ihath

I lived four years in Israel, so that makes me an expert on the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, Right! I am afraid the matter is much more complicated than that. In order to understand the situation you would need to understand the 2000 years of Arab and Islamic history, 4000 years of Jewish history. You would need to understand events of the WWII, the holocaust and how that contributes to modern Israeli thinking today. The colonization of Britain in the region and how that acted as a backdrop for events today. You would need to understand America’s long-standing interest in the region and its attempts to protect those interests. Finally, you would need to comprehend what happened when European Jews fleeing prosecution came to the holy lands, mixing with Yemenite and Moroccan Jews and the indigenous Palestinian population. East meets the west in more than one way and Boom! You have the very unique Middle East conflict. Speaking Arabic and Hebrew wouldn’t heart either. In short, it is very complex. There are about 9 million people living in Israel and the occupied territory and almost each one of them has an expert view on the situation. When I moved to Israel I was surprised how even 6 year old children have an understanding of the political climate surrounding them and pointed opinions about it. No doubt, if you have been following the commentary on the conflict, you have heard various experts mention historical events and statistical data in an attempt to make sense of it all.

One day I was sitting in a coffee shop in western Jerusalem, sipping coffee on a beautiful sunny day. A Palestinian boy about 10 years of age approached me selling some trinkets. The expression on this boy’s face was that of a 60-year-old man who has lived through catastrophes. I never saw so much desperation on a child’s face. I gave him some money hoping to illicit a smile. The boy placed the money into his pocket and stared back at me, not even a hint of a smile. I placed my hand on his shoulder and shook him gently saying “smile for god’s sake, you are only a kid”. He stared back at me with that same desperation and simply walked away. The expression on that boys face has haunted me till today. I frequently wonder what this boy’s life must be like for him not to be able to smile. What sort of a world are we living in, when even children can’t take joy in living?

My own kids frequently play pretend games. My eldest daughter likes to pretend she is a teacher and the two younger ones are her students. Sometimes, they play fashion show; they wrap themselves in blankets or towels and march back and forth pretending to be fashion models. In Ramallah, Palestinian children play pretend funeral. One of the kids pretends to be dead and the rest walk around in a procession carrying him on their shoulders. You can also catch kids playing pretend demonstration, where half of the kids will pretend to be Israeli soldiers and the other half pretends to be demonstrating. Then the pretend Israeli soldiers beats up the pretend demonstrators and then they switch roles.

I don’t have a PhD in political science nor history but I know that this situation must end. If I had the chance to meet Israel’s prime minister Ariel Sharon face to face, I would place my hand on his shoulder and gently shake him while saying “ For g-d’s sake, withdraw the army from the occupied territories.” Maybe one day even Mr. Sharon will crack a smile. The sort of warm and sincere smile that usually comes from a child.

For most of my career I worked in companies where I was the only woman. There was always me and the receptionist and maybe the bookkeeper. Everybody else was male. All my coworkers, bosses ...etc. In every single meeting I was the only female in the boardroom. There were times when I felt like a freak. Why am I the only woman interested in computer programming? Why can't I like nursing or teaching. In this super male environment I frequently found it embarrassing the way some guys would talk about women. Commenting on the size of their boobs and thighs, making disgusting noises, taking about how wonderful or not they are in bed. The more I blushed the more they seemed to delight in it. The self-righteous speech about “women are not sex objects” only made matters worst. I felt depressed. I want to be treated with respect and dignity; I want to be treated as a person not as a potential sex conquest. Eventually, I found a method that solved this problem completely. This method is so effective and has worked for me so many times that I should patent it. But I will share it with you for free. Before I explain it to you let me give you a few examples.

Story #1
I am sitting in the lunchroom eating a sandwich. My coworkers Steve and David are discussing the difference between fake and natural breasts. They are guessing which actresses have natural and which have fake. An inappropriate topic for discussion at the office lunchroom in the presence of a women, don’t you think? Steve asserts that natural boobs feel completely different from boobs that have been enhanced with breast implants. I ask him how does he know all this. Steve smiles in a sneaky way and says “I just know”. I say, “I think I know how Steve knows the difference between the two. I bet you he has purchased a pair of fake breasts implants, which he fondles at home at night. He probably has them in his brief case right now.” Everybody in the lunchroom is laughing his head off. Steve’s face turns red and he never discusses boobs in my presence ever again.

Story #2
I ask my coworker who reports to me to write a report on a technical matter. Few days later I ask him if he has finished the report. He answers “Oh, when you asked me to write the report I thought you were faking….. you know….. the way women fake the other thing … ha ha ha ha”. An inappropriate answer, don’t you think? I look straight into his eyes and tell him. “Honey, maybe you are talking from a personal experience, maybe this happens to you all the time, the faking is entirely dependent on the man, you know!”, The guy’s face turns red, he goes back to his desk and writes the report right away. Afterwards he tells me that I am mean and that he wants to go home to hide under his bed and cry. In any case, I never hear about faking or anything remotely related to sexuality from him ever again.

Story #3
I start a new job with a coworker who is older than me, yet I am hired to a more senior position with higher salary. It is obvious right from day one that this is irking him to no end. One day as I am sitting in my office, he stands behind me and start messaging my shoulders. As in, yeah! You have the more senior position but I am a man and I can put you down and make you feel uncomfortable. So I move his hands away and ask him politely not to touch me. The next day he does the exact same thing. This dude is asking for it, don’t you think? So I get up to face him and I shout as loud as I can, ”DON’T TOUCH ME AGAIN OR I WILL KICK YOU.” Everybody in the office stops in mid conversation or in mid whatever they where doing and stares at us. The guy’s face turns red and he walks out of my office and sits at his cubicle. From then on, me and him get along just fine and he never gives me a hard time.

Story #4
I am at a pub with many of my coworkers, at a company social. Paul who has just come back from a long business trip abroad is telling everybody that he hasn’t had sex in a long long time (the whole time he was away) and that he is ready to jump on the first woman he meets. Then he brags about the long list of women he has slept with. Jennifer gives him the self-righteous speech about, “women have feelings, women are not sex objects, yada yada”. Paul says “But these are not real women, one day I will meet a real woman and merry her, these women that I sleep with are not real women.” A downright condescending comment, don’t you think? I look very innocently at him and say “Aaaaaaaaaah! You mean you have been sleeping with a wide collection of plastic dolls, which you left home while on your trip.” Everybody bursts into laughter, men and women. Jennifer is laughing so hard, tears are streaming down her cheeks. The laughter lasts 20 minutes. The look on Paul’s face is worth a million dollar. Yes you guessed it right, Paul never brags about the number of unreal women he has slept with ever again.

I don’t get depressed, I get even. That is my moto. My method is simple. When somebody is putting me down or attempting to embarrass me because I am a woman, I go for the jugular. I insult his manhood in the most painfully embarrassing way possible and I do it with humor and wit while keeping my cool. The bigger the audience, the bigger the humiliation.

So ladies go out there and try out this method and write me back with the results. I would be interested in collecting these stories and publishing a “Attack of the dragon woman collection.” on this website.

P.S. Most of the men I have worked with have been wonderful, intelligent and great to work with. However each office seems to have its token representation of the idiot species.

My husband told me a funny story that happened to his friend the hydrologist; lets call him Jim (not his real name). Jim and another person were doing research on a certain river in BC. The river runs parallel to a highway. They used a small boat to sail through the river, until they reached a section that contained large boulders lying on the riverbed, right underneath the water surface. The two men decided to dock the boat and step from one boulder to the next, to do their measurements and take samples. They were using the boulders as footsteps, and moved briskly along the river. While they were working away, Jim lifts his head up to see a group of people gathering around. Each person had parked his car to the side of the highway and was starring in the direction of the two working men. From a distance, it looked like Jim was walking on water. The crowd thought they were witnessing a miracle. The fact that Jim is a slender bearded man probably contributed to the confusion with a certain biblical figure.

"I am a Christian", I declared in first grade. I was attending Amal, a catholic run private school in Kuwait where half the students were Christian and the other half were Muslim. Amal means hope in Arabic. The Muslim kids had to attend a weekly class on Islam as mandated by the state curriculum. We Christian kids got to play outside. Being a Christian was good, one less class, less homework and less studying. Until my father had to ruin it for me by telling the teachers and nuns running the school that I am a Muslim. I could no longer join the Christian kids playing in the courtyard during Islam classes. I had to stay in class and learn to recite the qura'an. "Bismillah al rahman al raheem", the teacher would say and we would repeat after her as loud as we could. "Al hamdo lilah rab al alemeen". In the name of god most gracious most merciful, Thank god the ruler of all the worlds. I understand what these verses mean today, in grade one I just repeated over and over again. Nobody explained what it meant just that we had to know it.

"I am shea'a" I declared in grade 5. I had transferred from the private catholic school to state run public school where the majority of students were Muslim. On my first day there, I was asked about 10 times if I was sunni or shea'a. I never heard those words before, I didn't know what they meant. At Amal we only spoke about Christians and Muslims, this was a new classification system that I was not aware of. At home I asked dad the question. My dad told me that our ancestors were shea'a, so shea'a I was. At school when asked the question, I had a clear and concise answer. People seemed happy with my answer and would nod knowingly. The "I don't know" of the first day at school seemed to confuse and irritate people. Now that they could fit me into well defined category everything was simpler. I never understood the difference between Sunnis and Shea'as, the two major sects of Islam until I became a university student and decided to do some reading on the subject.

"Islam is the only true religion", my primary school teacher told us one day. It is obvious that Islam is the only true religion; anybody who thinks about it would realize that fact. She didn't explain why Islam is the only true religion; it just is. Questioning the teacher was not allowed. Even as a child I had my doubts. There was a faint voice in the back of my mind that said "it is not obvious to me". Would I still believe in Islam if I was born and raised in Holland or China? I would dismiss those thoughts and try not to think about it too much. Everybody around me seemed to confer with my teacher's proclamations, grownups and children alike. In Kuwait doubting the existence of God or Islam is punishable by law, furthermore it would make me an outcast within my own society. I would pray but feel nothing except the physical movement of the prayer. I would fast Ramadan and feel nothing except the challenge of conquering my hunger and thirst. I had faint doubts about my religion in the back of my mind but was too afraid to acknowledge them. "May be there is something wrong with me", I thought. I wanted to believe, I wanted to have faith.

In 1996 I moved to live in Jerusalem, Israel because of my husband's work. I thought that living in the holy lands would help quell those doubts; I was expecting to have some sort of a spiritual experience.

"I am Jewish", an acquaintance of mine in Jerusalem told me one day. "And that means that I have a right to this land. It is the holy covenant between god and Abraham that we the Jewish people were promised this land". "But what about the Palestinians?" I ask him. "They don't matter, they can stay or leave, but this land is ours because it says so in the old testament." In my mind I was thinking "but use your head, use your heart does it seem right?". I don't say anything, he doesn't seem very perceptive anyway. He has faith.

In Jerusalem you can tell a person's religion with in the first second you lay eyes on them. Muslim women wear a small qura'an hanging on a golden chain, Christian women a cross and Jewish women a star of david. Everybody is wearing their religion around there necks, but is any of it getting inside.

One day there was an explosion in a coffee shop in Tel Aviv. Among the dead, a mother of a new born baby girl. The baby was injured but survives. Somehow the story of this young mother touched a chord with me. I remember the stressful and overwhelming first year when my daughter was born. I would go for a walk while pushing a stroller in front of me. When my daughter would go to sleep I would go to one of the local coffee shops and have a cup of coffee, sometimes I would have a desert with that. It was a prized treat that I gave myself. Somehow I could imagine this young woman walking around with a stroller all tired from too many sleepless nights, her daughter finally goes to sleep and she decides to go relax a bit, have a cup of coffee and enjoy a stress free 15 minutes. Then boom! She dies. Her crime being that she was enjoying a cup of coffee on beautiful sunny day in Tel Aviv. Few days later a religious and bearded man from Hamas gives a speech telling people not to feel sorry for this woman. Her death was necessary, we must be stead fast in our fight against the Israeli occupation. Rip any sympathy for this woman or her baby out of your heart, no room for such sympathy. He repeats those statements several times. I feel a piercing pain going through my heart, this man is asking me to give up on my humanity in the name of god and in the name of religion. If religion is not humanizing us and making us more compassionate then what good is it. I can be a hateful person without any religion at all.

One day I decided that I would visit the Holocaust museum in Jerusalem (Yad Vashem). My husband said: "don't go, you will be depressed for a week and I will have to deal with you". I insist that I should go to a holocaust museum at least once, I think I am ready to face it. Off I went with trepidation. The museum is very silent, there is this stillness hanging in the air. A section displays works of art by children that lived in concentration camps. Handmade toys, children's drawings, children's clothing is on display. Under such difficult conditions kids still managed to find joy and play. As I walked out of the museum I felt crushed. It was a beautiful sunny day in Jerusalem. I looked down from the mountain where the museum is situated I could see cars driving below. A flock of birds was flying below in the valley. Such beauty surrounding me, yet so much ugliness in the world. I kept asking myself, "Oh God ,What does it all mean? What does it all mean?". I do believe that what happened next was divine intervention; I think that higher powers decided to answer me. A Jewish ultra orthodox man approached me, white beard , black suit and a black hat. He had a pleasant smiley face. I think he could see the distress that I was feeling. He starts chatting to me and I was happy to talk to somebody. He says that atrocities like the Holocaust are difficult for us human beings to comprehend but that we must not lose faith in God. There is a reason for everything, even the holocaust. We must not question the wisdom of God. I listen attentively to every word. I want to believe in what he is saying. Listening to his calm voice is pleasant. He asks me about myself, my family situation and my work. Then he tells me that he is married with seven children. "Me and my wife have a very special relationship, we are close like this", he gestures by placing two fingers parallel to each other. Then he proceeds by saying that even though he loves his wife very much and is dedicated to her, he enjoys having extra marital affairs. He asks me if I would be interested in having an affair with him. I can't believe my ears, I think to myself "I must have heard that wrong". I ask him to repeat what he said and again he tells me that he would like to have an affair with me. "We can meet once a week at your place while your husband is at work', he adds. I get up abruptly and say that I have to go home because I am late. Quickly get into the car and drive away. I feel shock but also I feel anger. "Who the hell does he think he is? Why did I even waste time talking to him? It is my fault for being friendly with him initially" I think to my self as I drive. While I am rebuking myself , I start laughing, I laugh so hard tears stream down my cheeks. I have to park my car to the side because I am laughing so hard. It suddenly dawns on me that a religious man can't go to the bar to pick up chicks, he would look out of place there. What better place to pick up a women than the holocaust museum? Tourists in distress after seeing images documenting one of the worst atrocities in human history. Mr. religious can offer comfort, few words of wisdom and score. Perfect! I bet that trick worked for him before. Hilarious!

At home, I start dinner. My husband comes home early and gives me a hug. How was your day? He asks me. "Fine", I reply. He looks a bit surprised, he was expecting me to be depressed, instead I have a smile on my face. That night I go to bed with a very light feeling, like a heavy weight has been lifted off my shoulders. I realize that I don't believe in religion any more, not Islam nor Judaism nor any other religion. From now on, no bearded man holding a religious book will tell me how to live my life. From now on, I will rely on my gut feeling to know the truth. The answer to my question "What does it all mean?" is that it means nothing. It means what I want it to mean. It can mean that life is beautiful or it can mean that life is ugly. It can mean that human beings are doomed and beyond saving or it can mean that children always offer us hope for the future. What do you want it to mean, Elen?

"I am not Muslim, not Christian , not Jewish", this I declare today, knowing full well what each word means. Not Sunni, not Shea'a or any other category. I believe that all religions should come with an expiration date. Valid for consumption until, beyond this date this religion will turn into poison if consumed. Since everybody is creating god in his on images anyway, I think that from now on I will create something that I like.

When asked by friends why I no longer pray or fast I reply that living in the holy lands has cured me from religion. It always shocks people and shuts them up. After that, people tend to change the subject and talk about something else. I no longer get the speech on how as a good Muslim I should cover my head with a scarf.

A catholic friend decides to visit me in Jerusalem. I decide that I will take her to all the religious sites relevant to Christianity. I do research on the internet and I buy tourist guides. We visit the church of the holy sepulcher, the garden of the tomb in Jerusalem. We visit the church of nativity in Bethlehem. At last, Tiberius lake. We visit a little chapel on the north east part of the lake. Monks is dark robes are walking around. Pious worshipers look profoundly moved. Apparently this is the place where Jesus performed the miracle of walking on water. I walk towards the edge of the lake and look into the horizon. Fog was starting to lift in the early morning while white birds are flying around in circles. It feels incredibly peaceful with the soft chanting in the background. There is magic in the air. I exhale deeply and then I look down. There are huge boulders, lurking right underneath the surface of the water. Many of them! Stretching well into the lake................... I don't think that having a laughing fit in this place would be appropriate.

I listened to this CD while writing this post, there is a song named "losing my religion" which I love.

When Nelson Mandela Smiles, my whole being smiles with him. In all the film footage I have seen of the man, he has a warm passionate smile. I frequently ponder what keeps him going. I zip back to my grandmother, a tormented and broken spirit. My grandmother is Russian who was forced to work as a slave laborer in Nazi, Germany. She has great difficulty talking about her memories of that period. She doesn't need to say much, the pain and horror is evident in her eyes. My grandmother is a bitter and paranoid person. She thinks the worst of everybody, always complaining about how unfair life is. Many of her opinions are racist, for example, she believes that white skin is superior to black skin and she hates all Germans with passion. My earliest memory of my grandmother is of her telling me that she will die soon and asking me if I would feel sad in that event. This was 25 years ago. She is alive and well today. Sometimes I wonder about her sanity. I can't remember a single memory of her smiling. Who can blame my grandmother? With all the hardship that she has been through, is it any wonder that she is cynical. Yet certain people go through enormous difficulty and come out the other side whole. I remember the first speech that Nelson Mandela gave when released from prison, he said "South Africa for all South Africans". My grandmother would have said, "Lets stick it to the white people, time for revenge".

In the Nelson Mandela's autobiography "Long Walk to Freedom", there is a story that is ingrained in my imagination. Nelson Mandela as a young man is walking home, on his way he sees a white woman digging through a garbage dump looking for something to eat. He is so moved by the sight, he immediately takes the money in his pocket and hands it to her. When he goes home he reflects on this incident. He realizes that he sees black women in that same predicament daily yet he is never moved so strongly by the experience. Nelson Mandela realizes that by growing up in a racist society he has internalized the fact that when black people suffer it is just a fact of life, yet when white people suffer it is unbearable and it must be remedied immediately. Nelson Mandela has to fight apartheid that is inside his emotions, inside his thinking and inside his soul before he is able to effectively fight the apartheid on the outside.

My grandmother, on the other hand, was liberated by the American Army. One day they showed up and told everybody that they are free now, even offered my grandparents a ride out of Germany. What my grandmother remembers most about her saviors was the neatness of their uniforms, how well fed they were, the fact that the soldiers would take time to shave every morning. "It is as if they weren't touched by the ugly reality of the war in any way, as if they were above it all", my grandmother told me once.

Shortly after the fall of Baghdad, President George Bush broadcasted a taped message to the Iraqi people telling them that soon they will be free. Since electricity was knocked out in most Iraqi cities, I wonder how many Iraqis got to see and hear the message. I wonder what sort of freedom President George Bush has in mind for the Iraqi people; the sort of freedom that Nelson Mandela was able to achieve or the sort of freedom my grandmother got. The burning oil wells sure looked happy to be liberated. As the shooting flames danced in the wind they looked like they were greeting the American soldiers. No words can describe my feeling of despair and helplessness. I have been to countless anti-war rallies. Heard the speeches and shouted the slogans. I feel so defeated. I feel humiliated as a human being. I feel that my efforts have been in vein. Will I be able to free my heart from this feeling of defeat? …… that is another liberation story.

My goal in life is not be famous. I don't want to be mentioned in any history books. I don't want to be a hero. I just want to be able to smile even when I am 90 years old and give my grandchildren passionate hugs, assuming I live that long. I don't judge my grandmother for her behavior, I am just glad she wasn't the leader of the ANC.

This article was published in thetyee on January 2004, a fabulous publication.

Last night I had a dream, I was standing in a room in front of a projector giving a business presentation. Saddam Hussein was sitting in the audience; he asked stupid questions, looked impatient with my presentation and showed very little interest in what I was saying. I kept it short, collected my stuff at the end and before I left the room, I said respectfully "Thank you Mr. President". I woke up greatly disturbed by my dream. You see, this is the first time I have a dream about Saddam in a long time. I thought I had exorcised him out of my dreams. Let me explain, I am an ex Iraqi citizen that grew up in Kuwait. Even though I never set a foot in my country, as a child I was exposed to Saddam's personality cult on a constant basis. In our living room, my parents had to have a picture of Mr. President on a corner table. People working at the Iraqi embassy had criticized my father because there were no pictures of the president in our house. My dad afraid of retribution bought the smallest one he could find and placed it in a prominent place in the living room so that all visitors would see it. This might sound ridicules to a Canadian, but all other Iraqi families had huge pictures of Saddam in every single room. Our neighbor had a huge poster of Saddam plastered on the wall, the wife would sit on an arm chair next to the poster and go on and on "Saddam is our father, Saddam is our protector, where would we be without him, .etc". Everybody sitting around would nod his or her heads saying nothing. The rumor was that our neighbors were associated with the Iraqi embassy. Later on, the same people had to leave Kuwait in a hurry; the rumor was that they had some sort of a disagreement with embassy people. My mom met the wife many years later, she sat in an arm chair in our living room and went on and on "Saddam is a criminal, Saddam is a dictator, why doesn't he send his own son's to fight his stupid wars .etc". My dad was a rebel with his single small picture. He tried to shield me from the propaganda as best as he could. Once in a while he would make a vague comment, like "Don't always believe everything you see on TV". Explaining that statement further was simply too dangerous.

As a child I had many nightmares involving Saddam Hussein. In most of them, I am running in a field, Saddam is chasing after me, I find a ditch or cave to hide in. Sometimes the dream involved my whole family being chased. I never met the man in person, but seeing the fear the mare mention of his name evoked, made me realize that he must be a scary man. Normally intelligent people would suddenly turn stupid in the presence of his picture. I used to watch him giving a speech on TV, his eyes piercing through me like an X-Ray. I would imagine him reaching out of the TV set to strangle me. Can he see what I am thinking about him through the TV set?

I immigrated to Canada in 1989, aaah! the freedom. No pictures of him, no long speeches on TV, nobody even knew who Saddam Hussein was. The only time I would hear his name was when I would come in contact with another Iraqi. All Iraqis have what I call the Saddam obsession. We can go on for hours talking about how much we loathe the man and what a horrible person he is. Each has his own favorite story of horror to tell, from the time Saddam assassinated his own cousin, the women he raped, members of parliament shot on the spot for criticizing the president, the list goes on. I have heard these stories told and retold with varying degrees of dramatization. Like folk tales that take you on a journey to a fairy-tale world, passed from one generation to the next.

I have a theory that Saddam Hussein doesn't exist. We the citizens of Iraq invented him. We placed his picture and statues everywhere, taught our kids to fear him and bestowed magical powers on him. We imagine his eyes and ears spying on us even in our sleep. Like the wizard of OZ, he has magical powers because everybody around him believes he has. He can be a fireball one minute and a scary beast the next. Oh yes! He might have nuclear weapons too. I think that Saddam objected to weapon inspections because he knew they would find nothing. His status as the regional buggy man would be diminished.

Before you pounce on me, I assure you that I am familiar with the history of my ancestral land. I am painfully aware of the Kurdish people massacred in Halabcha. I know about the war against Iran that killed 1 million of both Iraqis and Iranians. In 1990, I read an Amnesty
International report that summarized human rights conditions in Iraq. Tales of torture; multitudes of people that disappear never to be found again. The report stated that Iraq is the only Arab country that tortures men and women equally. In Egypt they have the decency to leave the women alone. Iraq is an equal opportunity torture country. I cried for a week non-stop after reading that report.

However, Saddam is a single man. Thousands and millions of people had to cooperate with his plans to put them into action. Perhaps like Dorothy,
before we uncover the true face of the wizard, we must destroy the wicked witch of the west. Oh she is scary and she has those winged monkeys disguised as soldiers and black bees disguised as smart missiles. Not to worry she will be defeated with a simple bucket of water.

I had hoped that one day the people of Iraq would take down all those pictures off their walls. I had hoped that the average soldier would say I am sick of dieing to defend the ego of a single man. I had hoped that the torturers in the prison cells would say, I refuse to obey orders; I take responsibility for my own actions. The person on the street would reclaim his dignity. Saddam would loose all his magical powers and we would see a helpless and a scarred man. You can't achieve that by simply changing the guy at the top with yet another wizard. You can't bomb and starve a population into empowerment. I hope that day of awakening comes soon because Saddam obsession is spreading into North America.

What did my dream mean? Perhaps I am scared of that business presentation I am about to give. At least in this dream I was able to look him in the eye and speak directly to him. In my next dream I will say "Mr. President you're a humbug".

An edited version of this article was published in Macleans Dec 2002