Ground Zero from the Cold...

I am not sure if you have ever experienced that yourself, that of belonging to another universe, speaking a different language, even though you like to believe you are part of "it" all...the "here and now" of it all.

Less than one hour's flight lies between the "statelet" (as a friend calls it) and between my Beloved, and if feels as if more than a trillion miles separate those two realities.

Can you imagine what it must feel like between another group of statelets -also known as the United States- and statelets is what they are, and my Beloved ?

I'm someone who always prided herself on what I deemed to be a "great sense of adaptability." Yet language fails me tonight.

I'm someone who strongly believed in bridges and a common heritage beyond history and culture, but then again, am taught a lesson, lesson 101 in revising long held beliefs...

I was with a group of people. I was asked to speak so I spoke...

They asked me about torture and I spoke of isolation. The different forms of torture; mental, moral, spiritual, sexual, physical and the "Stockholm syndrome."

I spoke of torture and isolation relegating you back to your infantile state where you are forced to bond with your torturer. Because that is what torture and isolation are all about. They are meant to break you and regress you to ground Zero, a ground where you will seek any attachment to life even with your own regular visiting sadist.

I spoke of rows of orphans and widows begging for food, waiting desperately for morsels to fall into a dirty disposable plate, as disposable as their lives...

I spoke of a foreigner called an American waiting to fuck a hajji "coz it's so cool and gives an awesome feeling once you finish him off."

I spoke of the Eye Raqi being a foreigner in his/her own land, considered an excess, a nuisance, easily eliminated for the sake of "peace."

I spoke of the different methods of breaking a spirit, of erasing a history, a culture...of nullifying a presence...

I spoke of every time you inhale- the most basic of vital functions- there is an invisible dust lodging in your nose, lodging in your lungs and you know you might die from it and it's called Depleted Uranium.

I spoke about every time you ingest food, you know fully well it's contaminated with poison but, being human and needing to survive, you have no choice but to ingest it, knowing fully well, it will kill you.

I spoke of how being "human" has a price attached to it, depending on your race and your religion.

I spoke of our favorite color black, because it’s the only color that expresses who we are today.

I spoke of women and girls selling themselves and yet those same people that drove them to "it" ,target them and eliminate them for not obeying rules...rules imposed by a group of men who use God as the ultimate authority when they have no legitimacy themselves.

I spoke of many things...

But it's as if I was speaking in the void, in the cold...

It's as if I was speaking from ground Zero. And Zero echo is what I got.

I am someone who not only prided herself on her "sense of adaptability" but also on her keen sense of "observation."

And I observed...I observed alright.

I saw people checking their watches even though I only had a mere 20 minutes to speak.

I saw people diverting the subject. I saw people giggling. I saw people yawning. I saw people sending messages on their cell phones...

Am no boring speaker. I go straight to the point. I don't mince words. I give it the way it is...I give it the way it ought to be given.

But these people had more "important" things to do...

They had to catch up with the latest Egyptian TV serial. The Dow Jones. The girl friend - maybe this time they will convince her to bed. The business deal to finalize. The party they had to go to, where they can "shine" and make a final impression.

In sum, they had more "important things"...

At one point, I looked at "my audience" and saw a group of skulls and bones seated on red chairs, holding a cell phone in their hands...

I looked and felt am in a cemetery.

The moderator, sensing my silence, said "Ms. Anwar you have 5 more minutes."

I replied in a zombie trance like state "Will these 5 minutes make a difference?"

I did not even bother to wrap up.

There was no wrapping up to do, it's an ongoing story happening not too far away...

This is a statelet, not too far away and these were the reactions.

Can you imagine what it must be like in the "civilized" world?

Can you imagine what it must be like in the conglomerate of pathetic statelets called the United States?

There is no more time for niceties - listen to me, look at me kind of niceties. This is the time for another manifesto.

A shake you into a fucking Iraqi oblivion manifesto from ground Zero, a manifesto from the cold...

And I have always prided myself on delivering my promises. And a promise I am making to you. You will get it. For sure, you will.

From ground Zero, from the cold, you will get it.

Warm up to the idea, now. For it's coming...

Picture: Best ever.