At a party two days ago I bumped into Kamal, a family member I hadn’t seen for a couple of years. Nattily spruced and dressed up the last time we had met, this time around he was sporting a full mane of wildly growing shoulder-length hair over a loose linen caftan and faded denims.
“What happened, Kamal? Why the switch? You were so proper at our last meeting. If my memory serves me right, you meticulously followed the etiquette of dinner-plate settings and silverware rules. Just what has happened since then?”
“Tariq,” he sighed. “That’s all in the past. I’m just going to remain in this mode until I see real change in our society. I was so upbeat and energized when we began hearing about the positive reforms that affected us all, but has anything really materialized? It’s all been talk and nothing else.”
“But surely, Kamal, there has been a degree of change. Attitudes seem to be mellowing, and extremism has been exposed for what it is; a sickness within,” I offered back.
“No, Tariq. People talk of change, and wait for change, but they themselves are the very ones who resist it. Look around you at all these people. They are the first ones espousing progress and rooting like cheerleaders, but so long as their bank accounts remain healthy, they don’t really care.”
“But what is it exactly that depresses you? What has actually turned you off, Kamal?” I asked.
“Tariq, when I read that the Shoura Council after a lengthy debate had forwarded a proposal to the Council of Ministers to allow school girls to benefit from physical education, that was uplifting. But then when I later read conflicting statements made by senior members of this same council either denying such a proposal or speaking out vehemently against it, it just brought me down. Very down.”
He continued: “I mean, here we are entering 2004. And we face far more pressing issues that need resolution. We have a serious unemployment problem. We have an uncontrolled population growth. We have a decaying infrastructure. We have a rise of corruption within the public sector the like of which never before existed. Our public services are failing to meet the needs of many.
“And while all this is going on, this representative body made up of ordinary citizens appears to be bogged down on the issue of permitting school girls some physical activity! Such continuing inconsistencies in this culture of contradictions. Let us move ahead for once and focus on the issues that really require attention. And by God, let the girls have all the physical activity they need. At least that would address the problem of growing obesity here.
“I hate to burst your bubble, Tariq. But the times, they aren’t a-changing.”
