The Ambiguous Odyssey

Dear God, You have the power to make me numb. The power to no longer linger on to the past. You can heal me with all my wounds. Dear God, I know you know the bigger picture. It's merely the fact that lately days seems more unbearable and the people I am coming across are even worse. I can no longer escape them because it feels like I am escaping my soul. Dear God, 17 is harder than I thought -so much harder-. You feel like complaining is invalid because your thoughts and complaints are disregarded. Yet every mistake you make is held against you with all the power in the world.  Dear God, I know everybody is somebody and you care about every one; I only wish that with every sin we commit we become less and less important till at one point we vanish. I wouldn't mind vanishing if everyone got their fair share. Dear God, I am tired of living in fear of tomorrow. I only sometimes crave I had a relatively normal life; one with peace. Dear God, I can live my life in fear of the fut...

And it's in moments like these when I realize -at least to some extent- how this whole scenario has changed me. I've been trying to look at the brightest spots in this dark void I seem to be sucked into. The void I've been living in for the past 16 months. The 7 stages of grief played backwards; starting with hope and ending with grief. That's a simpler way to describe how it feels to live a life full of deaths. I would be lying if I said I could define myself now. I have never not known myself. I have never been such a stranger to my existence. I can no longer bear thinking of the present, let alone the future.  When you indulge yourself in the reality of this world it's hard to think 10 steps forward; when you see people who can't make it through the day and others who can't pay their medical bill which is basically a fraud. But the glitch in indulging yourself in all the bad news is that at some point you give in. You lose all what remains of you. I ...

I once heard someone say the phrase "Making peace is harder than making war." At the time, that seemed so irrational, so absurd. On April 17, 2016 just before I closed my eyes, I made one final plea to God. A plead to end this storm of air raids -that have been surrounding me for 14 months now- and fell into a slumber. Waking up hurriedly, to see the news only to be hit with a shock of disappointment that the air raids never stopped and my plead wasn't heard. To think that for a moment I believed peace would prevail, how silly of my 17 year old self.   A few days passed and news that the peace talks were back on came and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't flooded by a new rush of hope. It's funny how much a human can hope. As happy as I was, I was equally perplexed. Bewildered by how the same people who send missiles in the earliest hours of dawn can also manage to speak of peace. Perhaps I am just not that good with multitasking, after all who am I to judge...

Tell me how did you spend the last 365 days? Did you end up getting that job offer? Did you get that scholarship you were working so hard to get? Did you graduate high school/university or perhaps you just got your pHD! Whatever you achieved I congratulate you! Well I'd like to speak of my 365 days. You know how we always chant the phrase day by day it all seems the same but looking back it's so different. I aged a life time within 365 days. I have experienced so much from fleeing my home to running down a set of 70 stairs in fear of a jet blowing up our third floor. Crying for nights and nights feeling death encircling me to laughing to the sound of explosions. Yes, I have lived some of the worst days of my life but I wouldn't change them for the world. Only now have I realized what an enormous amount of pride comes with being Yemeni. I am now in my senior year and I have broke down into fits of tears more times than I can count in school due to the sudden air raids ...

"Hope springs eternal in the human breast; Man never is, but always to be blessed. The soul, uneasy and confined from home, Rest and expatiates in a life to come." This was extracted from, An Essay on Man by Alexander Pope. The writer had a connotation of the concept of life after death, but I've always believed a word can be viewed different every time you read it, that being said I will interpret it. Our hearts are filled with despair and hope; endless, vast amounts. They originate from our hearts; a spring. Human kind, our race is abundantly enviable we don't discern it. Alas, we are never content. We have our comfort zones, our safe havens that we wish to never retreat from yet we don't value or cherish them. Life forces us to relinquish them at some point.Then and only then do we long for our harbors. Our asylums. But in due course with hope and humility we fathom the significance of the change and we begin to adapt and rest tranquilly. Hope is...

The thing is when I close my eyes tighter، I hear them louder. Shutting down one sense only clarifies another. The speed of light is a thousand times faster than the speed of sound, the only thing faster than that is the rate at which my heart beats. 9 months later and nothing has changed; my mouth dangles and my eyes widen, enlarge and I taste the end, not of this coalition; but of my life. My life that seems to have been ephemeral and now is burdened be. Looking back on how much I've grown, the only visible difference is how any sound whether cars passing by, motorcycles approaching my neighborhood or one of my siblings slamming the door too fast or strutting harshly in the second floor -or third or fourth-, scares me and makes me tremble to my feet. I've grown accustomed to my realm of vulnerability. They say there have been over ten thousand air raids on Yemen, I've seen every memory of the past 16 years flash before my eyes at least ten thousand times. With every...

‪#‎ 200Days‬  have changed me. 100 felt important 200 just doesn't have a ring to it. It hurts but it doesn't hurt like it used to, not because I grew numb to death, rather I learned that death is like an arch it pulls you back a step -or two- then when it let go's you leap forward with full force.  200 days means nothing. I feel the same anger and frustration I have been feeling these past six months, every air raid is still as petrifying as the very first one. The only thing  that changed is I now know who I am mad at and why I am mad at them. 200 days have made me stronger. I learned that death has a bitter-sweet tang. A taste I sometimes crave. I linger for the way death stares us bluntly in the eyes and leaves us there awaiting a closer encounter. Everyday that passes is a closer day to the end. 200 days has supported me with faith. 200 days and still counting.

I always imagined the light I saw before dying would be that sent from God - bright white with an angel glancing at me, tranquility- not that dropped by an aircraft. It scares me how many times I've escaped death. I feel every breath of air I breathe is stolen. I feel like a fugitive running from death. Have you ever touched a dead person? They feel so cold, icy. Gelid. Every missile that hits makes my blood turn cold, my jaw dangles wide open and I can't speak. I try to r emind myself that once again I have fled death. Once again I have beat the odds. Some days I am strong and invincible. Other days like today I am shattered, broken and frail. I am trying to sleep but the thought of waking up dead is frightening me, but nobody is ever ready to die. I remember being 9 years old dreaming of my teens and how "cool" I'd be and how rebellious and flawless my life would be. Now at Sixteen all I can think of is whether tomorrow I'll be cocooned in a white clo...

I always sleep around 8:30 pm yesterday I had to stay up till around 10 pm; I was talking to a friend the moment I heard the holy air craft I threw the phone and tried to go to sleep. I literally covered my ears and took loud deep breathes in order to not hear it's harmony. Thankfully, I fell asleep before it hit. The thing here is I am a deep sleeper. I sleep early before they start hitting so I can withstand the troublesome of the mornings air raids. Otherwise it is just t oo much to bear. Before I fall asleep I always imagine waking up in a blood bath or waking up with no sign of my Mother and two siblings. Or perhaps homeless. All that being said; I am weary from all of this. I have changed. I am no longer the same person I was before all of this happened. But... I wouldn't change it for the world I feel free. 6 months ago to be Yemeni was to be minuscule, vulnerable & worthless. Now we are freedom, bravery & pride.

As I lay breathing, safe and sound. Cuddled up in my blanket hearing the birds chirping. It hits me once again, he is dead. Gone. Gone for eternity. He has bid his farewells to this cruel world. Around a month ago I visited a few of the +9000 wounded due to the Saudi Led Coalition, at that time we were working on an Eid project, we were supposed to get each of the injured to say "Eid Mubarak". We got the chance to hear their tragic miseries. However, he was different, this  is his story; He was on a bus with 17 other people when the missile hit. They all perished, he was the lone survivor. He didn't leave in one piece he lost both legs and was deeply wounded and burnt. He was too fatigued to speak, he didn't want to say "Eid Mubarak". He felt like his life was futile, vain. He is burned, scarred for life. For a sin he didn't commit. While awaiting for him to prepare mentally and emotionally, one of the nurses mentioned the fact he doesn't hav...

Today I was honored to have visited a few of the 300,000 people who have been displaced as a result of this Saudi led coalition. I have never been surrounded by so much love, than with these angels. It was a pleasure to have met them and have had a conversation with them. I left with so much happiness. I was gleeful, over the moon!  However, it breaks my heart to see how poorly they are living. They reside in governmental schools. We are speaking of people who had homes. They aren't beggars from the street. No water, no electricity & no clothes. A whole family which could get to the size of 10 people live in the small space of a "classroom". A literal classroom. Let's speak food-wise they have such small amounts of food yet today while the children were each given a biscuit and a juice box, you would expect any normal child would just dig in. Especially since it's Ramadan and none of the adults could take it away. One of the kids, a boy around 7 years old gav...

Even after 3 months and a fortnight the sounds of war crafts still terrify me. My mother promised if I heard their utterance they are far away. Regardless, whenever I apprehend the sounds of them my heart beats rapidly and my stomach clenches. As soon as I hear the missile explode I taste death one more time. I remember when I conjectured that the tang of death is sweet. I was raised to be strong, hard headed and invincible this coalition made me question my strength, do I in  sooth have any strength? I always knew politics was dirty business and I know no one cared much for Yemen, including the UN, but seeing all the genocides and terror I can't even imagine how they sleep at night. Are they intact of their humanity? Putting all my fears and all my worries aside; this country is something else. Every time I scramble out of the house crying of trepidation from those war crafts expecting everyone to feel as I do but I am bewildered by the reality. The fact people are on the streets,...