Kidnapped

Words can stop the heart. Yesterday, a neighbor related the story of her 6 year old niece to us. She went missing.

They looked all over the neighborhood, but couldn't find her. Frantic with fear, a ring on the father's phone silenced the family. "Hello!" he said. "Abdullah, I have your daughter," came the voice on the other end. "Where, where are you? Where is my daughter?" he screamed. "No, no calm down. I'm the police. I just asked this man at the check point who the little girl was in the front seat. The man said that she was his, but then the girl yelled, "No, no he is not my dad, my dad is Abdullah."

"Remember me, we met at..." his words trailed off as Abdullah slunk to the floor, "They found her, they found her..." he whispered as his heart nearly stopped beating.

The police reunited the girl with her family, but the kidnapper had been able to travel over an hour away from her home before he was caught.

In our own city, a 13 year old boy was abducted last winter. Three burly men from Mosul grabbed him in broad day light. They took him to a shed on the edge of town and beat him with a whip and poured cold water all over his body. Then, a fierce discussion arose between the men. They couldn't decide how they were going to get the boy to Mosul without being caught. Eventually, they just locked the shed tight and left him there in the subfreezing temperatures. Fortunately, a man happened by the shed the very next day and was able to let him out.

This is Kurdistan, I'm afraid. Every culture has its layers, but occasionally the layers that are the most unseemly drift to the surface all at once.

Yesterday, was that kind of day for us.

Once the story of the averted kidnapping was told we learned about the one closer to home, but it didn't stop there...

Just south of us two big tragedies happenend just in the last few days.

A couple with a 14 year old boy were hiding from the mother's parents since their premature marriage nearly 15 years ago. They were in love, but the parents did not sanction their marriage, so they had to flee. For 15 years they had lived in a town 2 hours away, and all seemed to be o.k. But, just a few days ago members of the wife's family discovered where they were. Her brothers came in the middle of the night. They murdered all three of them and literally butchered their bodies.

In the brother's minds, peace had been restored. Honor had been avenged, and their anger had finally meted out the justice that they deserved.

This is Kurdistan. You'll find some of the most lovely people on the planet, but most every one of them has a story to tell that could very well stop your heart.

In other random news of violence, a man in Sulemaniye yesterday decided with malacious intent to throw a hand grenade over the outside wall of someone's house. It blew up, killing the teenager girl on the other side.

There are days here that make your blood boil. Boiling is o.k., I've learned. I can handle that. The problem is when your blood turns cold and men's words chill your heart, threatening to stop it's very next beat.