Tag: uncertain future
Exile Changes You Forever – The Atlantic
The onset of the Arab Spring can feel like the distant past amid the grim brutality of our current times, but it raises timeless questions. What is the trade-off between courage and safety; idealism and caution; hope for change and fear of it? In hindsight, we can tell a story of how the wave of revolution crested and the undertow of counterrevolution prevailed. Autocrats remained in power. Uprisings turned into simmering civil and sectarian conflicts. Millions of people sought
Ukraine After the Deluge – The Atlantic
On a hot summer day in Ukraine, two young boys named Timur and Slavik were playing on what used to be the banks of the Kakhovka Reservoir, part of the Dnieper River. I met them when I was visiting the area in July. The air’s tranquility was occasionally pierced by the sounds of fighting in a frontline town not far away. This region is a focal point of the Ukrainian counteroffensive, and in June, evidence suggested that Russians, trying to
A Eulogy for the Free Press in Hong Kong
On the morning of July 1, 2020, newsstands across Hong Kong had a conspicuously uniform appearance. At least eight major papers carried identical front-page advertisements: a cerulean-shaded photo of uniformed officials standing below the Chinese and Hong Kong flags with the city’s harbor in the background. The image was overlaid with lines of white text triumphantly welcoming the arrival of a sweeping national-security law enacted the night before. Just one paper looked different, breaking from the monotonous propaganda. Apple Daily