"Madame Bomba" Gauges Citizens' Reactions to Recent Beirut Bombings

Dressed in black, with a costume of larger-than-life red TNT sticks strapped to her body, Lebanese multidisciplinary artist Rima Najdi – or, as she calls herself, "Madame Bomba" – took to the streets of Beirut to gauge the reactions of her fellow citizens. As reported by the Lebanese LBC TV channel on January 13, 2014. Najdi plans to make a documentary about her experiences and about how the Lebanese deal with the constant threat of bombings.

Following are excerpts from the report:

Reporter: In less than a week, 13 Lebanese citizens were killed in two explosions, which marked the end of 2013 and the beginning of 2014. Rima Najdi had an unusual response to these explosions. Rima transformed herself into "Madame Bomba," an "explosive" cartoon figure walking about the streets of Beirut.

Rima Najdi – "Madame Bomba": We are all afraid of the same thing. We see explosives wherever we go. I wanted to check how people react when they see explosives. I didn't want it to be too "in your face" or too aggressive. So I decided to do it in a more comical way.

Reporter: People's reactions to seeing TNT sticks walking among them varied from street to street.

Rima Najdi: On Al-Manara Street and Al-Mreisseh Street most people were amused, and others, who were afraid, expressed their fear. In Zaytuna Bay, they wouldn't let me in, so that I wouldn't scare the tourists. When I tried to enter the Beirut Souk, they told me to write an email to the Solidere Company for permissions, even though they brought a sniffer dog, and it turned out I wasn't a real terrorist.

Reporter: Rima wants to document what she did in a film, reviewing people's reactions to the real bombings and to her comic explosion.

Rima Najdi: I am not trying to make fun of people. It is important to me that some people wanted to take their photo with me, while other people were afraid and talked to me about it.

Reporter: Getting used to fear of death is not a natural thing. Madame Bomba laughs at our reality, and refuses to let us spend our lives waiting to become victims.

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