When a British (Yorkshire) woman died in Baghdad in 1926, it was reported that the whole city, together with Islamic leaders and desert sheikhs, turned out to follow her coffin. Who was this woman? And what is her relevance today?
An excellent biography of Gertrude Bell, the woman behind the creation of modern Iraq, goes far towards making her a true heroine, a Gertrude of Arabia to match her friend, T.E. Lawrence, says The Economist. “By all accounts Gertrude Bell was a phenomenon. Plus she wore beautiful clothes.
“At Oxford in 1888, she was the first woman to take a First in Modern History. She fell in love with the desert and its archaeological remains, and between 1900 and 1913 journeyed about 20,000 miles (more than 30,000km), from Istanbul to the Syrian desert, from Damascus to the Tigris.
“An unveiled woman, leading her caravan, she conversed with warrior chieftains and wrote it all down in her diary: the feuds and alliances, the routes and water sources, the flowers and ruins…
“But the first world war changed all that. Turkey entered on Germany’s side. All her knowledge and friendships were now hot information. In 1915 came the order: Major Miss Bell was to join the intelligence men in Cairo, ‘the first woman officer in the history of military intelligence’….”
It is said: “Gertrude Bell (1868-1926) was a lone English woman in the male Muslim world of the Middle East; a famous author who wrote about the Arabs, an acknowledged archeologist, a courageous traveler who dined with china and crystal, dressed in extravagant clothes, rode on a camel and horse and penetrated dangerous regions of the Arabian desert.
“Ms. Bell was the most powerful woman in the British Empire in the years after WW1. She was named to the high post of Oriental Secretary and achieved nothing less than a miracle by creating the modern state of Iraq. Gertrude was the winner of the gold medal of the Royal Geographical Society; the honorary director of antiquities at the Baghdad Museum; and the recipient of a Commander of the Order of the British Empire.”
It is also said that: “Though she is remembered today mainly by Middle East scholars and travel writers, there has recently been a modest revival of interest in Gertrude Bell (1868-1926) because of the key role she played in the creation of modern Iraq in the early 1920s.
“She was involved not only in putting King Faisal, son of the Hashemite Sharif of Mecca, on the throne in Baghdad, but helped draw the new country’s borders and mobilized its tribes and religious groups to support the new nation-state.
“To read her copious letters from Baghdad during the 1920s is like scanning this week’s headlines: many of the issues she confronted are the same ones the U.S. administrators and the new Iraqi government are dealing with today.”
As I said in one of my earlier posts, at times a woman can do a job far better than a man!!!
Swaraaj Chauhan describes his two-decade-long stint as a full-time journalist as eventful, purposeful, and full of joy and excitement. In 1993 he could foresee a different work culture appearing on the horizon, and decided to devote full time to teaching journalism (also, partly, with a desire to give back to the community from where he had enriched himself so much.)
Alongside, he worked for about a year in 1993 for the US State Department’s SPAN magazine, a nearly five-decade-old art and culture monthly magazine promoting US-India relations. It gave him an excellent opportunity to learn about things American, plus the pleasure of playing tennis in the lavish American embassy compound in the heart of New Delhi.
In !995 he joined WWF-India as a full-time media and environment education consultant and worked there for five years travelling a great deal, including to Husum in Germany as a part of the international team to formulate WWF’s Eco-tourism policy.
He taught journalism to honors students in a college affiliated to the University of Delhi, as also at the prestigious Indian Institute of Mass Communication where he lectured on “Development Journalism” to mid-career journalists/Information officers from the SAARC, African, East European and Latin American countries, for eight years.
In 2004 the BBC World Service Trust (BBC WST) selected him as a Trainer/Mentor for India under a European Union project. In 2008/09 He completed another European Union-funded project for the BBC WST related to Disaster Management and media coverage in two eastern States in India — West Bengal and Orissa.
Last year, he spent a couple of months in Australia and enjoyed trekking, and also taught for a while at the University of South Australia.
Recently, he was appointed as a Member of the Board of Studies at Chitkara University in Chandigarh, a beautiful city in North India designed by the famous Swiss/French architect Le Corbusier. He also teaches undergraduate and postgraduate students there.
He loves trekking, especially in the hills, and never misses an opportunity to play a game of tennis. The Western and Indian classical music are always within his reach for instant relaxation.
And last, but not least, is his firm belief in the power of the positive thought to heal oneself and others.