Little Victories

  Thousands of Algerians flooded the streets of the French capital Paris following their team’s victory over Egypt in the decisive world cup qualifying game yesterday. Algerians of all ages and genders flocked to the Parisian city centers to celebrate the Algerian team’s historical victory and consequent world cup qualification. Why are Algerians celebrating the victory of their team in France? Who are these Algerians really? Aren’t they French citizens before they are Algerians? Why would the citizens of a sovereign nation celebrate the victory of a foreign team? The sight of the Algerian celebration on French soil was perplexing at best, brining to mind the painful oddity of a foreign community that could not assimilate itself with the rest of the national population despite decades of coexistence.

  What added insult to national injury was how the Algerians waved high the flag of a foreign country along the streets of Paris and how they chanted ‘Viva Algerie’ as the ‘original’ inhabitants of the land passed by innocuously. The Al-Jazeera Arabic news station which is banned from opening any offices in Algiers or anywhere in Algeria used Paris as the launching-pad for its reporting on the Algerian victory celebration. The report featured-among other things- brief interviews with some of the Algerian revelers as they hooted, tooted and chanted Algerian nationalistic slogans blessing and commemorating the Algerian revolution. The art of using a small seemingly frivolous occasion to parade national cataclysms is nothing new for Arabs, yet the rich irony of people celebrating the revolution of a nation against the country where they currently reside was apparently lost on Al-Jazeera. A television station touting agendas such as that of Al-Jazeera often lends itself to the agonizingly wry paradox of blowing out of proportion the foreign incursions on Arab national views and symbols while raptly celebrating the sore-thumb in-your-face antagonism of the European Zeitgeist by Arab minority groups. The view of Algerian flags coloring the Parisian night sky and whirling around French landmark symbols such as the Arc de triomphe delighted the Al-Jazeera reporter as he proclaimed that day to be a day of joyous pride for all Algerians.

  The irony gets richer, on the same night when the Algerian citizens of France were celebrating their mother-country’s victory, the French national team also won a ticket to the world cup finals in South Africa following a draw with Ireland ( shame on you Henry for touching the ball with your hand). The real white éclair eating French were celebrating that occasion on the other non-Algerian infested part of the capital. If this proves anything it is this: the French, despite the snootiness of their pundits’ mustaches, the chauvinism of their secular culture and the abysmally bad behavior of their passengers aboard airplanes, are a tolerant nation, or else how could one explain their acceptance of such a flagrant display of foreign nationalism on their soil. I wonder what the situation would have been like if instead of Algerians we had Hindu Indians rejoicing the victory of their national cricket team on the streets of Saudi Arabia…hmmmmm!!!!

  The fact of the matter is that we Arabs bask in hypocrisy as often as we blame others for it; we consider it an affront to our culture when western women wear mini-skirts on our streets but we cheer our cohorts as they wrap foreign Arab flags around the base of the Eiffel tower, we want others to respect Islam as we sit and listen obsequiously to Islamic sermons that rebuke all other religions, we want other countries to grant us rights to build mosques while we frown at the infidels who build churches and temples on our holy soil, we call a foreign president who kills our people a ‘war criminal’ but an Arab president who does the same thing a ‘hero’, we want for our minorities to be forcefully assimilated into western populations without ever having to accept a single cultural tenant of that society, we want the whole world to call our homegrown terrorists ‘jehadists’ and holy freedom fighters. It is also no secret that we Arabs wallow away in the lowermost strata of global culture, politics, economics, arts and even sports, so it is no surprise then that when a small victory comes our way we labor assiduously to celebrate it even if it is a victory over some of our own. Arabs live most of their lives in a cultural void where fair and accessible political systems are nonexistent, freedoms of expression are a taboo and arts are subjected to the onerous scrutiny of archaic, myopic and stifling religious institutions.

  Some might argue that the Algerian display of horizontally misplaced and anachronistic nationalism is but a seething outburst of indignation at a government that has miserably failed to properly assimilate them with the rest of society. Arab communities exist and flourish in various places allover the globe, the Arab communities of South America for instance serve as a marvelous example of near seamless assimilation and exemplary contribution by a foreign minority in the predominant culture’s progress and wellbeing. The Arab community in Australia has recently celebrated the invaluable contribution of 300 of its members in the various sectors of Australian society from politics, to theology, to arts and literature, to medicine; a bright shinning example of the fundamentally positive role played by Arab minorities in foreign cultures.

   My intention behind writing this article was to merely capture an ephemeral sentiment against a background of a much greater problem; a problem that some conspiracy theorists among us call the ‘great conspiracy’ against Islam. One thing is for sure, the Algerians are not likely to forget anytime soon the slaughter of one million of their country’s men and women at the hands of the French colonists, they are not likely to forget Jamila Buhraid, and unless a better mean of expression is devised they will continue to use sports-especially football- as a lectern from which they make the voices of their indignation heard.

Titles

 

  In a recent article which I have written and posted to my blog titled ‘The almost man’ I have made a passing mention of my spurious intention to work for the porn industry as a ‘title writer’.  The note ( a cheap yet tactical ruse) was initially written as a jape aimed at generating some frivolous laughter from my audience, but much to my surprise I found myself getting down to it and actually compiling a list of potential titles for porno flicks, below is a list of some of these titles:

-          Fist full of nuts

-          Hung jury

-          Topless in Seattle

-          Easy cum easy go

-          Booty and the beast

-          On cloud 69

-          The curious case of Benjamin Buttocks (Gay porn)

-          Straddle and hum

-          Teabaging Texas

-          A tale of two pussies

-          Gag order

-          Don’t cry for me Saudi Arabia (Gay porn)

-          Facial discrimination

-          Chiti chiti gangbang

-          Tongue ho

-          Poke-her-face

-          Fun with Dick and balls

 

Thank you for reading….feel free to use the above titles for your own merry home movies.

The ‘almost’ man

 

 The cursor flickered on for a while before I was finally able to write and fill these lines with words. Dire is the human condition that brings forth such stagnation and torpor. I have suffered immensely from my unemployment, yet I don’t think that unemployment is the sole reason why I feel the way I do right now, for I have always been a malcontent, lounging on the couch using one hand to clinch a fist of anger at a sick war-torn world and the other to enthusiastically masturbate with. Speaking of masturbation, I did so twice last night to the digital images of Sophie Dee getting pounded by two black cocks. For marketing purposes she acted like she never had a black cock before, in accordance with the oldest trick in the porno book, she feigned innocence and stupidity to stoke up more of her viewers’ excitement; man’s sexual desires are inflamed by the paradox of the slut acting innocently and the innocent occasionally strutting around sluttishly. I wonder if someone else was watching that same porn last night at the exact same time when I was watching it, if yes, I wonder what they were wearing.  

 

  After my masturbatory teleconference I scraped the cum off my dickhead and sat in the dark smoking a flimsy ol’ fig from Marlboro country. I was unable to go to sleep, the ghosts I sleep with every night refused to share the bed with me as they did once or twice before. I suspect we all sleep with ghosts, but hardly any one of us really admits it. I sat in the dark for a while contemplating a life that is better off lived in an ashtray, I was ready for judgment day, or night, waiting for fire and brimstone to light up the sky over my crowded neighborhood, I waited for a rapturous uplift to heaven to meet the saints and the working class, and then for a whirly spiral down to hell to meet people like myself, I waited for the sedative that I’ve consumed to take effect, but nothing…nothing but the afterimage of Sophie Dee getting pounded by two pitch-black cocks.  

 

  It is now high noon in the Persian Gulf, I turned my curtains up to let some goodly sunshine in, I feel great, invincible in my futility, I feel like going out for something that no one has ever tried before like tea with milk or watered-down tequila. I feel like teaching my cock how to spit gooey arsenic bubbles before I take it straight to my former boss’s mouth. I feel like, more attainably perhaps, watching another porno, this time I’ll focus on how it feels to be a man. For the past three paragraphs I have managed to keep my personality faceless and my identity concealed, but no more…ladies and gentlemen meet the ‘almost’ man.   

 

   One night while I was out partying with some friends (two to be exact) in the ever so decadent flux of Dubai, I decided to spend the night at a hotel instead of going back home. After an extraneous reservation process in which I was required to show my ID at the reception desk, I was given an access card to a room on the fourth floor. The bar heaving with Slavic prostitutes spilled its noise over to the lobby as I stammered to the elevator which, on this particular occasion, lived up to its name by elevating me instead of bringing me down like it usually does. I got to my 3-star room, took my shoes off and jumped on the bed where I remained in a fetal position supine for a long while, thinking about how disappointed the Filipina receptionist was with her life. Then with the might and money I had left I launched a blitzkrieg on the unsuspecting mini-bar where sippy-size bottles named after countries and drunken Generals waited ever so gracefully for my puckered up lips. I drank em’, I drank em’ all… and that, ladies and gentlemen, was the cataclysmic event that triggered the global economic recession.

 

   My previous job was not much, like its predecessors it was enthusiastically miscommunicated to me, this time by two people who I later found out were the CEO and the HR manager. They managed to wrap me up in the subterfuge faster than I was able to find the Arabic equivalent for ‘Ay Ay captain’, and by the time I realized the true nature of my symbolically janitorial position I was in deep with the bank and government.  For a moment when the lady CEO, whose father owned the little corporate fiefdom, was describing the job to me, I thought I will be picking-up VIPs and celebrities from the airport; this is pretty fucking exciting I thought to myself. The thought carried on for a few days after I signed the contract but before I actually started working. I went out shopping for a new sartorial ensemble, thinking all the while about how I was to look just in case Rose McGowan’s name popped up on the list of airport arrivals. Oh Rose you’re so beautiful and pale, and I assume you’re now unemployed too!

 

  Eventually I discovered that the job had nothing to do with picking-up Roses, but rather freshly imported Indian and Nepali waiters, dishwashers and busboys. Dubai Dubai! The city that spins and browbeats the emaciated and the impoverished into a never-ending cycle of hire and fire, import and deport, treat and mistreat…lube and fuck. To ameliorate my sense of appreciation for the job I began thinking about how being alone with Rose aboard the company bus would have actually ruined my career and life, after all how on earth would it have been possible for me to stare at the impeccable translucence of her skin without aimlessly asking her out or offering her a pearl necklace.

 

 I keep memories and delusions such as the aforementioned from my old job close to my heart. I actually miss the Indians and Nepalis I use to meet and greet at the airport, I miss their abysmally horrible grasp over the most basic grammatical rules of the English language and how they silently struggled to teach me the true meaning of people skills. Today I am a barely lucid organism that swings between the pungent smell of the morning’s scrambled eggs and the nightly feel of cotton bed sheets on my body. Unemployment reduces the human senses and sensibilities to their bare minimum levels. In-between there is always the news on TV, to the unemployed the news about the global recession getting worse are like a peanut addiction after an anaphylactic shock. Dark and dirty thoughts often come to mind as a result, thoughts about finding a job!

 

  Being unemployed attracts attention, especially in a city like Dubai where everyone has to have a job or else face the possibility of getting deeeported (the multiple Es signify the irony and the national government’s enthusiasm to deport). I am acutely aware of that fact, my family is too, my father prays insistently that I find employment soon; his prayers are often louder and more somber than the sound of a shofar blowing at the end of days. The unemployed man in Dubai is much like a leper or a man who savors the smell of his own fart; in either case a public appearance is often inauspicious. Unemployment in Dubai borders a taboo, there are no support-groups, help centers or psychiatric wards that could help the individual cope with the stagnation and the pecuniary plight, unlike in the US or Europe where support-groups are copious in their availability and useful in their ability to help everyone from the unemployed to the coprophiliac.

 

  Waaaah! I’m confused, I even had to strip naked to focus on what I am writing. Unemployment makes an evil man out of me, an evil man who now enjoys hearing about the tired, the hungry, the underappreciated, the suicidal and the wretched refuse of the third world. Hey! Whatever happened to that term anyway? The Third World? Political correctness turned it into ‘the developing world’, as in the world that eagerly awaits western handouts and falls flat on its back when capitalism is snagged. I am an unemployed man trapped in a concrete jungle. I am thinking about sending out a unique call for help; a modern call so avant garde, a free-verse poetic SOS, an upward spiral of pink perfectly circular smoke signals, a lascivious baritone distress call ‘hey baby Mayday Mayday’, an upside-down flag made of Chanel haute couture.

 

 

  I have also thought about the various other ways through which I could make a buck and be famous as well, below is the numbered bulletin containing some of these ways:

 

1-  Grow my armpit hair long enough to compete for a page in the Guinness Book.

2-  Drink more Guinness.

3-  Work for the Porn industry as a ‘movie title’ writer.

4-  Work in the restaurant business as a menu writer; I would use my linguistic proficiency to produce eloquently-written menus that highlight the succulence of the dishes hence eliminating the age-old customer dependence on menus with pictures.

5-  Revive the old profession of Town crier and experiment with its application in major cities in Europe and North America.

6-  Make an attempt to fly by covering my entire body with feathers and jumping off a high tower. The fact that airplanes have already been invented and re-invented will make the experiment seem that much more ridiculous, enabling me to generate more derision and money.

7-  Launch a campaign to create a niche market for cigarettes among 5-year olds (hey I already told you I was becoming evil).

8-  Masturbate in public then (after getting arrested) blame the whole incident on Ronald McDonald.

9-  Attempt to prove with indisputable historical evidence that the holocaust did not happen in the way the international media likes us to believe it did (oh wait, that would actually ruin me and drive me kicking and screaming into bankruptcy).

10- ‘Dancing with the stars’.

 

 The list goes on, but I will have to stop here because thinking about all these possibilities causes me to get unusually and unnecessarily excited.

 

   Unemployment isn’t that bad really, who needs money and why? I could live without elegant clothes, electronics, cigarettes, vacations, furniture, medication, water, food and Honda concept cars with puckered-up front bumpers ready to kiss the road and everything on it. I have learned a lot during my period of extended indolence. I learned for the first time what it means to be stripped of a social life, I learned the importance of picket lines and the origins of the ‘Killing joke’, I learned that adults in ancient Greece use to fuck pubescent boys and that somewhere down the line we were goaded into calling that a ‘civilization’. I learned that my father’s faith in me has no limits. I also learned a quick little love-handle-loss exercise that can effortlessly be performed in bed while one is asleep, unfortunately it hasn’t benefited me yet…it’s all in the hips.

 

  Friends talk about their jobs, everyone talks about his/her job, people talk about their jobs with such zest I often wonder if that’s what they talk about when they’re fucking their pillows or if their jobs are going to be the only thing on their mind when they are sprawling across their death beds, if that is the case then let me say it now ‘dear pillow and grim-reaper I have absolutely nothing to tell you’.

 

   I am the ‘almost’ man, I almost had a happy childhood, I almost found true love, I almost loved my true love back, I almost got married and when I did I was almost a good husband, I almost became a good father to my daughter, I almost deserved the love that my family gave to me, I almost graduated college, I almost quit smoking…many times, I almost did the right thing when the right thing seemed so undesirable, I almost kept a job, I almost contributed positively into someone’s life and almost ruined many more, I almost made people laugh before a credulous post script spoiled the joke and distorted the irony,  I almost found America, I did find America but by that time America was a departing Ariel view from my window-seat, I almost fulfilled a dream or two, I almost believed in myself… I almost wrote an article that actually makes sense.  unfortunately, ‘almost’ doesn’t count.

Obama and the Arab world.

People in Florida have been flocking in large numbers to the local travel agencies that book flights from Miami to Havana, since last month when the US congress eased travel restrictions for those with relatives in Cuba. That was even before president Obama went a step further and lifted the travel-ban completely. For sanguine optimists like me, this is indeed a leap forward towards a new era of better US-Cuban relations.

   Despite initially shocking the world with his choice of cabinet members, president Obama has so far managed with a considerable level of success to make due on his promise for messianic change in US foreign policy. The glad hand he extended to countries like Russia, Turkey, Cuba and Iran, and the consistency of the positive motif in the speeches he delivered both at home and abroad, are clear indications of Mr. Obama’s intention to infuse viable elements of change in American foreign policy. However, the world remains skeptical as to how much change can be expected from this dashing enthusiast after decades of intrusive, aggressive and imperialistic American foreign policy.

   The more advanced, developed and socially-enlightened a country is, the more indispensable it becomes to global economics and development, and the more likely it is to benefit from the Obama approach. Europe may have found a new more empathetic partner in Obama who ostensibly shares common liberal values with the predominant European socio-political establishment and can better communicate with its increasingly worldly and politically-inquisitive youth. Russia may have seen a glint of calm gun-shy wisdom in Obama that would quell any binary tendency towards another dangerous cold war-style confrontation. China may very well partner with Obama to attain mutual and symbiotic economic development. The major players in the global arena are in a better position to bargain and cooperate with the United States now that Obama is in office, but the less advanced regions like the Middle East  for instance, continue to stand on unequal grounds, expecting the unexpected and demanding the impossible, hence squandering the chance for any useful cooperation with the US and the rest of the civilized world.

   The day a man with Hussein as his middle name got elected to the highest post in the land, the Arabs expected him to wear the ‘hatta’ and demand that the Israelis give Jerusalem back to the Palestinians, they expected nothing less especially since some of them went as far as believing that Obama was indeed a closet Muslim. The Arab world was consternated by Obama’s visit to Israel and his show of support for its safety and welfare. Unlike other countries in the civilized world that carefully dissected the Obama policy and looked for possible avenues of cooperation and mutual understanding, the Arab countries glowered at him via the same myopic angle through which they look with unremitting anger at everything and everyone else.

   The Arab world’s inability to understand the Obama approach and hence benefit from it comes from a broader inability to understand world politics, appreciate strategic concepts and manage the national expectations. Unlike the rest of the world, the Arabs look at change from the parochial unilateral perspective of the Arab-Israeli conflict; a perspective that demands an unequivocally hostile American stance against Israel. When Obama was elected, the Arab people, unaware of the real mechanism of American politics and the power wielded by lobbies on American foreign policy, expected him to chant the anti-Israeli diatribes of Hezbollah and to taut the cause of Hamas, when he failed to do so he was assailed and condemned as an extension of the acrimonious and anti-Islamic Bush agenda, the closet Muslim was now the closet apostate.

   Despite the major political and ideological differences that exist between the US and countries like China and Cuba, there still remains a common ground to stand on, a leeway of reconciliation that can yield mutual benefit. The Chinese for instance are just as economically pragmatic as the Americans; they share a common interest in commercial and economic development and they fully understand the interdependence of their national interests. The Cubans, by virtue of their geographic proximity to the US, share numerous common values with the Hispanic communities embedded in various parts of the United States, these commonalities make it easier for the two nations to understand and reconcile their differences despite the formidability of the apparent schism. The Arabs, on the other hand, are far and away from America both geographically and ideologically, there is not much in common between the two nations beyond the visceral respect for human life and the rudimentary sentiments of kindness and civility that all nations around the world basically posses.

  By nature all human beings are born with some degree of reason and pragmatism, however, the Arab world is a prisoner of its own mob mentality that riots in the streets and burns effigies, the mob mentality that unremittingly resuscitates the colonial nightmares in an effort to preclude any and all possibilities of a détente between East and West. The Arab mob, subjugated by onerous despots and fueled by fanatical religious interpretations, is unwilling to compromise even for the sake of social progress and economic development. To the mob, cooperation with the US can only be kosher and socially acceptable if Obama rides a white horse and liberates Palestine, anything short of that like say a peaceful overture towards Iran, or a full withdrawal from Iraq, or a permanent shut-down of Guantanamo bay, or the overhaul of the entire Bush policy on terrorism, or the numerous speeches promoting mutual respect, or the support for the Turkish bid for EU membership, or the omission of the term ‘war on terror’, is just not enough.

    The Arab governments are yet to welcome and celebrate Obama like they did George W Bush, because unlike Bush Obama and his intentions pose a real threat to the totalitarian establishment of the Middle East, his methods of probing true democratic reform in the region will soon prove to be more potent and purposeful than the Bush democratic reform ruse that was in fact a disguise for his lust for oil and his espousing of the imperialistic ‘Grand chess-board’ doctrine. Arab governments, more than anyone else, do not want to see Obama succeed in his efforts, they would much rather have a neocon in office who will slice and dice his policies and share the spoils with them, without any real regard for the general public’s welfare or development.

  It is wrong and unfair to lump all Arabs under one category, Arabs are as varied in their opinions and predilections as ‘Baskin Robbins’ flavors, yet the fact remains that the Arab populace lives under the hilt of despotic regimes in the total dearth of free press and fair governance, which makes it extremely difficult to gauge the real popular sentiment towards international politics and relations. The average Arab does not elect his government’s officials and he is not involved in its functions, decision-making or political paradigm. Like many other cultures the world over, the Arabic culture exists under layers of misinformation, religious zealousness, state subjugation and social intolerance. Cooperation and mutual respect between the West and the Arab/Islamic world has never been and will never be impossible, yet for a nation to be able to express itself better on a national and international level, for it to be able to partake and benefit from the interplay of global development, and for it to plant its footprint on the trails of civilization, it needs to be free.

  The Arab pundits are right when they say that president Obama needs to do more in-order to translate his words into actions, he needs to strongly support political and economic development in the region, he needs to halt the notorious American policy of intervention and intrusion, and above all he needs to take an impartially objective stance on the Arab-Israeli conflict; he needs to step up on occasion and condemn the brutal war crimes and acts of murder that are being committed against the Palestinian people. The Arabs on the other hand, need to understand the gradual nature of change, they need to think outside the narrow box of theological absolutism, they need to assiduously pursue progress and development on all levels and in all sectors of the socio-political structure, and they need to lay aside their weapons and adopt new methods of asserting their presence in the global arena. This is probably the best chance the Arabs are ever going to get for their voices to resonate and echo in the chambers of the global power-centers, the choice to be made here is whether the Arab countries want to join the partnership of progress or risk the eternal damnation of being rogue states like the impoverished and ravaged North Korea.

   President Obama has wisely chosen Turkey as the launching-pad of his new and improved Middle East policy. Turkey is a vast and powerful Islamic country with a very dynamic and progressive society and an enormous influence on regional politics. It is indeed the best choice for a number of obvious reasons; one being Turkey’s geographical position that links the East with the West, Turkey is also the only democracy in the region and it is the only country in the region (apart from Israel) that shares ideological and socio-political parallels with the US. In the days following the Obama visit to Turkey, President Abdullah Gul urged all Arab countries to support the Obama policies.

Without A Trace

Below is a script from an atypical episode of the hit TV show ‘without a trace’ inspired by the antics and disappearing acts of none other than the Bad boy criminal of Africa, the spiv of the Middle East, the shinning black jewel of the Nile, the bodacious bandit of Sudan Mr. Omar Hassan Al-Basheer.

 

 The show opens with Al-Basheer busting one of his world-famous moves in a concourse somewhere in the dusty bowls of Darfur. The camera moves around to capture the scene with all its relevant minutiae; the people insanely gyrating, the signs of support hoisted up and waved in the dusty atmosphere, the shrieks, the howls and a couple of monkeys on a nearby tree wahooing their support. The festive madness continues for a while as the camera takes a few more sweeps before focusing on two Darfurian locals talking to eachother.

Darfurian local 1: look at that ape, laughing and dancing to show the world that everything is ok.

Darfurian local 2: I think he looks fatter than he did before Ocampo called for his arrest, maybe he’s depressed.

Darfurian local1: are you kidding me Mohamed? I just saw the man chug a whole goat like it was a baby banana.

Darfurian local 2: I hear depressed people eat like crazy, I read that in an article in ‘Cosmogirl’ magazine.

Darfurian local 1: I love that magazine, on another note, I wish somebody would pour a sack of ammonium nitrate in that fat man’s stinky safaris.

Darfurian local 2: are you saying someone should kill him?

Darfurian local 1 leers as the camera slowly shifts focus to the sight of Al-Basheer disembarking the stage and his image fading away in cinematic disappearance.

 

Opening credits.

 

 The scene opens with agent Malone and agent Taylor roaming around the arena where the president was last seen before his disappearance, the words ’36 hours missing’ appear on the screen. Vestiges of the festivities staged in honor of the president are still visible on the ground; confetti, pieces from busted balloons, discarded traditional Sudanese turbans, empty packets of lay’s chips and orange soda cans.

Agent Malone (bends down to survey a turban left on the ground): phallic symbol!

Agent Taylor (observing the long twirled-up turban): they’re packin’ alright.

Agent Taylor pokes a can of orange soda as he squats on the ground, he lifts it up with a stick and flags it in clear view.

Agent Taylor: the Afro beverage of choice.

Agent Malone: you should show it to Viv she’ll get a kick out of it.

The two agents snigger as agent Malone squats on the ground. Suddenly a giant rat jumps from in-between the sand and debris on the ground and runs towards agent Taylor who shudders and leaps backward violently.

Agent Taylor: Jesus!

Agent Malone strides forward and kicks the rat hard, hurling it far into the distance. The camera view shifts and captures the sight of an old veiled Darfurian woman in the distance glowering at the two agents.

 Agent Taylor (huffs petulantly): why are we here again?

Agent Malone (puts his arm on agent Taylor’s shoulder): to find a missing dictator.

Agent Taylor: ah yes, I love this job.

The two agents walk around the arena to canvass more of the vast dusty crime scene, they spot a tall dark Darfurian standing close to the podium where the president was last seen crumping and wiggling away.

Agent Malone: hello there!

The Darfurian looks in the direction of the two agents, as they approach him, with a cold listless stare.

Agent Malone: what’s your name?

Darfurian: Mohamed.

Agent Taylor: that’s an uncommon name.

Mohamed’s stare grows colder.

Agent Malone: I am special agent Malone, this is special agent Taylor we are with the F B I (agent Malone spells the acronym very slowly) have you ever heard of the F B I?

Mohamed: yes, I was the one who called you.

Agent Malone: wonderful, tell us what happened.

 Mohamed: look, I don’t want to start any trouble for no one, but I think I know someone who may have something to do with all of this.

Agent Taylor: you’re not starting trouble my friend, you’re helping us find your president, you love him don’t you?

Mohamed: not really, but I don’t want him dead either, he’s a fellow Muslim.

Agent Malone: let’s cut through the chase, tell us what happened.

Mohamed looks at agent Malone, pauses and then looks to the right in a downward angle.

Mohamed (speaks wistfully): I told him to stay away from trouble, but he wouldn’t listen, he never listens.

The camera fades into a cinematic flashback scene as Mohamed begins to recall the events that transpired a day and half ago. The flashback scene shows the festivities and the wild confluence once again, Al-Basheer doing a Stairmaster dance and sweating.

Mohamed: you have any idea how powerful that fat man is? He’s the president, if you’re caught conspiring against him they will do to you what they did to your father.

Ali: it’s a small price to pay for the freedom of my people.

Mohamed: a small price?! Remember what they did to your papa Ali? Ha? They wrapped his turban around his waist and made him belly dance for the Janjaweed before they beheaded him infront of the whole village, have you forgotten how his ass and thighs were still quivering and shaking after they cut off his head?!

Ali’s face grows dim with virulent anger.

Ali: yes I remember, that’s why I want to kill this ape.

Mohamed: you try and they will do you like they did your papa.

Ali: my papa died a hero.

Mohamed: yeah, a hero who died with his ass shaking? Did you know that Mondinga still uses that joke in his comedy routine?

 Ali: that village idiot, the whole town thinks his funny, I’ll show them funny.

Mohamed: think about it, don’t ruin your life.

Ali: ruin my life? Did you know that they were going to bring Wal-Mart into Darfur but that fat Khartoum bastard spoiled the deal? Wal-Mart Mohamed, you know what that means? Open til’ midnight, sardines and tires in the same place, one-stop shopping, and Wrangler jeans, impulse buying would have changed this town but that fat fool took it all away, now he has to pay and pay he will.

Ali extends his arms sideways, flutters his lips madly, lets out a wild screechy hoot, skips and disappears into the crowd.

The flashback ends and the scene switches back to a close-up of agent Malone’s face befuddled and distraught.

Agent Malone: he was skipping?!

Mohamed: yes, Ali skips when he gets excited, he skipped for a whole day once when he fell in love with a town girl named Khadeeja, she died a few days later as a result of a circumcision gone bad and he never stopped skipping since.

Agent Taylor: Jee this Ali is one unlucky dude, where can we find him?

Mohamed (hesitates briefly): sand street 3, mud hut number 41.

Agent Taylor (chuckles): good one, no really where can we find him?

Mohamed (frowning deeply into agent Taylor’s eyes): I told you sand street 3, mud hut number 41.

Agent Malone: thanks for your help Mohamed, we’ll stay in touch.

Mohamed: yeah.

Agent Malone: one last thing, why did you call us? Why didn’t you call the Sudanese police? 

Mohamed breaks into a bout of guffaw, he almost barfs.

Agent Malone (angered by Mohamed’s reaction): did I say something funny?

Mohamed: did you ever try calling the Sudanese police?

Agent Malone: no, but that’s because I live in Philadelphia.

(Mohamed’s wild jerky laughter continues): did you ever try calling the Sudanese police from Philadelphia?

Agent Malone: no.

Mohamed: my point exactly, good day gentlemen.

 

After a galling search the agents finally get to the address and find a tall slender man lying on the dirt inside mud hut number 41.

Agent Malone: hey there, you Ali?

The man gets up off the floor frantically.

Man: yes, who are you white people and what do you want? If you are Ocampo’s people I got some information for you.

Agent Malone: no we’re not Ocampo’s people, we’re with the F B I (agent Malone spells the acronym slowly) have you ever heard of the F B I?

Ali: yes, I had a cousin mail me a T-shirt once, a T-shirt he bought from Wal-Mart, can you guys tell me more about Wal-Mart?

Ali’s eyes start to get misty with yearning.

Agent Malone: unfortunately Ali we don’t have time to talk to you about Wal-Mart, but if you help us out I’ll send you a catalog.

Ali’s eyes brim with excitement.

Ali: sure how can I help?

Agent Malone: tell us what happened to your president.

Ali: president? Oh no, I have nothing to do with that I assure you, I can get into a flashback that will prove my innocence to you.

Agent Malone: go ahead.

Ali (begins to ruminate): it all started when I was 6 years old.

Agent Malone (interrupts): oh no no, flashbacks can only go as far back as one year, no more.

Ali: oh ok! In that case let me tell you what happened a day and a half ago.

Ali gets into a flashback and manages to eventually convince the agents that he is indeed innocent.

Agent Malone: your flashback is quite convincing Ali, but if you really want that catalog you’ll have to tell us more.

Ali: go to Khartoum, to the presidential palace, you’ll find all the answers there.

The two agents turn around to make there way out of the hut.

Ali: agents wait!

The two agents turn back.

Ali: is it true that there is this store in America that’s just like Wal-Mart but a lil’ smaller? A store called the piggly wiggly?

 Agent Malone: yes there is.

Ali’s face lights up exuberantly, he puts his two hands to his mouth then extends them forward and blows the agents a big amorous kiss mmmowah!

Ali: I love America.

 

 A local channel commercial break interrupts the show, the break features the opening of a new nuclear-plant and the opening of the first barber shop in Darfur called ‘cornrow curls’.

 

Meanwhile back in Philadelphia and in the absence of agent Malone, agent Vivian Johnson is temporarily and bitterly in charge as the team labors assiduously to tie the loose ends in the puzzle of the missing president on their side of the Atlantic. After turning down a few useless leads that came from a club called ‘Alexander’s Macedonian surprise’ and the Pittsburg state college for clowning and general tomfoolery, agent Johnson finally came across a useful lead in the person of a CIA agent who waited calmly in one of the offices down the hall as she and agent Fitzgerald marched down to meet him.

Agent Fitzgerald: you alright Viv? You look kinda tired.

Agent Johnson: yeah I’m ok; I just need to get some sleep, that teenage son of mine is driving me up the wall.

Agent Johnson was hiding the real reason why she looked so fatigued; her heart condition.

Agent Fitzgerald: oh yeah? What did he do?

 Agent Johnson: he’s been skipping school to go hang out with friends at the park and drink, the other day I caught him there wearing a poncho and screaming ‘what you bitches want from a niga’.

Agent Fitzgerald: wow, that’s awful despite it being a rhetorical question.

Agent Johnson: tell me about it, that boy needs some ol’ school spanking; the kind that people in Abe Lincoln’s time use to give their kids.

Agent Fitzgerald (chuckles): I’ll bet.

The two agents enter the office where the CIA agent is quietly sitting and looking around.

Agent Johnson: agent, I am special agent Johnson this is special agent Fitzgerald we’re with the FBI.

The agent smiles mockingly: I know that, we are in the FBI building.

Agent Johnson (lets out a muffled laugh): I’m sorry agent, this case has been getting the best of us lately.

Agent Fitzgerald laughs.

 Agent Johnson: I know you don’t want us to know your real name so how do we address you?

The agent: well, my code name is agent sour milk.

Agent Johnson: ok, fair enough, agent sour milk, how do you propose to help us?

Sour milk: please understand that I’m not even suppose to be talking to you, but after I heard that son of bitch Basheer went missing, I couldn’t keep it to myself anymore.

The two agents pause as sour milk takes a deep breath and gathers his thoughts.

Sour milk: a few days ago I got a message from one of our contacts in Myanmar, a local rogue named ‘One Gook Phuck’.

The two agents look at eachother and smile ambivalently.

Sour milk (continues): One was working the local black markets and peddling opium on the side when we hired him to get us some information on Aung San Suu Kyi; prison location, health condition, stats, that kinda thing. He got us a few pictures that I think would be of help to you.

Sour milk reaches into his coat jacket and pulls out a set of pictures.

 Agent Fitzgerald (scrupulously examines the photographs): these are pornographic pictures of a famous black porn star.

Sour milk: I know, if you look closer, you’ll notice a girl in the background.

Agent Fitzgerald: that’s Booty Collins, I watch her on my ipod all the time.

Agent Fitzgerald retracts sheepishly as he realizes the inappropriateness of his statement.

 Sour milk: you’re absolutely right agent Fitzgerald and besides having a killer rack and a banging bumper, Booty here has a Sudanese connection that I think you guys should follow up on.

Agent Johnson (grows very uncomfortable with the situation and decides to wrap up the porn-pandering conversation): thank you so much for coming by agent, we will look into the information you’ve provided, I’m sure it will be of some use to us.

 

Back in Khartoum agent Malone and agent Taylor walk into the Sudanese presidential palace garden to the sound of strange tribal chants and the sight of little darker skin boys tending to a herd of sheep as they scamper around wildly and poop allover al-Basheer’s rotunda. Agent Malone is quickly accosted by one of the slaveboys who starts gawking at him and agent Taylor in a manner resembling that of a jungle boy witnessing an F16 crash-land alongside a swamp of crocs.

Agent Malone (speaking to the slaveboy): I’m special agent Malone this is special agent Taylor.

Boy continues to stare dumbly.

Agent Malone: what’s your name?

Boy: little Minni Minawi

Agent Malone: that’s a very nice name young man, we are with the F B I (agent Malone spells the acronym slowly), have you ever heard of the F B I?

Boy: yes I watch that show ‘without a trace’ all the time

Agent Malone: great, you should watch the sweeps week episode, now tell us where your president is, can we see him?

The little boy’s eyes veer around to scan the surrounding for intruders and palace spies, then he quickly gets closer to the two agents and whispers: I was waiting for the president this morning as usual, he wakes up everyday at 8 for his morning rub-down in the tub, but he never came out. I thought maybe he was sleeping the day in as he usually does when he comes back from Darfur all drunk and tired, so I waited for him to come out in time for his lunch, we just slaughtered his favorite goat for him this morning you see

Agent Malone: what happened next?

Boy: nothing we slaughtered Ocampo and began to cook it

Agent Malone: wait wait wait, Ocampo?!

Boy: yes, the president’s favorite goat, I told you already

Agent Malone: ah yes

 Agent Malone looks at agent Taylor and they smile at eachother.

Boy: we waited and waited but the president never came out

Agent Malone: anyone try to go into his room?

Boy: oh God no, the last time one of the other boys, little John Garang, went into the president’s room and saw him lying sideways with his cane and dancing in his sleep, moving back and fro like so, (The boy flexes his arm and leg in opposite directions), the president suddenly woke up and saw little john, he struck him so hard on his head little John bit his tongue, he’s been lisping ever since.

Agent Malone looks at agent Taylor and scowls bemusedly.

Agent Taylor: so for all you know the president may still be sleeping in his room?

Boy: no, I mean maybe.

Agent Malone: did you try contacting the Sudanese police?

 The boy laughs hard.

Agent Malone: what’s so funny young man?

Boy: nothing, but did you ever try calling the Sudanese police?

Agent Malone: no, but that’s because I live in Philadelphia.

Boy: ok, have you ever called the Sudanese police from Philadelphia?

Agent Malone: of course not.

Boy: my point exactly

Agent Malone looks at agent Taylor with an intensely flabbergasted demeanor never before seen this side of the Nile.

Agent Malone (now speaking more sternly): we need to take a look at the president’s room.

(The boy’s face shrinks and his body begins to tremble in fear, his voice now resembling that of a castrated belly goat): I don’t think you can do that.

Agent Taylor: we’ll have to look into the bedroom if you want us to help you find the president.

Boy: you will need the vice president’s permission for that.

Agent Malone: ok take us to your vice president.

The boy leads the agents along a meandering path through the presidential palace leading all the way down the hall to the vice president’s office, strands of strange animal pelt, white paint stains and pictures of Louie Ocampo with a penis drawn dangling from his lower-lip were scattered allover the floor. The boy knocks on the office door politely, then gently steers it open. A man sitting on a large looming leather chair appears, smoking a cigar and nursing a glass of grape juice.

Vice president: Who are these people little Minni?

Agent Malone: I am special agent Malone this is special agent Taylor we’re with the FBI

Vice president: FBI? What are you doing here? Get out.

Agent Malone: I’m afraid we can’t do that Mr. vice president.

Vice president: what are you doing on Sudanese soil?

The vice president places the glass of juice on the table and reaches to pluck a nostril hair that has bothered him plenty.

Agent Malone: we are here to investigate the disappearance of your president.

Vice president: disappearance? Who said the president disappeared? I was with him a while ago in his room.

 Agent Malone: we would like to see the president if you don’t mind

Vice president: I do mind, you can’t

Agent Malone: look Mr. Vice president we could go downtown and get a warrant but that would take time.

Vice president: I am missing your point, is that a bad thing?

Agent Malone: I’m not quite sure, it’s just something we’re use to saying on the show

Vice president: show?

Agent Malone: I mean squad.

Vice president: get out of my office and get out of Sudan or else

Agent Malone: or else what?

Vice president: or else I’ll be forced to splash some grape juice on your tie, and that’s against the principles of our hospitable and generous culture.

Agent Malone: that’s noble coming from a man who participated in the slaughter of thousands of innocent south Sudanese and Darfurians.

 Little Minni bolts out of the room as soon as agent Malone makes that statement.

Vice president: how about some pure freshly brewed African tea? You gentlemen like tea?

Agent Malone: we are not here for pleasantries Mr. Vice president.

Vice president (yells): Othman!!

 A big burly dark skinned man walks into the room

 Othman: yes sir.

Vice president: please fetch some of our best African tea for our two American guests.

Othman: the ‘James Polk’ brand?

The vice president pauses and scratches his chin.

Vice president: yes, why not.

Othman complies reverently and strides out of the room hooting and feigning a horseback ride.

Vice president: I assure you gentlemen that the president is doing fine, here have a cigar.

Agent Malone: no thanks.

 Vice president: you know agent Malone one of the things I like best about traveling abroad is sex with minors and enjoying that which is illegal in my country.

Agent Taylor’s phone suddenly rings, he excuses himself and steps out of  the room to answer it.

 Agent Taylor: Taylor here

Voice on the other end: Danny it’s Samantha, we ran the presidential vehicle number plate through a DMV database dump, it almost matched a plate number belonging to a Karl Hayfork who lives in Scranton New Jersey, Karl’s aunt is a waitress who does meals on wheels on weekends, we cross referenced her number to a phone number belonging to a Leigh Maddox in Elpaso

Agent Taylor: did you check her last e-mail log?

Samantha: we were about to, she’s been missing for two days, the neighbors say that she got a pizza delivered to her house three nights ago and get this the delivery boy’s name is Alvin Bridgefoot whose uncle teaches special ed. in Maryland.

Agent Taylor: let me guess, lots of retards.

Samantha: yes and one of them likes to play sudoku.

Agent Taylor: Garns or Nikoli?

Samantha: not really sure, that’s what you guys need to find out while you’re in Khartoum, but I gotta tell you Danny, it doesn’t make one bit of sense to me.

Agent Taylor snaps back into the room with a frontal karate kick and yells: sudoku!

The vice president raises an eyebrow in quiet limp amazement.

Agent Taylor: we need to see the president.

Vice president: you were gone a long time agent Taylor, agent Malone and I were discussing the usefulness of avoirdupois.

Agent Taylor: we have to see the president now!

Vice president: gentlemen, am I being charged with something? Because if I am I believe I am entitled to a lawyer.

Agent Malone: yes I would get a lawyer if I were you.

Vice president (yells): Othman!

In walks the same big burly man who did a few moments ago.

Vice president: agent Malone, agent Taylor, let me introduce you to my lawyer.

 Agent Taylor: the tea guy?

 Vice president: yes, he also happens to be a marvelous attorney, we discovered that talent in him last week when he accidentally spilled tea on the mayor of the Khartoum municipality, I suggest you talk to him from this point on.

Othman sticks out his tongue, flaps it wildly and lets out a primal shriek while crossing his eyes.

 

Back in Philadelphia agent Vivian Johnson is still keeping her ailing heart condition a secret from her colleges and agent Fitzgerald is sourly missing Samantha who sits in the next room calling all the Vietnamese owned beauty parlors in the city to find out if a man named Louie who appears in one of the police sketches has ever come in for a pedicure, in each one of the calls made Samantha asks the beauticians if they knew or heard of a Louie who daydreams about stabbing a Basheer in the colon.

 

Agent Malone: Mr. vice president we are going to need a list of all people who visited the palace in the last 24 hours.

Vice president: list? Why? I told you the president is well.

Agent Malone: in that case we need to see the president’s room

The Vice president (unaware that Othman is still standing next to him) yells: Othman!

Othman: I’m right here sir

Vice president: show the gentlemen the list

Othman flicks a crumbled piece of paper out of his side pocket and hands it to agent Malone.

Agent Malone (looks at the paper with disgruntled wonder): Scarlet Johansen, Grace Kelly, Andy McDowell, these are names of actresses.

Vice president: yes it is, you asked for a list of all those who were at the palace in the past 24 hours.

Agent Malone: what is this some kind of a joke?

Vice president: yesterday was movie night here at the palace, the president likes to dress up the palace staff as Hollywood actresses, it’s a lil’ thing he has, I’m sure you saw the paint stains on the ground on your way here. You should have seen Othman here, he was Regina Hall, he’s allergic to paint you see.

Agent Malone: I’m not exactly sure what you are trying to pull here, but I assure you that if you don’t comply, you and you’re entire administration will be in a fog of trouble you won’t be able to see your fingertips, agent Taylor and I will walk out of here and personally check each and every room in this palace and if we don’t find your president, we will issue a warrant for his arrest effective immediately, need I remind you Mr. vice president that your president is under indictment and he will be arrested if he’s found anywhere outside the jurisdiction of this city.

 

Elsewhere in the palace another suspenseful scene burgeons as the camera captures the shadow of a heavyset man surreptitiously lurking between the bushes in the garden. The man (apparently drunk) wearing what appears to be a khaki safari suit grabs a ladder and winches it up towards one of the palace windows, he fumbles initially as he attempts to steer the weight of his body and the ladder in the right direction, finally he lifts up the ladder and places it a few inches below the window located several feet above the ground. The ladder feebly capitulates under the uncouth heaviness of the man’s weight causing him to slip and fall back on the bushes generating a loud thud.

Agent Malone: what was that?

 Vice president (looks up in a clueless pretence): what?

Agent Malone: that sound!

Agent Malone and Agent Taylor storm out of the room and into the hallway.

Vice president: excuse me gentlemen where do you think you’re going?

Oblivious to the vice president’s remarks, the two agents stride on down the hall. The vice president quickly catches up with them and grabs agent Malone by the arm.

Vice president: where do you think you’re going? This is not bloody Time square.

 Agent Malone lurches his arm off of the vice president’s grip touching in the motion a pointy slant on his moustache.

 Agent Malone (glowering at the vice president): we need to see the president…now!

The vice president (looks around himself for a while as if he just smelt a rancid fart): Ok, but once you speak to him you get the hell out of this palace and the hell out of my city.

 Agent Malone pauses as he stares at a thump on the vice president’s moustache.

Agent Malone: why don’t we let your president decide who gets to stay or leave.

The camera alternates between scenes to capture the simultaneous progressions; the heavyset man struggles to climb back on the ladder again while the vice president and the two agents pace down the hall and up the stairs. The camera continues its systematic switch, scenically stoking suspense until finally the vice presidents stops at one of the doors where he and the two agents pause and stare at eachother.

Vice president: this is the president’s room, I ask you for the last time not to disturb him.

 Agent Malone: Thanks for your concern Mr. vice president, we’ll take our chances.

The vice president looks around flustered and confused as if he was recovering from the demoralizing effects of an atomic wedgie. The door creaks open slowly on an incipient view of the bedroom. The two agents are jarred with utter amazement as they stare at the president in his silky white boxers lying in bed edgewise with on arm behind his head exposing a bushel of his armpit hair in scandalous lasciviousness, his big and saggy parabolic belly protruding and straddling the bed, he looks like a cross between a model in a Modigliani painting and a giant ladle.

President: who are these people?

Vice president: they are with the FBI sir.

President: aaaah, I believe you’re here to check on me, well I am doing fine as you can see.

Agent Malone: I am special agent Malone, this is special agent Taylor, we’re just making sure you’re ok, we thought you were missing.

President (roars angrily): bullshit! You’re here to ensure that Ocampo’s orders are being followed, go to hell.

The president  flutters his arm angrily.

Agent Malone: we apologize for any inconvenience we may have caused, now if you excuse us we need to be on our way.

Agent Malone signals agent Taylor to leave the room.

President: agent Malone!

The two agents turn their heads around to look at the president.

President: have you ever watched the movie ‘Ferris Bueller’s day off’?

(Agent Malone’s confusion brewing to the boiling point): yes a long time ago.

President: brilliant film, what I like most about that film is how that little rascal Ferris makes such good use of his window, he manages to sneak out of his house unnoticed, he raises all kinds of mischief and still manages to return to his bedroom on time and without ever being noticed, all because of how cleverly he uses his window.

Agent Malone (looking very pale and helpless): very well Mr. President, have a wonderful evening.

President: and one more thing agent Malone.

Agent Malone turns his neck around one more time, with aggravated peevishness.

President: please deliver this to your Zionist master Ocampo.

The president pouts his opulent and luscious African lips, tweezes his left nipple and blows agent Malone a big wet squeaky kiss.

 

Executive producer

Not Jerry Bruckheimer.

Evil Science

 Masturbation causes cancer! That’s real bad news because now I will have to stop masturbating if I want to live longer. Masturbation causes cancer especially to those men who masturbated regularly in their 20’s! That’s even worse because I’m 32 so even if I stop masturbating now it wouldn’t make a damn difference. This is actually true according to the latest research done by some university professor who I bet looks a lot like a cross between Richard Simmons and that evil professor from ‘Mystery Science Theater 3000’. What’s with these scientific fact-finding crusades anyway? What are these beaker-neck professors trying to accomplish? First barebacking now this? What should a man marooned in the total lack of sexual gratification do to attain sexual gratification? Doesn’t this tube-faced professor know that if the layman is given the choice between attenuating his ephemeral horniness or not doing so to avoid the eternal pangs of malignant ailments he will most definitely NOT choose the latter. This research may have been a more useful deterrent to women because they can always replace sexual gratification with shopping-sprees, chocolate binges or giving false signals to men at nightclubs, but to men it is as utterly useless as originating a research to prove that Remote-Controls don’t exist. Even if the findings of the research were proven to be true, it will not daunt me or the millions of other Alpha-Hunks from complying with the dictates of our needful nature… or will it?, I will be forced to live with the regret that my mother will one day have to bear the shame of telling her prudish good-wife Arab friends that her youngest son; her little pumpkin died of carcinogenic masturbation.

 

   I really wish that our current human civilization would regress to the dark ages when we thought the moon was made of cheese and that tobacco was actually good for us, the times when life was nothing more than the polar opposite of death, the times when we had more belief in ourselves and our destiny. In the hubbub of our newly acquired ‘modernization’ we have lost sight of the mere fact that we will die and we will die when we’re suppose to die, not when the clocks of condescending scientific spiel tell us to. As citizens of a brave new world we have actually savored cowardice, we like to fear and fuss, worry and pout, about everything from the big shrink to the waist that wouldn’t shrink. In a way I suppose we are justified in fearing death so much, there’s so much more to love about life and healthy living now that we’ve invented the wheel, after all whose gonna love our beautiful elegant wives and enjoy their immortally youthful looks? Whose gonna drive our cars that keep getting fancier as these words are being typed? Whose gonna go on our vacations and enjoy our high tech contraptions? Whose gonna be here to enjoy such a bountiful life and eventually feed the curiosity of finding out how it all ends? Therefore, we need to be absolutely sure that our lives are long and healthy and what better way to do so than by following the capricious tide of ‘scientism’.

 

  If there’s one service that these scientifically wayward researches have done us it is the creation of a plethora of phobias for us to choose from. Having a phobia these days is like belonging to a coterie or a book club, the phobia-free folks are the new freaks and they are as free a game to pick on as the nerds and the kids with rickets were back in school. These pseudo-scientific researches are indeed the remedy that created a disease by curing a disease that initially did not exist. By medically machinating fancy phobia names, the commercial science community has managed to convince us that we actually have these phobias; we now have in our midst (in addition to the regular phobes we knew from back in the day) the pogonophobes (those who fear beards), the Achluophobes (those who fear nightfall) The Phagophobes (those who fear eating) and the latest edition to the family: the keraunothnetophobes  (those who fear satellites falling to earth), so I guess the Achluophobes should be ok working until sunset, the Pogonophobes should never hang out with the Taliban, the Phagophobes make Kate Moss jealous and the keraunothnetophobes  should practice a rigorously scheduled routine of ‘duck ‘n’ cover’. Phobias.com actually lists all phobias from A to Z, apparently there are phobias ranging all the way from fear of beautiful women, to bath time, to new things, to Bolsheviks, to decision making, to the color yellow, really I’m not making this up. Apparently the letter Z has no phobia listed under it, maybe fear of the famous Brazilian soccer player Zico or fear of A-Z lists need to be diagnosed. It seems that the scientific or should I say psychological community in this case, was forced to embark on a prognosis binge when clinics and psych-wards were raided at random by furious patients demanding fancy and precise names for diseases they never really had, or else how would one explain the distinctive dichotomy of Arachnophobia and Apiphobia given that a man who fears spiders will more than likely not scream “Geronimoooo” and rush headlong to battle an oncoming swarm of bees, and isn’t xenophobia just a euphemism for barefaced  racism.   

 

 Ten years ago, people in the ‘Middle East’ AKA my part of the world, had neither the will nor the stamina to chase after scientific research findings, we stroked ourselves silly, ate whatever our mothers put on the table and our only real fear was of scraggly-hair despots looting our national income. Today, in our relentless labors to mimic the western values of modernization we picked up on previously non-existent fear signals. The gulf between the rich/modern Arab world and the rest of it has grown wider leaving the rich to care about the frivolous and the mundane and the poor who live below heights or poverty lines or behind walls to worry about the calamity of occupation. Pill-popping centers, botox clinics and psychiatric facilities have sprung up like moles in a game of ‘whack-a-mole’ around our modern sprawls, by the time you realize the presence of one another pops up right next to it. We scrupulously began to immolate the fiendish western obsession with being slimmer, prettier and more socially adaptable; we too have begun to seek the Zorasthra within us, the superhuman, greater, faster, healthier and more. It worked just fine for our governments who now have to worry even less than they did before about being deposed, because we have no time between the trip to the office, the clinic and wellness center to consider better socio-political alternatives, we are now phobic, we don’t only fear the guns and the mighty fist of our governments but we also fear their beards, the food we eat and the satellites hovering in the heavens.

 

  The Arabs have managed to splash more blood on the ongoing fear-fest by creating and believing in a new strain of scientific investigation; the one that comes coded with a ‘religious/nationalistic’ DNA. A few days ago I received an e-mail from a well-meaning friend containing information about a new brand of lingerie that’s made in Israel but tagged as American, the bra and panties contain some metallic agents that are infact carcinogenic, there we go again, so coupled with cancerous masturbation, the lingerie set will make for one killer session of dry sex. I wonder what incurable disease would ravage a crossdresser jerking-off in that Israeli lingerie. I’m usually unscathed by such e-drivel, but to so many Arabs and Muslims such e-mails are nothing short of ominous signs to a grand conspiracy. Such e-mails often hit our fiberoptic switch-boards and they hit them hard, bare-knuckled and uncorroborated, leaving most of us shuddering in disbelief at the temerity of the enemy’s relentless desire to sabotage our consumerism tract. Our stammering sense of patriotism is then called upon to spread such messages across our anger-ticking networks like fecal coliform bacteria in a towering pile of shit! This Arab-grown variation of unverifiable scientific ersatz feeds on the peoples’ reverence and timidity to duly examine religious and /or nationalistic assertions, it exhibits a great deal of contempt towards the reader’s ability to investigate and determine the veracity of the claim by him/herself.      

 

  In the past few months I have read a set of scientific researches that was so confusing it left me looking towards alcoholism and homosexual fantasies for clarity. One research stated that ‘chain smoking’ is actually bad for health, alright fair enough, another research on the same subject, however, claimed that according to some experts in cardiovascular diseases, smoking three or less cigarettes a day is actually worse than chain-smoking. A research about water supply claimed that tap-water is actually healthier than mineral water…I wonder how the people in Mexico feel about these findings. Another research contradicted conventional wisdom by claiming that organic food is a lot more harmful than the genetically modified hodgepodge we find in supermarkets. The publication of such frivolous pseudo-scientific researches serves no one but the institutes that aid and abet the existence of the over-paid and under-worked professors who are (in effect) the sop to the long and prosperous existence of the institutes. These institutes are an industry above all else, an industry that seeks to preserve its longevity and wherewithal, and it does so by securing the existence of a society that will always be unequivocally dependent on it, a society that will always swallow whole any and all morsels of data chucked at them by anyone so long as their names are preceded by ‘professor’. This industry is constantly seeking to establish itself as the one prime authority, unquestionable and incorrigible even when the researches they publish are prevaricated half-truths and the medicines they manufacture are 99.9% effective. The margin of error is not promulgated for our caution or safety but rather for the industry to be always right and free from doubt. The question here is not whether or not these researches have yielded accurate findings, but rather ‘why do we need to know?’ No one can argue against the benefits of being informed about what’s good and bad for our health, but when the information is produced in bulk, when the priorities are mixed, when unctuously embellished technical prattle is disguised as life-saving literature and when the protagonists in the field act with such disingenuousness to profit on the public’s fear, what we end up with is one credulous, hypochondriac and scientifically-impressionable society.      

                     

 

It is impossible to categorically deny the scientific institution benevolent contributions to human progress thus far, but it is real science that has made that contribution, not ‘scientism’, not the system that has aspired to establish itself as the supreme authority on reason, human conduct and existential credence by creating erroneous mock-panaceas and feeding on our fear. This ‘scientism’ was duly discussed by Neil Postman in his book ‘Technopoly’ in which he propagates this form of obdurate and deterministic pseudo-science to be a fiend, deviant and ubiquitous dogma, seeping into and therefore usurping the leadership role in our social and cultural pantheon, creating in its wake a ‘dystopian’ culture that is both blind and docile; a cultural milieu that fosters the dissipation of the ‘context-free’ information and the prosperous existence of the supreme unaccountable demigods of ‘scientism’. ‘Scientism’ as a socio-religious canon with the ‘information asymmetry’ as its bible governs human beings and the human experience in its entirety as a set of data that can be generated, clustered and manipulated in anyway that the professors deem fit. Scientism strives to consume our human culture entirely with all its symbols, ideals and purpose, subsequently replacing it with the ‘context-free’ spectrum inundated with meaningless and purposeless data pixels and information bits aimed at no one and for no apparent public interest.

 

  We have indeed veered so far from the profound noble science of Galen, Ibn-Rushed, Galileo and even Kant and Descartes; the true science that helped, cured and inspired people, the science that made the lives of our ancestors better, the science that fostered a better understanding of the meaning of life and hoisted the human experience into new heights of progress. The advent of the modern age and the subsequent supernova of information rendered us utterly confused, not knowing where to turn to or who to trust in the deluge of informational froth. We have, in consequence and in practice lost faith in ourselves and our natural ability to discern truth from lies and fact from malicious informational fallacy. When the confusion reached new heights we took a back seat and let the mad professors of ‘scientism’ take the wheel and do the dirty bidding of finding out the truth for us. What we ended up with as an upshot of our ignorance, fear and reluctance to interrogate the data presented to us, is a malignant supercilious dogma that functions beyond human nature, ordained by a callas and self-serving bunch of epicureans who most certainly don’t have our best interest at heart. There is really no high note to end this article with, for I myself have developed my own personal phobia; my fear of finding meaning in life. Maybe what we need is a revolution, not a bloody ruinous one where we chant diatribes and wear Chi Guevara Ts, but a revolution of the mind and self, a revolution that will enable us to reclaim our belief in ourselves and our destiny; a true reformation. Or maybe it is a lot simpler than that, maybe all we need to do is look at these scientism mock-facts the same way most westerners look at religious diktats; with curious and shameless doubt. For now I will go and do what I usually do to celebrate the conclusion of another article; a little festive practice my friends in England call ‘a wank and a fag’.

 

 

 

 

The Interview

Another evening, another interview. I would much rather be nipping on dry martini with Laura Dern on a terrace overlooking the vineyards of Tuscany. It always feels like I am starting from the very beginning everytime I go for one of these job interviews, it’s like being forced into starting a new spell of courtship with a wife I have divorced so many years ago.

  I sat with the genteel geriatric for about 30 minutes discussing the nature of the job offered. When asked about my potential contributions to the company I quickly started laying down some concrete occupational proposals and process plans, I was dialoguing with such A-Grade English I thought reciting “shall I compare thee to a summer’s day” was not too far off from our conversation. At the end of it  he asked me with the equanimity of a lethal-injection Administrator “how is your English?”  The conversation was mainly about job duties that I could have performed with my eyes closed and my testicles in severe pain, yet for the sake of the innate respect I have for people who survived the great volcano of Santorini, I sat there on the revolving chair listening to his peroration, barely keeping my eyes open and if it wasn’t for my voluntary leg-shaking I would have had to eventually succumb to lime and rust growing on the tips of my tows.

  Nice man, I thought to myself, very polite, respectful and soft-spoken, I would have been more than happy to be led by him in prayer or drive behind him during peak rush-hour without once honking at him, but being interviewed by him was a lot like attempting to sweep the surface of the ‘Empty Quarter’ with a broomstick. At some point during his oration I caught my mind thinking about the number of times I have been to job interviews, I have been to so many interviews that if taken altogether they would probably amount to a period longer than the time I spent working.

  In the time of credit crunch, cost-cutting and massive layoffs, I wonder if someone would actually pay me to just go to interviews and spy on other companies’ questioning techniques, ‘external interview coordinator’ would be a good designation. I may actually drop that idea by the next interviewer; I would ask him if his company would consider investing in my interviewee acumen. “Listen, how about if you guys pay me to run around town, apply for jobs with other companies and go for interviews” I would say with the bravado of Paul Revere. “I could get you guys some class-A information on interview techniques and insider information on the competitions’ secrets through Freudian-slips and ‘off the record’ statements that could crop up during interviews. All you guys need to do is provide me with a vehicle and a weekly pay in local currency, forget the spacious work-space and extravagant access cards, forget clock-ins and clock-outs, all you guys need to do is hurl me like a messenger-pigeon in the morning and at the end of business just wait for me in a semi-circle with your fingers crossed, for you guys it will be as exciting as it is for a bunch of kids waiting for their parent to return home from a trip to the toy store, or a throng of town folks waiting for the local travel connoisseur to return from his journey to faraway lands with a menagerie of exotic animals or a cargo of rare commodities”. The interviewer’s angry discontentment would be of no relevance to me at that point, because he would be nothing more than a dimwit who deprived the corporate world of its chance at discovering true occupational talent.    

  Who called them interviews anyway? They are nothing short of a strident and aberrant molestation of the human psyche. There you are in an office usually bigger than the duties of its tenant, seated on a chair that is often black and revolving, when you should be laying face-down and buttcrack-up on a cold dry table, ready to be probed, perplexed and embarrassed inorder to prove your aptitude for a job you would trade for a glass of expired milk anyway. The only real benefit that I have ever reaped from going to so many interviews is the development of my nascent ability to empathize with prostitutes and porn casting-couch candidates losing their dignity when they are poked, fingered and squeezed by their assessors to prove their physical aptness for the job. I did reap one other benefit from attending so many interviews, benefit in the shape of a perky rambunctious girl named Farah, who interviewed me for a shoe-salesman job once. That girl was so hot she reminded me of the importance of paying attention to details.  

  After attending so many interviews, I am now in a position to demand that my next interview be held in a giant stadium. The interviewer, myself, two revolving chairs and a table will be placed at the center of the stadium with thousands of spectators watching as they later find out that this is the opening number that precedes the gladiator fight or the ’superbowl’ they came to watch. Thousands in their rows and millions of others at home will be watching me as I give quick and decisive answers to all the questions pitched at me by the listless interviewer. The decision whether I should get the job or not will be based on the spectators’ votes. Upon finding out that the crowd loves me and I landed the job, I will stand-up and expose my nipple like Janet Jackson did before millions on national television. The event will be a huge success and ‘Arena Interviews’ will become a permanent fixture in all major sporting events around the world. “Daddy, daddy can we go to an interview game today please” the average kid would say to his father “a financial analyst is going to be interviewed by an investment firm, it’ll be really cool, can we go please?! Can we? Can we?”
“Not before you finish your homework” the father would answer
“Cool, you’re the best daddy ever, can we get some hotdogs and popcorn at the game too?”
“You’ll have to ask your mother about that”

  Back here on earth, interviews remain to be that ever elusive prize, they are not even the carrot that dangles before the horse, they are the thoughts being put in the horse’s head that there maybe carrots later. To further elucidate the galling nature of interviews let’s imagine what life would be like if we had to be interviewed before getting anything done. Imagine if you meet someone you like and instead of spontaneously conversing in the heat of the moment, she decides to sit your hopeless romantic ass on a chair and starts a barrage of questioning that will leave you sweaty and nervous over issues such as: daycare expenses, shopping budget and the children’s college fund. She may also ask you about how you can contribute to her sexual arousal and how you feel about teamwork in that respect. Imagine you are at a hospital to get treated for hemorrhoids and the nurse tells you “give me one good reason why I should offer the treatment to you and not to someone else with the same bruised achy flaky butthole”. What if you are denied membership to a gym because the person sitting at the reception couldn’t see any potential in your puny body to grow any muscle? Imagine while having sex you ask the girl to bend over and she says “sorry that position is closed”. What if you deny your kids food and shelter until you see their mid-term test scores?

  Of all the things in life that are mandated upon us and are absolutely elemental to our survival, work is the only mean we don’t have an inherent right to. We would simply kill those who attempt to deprive us of food or oxygen, because we are born free to eat, breath and live, but for those who deny us the means to provide ourselves with these necessities; those who deny us the employment opportunities we need to live, we offer our sincere smiles, handshakes and ‘thank you’ letters. No one should ever give out free money, no one should ever be given an undeserved opportunity and I suppose that’s what job interviews are put in place to ensure, yet as someone who has been to so many interviews and someone who had to interview others as part of his job, I can say with absolute certainty that inaptitude is rarely the reason why people are denied employment, timid personality, disheveled appearance and soggy handshakes, come way before inaptitude on the list. Why is it then that we wake up at wee hours, dress up in our most treasured outfits and wear our ’secret weapon’ looks? Why do you sweat like hogs and make frantic calls to friends to ask about what we should say and do? Why do we cram so much information from whatever source we can find up our noses to build our confidence level? Why do we go through all that trouble only to feel like turtle hatchlings with the survival probability of 1 in 1000?

  The answer is simple; we have to. We can’t help but chase after the elusive rewards that may come about as a result of an interview gone really well. In the same way that we approach a gorgeous girl who maybe way outta our league or think about throwing our money away on an improbable ’scratch n win’ chance at getting millions, we go for interviews believing wholeheartedly that we will get the opportunity of a lifetime if we give it our best shot, if we go through all the trouble and take the risk. In the midst of it all we may have actually given ourselves another reason to go for interviews; a reason personified in our sincere and pragmatic efforts to get things done, regardless of how many times it takes, regardless of the cost. Going for interviews may ironically bring into light yet another aspect of the human experience that is worth admiring.

The Funnyman’s Dilemma

Ladies and gentlemen I have just realized that I’m not funny, oh dear Lord that’s tantamount to pooping in one’s pants at a gala attended by George Soros and the spirit of Audrey Hepburn. I have come to this realization when one of the comments posted in response to one of my articles on ‘wordpress’ read “oh sorrrry I thought this was the humor section” I guess the multiple rs were suppose to signify the reader’s utter regret. I have begun to unwittingly categorize my articles as humorous when I started feeling frustrated with them, when I did not know what they really stood for or what sort of mood they were to befit. But now I do shamefully realize that my articles may not have been funny at all, infact and in retrospect I do think that my articles are imbued with a soporific down-tone that can lull a high-strung 5 year old sugar kid to sudden sleep.

  But flaunting my supreme baby-sitting skills was never the reason why I picked up writing in the first place, neither was it my deep-seated desire to wear the checkered woolen suit with the arm patch that pencil-neck fiction writers often wear. I have pondered over the reasons why anyone would ever choose to write about anything. I remember a tubby bespectacled kid back in school who always paraded his writing skills every chance he got, to thoroughly savor the ephemeral  moments when he managed to rub the noses of his bullies in the muck of their literary ignorance and limited vocabulary. Such was the true specimen of a teacher’s pet. I could have never used my litrary adroitness to become a teacher’s pet; I hated that entire kennel, besides my writing skills never elevated to the level of a teacher’s pet, I was always content with my writing skills being comfortably tucked away somewhere between the skill-level of a two year old spelling-bee champ and a drunk Dr. Seuss.

  I have never really endeavored to wow anyone with my verses, the chicks were sufficiently surprised with my drunken courage to verbally ask them for a dance and my mom was happy enough that I had teeth to chew on the food she cooked. I have never approached a girl with a poem, a friend with a written apology or a concerned citizen with a petition. I have never gone past the point of girlish fantasy when it came to writing for the sake of hearing people say “oh wow you wrote that yourself?!” although there were those few and far inbetween moments when I enjoyed surprising those who thought I had the IQ of an accidentally swallowed corn kernel. When I eventually did pick up writing as an avocation I realized that maintaining a certain literary mode and a consistent motif was a lot harder than making people say hmmm.

  I have dabbled with poetry writing and I think I may go back to that soon because I realize that being serious, dark and morbid enough to write a non-decipherable melancholic note about lost love is far easier than making people laugh, especially given the fact that I don’t really like people enough to wanna make them laugh. Furthermore poetry writing alleviates my burden of having to constantly etch out consistent and sober articles in which I have to address a certain concern or fear the unintentional offense of a jilted housewife. I don’t have to worry about peoples’ understanding of my poems neither do I have to gasp at the opportunity of hearing someone opine on them. Yes my poems are primarily meaningless (except those that have some meaning) and yes I do enjoy the meaningless interpretation of a meaningless life and no I don’t think that’s funny, although if you do please let me know so I can go back to being funny again.

  In the literature business, as it is with circus calliope playing or any other business that involves showcasing one’s perceived talent to the world, only the best and the worst are forever remembered, the happy mediocre, on the other hand, is swallowed by the void of undignified anonymity. The choice that the writer has to make and the relevant efforts thereof are clear; does the writer want to be the Rocky Marciano of writing or will he be content with the anomalous triumph of being the ‘Ed Wood’. The road of the ’starving artist’ is paved flat for my heedless trotting, a life connoted by tousled under-furnished studio apartments and a social life with intellectual derelicts, casting call rejects and effeminate runaways who believe they were flying Triceratops in another life. I think I do have the fortitude to stand the position of the writer manqué who struggles with his self-perception of talent and the fact that he has never produced a single article that anyone ever deemed valuable.           

  One of  my first few blogs titled ‘the funny man’s fury’ was about being funny, I did enjoy the entertained comments I got from friends and sycophants and I still relish the memories of the times when I was told that I was funny by a beautiful girl who was about to let me in her secret garden. There is really nothing wrong with being and writing funny although I don’t have to sweat it, because when I’m old and toothless, my senile memory lapse and uncontrolled bowel movements will make me funny by default. But being the literary worrywart that I am, I am often concerned when my intentionally humorous notes are perceived otherwise, not because I am particularly concerned about my waning sense of humor, but rather because as an agoraphobia-free ‘walking talking’ being I do wish to be often understood when I am trying to make a point. I guess it’s much easier to make people cry and commiserate with me if I make up a story about how my cute little 6 month old Alaskan Klee Kai puppy got smashed by a truck than it is to make them laugh by wiping out an epigram about what Shakespeare would have said at Grace Jones’s birthday. People are not usually as cruel when partaking in eachother’s misery as they are when they spot an awkward Groucho in the bushes trying to sneak a laugh outta them. 

   Writing an article may seem like a facile task at first, from the first sentence all the way down to proofreading, but once the amateur writer factors in the audience prospective opinions, trepidation starts kicking in unannounced like methamphetamine at a family reunion. Reading a good book by an accomplished writer is a lot like eating a scrumptious meal and my ensuing attempts at writing my own articles is like puking that good meal; no one will ever refuse an invitation to a good meal but with a pile of vomit even a stray dog may not RSVP. When I’m engrossed in a good piece of fiction or an enchanting autobiography,  I feel blessed that I have been given the opportunity to let my mind wander away in the direction of someone else’s life; a life that is more interesting than my own, replicating that fantasy in writing is a whole new ball game.

  My fantasies with my literature have nothing to do with the facts on the ground; my struggles, my friends or the quotidian details of everyday life, my fantasies have nothing to do with the content of my articles or with the process of writing itself, but rather with the surrounding circumstances in the make-believe situations when I have already become a consummate writer; a lofty place of fame and glory reached without the need for a plan of arduous key strokes and writer’s blocks. I fantasize about being a writer loved by millions, living a life that is drastically different from my current one; press conferences, book club broadcasts on C-Span, luncheons with khaki-suited dictators and inebriated uncouth salsa dances with Latin starlets who can’t keep their eyes off of me despite my mumbling and the spit that spears out of my mouth, late night parties where Rachel McAdams and I share music interests and a straw to snort a myriad of fine Columbian lines, she would store her number in my cell phone but I would forget to call her the next day because Iwould  have, by then, given into Oprah’s nagging for an exclusive interview on her show. “My next guest is someone Vanity Fair calls the next James Joyce” Oprah would introduce me to the audience “although we all know how much more stylish and handsome he is” the introduction will be interrupted by an anxious round of applause as the cameras take a quick sweep of the audience showing the pretty dazzled faces of beautiful women covering their lecherous desire for me underneath DKNY designs. “A man who has so wowed us with his writings, a man who truly understands women and oval-office politics, Oh forget it I know you ladies can’t wait, please welcome Mustafa Murshed….” I would enter to an unrestrained bout of screechy feminine hoots, Oprah greeting me with a blaze in her eyes and smile like a knife-slit from cheek to cheek. “oh my goodness you are so much more handsome and truthful than that James Fry” Oprah would say , another camera sweep shows pretty laughs and concurrent nods at Oprah’s quip, I would be smiling too, bordering a feigned guffaw and pitching a few winks at the admiring crowd.                      

  That sure beats the struggle of writing one badly publicized article that could have potentially saved a couple of Siberian tigers, or writing a speech for my high school reunion where I’m the only one who showed up without a spouse or a ‘house mortgage’ story to tell. I would like to find out once and for all why is it that I really like to write and why is it that I do whatever I do, why is it that I have friends but no companions? why did I succeed in serendipitously finding love but failed to willfully keep a marriage? why did I love my child with all my being but hated waking up early to keep her company? why do I want to be a good son without having to prove it? why do I find myself doing things I loath just to kill time? why do I want to kill time in the first place? why am I here not anywhere else? why am I 5′7”? why do women gravitate towards Louis Vuitton accessories so much? why are men more courageous in chat rooms than they are in real life? what’s in a Panadol pill? Maybe writing an article about every answer that I find would help me find out why I write, if that fails then I could always drop writing altogether and work on contriving a video game in which I fight with a scythe goblins and child-molesters, or formulate a pill that cures hypocrisy; it would say ‘clinically proven to work on politicians and sleek-haired boyfriends’ right there on the box.

In the Dark with You

 Demons spin as you begin to surrender

It’s all on you so clear to see

Like a translucent broken mirror

Shinning through what you feel for me

 

A sweet nectar on the pallets of your tongue

It drips and slips through the thrust of weakened honesty

Watch the binding ordinary

Denuded from pride…free

 

Layers softly flaying off of your skin

Mist from the islands in your blue eyes

Gently falling on your lap

Spreading to embrace…the keeper of your soul

 

In the dark with you and the animals

The animals are of truth and deceit

Sadness perfect at your departure

And by the acts of tyrants it’s made complete

 

Layers folding slowly on your skin

Mist from the islands in your blue eyes

Gently falling on your lap

Spreading to embrace…the savior of your soul

 

Wandering dizzy in empty hallways

Lingering thoughtless like myself

In the street struck with strangers

Soft creatures, soft hands for my itching glove

 

But in troubled times I repay you with faithfulness

I keep my letch cool in the heat

Strap my want in with submission

Amid the banging pulse and growing meat…repeat

 

Layers softly flaying off of your skin

Mist from the islands in your eyes

Gently falling on your lap

Spreading to embrace…the gentleness of your soul

 

 You crack the silence with your laughter

A shrieking sound of disbelief

You speak and your words border a catastrophe

Abandoning the madness that seeks relief

 

The bed is bouncing in your backdrop

The sight of scattered clothes makes sense

Conversation growing more laconic

Muted for something more intense

 

Fairness compels me to ask for more

Beyond this ruptured vibe flat on your body

Your will in a ball and chain

A frivolous value for my monogamy

 

Layers softly flaying off of your skin, a rhythmic ebb and flow of flesh

Music made by the bed-post and sheets

Sweaty curves intertwined in the air of midnight

A raging bone beneath the heart that bleeds

 

Caustic remarks while you may still want more

Desire dead in dissipated glue

Your scented hair adorns the aftershock

Bathroom lights flicker and then returns another you

 

Sweet pillow talk past the deed

Like discarded half-eaten plates after a feast

Our stomachs full of what we have come to devour

Now shut the lips I’m done kissing and go to sleep.

The Adventures of George W Bush and the Flying Pair of Shoes

Warning:

    The below article was written by an unpaid and unskilled amateur writer for entertainment purposes only. The opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect the position or viewpoint of the writer. Please do not mix the written words with alcohol or gun powder and please do not attempt this at home.    

 

 

 

  “Oh my God! Did you guys see that?!” is what I would have yelled in breathless excitement if I had witnessed the televised incident with a group of friends. Unfortunately I was alone when I saw it happen. I was having lunch to the usual broadcast of earthly death and destruction we collectively refer to as ‘the news’ when Shooo! It flew right be him. I have never seen a man get killed before, but that wouldn’t have been half as exciting as watching the leader of the free world dodge a shoe. Shooo! It flew right by him, a few seconds after he said “Ahlan Wa Sahlan” to a group of eager local and international journalists. Then came the second one…zoom! and he managed to dodge that one too, quickly and nimbly like Neo did with flying bullets. After the man with the flying shoes was dragged out of the conference room kicking and screaming “you have murdered the people of Iraq” and the journalists and security personnel returned to their positions the incident seemed to have added more to George W Bush’s sardonic ‘town-drunk’ sense of humor. If I didn’t know any better I would have concluded that the airborne shoes flying past the side of W’s head were parts of a staged antic road-show, put together to draw the audience into frenzied chuckles and to make outlandish political proposals seem more palatable yet again.

 

  The news of the flying shoes spread like cholera germs in a puddle of stagnant rain water across the Arab world a few hours after the incident took place. People started distributing candy on the streets of Baghdad and hailing the shoe man as a hero. We Arabs love distributing candy; we distribute candy on wedding days, birthdays, mall-opening days and certainly on ‘throw a shoe at an American president’ days. “The man is a hero” said one of the Iraqi men on the street who may have already loaded up on candy before been hurled infront of the camera, “Iraq is proud of him”. Millions of voices echoed that same opinion all over the narrow beaten vistas of the Middle East; attorneys were united, newscasters were made speechless and poets were inspired by the act of the unarmed journalist who fired two of his ground-to-air missiles at the white house but missed.

 

  When the excitement wore out and my mother was the only one left serenading the hero and flirting with the idea of supplying the Arab world with more candy, I began to flutter my eyelashes and wonder. “Oh Arabs my dear people” I imagined someone say, “Have we really become so egregiously defeated? Have we run out of all gambits and strategic tactics to uphold our pride and preserve our honor? Have we lost our will to fight to the point that we now consider a man who chucked a shoe to be a hero? If we hate this Bush dude so much why doesn’t someone shoot him right in the temple instead of pitching shoes at him? Why don’t we shred him to pieces if we so ardently believe that he is responsible for the murder of millions of our men and women? Why didn’t we kidnap his cochead daughter or tickle to death his snooty stiff-faced wife? Why didn’t any of us ever try to get him in a headlock and force a bottle of bourbon down his throat so he can go back to his addiction and leave us the heck alone? Why didn’t we hire some ninjas to hurl poisoned ‘ninja stars’ at him? Why oh why oh why? Wait a minute…I think I know why…yes, it’s because we are defeated, we have run out of gambits and strategic tricks. If we were magicians we would have had to pay rabbits to get into our hats”.

 

 

  We are defeated, we can’t threaten economic sanctions against the US government that has supposedly pillaged our land and ‘smart-bombed’ our kids, because if we did we would then have to liquidate the largest portion of our investments, replace our cars with horse-carriages and use our excess crude oil in place of anti-bacterial hand soap. Who would buy our oil for cheap and sell us cars that run on the oil we sold to buy these cars? We can’t wage a war against W and his covey of glass-eyed villains because our armies are only hired and trained for the purposes of pummeling their own people and dragging them to prison, and our tanks are designed to shuttle the prisoners should any of the overloaded prison buses have a flat tire. We can not do it the ol’ fashion way with the Ottoman cannons or the Meccan spirits, we can’t, we simply can not, so we salute Mr. Goody Two Shoes.

 

 Then again in a world muddled by media Sound-bites, destroyed by cluster bombs and awash with socio-corporate materialism, aren’t we in desperate need of a healthy dose of symbolism?; a radical, brutal and self-affirming symbolism that only a frustrated man with two shoes can render? Isn’t that ordinary man from the dust-bowl streets of Baghdad truly a hero for reminding us that all we need to preserve our honor are a pair of clinched fists and shiny shoes? Aren’t shoes a better solution than bullets under most circumstances? After all shoes never really killed anyone in modern history and they are far more stylish. What’s wrong with starting a shoe revolution that serves the Pan-Arab purpose and keeps Joan Rivers happy all in one toss? Isn’t this our chance to prove to the rest of the world that we are not all terrorists and that we sometimes prefer alternative methods to IEDs to express our opinions? 

 

“ The action taken by that ordinary man who was exhorted by raw anguish and frustration after seeing his own country turn to ashes, has united the Arab world” some might say, even for a brief moment.  It silenced with a resounding bang the sounds of the guns and tanks that the Arab armies never bothered to mobilize in our defense; it spoke louder than the proper politically correct words embellished by empty promises muttered in UN hallways. That ordinary man may have proven that by doing what Taiwanese parliamentarians do almost everyday we can make ourselves heard by the rest of the world, we can put a tyrant to shame without spilling a single drop of innocent blood. The opinions on the heroism of the act may vary but I think we can all agree that it did deliver a high entertainment value.