I couldn’t believe it that this debate competition had led me to the 1900s. A few hours before I was in my room filled with frustration and now I was here getting all sorts of ideas for my speech. It all started when I agreed to take part in the debate competition to get Iman off my back.

“Fizza, your topic is ‘Should you fight for peace?’ and you are supposed to be against Areeb, who is in favour.”

‘Oh, no! Areeb is the best debater in our class. I would surely loose.’ I thought as anxiety filled inside me.

I noted down all the ideas that came to mind, just to find they were all wrong! It was the last day and so I sat with my head buried in my hands, trying to make one last try. It was 12am and I felt like I was physically awake and mentally asleep. My mind was not ready to help me. I felt helpless.

All of a sudden, the whole house shook. Earthquake! The whole world seems to go upside down, but a second later, all was still. There was nothing to hear, except my heartbeat.

What was that? My curiosity nagged me to investigate. I moved out of my room. The door leading to our storeroom was wide open. I went in to find a cube-like box, a very large one. ‘What is it?’ I wondered as I stepped inside.

It was chaotic inside. People were fighting, but for what? I walked towards them.

“I want Germany finished,” roared one man. “It destroyed America’s peace. Now we’ll fight back.”

“No, it will be no good,” explained another. “We will only loose our men.”

“I don’t …” I said, but was interrupted immediately.

“What happened, you don’t what, huh?” the man pointed at me.

After that I don’t quiet remember what happened. The next thing I knew I was captured as a prisoner for listening to their conversation. I could not convince them that I was wrongly accused and I was not a German or Austrian or any of their rivals. They were not willing to believe I was a Pakistani.

“You are a German spy and that’s it.”

“But why would I spy?” I said frustrated.

“To know our plans, of course,” one of the men yelled and turned to leave.

“You want to fight for peace and you don’t get peace. Instead you continuously blame others for ruining your peace and destroy their peace too,” I concluded.

In a blink of my eye, I was in a gigantic conference room. “If they let us live in peace surely we won’t harm them, but if …” a grumpy voice boomed.

“Really!” another voice called, “Germany …”

“Of course Germany, broke peace for war.”

I was perplexed by their debating skills. Suddenly the fear of being locked in the dungeon made me move out of the room.

As soon as I stepped out, I was in my room. I quickly scribbled a wonderful speech which won me second position (after adding some quotes from the internet). It went like this:

“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. My topic today is ‘Should we fight for peace?’ and I am totally against this topic. I would like to quote, ‘Violence never brings permanent peace. It solves no social problem: it merely creates new and more complicated ones,’ said Martian Luther king Jr.

“So fighting for peace is not the best idea. People say, ‘Fighting for peace is our right.’ To some extent, yes, it is. But when you add violence in it, you just face aggression. You start blaming others for not being able to live in peace.

“Let’s take the example of World War I here. Why did America join the war? Because in 1917, German submarines were attacking American ships and ships having American passengers. America felt it was its right to fight back for peace which led it to participate in one of the most destructive wars.

“Then as someone once said, ‘The world is a mirror it reflects your image. Smile and it smiles back at you.’ So if you fight, it will fight back and surely you won’t gain any peace.”

My speech was long, but it surely made an impression and conveyed to people that ‘fighting’ for peace is just ironical in itself!

Think about it!

Published in Dawn, Young World, June 9th, 2018