The Absence of Light

Life is too much sometimes. We choose our lies, whatever they are, what we want to live.. that the world can be a fair place, that truth and justice prevail, that prayers without the tough deeds we need to be doing can make things better. We choose whatever lies get us through the day, at whatever price. The price is usually others, those who fight on our behalf, those who get punished on our behalf, those who get sucked into the world of evil greedy men. These wonderful shoes I bought, at the expense of some of the downtrodden in an Asian country, but it doesn't matter, they're not people I know, I choose my lies. That great bargain on my shirt, with people toiling away so that many like me get a great bargain. This security I feel in my rich quarters, why was the land expensive? I choose my lie, refusing to see that this money is for security forces to violently fend off others who attempt to infringe on my right to my lies.

We choose our lies, but sometimes the truth chooses us. We come face to face with reality that everyone wants to deny. Face to face with a reality of the world that is far more intrusive, far less comforting than our lies. The truth catches up with some of us.

Coming face to face with the truth makes you feel you want to spread it to the blind as though it were light. It makes you feel you want to proselytize and convert, because you know what you know and you've seen what you've seen. You try and find a pathway other than your own experience such as emperical and logical evidence, but to no avail. We often forget that it's not the absence of light that doesn't make the blind see, it's absence of vision, no matter the light.

You cannot make the blind see by asking them to look harder, and sometimes that's how it feels as I try and share what I know. It's written off despite my unfortunate privilege to witness something about the truth of the world.

I think I've given up on change a long time ago, but I've kept sharing because I wanted to prove to myself that I can still retain that truth that visited me, that I can still retain my integrity.  But what I'm seeing is so disheartening that makes me even stop wanting to share. I keep on doing it not to change things but to prove to myself that their lies cannot defeat my truth.

Maybe I should keep that fight to myself, not everyone has to know, it influences too few people. Yet, it's difficult, it feels as though it's a duty. I'm stuck between that feeling and the futility of my words, written off as a point of view that can be easily discarded in favor of another. It's difficult for me to see oppression as a point of view, but at the same time, it's difficult to speak of what I know and see those around preach flawed, selfish values that help them sustain their lies.

I know it doesn't matter what I say, and perhaps soon I will see the value of silence.

Miracles and Realism

"...in my experience miracles never bother a realist. It is not miracles that incline a realist towards faith. The true realist, if he is not a believer, will invariably find within himself the strength and the ability not to believe in miracles either, and if a miracle stands before him as an incontrovertible fact, he will sooner disbelieve his senses than admit that fact. And even if he does admit it, it will be as a fact of nature, but one that until now has been obscure to him. In the realist it is not faith that is born of miracles, but miracles of faith. Once the realist believes, his realism inexorably compels him to admit miracles too. The Apostle Thomas declared that he would not believe until he saw, and when he saw, said: 'My Lord and my God.' Was it the miracle that made him believe? The likeliest explanation is that it was not, and that he came to believe for the sole reason that he wanted to believe and, perhaps, in the inmost corners of his being already fully believed, even when he said: 'Except I shall see...I will not believe.'"

~ The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Fair Game

It's fair. It's absolutely fair that we should lose to the USA by three and that the USA should qualify. It's not just fair, but right because of the great many differences between not just the two teams, but the two countries.

How can you expect a country to do something right when everything goes wrong? I mean with Africa, it's okay, because most of the African countries are as messed up as we are or even more, and the mentality is similar, so there's no difference between one underdog and another. But when we're playing against the USA we have to understand that it’s not the American team but the American attitude that’s difficult to defeat.

America is mostly despised but perhaps also loved for the same reasons it is despised, not the least of which is its winning attitude that is so fervidly despised in Europe. But to be honest, America is a comeback junkie, with a great thirst for winning and most of its citizen think they're in a Rocky movie, expecting a comeback at any minute. They believe anything is possible till the last minute, and while they might be wrong sometimes, this attitude enables them to do all that is possible for them to do. In the end they go down fighting. Despite their sometimes annoying positivism, I'd always want an American on my team because the general attitude is not to quit.

In Egypt however, the loss is symptomatic of a country where good things are accidents. Like all accidents that happen in Egypt, even the good ones are plentiful. Did we really think that things were doing things so right so as to actually make it to the second round? No, we’re just a first round kind of people. It's just not right that we should do something contrary to our nature, and unlike matters within the country where doing things the wrong way gives you the greatest rewards, the world does not recognize nor accept this way of life, and for this reason we lose when we don't do things right, as it should be within Egypt.

I'm not one to change my point of view overnight like most people who will suddenly see Egypt's team as having no potential; on the contrary, we played great previously, beating Italy and giving Brazil a run for their money. We have some world class players occasionally and I don’t mean that we have a good player once in a while, but rather a player that does well once in a while. The point I mean to make is that we're consistent in our inconsistency. We're too mercurial (as is evident from FIFA stats) and it’s in our nature to let go once we imagine success. Our standards are so low that we don’t care to keep giving it our best shot. Doing well is not a way of life; it's an activity that we practice once in a while albeit a very long while.

In this game the nature of the countries collided with one another and if there’s one thing we ought to know, it’s that our nature can’t win. A country with talent and history was defeated by a country with less talent and less history but so much more will and enthusiasm. A mentality of losers was aptly beaten by a mentality of winners. A country that lost its ability to resist was beaten by a country that never quits. In short an enslaved country was beaten by a free country.

Is that too much philosophy for a football game? It might be, but I think we don't have enough philosophy to win as much as a football game. If we talk about the concrete reasons, they'll be something as boring as our league is horrible and undisciplined, our players don't train properly, our education is crap and it affects our mentality, our values are screwed up and we value pleasure more than hard work that gives so much more pleasure in the long run, etc.. etc.. The concrete reasons are there, but the problem is that our hopeless philosophies in life are what lead us to these concrete reasons in every field and on every field.

I've said it before and I say it again, it's not that Egypt is so damn hopeless, it's those moments of hope that really make you realize how we could have been. We caught a glimpse, but it all faded away… In the end it appears that this is all we can ever get.

One River

The rivers that flow carry water, and the water that is dispersed at a later time can be seen as one. We cannot differentiate between the water by its destination, it’s one, linked together. When taking water with a bucket, it separates and though it’s still water it doesn’t seem like part of the stream, and yet by pouring it back, it merges again, and you can no longer distinguish what you had in your bucket from what’s there in the stream.

With this water all thirst is quenched and through this water we all become part of each other. We share the one thing we all need, and though we think we’re different, we’re not. We’re one stream that has been separated by many ways.

The air in my lungs leaves me and joins the air around us, and after some time that same air that has visited my insides finds its way to your lungs. Many a sad sigh have I given out, bearing with it a part of me, and which you have inhaled and many a previous laughter have I inhaled too. And so the air that has visited my insides, my very own internal places, that I myself have not seen, has visited you as well.

So why do you oppress me and despise me. Why do you look down upon me like I’m worthless? Why do you hold a gun to my head and threaten to take my life. Why do you steal from me and not earn your living instead. Why do you hate me for no reason at all.

Can’t you see we’re water that has been taken out of a stream? Can’t you see we’ll one day join that stream again. What will you do then, when we’re joined once more. Can you hate yourself and cheat yourself, for we are one.