The most gripping account of the Iraq conflict came from a web diarist known as the Baghdad Blogger. But no one knew his identity - or even if he existed. Rory McCarthy finally tracked him down, and found a quietly spoken, 29-year-old architect. From next week he will write fortnightly in G2
Friday May 30, 2003 The Guardian
[The body of the article: <http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,966768,00.html>] *****
***** ...A day before that I sold my soul to the devil. I talked to Rory from the Guardian. Look, he paid for a great lunch in a place which had air-conditioning and lots of people from foreign. It was fun talking to him but when Raed saw me after "the talk" he said I looked like someone had violated me. So there is a bit of guilt. But that was washed away with the cool air-conditioning. Yeah, I am cheap like that. I would sell my parents for a nice bottle of wine.
You know how much you would pay for a pizza before [attack of the media types II] started? 2500 dinars, a bit more than one dollar. Do you know how much it costs now? 6000 dinars, a little less than 6 US dollars. Plus the exchange rate is totally fucked up and the real estate market is getting bizarre. You can follow the trail of the foreigners by how much things cost in a certain district. Of course Rory didn't buy me the 6000 dinar pizza, that would have been too cheap, he paid an extra 3 dollars....
<http://dear_raed.blogspot.com/2003_05_01_dear_raed_archive.html#200338293> *****