‘Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.’
― Alexander Pope
I have been waiting my entire life for somebody to see me.
For another being to take the time to understand.
I should not have bothered.
Then I would not be so fucking disappointed right now.
Because I always feel physically unsafe, I have had to trust people implicitly in order to allow myself to be in the world and socialise at all.
Otherwise, I would be too terrified of everybody.
Unfortunately, trusting some people is a terrible idea.
When I arrived in South Africa for my post doc, I was a wreck.
After completing a difficult PhD, playing a role in an international movement for justice in Palestine and then throwing myself into highly controversial research on the Israel lobby, I was underemployed and falling apart.
I was also in love with an unworthy married man who refused to leave me be.
I needed to feel some self worth, so I tried too hard in a particularly clumsy fashion to command some respect in Johannesburg.
It backfired spectacularly.
My line manager saw it as threatening, not a desperate effort to feel valued. I am not joking, but he tried to kick me out of the country.
After moving all of my things and settling in.
As I said already, I was a wreck and this move completely shocked me. Hiding under my work desk and sobbing hysterically, I tried to figure a way out.
It was one of the most ridiculous episodes of my life.
I negotiated giving me just a few months instead. Luckily, after that time had passed, he was no longer the head of our department.
So I was safe to stay on.
And in the end, I also managed to appease him by total surrender. This is how I have always gotten out of problems: taking it on the chin.
To get back into his good books, I spent countless hours editing his speeches without any renumeration. Over the course of two years.
That is always me: whenever I fuck up, I own up. I have to in order to survive because otherwise my monster makes me suffer even more.
This is why I am absolutely crushed by the koala’s behaviour.
I have never been so disappointed in anybody ever.
I really looked up to him. And I so fucking cared.
I also made the biggest effort of my life to try to be properly understood. I put everything into my email confessions to him.
And he responded like my childhood friends.
I have already written about the early bullying. When I was about 14 years-old, I ran for vice president of my class and drew my posters.
One day I saw them defaced, saying that I was a stuck-up bitch.
I remember time stopping, like it was the most earth-shattering thing possible, to be misunderstood so grotesquely like that.
I silently screamed like somebody possessed.
Of course, the culprit was my once best friend, the one who liked to bully me. Luckily by then she was just one of many friends.
So, I was not too sad when she lost the election and I won. Especially as she was running for treasurer against a mutual friend.
I was reminded of this episode when reading the koala’s notes.
One day, I tried to open up to him about how difficult my field experiences were. Doing PhD research in an invisibly disabled body is not easy.
But I am also keenly aware that I am from the world’s superpower with all of the privileges that entails, which always humbles me.
I was trying to explain to the koala how this contradiction weighed upon me, particularly during and after being threatened with prison in Iran.
I was interrogated for five hours. It was a truly terrifying experience.
I mean, we do not even have a US embassy there!
And the thing about interrogations is this: we have all done bad things.
As a result, it is really fucking hard not to feel guilty in face of such a power imbalance, even if you did not do what they say you did.
Also my monster makes me feel guilty every time that I try to stand up for myself. But I had to do that strongly to avoid prison.
The experience was surreal. I even wrote a short story about it using magical realism that someday I hope to be brave enough to publish.
Of course, I was in excruciating physical pain throughout it all.
And I was also absolutely heartbroken as it meant that I could never return to Iran, when it was the best country that I had ever visited.
Importantly, I could not complete my intended doctoral research.
Unsurprisingly then, when I returned to New York for my studies, I was lost.
Nevertheless, I wanted to put everything into perspective given world politics. Afterall, this was the height of the so-called ‘War on Terror’.
So, instead of spending time feeling like a victim and hating on a country heavily sanctioned by my own, I chose to research the persecution of a local Iraqi-American imam who had been framed as a terrorist for sending humanitarian aid to Iraq in violation of US sanctions.
Maybe I just needed something external to feel angry about, because the university community was silent during his trial.
According to the koala, sharing this showed my ‘field soul elitism’.
Yet another stuckup bitch comment, really?
By then I had spent countless hours trying to tell him all about my pain, suffering, self hatred, suicidal tendencies, worthlessness etc.
No wonder I was suicidal under his treatment.
I really hate waiting for this case to be adjudicated, but even if my complaint is not upheld, I am still very proud of myself for making it.
I definitely would not be healing like this otherwise.
So, here is one for us all to dance to!