MODERN BAGDAD

Hawera Star, Volume LIV, 23 April 1935, Page 7

MODERN BAGDAD

AGAIN A CENTRE OF TRADE MEMORIES OF SPLENDID PAST THE RUINS OF BABYLON.

Whether or not Irak is the site of the Garden of Eden—as fable has it to be—no one, no matter how great his imagination, could credit it now. In summer Irak is an arid waste and in winter a quagmire.

It might seem eurious at first to learn that this desert supports a population of over 3,000,000 and has an enormous trade in dried fruits, palm oil and natural petroleum. But this is readily explained by the presence of the rivers, tlie Tigris and Euphrates, says a writer in the “Christian Science Monitor.” As. bleak as is the landscape onco you leave the river littorals, the river banks support luslx vegetation, and. palm forests. Also the moment an attempt is made to apply modern irrigation methods to this desert mud it becomes unbelievably fertile and will produce two and three crops a -year with ease.

Nor need the irrigation bo so eompdex as the word modern might have implied, because the vast wealth of the empire of Babylon and Assyria was very largely based on- the irrigation of the desert by the river water so close at hand.

TRADE TIDE EBBED. With shifting trade routes the glory that was Bagdad’s began to fade away and before the war it seemed that this outlying province of the Turkish Empire' with such glorious memories of its past would subside and disintegrate into the desert dust from whence it had sprung. Indeed, this was the prospect before the inhabitants of the Tmris-Euphrates Valley until one day it was realised in Berlin and consedtientily in Constantinople that The Tigris and Euphrates were of strategic and economic importance. Out ol that was bom that daring plan for a Berlin to Bagdad railway. With the turn of the twentieth centurv came the turn of a new leaf tor Irak. By tlie outbreak of the World War the railway had been constructed to 3CO miles from the railhead at Kirkuk that runs to Bagdad and thence to Basra on the Persian Gulf, which is the port for India. The war came a few months too soon for the good of the BerlmBagdad railway and for four yeais Irak was one of the most important theatres of war. It became the battlefield of Turks, British; Arabs," Russians and Assyrians, After the war came a British mandate and then two yea-is a<ro complete independence, so that these 16 years of the post-war era have brought the former minor Turkish province into a state of comparative prosperity and independence. MODERN BAGDAD.

To-day Irak is a constitutional monarchy and Bagdad a city of between 360,000 and 400,000 inhabitants. It is rapidly becoming again tho centre of trade, although a vastly different one from that which distinguished it at the time of the Arabian Nights. Modern Bagdad, besides catering to the requirements of the large urban population of a capital city, is the “head office” of innumerable concerns such as the oil and fruit interests as well as the sales centre for foreign manufactured goods. The present city is not much over 600 years old, yet- it would he hard to imagine a more typically Oriental scene than that presented by the side streets and bazaars of the old capital of the caliphs. Despite the increasing popularity of the motor-car, however, the “arabana,” or horse-drown carriage, holds sway in tlio realm of taxi service by reason of its economy. The customer I bargains before stepping into tlio vehicle for just how much he shoukl pay. If the driver pretends its too little, which he invariably does, he will say so in no uncertain tones. If he really things it is too little, he will not waste time- but starts to drive away.

The customer then is faced with the prospect of either raising his price or seeking to induce another “arabanshi” to take him for the same price. Once the price is settled it is stuck to by both parties. . . that is honesty in Bagdad. Similarly in the native bazaars one comes upon interesting points of native honour. If one comes up with a shrewd expression on one’s face and starts to bargain for/an article, it is more than likely that even the most canny 'buyer of our most solvent department store would find himself outdone. If, on the other hand, one shows the shopkeeper the money and announces that one is prepared .to spend that much in his shop if he in turn will treat you like a friend and give you its fair equivalent in goods, he will probably treat you fairly. In the East there is no abstract honesty. Tli ore is instead a complex form of personal honour and to cheat a friend in the East is a breach of personal honour and -so dishonest. Naturally this hardly holds good for the really urge trading concerns in Irak. Sightseeing in Bagdad itself is somewhat restricted. It is still not very wise for a European to enter a mosque. Instead, one can wander about the streets, ever new to the foreigner but old in time, with their overhanging wooden and clay houses. The museum contains interesting sculpture from the excavations at Ur and Babylon. The king’s palace outside the city, the bazaars.' the Arch of Ctesiphone, and the native cafes keep the traveller busy ail bis spare time.

FIVE HOURS OF LEISURE. For in «nminer it is impossible to do anything between 11.30 a.ni. and 4 p.m. The problem between those hours is principally one of keeping cool. Most of the houses are equipped with “surdebs,” cool cellars, which are, where possible, further cooled by large electric fans; Irak is well equipb ped with electricity at remarkably low cost. A- siefeta furthers the purpose of keeping cool during this tiihe when

the heat" in the sun outside is often as hot as 170 degrees. . . Few travellers who have come as far as Bagdad would like to return without making a trip to the ruins of that far older but far greater city, Babylon. There are a, number of cars that ply between Hillah and Bagdad. Hillali is a modern Iraki town but four miles from the ruins of Babylon on the Euphrates canal. Babylon is perhaps the greatest testimonial to the paltriness of material achievement. Those great walls and gates; the walls now' broken down and the gates ever open to tlie curious jackal and pariah dog. The ■;“Saered - Way” , where once kings marched in triumph is now the -haunt of the Arab curio vendor. The spectacle of its three different levels is a sight ,for travellers from a land whose inception was not for almost 200 years after the last Chaldee had gone to live in the camps of his enemies.

One can see the that was Belshazzar’s palace, although the walls upon which we are told the handwriting appeared have long since crumbled into the desert dust. Where for 4000 years the inhabitants of the plain hustled and trafficked, now an occasional poor marsh Arab tends his small flock. Basra, which can also he reached by the alternative method of motor-car and train, is the centre of the fruitgrowing district of Irak. Here the two rivers meet and rush out through the delta- into the Persian Gulf, forming a more or less natural irrigation system. As is to be expected, the new reclamation of the desert first attained success here. Farther up the Euphrates, between Hillah and Bagdad, s the Hindyah barrage, a large dam across the river, (enabling the nearby land to he irrigate and also electricity to be generated. Irak is governed by a constitutional monarch with a two-chamber Parliament beneath him and a species ofCabinet Government. The British now merely have control of the air force at. the invitation of the Iraki Government. The banking is in the hands of German and British supervisors, although there is talk of forming a national bank, to he run principally by thb Jew's, who are the. descendants of thofce who remained behind at the close of the BibylOiiian Captivity.,