Sometimes, after a hard week, the smallest serendipities can do wonders. I was driving along, physically and emotionally spent, when I spied the sort of vehicle I photograph to use for this feature. Because it was a pick-up truck and because I was in a part of southern Arizona not noted for its liberalism, the “Jesus is coming” sticker I spotted first inspired dark thoughts. (More…)
It’s difficult to access pornography in Yemen. Most adult websites are blocked by a firewall. It was at the end of a particularly bloody week in the capitol city, and I was looking for some diversion. An article in Gentlemen’s Quarterly intrigued me, not the least because GQ is itself somewhat risqué. (More…)
People with direct experience of totalitarian regimes are understandably wary of iconography. When you’ve been exposed to stylized images of Hitler, Stalin, Mao and their ilk day after day, year after year, seeing anybody flattened into a stereotype is unsettling. And when that celebrity treatment has explicitly political implications, the anxiety mounts. (More…)
In The Theater and its Double, French playwright Antonin Artaud put forth a radical idea called “The Theater of Cruelty.” Describing mainstream theater as empty and apathetic to current events, Artaud sought to expose his audience to a whole new experience, in which stories and events challenged the false sense of “staged reality.” (More…)
I don’t “get” sex. And I’ve never liked talking to Americans about it. I never quite realized it until I talked to expatriates about sex out here in Sana’a. Expats have a habit of dominating every social conversation they have with their desperate yearning for being touched, which makes me wonder what is so great about it for them in the first place. (More…)
When the House and Senate budget talks got underway a few weeks ago, Paul Ryan, the GOP’s lead running dog on economic policy, reiterated the party line: The current situation is unsustainable. Negative consequences will fall hardest on the poor and the elderly. Therefore, sacrifices must be made…by the poor and the elderly. (More…)
As much as I love New Zealand, it has been increasingly difficult to ignore disturbing strands within the dominant Pakeha (European) culture here. As a liberal British import to the land also known as Aotearoa, having traversed half the globe to another democratic first world country with a proud progressive history, I expected a similar level of tolerance as that which I had encountered in my former home, London. (More…)
I took a photo while the soldiers weren’t looking, and posted it on Facebook. I saw something that looked familiar, as a Pakistani. It was on 26th of September Street in Sana’a. A truck with a machine gun, and three infantrymen, sat quietly. I titled it, “War in the City.” A teacher at my college commented, “Are you serious??” (More…)
“I’ve driven to Yeraskh more times than I can count,” says Artash, Yerevan veterinarian and part time tour guide. “It always amazes me.” Mount Ararat, on one of those crisp Armenian autumn days, is visible from the city’s centre. Cynics might, and do, see it as Turkey looming over what remains of the Armenian state. (More…)
I was speaking to my mother about democracy, expressing wariness about European models, which many Pakistanis associate with the Soviet-inspired experiments of the Afghan Communist era. I mentioned the jirga, as a way of envisioning direct democracy, in South Asian vernacular. She found it appealing. “That’s like the old days, people coming together to talk about their problems, that isn’t from the West,” my mum replied. (More…)
It shouldn’t surprise anyone that a quick deal between the P5+1 powers and Iran failed to materialize. Hopes were understandably raised by the fact that the United States wanted a deal, and that Iran declared its openness to unprecedentedly intrusive inspections of its nuclear facilities. But what is at stake in these talks goes beyond the atomic issue. It deals with the entire Western approach to the Middle East. (More…)
We Are All Illegal Immigrants. (“Siamo Tutti Clandestini.”) A message of solidarity to illegal migrants, for anyone who has spent time in Italy, the slogan can be as common as the circle A that often accompanies it. Not that it is necessary to impose anarchist branding. So synonymous is this idea with the politics, the symbol risks overkill. (More…)