[MUSIC PLAYING]
SUROOSH ALVI: Since it was the Muslim holy month of Muharram,
which is especially significant for the Shia, we
decided to head to Sadr City.
It's Friday.
We're going to check out the big prayer.
Apparently, it's a sight to be seen.
Everybody prays on the streets for a huge distance from the
mosque all the way out.
Now, just a few years back, the idea of Westerners paying
a little visit to Sadr City would have been unthinkable as
it was the heart of the insurgency against the
American occupation--
the home of firebrand cleric Muqtada Al-Sadr
and his Mahdi Army.
Even now, it took a lot of work and a Mahdi Army escort
to get us in.
It's supposedly forbidden to fight during
the month of Muharram.
But with heightened Sunni-Shia tensions, the Iraqi army
thought it was a good idea to have the bomb squad present
just in case.
-[SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE]
SUROOSH ALVI: More than 13,000 people turned out to pray and
to listen to a cleric who influences the attitudes of an
even greater number of Iraq's Shia majority.
METHAL AL-HASNAWI: [SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE]
SUROOSH ALVI: How do you feel about the westernization of
Iraqi youth since the American occupation and
since they've left?
METHAL AL-HASNAWI: [SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE]
SUROOSH ALVI: The cleric made it clear that getting the US
out of Iraq wasn't enough.
He wants to eliminate American influence of any kind.
We headed back to the neighborhood of Karrada to
meet up with Waleed and get a tour of his old haunts.
Hey, welcome to Iraq, buddy.
Welcome home.
Waleed wanted to check out Acrassicauda's old practice
space, that is, if we could find it.
There's a strange feeling walking around, considering
the last time I was here I wasn't even allowed to get out
of our armored car.
WALEED: It's been a very, very long time since I've last
walked this street.
This is filled with memories of starving nights with the
band hitting the shit out of the instruments, rocking out,
and trying to figure out-- how the fuck are we
going to go back home?
SUROOSH ALVI: This is basically 10 years ago.
WALEED: Yeah.
This is it.
SUROOSH ALVI: It's been rebuilt.
WALEED: Yep, completely changed now.
SUROOSH ALVI: It's like art galleries.
If we hadn't been sure this was the spot, we would have
walked right by it.
The practice space got completely bombed
out during the war.
And today it's unrecognizable, which I guess is a good thing.
WALEED: The area changed so much that it
looks completely different.
SUROOSH ALVI: Waleed wanted to see if his childhood home was
still standing.
But on our way there, we were re-introduced to one of the
most notorious features of Baghdad--
checkpoints.
Car bombs are such an issue in Baghdad that hundreds of the
checkpoints that were originally established by the
American military are still in place today.
WALEED: Look at this fucking shit, man.
Have you noticed, every street has a checkpoint, every area
has a checkpoint of entrance and exit.
It's so sad.
Literally, you have to plan your day to the T.
SUROOSH ALVI: Because it slows everything down.
Not only does it make getting around a nightmare, but doing
anything other than staring straight ahead and hoping you
get through can throw your entire day into a tailspin.
Put it down.
What are they saying?
You can't film?
WALEED: They're like, don't film near a police patrol.
SUROOSH ALVI: After inspecting our press credentials and
undergoing a thorough search, we were allowed to slowly make
our way to Waleed's old house.
WALEED: Everything is blockaded.
You can't really access the house or the neighborhood.
So we had to turn around, go all the way back, and then
come through here.
SUROOSH ALVI: Did it get bombed, this neighborhood?
WALEED: Yeah, and it looks pretty fucking different.
That's pretty fucking insane.
This used to be my old library.
It's like a fucking junkyard, man.
SUROOSH ALVI: Right before Waleed left the country, he
received a series of death threats.
His work as a fixer for foreign journalists and as a
member of a heavy metal band made him a target.
WALEED: I'll show you right here.
So at 6:00 in the morning, I would leave.
And there was a note right here, an envelope, right here.
And when I opened it, it was a very, very frank letter of--
we shall cleanse the soil of our country from the stench of
people like you.
So I went kind of crazy, and I went into the street, and I
started screaming and yelling, like if you're a man just come
up right now.
I came back after two weeks, and I left at a different time
this time in the morning.
And there was another one of those.
SUROOSH ALVI: Waiting for you when you walked in.
WALEED: Waiting for me.
So what I realized is that the person who had dropped it had
to have been watching over from somewhere around here,
where he can see me leaving the apartment and going down.
And that's when I knew that the danger was very, very
imminent on my family because of me.
So yeah, three days after that, I was in Jordan.
SUROOSH ALVI: But the death threats against anyone who's
not on the straight and narrow continue to this day.
And as we would learn, these threats are not empty.
-[SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE]