Mailing address for the Al Basrah Central Library in Iraq

January 14, 2014 6:38 AM

I am looking for the mailing address for the Al Basrah Central Library in Iraq.

My students read the book The Librarian of Basra and wrote letters to the librarian Alia Baker. I would like to mail them to Iraq, but I'm having a hard time finding a mailing address. This is what I see on Google Maps. Basra Public Library
Al-Saady St, Basrah, Iraq , but I don't see the street number? I'm also not sure what other numbers should be included to mail to another country?

I'd also really like to include a short Arabic letter that states who we are and why we are including a bunch of English letters to the Library for politeness sake. I've posted a link on MefiJobs, but I haven't gotten any takers. Where would be a good place to post this kind of job, ODesk?

posted by aetg to Education (4 answers total)

You might want to try contacting the book's publisher. They might have received requests like this before. They are very likely to know whether Alia Muhammad Baker is open to receiving letters like these, and if so, where they should be mailed.

For example, most publishing houses receive and forward letters addressed to their authors. This is a slightly different situation, but I suspect they might do something similar for you.
posted by snorkmaiden at 7:41 AM on January 14, 2014 [1 favorite]

You also might try going through the Embassy's PR or cultural affairs office.
posted by Ideefixe at 9:26 AM on January 14, 2014

Best answer: There might not be a street number for the library. I am not certain whether things are the same in Iraq, but I know a lot of mailing addresses in the Middle East (I've mailed things in the UAE and KSA mostly) don't have street addresses as we might know them.

Drop me a MeMail with what you'd like included in the Arabic letter and I will ask my partner to write it up for you.
posted by gursky at 7:13 AM on January 15, 2014 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: gursky, Thank you for the response and thank you VERY much for the offer. I really wanted to send them off and thought it might be a little audacious to send a bunch of letters that would need translated with no obvious reason or purpose. Thanks.
posted by aetg at 5:18 PM on January 15, 2014