Baghdad Bruning Theme

Riverbend presents multiple themes in her blog Baghdad Burning. One of the main themes so far in the book is  how incorrect America's view is of the Iraqi people, society, and culture is. Reading this blog has made me feel very ignorant as to what is going on in the lives of the people in Riverbend's country, and how drastically their everyday life has changed from before American occupation. The way that Riverbend first presents this theme is by explaining how when she first started this blog, many of her readers did not believe that she was an actual Iraqi woman blogging from her home. She describes the common misconceptions that Americans have about Iraq. "The Myth: Iraqis, prior to occupation, lived in little beige tents set up on the sides of little dirt roads all over Baghdad. The Truth: Iraqis lived in houses with running water and electricity. Thousands of them own computers. Millions own VCRs and VCDs" (p. 34).  I firmly believed that Iraq was a very poor an undeveloped country.She also makes it clear how frustrated she is living in a place that is constantly under attack. She describes what they have to deal with everyday, including raids, tanks driving around the streets, shooting at anything that gets in their way, and innocent people getting killed. Although she deals with this everyday, she still claims that she is not angry with the Ameicans. " - I feel terrible seeing the troops standing in this merciless sun- wearing heavy clothes… looking longingly into the air-conditioned interiors of our cars" (p.13). This was shocking to me.  Riverbend's blog completely contradicts the view of the American people. It was necessary for someone to create a blog describing what life is like for someone our age, who we can relate to and see how different their life is to ours. Her main purpose in writing her blog is to let the American people know what is going over their from an Iraqi's perspective instead of what the American news is telling us and wants us to hear/believe.