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Pictures no 2, 4, 5 and 8 are all taken in Karade Kharidge, one of the 7 most important roads of Baghdad. Its about 5 km long and reaches from the branches to the Two-Story-Bridge and the Hanging Bridge (closed) to the former German embassy. Here you find (s. photos) all kinds of household electronics, but as well the famous Abu Afif, the best sweets of Baghdad City, the Werde Supermarket (about 400 m2), that offers many things foreigners would miss otherwise, since some time even Takeaway, cubba included. Last not least, precisely in front of the Ministry of Industry and Mineral Resources you find Al Mahar, the best fish-restaurant of Baghdad for mesgouf, fish roasted in the clay-oven (tanour).
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The excerpt above, from the new Gecko-Map, shows the shopping road Karade Dahil up, the Karade Kharidge, the outer Karade, in the middle, and the luxury shopping road Arrassat al Hindiya between Karade and Mesbah, the strand. The bank is built with villas, nowadays occupied by new parties, institutions and all kind of important people. The numbers refer to the (german) text "Eine Reise nach Bagad" of 2003. |
The southern extension is called Jame'a Road, as it leads to the University, built by Gropius (s. architecture). At the southern part you find several garden-restaurants, allowing for a rest in the fresh air. The largest garden-restaurant would be the Garden City at Kindi-Road.
Karade Dahil (pictures 3, 7, 9 and 10): That's an old and still romantic road for "normal" shopping of all kinds. Karade Dahil, the inner Karade, was never a luxury road as Mansour or nowadays Arrassat al Hindiya. You find as well vegetables, fruits, kitchen utensils, furniture, clothes, jewelers, one of the three still open alcohol sellers and some small restaurants.
Saadoun Street: Saadoun Street was "the main road of Baghdad", and it still is in what concerns tourism offices, hotels, travel offices, airlines and restaurants (those especially at the eastern part between Fates Square and the former German Embassy). Until nowadays its a kind of psychological center, as nobody (not only as Saqaf) believed to the Americans that they have taken Baghdad so swiftly, until pictures from Firdous Square came up. Firdaus Square is just about in the middle of Saadoun Street. At the northwestern end the shops for laboratory and hospital supplies aggregate. At the northwestern side you still find remnants of the old jewish quarter, that has been placed, as was the custom even in Europe, outside the city-wall. There and in the adjacent quarters of Betawin and Beit al Abieth (White House) you still find some traditional brick-buildings.
Aadamiya: This quarter, especially the promenade along the Tigris, the Corniche, was, besides Mansour, in the 80ies the most favored area for strolling about (and looking after the girls). With increasing tensions (and temporary shootings) between the Shiite Kadhimiya on the other side of the Tigris, as with the rise of Rubaiyhy-Street and Arrassat al Hindiya, Aadhamiya lost much of its clout - and visitors.
Rich Baghdad
Arrassat al Hindiya: If you just drive through the busy Baghdad, you might overlook this road for weeks - except someone intends to invite you (or get invited by you) to one of the most expensive restaurants of Baghdad. Here you find, besides the restaurants, as well dresses, furniture and jewelers, most of super luxury class - by iraqi standards ... but still you may pay the same for a menu as in Switzerland.
Mansour Street & 14 Ramadan Street: Those developed already in the 80ies to higher-class shopping roads. Cafeteria Mansour (nowadays only a clothes-shop) was at that time THE meeting point for foreigners. The famous Mansour-Coctail had already that time a price of SFr. 8.-, was so only affordable for foreigners and rich Iraqis. At 14th Ramadan Street, close to Mansour branching off, you find an upper-class bakery, most probably the only place in Iraq where you might get croissants (Don't worry about hamburgers, those you may get them at any corner). Just beside it a furniture shop of local super class, well, with italian furniture. Southwards ice-cream, an other food tourist guides will recommend you to abstain from. They are right in principle, but you are going to miss something (s. Syria), as the Iraqi ice-cream is still made with substantial parts of real cream, and not just calorie-free water and chemicals. So it tastes quite better than that, we got used to in the meantime. At the corner Mansour Street - Rahman Mosque (the first and smaller unfinished one), there is an agglomeration of carpet sellers, that resided before in front of the Mustansiriya.
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| © Geckomaps |
Rubaiyhy Street: Rubaiyhy Street developed into an upper-class shopping road in the 90ies. Many restaurants, often with quite a dubious architectural as gastronomical (hamburgers) stile border it. At the northern end the traders of house-security items found their place.
But there are not only shopping roads for higher class, but as well living quarters. Besides the borders of the Tigris, that always were the favorites for Saddam & Co's villas, it was once Waziriya, where the embassies joined the rich, then, in the 80ies Mesbah and later Mansour. In Waziriya there are only very few left (Italian), as well at Mesbah (Swiss e.g.). Most of them are nowadays at eastern and western Mansour (where mapping might lead you directly into prison ...), while nowadays some seem to move to the Green Zone (USA, GB, Denmark and some "undercover embassies, that don't want to say whom they represent. The last move is rather due to security considerations. Many might prefer to be close to the US, that intend to open their largest embassy worldwide, with a staff of some 1000, what reminds of the situation in former marxist South Yemen, where the USSR run an embassy of similar size. The guess, that the CPA and Palace Zone will be used by the new US-Embassy has proven correct (s. faq / CPA-New Interim Government)
For most Baghdadis the counterpoint to those rich areas would be the former Saddam City, nowadays (still) Sadr City, beforeThaura City. It has been built before over 40 years as settlement (social housing project) for farmers from the shiite south. Some think its rather a coerced resettlement for cheap laborers, needed by the upper class quarter and food processing industry of the adjacent Jamila quarter. The bad reputation of Thaura City is misleading. There is no other area in Baghdad where life and business is as thriving and vivid. The three roads in the west, Juader, Dahil and especially the middle one, Fallah Street, are stuffed with markets and life is so pulsating there, that one would not like to miss such areas. Here the market still happens on the road, as it did all over Baghdad before 20 years.
Really sad are the conditions in New Baghdad, at the eastern fringe of the town. Neither Saddam cared for this are, nor the new lords. The people live in cells, rather resembling garages. The sewage is running through the streets and forms ponds around the settlement - as it did in Europe during the Middle Ages, and probably still does nowadays in the old town of Ibb, Yemen.
Even in the middle of downtown Baghdad there are clusters of decay. The most busy area of Baghdad is Rashid Street, Khulafa Street and especially Suq Shorja, the largest market of Baghdad. Traffic jams are permanent there. With a car you need about an hour for 1 km, walking you are only slightly faster. If you look behind the front row of busy business facades, you get immediately into old quarters of adobe buildings, looking like bombed. But here it was only neglect that produced this result. Those quarters have been built in the beginning of the 20th century, most probably after the big flood, that destroyed most of the old mud-houses in the old town of Baghdad.
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Those informations and much more you find in the new city map / town plan of Baghdad, based on my ground check in April-May 2004. If, for professional or political reasons, you need more detailed infos and maps, don't hesitate to contact us:
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