KARIMA'S DAYS, KARIMA'S NIGHTS
"I just got depressed
Is that a surprise?
No, not really...
But that's the only thing I do
Best with great persistence and determination
Willingness even
Yes, willingness
Thinking that this activity
Is not the product of my will
But it is. It certainly is...
Conscious or subconscious
Or whatever...
There is no need to analyze any longer
It's the thing one does
Because it must be the thing
One likes best...
So stop putting yourself down
Annouce your love for it
And celebrate it...
Be joyous about it...
Let's play the game again
"What are you going to do today?"
'Be depressed."
"But you did that yesterday
"And the day before"
"Sure, it's my full time job"
"All of you have jobs
Don't you?
Sometime all of you say,
"Oh! my job makes me depressed."
Right?
So why my job
Which is to get depressed
Every day without fail,
with great dedication
Can't make me depressed?
Come on, be fair...
That's my job
To be depressed every day
That's my job...
Ok?
"I understand
Since it's your full time job
Then make it a happy experience...
'Yes, sure, I should."
"But you don't, you look so sour
So unhappy, so depressed
Actually when you announce to the world
That you are depressed...
Be proud of it...
Tell people that your depression
Has no interuptions
It's constant
Like the waves in the Occean
No matter what happens
The waves keep coming
And keep going back and forth
Back and forth with such discipline
Singing the same melodious song
"My song isn't so melodious like the waves."
"It must be.
That's the only song you always sing"
"That's the only song I know."
"Why do you want to be a singer then?
If you have no repotoir
A singer with one song...
Who is going to listen to it over and over again?"
"Got stuck, singing the same song
In the same corner..."
"Leave the corner
Go to another corner actually"
"All corners are the same
They seem different
Because they are other people's corners
But everyone of them are stuck
In their own corners
Even if they don't seem like it
It;s called life my dear, life, the dear life."
"I want to go to Tunisia"
"People in Tunisia feel the same way
They are stuck in their own little corners."
"There are no corners over there
There are no corners in Tunisia
No one is stuck over there
Corners are only in the East Village
Corners of Ave A, corners of Ave B and C and D
No Avenues like A and B and C in Tunisia"
"In Tunisia they have different names for their corners
But they are there nevertheless"
"I want to be in some one elses's corner
Then I will feel differently
I don't want to be in my own corner"
"You better be in your own corner girl
You know how tough it is to be in some one
Else's corner?
Stuck in some other corner
Where the war is raging all around it?"
"I don't want to talk about the war
War and the homeless and their matresses on the streets
That is perhaps the source of my depression."
"Don't make excuses
You were depressed long before the war"
"I never was depressed, never, never before 1991"
"What happend in 1991?"
"The first war."
"The first world war?"
"No silly- the first Persian Gulf war."
"Oh! that war. Every one has forgotten about that war.
Thats way in the past.
You are still depressed about that war?"
"That's when my depression actually began.
I was always happy and slim before that."
'What that has to do about you being fat?"
"I just sat down, got depressed, sat down
And just read about that war and war only.
I was in shock.
That was my first experience of the war"
""Lucky you- we went on the streets
marching against the Veit -Nam war."
"I wasn't involved in that."
"Me too, I wasn't involved either
But we wanted it to stop..."
"Don't we want this war to stop?"
"Which one?"
"This one, the one going on right now?"
'There are too many wars going on right now
And it's too hot to march against it
And inspite of the march the wars
Still keep raging..."
"That makes me depressed
And I can't deal with it
And I watch other people
They still have their normal lives
They deal with it
Because they are normal people
And normal people are not affected by such things
They get up and go to work
Go home
Cook, clean, eat, watch tv, sleep..."
'Why don't you do the same?
Cook, clean, watch tv..."
'I don't have a tv...
"Still go to work, come back, cook, clean..."
'I don't do all that. First of all I have
No job, so I don't go to work
And then I don't come back from work
To cook and clean..."
'What do you do?"
"I write plays."
"Oh! then write plays about the war..."
"No, never, never, never..."
"Why not?"
"I wrote plays about the war
That was a big mistake."
'Why was it a big mistake?"
"Because it offended so many, so many people.
It pleased no one."
"The plays shouldn't be about pleasing or offending
It should be about raising conscinece and awareness
About the horros of war..."
'Oh! the critics don't like such topics, the producers
Don't like such topics, it doesn't make them money
They like the wars though because it makes their countries tons of money
And I kind of introduced myself as the anti war playwright
And that was the end of that..."
"The end of what?"
"The end of any kind of praise for my work and I was dismissed...
You know that is a very good technique in the West..
Just do nothing but DISMISS whover you want to dismiss
For whatever reason and that person will be completely forgotten
It works...That technique is brilliant, it works..."
"Then write about something else."
"Right now I have no other idea, no other thought
Except war..."
"Are you a war playwright? Like our president...
He is the war prsident, totally 100%
Dedicated to decimate the world before it ends on it's own..."
'No way...I am not a war playwright...According to the
Critics I am not a playwright at all...But I can never be a war playwright
Because I hate war, but it's going on since, 1992 and I have no other Idea
Of any other topic...
'You are realy stuck, arn't you?
"I am. I am realky stuck and that's why I am depressed."
"No, honey, you were depressed before that
Long before that..."
"No, I wasn't"
'You used to say often, "I am depressed,"
"Every one says that once in a while.
All artists say that. But they are not all depressed
They are all working...they just say that...They
say it because it's artistic but I mean it
They are working, I am the only one not working."
"You are working darling, you are always working.
Always reading about the war...It's been a year now...
Forget about it...read some self help books about
How to have fun..."
'I can't do that. I feel incredible affinity for Iraqi people
Who are all dead and damaged...I can't stop thinking about them."
I don't know what has happened to me...
Even when the strangers see me they ask,
"So what's going on with the war?"
I get offended and I say,
"You tell me what's going on with war?
You are reading the same newspaper."
But they say, "
Oh! but you know more about the war
We are sure about that..."
'Why?"
I ask
My voice get higher with agitation
"Why should I know more about the war while your NYT is
Keeping you update about it?"
"Then they come to the real racists part...
'You know more about it because
You are from that part of the world."
'What?"
I say
"You are from that part of the world."
They repeat themselves
'First of all I am not from Iraq
But even if I was, how would they all know?
How do they all know that I am from that part of the world?"
I feel they are all spies, each one of them...
And they want to provoke me...
Because they are after me...
And then I become paranoid and want to stay away
From all people...
And just stay in my corner
That kind of Isolation
And it's reality is very depressing...
And I begin to get very depressed...
And then to avoid the idea of that horrifying feeling
I want to believe
That they are not all spies and I am just paranoid
But the idea of being paranoid and Isolated is also extremely
Un-comfortabale and depressing...
Paranoia is a disease which is now entering your system
Slowly and constantly
And the fear of knowing how crippling it is..
And under the influence of all that
NO HAPPY IDEA CAN ENTER MY MIND
TO COME UP WITH A NEW ENTERTAINING PLAY."
"Stop reading about the Iraq war and thinking about it
Read something else...
Read something meditative and poetic to relieve
Your paranoid mind..."
"And I DID
I PICKED UP TREASURED WRITINGS OF kHALIL GIBRAN
AND ALL HE WAS TALKING ABOUT WAS BEKA VALLEY AND BABAACK
WHICH IS IN LEBANON AND MY MIND WENT RIGHT BACK TO WAR..."
"Read the writers who didn't write about the war.
"
Khalil Gibran didn't write about the war but he came from Lebnon
And that part of the world had centuries of wars...
His poetry is all related to his home and the loss of it and the nostalgia...
Of the valley and the family..."
'But Iam sure he still did his laundry and washed his hair
And cooked and ate and took care of his daily work...
And his life in New York...Learn from him...
Take care of your daily life..."
"MY DAILY LIFE IS MY THOUGHT."
"Get rid of your thought. Just do laundry, cook, clean, sleep.
Just do that . THAT WILL HEAL YOUR FEARS AND DEPRESSIONS.
'And when people ask me, "What's with war?"
What do I say?"
"Say, "What war? There is no war here.
There is no war in NY and I have to run...
My laundry must be dry by now and then
I have to run home and mop my kitchen
And cook a meal in this boiling hot weather
And I am exhausted from any other thought
Especially the thought of war..."
Yes, you say that, actually yell at all of them
And collect your laundry and go home
Think of Khlil Gibran and continue
Your ordinary life... your daily orinary life
War is not for you
It's the stuff designed for extraordinary world powers."
'Don't try to be a war philosopher.
Just be an ordinary philosopher
And try to deal with every day's mundane reality
That's the real philosophy of existence
Till existence is no more...
'Conqour the little things in life.
First of all you are a warrior too...
Fight your own little wars
Then the thoughts of bigger wars won't depress you
Your duty is to fulfill the function your existence
assigned to you...
Nothing more...nothing more...nothing less.
You are only a fragile human being...
Fragile things break easily........
