Self-Tolerance

|| P.S.: This post may not make any sense at many points. I just wrote it how I felt it.  

Our bodies are designed to be their own saviors.  We were created with countless mechanisms that collectively work to keep our bodies safe from any internal or external attacks. But what if the attack is external? Like a virus or an accident?

Could it be avoided? If you know what it is that is lurking to get you maybe you could avoid it if you’re careful enough?

 Some people over do it, they think disinfecting their hands million times can keep them safe from germs or some sort of an external invader that will have them trembling with sickness. So they over protect themselves and their children and the whole family ends up germophobic with OCD. Is that really a life? - To me, most defiantly not.

But what if the attack is internal? What if your own body is attacking itself? And what if your lines of defence are standing by just watching the battle you’re losing?

Your immune system recognizes the various cells of your body as foreigners and starts recruiting its defence lines against, well basically against you. Your body is destroying itself from the inside out. Cell by cell, tissue by tissue, organ by organ and system by system. This is called an autoimmune disease.

I know this comparison highly underestimates the severity of autoimmunity but, doesn’t it feel the same way when you're overwhelmed with doubt and countless questions that are eating your head day and night?

When you feel like overthinking is literally self-destructive to a point where you can no longer function and all you really want to do is stay in bed and avoid the day.

To me both cases bring up the same choices and present the same fundamental question; would you go looking for answers and solutions or would you give up completely and go dying in a loved one’s arms?

I know this sounds depressingly tragic. But I’m just warming up.

Autoimmune disease is hard to diagnose. Because all you have is signs and symptoms given to you by the patient. Sometimes doctors can’t really detect the exact autoimmune mechanism that is doing the harm. So many patients are diagnosed incorrectly or accused of making up the symptoms. Does this ring a bell?

On many levels it does. How many times you felt it in your gut that something is wrong? You can’t quiet put your hand on it but you just feel its void. You just feel it with every cell of your existence. Some people are lucky enough to figure it out; others are destined for life with absolutely no joy regardless of how hard they look for it, or how many times they think they’ve chased it down. That thing that will make everything alright and restores life to normal.

If my father heard me saying this he’d accuse me of making a problem out of nothing, maybe he has a point. Life should be simple right? No?

Speaking of simplicity, let’s go back to immunity. When it comes to our immune system, it’s not all destructive and tragic.

Our immune system presents the most beautiful concept I’ve ever encountered. The term ‘Self Tolerance’ as defined in Robin’s Basic Pathology by ‘’the lack of immune response to one’s own tissue antigens.  Obviously, such self-tolerance is necessary if our own tissues are to live harmoniously with a marauding army of lymphocytes. ‘’ 
I mean how majestic does that sound? Beautiful beautiful beautiful. 

Our bodies’ immune system sounds peacefully perfect doesn’t it? Well if you’re a normal-healthy person that’s exactly what it should be like. The body detects the self-destructing molecules and gets rid of them before the reach our vital tissues and organs. Don’t you just wish we have a filter exactly like that for your unwanted feelings, doubts and insecurities? And everyone ends up living and everyone is satisfied. Or maybe they just think they are? Maybe they’re just Okay with settling for simply just that. An ordinary life. You know; graduate, work and then die.

But if you’re one of those handful of people who are striving to make something out of their lives. Refusing to settle for anything less than that. These insomniac perfectionists, the counter of all stereotypes, living in a constant battle with themselves. Hiding behind million fears and insecurities but trying anyways.

Are you hopelessly autoimmune-d to peace of mind?

Questions that bring up more questions. Let’s end it shall we?

Aside from that, I guess what I’m trying to say is that maybe our immune system is telling us something here, it’s giving us a priceless lesson, one that is not learned very easily, ‘Self tolerance’ learn to tolerate yourself, your moods, your insecurities, learn to accept your fears, and the most important lesson of all is learning how to understand them in order to co-exist peacefully. Because in life everything requires self tolerance first.

We Are The Universe: Salt Edition.

Reporting from the land of duty and after 5 weeks I can honestly say that today is the first day that I actually ENJOYED working at the laboratory. After countless and soul oppressing venipunctures here comes redemption, also known as The Microscope.

I’ve started working at the parastiology section today. Preparing the perfect slides and adjusting to make the perfect field and then observing the miniature universe and finally writing down these observations.

As being the intern has it’s perks (sarcasm) and for it being my first day I wasn’t on the fighting front right from the start so my supervisor worked most of the time and then called me to watch the prepared slides under the microscope. Few slides has passed and then there it was. My supervisor with her hands on the fine adjustment knob of the microscope  called me specifically saying ‘’Drop whatever you’re writing down this second and come see these dancing stars, Subhan Allah’’ – She had me at stars.

The actual slide that I saw today.

Closer look at the calcium oxalate crystals - Google search.

Needless to say I had my eyes through the lenses in a fraction of a second and then said, ‘’what am I looking at?’’ They did look like perfect shapes of what we learned to draw as stars.

These tiny perfect starry shaped are calcium oxalate salt crystals. And when my supervisor told me this, at that exact second this Hubble photo crossed my mind.

Like Salt Sprinkled on Black Velvet
Click here for more details on the photo

I’ve seen it a while ago and remember its title clearly ‘Like Salt Sprinkled on Black Velvet’. 

Kind of awesome right? And maybe a bit scary in the most poetic way possible..

This Hubble Telescope photo of this realm of the universe has a striking resemblance of the slide I saw today

This can mean whatever you want to mean, to me it's only saying that the very small resembles the very big. That is if you can understand the small scale stuff you will find your way to the bigger picture, whatever that is for you. It makes you think, we're as humans are floating universes on this Earth. We often complain about 'Finding our way' or trying to see this bigger picture and figuring out what to do with our lives. Here's what I learned today: Adjust your knobs, find your field and make sure your lenses are clean and ready.

 I’ll leave you to look. I’m speechless.

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'Like Salt Sprinkled on Black Velvet'

From NASA To Gaza : An Inside Look.

A week ago I was a fresh senior embarking on my summer training with nothing but optimism and excitement; after all, I was going to get a sneak peak of how my future job would look like. My first day at the laboratory of Maen Clinic was shocking to say the least, despite everyone being very welcoming and understanding of my little experience as a young intern. It was everything I didn’t imagine or expect. I was blind sided.

Three years ago I quit pharmacy school at Al Ain University Of Science and Technology – UAE after finishing 2 semesters and came to Gaza to study Laboratory Medicine. It was love that drove me to this major, that miniature universe under the microscope and the peace that you feel when you work in the lab. But the first day of training was the contrary. The work load was huge; people didn’t stop flowing till the last hours of the work day. There was no peace, there was no ‘’Microscope Meditation’’. It was a battlefield. Everyone working in the lab were on their feet trying to catch up to stay as organized as possible. I came home and spent 2 hours on Skype complaining to my parents and telling them that I don’t want to spend the rest of my life doing this. Shocked and mortified are understatements of what I felt after my first day. Nothing and no one made sense. I was on the verge of giving up. I felt weary. Everything I ever dreamed of seemed like a joke.

A Breath Of Fresh Air

From NASA To Gaza

Last Saturday there was a seminar organized by Gaza Group of culture and Development. titled ‘’From NASA to Gaza’’ for Dr. Suleiman Baraka who is an astrophysicist from Gaza that worked with NASA. I was the first one to arrive. The seminar started and Dr. Suleiman being the inspiring person that he is can simply trigger your emotions with his wit and wisdom, he talked about what ignited his passion to physics and how despite the unstable circumstances of Gaza he managed to get his PhD from university of Pierre and Marie Curie – Paris and then found his way to NASA. And about how with imagination you can reach the maximum potential of your mind. For the entire seminar an overwhelming feeling of peace occupied my every sense. For a brief period of time I lost contact with the outside world because there was no force in this universe that could’ve distracted me from the undeniable power of Dr. Suleiman speaking from his mere experience. Here he is a living example of someone from the heart of Gaza, the home of uncertainty, contradictions, siege and occupation and against all odds he achieved what many may think was impossible or somehow, insane!.


Dreams Know No Borders 

You listen to him and you just believe, with your heart, with your brain, with your soul, you believe. You believe in yourself, in your maddest dreams, in your world, you believe that you too can make it. You believe. And then something that I thought died inside me a week ago was rising from beneath the molten anger caused by the shocking reality of my ‘’future job’’. And I finally saw what was staring me in the face the entire time. This was only the beginning. 

 I couldn’t see the sun any clearer than I did after I left the seminar. There she was the mesmerizing lady of fire smiling at sundown with the promise of a splendid tomorrow. Thank you Dr. Suleiman, thank you Gaza Group, thank you for everyone who worked on the event! From the bottom of my heart, thank you!  

It was a full house! 

Cosmic Chaos: Student's Life in Gaza

Just another exam, just another day full of countless hours of studying and revising. Or at least that’s what I thought it’s going to be. I woke up early to study for my Parasitology final exam. Sitting quietly in my room and everything was perfect, the electricity was on, what more a student can ask for?

It was hours later when the beloved electricity decided to depart leaving me angry and frustrated. But anyhow that didn’t stop me from studying, there was sun out there. I pulled a chair and opened the balcony and sat down and started studying under the beautiful Gazan sky. Perfect again? No. and then the bombs started flying around. East Khan Younis where I live was under attack. Almost every hour there was sounds of gun shots, explosions and the following ambulance sirens. The Earth was agitated like it’s never been in a while. Regardless I continued studying because god knows no amount of time is enough for Parasitology, I kept that in mind and decided to block out the sounds of everything around in order to finish but imagine how hard it was when you’re sitting in the middle of this unpleasant action. RPGs. Arterially shells. Ambulance sirens. You’d think I’d freak out and drop my books but to tell the truth the idea of not being able to study and revise properly scared me more. So I kept on studying while being continually interrupted by the sounds of gun shots and explosions and again screaming ambulance sirens. This seemed endless. But I kept on going anyways, it took me longer than it usually does to memorize the classes and diseases caused by each parasite because I kept forgetting them, thanks for the countless distractions around and that’s when I decided to use them in my favour. I linked each class of parasites to a time we were being bombed and  I eventually did get them right. Israel eat your heart out!

Now the sun was also departing declaring that I can no longer use her beautiful rays to study. And that’s when I decided to go grab some coffee from a nearby café in Khan Younis. Hoping by the time I get home they would’ve turned on the generator and I can continue studying.

I came back home after 30 minutes to find my mother and sister  still drowning in the darkness they were in before I left. I was mad. I still had an astronomical amount of studying to do and there was no light! Then the conversation drifted not to be about the absent electricity but about my short temper, which got even shorter when it was the centre of attention. As if they don’t know that it’s a good thing that I’m still sane after all. I went to search for the ‘’Kaz light’’ I haven’t used it in ages and it was time for it to shine (literally). I lit it and started studying. Ok it’s a summer day it was hot already and the little kaz light wasn’t helping the matters. Anyhow, continuing: intestinal nematodes, tissue and blood nematodes and life goes on. And my vision doesn’t.

Hours later the generator magically started working! It was like an adrenaline shot straight to the heart, I jumped and turned on the lights and guess what!

Due to fluctuating current of the generator the light bulb decided to explode, as if it wasn’t enough being bombed all morning.

You’d think I’d go mad and drop my books.

But instead I started laughing hysterically. The day has been hilarious no?

At that point I had no fight in me and my eyes started to give up.

I made myself another mug of coffee and got up to the roof to watch the mesmerizing night sky, something has to be good about this day.

Perfect again? Sad to report that it wasn’t.

The sky was perfect but that wasn’t the issue. As I gazed  at the sky I noticed the lonely creatures roaming above aka DRONES. And other warplanes making a pattern in the sky that could distract you even from Vega.

The whole day felt like a cosmic chaos from the start, most days in Gaza are like this, we’re bombed but we choose to continue studying. The power is out but we choose to continue studying. The generator is not working, we choose to continue studying. The drones are so loud that you can’t sometimes hear yourself think, we choose to continue studying. Regardless of the circumstances we choose to continue studying because we know very well that as Palestinians our education is our ticket to freedom. And that’s what was engraved in every cell of my brain from the moment I was born.

So cheers to all the Gazan students  studying when the power is out and losing their eyesight just like I’m losing mine. We can make it! 

#VenusTransitGaza

Wednesday morning the 6^th of June was a unique one. A rare cosmic event was occurring, we in Gaza were lucky to have the opportunity to watch the Venus Transit and enjoy the beauty of the event via Dr.Suleiman Baraka’s Solar Filtered Telescope.

THANK YOU TWITTER.

Earlier in April I met Dr.Suleiman on twitter and he told me about the Venus Transit and said that he will be preparing a sky seeing event if his trip to France was cancelled and that I was more than welcomed to attend. Guess how excited I was at that moment I felt like I couldn’t breathe!. Now I didn’t want to wish that his trip gets cancelled for my own selfish reasons, I just kept dreaming about the day.

When the details of the event’s location were disclosed and I found out that it’s really happening I was smiling all day that I didn’t feel my facial muscles aching till late at night.

Now I understand why people get excited about rock concerts.

Wake up, Venus is visiting!

The night before the event I was supposed to ‘’get some rest’’ but I tried to sleep countless times and failed. I kept following the progress of the transit online and when it was 5 AM I woke my mother and my sister to get ready because the location of the event is an hour away from where I live. I’ve already made plans with a taxi driver to come pick us up at 5:30 AM. Everything and everyone were set.

We headed to the event and again I was smiling all the way and wasn’t able to hear anything my mother was saying. Apparently she was making fun of the fact that we’re up this early to see Venus. We arrived at the location and people were there already and the telescopes were installed and guess what! Dr.Suleiman Baraka was there moving gracefully between the audience and talking to everyone and making sure everyone got their chance to watch.

Dr.Suleiman adjusting the telescope.

I wouldn’t be exaggerating if I said that the highlight of the event wasn’t Venus passing between the sun and the earth, but more it was Dr.Suleiman with his exquisite knowledge that he was more than happy to share. He told us about the myths surrounding Venus, it’s history and linked all of that to Ayat from holy Quran. It was amusing listening to him speak, he is one of a kind!

Dr.Baraka explaining to the audience what are sun spots!

I kept following the progress of the transit via the telescope and by the naked eye and every time I saw it, it electrified me. I needed few minutes to regain my breathing and heart rhythem back to normal after every observation.

Dr.Suleiman asked me ‘’Mabsoota ya Basma?’’ I replied: ‘’Mabsoota is an understatement sir, I’m ecstatic!’’ He smiled and thanked me for coming.

There was a good amount of media coverage for the event. I did two TV interviews for it. The interviewer asked me what most people ask when they first know that I'm a laboratory medicine student / space geek. 

''Why was it important for you to be here''

I replied: ''Astronomers look at the universe around us through their telescopes, we laboratory medicine students look at the universe within us through our microscopes, it's not that different. We are the universe.''

And at 7:30 AM Gaza said goodbye to Venus declaring the end of one of my best mornings in Gaza.

قمرٌ محير.

يسكن ليلنا، هو جرمنا السماوي المفضل، كيف لا يكون؟ 
فهو المكان الوحيد الذي وطأه الإنسان خارج كوكب الأرض.
 ذلك الشي الذي وجوده الروتيني يبعث على الراحة. دائمًا هناك في عمق السماء يظهر لنا وجهه اللا متغير. 

نراه يلمع بأشعة الشمس المتفائلة، لا نرى سوى وجهه المتبسم و نعتقد بأنه أسعدهم و أكثرهم فرحاً، كيف لا و هو المنير بجمال لا مثيل له؟

لا نعلم أنه في الواقع من أكثر الأماكن صمتاً و حزناً في كوننا الشاسع. و قد تفاجئ لو علمت بأن قمرنا هو محارب قديم ولد من باطن الأرض البدائية، انقسم عنها في محاولة للهرب و كأنه كان يعلم بأنها ستصبح مكاناً لا يطاق، مكان تملؤه الحروب و الدماء و جثث الأطفال المتناثرة و الأكاذيب المتلاطمة. فضل قمرنا الإنسحاب من هذه الفوضى محاولاُ التبرأ منها قبل أن تبدأ. حاول أن يسبح بعيداً في الفضاء و لكن سطوة الأرض بجاذبيتها العاتية فضلت أن تبقيه قريباً في مدارها (يا لها من أنانية!) لكي يرى و يشهد الأحداث. و لربما هذا هو سبب حزنه الذي لا نراه.

الهدوء القاتل

فلو ذهبت للقمر، ما أن تخرج من سفيتك الفضائية حتى يحيط بك الهدوء القاتل! نعم سيدي، هنالك هدوء خانق قاتل لا يمكن إنكاره. فالفضاء لا يحمل بين طياته الهواء فلا ينتقل الصوت من مكان لآخر فتجد نفسك محاط بذلك الهدوء الذي قد يبدو من الوهلة الأولى مسالماً و لكن لا، فالحكاية لم تنتهي هنا بعد.

لربما كان هذا الصمت ردة فعل القمر على كل تلك الأحداث المريعة التي مر بها، ربما هذه وسيله للدفاع عن نفسه أو ربما ما عادت الكلمات لتغير شيئاً ففضل الصمت الأبدي المطبق!

الحداد الرمادي.

نراه أبيضا لامعاً فنظنه سعيداً ضاحكاً، و لكن ما أن تهبط عليه حتى يظهر لك وجهه الرمادي المتشح بسواد في بعض مناطقه و الملئ بالندوب.

لربما تصدم حين تراه عن قرب. فكيف لشي يبدو بتلك السعادة من الأرض أن يبدو بهذا الحزن عن قرب؟

تقف عليه وحيداً و يبدأ حزنه يتسلل إليك، قد تتسائل عن سبب ذلك الحزن و ربما لا يتسع عقلك لاستيعابه فتغرق في حالة من الصدمة و قد تنهار باكياً على حاله.

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 بالرغم من كل هذا الحزن الذي يملؤه أجد نفسي أحدق إلى وجهه في كل ليلة يظهر فيها،

أجلس أنا و فنجان القهوة مترقبة إنقطاع الكهرباء عن الحي حتى لا يعود هنالك ما يزعج قمري و يشتت انتباهي عنه. أجلس على حافة الشرفة و أنظر إليه. فكلانا يعلم شيئاً لا يعلمه الآخرون.

نجلس سوياً في صمتنا المطبق، فنحن أصدقاء قدماء لا نحتاج لكي نتحدث ليفهم كلانا الآخر.

يجعلني أتساءل أحياناً ما مصير أهل الحزن؟ فالقمر صاحب الخبرة في هذا المجال، فهو متوقف في هذا الزقاق من الكون منذ أربعة بلايين سنة ونصف. هل كان حزيناً منذ ولادته؟ و هل سيبقى حزيناً حتى مماته؟ هل سيتمكن من الابتسام بصدق يوماُ ما؟

يحيرني قمري.

ولكن حيرتي هذه لا تزيد سوى حبي له.

أحبه بالرغم من مزاجيته و حزنه و حداداه. فهو محاربي القديم و صديقي الدائم.

It's A Relativity Thing

   

The semester is ending. It’s been a great semester for me on many levels.  Great things have happened and greater things are about to happen. I can feel it in my bones. I can’t say its been the best semester for me in terms of attending lectures. But when was it?  

I usually don’t attend that many lectures & end up getting high scores anyways.

Anyhow, let’s get down to it, shall we?

Few weeks ago I ran into a friend, we talked, joked, and exchanged the latest updates and before we both went on our ways he said ‘’I know there’s something bothering you, so what’s up?’’ I confirmed that nothing is bothering me and that was it. Or so I thought.

Yesterday I met a friend for coffee, and she kept asking me how I was doing as if she knew something that I didn't know, I insisted that I’m doing just fine and preparing for my finals, and after chatting for a good hour she said: ‘’Even though you’ve given me three good news, I believe you’re not okay’’ The only reply I had in me at that point was ‘’I’m not okay, I’m fantastic’’. We departed after that.

Today I ran into a colleague we were both in a hurry so it was just a quick Salam and a hug but that didn’t stop her from saying ‘’I have a feeling that you’re not okay’’ now at the moment I wanted to explode and ask her why does everyone seem to think that lately? Do I have a dark halo over my head? Or do I walk dragging myself with misery? Instead I smiled and told her that everything is fine and that she might be feeling this way because it was time for finals and everyone’s nervous. 

I headed to the bus that will take me home, sat down, put on what my friends call ‘’Shakoosh Face’’ so no one in the bus would annoy me with their meaningless ‘’get to know you'' chat. I opened my purse to look for my headphones, didn’t find them. I looked to see if I brought my novel, didn’t find that either. So I was forced to sit alone with my torturous thoughts for the whole drive home which is an HOUR.

I started thinking why does everyone seems to believe I’m sad, depressed, not okay whatever the expression their insistence was equal. I kept thinking and thinking and thinking, ‘’digging deep’’ as my friend Rana calls it, she always tells me ‘’Dig deeper and you will know why, you need to know the reason to start to know how to fix it’’ I dug as deep as I can, couldn’t find a single reason, then my head started spinning with headache and an image of the moon rotating around the Earth suddenly appeared before me, but why?

I imagined myself as the moon and the problem I was so determined to figure out was the Earth. I was rotating around the problem trying to explore what the hell it was. That’s why my head started to spin and my heart was racing and my breathing started to escalate

Then I thought, why am I forcing myself to spin around a problem? Maybe it doesn’t exist, but even if it does, rotating around it only gave me a headache.

You’d think I would stop rotating around the problem and start doing something normal sane people would do when they’re in a bus, look outside the window.
 I didn’t.

Instead I replaced the problematic Earth with the Sun, which to me symbolizes positive thinking, and started to imagine myself rotating around the sun, faster faster faster! The faster I imagined myself orbiting around the Sun the calmer I felt, my heart has slowed, so did my breathing and the headache didn’t feel as bad.

Down to Science.

Einstein said that space and time are interconnected like a fabric.

And that explained what Newton called ‘’Gravity’’. We were taught in school that gravity is a force that differs according to the distance between the bodies and their masses . Einstein with his theory of General Relativity explained that gravity is not a force.

‘’Think of a heavy rock placed on a bed. The rock, of course will sink into the bed. Now shoot a tiny marble over the bed. The marble will not move in a straight line but in a curved line around the rock’’- 

Space-Time Continuum (click here for more info)

'’Now replace the rock with the sun, the marble with the earth, and the bed with space and time. Newton would say that an invisible force called gravity pulls the earth around the sun. Einstein would reply that there is no gravitational pull at all. The earth is deflected around the sun because the curvature of space itself pushing the earth. In a sense, gravity dose not pull, but space pushes.’’

-Einstein's Cosmos a book by Dr. Michio KaKu's book 

Now you may find yourself wondering why am I throwing Einstein and Newton in your face, or what it has to do with what I’m trying to say, I’ll tell you.

Let’s replace the rock, marble, and bed with something else shall we?

Imagine your life is the bed (space time fabric), you are the marble (Earth) and your thoughts, decisions, actions, emotions are the rock (Sun)

Life is curved, we’ve established that, and I’m sure we all faced that at some point in our lives. But it’s you who should decide which curve to rotate around, It can either be the happy optimistic sun, or you can orbit a black hole of self destructive actions. Knowing that a black hole is in fact much more powerful and it bends space-time at a greater curvature than our sun does, simply because it’s much more massive.

So it’s up to you, you have to decide.

It’s simple.

The Sun or a Black hole?
''A black hole is an object whose gravitational pull is so great that nothing-not even light- can escape from it. A black hole forms when a massive star dies and collapse under it's own mass. Some black holes, billions of times more massive than the sun'' - The Night Sky a book by Glies Sparrow

Click here for explanation!

Many people spend their entire lives circling a black hole of negativity and keep wondering why bad things are happening to them, well hello! Did you try to orbit a beautiful luminous star? No. They keep going round and round and eventually get ripped apart  atom by atom by the black hole they so eagerly surround as if it was their only option. And it’s that lack of courage and negativity that holds them from taking a fateful step to dip their toes into this vast universe of life.

Be courageous.

''Here's what I know:

if you're willing to take a chance,

the view from the other side is spectacular.''

HorseHead Nebula :)

'You need chaos in your soul to give birth to a dancing star.'' - Friedrich Nietzsche

Life is like our universe, full of hostile places, quasars radiation will relinquish you, black holes will devour you, but if you wander long enough, you’ll learn that this isn’t all, somewhere near these horrific hostilities there lies a beauty in the deep, a happy colourful nebula welcoming the birth of new stars (happy thoughts), instead of spending your life around a black hole, find your way to nebula, where new beginnings are possible and what we thought was impossible now becomes inspiring.

It’s your life, so where do you want to spend it?

-Quotes above are from Dr. Michio KaKu's book ''Einstein's Cosmos''

Poem: Defying Inhumanity

 A Palestinian Prisoner on HungerStrike

Tolerance to inhumanity was ceased,

His mortal body decided to plea,

''HungerStrike! HungerStrike!''

          He screamed.

To his loved ones he wrote in tears;

''I may not survive this fight,

But my cause will be clear,

Do not fear for this mortal body, mother

It shall soon be free''

And so the battle began,

Salt and Water are his only companions,

The mind, body and soul.

All at a fierce war,

Every second,

Every minute,

Every hour,

Every day,

He starves for food,

But his appetite for freedom conquers all,

His frigid body becomes weaker,

On it's own it tries to feed,

To keep this daring solider of justice on his feet,

The days go by,

And he can no longer stand,

His muscles are burned to the ground,

He can only gaze at this endless wall of gray,

And with his imagination he escapes,

He dreams of the sandy beaches of his homeland,

His mother whispers:

''Be strong my child,

Yes you can endure,

Think of us, we'll be united soon.

And we will celebrate you like no other groom''

He smiles in complete peace.

His breaths are slowing,

His heart is slowing,

And every organ starts to fail.

''Clinically dead'' they claim,

But the undeniable truth tells,

Medical facts are defied 

Logic is re-defined.

Dignity is defended.

Inhumanity is defeated

We scream. We pray. We fear. We watch.

And I can't help but wonder,

Is it enough?

Is it enough? 

Is it enough?

Space Bound*

It was a regular family gathering afternoon, my family was invited to my uncle's house for a Friday Feast, everyone had just finished their lunch, and were now drinking tea and chatting, it was then when I sneaked out and left the crowed to go to my uncle's office where he had this huge library, I was about 7 years old, I can hardly reach the top shelves that held the heavy old looking books, so I settled for the ones my tiny hands could reach to avoid the trouble I would get into if I needed anyone to help me to get to the ones on the top, because that would end up with my mother freaking out and me outside the office which was not an option!

I grabbed a couple of books, sat on the floor, and started to flip through the pages, the book was in English, so I didn't understand a thing and kept looking at the photos in it, now from the title of this blog you’ve guessed already what that book was about, it was about Space! More specifically the Solar System, which at that age barely knew anything about, anyhow that didn’t stop me from flipping for more pages and gazing at more photographs, it was a few minutes later when my little sister had found me hiding in my uncle’s office, she came in, looked at the book and then asked ‘what are these things? Basma, do you know what are they?’

‘What are these things?’

By the time she came in I was staring at a drawing of Saturn, it for some reason captivated my attention because none of the previous drawings of planets had any rings around them, so my sister’s question was about the rings, now I myself didn’t know what were they, but it was shameful for me to seem so ignorant in front of my little sister, because after all I was the ‘smart mouthed’ kid in the family, I had the answers to everything, how can I not know ‘what were these things’ so I made up a story and told  my sister that they were advanced antennas for alien satellites and that she shouldn’t ask anymore questions because it would  be dangerous, of course I only said that to scare her away from asking me any more questions that I had absolutely no idea how to answer them.

She left the room and never asked me anything related to space till this very day, except our usual ‘do you believe in alien life’ arguments now and then, now I understand why she doesn't believe in intelligent alien life, I think I scared her for good!.

My family's weekly visits to my uncle's were the highlight of my week because it meant more time for me to sneak to his office and flip through the pages of the space books he had. I had so many questions but I was afraid to ask, because then they would find out that I was disappearing into his office which was a forbidden zone for the children in the family, so I settled for only looking at more drawings, and oh man I was hooked!

In our school systems, they only teach you about the Earth, moon and Solar System, so you grow up thinking that the universe is that limited. That is if you’re thinking about the universe in the first place.

For the most part while growing up I wondered about the shapes that appeared on the moon and if they meant anything, now I know there’s no man on the moon and there’s no rabbit either, but in fact it’s ‘maria’ that resulted billions of years ago when a giant asteroid hit the moon and caused the lava to expand to the other side of the moon which we now see as dark regions. 

As I grew older my love and fascination with our ever expanding universe intensified, I’m often asked ‘What is a Laboratory Medicine student doing reading about pulsars?’ or why do I spend hours in the library chasing down an information about the history of the universe, I can list a million reasons to why, but I think one is enough.

It’s love.

During a long exhausting day of lectures, whenever I have a free hour, I would run for my life and I mean RUN, to my university's library just to escape into a parallel universe outside the pressure of lectures with ‘Heaven & Earth’ 

  After 2 weeks of library deprivation due to my hectic schedule,
 I came back to find my baby alone and dusty!  

Somehow when having a regular conversation with a friend, no matter what the topic, I end up turning to space in an attempt to ‘clarify’ my point by either using Einstein’s general relativity theory in comparison to why we as humans are attracted to grand things, don’t they usually say ‘The Bigger the Better’ or as a Palestinian would say it ‘estakber.ha walaw kanat 3ajra’ which is usually a failed attempt mostly because no one knows what the hell I’m talking about.

With my friend Randa at our university's library ,
where I spent a good 40 minuets explaining to her what was a 'Hubble Deep Filed'

I remember once a my friend Raghda was traveling to Qatar and it was during the tough times of Rafah Crossing, she texted  to tell me that she finally made it outside Rafah Crossing boarder, and I replied ''congratulations, you made it to the other side of the black hole''

One time when I was visiting my family in UAE  I went to my mother's office to help her out, I met some of her co-workers, all nice people and got to know them better, of course they noticed my Space Geekiness, because it was the 7^th of March and there was a huge Solar Flare heading towards the Earth and I was on my mother’s computer following the progress of the Flare online.

So it’s no question that the perfect gift for someone like me was ‘The Night Sky’, which was exactly what I got when I went in for the last time to say Goodbye before heading to Gaza! Imagine how happy I was to get it. I carried the book like it was a newly born child and refused to let anyone touch it or even smell it!

Heading home with my new best friend! :D

More more Love

-It was a regular night in Gaza and by regular I mean there was no electricity, I was sitting in my bed with a small searchlight in my hand to help me read ‘The Night Sky’ I happened to be reading about pulsars when the Israelis decided to bomb near by, of course I freaked out for a second but when I noticed the irony I exploded with laughter, oh Gaza you always know how to ‘blast’ my mood! :D

-On my way home one afternoon, I shared a taxi with my dear friend Rana, we were talking on the drive home and of course, again, somehow I ended up talking about space! I started about the space-time continuum and drifted to a completely different world and started to explain to her using my hands, how Einstein said that space and time are interconnected like a fabric, days later she told me that the guy that was sitting next to us in the taxi ‘freaked out’ according to Rana he did ‘’especially when u got excited and started to talk about space there were some birds flying above his head’’..Call me crazy but I enjoyed it! :D

-After a bad day or a long exhausting day, the only thing that would lift my spirit  is looking at NASA’s Astronomy Picture Of The Day website to find the dancing Nebulae speaking to me and only me about the secrets they so creatively keep. Or sitting on the rooftop with my mug of coffee listening to Umm Kulthum while watching the stars, these luminance wonders so far away that they almost seem mythical.They never fail to spark optimism in my soul.

It’s magic.

Though my soul may set in darkness. 

It will rise in perfect light. 

I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night

- Sarah Williams

When everything seems to be dark as the dark matter, the only thing that would bring back lost hope is looking at the starry night sky, even though in Gaza sometimes the sky is feared because it carries the war planes that bear destruction, so if you’re ever in Gaza, never mistake a passing flash in the night sky for a supernova, it’s most likely a just a ‘light bomb’ or what is locally known as ‘Qanadeel’ which is their attempt to light the night sky to get a better visual. 

Gazan Moon! Photo taken from my rooftop! :D

The way I feel about Space is the same way Elizabeth Gilbert feels about travel, and this quote pretty much says it all:

‘’Still, despite all this, traveling is the great true love of my life. I have always felt, ever since I was sixteen years old and first went to Russia with my saved-up babysitting money, that to travel is worth any cost or sacrifice. I am loyal and constant in my love for travel, as I have not always been loyal and constant in my other loves. I feel about travel the way a happy new mother feels about her impossible, colicky, restless newborn baby - I just don't care what it puts me through. Because I adore it. Because it's mine. Because it looks exactly like me. It can barf all over me if it wants to - I just don't care.’’ – Eat Pray Love

When you love something this badly you don’t need a reason to explain it to others, they can see it in your face and the sound of your voice when you speak about it, I know it might be weird and uncommon for someone to care this much about what seems to be useless to others, but like Elizabeth Gilbert said, I don’t care!

Antares :).
My favorite Red Giant 

‘’We are StarDust.We are golden. We are billion year old carbon’’

The quote is from the song by Woodstock which was inspired by Carl Sagan.

Every atom in your body was once a part of a star. But how you may ask. You may know that heavy atoms only result from the nuclear fusion of smaller atoms which can't occur on Earth. This only happens under extreme heat. Which is called Thermo-nuclear fusion. This reaction only occurs inside the core of massive stars. They are the giants that harbour this immense heat. And when the star dies and goes supernova more heavier elements will be created.

Anyhow, you may find this hard to process but that’s not what I’m getting at by quoting Carl Sagan.

My point is, if you believe that you are something more than the flesh and bones that make you. That you are indeed a supernovic pulsating star of life. You can’t imagine the countless astonishing achievements you can, yes YOU can achieve. You only have to open your mind and B.E.L.I.E.V.E. 

''Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known''

 - Carl Sagan

Great references if you’re interested:

 Documentaries:

 -Journey To The EdgeOf The Universe.

-The Known Universe.

-The Universe.

Websites:

NASA Astronomy Picture Of The Day

Astronomy Picture Of The Day Arabic

  Music

*The blog title  inspired by Eminem's hit ''Space Bound''