A picnic, to me, was always simple.
Something you do during the day.
Parks, sandwiches, fruit, kids running around, families scattered across the grass.

That’s what I thought a picnic was.

So when my friend in Saudi Arabia said, “Let’s go for a picnic,” I said yes without hesitation.

But then we met at 9pm.

Huh?

And then we drove for 35 minutes.

Huh?

It wasn’t a far-away desert shop.

It was the desert.

No streetlights.
No people.
No park.

I was pleasantly surprised.

Then before I knew it, another car approached — it was more brothers.

We placed a mat on the floor. My friend tore open a bag onto the floor, and poured rice and chicken onto it.

No sandwiches.
No blankets.
Just a full meal… in the dark… lit by our phones.

We gathered around: a Syrian, three Yemenis, two Saudis, one Bulgarian, and one brit all eating rice with our hands.

And yet — above us — was something I’d never seen with so much majesty.

The sky.

Not just stars… but a sky completely filled with them. Endless. Overwhelming. Glittering.

I laid flat on my back mesmerised. I had never seen anything like it before. In that moment, sleep lost all its allure. I had already been seduced by the world above. I laid there lost whilst gazing above.

What also struck me most wasn’t just how beautiful it was—
but what I compared it to.

You will never believe it.

The ceiling of a Rolls-Royce car.

Am I serious? Unfortunately, I am afraid so.

There I was, staring at the same sky that Mohammed, Moses, Jesus — and the millions before me — had gazed upon.

And that was the the best comparison I could do.

In that moment, I realised something was off.

Instead of seeing the ceiling of a Rolls Royce and seeing it for what it was — a pathetic attempt to imitate the stars — I had done the opposite…

In that moment, I realised how distant I had been from nature; how distant I had been from reminding myself of my own insignificance. A question was raised in my head: in going distant away from nature, have we truly advanced?

But that night brought me back.

We laughed.
We told stories.
We ate dessert.

Time didn’t matter anymore.

At some point, I tried to politely hint that I wanted to leave—catch some sleep before Fajr.

I quickly realised… that wasn’t happening.

My friends had no plan of leaving at any respectable time.

If I wanted rest, it would be right there under the stars.

So the sand became my mattress.
My friend’s jumper, my pillow.
And my shemagh… my protection from whatever flying insects that was going into my ear.

I never slept. We left just before Fajr…
and prayed in Al-Masjid an-Nabawi.

A night I won’t forget.

In shā’ Allāh, many more to come.

You show how shallow yor thinking it is, and therefore how shallow you are. (Am i mistaken with this deduction?) You are allow yourself to be judged. You are giving people the most direct access to your most private parts: your thoughts.

I fear what people will think. Why even invite people to my private space: not just any people, everyone; the potentially belligerent, the potentially rude, potentially the people who will come in with their shoes, spit on the floor and desecrate my most most prized mantlepiece (gifted to me by a person I can’t name nor remember). If I wouldn’t do invite everyone with my house, why do it with my brain? The last refuge I have when all others fail.

And then would I be so fucking stupid so as to publish it? Put it out into the world. Allow everyone to know what I think? They literally say always keep them guessing, and you want me to put my ideas out there into the world for all to see?

Maybe I have some internalised shame, also. “Are you trying to be poetic?” is a phrase that I still remember. It seems to be similar to the “are you trying to be a philosopher?”. I heard the “are you trying to be Malcom X?”. There is no worser insult. There is nothing that stings more. I feel there is no worse insult than the insult of “trying to be poetic”. It’s the feeling that you have head rested on the palm of your hand because of the weight of your contemplative thoughts as you daze into the distance. It’s the feeling that writing is “gay”.

I say this despite it being my most deepest and most persistent to write. There has been no comparable joy. But I allowed myself to experience such joy because I was forced to write for exams and school homework. I would never write voluntarily. Afterall, I could never risk someone stumbling upon my work and realising that I was “gay”.