Well, well, well. There are 101 blog posts in my head waiting to be written. There are another 1001 'urgent' and not too urgent articles waiting to be typed. And there is a life waiting to be lived. In the meanwhile, all that I am doing is waiting. Waiting for Summer to turn into Winter, and Spring into Autumn - not that we really have seasons in Bahrain, but you get the the idea.



The truth is that I have been waiting. Just simply plainly waiting. Waiting for things to change. Waiting for life to get better - and not even keeping track of time. It really hits me as a surprise when I realise that it's a Friday, for instance, because everyday has become a Friday for me. And I kid you not, I did a somersault when I saw today's date and realised that we just have a few more eye blinks until the end of the year. Two or three at the most, especially at the rate I am going in.

Ask me not what I did in 2010 for the answer is null. Nada. Nada. Nada. And don't you dare tell me that I am being ungrateful or hard on myself because sometime ago I made a pact with myself not to jump over to the dark side, and I have kept that promise. I have continued to remain upbeat and positive (sort of), I have continued to keep my house tidy (sometimes), and I have played with, fed and groomed my cats without fail on all the days I have been in Bahrain.

Like me, Bahrain has tried to remain the same this past year. But unlike me, it has gone to the dark side - to a place of nightmares, hallucinations and dark thoughts. A place of schemes, webs and plots, and hilariously laughable mind games which we continue to pay the price for. And just as I have sheltered myself from all the bad things in life, content with a very small group of relatives and friends and my non-sectarian gang of 11 cats, Bahrain has shut itself up in a self-made cocoon, weaved with lies and half-truths and sealed with frustrations. What baffles me the most is when intelligent people fall into the trap of lying on themselves and believing in those lies. How does that really work? Yes, politics is a dirty game but do we really have to accept the fact that we are being gagged and our thoughts are being monitored for the common good? Do we really need to continue sticking our heads in the sand and get all that dirt into our eyes so that we can blame the desert for our blindness?

What good does it make to censor whole swats of the Internet? How does that work again when even the least technical person among us can bypass that proxy and dig into the world wide web, reading and learning and understanding? When have we become a nation that loathes itself and become an enemy of openness and transparency? Why do we still get those wretched blocked pages and worst of all, why are we all so quiet about it?

Why is Google Translate, for instance, blocked? What purpose does that serve in a country which prides itself for being at the forefront of education, development and breakthroughs and what breakthroughs do we exactly pride ourselves of? Seriously. Come on! Will we ever reach a stage where we are treated as mature citizens or will we continue to live happily basking in the thought that we are subjects in our Wonderland? Or are the rights and responsibilities too big a chore for us to bear? Just asking.

2 comments:

Mohammad said...

This is the situation everywhere in the Arab world.

It's sad. Censorship is something families should do in home, not governments.

our governments are in denial. they think that by censoring, they are protecting us. what they are trying to protect is their thrones.

I'm shocked that Translate is blocked in bahrain. non sense. We had flickr blocked here in Dubai forever, they only opened it last month!

I think the internet should be open. every house, every work, should be responsible for their own people. If i don't want my kids to watch porn, or read politics, then I can do this at home through third party firewall apps. ahh i'm pissed.


@mzaher.

zahraa said...

"What baffles me the most is when intelligent people fall into the trap of lying on themselves and believing in those lies."

Its makes me mad, are they really that stupid? It also makes me very sad.. why do they 'want' to believe such things?

"... and worst of all, why are we all so quiet about it?"

This question keeps popping in my head! I think that's how we reached this level of "darkness" in Bahrain.. by being silent

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