As a writer, before I ever tackle a subject, be it Suicide, or Robin Williams, or any other subjects I write about that aren't poems or short stories, sometimes even those, I ask one question that leads me down the path of researching: How come. Little did I know I found myself in this mode in real life as opposite to something I see or read about online. This whole dive started when I asked myself one question: How come most beggars I encounter near shrines have a child who suffers from hydrocephalus?
To those unaware of how hydrocephalus looks like, it basically leaves a child looking like this
So near shrines in Iraq -which there are many- there a lot of beggars, mainly women, holding their children having hydrocephalus. They sit and ask people for money while carrying their "child". Watching how familiar and repetitive that scene is the comedian in me asked himself the "how come" question in an almost Seinfeldian way. Little did I know, it wasn't a coincident at all.
How Deep Does it go?
Well, to be a beggar near shrines, turned out you need to pay specific fees.
1- Money for children
2- Space rent money
3- Protection money
1- Money for children
The most fascinating part is that there are people supplying those children for a set fee, around 25 dollars a day. Those people provide those children by paying families for their children, then add scars to those children, most of the times painted and created by specialist artists. Some cases, they actually inflect scars, something I will come back to later.
The payment for those children varies, on normal days it goes from 10 to 15 dollars. On special occasions, that is Ramadan, Eid, holy months such as this Islamic month Moharam, the payment goes up to 25-30 dollars.
2- Space Rent Money
Now, there are few specific places where you could make money, near crowded shops, public restrooms, near the entrance to the shrine, and finally inside the shrine itself. The fees vary -Just like the previous example- depending on the day, but also which of those places you want to occupy. Inside the shrine on normal days would cost you at least 100 dollars, could go up to 300 dollars on special occasions like the ones mentioned before.
So, how such a system can be maintained? This leads me to the third part
3- Protection Money
First of all there are gang members preventing any -Maybe actual- homeless people from begging in those areas, those are paid, the police don't intervene as they are paid as well as the shrine guards, especially by those who choose to beg inside the shrine.
This adds around another 10-25 dollars per beggar. Making the total cost of becoming a beggar in those areas is between 50-400 dollars a day, a DAY.
How do those people make so much money?
Well, the Imam Ali mosque/shrine sees around 4 million people annually, his sons Husayn and Abbas, around 30 millions. Visiting a shrine is a part of the annual death anniversary of someone in Iraq. To put this in perspective, Hajj in Saudi Arabia hosts around 12-17 millions a year, and Hajj is a pillar of Islam.
So there are thousands of people visiting those shrines in just regular days, tens of thousands on weekends, and millions on special occasions. People who go there are already in sin atoning mode therefore a giving mode.
A funny story happened to me back in my naive years was when I felt bad for a woman begging in the street and offered her around 40$ to clean the house once, she said that she makes more in an hour.
The disturbing parts
First of all, children with actual hydrocephalus go untreated and eventually die. People who often rent out their children seem to have such short sight, they don't believe in tomorrow, they believe in what they could make today. Therefore they don't think about the well-being of their children as much as they think about how much money they could make.
Another they have agreements with hospitals to cause actual deformities to men, as they are less likely to gain sympathy if they weren't deformed. Thus, there are men willingly get a hand or an arm cut off so they could make a living.
Finally, children in the industry.
There are parents who force their children into begging, punishing them if they return without bringing in a certain amount of money, often torturing them. Some children end up dying at the hands of their parents, especially fathers.
There are a sort of little communities of children begging in the street. Some of the children resort to prostitution once they are 11 and older. A certain group I encountered personally had a girl who is 12 years old who would be "rented" by this fat greasy car mechanic everyday. For little money such as 10-15 dollars, in some cases 5 dollars for a child rape, basically.
Also, some of those children themselves would actually rape each other. But due to the fact that those who are raped have no place to go, they stay in those groups. The way they would they talk makes you feel like it is a normal thing that happens.
Girls who get pregnant almost always end up dead, either by the group or family. Their death ends up being attributed to honor killings, random death, or not even questioned.
In Conclusion
Not counting
The underground begging industry in Iraq is something that is organized from top to bottom on a level that would put Apple, Nike, and Amazon sweatshops to shame, or more angelic depending on how you look at it. It is a system that is strict and corrupt on citizen and government level, it is as untouchable as Apple and Amazon, but unlike them, attempting to fight it would make you look like the bad.
It is an industry that makes people in charge of it hundreds of thousands of dollars on a local level, and tens of people dead due to direct murders, neglect, infections etc... It remains a thing, known to all, but a few to no people talking about it.