Essay from Jaylan Salah

Posted on by

 

Invisible Ghosts from a Scriptwriter’s Present

Mohamed Solaiman Abdelmalek on Plot Twists, Echo Boomers and Naguib Mahfouz

 

(Mohamed Solaiman Abdelmalek – photo credit: Amr Salama)

(Mohamed Solaiman Abdelmalek – photo credit: Amr Salama)

We need to talk about Ramadan and TV land

 

Ramadan season is usually the main course for filmmakers, scriptwriters and actors. The biggest production companies in the business fight for time slots, optimal screen time and stars face the greatest exposure to the largest number of audiences. The key gameplayer in Ramadan TV series season is Egypt; however, Arab countries such as Syria, Lebanon and Kuwait make notable contribution to the TV-sphere. Despite that, Arab stars strive to appear in one or two Egyptian TV series. Most of them consider the Egyptian audience to be the major target which they intend to seek exposure to.

 

Why the long intro? My guest today is a prolific writer; one whose life -apart from the job- has been a series of long-term travels and escapades in the murky waters of writing. He started since he was studying medicine in college by writing series of thriller/suspense YA fiction novels. His aim was to explore himself as a scriptwriter and provoke the sense of security and normalcy that most Arab audiences seek. By writing a historical fantasy series of novel rooted in Pharaonic Egypt, he made his landmark as a literary writer, branching out to writing for TV and enjoying the medium with all the limitations and astrophysical lack of sophistication that it provides.

Continue reading →

Short story by Sheryl Bize-Boutte

Posted on by

Uncle Martina

I don’t know why Daddy brought me with him to Uncle Martin’s house that day or even remember whether it was just he and I, but there we were, standing on the curb edge squinting into the sun, waiting for Uncle Martin to cross the street.  Dressed in an un-tucked flowy white shirt and severely creased beige slacks, Uncle Martin was looking back nervously over his shoulder as he slowly made his way across the yard and on to the sidewalk carrying a small raggedy suitcase containing what he would later tell me were his “essentials.”

Much later, I would understand that Daddy was the logical one to be there that day.  He and Uncle Martin had been close since the day Daddy married his only sister, my mom.  Uncle Martin took one more quick look over his shoulder just before his foot hit the black asphalt of the street.  Standing in a stiff row behind him were the family he was leaving, an angry wife and three children; a girl aged 10 and two boys aged 7 and 5.  The girl stood solidly beside her mother trying her best to mimic her adult fury, while the oldest boy simply looked lost and confused.  The youngest boy, who looked nothing like Uncle Martin, had a look on his face that coincided with his mismatch, that of utter detachment.

In the middle of the street now, car engine running, Daddy called out, “Come on man, let’s go.  It’s hot as hell and I’m wasting gas here!”

With that, Uncle Martin wound his long slender fingers into a tighter grip around the fragile suitcase handle and sauntered in extended elegant strides to mom’s humming, brand new 1962 Chevy “Big Rider.” Daddy grabbed Uncle Martin’s shoulder and squeezed it, which made Uncle Martin lower his head and smile a strange combination of devastation and relief.  We all piled onto the new car smell green leather seats, and with Daddy and Uncle Martin in the front and me in the back, Daddy pulled away from the curb.

Continue reading →

Chimezie Ihekuna’s play The Success Story: Part 3

Posted on by

Please read the first installment of Ihekuna’s drama here and the next here.

We’re serializing this play one scene per issue.

Chimezie Ihekuna (Mr. Ben)'s newest book, The Poured-Out Thoughts

Chimezie Ihekuna (Mr. Ben)’s newest book, The Poured-Out Thoughts

In Greg’s Room…

It is three days to resumption. Greg, the only one in the house, is pacing back and forth his room, thinking becausehe has just completely read through the last chapter of the 150-page ‘Find Your Way Back’. He then forces himself to lie on the ten-inch-thick bed. But restlessness can’t make Greg take a nap after hours of preparation for school. Greg has his clothes properly placed in his medium-sized traveling bag. It is a tasking situation for the eighteen-year-old, having to select the clothes—from a variety of clothes in his white cupboard—he will be wearing throughout the duration of the session.

Meanwhile, Greg’s radio player, placed on a small white table, with a simple standing fan by the side for some cooling effect, is listening to a program on 88.1 Flash FM. The Program aired is: Return To Your Calling. Greg’s restlessness soon turns to comportment:

Hello, I’m XYZ, your anchor woman for today’s program. Listeners at home, school, work and some other places, how are you doing? Hope you’re enjoying your day? I am enjoying mine…

You’re unto 88.1 Flash FM …the station that has your interest at heart!

Today, the program, Return To Your Calling is a second-chance, never-too-late and decide-for-yourself interest dedicated to those who, by virtue of forced conditions and misplaced priorities, have ventured in various endeavours that they shouldn’t have been.

Continue reading →

Poetry from Karen D’Antona

Posted on by

Talkin’ to my Son

 

Talkin’ to my son today, he all weird’d me out/

When we was done, I didn’t know if I should cry, scream, or shout/

 

He’s says he wants to move to Brooklyn, with no job or plan/

But he needs a car, ‘cause he’s a young man/

 

I says how much does an apartment cost/

He say two thousand grand/

 

He’s only fourteen/

God, how do I make him understand/

 

You don’t move to Brooklyn/

With no job or plan/

 

He’s only fourteen/

God, please give me a plan/

 

A fourteen year old/

Is not yet a young man/

 

Now don’t get me wrong/

It’s not what you think/

 

I want you to follow your dreams son/

Do what you think/

 

But son, if you make one wrong move/

It could be over in a blink/

 

I thought writin’ rap would be fun/

But this really stinks/

 

It’s four a clock in the morning/

He’s restin’ in bed/

 

I am sitttin’ at this computer/

Bangin’ my head/

 

At least I know he’s safe right now/

God, please look over him/

 

He’s only fourteen/

Not yet a young man/

Poetry from Vijay Nair

Posted on by
Vijay Nair

Vijay Nair

The Candle

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tallow wax in slender

Rare corpulent in shapes

Peppy she a burning bright

The way of spreading light

Her moments are in delight

Never knew the plight

Grief no for the life span

Brief than an hour;

Her fleeting existence

Is no one’s concern

Since, she melts to cast the shadow,

To show her celestial beauty

Before she dies without sorrow

Poetry from Joan Beebe

Posted on by
 
VACATIONS

I think we all look forward to that

Break in our daily routine, whether

We work or we are at home.

In this busy world of rushing back and forth

Our dreams of fun and relaxation take over.

We browse through travel brochures and

The urge to leave our cares becomes stronger

 as picturesque thoughts take flight

 and our imagination soars.

Waving palm trees, glittering white sand,

Soft and soothing.

The ocean sparkles with the rays of the sun

Reflecting the beauty of the ocean rippled

With colors of azure blue and shadowy green.

Nature has brought peacefulness to one’s mind

And the stresses are carried away on the

Poignant sea wind.

Poetry from Mahbub

Posted on by

The Torture and Death You Brought About

 

They are the Rohingyas

They are the Muslims

They live in Rakhine of Myanmar

You, the armed forces,

You, the angry mobs and the hungry Buddhists

What have you made to do such monstrosities?

I hear the sound of cries and pains still now floating on the wind

I can still see the sight of torture and death on the screen

I can see the fully naked women tightly tied in a tree with ropes

The screaming, howling and growling with pain touches my heart

Sinks into darkness

Animals have also the rules to prey

More furious than they living in the darkness of forest or jungles

You, the killers play the role of demons

When I see the cutting of legs and hands of a living woman

Before blowing the knife on her throat and separating her head

Keep it on her hip

My eyes lose its power to see any more

When I see a man sitting on a stone fixing his hands and legs

Standing three with their black head from back

Suddenly started to blow the knife on his throat

Separating his body from head leave the track with the head

Numbs my body in the silent morning after rising the sun

When I see the boys and girls are mangled

with the axes in their mouths and foreheads

Immediately the land is flooded with blood

How can I keep my eyes open to the blue and rainbow sky?

When I see the children are held hard and beaten with sticks and rods

And shoot and cut the bodies and hung to the wall

How can I take my breath?

When I see the human bodies are lying on the ground

And the armed forces and mobs are beating and chopping them to death

How can I sound any more?

When I see the young official play with a young lady in the jeep

And tear her breast and vagina with weapons

Laying her flat on the road jump on her body

How can the world be silent?

When I see the live persons are burned to death by petrol

Pouring on their bodies

How should the green be the green?

When the houses are burning with the dark smoke

And the people are running to escape themselves

People of all ages; children, young and the old

Rush to Bangladesh crossing the river Naf

The water of the river has been red, the red blood

It is groaning with rage

Hundreds and thousands of dead bodies are floating on the river

The Rakhine land has already been cultivated with the seeds in this way

the so many silent dead bodies

Genocide! Overcomes all the savagery in the history of the world

O Aung San Suu Kyi, what will be your answer before our Creator

When along with them you will again open your eyes

to the Judgment’s day?

Would it be able to save you your prestigious certificate?

The Nobel Peace Prize?

Does it bear any more the honor you achieved?

Continue reading →