because we are also what we have lost
it's 9 in the evening, the end of july. last week i turned 25. i'm in my sister's house in defense housing authority, mujahid and 28th, karachi pakistan. i've just been told i don't know how to spell my name. which gave me a flashback to my ESL kindergarden days. only now i'm smart enough to back up the anger with argument. though not always brave enough. that remains the same.
i packed my bags onto a donkey cart and left my house in agordat for good at the beginning of the month. it had rained hard throughout the night before. puddles filled the dirt roads and muddy water splashed up on my feet as we rode. the grandma next door had tears in her eyes and the sun was nowhere in sight, obscured by clouds. it was the most pleasant morning, as far as the weather goes, that i had ever witnessed there. i had said my many goodbyes.
a week later i was taking a night cab from central asmara to the airport. as i watched the landmarks roll by and recalled seeing them in reverse 674 nights earlier, i think i might've felt something bordering on emotion, and i thought, maybe i'm a person afterall. the feeling didn't last long.
i arrived at karachi's quaid-e-azam international airport the following night. as usual, without my bags. my sister and cousin were waiting outside for me, entertained by the people shrieking as they tried to mount the foreboding escalators. i spent the night sharing a bed with my grandmother, as i do most nights nowadays. just me and my granny now living in the house that was once home, and that once bustled with many husbands wives siblings children and cousins. all of whom have left for faraway places, sometimes 6 feet under. the guns, the ones i can hear, go off once in a while at night. but that doesn't stop me, and millions of others, from roaming the streets in the day, and joyriding in dope and pop music filled fast cars through karachi's mean streets by night.
i started language classes today. among other things, the teacher told me i don't know how to spell my name. which is when i had my kindergarden english-challenged flashback. but back then, i didn't know how to spell anything at all. and i knew it. and now, though other things i can spell, i'm still told i don't know how to spell my name. and i don't believe it.
anger? indignation? disbelief, doubt, annoyance, or perhaps, and most likely, just a temporary short-lived grazing of my indifferent shell? whatever it was, it made me feel something. and i thought, maybe i am a person.
