hen all grounds of any interest are owned, controlled and lined up, the skies got to stay open!

The art project "1001 Nights 2002" has reclaimed the freedom of the sky.

It was an attempt to test if you can cross borders, flying yourself and manage as an individual to process

the massive amounts of red tape, combined with such an operation.

To obtain necessary permissions and fly, map in hand, looking out the side-window;

following rivers, roads and valleys along the border of Iraq right into Iran.

Crossing it and pursuing on a mission to reach Kabul, Afghanistan.

Claiming anyone's right to the sky.

The freedom to fly anywhere at any time, even after 9/11.

It took off from a farmers grass strip in Denmark, at the 4^th of September 2002.

hat was ten years after Rumsfeld, Cheney and Wolfowitz had published the first draft of "Space power theory".

A document describing how air power can be used to control the grounds and how space power can control the air.

"Full spectrum dominance" is a key issue in this paper. Establishing USA as the only dominating power on the planet.

The "drone attack" in Yemen hinted  towards the perspectives of full spectrum dominance.

To take out any target, anywhere at any time.

The war in Iraq showed it even more clearly, cruise missiles attacking top targets in Baghdad.

B-2 bombers taking off from fields amidst lands of genetically modified corn, flying

superdupersonic speed across the globe. Crashing the cradle of agriculture between

the Tigris and the Euphrates.

Finally ending that era of agriculture, establishing their new times.

A task obviously not fully understood nor challenged in a Europe lacking coherent space policy.

Staging an impotent war machinery.

Briefly addressed by Beijing's declared will to reach the moon and a Russian hope to cling on to,

what was once a race, but now, is an established fact of domination of space-research.

ar eastern Iran, the holy city of Mashad.

Close to the Afghan border.

Three months on our way. The Americans controlling Afghan air space, denying us to enter.

Last words from the US Major on a hissing line to Qatar:

"Sorry to say Mam, but if you cross that line, you would be a target Mam. I repeat Target!"

Click!

Time passed by noon before we finally entered our forty-year-old Piper Colt.

The little two-seater wiggled out over deserted lands, once the route of silk caravans.

A line in the sand, clearly visible from 2500 feet.

The Afghanistan border.

Goodbye and good luck from Iranian air-defense radar control seventeen minutes ago. It didnÕt take long before the radio started to spark:

"This is area control. Aircraft crossing line, heading one, two, four. Identify! Identify!"

Like an invisible voice from the sky, the ever patrolling AWACS high up there somewhere. They spotted us immediately.

We penetrated American fortress Afghanistan.

"We no shoot you down! This is baby-plane, no danger!" the local commander

of Herat airport watch-group explained, pointing his Kalashnikov to the sky.

If you are small and persistent Ð you can succeed.

            *

abul, on a mission amongst ruins to find a girl.

A certain girl, special, her name: Faryal, a 16-year-old with the outspoken dream of becoming a fighter pilot.

She told this to a Danish reporter, those hectic January days when reporters paid thousands of dollars to be driven around,

having women to unveil and shyly look out of their burkhas.

Now the reporters gone, the burkhas on.  

Faryal still in school, now teaching the English she learned less than a year ago.

We found her.

Completing the "axis of meaning"Simone saw that grayish winter day over a cappuccino in her morning cafŽ.

The article was electric to her.

After the work "Sisters in the sky" about how women went into the field of military pilotry during WW II,

a link was there, the future in front of her.

Faryal facing much the same problems with cultural resistance as women did in the west not to long ago.

To take her flying, letting the controls to her over the ruins of Kabul. A wish for the skies would come true.

odus operandi being the one of aero feministic action.

Building a cross border, cross time, sister hood in the sky.

Using the full involvement technique developed in earlier works.

That is, to perform the task and persistently telling and retelling your story, letting every individual who wants to,

become a pillar in this imaginary air bridge between west and east.

Trusting their Yes! to open skies, making yet another leg closer to the goal.

Bringing courage from flying sisters along route.

There where the young Croatian girl, new at flight academy. The Turkish-Bulgarian, a Muslim, well on her way in the cockpits.

Turkish female fighter pilots of today, who flew formation with Simone in their F-5,"Freedom Fighters".

aryal facing this sister hood was quite uninterested in them all.

She more bound to deny her dream, controlled by a mother obstructing possibilities for the daughter to lift from the ground.

We, a metaphor on how the west throws itself upon any prey in need to satisfy this thirst for righteous"good-willing".  

Faryal is tough, Afghanistan is harsh. Simone is determined.

Now cultural negotiation begins for real.

A Pashto clan leader helped as an intermediary.

Letters signed by ministers from Aviation and Defense Department provided security.

Cooperation with controlling Turkish forces made the actual flying possible.

Slowly Simone and Faryal could define themselves, sharing the same dream.

It took a month to do.

No more men, mothers or officials in their way.

They met on the ground, found a platform, made it closer to the plane.

Faryal finally took off. She steered the airplane out over Kabul.

She smiled, threw up, wiped off, laughed and flew on.

 Ò1001 Nights 2002Ó succeeded in its claim for anyone to fly anywhere at any time.

No matter what.

The skies reclaimed!

Tin-tinism and postcolonial flair being a flirting bonus a year when aviation celebrates 100 years.

The Wright brothers took off 1903.

Where did it take us?

Simone Aaberg Kærn/ Magnus Bejmar