For Hadji Girl

Yet another reason why I write.. I'm doing this as the first post because it sums up well where we are today in terms of Muslim/non-Muslim relations. It also ties into the origin of this blog's name.

بسم الله الرحمن الرحي

In the name of God, the Most Merciful, the Most Forgiving

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This video was made in 2006 by a U.S. Marine stationed in Iraq. It's titled "Hadji Girl", and tells the story of the soldier's fictional (?) experience of getting ambushed by the family of an Iraqi girl and the fight that ensued.



The song was posted on youtube (and then banned from the site for some time) in March of '06 and got some attention in the media, though I never heard about it until discovering it earlier today. It was released at an especially inopportune moment for the military: during the aftermath of the killing of 15 unarmed civilians (including women and children) in the Iraqi city of Haditha by a group of U.S. Marines.

(Note: the word "Hadji" is a title for a Muslim who has done pilgrimage to Mecca. According to the BBC, it is also "commonly used as a term of insult against Iraqis among US troops.")

Here are the lyrics:

Hadji Girl

I was out in the sands of Iraq
And we were under attack
And I, well I didn't know where to go..

And the first thing that I could see
Was everybody's favorite Burger King
So I, threw open the door and I hit the floor.

Then suddenly to my surprise
I looked up and I saw her eyes
And I knew it was love at first sight.
And she said:

"Durka Durka Mohammed Jihad, [laughter, clapping]
Sherpa Sherpa Bak Allah"

- Hadji girl I can't understand what you're sayin'... [laughter]

And she said:

"Durka Durka Mohammed Jihad,
Sherpa Sherpa Bak Allah"

- Hadji girl I love you anyway.. [loud cheers]

Then she said that she wanted me to see;
She wanted me to go meet her family
But I, well I couldn't figure out how to say no.

- Cause I don't speak Arabic, so -[soft laughter]

She took me down an old dirt trail
And she pulled up to a side shanty
And she threw open the door and I hit the floor..

- 'Cause her brother and her father shouted:

"Durka Durka Mohammed Jihad, [laughter]
Sherpa Sherpa Bak Allah"

They pulled out their AKs so I could see..

And they said:

"Durka Durka Mohammed Jihad,
Sherpa Sherpa Bak Allah"

- So I grabbed her little sister and pulled her in front of me. [loud cheers and laughter]

As the bullets began to fly
The blood sprayed from between her eyes [amused laughter]
And then I laughed maniacally...

Then I hid behind the TV
And I locked and loaded my M-16
And I blew those little fuckers to etern-i-ty. [modest applause]

And I said:

"Durka Durka Mohammed Jihad, [laughter]
Sherpa Sherpa Bak Allah"

- They should've known they were fuckin' with the Marines.. [strong applause]

The song's refrain, "durka durka Mohhamed jihad", is a reference to a scene in the film "Team America: World Police", which "satirizes" America's foreign policy and the 'war on terror' (... kind of the same way Hadji Girl "satirizes" the killing of Iraqi children... or the way 'Larry the Cable Guy' "satirizes" being a redneck..). Anyway, here's the scene - set deep in Durkadurkistan:



Stylistically, Hadji Girl is similar to Adam Sandler's The Chanukah Song. Both are minimalist storytelling songs accompanied by acoustic guitar that rely heavily on comedic timing and audience reaction/participation. The climax of Sandler's "Chanukah Song" comes near the end, when he sings those classic lines "So drink your gin and tonic-ah / and smoke your marijuana-kah!" (later rhyming this with "have a happy [3x] Hanukkah").

Con/per-versely, the climax for Hadji Girl comes when the Marine belts out - in a guttural intonation reminiscent of Sandler's trademark style - the line about "grabbing her little sister" and using her as a human shield during the gun battle with her family. This, I think, is the most gruesome aspect of the entire song. "Laughing maniacally" as "the blood sprayed from between [the little sister's] eyes" is plenty insane, and describing the Iraqi family basically as sand critters ("those little fuckers") is obviously dehumanizing, but the positioning of "So I grabbed her little sister and put her in front of me" as the song's prime comedic moment is just unfathomably sick.

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Somehow, in its coverage of the "Hadji Girl" story, MSNBC managed to massively fail at describing the song's plot, saying that:

"Hadji Girl” tells a story of a Marine who falls in love with an Iraqi girl and is taken to meet her family. The girl’s family shoots her and then attacks the Marine, who uses her younger sister as a shield and watches blood spray from her head.

He then sings about blowing the father and brother “to eternity.”

Nowhere in the song is there any mention or insinuation of "Hadji Girl" being shot by her family. If anything, she would have been gunned down by the soldier when he "blew those little fuckers to etern-i-ty". But I suppose MSNBC can be excused, as it is, of course, only natural for Muslim/Arab men to murder their daughters..

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Yeah, so.. this is where we are. Anyone got a shovel? Hadji Girl needs a proper burial, and I need to dig my way out of here.

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The aftermath of the Haditha killings:

They should've known they were fuckin' with the Marines..

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Khuda Hafiz -- May God protect you
خُدا حافظ