Life is full of little mysteries.
A wise man once said that the first twenty years of your life you learn, the second you earn, and the third you return. Either Tywin Lannister or Anies Baswedan; couldn't pick either of them apart.
👋 Hi there. My name is Hanifah Ahmad, a writer from Jakarta, Indonesia. I am a mere human like the rest of you, and I possess urges—ones that have taken on a life of their own and are difficult to resist.
I have the urge to tell stories.
My mother's, my grandmother's, mine own—imagined or real.
Stories kept me alive through raid and storm. They kept the light inside my chest from tapering off and dying. They sharpened my wit and bolstered my spine against demons, mongrels, and other scums of the earth.
As I am preparing to enter a third chapter, I vow that the winds of winter will not take me. They will not turn me as they have many others.
I saw people fall off a cliff into a mountain of rotting mass and bones. A castle stands atop its peak. I saw people with eyes swallowed by the ocean, their heads ballooned, parading their gold with pride. Their fingers, devoid of bloodstreams, move and click without control of the brain. There are masters of performance putting on shows for red-eyed children and men who act like one.
I will not drink the poison of comfort.
I vow to always keep my feet on the ground, but never forget to look up at the sky and see the stars.
So, I write.
To look adversity in the eye, have courage, and move forward with conviction in one's own ability to see things through. To spread the belief that your life is a journey in which you are the master of its plot. No one else is coming to your rescue.
So, I write.
To breathe significance into one such inconsequential human and her tiny world, in an island nation far away from the centre of the world, trying to write tales that would be remembered. Tales that move mountains, or a creek of hope that seeps into the night.
So, I write.
So that other inconsequential humans from tiny worlds who are stuck in the dark pit of despair and hopelessness would be able to see a reflection in the mirror: someone who is already marching to the music. Even if only they themselves could hear it. Even if it means no one else would.
And, I write.
In hopes that unlike my frail mortal body, my stories live on forever.
Welcome to The Liminal Margin.