Essay Contest Runner-Up: The World Is Far from Perfect

By Khatera Torkmany

As a child, your parents are like shields, protectors, and barriers. Shields that protect you from danger and the reality of the world. We don’t have a chance to see, learn, or analyze. We don’t think or feel about the world because we are not yet shown BBC News. We are shown programs like Peppa Pig. We see that life has beautiful scenery with fresh grass and a dazzling sun. We see hills and mountains and rabbits, pigs, dogs and various other creatures that are friends with each other. Enemies don’t exist. We see that the biggest worry or fear we will ever face is Daddy Pig facing a car accident or losing your toys or even dangerous things like catching a cold. Whatever the problem, it is usually solved within 5 minutes of the episode. We get scared, extremely terrified for a few minutes, and then we are happy again. But little do we know that the world is far from perfect. We then grow up even more and we occasionally see our parents watch the news. We don’t like Peppa Pig anymore, we prefer big toys to play with now, we prefer to have little cute journals and glitter pens to use. After a few more years pass, we’ve grown out of journals and glittery pens and now we prefer serious things like study books and phones with ‘#equality’ phone cases. Obviously, we don’t know what that means yet. We are just told that everyone is born the same, we are all made in the image of God so we accept that idea. But little do we know that the world is far from perfect. 

But now, as we grow, when we truly are capable of seeing and thinking for ourselves we realize it’s not up to us to accept everyone is the same. Everyone is the same only when the people around us act like we really are the same. I’ve known it. I’ve even felt it. Those glares that follow behind you like cameras in a high school, making sure you don’t have any objects you shouldn’t be having. Those questions people ask you that don’t even make sense. I mean, how do I answer to shopkeepers when they ask why I have so much money in my bag? Or when they ask “Surely the government hasn’t made it illegal for your mom to be a lawyer, right?Right? Well, it all depends on how much we know the world is far from perfect.

I doubt myself sometimes; maybe if I walk, dress and talk the way they expect me to then it won’t be so much of a hassle to just go round the corner for some sweets? But what of the things I don’t get to control? What about those times I see posters on social media that say, 'Not all muslims are terrorists, but all terrorists are muslims?” What about those times when you have to react on the spot? When your friends say things that anger you. Do you know what comes next?

They ask whether we’ll blow up because we are too angry. Angry for being called names, angry for being called adjectives that are used to describe criminals, verbs used normally in a news session of what’s currently happening in Afghanistan. Obviously, however, they don’t get questioned. We are the ones that are asked why? How? When? I don’t exactly know what they think that I’m thinking or that I know but, hands on my heart, I didn’t enjoy it one bit when my grandad was blown up into smithereens. Neither did I enjoy it when my dad told me we had to leave our house. Neither was I smiling when I sat on the plane not knowing the next time I was going to see the mountains of my country, feel the warmth of the sun that never gave anything less than 30 degrees Celsius, or touch the sacred sands of my country’s ground. Even those sands that I once used to run across acting like they were just sand, my eyes were pouring at the idea of not being able to run on them again, because, believe it or not, they were not just sand. Each grain was a capture of my childhood, a gesture of my home connected straight into my heart. You really can’t leave your heart, can you? What happens if you do? Do you die? I notice I’m still breathing. 

That was when I was two years old, but now I’m sixteen and I am still breathing. Breathing is not the same as living, let me assure you. It’s way better to have a meaningful short life than a lifeless long one. It’s better to beat with your heart than rely on fresh air. Yes, my country always smelt like cows and sheep. Yes, it was always full of loud noises. Guns on new year and knives in weddings. But nothing seemed dangerous. Ever! No one stabs, no one injures. No one does anything bad because all I hear is laughter but the point is, all I feel is an ache. An ache that is now fourteen years old, living in the four chambered organ we call ‘heart’. My dad assures me that we are safe and far away from all the people that do bad things to good people. My dad assures me that this new place we call ‘London’ is a very good place and will give us everything our country could never give. Peace, education, equality. That same bloody word again - equality! But, can ‘London’ give us home? The thing is, although we have reached 2020, equality doesn’t exist. It hasn’t been invented yet. Therefore, it shouldn’t be in dictionaries. How equal is it that one side of the world has the guts to design new buildings but the other side of the world fears to create new buildings because you never know when they can blow it up again.

There’s so many “theys" in the world. There’s one “they" as in they who make comments and judge us like we are the ones that have fun destroying our own country. Then there are “theys” as in they who blew up our favorite historic building, they who we can’t go shopping in fear of being blown up, they who have the right to stop us on countryside roads and check through our phones to see if we are associating with any other countries. Do I have to remind these “theys" of where they get their guns and bombs from? 

I always wished I could do something. Anything that could help, but when you look deeply you see there really isn’t anything that has the power to stop these “theys.” We depend on either the president or our God. The all-powerful, all-loving god who doesn’t stop all the injustice that happens right in front of my eyes. We all know the world is far from perfect, but I thought God was the most perfect thing ever. There was once when I was 2 years old living happily, didn’t know what good and bad was. Didn’t care what right or wrong was, which just makes you go back to thinking, what if we could hold time in our hands, treasure it and let it flow when we were ready for it to flow.

But little did I know that the world is far from perfect. Now when my dad assures me yet again that we are safe, I ask myself, do I even want to be safe? What if I want to go back? What if I want those sands and sunshine? Those winds and wonders? So what if it means I am not safe; at least it does mean I am with my people, my place, the place where I came to this cruel world, the place where I grew up, the place where all my family were with me, even my most distant uncle that still bought me chocolates. I’m scared that now I don’t remember what my grandmama looks like, what my home looks like. I think I've even forgotten how the sand feels and how big the mountains are. I’ve even forgotten what the rain smells like. 

We still go from time to time, around every decade. For me and my siblings it means we’ve either been once or never. We are supposed to feel excited as we fly the plane, so why do I feel scared? We are supposed to feel happy, so why do I sense the worry that this might be the last time I live? Most of all, we are supposed to be grateful that we are seeing our family after such a long time, so why is it that when I reach my country, half my family isn’t there? Are they facing what I’ve been facing? Or are they…just gone? No one has the right to stop my uncle like that! No one has the right to point a gun at my dad’s head! No one has the right to check through my phone and ask why I even have one and then break it under their shoe! No one especially has any right to act like any of this is my fault! I say this in my head again and again but my eyes tell me something completely different! Who do I listen to? Who do I follow? Because in reality, no one is really listening, no one is even trying to listen! How can I get the world to notice my country? We are supposed to be the heart of Asia but I think I’ve just discovered how dead the heart really is.

Khatera Torkmany is a year twelve student studying history and politics. She is an ambitious story writer and hopes of flying a plane one day.