Ask Yourself: Are You Being Tested? Or Are You Just…There…?: A Short Story About Sudan

Mikaela Brewer
Jun 25, 2024
7 min read

by Mikaela Brewer for The 44 North

**A red, blue, and yellow geometric cube coming apart**

I should have been sleeping late last night, but instead, I was about to start a Twitch stream with a couple of friends, @valvalkyrie and @Halla_la_sculptrice. I’ve never actually met them in person, but Valerie and Halla are quite possibly the coolest people I know, not to mention that their names, together, create ‘Valhalla.’ A strong, unexpected gift, as translated across languages. Neither is Norwegian or Finnish, though—Val is a Mexican-American video game engineer/designer, and Halla is a French-Egyptian sculptor. My adoptive parents are both from Jamaica, but we live in Brampton, Canada now. I don’t know a whole lot about where I was born, but at the outset, it would appear I’m the one from Norway or Finland—pale blue eyes and icy blonde hair.

But anyway! Minecraft seemed a much better use of time than Instagram and TikTok. And that’s where it all started. Remember when I said Val and Halla were the coolest people I know? Let me tell you about the brilliance they came up with last night and why I’m writing about it now.

I created a link and messaged them on Discord.

“Hey! Anyone need a Minecraft study break?”

💜2 🎮2 👾2 🫶🏽1 🫶🏾1

“ROXANE! Yes ma'am! What a legend…you read my mind.”

🤪1

“My goodness…same!”

😘1

“Kk! Will join in 2! Stream is here:”

“twitch.tv/RockieRacoon-8264Y9RUFJ756B84”

After a quick pee, I returned to my room to find Val and Halla already in deep. With one hand, Val was fiddling with the sage-green streak in her dark hair and with the other, her orange, felt-pixel-rose earrings, which matched the colour of her eyeliner. The orange made her green-flecked hazel eyes pop in her ring light. Halla was sitting in the dark, hands cupping one of her chamomile and lavender wood wick candles, eyes swollen and face shadowed. Her fingertips tapped the little flower drawings sketched across the clay candle cup she’d created last week. I wasn’t sure what was happening, but I had a guess.

“So down to just veg to ASMR, Hallala. I can basically smell your candle from here.” I could actually smell the tacos taking over my desk with their assorted take-out condiment cups, but I smiled brightly, using our affectionate nickname for Halla. Honestly, the three of us were deeply sad and we knew it. Gaming together gave us joy, which was needed, but we also spent a lot of time talking, and I can’t articulate how grateful I am to have such caring, genuine people to parse through this hellscape we’re surviving, not living.

Halla looked up and smiled weakly. Her perfectly matched gold jewelry sparkled in the candlelight. Val was staring off into space with a near vacancy.

“Talk to me,” I offered. I had an inkling. That morning we’d been audio messaging about the global student protests for Gaza, and how we were so incredibly proud. But the fight for liberation has to include Sudan, which we felt was being left behind.

“I just feel this urge to do something. Right now. And like we have a unique, creative skill set to do it with, you know? Halla, we build things from both sides of the coin, and Rockie, you’re this brilliant blogger…” Val’s sentence trailed off as she spoke with a soft, yet husky and vivacious energy.

Halla nodded, adding a gentle whispered, “We’ve never met in person, right? But I dunno about you. I can’t imagine our lives apart now. That’s powerful isn’t it? Power enough to reach everyone.”

I nodded affirmatively, pulling up the hood of my sweatshirt and hugging my knees. I reached up and turned off the overhead light in the room, wanting to be in the dark with nothing but Val, Halla, and her candle.

“It’s been over a year,” I said, my voice cracking, “and hardly anyone’s said anything. Did you read Safia Elhillo’s post?” Safia Elhillo is one of our favourite Sudanese-American poets.

“Yeah, how there are so many dead bodies piled in the streets that birds and eagles are adjusting their migration routes to eat them. It’s a mating ground for stray dogs. No burial rites or customs. I don’t even know what to say,” Val said.

“This is the worst humanitarian catastrophe in the world.” Halla’s typically quiet voice had a subtle edge now. “I mean, imagine a whole year without running water.”

Val spoke without looking up, her voice raspy with anger, “800, 000 people in El Fasher, North Darfur, are in immediate extreme danger. They’re sheltering there, internally displaced, with nowhere to go. That guy at Yale’s Humanitarian Research Lab, Nathaniel Raymond, said it’s called a “kill box”—that the massacre would be similar to Hiroshima or Nagasaki. Everyone keeps saying “Forgotten War” all over the media. Famine. 25 million people facing food insecurity. Severe, acute malnutrition. Tuberculosis outbreaks.” (1), (2), (3)

We were quiet for a while. Unsure what to say. Unsure what to feel.

But then Val’s eyes sparkled in the screen as if her tears freed an idea. “Do you guys remember that incredible video we saw on The Slow Factory, with Jenan Matari, about NPCs?”

“Yeah,” I replied, “about how some people have to be experiencing soul loss to uphold systems and distract us—just non-player-characters, whether violent or non-violent, and we’re the ones being challenged?”

“Exactly, and Stefanie Lyn Kaufman-Mthimkhulu said in another post, about soul loss, that “If a soul is lost, it must be retrieved [...] There is no pill that will undo the ideology of Eurocolonial dominance built on superiority and violence. The medicine of the ideology is decolonization & liberation.” Right?” Val looked at us expectantly, as if we could expand the fire in her voice.

“So, how do we put the soul back in!” Halla’s familiar full-face, kind smile lit up my monitor.

“Yes! This is what I’m thinking: people are afraid, maybe feeling separated from one another right now. What if, through a video game, we could reconfigure, reprogram, and kinda-sorta hack our way to reaching real non-violent NPCs (RNPCs) by rewriting the code for the game’s violent & non-violent NPCs (GNPCs).”

“Oh! And art! I read another of Jenan’s posts about Colonizer vs. Indigenous Art and have been thinking about that paper by Eve Tuck and K. Wayne Yang—decolonization is not a metaphor—and how artwork can center landback movements. What if the GNPCs begin posting Sudanese street art, painting it onto the walls of every building/structure in the game—where people can’t avoid seeing it.” Halla was grinning.

The whole time I was listening, I was also researching Minecraft and ROBLOX. “You two are absolutely brilliant. Minecraft has over 166 million monthly active users and ROBLOX has over 216 million.”

“Perfect,” Halla replied.

“But how do we discern RNPCs?” I asked.

“I’m not sure we can. But! We can create a catch-all. What if we create some sort of free event to entice users onto the platforms at the same time?” Val asked.

“YES!” Halla was bouncing in her roller chair. “We can blast Alsarah - Farasha فراشة ft. Sufyvn, Flippter, too, this wonderful song dedicated to the beautiful women of Sudan. The video is incredible, too.”

“And I have links for a few of Safia Elhillo’s poems,” I said, “Ars Poetica and Good Muslim/Bad Muslim and Modern Sudanese Poetry and Ode to Sudanese Americans, and Sudan, TX!”

We all began furiously typing, organizing art and videos from Halla, who messaged us a blurb from the Khartoum School, founded in 1960, noting how Sudan is a critical modern art influence in Africa, offering a blending of Arab and African artistic and cultural practice unique to Sudan. We found:

Alaa Satir’s murals in the Burri neighbourhood of Khartoum highlighting the role of women in the revolution.
Galal Yousif’s Mak Nimr bridge mural in Khartoum, "for the people and by the people" and noting the signing of the 39-month transitional period agreement.
Merghani Salih’s mosaic of the ‘The Kandaka’ highlighting women’s contribution to the revolution.
Assil Diab on Street Art, Revolution, and the Pandemic in Sudan
Mustafa Abushamma on Art and Revolution in Sudan

After so many hours, I lost count (and many emails gaining permission to use the works above and/or providing compensation), we all took a deep breath.

“Are we ready?” Halla asked.

“Let’s do it,” I said, already opening the blog document you’re reading now. Aside from my blog, who knows where or when it will be published? We just wanted you to know what went down and share all the links/notes in case we get into trouble (likely, but worth it).

“Ready.” Val, our tech whiz, winked.

I typed into the document title: “Ask yourself: Are you being tested? Or are you just…there…?” followed by “And please, if you read anything in this document, read this.”