The Academic Tent at Change Square

“Through my journalistic work, I was educated about many nations and what I noticed about Yemen is that it’s one of the developing countries where most of its citizens have to beg or steal to live a descent life!,” those were my words at the Academic Tent that I was at in the Change Square, couple hours ago.

Among the many tents there, this one is run by school teachers and university lecturers. It’s relatively a big tent, embracing teachers, lectures and anyone who wants to join. They continue their non-violent protest by establishing panel discussions within the attendants, Q & A conversations from attendants to the lecturers, and striking conversations to raise more awareness about the revolution, Yemen’s political challenges and initiate deep analysis of the current situation.

My input was among many other inputs. I spoke from my heart because that’s what breaks my heart the most. “Our revolution is so close to being completed; it’s like a ripe apple on a tree, waiting to fall down. We have to fill the Square with as many as possible people we can gather. Everyone must convince someone he knows, who’s not usually coming to come. If each one brings someone else tomorrow, our people’s momentum will be double and our presence and voice will reach the whole world. Everyone has to bring someone else with him tomorrow to have the biggest momentum. A huge presence is what we need for the drastic change to take place,” I concluded.

For the last past days, I couldn’t go for many reasons. The recent violence incidents happening there and eyes were upon me! And I kinda got to become very depressed by not going. Today, I went, snapped out of my depression, got really energized again by the beautiful scene I saw. The place is increasingly becoming crowded each day. It’s an amazing place to be at. “A celebration of freedom of expression, I call it.” It feels liberating to be there. After all, it will be the starting spot of the coming change.

However, there is news that neighboring people are bothered by the protestors’ “voices and tents”. In fact, at the entrances; the neighbors are distributing paper sheets; written on them “please stop this! You all are paralyzing the area!” On the other hand, at the square I saw many people sharing newspapers clippings of news from around the country; of protesters killed in clashes. Ironic!

In the meantime, something I love about the revolution is that people started to read ^_^ (Yemen, a country that suffers severely from illiteracy); whether brochures or newspapers, Yemenis do read now ^_^