It’s 8:30 am. I’m sitting in front of the TV as I drink my coffee and smoke my cigarette. At this moment, Al Jazeera Mubasher is showing Baba Amr neighborhood in Homs, Syria. A camera installed on a rooftop or a high balcony shows the tops of buildings. A minaret appears to the right of the screen. The sky is cloudy. The sound of heavy shelling rings through the air. I drink my coffee and smoke my cigarette. My heart is aching.
I wish I were with them. I know I am not there. I am in a safe place. Warmth fills my room. I slightly open a window to let in some fresh air. I do not feel cold. I hear the sound of gunfire coming from the TV screen. With a click of the remote control, it's all over. But does it really end? Or does a new phase in the life of Syrians begin when we turn off the TV and go on with our daily lives as if nothing had happened?
I read the morning paper. Asma al-Assad declares her solidarity with her husband. She says he is the president of all Syria, not just a class of Syrians. A few days ago she and her husband visited a student named Pierre who was shot by a fellow student at the university. They sat at his bedside. Pierre told them how the student who shot him looked him in the eyes before shooting. The names here are nothing more than a cheap ploy to promote sectarianism in Syria. Pierre, George and so on, and their visit was nothing but cheap propaganda.
At that very moment, people were being killed on the streets and the president was offering to pay Pierre’s university fees for his four years of university studies. He thinks he will stay in office for four more years. At that moment, children were being killed on the streets and the president was telling jokes. He laughed. His laughter filled the air. His tiny eyes disappeared behind his eager laughter.
The president finds it difficult to swallow his laughter. He jumps around on his chair. He then makes fun of Facebook and YouTube. He tells Pierre’s family that the other student he visited a few weeks ago lives on the fourth floor and that the residents gathered at the entrance to shake his hand, but that Pierre’s family lives on the ground floor, which is better. He then bursts out laughing.
The president laughs, his wife laughs, and then Pierre’s family laughs. Everyone is laughing. And people are being killed on the streets.
I will pretend that armed gangs are killing the people and that they are being exposed to an armed attack. They fall like leaves, they die, and their wives and mothers mourn them. I will pretend that Syria is being exposed to a major conspiracy. But the president laughs. His army kills and he laughs.
It is now 9 am Baba Amr Time. Shelling continues. Gunfire. A minaret appears to the right of the screen. The sky is cloudy. A rooster’s crow cuts through the sound of gunfire to announce the beginning of a new day.
