[Jeff Head]

First, where did this kid get the money to finance such a venture? Does he have his own credit card and a megga account to make these flights? Why didn't his parents contact the authorities and embassy in Kuwait when they knew he was there and cut off his funds and have him sent home from there?

Second, as to this, I want to experience during my Christmas the same hardships ordinary Iraqis experience everyday, so that I may better empathize with their distress

Well, Farris, you cannot really do that with a ten thousand dollar credit card account letting you fly the heck in and out of there whenever you please...whenever you decide you have experienced enough. Knowing them would only come when you had no such option and then experienced what they experienced day in and day out for years. I don't think you really want that.

Finally, as to this: he also wrote in an essay saying he wanted to volunteer in Iraq.

I applaud this if it is relly true...the nearest recruiting station will help you realize those very ambitions and desires if they are truly what you want to do.

[VeniVidiVici]

Wow!

I at least hope he gets an 'A' out of it!

[inquest]

As a junior this year at a Pine Crest School, a prep academy of about 700 students in Fort Lauderdale, Hassan studied writers like John McPhee in the book "The New Journalism," an introduction to immersion journalism — a writer who lives the life of his subject in order to better understand it.

Diving headfirst into an assignment, Hassan, whose parents were born in Iraq but have lived in the United States for about 35 years, hung out at a local mosque. The teen, who says he has no religious affiliation, added that he even spent an entire night until 6 a.m. talking politics with a group of Muslim men, a level of "immersion" his teacher characterized as dangerous and irresponsible.

Why would that be dangerous? It's a religion of peace, after all. Didn't the teacher properly read the No Child Left Behind educational guidelines?

[ozzymandus]

His mother is a psychologist, which might wxplain why he's so screwed up.

[manwiththehands]

I'm surprised the AP didn't turn him over to insurgents for beheading just for the propaganda value.

[tet68]

Give the kid a little credit, it sounds like he learned
some lessons, AND he will kiss the ground when he lands in
the USA.

[Centurion2000]

Stupid kid, but also brave, lucky and probably a card carrying conservative after writing that paper and going through that experience.

[Sisku Hanne]

"Farris Hassan's Day Off"- coming to a theater near you.

[GovernmentShrinker]

His mother, Shatha Atiya, a psychologist

I think she's got a bit of work to do on her son . . .

He again called his father, who told him to come home. But the teen insisted on going to Baghdad. His father advised him to stay with family friends in Beirut, Lebanon, so he flew there, spending 10 days before flying to Baghdad on Christmas. His ride at Baghdad International Airport, arranged by the family friends in Lebanon

Family FRIENDS?!?!?!? And they didn't physically restrain the boy until his parents could come and fetch him?

His mother, however, sees things differently. "I don't think I will ever leave him in the house alone again," she said. "He showed a lack of judgment."

NOW she gets it. Shouldn't a psychologist have noticed a bit earlier on that her 16 year old son was not quite all there, and shouldn't be given thousands of dollars in cash to get himself in trouble with?

[Central Scrutiniser]

Cool stuff. If he really wanted a dangerous trip, he could have just wandered around Compton for a few days.

[OldFriend]

Is there not one brain cell amongst the entire bunch of imbeciles.

[Xenalyte]

His mother, Shatha Atiya, a psychologist, said she was "shocked and terrified."

How come Mom has a different last name from the little angel?

[TChad]

Good for him. Kid recognizes that upper-middle suburbia is not the real world, and is not challenging him or teaching him. So he sets out in search of the lessons of the real world, screw the risk. He now knows that he has courage.

[reagan_fanatic]

"Farris, you got some 'splainin to do..."

[Domangart]

This is a trip every J school student should make. Sort of thin the herd at the same time. What everyone failed to note is, he did not return to the same place or use the same route again. Also the Prodigal son returns so there was some relief.

[maine-iac7]

ummmmp ahhh, how was a 16 year old able to travel to a foreign country - let along that region - without verified, signed legal docs from parents?
My 16 year old niece had a terrible time getting into Canada, even tho she had signed parental slip, an older sister with her and being met by my son-in-law, a US Navy pilot on 'loan' to RCAF in Nova Scotia. They were going to send her back on ferry to US alone!

[kublia khan]

"He thinks he can be an ambassador for democracy around the world. It's admirable but also agony for a parent," Atiya said."

Sorry mom, but one that does something this stupid no matter what his age ends up with his name on his work-shirt. "Hutzpah" ain't worth a sh** without some brains to go along with it.

[Alouette]

I'll bet his hero is Johnny Lindh.

[AmericaUnited]

Wow! He'll go far if he manages to stay alive... :)

[Brit_Guy]

Now that takes me back! Well done to this kid. When I was 18 (a wee bit older than this one) - I took myself off for a years adventure and found myself working on the Southern Lebanese border and on my second night got to watch an incoming Hezbollah Katysha rocket. A few months later I got myself arrested in Jordan by the police after a row with a taxi driver over an inflated fee. In the rest of my life, in all the years since, in all the many (safer!) countries I have travelled too I don't think I have picked up as many unique stories as I did on that one mad trip. When you're a young kid you think you're immortal and it'll never happen to you. If you get away with it you get some great tales to tell!

(still when it goes wrong like that deluded 23 year old Brit in Gaza today I don't suppose the tales are quite as good)