MARWAN BASSIOUNI
NEW DUTCH VIEWS
I was 15 years old, when one afternoon while my friends and I were shooting hoops, we heard about something unbelievable that was being broadcast on TV. We rushed to the school canteen, and there we saw that two planes had just crashed into the Twin Towers. We were in shock. That day felt completely surreal.
A lot of things are fake, superficial and corrupt. That’s what I thought as a teenager. Later, I discovered that this is considered part of the normal process of growing up. I am not too sure about this anymore. I think I was right.
I used to believe that I fit in and I did not question this back then. But if I really did fit in then why did I try so hard? I had the impression that to fit in you needed to be like everybody else, but I didn’t want to be like everybody else. I wanted to fit in in my own way. Maybe I am a non-conformist... I was definitely seeking something though. I mean, during high school I went through both a hip hop and a neo-metal phase.
When I would switch on the TV, it would often make me angry to hear the way we spoke about the region where my dad was from, and which I felt close to as well. I never fully understood why the news called defenceless civilian victims ‘necessary casualties’. When I mentioned my thoughts about this at school, either people would ignore me, or they would oppose my views. I expected more from my teachers. More compassion, or a sense of justice, but most of them seemed indifferent or evasive. “It wouldn’t be right to take sides” they would say. But I didn’t see any sides, I just saw mass silences which became the norm.