Diabolic Digest
Episode VII –
273
hostages in search of a journalist
Place: Hijacked
Aeroflop flight 122/999 – JFK
Airport, New York
Date: 20th
November 2000
Time: 11:23am
Is this situation for real? Do I really exist?
Since time immemorial, man has been pondering this basic existential question.
How do you prove you truly exist? Having been stranded on this plane for over a
fortnight, I have had plenty of time to carry on this ancient tradition and
have concluded that the media is our reality gauge. Meanwhile, Kahka has been
pacing impatiently around me, producing scathing testimonials on the state of
the media, politics, and, most recently, the world and everything in it.
“This is totally intolerable!” she
shrieks intolerably as the heels of her boots snap the final thread out of the
worn carpet. “How can humanity live with such a burden of apathy and guilt?”
she asks rhetorically.
I mistakenly answer, “By ignoring
it.”
“And how much longer can we continue
to go on like this? To ignore is apathy. So to ignore our apathy is a double
apathy. Apathy breeds ignorance and a double apathy is a triple ignorance. And,
you know, ignorance KILLS! So, let’s just kiss the future goodbye.”
Her philosophy sends my mind
reeling. “Wow! What a wasted genius!” I think to myself. She just exhausts her
expansive intellectual capacities on futility and bitterness. Nowadays, she can
only see the world’s ugliness and corruption and stink. She sniffs heavily and
turns abruptly to continue pacing down the aisle with definite non-apathy.
We couldn’t have picked a worse time
to arrive in New York. A hijacking is normally an event of great magnitude and
importance to the media. But this time, the attendant media circus is missing.
There is no rolling film, no clicking cameras to capture the images, no
whirring mics to capture the sound and broadcast it around the globe LIVE (but
not quite alive) into people’s homes. A regular news bulletin looks like it
dropped out of a Conrad novel.
The hijacking didn’t make any of the
news programmes. Apparently, it wasn’t important enough. America, the beautiful, has been too preoccupied
with meatier matters. She has been looking at her reflection through the magic
media mirror – “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the fairest, strongest, most
important one of all?”
In today’s world, we’ve finally
cracked that age-old existential enigma. The media is our anchor on reality. It
helps us prove to ourselves that we really exist and that our concerns and
worries and aspirations are genuine. And as the media grows more surreal, so do
our perceptions of reality. Consequently, what the media deems as irrelevant,
is quickly discarded as invalid.
All the big networks have politely
rebuffed us. CNN, NBC, ABC, even the BBC have their acrimonious sights set on
the gory, tangled bush of melodrama of that daytime and late night soap, Al and George, that has taken the
country by storm. Al is a grey, bureaucratic straight guy who waffles on
inconsistently and nobody can really understand what he stands for. George, on
the other hand, is cocky and self-assured. And, just like the empty vessel that
he is, he makes the most noise.
Most critics would dismiss the show
as mediocre, not really a ratings-grabber. However, to boost the show’s
entertainment credentials, both men entertain the bizarre delusion that they
will become president of the United States. Kahka, never a big fan of politics
and politicians, sees this as another nail in the coffins of both.
“Politics have become a commodity
market. Is there really any difference between Ariel and Persil? Well, like
Coke and Pepsi, the only difference between Al and George is the type of
sweetener they add,” she says in that bitter-sweet tone that only she can pull
off. “People are so sick of the whole game that they can’t even be bothered to
vote anymore, because the difference in their politics is like the difference
in their results – zilch!”
Well, the elections haven’t been big
on issues (should we have huge tax cuts for the rich or slightly smaller
ones?). They were actually extremely bland until the Middle East blew up. Kahka
has tried to bring that point across to the networks to convince them that the
hijacking was worth covering. When she started yelling, “When did you complete
your metamorphosis, you cock-a-roach?” down the line, I knew she had failed in
her attempt.
I tried a more media-savvy approach.
I used, as my selling point, the novel angle that there were actually 273
hijackers on board and no hostages because everyone on board the plane felt
strongly about the issue. “So, if there are no hostages, there’s no danger and
we don’t need to follow it up,” commented one unimpressed editor. “We’re all
moral hostages to what is happening to the besieged Palestinians,” I countered,
conjuring up images of myself as a modern-day Guevara lost in the skyscraper
jungle. The editor yawned, “The Florida Supreme Court is about to pass a
verdict on the recount, excuse me.”
The media is fixated on the Florida
recount. Personally, I don’t quite understand why they need so many recounts
and why it should take so long. I have
read quite a few reports on how poor at mathematics the average American is,
but little did I suspect that it had reached such crisis proportions. This is
perhaps proof of just how bad basic numeracy is in the US and that Florida is
well below the national average.
It would appear that a good part of the
world is also enrapt by the unfolding drama. When I tried to contact the UN
Security Council directly, I got a recorded message, “We regret that your call
cannot be dealt with at the moment. You have been put in an electronic queue.
You have been assigned priority number <blip> 1-7-8-3-5-4-1-2. If,
however, your call is of an urgent nature, then press 777 and you will be
connected to our temporary hotline which is manned (and womaned) by our
dedicated skeleton team of junior staff who will notify the top brass in the
event of nuclear Armageddon, global economic meltdown, or a communist
resurgence. All other matters will be dealt with in the strict order in which
they were received once our normal activities are resumed with the conclusion
of the US presidential elections.” I’d often suspected that the UN was an
American toy but never had I suspected that things could degenerate this far.
Kahka, sick and tired of waiting for
the political game to play itself out, confides in me that she just wants to
return to her bakery and see her dough through the painful and formative
transition to fully fledged breadhood. She felt bad about leaving her dough at
such an impressionable age, where it would be like putty in the hands of other,
less scrupulous bakers. Who else but her could raise (or is it rise?) the
dough?
Place: Hijacked
Aeroflop flight 122/999 – JFK
Airport, New York
Date: 6th
December 2000
Time: Does it matter? Can’t distinguish anymore
Another month passes and we still
have no winner. In a country of nearly 300 million inhabitants, Bush leads by
just 192 votes. Clinton, through possible emergency provisions, looks set to
remain president for a while longer. The British prime minister has offered
Americans the option to return under the rule of the British crown. The UN
secretary general has proposed, in that great Wall Street tradition, a merger
between the US and UN, in a cynical attempt to consolidate the power of those
two great establishments more equitably and, in the process, to become the most
powerful man in the world.
In between news of the suits and
counter-suits brought by the Democrats and Republicans, we have been watching
reports from the Occupied Territories with rising concern. That crack army of
stone throwers who have been especially trained to inflict the most horrendous
scratches and, worse still, possible nose bleeds on Israeli soldiers, have been
dropping like flies swatted by Israeli snipers. Well, they have been committing
the most unforgivably fiendish acts of protesting a foreign occupation of their
land, and more sinisterly, chipping the paintwork on an Israeli tank or
armoured personnel carrier. Naturally, a stone is the deadliest weapon known to
man, deadlier than missiles and M16s, as Goliath learned at the hands of David.
The Israelis are understandably cautious of making such a biblical error. And,
if the price is to liquidate Palestinians willy-nilly, so be it.
However, we don’t agree. Passions
are running high on-board Aeroflop flight 122/999. Kahka, backed up by the more
radical passengers, wants us to land the plane on the White House lawn or
outside the UN buildings, or even by the Knesset. Others think we should find a
way to play the media game. Talk of sanctions, boycotting and an international
observer force is thrown around, while more Palestinian youth fall by the
wayside and desperately needed humanitarian relief is left to rot at the
border.
Finally, a motion is passed for me
to go and seek out a journalist by a 96% majority. We, Arabs, are notorious for
being unable to agree and so I find the consensus suspicious. I ask for a
recount but am shouted down by all the passengers to get on with it. I am glad
that, on my first political mission, I have public sentiment behind me.
Encouraged, I set off in high spirits. Once I get out of the plane, I begin to
wish that Kaydee were here to volunteer his journalistic talents.
The first practicality that
confronts me is how I’m going to get out of the airport since I only have an EU
visa. As is my forte, a devilish scheme of such fiendish simplicity, forms in
the outer reaches of my grey zone.
“Howdy!?” I greet the immigration
official.
“Howdy!” he replies as he looks in
bewilderment at my galabiya-clad
splendour. “You… speak… Eng-li-sh?” he spells out.
“Sure I do,” I answer simply.
“Your passport, please.”
“I’ve been watching your elections
with some interest,” I say by way of conversation as I dig into my pocket for
my travel documents.
“Never been one quite like it, but ol’
Bush will come through,” he says proudly.
“I take it you’re a Republican man.”
“You bet! It runs in the family.”
So, it’s genetic, I think to myself.
“So, what do you think of Mr Bush?”
I ask innocently.
“Damn smartest president we’ll ever
have, no matter what the talk shows say.”
Reassured, I hand over my passport.
“This visa is for Holland, sir, and you are in the United States.”
“I know,” I answer calmly and
slowly, “I am going to New Amsterdam.”
“It’s still part of the United
States.”
“But it was a former Dutch Colony
and there is an agreement between the American and Dutch governments for it to
remain part of the Netherlands.”
“How is it part of the Netherlands,
if it was a Dutch colony? Should it be part of Dutchland?”
“But the Dutch are from Holland.”
“So it should be part of Holland,”
he concludes reasonably.
“Holland and Netherlands are the
same country.”
“I knew that!” he protests
self-righteously. “I was just testing you. Don’t you think it’s pretty stupid to
call a country by two names?”
“An accident of history. Can I pass
through now?”
“But I’ve never heard of this
agreement,” he returns.
“It’s in amendment 632a of the
constitution, ‘He, who shall travel to the Netherlands, shall also have access
to the autonomous region of New Amsterdam in New York State, which has, by
virtue of this decree, been declared a Dutch protectorate’,” I quote from a
mythical constitution.
“I knew that, too! I took it in High
School. I was just testing if you knew what you were talking about,” he lies as
he stamps my passport.
Place: The
Big Apple
Date: 6th
December 2000
Time:
Evening
I have been in the city for an
entire afternoon and have still found no clue as to why they call it the Big
Apple. Is it because a bite of it keeps the doctor away? Or, perhaps people
living there, like Adam and Eve, have experienced a fall from grace?
I put such deliberations to the back
of my mind and focus on the pressing task at hand. In one of the world’s press
capitals, I am having real trouble smoking out a journalist. In a final act of
desperation, I make my way to the elevated headquarters of the globe’s top
press agency, Wrighters.
Through a lifetime of conditioning,
I expect to be met by a beehive of frantic activity as journalists dash to meet
ever-narrower deadlines. I expect to hear phones ringing off their hooks,
reporters yelling at each other across the office, printers loudly spewing out
reports from around the country.
I walk into a silent, disinfected
environment. Computer terminals are lined up like endless, motionless rows of
Scots Guards. Bleary-eyed journalists man the consoles, typing madly away, not
once looking up over their monitors at others in the office or out over the
panoramic view of the city beneath. They are living evidence of how, in order
to record what goes on in life, you must withdraw from it.
I talk to the first reporter whose
eyes meet mine. I tell him about the story of the hijacking. I am passionate. I
am articulate. He is not impressed. He is dressed in a neutral suit and talks
in neutral tones. He looks and sounds like a wire-service press release. He
asks me where I came by this information. I tell him that I saw it. He asks me
if I can source my story. I say I am the source. He asks me if I am reliable. I
say, of course I am, I am Haflatoun. He says that they don’t know that I’m
reliable. I tell him to come and see for himself. He doesn’t trust me and turns
back to his terminal to get on with the merger story he’s been working on.
I wander around and wonder to myself
with growing despair whether I’ll be able to get hold of a journalist. Then, by
some miracle, I see a vision. In a remote corner, I spot an ethereal light that
glows much weaker than I remember.
Could it really be Kaydee? What is he
doing here? Last I heard of him he was hiding out in a remote oasis with his
lady love.
I rush over to him, all ecstatic and
excited at meeting an old friend, forgetting for a moment the purpose of my
mission. He looks up at me. The passion is gone from his eyes. “Haflatoun,” he
says matter-of-factly. I can’t believe
how banal he sounds. “What are you doing here?” he asks in a professional,
unemotional voice. Undeterred, I say excitedly “I should be the one asking you
that question.”
We go off for a coffee and it
emerges that Kaydee was recently recruited by Wrighters International as a
reporter and was pretty soon transferred to their New York office. However, the
move into agency work has taken its toll on him. He now speaks no more than
four lines to a paragraph and forty lines to a conversation. He always sources
what he says, uses few adjectives and short, sharp sentences.
“What happened to your passion and
love of language?” I ask him, concerned.
“It’s still there. I exercise it out
of office hours. I use exhilarating, exciting, emphatic, articulate, suggestive
words and ideas and long, winding, meandering sentences out of the office.
Damn, I’d better be careful. I’m still in the office. Oh, Haflatoun, if anyone
hears me…” he doesn’t continue.
He takes me out to the cafeteria and
we have a coffee together. I tell him about the hijacking. A look of excitement
sparks up in his eyes, one that is closer to his normal self. He grills me for
the details and is keen to come out and cover it, LIVE. All right, Kaydee.
He says he needs my help, first, because he is
researching this story that is of such mind-boggling proportions that it could
change the world as we know it. He lets me into his confidence, and I shall let
you into mine, so don’t betray it. He is working on the scoop of the century
(which at the moment means the year).
Top-secret files have fallen onto his lap (I
didn’t ask him how) of a top-level cartel of CEOs and military chiefs who are
planning a military coup. He says they helped engineer the tie-breaker
situation so that they could use it as an opportunity to declare a state of
martial law. They plan to install the Clintons as the public face of the new
dictatorship regime.
“Do they know about this?” I ask breathlessly.
“I really don’t know,” replies Kaydee. My mind is spinning and reeling at the
revelation. Is this for real or yet another of the surreal situations I find
myself in? What will it mean for humanity? Is Kaydee on the scent of a stink or
has he just not bathed enough recently? Is he about to dig up the roots of a
major conspiracy or is he simply barking up the wrong tree? Will he manage to
fit in a report on the hijacking in-between the election reports? Tune in next
time to another exciting instalment of haflatations.
This piece appeared in the December 2000 issue
of Egypt’s Insight magazine.
ã2004 K. Diab. Unless otherwise stated, all the content on this website
is the copyright of Khaled Diab.