Category: News

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Ten years ago

It’s been 10 years since we lost our dad. This photo was taken in Amman just before my father and I drove back to Baghdad in early 2004 and the beginning of an intense, life-changing journey documented in my film Nice Bombs.

We had been apart for many years and away from Iraq for more than 24 years, which made the trip deeply significant. My father, Hameed, was a risk-taker and adventurer who never needed a map. “Let’s just keep driving,” he would say, and this helped when I took my own risks and traveled and entered new and strange places.

It’s ironic that he brought us to the United States, yet was never able to truly settle here.

Becoming a father myself, growing older, and reflecting on my own childhood have given me an even deeper love and appreciation for my father.

I miss you, Dad 🤍

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Mountainfilm Festival and Trip Ziggurat

Lauren and I had such a fun and memorable experience at Mountainfilm festival! It was so great to connect and bond with other artists and filmmakers. I was also so happy to reconnect with my former students who are part of the Mountainfilm Festival crew.

Also a shoutout to Firelight Media, our amazing production studio behind our film Trip Ziggurat.

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Through the Student Lens featured in the Collegian

“Through the Student Lens” festival presents assorted work, boosts film accessibility

“It’s just nice for us to get together in a dark theater and share a world,” Alshaibi said during the Friday showing. “I really believe that filmmaking is a way to enter another person’s life, to enter someone’s dreams and their desires and their fears, and to share that experience helps us to understand one another a little better. I think it makes a better world when we can all share our stories.” (read more)