They Taught Us to Fly

The closest I got to a religious experience, or at least a spiritual one, was when I set foot in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina and shared the same space with the Wright Brothers among the dunes of Kill Devil Hills, albeit a 109 years too late. This has always been a dream of mine, a dream shared by every pilot and aviation buff the world over, the pilgrimage to Kitty Hawk. Orville (1871-1948) and Wilbur (1867-1912) Wright invented and built the first successful airplane. Then they piloted it themselves to become the first humans to fly in a controlled, sustained, powered and heavier-than-air aircraft on December 17th, 1903.

My son asked me once: "Who taught the first pilot how to fly?" and I found it difficult to give him a straight answer. Many men died in pursuit of that heroic endeavor but once you fully learn about the Wright Brothers’ achievement and how they realized it the mystery of this daunting task and of flight itself becomes less enigmatic. Orville and Wilbur were two bachelor bicycle mechanics from Dayton, Ohio. The absence of women in their lives had forced them perhaps to seek an alternative way to fly and be giddy. Their pain, or lack of it, was our gain of course. Just consider the tremendous advances in aviation over the last century and you would matter-of-factly appreciate why the airplane is indeed the greatest human invention in history.

The Wright Brothers were not of the daredevil type portrayed in the mostly romantic movies about the dawn of flying or even modern day aviators. In fact they were more of the bland type of men. Sedate, methodical and systematic, they attacked the problems of controlled, sustained and powered flight with empirical data and analysis reserved to physicists and experimental scientists. The self-taught aviators persisted for years in the unraveling of the secrets of flying by direct observation of the flight of birds then by making over 1000 un-powered flights in gliders of their own design and built. They chose this particular spot near Kill Devil Hills in the Outer Banks of North Carolina for its dependable winds, soft sands and unobstructed expanse years before they made their historic flight. They failed and returned to their drawing board and workshop over and over again without truly risking their lives like the many fallen heroes before them. They corresponded with renown aviation scholars and glider pilots from Europe and exchanged ideas and discoveries. They invented the wind tunnel, they manufactured their own gasoline engine from scratch, they carved the propellers, they sewed the muslin, they glued the struts and reinforced the wings of their Wright Flyer with bicycle spokes and all with their own hands. Then on December 17th, 3 days after a failed attempt by Wilbur, who won the coin toss to fly the airplane first, Orville soared into the air and flew for a distance of 120 feet (37 m) in 12 seconds and at a ground speed of only 6.8 miles per hour (10.9 km/h) due to the strong headwinds. The brothers alternated as pilots and made 3 more successful flights on that same day. The next two flights covered 175 feet (53 m) and 200 feet (61 m) and were piloted by Wilbur and Orville respectively at an altitude of about 10 feet (3.0 m) above the ground. The fourth and last attempt of the day (the Wright Flyer was severely damaged afterward and never flew again) saw Wilbur fly for 852 feet (260m) and lasted for 59 seconds. Modern aviation was born and our world changed forever.

There are thousands upon thousands of detailed accounts about the Wright Brothers’ achievements and contributions to humanity and it would be idiotic of me to attempt to add more. I can, however, express my own feelings of awe as I stood, walked then ran around the Wright Brothers National Memorial in Kitty Hawk. Once I climbed that hill and stood by the monument erected in their honor and memory the sky opened up and rain started to fall, cleansing my body in harmony with my mind... and I soared. It is simply impossible to capture the essence of the place in this short video but that was the best I could do. As I scanned the infinitely visible horizon, clearly defined against the overcast sky of the late afternoon I imagined hearing, carried with the winds and over the years, the unassuming words of the brothers sent in a telegram to their father in Ohio: Success four flights thursday morning # all against twenty one mile wind started from Level with engine power alone # average speed through air thirty one miles longest 57 [sic] seconds inform Press home ####Christmas.


*Video background music Learning to Fly by Pink Floyd, 1987 from the album A Momentary Lapse of Reason

Cloud

The budding year has brought us rain to wash the grime off of the facades of monstrous buildings and to cleanse our burdened hearts soiled from decades of cruelty. It’s not easy to shed a debauched past with the magic wand of a peaceful protester or the whim of a benevolent mogul and expect a miracle to save us all. For I had walked among the dead, the silent ones and the zombies, and saw them for what they are, vampires feeding on hope and spoiling the landscape with their excremental nostalgia. They are an admonition of what we could turn into if we give up our dreams. Outside my window, puffs of clouds, white, gray and dark scuttle across the sky. They gather from all directions, ominous with the threat of a devastating storm or a magnanimous deluge that will bring life to this barren land.

While apathy is plentiful work has become scarce. With nothing to kill but time I lose myself to a recurring daydream*. I’m flying among the clouds in unconditional freedom. I type “cloud” in the search box and come up with a game. I was never big on computer games but this one intrigued me by its utter benignity. Cloud was developed by a group of students at USC School of Cinematic Arts in 2006. It is the closest rendering of the ubiquitous dream of flying experienced by almost every child and a few lucky grownups. The purpose of the game, as if it needs a purpose, is to fly among clouds, to shepherd them in a flock and to bring rain to thirsty cities and souls. The music is serene, the graphics and wallpaper inspiring and the demands on your system and dexterity minimal. It is as close as you could get to practicing Yoga on your PC. Make sure to explore the various dreams and extras after your install the game.

Cloud can be downloaded for free at the game’s project website and on CNET.

*Read more about the Cloud People.

A Song from Afar

I took a lung-full of air and plunged at an angle, my body gleaming in the sunlight before it disappeared. The song came from the north, faint at first then growing louder like the knell of a fog-bell on a distant buoy. It was the first time that I hear such a song, yet it was one I've been longing for as it reverberated through my spine into the depth of my loins.

A primitive feeling of urgency took hold of me. For days and nights I felt as if I had lost all control of my faculties while being goaded by an intangible need. A blurred mirage of mother hung snugly in a dark recess of my brain, emitting a feeble light that turned the blackness into a fugue of gray. An anamnesis from the past, as shapeless as the surface of the sea on a windless night rode the back of the song from far away and guided me ahead.

It grew loud as the water got colder, crisp as the air turned brisker. I felt the currents, diverging near the top, converging the deeper I dived. A vast solace engulfed me in the frigid darkness and when I resurfaced I irresistibly stared with misty eyes at the stars above. Getting my bearings by sound and light pervaded me without any conscious attempt. Where did I learn to do that? Who taught me? The questions, the myriad of them, remained unanswered.



On a spry morning, 49 rising and setting suns after I left the bay, I saw them in a pod dotting the horizon. I called and they answered back, wordless voices of certitude but of little or no choice. They are like me, I reckoned. Memories trickled back then flooded my field of vision. I saw the school I grew up with. I felt the warmth of mother. I remembered ephemeral associations. That’s what brought me here and what will take me further west till I reach that solitary humpback! That’s what brought the others here too. The song, the eternal song, I hear for the first time.

Jets of froth filled the air and cascaded down like broken chrystal. Tall obelisks of fury erupted and ruffled the shoulders of the undulating waves. I was cornered in the endless ocean among my peers, fighting with each of them for my right of passage. Only if I could best this brawny one off to the left. Oh, and that one with the ugly cut in the fin, and the slimy looking one there and that fat one and the other.

With the break of dawn the melee came to an end. The ocean had turned red with the blood of the losers and mine. My body fat consumed, my strength depleted, only the burning in my loins remained. I swam by her side then circled around. Her own quest had come to an end, she acquiesced. She stood still realizing without looking back that I was the sole one for her. I made one last shallow dive and took her from below, holding her with invisible hands. As our eyes locked and my sperm flowed irreversibly into her she sang her eternal song one more time but only for me.

She will call again and I will swim across the earth's oceans. She is mine, we both know it, till the end of time.

Espresso

In January of 2000 I went on my first trip to Italy. Three days after a job interview in Tartous with a visiting delegation I received a call asking me to attend a meeting in Treviso. The company had applied for an expedited visa on my behalf and one week later I was there, at headquarters.

We sat in a very large and Italian meeting room with glass all around instead of walls. The ceiling and the floor were mostly made of transparent panels too. It was fantastic architecture by all means and although I'm no great fan of cutting edge modern design I was impressed nevertheless. The same 3 men who interviewed me in Tartous walked into the room with an amicable disposition. They inquired about the flight, if my room in the hotel was comfortable enough and whether breakfast was to my liking. Then we sat down to business. I neglected to tell them that I didn't have time for a proper breakfast but instead only had a cupcake. Most importantly there was no coffee in the breakfast area and before I had a chance to order it from the bar the dispatched car and driver had arrived.

15 minutes into the meeting I was dying for a cup of coffee. I was also reflecting on how differently business in Syria is conducted. The first half an hour or so is mostly spent on pleasantries such as talk about the kids, the weather and world economy, in Tartous at least. Coffee and/or tea are brought in by an attendant. Sugar is premixed as per each individual person's preference. Then ever so slowly the talk tangos into the business at hand. One of my hosts, more attentive than the others and who eventually became a personal friend, noticed my discomfort and asked if he could get me something. Yes please, can I have some coffee?

I was surprised that in a company with over 800 employees worldwide and with an office staff of 150 there wasn't a single person with the designated job of making and/or serving beverages. Of course that was my first venture into the world of big business abroad. It's true that I worked in the US before and that there was no one to serve coffee either, but I only worked in a university and a small general aviation company. Carlo, logistics and international crew and recruiting manager, got up himself and fixed me an espresso.

I was 40 and I just had my first real Italian espresso but I got hooked since. There's nothing in the world, not a single dish or beverage that comes close to an Italian espresso. But more than their cuisine or their wines, the football or the super cars, architecture, painting or sculpture, Italians reached their true height in art and science with their espresso machines and coffee.

I bought my first and only espresso machine in February of that year as a birthday present for myself. It was simple and actually the only one I could find, a French Moulinex Gusto. Unlike fancier machines, which contain a stainless steel or a brass boiler, an exchanger, complex plumbing and a powerful pump to flash-heat the water to precise temperature on its way to the basket containing the ground coffee, minee had a plastic water tank, a small heater in the head and an electric pump. Once the water temperature gets to a certain degree in the head itself the thermostat light comes off. I push a rocker switch activating a pump which in turn forces a jet of water over the coffee. I had it for 12 years and it served me at least one cup of coffee every morning I've spent at home since. I never filled it with anything but Lavazza coffee, the brand that I chose as my favorite after my maiden 5 days visit to Italy.

Last week the Moulinex started leaking on the sides around the filter holder. I fiddled with it as best as I could but I realized that it had reached the end of its useful life. This morning, my cup of espresso tasted almost as bland as a cup of American coffee with the consistency and suspended particles I so much despise in Turkish coffee. I cleaned the machine reverently for it had served me well. I even spoke to it and promised that I'll try to fix it but with the relegated role of a backup.

I just bought a new machine, a steam powered espresso coffee maker and an Italian at that. My DeLonghi is set up and ready. I can almost smell the fresh brew and the temptation is killing me. But that will have to wait till morning. For now, a shot of Grappa to celebrate the change of guard is in order. Salute!

Return

It hurts not to write, to wean my imagination by damming the river within or to trickle updates and comments on a bedlamite Facebook. With premeditated arrogance I pronounce that I’m too good for politics, but even a lofty leopard is distracted by buzzing flies. I should be writing about the beauty in and around me. Whether they are about the woman perched on a throne of clouds or the city I see in my childish eyes, I miss the echo of my own words. The music they make when they meander around in my head then dance to the drumming of my racing heartbeats. Leave the grease and the exposed hairy cracks to the mechanics, I tell myself then zoom past the desperate crowds in a dream powered Ferrari. I have the heart of Gawain and the ardor of Adonis, the Syrian God not the grovelling poet. I am the Tartoussi, Ibn al-Balad, who’s known the before and after, standing by and waiting for the end of this long day and a new beginning.
I'm coming back.

2011

I don't have mixed feelings toward 2011. It was by all means the year, one which we can look at from the shortsighted vantage point of the here and now or from afar to perceive its magnitude from the acquired insight of a future in the making.

No, I have no doubts. I know exactly how I feel about it as it has been the epochal year of my life although certainly the most agonizing for all of us. I wouldn't be claiming prescience if I had previously predicted its inevitability. Although it took me, like it did everybody else, by surprise I have been waiting for it to happen for as long as I can remember.

The inflicted pain of 2011 will linger on for a few more years, of that I'm certain. Yet I'm optimistic that out of calamity my and other children will lead more dignified lives. They will dig within their own bags of memories to compare the before and after. They will bask in precious liberty earned with the limb and blood of their brethren who made, and still are making, the ultimate sacrifice.

Many compatriots are against subversive change. They chose to bury their heads in the sand or worse to vehemently oppose the natural human aspiration for freedom for several reasons, not the least of which is the preservation of their privileged economic position and/or chaperoned social status. They were of the opinion that if it ain't broke don't fix it and thus embarked on a blind mission of psychotic denial and base justification for atrocities and crimes perpetrated and committed. Needless to say that their defeatist outlook is only helping in delaying the fateful outcome but it won't put a dent on its certainty. Over decades of subservience they've learned to tip the scale in their favor exactly like all parasites in the animal and plant kingdoms. They were able to make a good living within a corrupt socioeconomic system, where they evaded fair competition and hard work. They'd rather live in advantaged voluntary servitude instead of being free among equals.

In the spirit of the season, however, let me wrap up my last post of the year by being as good-hearted as I have it in me and by offering my best wishes for 2012. May peace fill the lives of every human, animal and plant. May the new year bring honor to those who earned it. As for freedom, I'll simply quote Abraham Lincoln to express my sincere sentiments: "Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves". Happy 2012 everyone :-)

The Aftermath

What shall I write about when everyone I know has turned into either a desultory opponent or a gullible supporter while those who are neither are the worst of all? I am a conspirator to the supporters and they are cowards to me. Highbrow hypocrites, camouflaged in diarrheal moderation, evade the deluge by hiding in the unreachable branches of tall trees, unprincipled, unashamed. They, along with the merchants of the two cities will surely recover and end up high and dry no matter how long the flooding remains.

courtesy thedailygreen

The cowards shall never win for their freedom will be handed to them as alms. The conspirators, and despite their fateful victory, have already lost their true identities. Eventually when the water recedes, the bemused survivors, cowards and conspirators, will pick up the pieces of their broken lives. The merchants will sell them their lives back, with interest and at a profit no doubt. And the hypocrite rascals will get down from their trees and fill the world with trash while, most certainly, making a damn good living out of cleaning the aftermath.