KARBALA, Iraq, March 30 -- A little after 6 a.m., as a relentless sun began burning through a gray sky, Abu Zahra and his men started their work. They stoked a fire with wood and kerosene, bringing to boil 110 pounds of garbanzo beans. They slaughtered three lambs. And they sipped sweet, dark tea on a morning imbued with ritual in one of Iraq's most sacred cities.
Around them, Karbala began to stir.
Pilgrims worship at the shrines of Hussein in Karbala on the eve of Arbaeen, the 40th day of mourning for Shiite Islam's most beloved saint.
(Hadi Mizban -- AP)
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Tentative at first, crowds ambled toward the gold-domed shrines of Imam Hussein, Shiite Islam's most beloved saint, and his half brother, Abbas. Young men loyal to militant clerics marched in military formation, pictures of their patrons taped to their shirts. Others beat their chests in ritual mourning known as lutm. Women cradled their young, their black abayas melting into the black banners fluttering along streets that overflowed with honeyed sweets, incense, religious books and prayer stones.
Green, red and white flags were unfurled, and an improvisational orchestra of mourning was unleashed: sorrowful chants for Hussein, pounding drums, laments crackling from rickety speakers and the shuffle of thousands of feet converging on the city.
Wednesday marked the eve of Arbaeen, the sacred 40th day of mourning for Hussein, the prophet Muhammad's grandson, who was killed with his thirsty, outnumbered followers in a battle here in 680. It was a day of spectacle: one of the most remarkable convergences of people in the Muslim world. And it was a day of ritual: the quiet routine through which Abu Zahra says he finds meaning.
"The best people never get tired, and they never lose patience," he said as he stirred the beans.
At once formal and intimate, routine these days is a powerful means of survival in Iraq. It is often rendered through the customs of burial, designed to bring comfort amid grief, to extract meaning from tragedy. It is constant, dignified and unhurried when little else is. This week in Karbala, a city blighted by suicide bombings last year on a similar holiday and shadowed by concerns about more of the same, it is an antidote to fear, an anchor in uncertainty.
For Abu Zahra, the ritual is making qima, the dish he and his men feed to thousands in the city.
"Take it easy, take it easy!" he shouted.
Men clad in black hurried across trampled and hardened ground, lugging the vat of beans. With a ladle known as a chifcheer, they poured the beans into pots, which drained into a bathtub. They then beat the beans into a paste with a mallet. To the side, three boys peeled and cut 20 pounds of onions with butcher knives. Another man checked on the cooking lamb.
Abu Zahra was one of three cooks at the camp of two tents. They arrived in Karbala 10 days ago after, as is custom, walking about 100 miles in plastic sandals from their village of Noamaniya in the southeastern province of Wasit. Their skin was leathery from walking 12 hours a day in an unforgiving sun. Each had a beard that came from sleeping more than a week in a tent.
"It's nothing!" Abu Zahra shouted. "Some people walk from Basra," a trip of 320 miles.
Abu Zahra is a spry man, with sad eyes that belie an exuberant charm. He has a prominent nose and a full head of gray hair that he keeps tucked under a red-and-white checkered scarf. His age is guesswork -- "50, 54, 55," he said, waving his hand. He talks as much as he cooks, ordering tea every so often for guests willing to chat.
"Ala ra'asi," he declared -- meaning, at your service. "I'm going to show you hospitality until you get fed up with me."
