SoC 3:1

London, Iraq, Florida

Another terrorist attack. This time they hit London. It caught me off guard. I check the news online every morning, after yoga, after the first cup of coffee, and every time I open the page of the news magazine I expect a troubled news ticker headline from somewhere. But all was at peace yesterday morning. Until later, when I opened the news page again to check the weather, and there it was. The news of bomb blasts in the London. In this city I have travelled to so often. In these subways I rode with Sharon, with Annikki, with Jess, with Alisha.

I mailed them, all the ones I know in London, and now I know they are all safe. Safe and scared.

It's so painful, this boomerang of hatred that draws only more pain. All those lives injured and hurt, and all those sons seeking revenge by killing people at random. Like a chain of darkness. And no one there who knows how to stop it. So much easier to destroy than to create. It's mad.

"We are all Londoners," someone said.

"London Tube" by Dorothee Lang

A news that almost went unnoticed in comparison today—a bomb attack in Iraq. Taking the lives of young men who lined in front of a police recruiting point. The very irony of it. Bringing up a slightly different thought: we are all Londoners—but are we all Iraqis? Or rather—is any of us? I wished there were some people from Baghdad in the internet forums that raised those questions. Some women. Sharing their daily worries, their life. It would make a difference, I am sure.

Maybe that's the drama of Iraq, that no one knows the place, that no knows the people who live there, as it was a closed country for so long. That's why London is such a shock—so many people have been to this city, have walked its streets, have visited its parks and squares, its theatres and museums, its cafés and bars. It's like one of the hearts of Europe.

And thinking of it, the world is really broken into first, second and third world not only in an economic way, but also in a communicative way: the second and third world is in grievous degrees silent by nature. So many who live there hardly have the chance to travel, or have access to the internet. And in far too high numbers, not even the power to read or write. And thus, no access to the world of books, of knowledge, of information at your fingertips.

On top of it, as if picking up on all the pressure, there's a hurricane building in the Caribbean. They showed pictures of Cuba in the news today, and a diagram of the path they expect the hurricane to take, up the West Coast of Florida. This coast that I drove down just some months ago, this coast of twin towns. This coast that hosts Naples, Venice, St. Petersburg and even a Panama, and connects all of those places through the asphalt lines of Interstate routes. No twin of Baghdad there, though. But Gulf Shores. And a Cedar Key.

Now for a pine peace door with a matching lock.

D.

(I wrote this diary entry almost three years ago, on Friday, the 8th July 2005. It is painful to see that those lines are still as true as back then, especially concerning the situation in Baghdad, and the lingering threat of another terror attack.)