The lounge at the playwrights’ club in central Baghdad’s Karada district offers alcoholic beverages and dambala, a game similar to bingo. The scene there looks like a stock market’s trading floor as depicted in American movies. Everyone has taut nerves, tensely holds a pen and hears nothing but the sound of the numbered balls quickly spinning in the basket, as they are drawn one by one.

Mohammad Sami, a young taxi driver, slammed the table and threw his pen and paper when he heard the number 45 called. The man, in his 20s, wanted number 47, which would have paid for his accumulated debts. That number “would have won me $1,000,” he said angrily.

Sami and a few other young men have become addicted to dambala, which is being played at several Baghdad clubs to attract customers and make regular profits. They sit every day at the tables as if they were employees. Cigarette smoke surrounds them while they await to hear the numbers being called out. When they hear a number, they scratch it off the square card they have bought.

Dambala is similar to bingo. It consists of several cards, each of which has 20 numbers. One card costs 10,000 dinars to 15,000 dinars [$8.60 to $12.88]. The basket contains 90 numbered balls, which are drawn one after the other. The card whose 20 numbers are drawn first wins the grand cash prize, which is determined by the number of cards in play.