• Collateral Damage - relates my reaction to the election and questions American's moral responsibility in the deaths of 100,000 Iraqi civilians. The number of dead Iraqis competes with the number of innocent men, women and children who have been killed in Sudan in a crisis that the United States has openly condemned as genocide. I argue that disagreeing with our government's actions does not absolve us from guilt.
  This article was published as an op-ed in MIT's The Tech on November 23, 2004.
  Note: This article was written to a liberal Cambridge audience (80 something percent voted for Kerry) and is not intended as a political argument. If you actually agreed with the war in Iraq, please don't read further. Constructive criticisms are welcome; irrational emotional outbursts are not.

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• Arabic Numerals - forces the reader to examine racial bias directed against the American Muslim population. The essay recounts my experiences in Egypt and the incidents leading to my development of a deep friendship with a Bedouin family. Interspersed within the story are three newspaper articles published in the years following September 11th that chronicle the violent anti-Islamic attacks and the general widespread anti-Muslim prejudice. The sharp contrast between the newspaper articles and my firsthand experiences of Islamic hospitality and kindness implore the reader to question the role of the American media in shaping our thoughts and biases.
  
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• In the Shade of the Killing Field Trees - describes my journeys through Cambodia and Vietnam, and my outrage at not being taught about the Cambodian genocide in high school. Through a comparison of the physical landscapes in both Cambodia and Vietnam (both have deep pits, the former full of human bones and the latter created by American bombs), I reflect upon American’s lack of knowledge of both countries’ painful recent histories.
  This essay won first prize in the 2004 Robert A. Boit Essay Competition.
  
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