Broken Ballerina

In my fluid motion and flawless executions, I spin and twirl until my head feels as light as I feather and then I slow down almost to a halt but not quite because at that moment I transition into another execution that requires me to make a jump and I flip and upend coming to a halt in twist. Perfection is my art, I do not have room for mistakes.

I am a Ballerina or I used to be. Now I am a broken ballerina, my back is fine and my feet is firm yet I am broken like a twig trampled on by a load two times its mass. I am broken, as broken as the wings of the bird that fell from a height, born to fly yet broken by a fall, I am broken.

From a Corps de Ballet to Prima Ballerina Assoluta I was a marvel to be-hold they called me the Goddess of the floor. The moment I step on my toes my world spins and I transform into the most beautiful swan, glorious in all forms and I put on a show. The faces of my audience as I entice them with my art were magical and it urged me to move them to their core.

My mirrors crumbled from the top to the floor and I cried until my eyes bled. They burned my stage and broke my beams as I watched in horror as they shattered my dreams. The flames burned my hard work and my art, I was not a swan anymore, I became a frog. Perfection died before my eyes and as the thick black smoke rose to the heavens, so did my art and my soul, pieces of me broke off and flew, they mixed with the smoke and put on a show. I watched them become one as they twisted and twirled, flipped and spun, it was magic and god was watching.

Call me the Broken Ballerina, I am not perfect and I am not a swan. I was once a marvel to behold but I have being robbed of my future. I do not dance the dance of the gods now and I do not listen to the music of angels. I am merely human, lost a crowd.

Woman

I went to the dictionary today and simply typed the word “woman”. I found an interesting definition “a female who is paid to clean someone's house and carry out other domestic duties” and I typed the word man and found one interesting definition “a person with the qualities associated with males, such as bravery, spirit, or toughness: she was more of a man than any of them.”

I am a woman, comfortable in her “feminity”. I love sneakers and lipstick, I love skateboards and nail polish, I love sports and getting my hair done. All of these do not make me any less of a woman than I feel.  My gender does not define me. Being a woman does not simply domesticate me. It does not confine me to the environment of the home/kitchen. I do not even like children, it does not make me any less of a woman. Lately I get this look of absolute horror when I tell people I hate to cook. It’s not that I can’t cook, quiet the opposite, I am a superb cook, I just do not like to cook all the time. That is it. It has nothing to do with my gender. Growing up, I have seen men on my maternal side that cook better than women, It is not strange to me. Why must everything go back to sex?

A man is manly only if he is brave and strong and a woman is womanly if she cooks and cleans well. Really? On what grounds are those statements right? A man can be weak and scared and a woman can be strong and brave. People are different, our genders do not define us. Society has placed this idea in our minds of certain ways a woman must behave and has put standards for men too. Even the dictionary gives a typical example of my argument. And I get this a lot “you a girl, I don’t blame you”, this has angered me more times than I can count. Really, being a girl suddenly turns me into an open book that you know so well that you get to judge my actions based on my sex. Really? And who died and made you an expert at that?

What we must learn as a society to look at in ourselves should  not be our gender, it should be our actions and our ideologies, our mentality and will. Those are things that define us. I was born a girl, a very smart girl who loves sports and reading and hates cooking and domestic work. It deosn’t make me any less normal girl than the girl next door who has conformed to the norms of society and is already married with kids. It is not wrong for a woman to chase her dreams and become a large inspirational figure for young men/women. It is not wrong for a woman to have ambition and to chase education. Society has killed us slowly, we have turned ourselves into machines that bend to whatever it is that is on the mainstream. It is sad that people are so closed minded that in a 21^st century society, it is a seen as a surprise that a woman is running for a political office, who says women can’t lead?

Raise your girls and boys to understand that their genders do not define them, they can be whatever they set their minds to. The women can be soldiers and the men can be chefs and vice versa, either way, society must learn to accept us the way we come, not alienate us and call us strange for not conforming to its norms.

LETTER TO PM TAYYIP ERDOGAN

To anyone reading this, i would like you to be please very objective and open minded and read this to the end.


Dear Mr Prime Minister,

I as a non turkish citizen, who has lived in Turkey for 4 years now knows enough about Turkey and this regime to write this. Personally, i admire you, i think you are a man with passion and drive and who knows how to rule. Regardless of my opinions, Turkish citizens think otherwise. These are people whom have democratically elected you into office. You as a leader have a responsibility to your people. What is democracy? Is it not a government of the people, for the people and by the people? As a democratically elected leader, your actions should forever be in the best intrest of your people. Putting personal bias and sentiments into your decisions is not your duty. As a leader, whom i admire so much, i am truly disappointed in the recent crack down in Turkey. To use so much force against the same people who elected you, went out of their homes to vote for you is just plain wrong. I mean, these are people who believed you would listen to their voices and act in their favor. Violence has never  solved anything, instead, it has instigated so much more violence and unrest. This is the 21st century, you as a leader knows better than to indulge your people into creating so much chaos in a country, whose economy and politics is admired all over the middle east. I believe you are a man of honor and integrity and using brute force against peaceful protesters is not what these people voted you into office to do for them and honestly, it is plain shameful. I as a human being who hates every type of violence is ashamed of the feelings i have towards someone who would cause so much harm to innocent protesters. So, why don’t you withdraw your troops, allow your people to protest peacefully, listen to them, have a reasonable dialogue with whomever their leader is and come to terms with them. It is in the best interest of your party, your government, your people and your reputation that you put an end to this unrest. Schools have closed and exams have being cancelled, don’t you think it is best to end this once and for all so that life will be back to normal for your people? People have being injured and some have allegedly lost lives, Is this what your democracy is Mr PM? Saying things like “for every one man in taksim, you have a 100 supporters” what is that? how does that benefit your people? how does that calm them down and encourage them to go back to their homes while you take care of their interests? If only you listened more to your people and stopped allowing your personal bias to cloud your judgement and make you forget that these same people elected you into office, things would never have gone this far. People reading this may think, “why are you writing this? you are not even turkish” but i have an answer for you, You do not have to be a citizen of a country to fall completely in love with it, you do not have to be a citizen of a country to know the difference between right and wrong, and you do not have to be a citizen of a country to have a heart, feelings, compassion and it breaks my heart greatly to see Turkey in the state that it is.

                                            Sincerely, 

                A compassionate non-citizen.