The US Embassy Riots in Tunis: A Drive Through

On the day that the US embassy was stormed by rioters, I was in Marsa with my parents having a look at some of the houses in the area. Soon afterwards, my sisters and I were taken to the local shopping centre where we were met by an acquaintance of my parents. When they left for Laos in the 1980’s, she came to buy some of their items. She is a French teacher at the American Cooperative School of Tunis, located on the other side of the highway where the US embassy could be found. After chatting with my parents and catching up, she explained that she had the day off in anticipation of riots breaking out after the deadly attack on the US embassy in Libya.

In the early afternoon, my father drove the car along the highway where the school and the embassy were located. The sight we saw before us remains imprinted in my mind to this day.

The overpasses above the motorway were packed with people, jostling each other for the chance to witness the protests for themselves. I peered to my left, past my father and saw bearded young men carrying the black Islamic banner that has become a common sight associated with the Salafi movement since the ruling coalition took power in Tunisia. One of the rioters propped a metal crowd control barrier against the wall of the compound so that its bars could serve as rungs for a makeshift ladder and several witnesses were capturing the action on their mobile phones and digital cameras.

The most absurd sight of the day was that of the riot police. A group of no more than 10 officers raced to the scene of the riots on foot, while two mopeds carrying two officers each followed them.

The back seat of the car was ablaze with discussion and my mother urged me to take a photo or keep some memory of the event. I sadly did not have a camera with me to record this day. All that you read before you are the highlights of what I witnessed on that day.

By the late afternoon, my sister Leila was on her iPad. She read aloud the latest updates from Al-Jazeera to my mother in the kitchen while my father raged at the government for its inability to prevent the attack on the embassy and the school nearby. The Associated Press put the body count of the protest at 2 dead and 40 injured on that day.

A journalist I met at the World Press Freedom Day Conference in Tunisia reported that President Moncef Marzouki personally dispatched his Presidential Guard to quell the riots, playing a “risky political card”. The American Cooperative School of Tunis had sections of its Elementary School burned down and computers and tablets were stolen. Up till now, it is still collecting donations of money and books for its Recovery Fund.

For my own part, I am thankful that my parents were able to get back to our house before the riots became truly violent. I am additionally thankful that despite the scaremongering generated by news outlets the problems that Tunisia faces are not as violent as in neighbouring Libya or in Syria.

Epiphany (1 of 2)

*A piece written by stream of consciousness on September 20, 2012. Reading this will help you understand how I intend to go about making this blog.

I graduated from University with a Bachelors of Arts in Journalism, thinking that it would be ideal for a creative writer. It was the chance for me to write about books and films, the environment and the arts and every other curiosity I thought I knew and understood.

As time went by and I really learned what journalism was like in practical terms, my tutors gave me their insight into my development as a journalist in training. My weakness, they said, was not like that of my peers. While many of my classmates struggled to write academic essays and managed to write reasonably well as journalists, I excelled in academic research and writing but struggled as a reporter. The good news was that I had news sense. I had a way of knowing what was newsworthy, something that could not be taught.

I chose to specialise in Radio Journalism because I felt that I didn’t have the right personality type to be a presenter or news anchor. My strength was in my voice, I believed. With the fast paced evolution of new social networking technologies and the ever-changing landscape that is modern journalism, I chose to specialise in Online Journalism. I wrote for WordPress and Blogger individually and with a group as was required by my tutors. It was there that I understood that my greater success came from combining my writing with a strong team of technically able people.