Home > Work > Quixote in Ramadi: An Indigenous Account of Imperialism
1 " I have been cheated out of being treated like a human being. In my reflection I saw an empty vessel. They had cheated me and I was desperate to make the sharp pain in my head stop. "
― M.B. Dallocchio , Quixote in Ramadi: An Indigenous Account of Imperialism
2 " Ramadi’s sky was generously filled with stars. Celestial ornaments set against a banner of a deep blue velvet sky. It was a place where hell, death, and heaven were so clear and the closest I’ve felt to all three in my life. "
3 " I wasn’t a person after all. I was simply this exotic thing for people to observe and investigate, an alien in any environment I was in. "
4 " To my surprise, it was a place where my thoughts were the most lucid. I wasn’t bogged down in random trivial details or the luxury of time-consuming over-analysis. This place forced you to live because at any moment, life could be lost. Ramadi forced me to die unto myself. "
5 " There were waves of genocide that overcame indigenous populations of Oceania and do we have a library of books or films to tell our story? No. We have tourist hula shows and commercials where the “natives” tend to tourists like indentured servants with plastic, lifeless smiles. It’s not such a charming picture, is it? The truth is ugly, but so is ignorance or denial of such atrocities and pain. "
