It is suddenly pitch black. The electricity has gone. Everyone remains in their seats - the best course of action considering the many armed men present. A few torches light up narrow slits in the room while Kadim guides us out. Like a flock of sheep carrying notepads we are herded over to the Sheraton Hotel on the other side of the parking lot.
- I’m bailing out here, Antonia whispers. I have a live just now. Tell me if anything happens.
We settle in the new auditorium and wait yet again for the minister. After a while the man wearing the XXXL uniform mounts the podium in the empty hotel and continues as if nothing has happened. While he talks about Iraqi gains in the war we hear it continuing full strength overhead. There are dull thuds as the bombs strike who knows where. The Defence Minister refuses to admit that the defence lines around Baghdad have been breached. - We Iraqis know the desert. Our trenches might be only sixty centimetres deep and half a metre wide, but they are effective. If a bomb should strike ten metres away from the troops, the soldiers will escape unhurt, says Sultan Hashim Ahmed, and calls the Americans cowards. - They bomb from such heights and cannot be accurate; they dare not fight man to man. The enemy has the capacity to go where it wants, but in the end they must attack this town if they want to win, and it will cost them dearly. The enemy thought this would be a five-day war, or a six-day war, or a seven-day war. I myself wish the war were over, but if it lasts it will only mean heavy losses for the enemy. The Americans might advance on Baghdad, they might be here in five or ten days, but they will never capture it, he says.
I glance at my watch; it is time for a live transmission. I get up and tip-toe towards the door in order not to interrupt. The door is locked. I try another. Also locked. A soldier approaches and shows me back to my place. I point to my watch and then to the door. Kadim comes over.
- I have to go, I say.
- You cannot leave before the minister.
- I have a transmission in ten minutes.
- You cannot leave before the minister.
- But what will my TV station do without me?
- You cannot leave before the minister.
- You cannot stop me from leaving the room, I say; the whole ministry is getting up my nose. I can no longer keep my mouth shut and argue using their own rhetoric.
- The president gave an important speech today. A speech which I have prepared in order to recount to my viewers.
- You cannot leave before the minister.
- Excuse me, Mr Kadim. Is the Minister of Defence more important than Saddam Hussein?
Kadim looks penetratingly at me, turns and walks away. The door remains locked. The guards follow me around. I wait for a small eternity.
Chairs scrape the floor up on the podium and the Minister of Defence waddles out. We are to remain seated until he has left the hotel. To hell with the Defence Minister. To hell with my live broadcast. I will have to phone and tell them I was held hostage at the Sheraton. One-nil to Antonia, who left on time.
I run down to report on the minister’s speech. Antonia’s minder is sitting on a plastic stool. He is proficient in German and watches over her every word. They are always quarrelling about what she might or might not say. He is stubborn and strict but has met his match in Correspondent Lionheart. The minder does not like her use of the word ‘regime’; it is negatively loaded. Instead of ‘Saddam’s regime’ she should use the expression ‘The Iraqi Government’. And why not treat him with some respect and call him ‘President Saddam Hussein’ rather than just ‘Saddam Hussein’? After all, you say President George Bush, don’t you?
When she has completed the transmission he gets up.
- I think you should talk more about children.
- The theme today was war and politics.
- I still think you need to talk more about children.
- I talk about children all the time. You haven’t paid attention! she hisses as only an Austrian can, and turns on her heel. Her lips are narrow slits and her eyes flash.
I wait my turn by the live point. Thank God no one supervises me. I can say what I like; the Baghdad spy-school is not that advanced - Norwegian is not on the curriculum.
The roof and garden below the hotel are humming with cameras and reporters. The assembly line principle is in operation. News agencies like Reuters and AP establish positions with cameras and satellite connections to the rest of the world and hire out time to reporters; ten minutes each, for thousands of pounds, and a scramble for slots. My permanent employers, NRK, SVT and DR, book slots a week in advance.
Over the course of the three weeks of the war, my workload has increased steadily. I report for Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, Finnish and Dutch TV, as well as several radio stations. Occasionally I work for BBC World and CBC in Canada, although without using my name as I fear Uday and his mob will punish me or throw me out of the country if I say anything contrary.
One evening while reporting for Dutch TV from the roof of Hotel Palestine I become aware of a man sitting on a stool opposite me. In the dark he appears threatening and sinister. I lose my train of thought. Have I really just said that it is difficult to get to grips with what Baghdad citizens say, because this is a dictatorship? I am angry with myself. Will I now be thrown out for being careless? I must cut out the English transmissions. I gather my thoughts, pick up the thread and mumble about heavy civilian losses, wounded, killed. ‘
Kinder, kinder, verletzte Kinder
’ rings in my ears, an echoing of Antonia’s minder. I conclude with something about wounded children.
When the transmission ends I quickly sidle past the glaring man. I pray he has not realised who I am. He remains seated in front of the cameras to monitor the next reporter, a petite brunette who ferociously lisps her way through the transmission - in Spanish.
Today is 27 March and Josh has invited us to a birthday party on the sixteenth floor. The blond Scot is the kindest and most helpful in Hotel Palestine. I have to find him a present in bombed-out Baghdad. A few food shops are open but there is not a gift in sight. I think of all the times Josh has invited me for breakfast; he tempts with three kinds of porridge: banana flavoured, with raisins, or plain. In addition he serves coffee and tea. I
have
to find him a present. I ask Amir to drive me to the book market. As we draw near he stops the car - a man passes by carrying a basket of home-made leek bread on his head. The area is windswept and deserted. The streets leading off the book market are empty, the windows shuttered. The wind gets hold of anything lying around: rubbish, magazines, plastic bags whirl around in a sad dance.
A tiny booth is open, selling stationery: A4 paper, paper-clips, staplers. I wrack my brain wondering if any of this could be a gift. I turn and twist a stapler, wondering whether Josh might need it. Gift-wrapped with some spare staples? The man in the shop looks at me quizzically. He must be wondering what I need stationery for now. I myself wonder why the hell he is open.
- I was crawling up the walls at home. Idleness drives me crazy, he answers. - But it’s almost worse here. I’m just sitting waiting for customers.
- Have you had any?
- You are my first customer today, he says, and looks out over the dreary street before adding a few phrases of homage to Saddam. Half-heartedly. They still have to be included; after all, who is the dark-haired woman accompanying me?
Then I spot them. Large, bound books with pink, mauve, black and green covers. The pages are lined. A perfect diary. Encouraged, I select a colour. Pink is too feminine, mauve too faded, black too depressing, while hope springs evergreen, or in this case, grass-green. My eye is caught by something on the next shelf - a card with a pink teddy bear and the words ‘Happy Birthday’. I open the card and a thin, creaking sound streams out: ‘Happy Birthday to you.’ I close the card quickly; no good wasting the battery.
There’s a whole gang of us celebrating Josh’s birthday that evening. Sky reporter David is sprawled over a low armchair and greets me happily with one of his well-aimed remarks. He has a very well-educated Oxford accent and was at university with Tony Blair. His swept-back greying hair and easy manner make him look as if he has just returned from a golf tournament - victorious.
Tim is submerged in the only other available chair, whispering that he misses his five children. Remy is on the bed, absorbed in the map Josh has downloaded from the Internet, a huge document from the University of California’s home page.
Veljko and Milan, the two Serbian cameramen yanked in by Sky at the last moment when their own photographers chose to leave, are on the floor, against the wall, drinking ‘champagne’ brandy out of plastic mugs.
The Red Hot Chili Peppers boom in the background. Josh is standing in the middle of the floor.
- When I got home today the chambermaid’s trolley was parked outside my door. I entered and as I passed the bathroom I froze - so did she. She was trying out my electric toothbrush and had a mouth full of toothpaste!
Josh laughs and says he gave her the toothbrush. I hand him my present. A pink light shines from the card when the birthday song is played. I had failed to spot that in the windblown shop. The Chili Peppers are turned down so that everyone might hear ‘Happy Birthday’. The thin sound belongs to another life.
There’s a crash; the entire hotel is shaking. The building sways from side to side. We rush out onto the balcony. In the west, towards the Tigris, I catch a glimpse of what look like smoke bombs. Beams of light rush across the sky, the crackle and flash of ack-ack guns is everywhere. There is another crash. Several of the buildings near the Ministry of Information are ablaze. Swoosh, a missile and blinding light flies past the hotel. We hear a target being hit on the other side of the river. Swish, one more, then another. The hotel sways again, but we are rooted to the spot; we must see what is going on. If a tomahawk arrives it won’t matter where we are. David rushes out to deliver a quick report. The rest of us have no more transmissions and stay up, drinking brandy into the night. The ack-ack flashes continue to decorate the sky, as if to convince Baghdad’s inhabitants that the air defences are working; a fragile defence against wave upon wave of cruise missiles and B52s which drop their cargo from thousands of feet up. While we watch the sky, mothers comfort petrified children and tend cradles occupied by premature babies, older children count bombs, and fathers fear that the next strike will bring the house down around them. To some, this horrendous night will stay with them for years to come.
The noise quietens down, and we hear it. Josh chucked the birthday card away when the attack started. Now it lies as if nothing has happened, playing ‘Happy Birthday’ in the same tinny voice.
- That’s certainly some card you got hold of, David crows. Must have the best battery in Baghdad. Not like Josh’s quality Swiss watch!
Josh’s watch stopped on the second night of the war, when the bomb hit the Presidential palace, on 21 March, 01.05 local time, never to start again.
The birthday guests soon droop. We are exhausted from lack of sleep. It is as if we are ice cold inside, immune to feelings of happiness, to brandy, fear, hunger. We walk the earth in a numb existence, an existence filled with trauma and insomnia.
A warm breeze makes the curtains flap. We sit silently. Now, when it is no longer possible to leave Baghdad, the discussions about fear have evaporated. It would not do to talk about it, it is actually taboo. Never once, after the war started, have I heard anyone utter one word about fear. When the bombing is at its worst we stare fixedly into the air, out of the balcony door, into eternity - but never into fear.
I thank Josh for the brandy, switch on my torch and make my way down the stairs. Another torch is on its way up. It is Lindsay from Channel 4. She stops and scrutinises me. - Is everything OK?
I nod, but suddenly everything is not OK. In the torchlight we talk about the war, about the Americans and the rumours.
- You shouldn’t sleep alone, she says. Why don’t you come and sleep with us? We can put an extra bed in the office. Timothy is there, so I’m not frightened at night.
The myth about hardened war correspondents is exposed. Many of them are grown women, with a well-developed maternal instinct. But they too have rules: comfort others, protect, but never, ever talk about your own fear.
- Come and have supper whenever you want, says Lindsay, and the torches part, hers up to the thirteenth floor, me down to the seventh.