At You I Stare In Disbelief

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I wrote this a while ago (mid-November, when #JeddahFire had just happened and the Egyptian protests were raging) and never got around to posting it. It's somewhat dated, but -I hope - still relevant, and decided to post it anyway.

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These days, the thoughts - the emotions - that cross my mind most when watching the news or when I'm on Twitter are ones of horror, pain (only something non human would not feel pain).... but most of all, disbelief.

Disbelief. Surprise. Shock.

Because most of all, what I think is:

How can this be happening? How can this all be true? It can't be true!

It all sounds like a cruel joke.

How can the great heroes of the Egyptian revolution still be suffering? January 25th, your fighting spirit has returned; but never again did we want to see the likes of January 28th.

How can the grand Midan el-Tahrir - Freedom Square - echo once again with screams and cries of pain, choked with tear gas and riddled with rubber bullets - but resound with chants of freedom?

HOW CAN THE BLOOD OF THE MARTYRS HAVE BEEN WASTED?

How can the brave sons and daughters of Syria still be suffering under their wicked tyrant?

How can things be the way they are?

Closer to home... In Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, one of the richest countries in the world - how can a girl's school burn down and cause numerous injuries, and several deaths?

The same city that saw tens killed and injured and millions in property damage in the past two years, because of flooding - from *rain*? The same city where people, now, in the winter with the rainy season coming up, look up to cloudy skies with worry clouding their own eyes?

The same city where I have seen no tangible improvement, nothing to prevent the same thing from happening again?

World, at you I stare in disbelief.

People - mankind - all of humanity -

At you I stare in disbelief. At our future, I eye in apprehension and stark fear. The rage at our present is building.

And then I roar -

ENOUGH!

On Revolutions, Saudi, and What Might Happen

Bluntly put, my opinion is worthless. After all, I'm just another spectator of the upheaval going on in Middle East countries. I merely happen to be closer to the epicenter than most people I know, right here at home in Saudi Arabia - where the latest chapter of the ongoing Arab revolution was supposed to happen.

Today, March 11, there was a fair amount of hysteria going on within and without the country about it. The story was that there was going to be a 'Day of Rage', beginning from after the Friday prayers - familiar to those who've been keeping up with Arab protests as a strategy to get as many people together as possible, the prayers being mandatory for every Muslim male to attend. Family members went today, and they came back with nothing but a tale of lots of police cars around the perceived 'danger zone' (interspersed with over-excited exaggerations from the younger one, of course), and nothing else.

I wasn't surprised.

In clear terms, I don't think a revolution in Saudi at this point is going to work. For one, King Abdullah is loved by the people. He recently returned from a lengthy recuperation from a back injury abroad, which brought on a fierce wave of patriotic feeling in most Saudis. I was out late on the day the King returned, and I was entertained at a long stoplight (with a foreign driver, a stranger to me, at the wheel, of course) by the sight of at least thirty cars full of young guys - who don't really need an excuse to coast the streets waving flags and whooping - doing just that. Bellowing the national anthem (off-key, may I add) as though the Saudi national team had just won a match. It's a superficial display of affection, like the BBM I got with the poetic "People burn themselves in protest, but we burn on the inside with love for our king", but genuine. Revolution will happen, if ever, after the king dies, but not before.

In general, the Saudi people are content. Yes, there are ludicrous violations of human rights; women are treated scandalously; rampant corruption exists unbridled, and there are scores of examples to set for each of these and many other offenses, a sea of details I don't need to dip my toe in at the moment. But Saudis (well, admittedly I've mostly talked to schoolgirls) are mostly of the opinion that the notion of protesting is foreign. That Shias, that Iran, that general malcontents - not us, not real Saudis - are instigating the unrest is the general consensus.

Helping is the manipulation of religion the Saudi government has going on - has had going on for quite a while - justifying itself. In one of my religious subjects last term, my book said that it was haram or unlawful to challenge the leader, the one in position - even if that leader is unfair/committing sins/being generally awful. This strikes a nerve with me, because in my opinion the great Muslim stagnation of the last centuries was caused in part by ineffectual, unfit, unchallenged rulers who used religion much as modern dictators have.

All in all, though, I just hope for the best. Dialogue, as the foreign minister said, can indeed solve much of Saudi Arabia's problems - if the government will heed the voices of its people and the warning of the fates of dictators past (and recent). Who'd have imagined, several months ago, that Mubarak and Ben Ali would be gone, Gaddafi and others teetering precariously on the same yawning chasm? Perhaps a few months further and we will be looking back in deeper skepticism, wondering at how we were in March!

So let us pray that God will lead us all out of this as a better, improved, more dynamic Saudi Arabia; as, indeed, I pray for the entirety of the Middle East.

The Sorry-I've-Been-A-Neglecting-Beast Post

It's pretty ironic that my last post on this blog is dated almost exactly a month ago. The last time I clicked 'Publish Post', it was January 25 - the day of the beginning of the Egyptian uprising, a most exciting chapter of the ongoing Arab revolution that has made the world sit up and take notice, that made me start feverishly using Twitter in an effort to find out and be updated on just what was going on.

Ironically, the very reason I have been neglecting this blog for a while.

You see, when you are busy checking a social networking site every few seconds (BlackBerries are both a blessing and a curse), checking the TV, checking newspapers, the whole shebang, you tend to neglect other, lesser-seeming stuff. Such as blogging to a nonexistent audience. It's the bitter truth that I must confront myself with. Sorry.

Add to that high school end-of-term exams (several of which I botched, incidentally.) Add to that a sudden resurgence of my until-recently-dormant desire to write FICTION, and this blog has been poorly neglected indeed.

Those are the factors which have left this blog so silent, dank and forlorn-looking. The fact that the color scheme is black doesn't help much either.

So here is the inevitable question - whatever shall I write about on this blog next? Probably politics - the eruption that is going on next door (I'm in Saudi Arabia, one of the lucky people who can call the Middle East 'next door') is far too noisy, colorful and dangerous to ignore. Until then, fellas - @TheLogicker on Twitter is where I can most definitely (thanks to that darned Blackberry) be found.

Now, a month and a day after January 25, I shall click 'Publish Post'. A post that is about absolutely nothing.

I hope you enjoyed it. :)