It's not the same anymore...

I'm not in my creative space; not even in the right frame of my mind. I'm here because I'm feeling a lot of things, and writing them down might help me get back to normalcy if only I can put them into words.

The last few days have painfully reminded me of Ukrainians and Palestinians, for whom normal life is different from the rest of the world. They have sacrificed so much in the past few years — lost their friends, family, homes and jobs to the war. I grieved for them but what I feel now when a war is imposed on my country is totally different. No matter how sympathetic you feel towards the oppressed, you can never truly feel their pain unless it's inflicted on you.

I don’t feel like going into details but soulfuldreamer has already summarized the conflict here if you want to know more.

Unlike other ongoing wars in the world, we have reached a ceasefire in just four days (which honestly felt like forty years), and are now moving onto the dialogue which India outright rejected intially. It's disturbing how some nations/leaders desire war so much. It's easy to give orders for chaos when you're sitting safely behind the secure walls of your home—especially if you're the leader. Such cowardly leaders forget (or rather, don't care) that people die on both sides. It’s not a victory for a woman if her husband dies fighting or for a mother whose son sacrifices his blood. No matter how patriotic you are or how willing you are to make heavy sacrifices and even though the rank of martyrs in Islam is the highest, the pain of losing a loved one and an innocent soul stays with you forever.

Apparently, it’s over now, and everyone I personally know is safe—but I feel as if I have lost something. Peace of mind, probably.

I’m feeling so many things all at once—paranoid about the future, grateful to Allah for the safety of my family, friends, and my dear Pakistan, and utterly heartbroken over the lives we lost. The world doesn’t stop. Both countries might settle temporarily on a neutral ground, but what about the families shattered along the way? They say they targeted terrorists. No, that little boy playing in the park with the other kids wasn’t a terrorist. That man whose little daughter couldn’t sleep without his arms around her wasn’t a terrorist. I don’t want the world to believe me, but I know they were innocent. I’m sure there were innocent people on the other side too, but I'm baffled by so much hate shown by avergae citizens of India, their ridiculous mainstream media and their government who decided to have a war with a nuclear state on a mere whim.

Who’s paying the price now? The people who lost their loved ones. The ones who had nothing to do with any of this. The ones who wanted peace. The ones with big dreams and a whole life ahead of them.

Oh, cruel neighbour, you have opened our eyes which were shut with false hope of friendship and brotherhood.