I’m a complainer.  Many of us are, we just don’t like to admit it.  It’s something that’s easy to do, just find something you don’t like and vocalize what you don’t like about it and why.  Sometimes, we’ll gather together in groups and vocalize, sometimes we do it with a friend or loved one, and other times, usually when we’re at our most frustrated, we do it alone, even though there’s no one around to listen.

Some of my personal favorite gripes include the government, poor parenting, ignorant people, teens, and more.  It’s easy to grouse about problems, but tougher to actually do something about them, which is probably why people do more the former than the latter.  As much as I love to bitch about the way things are, I am not unhappy in most respects.  I enjoy and appreciate the freedoms afforded me in this country, freedoms we often overlook and take for granted.  So with those freedoms in mind and Memorial Day not long passed, let’s pretend for a moment, shall we?  Let’s imagine how life just might be if we all lived elsewhere.

Hello, my name is Ashish Hadinuv.  I live in the forgotten country of Screwedbekistan.  In Screwedbekistan, there are no elected officials, only appointed officials.  These officials are all appointed by a soulless man who murdered his way into power by way of a bloody coup nearly twenty years ago and has maintained an iron grip on my country ever since.  Screwedbekistan has no oil, so the U.S. doesn’t seem to care about what happens here.  Very little information leaks out of Screwedbekistan since our treacherous “president” controls the media – what little there is of it.

Screwedbekistan has an area nearly half that of the U.S and our population hovers around 100 million.  However, while the U.S. unemployment rate sits at around 5%, ours has not dipped lower than 30% since 1992.  The Screwedbekistan government claims to have a constitution and to be a “true democracy”, but since Amnesty International and the Red Cross aren’t allowed in, no one in the outside world knows what atrocities occur behind Screwedbekistan lines.  But since I live here, I know.  I know all the secrets.

I am one of the fortunate Screwedbekistanians – I have a job.  It pays me nearly $3.00 per week which affords me and my family some comforts, like bread (when it’s available) and shoes for my youngest.  It is true, we have to wait in line for 7 hours to buy stale bread and the shoes are tattered and missing the laces, but it’s better than most have.  The rebels were quiet today – I only heard a couple of distant gunshots while waiting in the breadline.  Just last week I lost two friends to gunfire in a very desolate part of town.  The rebels are trying to wrest control from the government, but the Screwedbekistan forces are just too strong and well supplied.

My wife does her best to keep our children safe and educated at the same time.  Though it is illegal to educate your own children in Screwedbekistan, she herself was secretly home-schooled by her mother to the point that she can read and write and even do a little math.  Our two children are eager to learn – there is very little else to stimulate them within our small home since we have no television (or even electricity) and they have very few “toys”.  We had three children, but our oldest son was killed by a landmine last winter when he and a friend were looking for tin cans in an abandoned lot. 

One of our most prized possessions is a book called “American Culture, Past & Present”.  My wife often reads it aloud to the entire family on quiet nights.  I particularly like the pictures of sandy beaches, thick full forests and beautiful mountain ranges.  Here in Screwedbekistan, we have no beaches and few forests remain, though we do have mountains.  Many of the rebels hide there and the area is routinely shelled by the government, so it is not a safe place to visit. 

I imagine how it must be to live in a country where you can travel freely to visit its natural beauty.  I imagine what it must feel like to be able to walk out your front door without fear of being shot.  I imagine what it is like to sleep at night knowing your family is safe from both criminals and the police themselves.  I imagine what it must be like to own a car and drive to the store.  I imagine what well-stocked shelves look like, as I have never seen them myself.  I imagine having the luxurious lifestyle of the Americans, but I don’t know of any way to escape this horror that is my family’s day-to-day existence.

I also imagine that Americans must revel in their freedoms.  Freedom is often the only thing I think of – when you don’t have something, you think about it all the time.  I wonder how often the Americans think about theirs?  The book mentions several holidays celebrating freedom and those who provided it for them, so they must hold their freedom in very high regard.  They must always have it in their thoughts.

Well, it is time for me to return to work.  It is my job to clean the horse stable of the local Regional Commander.  He enjoys riding on Tuesdays and if the stables are not clean enough I will suffer lashes from his riding crop.  He will often beat me for his own perverse reasons anyway, and as the crop cuts deep and the pain fires through me I focus my thoughts on America and imagine what could be.