My first time smoking a cigarette was in Algeria. But no hard feelings towards Algeria because I actually hated my first cigarette.
The hard feelings award goes to covid and lockdown, throughout which I found out that the only thing that made me less anxious was to smoke a cigarette.
At the end, the fault is mine, for being a mess when it comes to finding ways to deal with my anxiety.
My first time in Algeria happened at the same time as one of the worst periods of my life, a period that lasted for months and from which I keep up to now sleeping remnants. Sleeping in daylight until it’s time to go to bed then the remnants wake up. I’m laughing as I write cause I sound like a fucking tortured semi-writer from the 20s after he fucked his closet or something by half artistic half coke driven urge and wrote a dark boring poem about it that absolutely no one gives a fuck about. I’m imagining Abdo’s face missing my North African telenovela-style script personality. Usually I write like a clown. But most of the time as the angry McDonalds’ clown that is fucking pissed 1) about his hair color 2) of having to sit a fucking 100 years on a fucking bench without the right to free mobility and speech. You still gotta be a clown but you’re angry, although I like it better reversed. You’re angry but at least you’re a fucking dope clown so better use that skill and have a blast!
Anyway the first time I tried a cigarette was in Algiers at 22. Lame, as you’d think someone who’s spent their life roaming around the wild would have had a cigarette somewhere that stays open after 8 pm. But throughout my wild teenage years, I was always clear about my rebellion mechanisms. It’s either I rob a bank, or I come back home at 7 pm and watch TV. I don’t do in-betweens (lying, cheating, cigarettes, alcohol, etc…). I only did stuff that the Declaration of Human Rights allowed and applauded after the French beheaded their king. Which I think was the only way to go anyway. The guy fucking pooped on the floor while wasting his money on keratin hair treatments for his lengths with curled up split ends. Who does that seriously, especially when they haven’t even saved enough money to build a restroom.
So I went to Algeria. Little did I know Algeria would then go to me. Snif snif, sorry not sorry.
Also little did I know that Tebboune, the president, would, in addition to maintaining the land closed between us, also close the airspace. And it’s not even like if I could say something like "Tebboune, open your borders!" Would sound strange and a bit too consent-lacking in my language, wouldn’t it.