If they stay, it will have a negative one." Aziz said the U.S. invasion and the power vacuum that followed had left her angry. Persistent violence made her afraid to send her 6-year-old son to school or her husband to the market. She wanted to know when the liberation promised by President Bush would live up to its name.
Direct Link: --http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10526-2003Jun3.html
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