A Pakistani Girl

They think that they can step on us as on insect...
It happened some time after that fateful September 11, 2001. The movie theatres were showing The Lord of the Rings where at one point the main characters travel through underground caverns. At the same time the American warplanes were shattering the caves high in the mountains of Afghanistan. I was thinking how the people who took the refuge in a cavern had to feel when the entrance to the bombed cave collapsed and they found themselves buried alive. I mentioned this thought, in passim, to my class attended at that time by about 35 students. When I arrived to the next class meeting, I found an empty classroom. In the back there was a small group of students; two black girls, a foreign student from the Turkey, one white student, and a Pakistani girl which used to be a flight attendant for the Pakistani Airlines. After the lecture I walked across the campus to my car. It was a beautiful evening and I was humming a song about the U ye wei fong I used to listen to during the better days on an island lost in the Northern Pacific. The Pakistani girl emerged from the darkness. Her black hair was swaying in the evening wind and her eyes were sparkling as black diamonds.

Surprised? she asked.

I should have known better, I replied.

You'll get used to it, she said. They think that they can step on us as on insect.