Amna Al Thani captures a scene she witnessed with words, still artistically leaving herself out of the picture and utilizing a camera’s functions of spanning, zooming in and zooming out.

Amna Abdulaziz Jassim Hamad Al Thani is a Qatari who has attended English speaking schools since the age of five and considers English her first language.  She is currently enrolled at the London School of Economics in the Sociology program and plans on completing a Masters of Science. She graduates in December 2009.  In May 2008, she graduated with honors from Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar with a Bachelors of Science degree in Business Administration with a minor in English.

         Wicked

The audience’s vertically stretched arms sway, glow in the dark, lime green candles, illuminating the pitch black theatre. A cacophony of resounding claps and voices saying, “It’s about to start …it’s about to start”, rise mountainously.  Alternate, thunderous drum beats and soft xylophonic rings are played melodically. The rich velvet, scarlet curtains of Broadway’s auditorium unfold announcing the start of the musical, Wicked.   

        In the far right hand corner of the front row, teenage Asian twin boys sit next to each other. The one on the right wears a camel brown shirt with a huge white horse sewn on the back. The one on the left wears a grey cashmere sweater with a collar of pale blue shirt visible around the neck; he chews the rim of an empty styrofoam cup.  The one with the brown shirt vigorously shakes a sachet of peanut m&m’s, tightens his palms around the bag, pops the bag open, and pours a handful of the m&m’s into his right hand.  He clenches his right fist, raises it above his head, and drizzles the candy into his mouth. Munching rhythmically, he looks at his brother and says with his copiously chocolate coated teeth, “These are wickedly good, want some?” His brother replies, “Yeah.” He pours all the candy in the sachet into his brother’s cup; he overfills the cup and the excess candy trickles onto the concrete ground.     

        The crackling noise of the m&m’s on the surface exasperates a woman who sits four seats away from the twin on the right.  She swiftly closes the musical’s script she is reading and tucks it in the corner of her seat. Vehemently, she turns her head, swinging her ample black glossy curls and revealing the beaded chrome colored straps of her emerald green chiffon blouse with small polka dots.  She angles her body toward the twins, leans close to them, and says in a low pitched tone, “Would you plheeeeeze keep it quiet!”  The twins look at each other and respond simultaneously, “What are you saying?” They both place their hands behind their ears and fold them outwards toward their cheeks and say, “We can’t hear you.” The woman frowns, revealing deep creases between her arched eyebrows, saying, “Be quiet…you are being disruptive!” The twins burst into laughter; the one in the grey jumper flushes and tears squirt out of the corners of his eyes; he rubs his eyes and says, “She doesn’t get it!” He looks at the woman and grinningly, says, “These tickets are non-refundable.” 

     The woman leaves her seat and walks toward the security guard standing next to the exit beside the last seat on the left side of the front row.  She whispers in his ear; he blinks and nods.  Striding, the security guard comes within near proximity of the twins, bends forward, and says, stretching his mouth broadly showing his petite iridescent teeth, “Gentlemen, you either be quiet or, I will have to ask you to leave.”  The twins stand and respond promptly, “We’re sorry.”  They sit and dart their eyes at the woman; she looks at them and smiles tightly.  The one in the brown shirt stretches his arms, folds them around the back of his head and says, “Let’s enjoy the rest of the show.”

      A strident siren fills the room, “May I have your attention please…there is a fire in the building… please do not panic and head to the closest exit.” The lights in the theatre switch on. The show stops. The curtains shut rapidly.  The audience stands hurriedly, their seats close, flapping. An empty can of coke with a rolled packet of gummy bears jelly sticking out of it, tumbles from the back, down to the first row. The auditorium empties and silence engulfs the space.