Reality TV hits home in Baghdad

Today, the crew is going to the Sunni stronghold of Adhamiya, a tough neighborhood where residents still battle US troops. For protection, everybody wears white baseball caps with the Sharqiya logo emblazoned in Arabic, which they jokingly call their hijabs (head scarves). Two months ago, Mahdi Army militants pistol-whipped a Sharqiya cameraman, thinking he was a Western journalist, and stole his equipment. They gave it back when they realized he was from an Iraqi station.

"OK, everybody, put on your hijabs," says Riyadh Salman, the show's gentle bear of a producer, as the car pulls up to Kadhim's house.

Inside, an overwhelmed Kadhim watches while the crew unloads box after box into a room. "On our program, the last episode is like Christmas," says Mr. Hanoon, smiling with pride.

Kadhim's house was reduced to a smoking ruin on April 9, 2003, as coalition troops battled fedayeen loyalists in a cemetery across the street. Today, it has been recreated down to the last detail. "There were scorpions in our house, the walls were black with smoke, there was no roof," says Ahmed Abbas Kadouri, Kadhim's adult son, showing photos of charred walls. "And you see it now."

Mr. Kadouri applied to a host of aid agencies - US, European, and Iraqi - without result. Then Sharqiya chose them for its second house. (Usually, families apply via e-mail - so far, the station has received 3,000 applications from Baghdad alone).

Standing in a forest of new appliances, Kadhim recites a Koran verse about how good deeds multiply. "Those who spend their wealth in the way of God are like a grain of corn," he says emotionally. "It grows seven ears, and each ear has a hundred grains."

As the crew leaves, the family spills out on to the street for a joyous sendoff. Beside their door is a plaque: "On May 4, 2004, AL SHARQIYA TV rebuilt this house, which was destroyed by war," it reads, the station's name in large green letters.

"Just wait," jokes Kadhim. "Tonight, there will be more fighting, and the house will be ruined again. And it will say 'This is the house that was rebuilt, and then rebuilt again, by Al Sharqiya television!'"

Everybody laughs, but the joke is serious. The night before, US troops battled militants in their neighborhood, breaking one of Kadhim's brand-new windows.

On the way back to the station, the crew stops to look at a house whose roof was ripped off. As they film it, a blast rips through the air, and smoke billows from a nearby mosque. The next day, "Labor and Materials" shows footage of the blast, which killed a young boy, as well as of Kadhim's house. "I like the program, and Al-Sharqiya, because it expresses the suffering of Iraqis without making it pretty," says Mrs. Redha. "It shows the reality."

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