Farewell to Santiago

USPA NEWS - As a start , let us ask :Have all of us become in the dream Santiago?The title may seem strange and incomprehensible and who is Santiago! Santiago is the hero of the novel( Alquimista )of the Portuguese writer ( Paulo Coelho ) which has been translated to 67 languages and entered the Guinness World

The story tells of a Spanish shepherd young who is the Andalusian shepherd "Santiago who lived in Spain and slept under a certain tree in some place in his town.Santiago dreams every day of a very great treasure buried under the pyramids of Egypt thus he has to arrive to the Pyramids to get the treasure and becomes one of the world rich men,
Santiago decided to travel leaving the tree under which he sleeps and to start his journey touring the country and crossing the seas and face the hardships until he arrived in the Pyramids in Egypt and started to dig under the Pyramids in the same place when he dreamed of the treasure in it.

After efforts and tiredness ,Santiago did not find the treasure which long he dreamed of but found a small paper containing the actual place in which the treasure exists!
The great astonishment to Santiago which represents his sole dream is buried in the same place of the tree under which he slept everyday in Spain.
The The real essence of this novel is that the dream of Santiago is under his head in his original homeland and at his home in Spain and that if the man wants to achieve his dream then he should seek it in his country.

This is the essence of similarities between him and the sons and families of our Iraqi poor people including the women,men,youth and children but even the elderly in some cases who tour the country and cross the seas and face the hardships in order to achieve their dream in seeking refuge to one of the European countries to obtain the treasure which represents the safety and security and to secure the future of their sons and leave their country and real dream and their genuine history considering that many of them lost their lives either in drowning or as a result of strain and tiredness which they faced plus risks which arise out of such trip which ,if we want to label it with a convenient title,is the Trip of Death.

But the migration of the sons of Iraq is not to seek a dream or a treasure at all but to search for a decent life or to secure longer years of life for their sons and to avoid what the Iraqi man suffers of car bombs and explosives in his own country or the Iraqi may leave his country as a migrant to refuge countries to escape the fear of being slaughtered or killed due to his name or sect with which he has no guilt but only he is born to the world with his present name and belongs to such sect.

The theme of the novel and its significance is how man belongs to his homeland and what rights he holds and what duties he does as well as how the citizen can benefit from the welfare of his country and prospers with its riches .But all of these dreams went unheeded due to the bloody events from which Iraq suffers since 2003 till today in addition to the destruction of the infrastructure of the country as well as the lack of human livelihood in it.

These were the first cause of the migration of millions of Iraqis to the countries of Europe ,America and Canada meantime the series of migration ,travel and asylum continue especially aftermath the events of the entry of ISIS and other repercussions and political disagreements among the political class itself which have been reflected over the Iraqi citizen.
Last but not least (Did all of us became in the dream of Santiago)