http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/ What's on the minds of young leaders from around the globe? en-us http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/518615
http://www.newsflavor.com/Politics/US-Politics/Election-Night-2008-at-Times-Square-in-Pictures.330673]]> Wed, 05 Nov 2008 12:58:00 EST http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/518615 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/507987 http://www.newsflavor.com/Opinions/America-Teacher-and-Student-of-War.314349

It came to me to write this when I learned how American soldiers were returning from Iraq with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) from serving in the war in Iraq. The question had also occured to me prior to that as well, as we hear things about how American war veterans are haunted for the rest of their lives from their war experiences, why is there this understanding and compassion for the psychological effects of war on the soldiers, the soldiers of the aggressing country, no less, but there is no compassion or understanding for the actual people living in the country that the soldiers invade and bomb?

This was upsetting to me and seemed like a very unfair and Ameri-centric attitude, so I wrote about it.]]> Sun, 26 Oct 2008 19:59:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/507987 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/506721
http://www.newsflavor.com/Politics/US-Politics/What-Do-Joe-the-Plumber-and-Santa-Claus-Have-in-Common.305461]]> Wed, 22 Oct 2008 01:53:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/506721 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/499907
This week John McCain, after failing miserably in the second debate with Obama, decided it was time to abandon all wisdom and substance and start inciting hatred and fear in his supporters against Obama by making links between Obama and terrorists. At John McCain's rallies this week, McCain supporters began shouting out things about Obama such as "Kill him!" and "Terrorist!"

This is a most unsettling development, especially after Hillary Clinton, who ran against Obama in the primaries, implied that she would not concede defeat because Obama might get assassinated, as Robert F. Kennedy did.

Today, John McCain was forced to correct his deluded, rabid supporters concerning Obama. He explained to a man, who sincerely seemed to fear that Obama would appoint terrorists to positions of power in the government, that he had nothing to fear of an America led by Obama. He then corrected the ignorance of an elderly woman, who couldn't seem to muster any words other than "He's Arab..." McCain shook his head saying "He is not an Arab." [As if it's a sin and a crime to be an Arab; don't worry, ignorant lady, he's not an Arab].

So, first John McCain incites and invites fear and hatred against Obama in his supporters, now he has to quel it. Regardless of how he succeeds, I fear that when Obama becomes president, an assassination attempt will be made on his life.

[The source of my information is MSNBC.]]]> Fri, 10 Oct 2008 20:12:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/499907 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/499787 Fri, 10 Oct 2008 16:55:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/499787 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/497209 Tue, 07 Oct 2008 08:53:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/497209 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/496835
I realized yesterday that I have to learn how to make my own website, or I will never have one. I began trying to figure out how to make a page with Dreamweaver last night and all day today. Progress is slow and I am told I am trying to do difficult things (dynamic pages). Any help from anyone who knows how to use Dreamweaver and can give me instruction on how to do certain things within a page would be very appreciated :). ]]> Mon, 06 Oct 2008 23:43:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/496835 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/494309

]]> Fri, 03 Oct 2008 23:19:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/494309 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/41575
Real article at this link under section titled "Friday 4 August":
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5239142.stm ]]> Fri, 04 Aug 2006 22:43:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/41575 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/41252
I happened upon a discussion of the Middle East crisis on Fox News as I was switching through channels. Among the participants in the discussion were Oliver North and Dan Senor. I sat listening without knowing much about any of them, presuming they were men whose words and feelings would hold significant influence and credibility with their American audience. The tone and the intentions that could be felt behind their words scared me. Their dialogue was bombastic, saturated with emotionally charged speech, glorifying the indiscriminate bloody assault being carried out by Israel on the people of Lebanon and Gaza, shaming the US for not partaking militarily by Israel’s side in the assault and calling for full US military involvement in an all-out war together with Israel to wipe out the “rogue states” surrounding Israel, wholly lacking in solid facts and sound reason or judgment. They delved further into the imagination as they began to speculate on a potential threat of “pseudo-allies,” such as Egypt, should such countries be swayed against the US.

To add to that, I happened to catch Paula Zahn on CNN interviewing the Syrian ambassador to the US. I was shocked by the emotional incontinence which she displayed, as a deliberate tone of hostility was leaking out of her mouth with her words and sullying the entire nation. She spoke to the ambassador insultingly, as if to a guilty child whom she was trying to pry her own predetermined truth out of.

There are two issues that are profoundly concerning when this is what is interpreted as news. The first issue deals with the impact that the tone and perception emanating from the speakers on the news have towards Arabs and Arab countries; things absorbed by the listener, but never spoken in word. While the discussion on Fox News was devoid of facts and sound reason, channeled emotions and their underlying implications were abundant. There was a clear implication that the participants speaking of Lebanon, Syria and other Arab Middle East countries did not perceive these countries as being comprised of humans, but of some sort of subhuman animal or bacteria and that it was the noble duty of the US and Israel to wipe them out. The participants stretched the imagination with irrelevant speculation and insubstantial dialogue designed to sow fear and anger into the hearts of listeners and so to form the opinions that the speakers desired their audience to have. No facts are stated or sought and emotion is used as the sole basis for opinions and actions. Growing up during the Cold War in the United States, I was taught that this news was the news of communists.

The second issue of concern with this interpretation of news deals with the victims of this propaganda…I mean news. Arabs across America, across the world, watching this news may not be able to articulate the implications, but they can feel themselves and their people being spoken of as subhuman entities to be wiped out. Such an insult goes beyond words and breeds hatred and a necessity for self-defense against the predator. There is no mystery why Hezbollah and Hamas exist; this “news” sows fear in the hearts of its victims too.
]]> Thu, 27 Jul 2006 12:19:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/41252 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/36981
And in this forest, he is overtaken with a shroud of guilt, self-doubt, self-devaluation. So when my love gets upset and retreats into his forest of despair, I go into the dark forest after him, to find him in its dismal depths and bring him back out with me, into the true light of day and into the warmth of my love.

I do this, even times when it was my own anger and tears that sent him into the forest. I put aside my grievance against him; I know he sends himself into the forest because he loves me and finds himself unworthy of my love, but I cannot let him be in that horrible, dark place, believing he is bad.

He is my love, and he, too, comes after me when I retreat into my deep, dark forest of despair.
]]> Sat, 25 Mar 2006 07:33:00 EST http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/36981 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/34586 below the din of their chatterings
beneath their dining table
with an appetite for far more than food

Beneath the table you and I meet
unperceived in our private place
to fill ourselves up
from the core of our soul to the infinity of God
you feeding me, and I you,
with an intimacy and a nourishment
they cannot conceive

because they think the essence of life
is in their chatterings and in their food.


Zahrouni, 05.01.2006
]]> Fri, 27 Jan 2006 03:47:00 EST http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/34586 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/31273
Do you know what hell is? People seem most often to believe that hell consists of some form of physical pain being inflicted on the earthly body. Perhaps physical pain is the worst kind, or even only kind of pain that many people can imagine. However, most people who might believe in hell or an afterlife will also believe that the body dies and that it is the non-physical elements of people that live on in the afterlife. What are our non-physical elements? You could say the soul. To be specific, our non-physical elements comprise what is in our hearts and minds – what you feel, what you think, what you desire - from these stem all of our actions and words, our behavior and the reasons for how we treat others, the acts we choose to engage in in our lives and so on.

What do you love? What emotions do you cling to? What emotions do you hate and want to flee from? Do you spend more time in ill-will, hating, disliking, criticizing, judging, psychologically and emotionally breaking down or destroying yourself or others than you spend in good will, loving, liking, complimenting, accepting, psychologically and emotionally building up or nurturing yourself or others? Now consider this; just imagine that once you die, you will be stuck for eternity in that ill-will or good will and in those negative or positive emotions that you carry inside you towards yourself and others…would you try to change yourself before you die?

Throughout my 20's, I told myself, hell is here on earth and I am living in it - my emotions were my agony and I strove in desperation to escape my agony. The emotions we choose to foster inside ourselves can be of heaven or of hell, and they can bring the agony of purgatory or the joy of heaven.

I had the following dream during a week when I was in the midst of what was the single-most horrible and traumatizing ordeal of my life, out of the long and intense period of suffering I have lived through growing up and throughout my subsequent adult life. Believe as you wish, but for me, this dream showed me without the slightest doubt one dimension of hell:

Evil woman spirit
6 August, 2002 7:31 Tues.

Some hours ago I had a horrifying “dream.” It was more than a dream though; its emotions bore a depth that was intense with reality, more intense and profound, more penetrating, in fact, than emotions I experience in people in reality. It’s the worst, scariest dream I’ve had since the one I had right before Bitsy died. Elements of it were too real and felt far too deliberate to merely have been a fabrication of my mind.

I was in the large spacious room of a new house, light with windows, happily occupying my mind contemplating what sort of rug to put in it. Maybe it happened as I was thinking to myself…I’m not sure—but I felt an evil woman present, and I mean once trouble started, I could hear and even more FEEL her, not see her. One second I’m blissfully contemplating interior decorations in a silver-colored room, the next second I am being sucked under the floor and feeling this evil woman. She was evil to the core and I felt a blood-thirsty hatred that she had for me inside her. THIS and the aggressiveness with which she was trying to bring me down to her hell and destroy me were the things that made this feel more real—usually dreams and those in them are more passive. This woman was actively, deliberately and passionately trying to destroy me, and she had great power at her disposal to do so and she was exerting it all on me.

I found myself, like 2-3 meters under the floor, like in some other world, like hell, and this woman was pulling, TRYING to pull me deeper and deeper. The hell were the emotions—horrifying emotions, maybe they were hers—I couldn’t bear them and I felt her pulling me in deeper, so in desperation and horror I immediately began saying out loud “GOD GOD GOD GOD GOD” and I said GOD louder and louder, focusing on God in my mind, maybe I was shouting by the end GOD GOD GOD. And I felt I was pulled up out of that hell and stood in the room again in shock and, I think, very angry at that woman. I left the room to a different part of the house to try to get away from her. But I felt her beginning to try to suck me back into her dimension of hell again and again. This time, also in anger at her, I began shouting GOD GOD GOD GOD GOD GOD GOD. Somewhere in me I was worried neighbors or someone else might hear me. Again, also with my more aggressive shouting, she went away and I woke up, just barely. And, drifting off back to sleep, I could still feel her presence in my “dream-mind,” so I woke myself up as best I could and asked God to please don’t let me have anymore bad dreams tonight. And so I didn’t.

But I felt there was more to that dream than just being a dream, so before I began writing in here, I asked God to please protect me from that woman and all others like her. This dream scared the hell out of me. The horror and depth of the emotions in it defy description. I believe they were hers, and I felt that, in addition to being directed towards me, she lived in them. They are feelings I don’t wish to revisit, and I may not even be capable of revisiting them in order to even attempt to put them into descriptive words you can feel. There are words though, they just don’t cause you to enter into the profound and extraordinary hell of what they really feel like: HATRED, FURY, ANGER, VENGENCE, BLOOD-LUST…this woman had some kind of power—she used it. She was power-hungry, blood-thirsty, murderous.
]]> Sun, 30 Oct 2005 04:48:00 EST http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/31273 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/30931 Enfin il a répondu au téléphone.

Moi: "J'ai essayée de te téléphoner hier, mais tu n'as pas répondu au téléphone."

Lui: "Quand?"

Moi: "Au moins trois fois. La dernière fois à une heure ou une heure et demi du matin et deux fois pendant la journée."

Lui: "J'ai rien reçu..."

Moi: "Le téléphone n'a pas sonné?"

Lui: "Non... Est-ce que tu es bien mon coeur?"

Moi: "ummmm.......cette saison est difficile pour moi...il y a quelque chose qui fait que je me sens mal."

Lui: "Comment tu te sens cherie?"

Moi: "Vide...effrayée...seule..."

Lui: "J'espère que tu te sentiras pas comme ça quand je suis avec toi."

Moi: "Non, je serai bien avec toi, c'est pour ça que je t'ai téléphonée."
"Est-ce que tu dors bien les nuits?"

Lui: "...un peu..."

Moi: "Pourquoi un peu?"

Lui: "Je me couche tard et je me lève tard."

Moi: "Est-ce que c'est parceque tu es avec ta famille pour la fête de Ramadan?"

Lui: "Non, il y a pas de fête......ben...peut-être un peu à cause de ça."

Moi: "Je suis à l'exterieur de tous Toufik. Je suis à l'exterieur de ton Ramadan, de ta famille, de ta vie..."

Lui: "Non Lucia. C'est pas vrai, tu es dans mon coeur."

Moi: "Mais à l'extérieur de ton coeur, je suis à l'extérieur..."

Lui: "Non, tu n'es pas à l'extérieur, parceque je me sens que tu es ici avec moi dans le Ramadan. Tu es toujours avec moi dans mon coeur et dans mon esprit."

Moi: "...Toufik...tu me fais pleurer..."

Lui: "Non, cherie, pleure pas...pourquoi tu pleures?"

Moi: "Parceque tu m'aimes..."

Lui: "Please, Lucia, pleure-pas..."

Moi: "Des fois, Toufik, ça fait du bien de pleurer...je ressens qu'il faut pleurer pour guérrir les blessures du passé."

Lui: "Je sais mon coeur."

Moi: "Toufik, je veux vivre avec toi dans notre propre monde, sans famille, sans amis, sans les gens, où il n'existe que toi et moi."

Lui: "Moi aussi mon coeur."

Moi: "Hmmm...:)"

Lui: "Quoi cherie?"

Moi: "Comme tu penses comme moi..."

Lui: "C'est parceque...on peut dire que, toi et moi, on n'est pas deux, on est un."

Moi: "Oui."

]]> Thu, 20 Oct 2005 13:59:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/30931 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/29940
Close eyes … feel … find peace … poetry …… love ….. look … dream … disappear …. see … sigh ...... write …

I see a heart, the aging of a bounteous love, fruits of passion over-ripening, never won, never touched, waiting. A window open to any who will see, yet never once seen. Chamber walls, worn with time and abandon. Emptiness in the chamber of a heart, deserted by its own soul.

I see a heart, not dead, in slumber. Fruits of love, not rotted, imperishable. But not the soul in sight. It is his heart, as he drew it. So sad, dejected. My love - he was the deserter of a wealth his downcast eyes denied to his sight.

But by the Divine Plan, he passed me by and he did glance into the window of my own heart. Recognized the bounteous love, over-ripening, untouched fruits of passion, waiting, never seen. The chamber walls, with the toll of life taken and shown, battered, scarred, in sore need of care. The emptiness in the chamber of a heart violently shaken, left to ruin. Its soul out of sight, cowering, and praying to God for the stranger's quick and peaceful departure.

But the stranger did not leave. Outside the window, peering into my heart, seeing me, frightened, fragile, broken as I was, he waited. Yet I did not come. Faithfully he waited, for he loved what he saw and he saw his love in me. Scales of fear shed from my eyes, in time, and I came to see him. Inside his heart, I saw my love in him. Not a stranger, but my very own love. And he took me inside his heart and I let him in mine.

[About the drawing: drawn by my fiancé, whose name I would rather not mention here]
]]> Thu, 22 Sep 2005 06:41:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/29940 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/27814
It is as if I already know the things that will happen. The direction of this world has been set and all I can do is wash my hands of the lot of them. I want nothing to do with any of them or with this world which they rule. I can do nothing, but stand by like a child watching parents at war and suffering the consequences - it would not be the first time.

I need refuge from this world and from the meticulous details and explanations of people and their acts, from their anger and their hatred, their grudges, their lust for power and vengeance. I hate those emotions, even in myself, and I just want to run away from them and forget what brought them. I have to get away from them. They are what creates hell on earth.

I just turn away from this world and wait until freedom comes. In the meantime, my only escape is inside myself, the only place I can find peace and love, in my heart and in my mind, and there I will not even have to be in my loneliness much longer, but with my good husband. If there is a way to make a heaven on earth together with him, we will find it - to be with him, like a cool, delicate and refreshing snowflake thriving amidst the fires of hell, in a world where I do not suffer for the evil and ill-willed deeds of others - that is the least I could wish for, as even to live beside them as an onlooker, seeing what is inside them, is sufficiently disturbing, and to live in the world with blinders, as if the evil deeds did not exist, seems selfish and cruel to those who still must suffer their consequences.
]]> Sun, 14 Aug 2005 04:25:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/27814 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/25896 About an hour ago, I turned on the TV to find out that there had been a series of seven explosions throughout London. Terrorists, of course. As I sat here watching Tony Blair speak, Pres. George W. Bush to his right, Pres. Jacques Chirac to his left, I saw the leaders of three countries who seem to be perpetually at odds with one another on many political fronts. Yet, as Tony Blair spoke and I observed the expressions of the two presidents behind him, somehow knowing what they were thinking, or at least knowing what they wanted the world to think they were thinking, I got a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes. Yet again, political adversaries were joined by human tragedy, a "barbaric act" imposed on them by their common enemy. Indeed, an enemy which does not show favor to anyone or any country in this world.

My thoughts began to broaden. This keeps happening. Why are they doing this? What do they want? What did this accomplish? They don't say… They have formulated their own little "religion," their own little brotherhood, I could say. It is a brotherhood which is not based on religion, not based on culture, not based on gender, nationality, race, but on some ideology they themselves have fabricated. I can't figure out what their goal is, but it has become clear that no one country, nation or group/category of people will be shown mercy or favor by this brotherhood. The network of their brotherhood has infiltrated everywhere in this world - there are no safe corners left.

I thought to myself, the earth needs an extraterrestrial mediator to solve this planet-wide war. I wanted to ask them in the brotherhood, what do they want? Why do they keep killing people and without prejudice to race, religion, gender, nation...? I realized that their actions have made or will eventually make every citizen of earth a victim and enemy to them and that animosity will grow in and spread to those who are more or less neutral, until not even the willful striving for civil behavior, self-control and upkeep of humanity can contain it, and thus, anyone who may currently be capable of impartiality will cease to be partial.

It is also a misconception that Muslims are, by definition, part of this terrorist brotherhood. If you think a Muslim or Muslims (Arab/Arabs) stand behind this brotherhood, just wait until a member of that Muslim's family becomes a victim of the brotherhood, as has been happening as a regular occurrence in Iraq. You would think that this brotherhood would at least care to save the citizens they consider their own. At this stage in world affairs, there is no longer an excuse for the ignorance of thinking that Muslims/Arabs as a group comprise this terrorist brotherhood. The brotherhood does not save Muslims/Arabs in their terrorist acts, because Muslims/Arabs, as a group, are not part of the brotherhood.

I think to myself, if I could just ask them what they want, what they are achieving... When I look at the reality and the results to deduce their goals, it seems their goal must specifically be to repeatedly outsmart the rest of the world, powerful leaders and politicians, by covertly plotting ways of mass-killing citizens without getting caught in the process, like a live computer war game, and the death toll is like the score. This is what appears to be the intention of the brotherhood and the reason for its existence. This is the logical conclusion when you look at the results, because this outsmarting is the precise and sole result from the terrorist acts, with the added byproduct of the perpetuation of an eternal and ever-descending spiral into retaliatory hell (part of the game, I guess).

When all is said and done, after all these years of mass killings, if the terrorist brotherhood were not getting the results they wanted and finding the gratification they seek through their actions, they would change their actions.

Well...with that in mind, maybe mediation, extraterrestrial or otherwise, will not provide any solution.

]]> Thu, 07 Jul 2005 10:56:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/25896 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/25667 When someone asks me where I'm from, my mind goes blank. I was born in Canada (1968-1970), grew up in the United States (1970-1988), traveled and moved much (always on my own and not for "fun"), essentially without a proper home or a normal life, between 1988 and 1998, lived as a citizen or immigrant in 4 different countries, currently Finland, and have felt to different degrees as a social outcast in all.

I don't want to say I'm from any country. I don't feel like I am from any country. I feel I have been rejected by the societies, the people, in several countries. I want to say I am a citizen of the world, because, as I am, it is hard for me to embrace any country as mine. I would like to embrace Canada as my country, but if someone asks me where in Canada I am from, what city or province I grew up in, where my family members live, I can't answer them honestly and still have them accept me as a fellow Canadian. I have had just a few brief interactions years ago with Canadians where I told them initially that I was Canadian, but when they found out my background, they left me alone, and one of them insulted me and told me to go back to the U.S. I feel I am a lying fraud if I say I am from any country, because I know their people do not accept me as one of them.

The countries which have left me with the worst life scars and the most profound sense of rejection are the U.S. and Finland. I loved Finland when I came here, and for 7 years after that, but despite my affection for the country, that affection was not reciprocated by the people. My affection blinded me to the unjust and/or rude ways people were treating me here. I chalked it up to the individuals who were treating me that way and I continued to love this country and the people.

I recall the day in February, 2003, when I went to the police station here to pick up the paper with the decision concerning my Finnish citizenship. When I looked at the paper, I saw I had been granted Finnish citizenship and I felt so good inside. I felt happy and I felt somehow that this country accepted me and found me good enough and useful enough to be "one of them." I felt like celebrating, telling friends, people who would be happy for me. As I was leaving the police station, I tried to think who would be happy for me, who did I know who cared about me…Well, I thought I would stop by my office and tell my employer, because he was the only one I could think of, and so I did. My employer was less than interested in my status in the country and essentially responded with "uh-huh" and continued about his business after the brief interruption.

Perhaps it was at this point that a process began in me which gradually removed the blinders of my affection for the Finnish people and led me to realize that it was not the exception that a person here was treating me carelessly and coldly, with indifference at best, but the norm – a friendly, kind person was actually the exception. On occasion, however, my loneliness has prompted me to attempt to try to find some kind of friendly acquaintanceship with a Finnish person and in my most memorable and recent attempts to do that here, via the Internet (as real life experiences have become too harsh and "emotionally unsafe" for me), I was first verbally attacked for not knowing some Finnish composer (not Sibelius) and as a result I was accused of being a Swede, a people who are apparently "proud to know nothing of Finland," and so, this person was angry at me for being Swedish.

I have had to be the recipient of hatred and/or hostility for being Swedish, Tunisian, Arab, American, Canadian… while all the while I have always been aware that I am not even of the countries where I hold citizenships, even if I might have wanted to be. What I am does not matter, because someone will hate me for it – if I am attacked for being American, an American will defend me, but that same American may be the first to berate me for being Canadian or Finnish (or Italian, or Arab, truth is not applicable…), and I believe from my experience that this behavior is the same for people of all world nations, races, etc. So, I side with no nation. I am either all nationalities or I am none. Meanwhile, in my heart, I know I am merely a foreigner in a foreign world.

I am only who I am, alone and independent of the societies and groups, familial, national, cultural, religious, racial, gender, etc., to which people bind their self-identities, self-esteem and their pride. I let people make up their subjective truths and hate me as they will, for I do not want to be liked for a citizenship, a language, a race, a religion, a culture, a nation… I hold my loyalties only with God and with the Truth, as best I can.
]]> Wed, 29 Jun 2005 07:08:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/25667 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/25010 Sunday night, in my usual solitude at home, I became engaged in what was a fairly pleasant online chat conversation with a Swedish guy. It is truly rare that I find the kind of person with whom I can even have a substantial (time-wise) chat.

We began, as usual, by learning the basics about one another, what country we are from, age, marital status, where we are living and how we came to live there etc., etc., mixing up languages and being very casual. In accordance with the natural flow of chat conversations, the subject matter became more personal, as he confided some sad and upsetting things to me regarding his upbringing.

I did make note of one comment he made early on, however; when I found out that he lives in a Swedish city that I used to live in, I told him the part of the city I had been living in, which happened to be a part of the city where many refugees/immigrants (apparently Arabs) live. His response was "ugh…Arabland…I'm not a racist, but there is where the Arabs live." I ignored the tone of the statement, gave him the benefit of my doubt and hoped for the best.

The nice chat continued, but came to an abrupt halt roughly 1½ hours after it began when he began to inquire about my fiancé, still in the same casual and friendly tone as before. After all the time we had been talking and all he had shared about himself, despite the hint of negativity towards Arabs, I guess I was hoping that he was more mature and emotionally stable than he turned out to be. When I told him my fiancé was Arab, he changed, as if into a different person. The chat proceeded roughly as follows:

him: Ok, so you gonna be a Muslim?
me: no
him: No?
him: How many Arabs do you know?
me: I know quite many.
him: Ok, and if ya not gonna be a Muslim he's gonna make you one…no offence…
me: He is not.
me: Don't you think we have already discussed these matters? Marriage is not a casual issue.
him: A Muslim can only marry a Muslim…and that's for life…
me: No, only a Muslim woman has to marry a Muslim.
him: Ok, if you say so…
me: A Muslim man can marry a Christian, but the children have to be raised Muslim.
him: The children can't choose what they wanna be :)*[*see note below] … Well good luck with you and your Muslim, heard enough, good luck…Take care…
me: wow, glad you're not a racist…
him: I can't be…
him: ;)
me: but you stop writing to me because he is…
him: He will make a few children with ya and move with them back to where he came from and you will shrug and wonder what happened…:P That's how the story goes…sorry, but true…
me: ok…
me: I believe that was a movie.
him: Do you ever read the news…?
me: of course
him: from Sweden?
me: No.
him: Try the Swedish news next time then…;)
him: A recent thing in December was what I just told you…
him: He came back with the kids after 2-3 years or something and got jail here, poor that mother and those kids…
him: And if you say YOUR guy is not like that, it's your choice :)
me: Why are you concerned?
him: I feel sorry for the truth is all, but it's your choice…:)
me: thank you
me: I wish I hadn't told you.
him: Why?
him: You read it every day here, no news here, but Finland don't have many Arabs so it's not that common there, I'm sure…
me: I see quite many Arabs, for the proportion of foreigners there are in this country.
me: The reason why I wish I had not told you…it is because the response was worse than I had hoped and made me feel bad.

*[This statement is inane 1) - coming from a guy whose parents were drunks, and, according to his own words, he was "9 alone in a city" and left more or less alone to take care of himself since the age of 6-7, and 2) - since children never get to choose anything when they are born, much less their religion. I saw how his antagonistic emotional reaction caused his brain to shut down, giving way to illogic and allowing him to distort and indiscriminately pluck specific bits of information or facts out of their reality and apply them out of context in order to justify his hostility and conform his information to his condemning ideas about Arabs/Muslims/my fiancé, and it is this warped version of reality that he embraces as truth. Perhaps what I find most offensive and despicable about such behavior, is that these people use the misfortunes and suffering of others to promote their anger and hatred – feigned concern about a woman whose Arab husband ran off with their kids, about poor children who can't choose their own religion, etc., is used as a prop to try to convince others to join them in their hatred. It is diabolical behavior.]

That is the essence of the conversation I had with a non-racist Swede.

Why do I need to write about this? I felt so awful by his reaction, just so awful. I could see myself, my fiancé, all Arabs, through his eyes. In his eyes, I, my fiancé, Arabs, are all sub-human, I could feel it in him.

I am not so short on intelligence and heart that anything he implied about Arabs in general or about my fiancé has even the slightest impact on my own understanding of the individual Arabs that I know. It is about him, his heart, his thinking, his twisted version of "truth" and the groundless hostility I felt directed from him at me and my fiancé, as an Arab. I kept asking myself, what did I do to him?? Where is his heart?? Where is his logic?? I can't fathom the hardness, the injustice of his behavior, how can he…how can this person, who himself has suffered from such a bad life, with alcoholic (Finnish) parents who neglected him so, who left him on his own, be so heartless and hostile, hypocritical, and pass such unforgiving and fallible judgment on me and my future husband, on all Arabs alike? Even for him to have a grudge against Arabs at all is just wrong, to say the least, because the offenses he cites for his reaction were not even done to him or to anyone he knows; it was as if he was just searching for reasons to hate…

It is the fact that he can and does behave like this that hurts me, not for myself, not for Arabs per se, but for him, or for the concept of humanity.

The ultimate irony of people who react like he does, is that they are too blinded by their own emotion to see that with the venting of their anger, they tell me absolutely nothing about the object of their hatred, but they show me more about themselves than I ever wanted to see, what is inside them. Sometimes I see inside the people around me, like him, and I look inside myself and I ask "Are he and I the same species?" and it scares me a little, until I remember God and that He is with me and that He loves me and He loves my fiancé.





]]> Wed, 01 Jun 2005 08:44:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/25010 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889 http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/24920 Shy

I am shy. I don't talk a lot in the company of people and I don't normally stand up for myself in public situations and I let people treat me as their conscience will allow. Many people don’t understand shyness in general, or why I am quiet and I have constantly been told I should change, which I do not like. Today I was able to articulate one cause for my shyness:

I was waiting at the bus stop on my way to visit someone. As the bus was approaching the bus stop, it appeared that the bus driver was not going to stop to pick me up, although it was obvious I was standing there waiting for her bus. Sometimes the bus drivers here do that, giving you the feeling that they don't want to pick you up and that you are burdening them by "making" them pick you up. I think if you would not stick out your hand to flag them down, they would drive right past you – in fact, on a rare occasion, they have been known to drive right past you even when you try to flag them down.

Since the bus driver today did not want to pick me up, I realized she must be in a foul mood. The feeling I got from her lingered in me after I got on the bus. As the bus approached the stop I was going to get off at, I pushed the button which lets the driver know I wanted to get off there, however, as it was, someone had already pushed the button. I personally don't normally make this mistake, but it is nonetheless a regular occurrence that someone may push the button after it has already been pushed – normally nobody notices or cares. However, this bus driver not only noticed, she scolded me. She just spoke out loud to me in a stern, annoyed tone telling me that if the button has already been pushed, I don't have to push it again. Inside of me I was stung once again by the cold harsh feeling of living in this country.

As I got off the bus, I felt so bad. I thought to myself, "What did she get out of that? Did it make her feel better? Did trying to make me feel bad make her feel better?" After getting off the bus, I began walking. Having completely forgotten about where I was going and what I was doing there, in my mind I began trying to understand the usefulness in her behavior and I suddenly became aware of how feelings linger in me after I have an interaction with a person. This is one reason why I am shy and I don't like to interact with people, if it can be avoided.

I realize that it is incidents like this that bring much of the emotional stress I experience to my daily life. The feelings from interactions I have with people linger in me and I ponder the incident long after it has occurred. I ponder my part in it, I ponder the other person's behavior and I ponder their words, I ponder the feelings I felt from them – and I ponder these things because their feelings linger in me, like a bitter aftertaste on the tongue. This is why I don't like to leave home or be among people. This is why I prefer my solitude and I keep myself safe from people in my home.
]]> Sat, 28 May 2005 09:45:00 EDT http://Bitsy.tigblog.org/post/24920 40.7141667 -74.006388940.7141667-74.0063889