I'm supposed to be read a letter but I want
to share a short story with you of what -- how
I happen to be here.
I -- it's a story of a dinner table in my
hometown, Damascus, where I grew up.
It's a dinner table where my mom and dad,
my banker brother, my sister, my two other
sisters, we used to sit around and have dinner
and listen to music every day.
It's a dinner table that I myself quite a
lot.
Syria was full of love.
It was the capital of -- capital of culture,
Damascus, once.
We grew up in a cozy, lovely apartment where
we were very sheltered and all we knew was
peace and love.
And that has changed in 2011.
I was an English teacher back then.
I -- when the protests, when the peaceful
protests started in Syria, I took to the streets.
I remember my first protest, I was walking
alongside the doctor, the lawyer, the banker,
the schoolboy, the mother, the sister, the
wife, and for the first time in Syria, I could
hear my own voice.
For the very first time as I am chanting "freedom,"
everyone chanting "freedom, equality, liberty,"
that's the first time I heard my own voice.
Sadly, it didn't last for long.
After protesting for a year, I got caught
by my own police force and I was thrown in
prison for 15 days.
15 days, I was tortured.
Electrocuted.
Both of my arms were broken.
Two of my ribs.
I almost lost my left leg.
But I lived.
I got out.
And I'm so glad that I got out, because I
didn't want to die in a prison cell tortured
by my own police force.
This is not how I imagined myself ending up.
