This guy wrote this article for Sudan Tribune, supposedly dissecting the lives of the Sudanese youth. I just feel like I need to remark on the paragraph that he titled 'the other poets'.
"The Other Poets"
Apparently there are real poets in Sudan, and 'other' poets, according to the writer- who seems to be the Master of poetry and the universal judge of all poets. After seeing a couple of posts on Facebook about certain lifestyle details (such as daily cosmopolitan interests) by young Sudanese men and women who welcomed him in Sudan and invited him to their lives and into their homes, he assumes their lives revolve around trivial, superficial matters which he refers to as 'artificiality in itself'.
According to the writer, the youth of Sudan betrayed their country by schooling overseas, and returned to Sudan but only to discuss shallow poetry over cupcakes and 'rebellious brunches' (whatever that means, as in brunch in a city like Khartoum is something extremely blasphemous).
He considers their spending time at cafes and leading normal lives (as normal as can be), performing normal activities, being normal in any form is both artificial and a delusion from the reality of the state that the country is in. His opinions, based merely on assumptions, state the youth of Sudan is not concerned with the ongoing war, perhaps aware of it but in some sort of denial.
Knowing this British writer personally, I feel obligated to say he did not bother to spend a few minutes with these people whom he referred to as the 'other poets' to know what they're really about... what their thoughts are, how they spend their free time, how they think, what interests them, what bothers them, the hardships they've faced, how the war has influenced them, etc etc.
Instead, he instantly judged them with the most amount of arrogance I have witnessed in all my 23 years of life, publishing an article based on zero facts and 100% prejudice.
I suggest, dear glorified writer, if you can't find a way to be impartial and nonjudgmental, that you immediately switch careers.
The youth of Sudan are intellectuals with perceptions deeper than your shallow self can ever imagine. We are aware of what's going on around us, and if you have taken the time to 'dissect' us properly, you would have figured it out.
But excuse us for disappointing you by trying to focus on the positiveness of life. We apologize that our nation recognizes modernness, etiquette and some sort of development, which seems to fail you significantly.
Dear glorified writer, in Khartoum, the youth perform normal activities as they do in England. We go to cafes, restaurants, gyms, open mic nights, yoga classes, dance classes, malls, picnics, recreational centers, shops, spas, and everything else you can think of.
Finally, I hope that by spending one year in Sudan (and not getting the most out of the experience, might I add) I hope that you at least feel that you fulfilled your 'goal', whatever that might be.. be it to brag to your friends that you lived in a developing country for a year and taught English, or some sort of self fulfillment that you did something 'good' for humanity.
Tweet
