The wall and my dream house

I am in the Lobby of the Rotana Hotel in Erbil…

I am drinking my Corona beer waiting for my taxi that will drive me to the airport back to Beirut…

As for my colleagues who are staying for 3 more days…they will have the chance to celebrate the first anniversary of the Hotel…

6 years ago when I was in Erbil, we had to stay in a secured compound…with guards watching us 24/7

Times change…

Vision is what is needed to build a country…

I am drinking my beer and I am thinking of what my Iraqi colleague had told me the night before…

He was drunk…I was drunk…he opened his heart…I had my hands open for his heart…

He wanted to learn music…they didn’t allow it…

He wanted to play professional football…they didn’t allow it…

He wanted to study literature…they didn’t allow it…

But he was able to find joy in his life…

And my thoughts were leading me to places that I didn’t want to go…because I wanted to protect myself…

I was hooked on Corona and banana cake during my stay in Erbil…

Corona and red wine automatically ejected me from Erbil into your eyes…

It is the ability to dream and to project ourselves in places and situations that keeps us sane when we don’t have what we want…

The ability to cross borders virtually is a gift if you are able to do it, you will have a permanent smile on your face whatever happens to you…

I think my colleague and I have that ability that is why we bring joy to others…

All this inner-thinking has brought me to the harsh news on tv that Israel will start building a wall on its borders with Lebanon…

I, once wanted to buy a piece of land on that border…

I, once was adored driving for 3 hours to be on that border to watch the other side, to contemplate looking at the beautiful scenery on both sides…to dream...

I, once dreamed of my dream house on that hills...

It gave me hope for a better future...

What will I see now, when I drive all the way to that area…

I will see a wall...

The danger is not the existence of the wall but the meaning of the wall…

Israel wants to limit the sight of its people and the people on the other side…

My dreams and the dreams of thousands will be blocked by the wall…which will make us limited…short-sighted…trapped in the ugliness of reality…

Israelis will be trapped in the box…they have surrounded themselves with walls and their sky is “protected” by the Iron dome…

Concrete wall and Iron is what is making Israelis survive?

Living in a jail is what they want?

But the irony is that they are putting themselves in this prison they call the holy land…

My taxi driver arrived…and asked me to follow him…it was time to go home…

I ejected myself back from your eyes into the taxi…and straight to Erbil International Airport…