I Hope You're Happy

This post is the conclusion of another blogpost I wrote earlier, titled "Real Beauty".

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I really do hope you're happy.

In a parallel world, we could be curled up on a couch, eating pizza and watching bad chick flicks which you picked out.

We could have had those annoyingly cheesy "no you hang up" conversations until one of us got cut off by the phone service provider because we ran out of credit.

We could have gone to those fund raisers you're so fond of and raised money for one of your good causes even though I was out of money and had to wake up early and all those excuses I'd have made up, but you'd have made me go anyway and earned my begrudged respect.

You could have met my friends and I would have tutored you on all our inside jokes so you wouldn't feel left out.

You'd have done the same with your friends, if you knew what was good for you.

I'd have come to your office on your birthday and made an embarrassing scene and maybe set your things on fire like Ross did to Rachel that one time.

Actually, come to think of it, I'd probably have found an excuse to make a giant gesture every other day because that's what I do.

You'd have shamed me into giving away half my money to homeless people and beggars on our way to dinner, so that we'd only have enough money to share an appetizer and a glass of water, having fits of laughter at the disgusted expression on the waiter's face.

We'd have a private language that no one else understood.

We'd be that couple who everyone else would use as an example for true love.

We would have had inexplicable fits of laughter over random things that only make sense in our heads.

You would have played your really bad music on my car's speakers and somehow I wouldn't mind because you're enjoying it.

We'd have long fights about very stupid trivialities and not talk for days until we intentionally forget about the fight because one of us had a joke or a funny situation to share and couldn't wait any longer for childish disagreements to resolve themselves.

You'd drag me kicking and screaming to go shopping with you and I'd jokingly mumble all the way there and then inexplicably have fun, even though you'd clean out my wallet doing the activity I hate most in the world (shopping, not cheating on me).

I'd proudly present you to everyone I know as the girl I plan on spending the rest of my life with.

We'd have a far away wedding and a serious discussion about the 12 people we plan on inviting.

We'd grow old together and have that happily ever after ending with the kids and the dog and the riding off into the sunset.

You wouldn't think this post was creepy.

But life doesn't work out that way. We don't always get what, or who we want. In a perfect, parallel universe, we'd be together and we'd be happy. But this is the real world, and you're with him and there's no way to change that. All I can do is hope he makes you as happy as I would have made you.

No, I don't mean to make you feel like you missed out, I genuinely wish that.

I will always be grateful to you for letting me know that I can have a relationship like that, and...

I wish you a long and happy life with someone else.

Home - وطني

A letter sent home by an Egyptian soldier in WWII; in Arabic and English (scroll down for English). In the memory of my grandfather; the inspiring, self-made humanitarian who rose high in the UN but who was always a simple farmer at heart, and who has urged me to write in Arabic several times.

This is the first time for me to publish a post in Arabic, so I would appreciate any feedback. (You should try listening to "Take Me Home" By John Denver (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vrEljMfXYo) while reading the English version; it compounds the effect. I know that sounds pretentious, but it really did for me).

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عزيزتي الغالية،

لقد ارتحت كثيراً عندما تلقيت رسالتك الأخيرة، فإن أخبارك منقطعة  عني منذ فترةٍ طويلة، وانت تعلمين كم أقلق عندما أتخيل أن مكروه قد أصابك وأنا بعيد عنك وغير قادر على نجدتك. أمازلتي مريضة؟ اتمنى أن تكونين بخير عندما يصلك هذا الخطاب.

 في رسالتي الأخيرة أخبرتك انني قد وصلت إلى قاعدة الأسكندرية العسكرية، ولكن عندما تصلك هذه الرسالة سأكون بالقرب من الجبهة في طرابلس. لقد اضطررت أن أرسل هذا الخطاب من الأسكندرية، لأنني غالباً لن اتمكن من إرسال أي رسائل في الفترة القادمة... لا تقلقي، فإني لن اشارك في أي هجوم؛ فقد اعطاني الإنجليز مهام حراسية في نقطة حراسة في الطريق إلى تونس. أرجو أن تخبري عائلتي كي لا يقلقوا علي.

استيقظت اليوم مفتقداً وطني. في البداية كان إحساساً ملحاً، ضاغطاً على أعصابي، طالباً جزء من تفكيري. حاولت بشتى الطرق أن اشغل نفسي، ولكني فشلت في التغلب عليه، وظل يزداد ويزداد في إلحاحه حتى شغل عقلي وكياني بالكامل، وملأني بالحزن والكأبة حتى أردت أن استسلم لتلك المشاعر وانهار تماماً، منهمكاً في همومي... ولكن بالطبع، الجيش لا يتقبل مثل هذه الأعذار، فضغطت على نفسي وشرعت أكمل مهامي اليومية في الوحدة، مثل حفر الخنادق وتنظيف أرض ثكناتي وتنظيف بندقيتي... ولكن مثل هذه الأعمال تركت لي مطلق الحرية لأن أفكر في مشاغلي، وبالطبع بدأت أفكر في وطني. 

أين أبدأ؟ بالمساحات الخضراء الواسعة، حيث قد زرع الفلاحون محاصيلهم من قمح وشعير وقطن من شهورٌ مضت، وحيث هواء الخريف المنعش كفيل بشفاء أي داء قد يصيب المرء؟ كنت قد تعودت أن أتجول يومياً في هذه الحقول بعد صلاة الفجر وأنا عائدٌ إلى بيتي، ماراً بعيدان القمح التي تميل أكثر وأكثر إلى الذهبية ريثما ترتفع الشمس في عنان سماء زرقاء اللون خالية من السحب ومليئة بالأمل، مانحةً للدنيا ألواناً لا حصر لها، راسمةً إبتسامة على شفتي. كانت حياتي سهلة... لا أعتقد انني كان عندي أي هموم. كل ما كان علي فعله هو أن  أرعى محصولي المتواضع وعائلتي المتواضعة بالمثل.

 ولكن ليس هذا ما يحزنني.

لعلي افتقد والدي، وضحكاته المدوية وهو يخسر في لعبة الطاولة من عم ابراهيم جارنا. أكاد أتخيله الآن، جالس القرفصاء أمام المنزل على الحصيرة، وكوب الشاي الساخن المعسول بشدة بجانبه... قد حذرته كثيراً من إضافة هذا الكم الهائل من السكر إلى الشاي، خاصةً لأنه يعاني من مرض السكر، ولكنه دائماً كان يربت على بطنه ضاحكاً، مستبعداً مخاوفي، قائلاً "أنا صحتي زي الحصان". كان قد اعتاد أن يوقظني كل يوم لصلاة الفجر مزمجراً، ناظراً إلي بسخط، لظنه انني لن أصحو بمفردي إذا لم يوقظني هو. "حتروح النار من غيري" كانت جملته الشهيرة. اتمنى ألا اضطر أن أصحو بمفردي من غيره... اتمنى أن يكون بخير.

أو ربما افتقد أمي. أمي الحنونة الجميلة العطوفة. في صغري، عندما كان أبي يضربني لارتكابي أحد حماقات الأطفال، كانت تعنفه وتحتضني بشدة لتحميني، وتؤرجحني برفق حتى أتوقف عن البكاء، وتقبل آلامي وتطوقني في درع آمن يحميني من مصائب الحياه، حيث لا قذائف ولا رشاشات ولا قنابل ولا أشلاء قتلى ولا أصدقاء أموات. كانت نظرة واحدة إلى وجهها النضر المبتسم كل صباح كفيلةً بأن تجعل حياتي سعيدة... فقد وهبت حياتها لترعاني أنا واخوتي. اتمنى أن يرعوها بدورهم... سوف أعنف أحمد بشدة إذا عدت لأجدها تشتكي من أي شيء، فقد تم الخامسة عشرة من عمره، ولم يعد طفلاً... يعلم الله انني لم أكن لاتطوع في الجيش الإنجليزي إلا لرغبتي أن أخفف عنهم و اكسب بعض المال لأصرفه عليهم.

أو لعلي افتقد اخوتي... كان أحمد كسولاً طوال حياته، ولكني أظن أن هذا لأنه يعرف انني موجود وقادر على دعم العائلة بمفردي... و لكنني الآن ببعيد، وأظنه سيكون قادراً على المسؤولية.
على الجانب الأخر، يسعى محمد بكل ما يملك من جهد أن يساهم في دعم الأسرة، ولكنه ما زال صغير جداً على الأحمال الذي يتطلبها العمل في الحقل، فإنه غير قادر على حمل الفأس الثقيلة بمفرده، فضلاً عن رعونته الطبيعية، حتى أنه قد صار من أهم مهامي اليومية أن  أخبئ الأدوات منه حتى لا يؤذي نفسه. وبالطبع لا يمكن أن أنسى اخواتي الأصغر؛ فاطمة وهنية... يثبون من حجرة إلى حجرة في المنزل، يغنون بأصوات طفولية شبيهة بأصوات العصافير التي تنشر البهجة والسعادة في فجر يوم كئيب غيوم... حتى أبي الصارم ذو الضحكة النادرة ما يلبث أن يراهم حتى تنكشف أسنانه في إبتسامة عريضة، فيحملهم و يداعبهم ويدغدغهم... وهو أمر غريب جداً لأنه كان هينهرني عندما كنت أحاول احتضانه في طفولتي، صائحاً: "الحاجات دي للستات". لكني أحبه، فإنه رجل صالح.

و ليس ببعيد أن أكون لقريتي مفتقداً... للميدان الرئيسي للقرية، حيث يتجمع أهالي القرية كل ليلة أمام النار (بالرغم من أن عندنا ساعتين من الكهرباء كل مساء)، يتسامرون ويتبادلون القصص والطرائف، حيث يتجمع الشيوخ ويعطوا الدروس الدينية والمواعظ ويسردون علينا قصص السلف الصالح، حيث يعرف كل الناس بعضهم البعض ويتبادلون الأخبار والسؤال عن الأحوال، حيث ضيافةً لا حد لها وحيث يتسارع الناس ليتعازموا على الطعام والشراب، بالرغم من بساطته. أعرف تماماً أنهم سيعتنون بأسرتي تمام الإعتناء، ولكني ما زلت أظن أن أحمد قادر على ذلك بمفرده.

ولكن الألم الذي أحس به أكبر من كل هذا.

تفكرت كثيراً عسى أن اميز ما يحزنني، وأخيراً تمكنت من ذلك... فبالرغم من أهمية كل ما سبق في حياتي، تبقى هناك جانب مهم جداً، ربما كان أهم من كل ما قلته حتى الآن. فجأة أدركت انني كنت قد حجبت هذا الجزء عن تفكيري عامداً، فربما لم أكن قادراً على مواجهته حتى تلك اللحظة... فإذا به كيان قائم بذاته، يشع بضوء الشمس ساطعاً، مطالباً بانتباهي... ولكني عندما انتبهت إليه إختفى، تاركاً خلفه فراغ كبير في قلبي، لا يملؤه أي من الناس الذين قد ذكرت.

افتقدهم جميعاً، ولكن كان إشتياقي إليك مهيمناً على قلبي... فإن لا حرب ولا دمار ولا قنابل قادرة بأن تنسيني ضحكتك المرحة وابتسامتك البيضاء البراقة؛ أو شعرك الداكن البني اللامع، مجعدٌ برقة و عاكسٌ لشمس الظهيرة (بالرغم من ربطة رأسك التي أكرهها)؛ وعينيك البنية المبهرة، مليئةٌ بالسرور والتفاؤل والبراءة. عندما أنظر اليهما، أرى إمرأة جميلة لا تعرف مدى تأثيرها علي... أرى إمرأة أقوى بكثير مما تبدو، ومما تظن. أرى إمرأة عاقلة ورزينة، ولكني أرى أيضاً فتاة مليئة بالفرحة، ما زالت في ريعان طفولتها، مرحةً وسعيدة بدون أي متطلبات. أرى إمرأة ذات حياه بسيطة مثل حياتي، ولكنها قنوعة ولا تريد أكثر مما تملك. أرى إمرأة لا تربط سعادتها بالماديات وكماليات العصر الحديث، فهي سعيدة في جميع الأحوال؛ سعيدة وهي تأكل المشويات الغالية مثل الملوك، وسعيدة بنفس القدر وهي تأكل الفول وعيش الشعير المتبقي من عشاء الأمس. 

أرى إمرأة كل ما تريده من حياتها هو أنا.

وهي كل ما أريده من حياتي.

في تلك اللحظة، وعيت انني افتقد بيتي، لأني افتقدك أنت... فإن اليوم الذي يتوقف فيه قلبي عن النبض بحبك، سأكون فيه من الأموات.

فأنت حياتي، وبيتي، و وطني.

بكل حب،
بندق العسكري الفلاح من سنة 1942

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Dearly beloved,

I was so relieved when I got your last letter; I had not heard from you in a long time and you know I cannot bear thinking that something has happened to you when I am away and unable to help. Please do not make me wait so long again... How is your cold? I know you were feeling a bit under the weather, but hopefully by the time this letter is delivered you will be feeling better. Last time I wrote you, I had just arrived at the military base in Alexandria, but by the time you read this I will have already arrived near the front-lines in Tripoli. I had to send this letter before I left the base because I might not have had a chance to send it later. Do not worry about me... I am not going to be part of any offensive. I will be stationed at a guard post on the road to Tunis, so I will not have any combat duties (as far as I know). Please let my family know so they would not worry.

I woke up today, missing home. At first it was like a insistent nagging at the back of my mind, but then it started bothering me, like a hangnail or a blister that I could not get rid of. No matter how hard I tried or how busy I tried to make myself, I could not shake off the feeling. It grew more and more in intensity until it was all I could do not to curl up in a ball, overwhelmed by melancholy and longing... But of course, such behavior is not tolerated in the corps. So I had to grit my teeth and busy myself with my daily duties; standing guard, digging ditches, sweeping my barracks and cleaning my gun. Such physical labor gave me a chance to think, and my mind naturally wandered off to home.

Where to start? The wide, open fields of wheat and cotton and barley, where the crisp, clean country air can cure a man from any disease? The long strolls I would take every morning after Salat Al-Fajr, whistling a merry tune and walking at a leisurely pace between the long wheat stalks, turning gradually golden as the rising sun cast its first rays of light upon them, lending color to a grey world and giving shape to an increasingly blue, cloudless sky. Looking back, I doubt I had a care in the world. Life was easy. I only had to tend to my moderate crop and care for my ageing parents. But when I thought about it, this is not what I was missing when I wrote this letter.

Maybe it was my father... his booming laughter as he played backgammon with our neighbor 'am Ibrahim, with his glass of strong sweet mint tea on the floor beside him where he sat cross-legged. I have told him a hundred times to stop adding so much sugar to his tea because of his diabetes, but he always gave a loud chuckle, slapped his belly and loudly proclaimed that he is "as strong as a horse". He would wake me up for Salat El-Fajr with a scowl every day because I almost always miss it if he does not wake me up, and he claims I would go to hell if he was not there to remind me. I hope he is always there to wake me up.

Or maybe it was mother. Matronly, caring, sweet mother. As a child, whenever my father would start hitting me because I had done something wrong, she would stop him and hug me protectively, rocking gently back and forth to calm me down until I stopped crying, kissing away my hurts and worries and enclosing me in a safe bubble where nothing can hurt me, where there are no mortar shells or machine gun fire or torn limbs or dead friends. One look at her kind smile in the morning, and my day is made. She only exists to care for me and my siblings... I hope they are taking good care of her. I will give Ahmed a good beating when I come back if he is not. He is 15; not a child anymore. God knows, the only reason why I volunteered in the British army is to support them.

Or is it my siblings? Lazy Ahmed, always reluctant to toil under the bright, warm sun. I know he was only being lazy because he knew I was always there to pick up the slack, but now there is no me and I know he will pull through. Mohammed, although younger, has always been more responsible... but a 10 year old boy would not know how to use a pick or would hurt himself trying. I always had to hide the tools from him because he was always eager to help but so clumsy that he almost always hurt himself. Then there are little Fatma and Hania, always skipping around cheerfully in the house, loudly singing in high-pitched childish voices and bringing joy wherever they go, like a pair of swallows on a particularly gaunt and foggy dawn. Even my stern, unyielding father would smile in spite of himself and lift them up and tickle them. That is saying a lot; when I tried to hug him as a child he would yell at me and say "hugging is for girls"... but his heart is in the right place.

Or maybe it is the village at night... the village square, where there is always a bonfire going even though we get electricity for two hours every night now. The village elders would sit around the fire and trade stories of times long gone; sheikhs giving religious advice and lessons; elderly women trading gossip. Everyone knows everyone else, and people always inquire after each others' health, genuinely concerned and wishing each other the best. Everyone invites everyone else over for tea and a humble meal; hospitality is unparalleled, and as sacred as their daily prayers... they would help support my family in my absence, I know... but Ahmed is man enough to do it on his own.

But the hurt in my heart was because of none of these things.

Once I had considered all these aspects of my existence, one part stood out. Arguably, the biggest part... glowing bright and warm inside my aching heart, expanding wider and wider, demanding my immediate attention. Once I started thinking about it, the glow was gone, to be replaced by a yawning, dark abyss of nothingness, swallowing up the memory of everyone I know, except one.

I miss everyone and everything else, but nothing holds a candle to you, my love. No war or death or bombs can make me forget your dazzlingly bright smile; your shiny, wavy ringlets of dark brown hair (covered by that hairnet I hate so much); and your cheerful, bright brown eyes; full of wonder and youth and possibilities. When I look into them I see a beautiful woman who is unaware of the effect she has on me. I see a woman who is a lot stronger than she looks, and stronger than she thinks she is. I see a mature woman, but I also see a happy, frolicking little girl, full of dreams and unspoiled innocence. I see a woman who is always happy; who has a simple life -like mine- but who would not trade it for the world. A woman who does not tie her happiness to personal belongings or materialistic wealth. A woman who would be just as happy having a kingly dinner of kabab and kofta as she would be eating leftover barley bread and beans. A woman who wants nothing but me.

And I want nothing but her.

And that's when I realized that I was homesick, but homesick for you most of all.

The day my heart stops beating for you, know that I will be amongst the dead. My heart is yours, now and forever, and if home is where the heart is, then you are;
my love,
my life,
and my home.

Sincerely,
Homesick 1942-Villager-Bondok


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Of Love and Horses and Shit

Horseback riding is not easy. Even though I'm a fairly fit person in and in good physical condition, I have been unable to move for the past two days because of a wild gallop on one of the stupidest horses I've ever been on. Please allow me a completely unnecessary digression to explain why horseback riding is awesome, but really not for everyone.

When you watch a medieval war movie, you never spare the knights a second glance. Sure, they look impressive on their charging horses, armored heavily and slashing left and right with their swords, but that's all. They're just cavalry. Right? Wrong. I've always been intrigued by old societies such as feudal Europe and feudal Egypt (the Egyptian Mamluks, one of whom happened to be my great great grandfather). They always used to hold knights in great esteem, and I never understood why. Essentially they're just soldiers, and I didn't see why they held a rank higher than the other soldiers just because they were on horses.

That gallop made me understand.

Let me paint you a picture: the horse is nervous and tired, and thus unresponsive to your commands. When you pull on the reins it turns with you well enough, but getting it to stop is almost impossible even when you pull viciously on the reins, and if it stops it won't move until it's whipped by its handlers. You wouldn't have these problems with a properly trained horse, but in war all horses instinctively behave similarly. Anyway, the horse is not your only problem; the saddle is extremely uncomfortable and there are bits of iron jutting out on the seat, making you uncomfortable at best and in agony at worst when the horse is moving at a canter, because you keep getting jarred on those steel irregularities as you jump up and down in your seat due to the horse's pace. When it picks up the pace and starts going at full gallop, your only option as a guy who wants to retain his reproductive capabilities is to take a half-seat position where you half-stand up on your stirrups, gripping the horse with your knees and leaning forward so that you're not sitting anymore. But watch out, because when you do that, your lower back usually gets jarred against the steel back-support of the saddle, which will give you nasty bruises. After that, if you're riding a fast horse, it's all you can do to grab the saddle horn and hold on for dear life. The saddle horn is, of course, made of steel and hence raises blisters and bloodies your hand and makes your wrists go sore, but it sure beats falling over and getting trampled by the other horses at your rear. Not only that, but there's an uncomfortable knot in the stirrups that stabs you in your leg repeatedly and you can't remove your leg from the stirrups unless you're fond of painful deaths, and the stirrups themselves are made of steel and they bite painfully into your foot. Moreover, you're forced to match the pace of all the other riders so you don't lag behind, and all the other riders seem to have comfortable saddles as opposed to the medieval torture device you happen to be sitting on, so they gallop at full speed, heedless of your pain and suffering.

Forty five minutes of this made me tired as hell. The effort of sitting in an upright position against the horse's frantic acceleration makes your back muscles scream for mercy, and your wrists, and your biceps, and especially your legs because you're doing a half-stand. The physical toll is considerable; all your muscles are sore, you're walking bow-legged, you're bruised all over and all you want to do is sleep. Imagine doing all of this for hours, while also heavily armored in unyielding steel armor which can cook you alive under a summer noon sun, while also swinging a heavy steel sword and being generally expected to land killing blows every now and then. I get it now, and I have a lot more respect for knights than I used to.

All of this just to say that I'm still sore all over, even though that was two days ago. The gallop was more exhausting than a whole week at the gym; my body seems to say.

But for some reason, as I sit here in the least uncomfortable position I can manage, I started thinking of cheesy stuff. Maybe because I've just watched a particularly cheesy episode of The Office, or because cheese is my default setting. Regardless, it seems to me that -much like horseback riding- people seem to have forgotten how love works. You have TV shows and movies romanticizing the giant gestures such as the cliched racing-to-the-airport-to-confess-undying-love. I'm not going to claim that the value of such gestures is to be completely discounted, but I don't think this is what love is really about.

It's natural to want to be with the person you love, but the feeling is not always mutual. Sometimes the other person does not feel the same way, and you're left with an uncomfortable choice; either to move on or to get even more invested in trying to get them to feel the same way. What I believe is that the latter is childish. Yes, we're not robots and it's perfectly normal for a person to at least try, but usually when it fails we try again, and again, and again, to the point where it's more an obsession than actual feelings. People usually start asking themselves "how do I get her/him to love me" instead of asking important questions, like "how do I make myself a better person and maybe one day they'll see it too". People completely disregard their pride and they get more and more invested to the point where they start resenting themselves for it later when they move on.

Like I said, I feel like this a childish approach to love; the love of a child for a toy he/she just has to have. Possession is not love. I don't like that saying that goes "if you love her let her go, if she never comes back then she was never yours to begin with" because it still implies that you're waiting for her to come back. That, again, is not love. Maybe she's happier when she's not with you... if you really love her, you'd rather she stays happy away from you than than be miserable with you. I know it sounds too holier than thou, and I won't claim to be so selfless myself, but I think it's how everyone should at least try to feel; it's simply the most selfless way to love someone.

Ask yourself this: if there was a way to help someone you love, which would be more important to you; that you help them, or that they know about it? More often than not, the honest answer is "that they know about it", because we seek their approval and we want them to know that we cared enough to help. Think of all the people you think you love, and -in my opinion- only the people where you can honestly answer "that you help them" are truly important to you. Getting someone a job interview without them knowing because they'd be too proud to accept your help if they knew; that's true love. Donating blood to someone without them knowing; that's true love. Even something as simple as wishing that a girl/guy you're in love with is happy -even if it's with someone else- counts for a lot, because they wouldn't know about it and that's what I think is what matters.

For years as a child, I thought my grandma was unbeatable at playing cards because that's what my dad used to say. She used to beat me all the time, and I used to stomp my feet and cry and sulk and to not want to play with her. As the years went by and I got older, and better at playing cards, I started beating her more often and I started wondering why I'd always thought she was so formidable... until one day, when I was spectating a game between her and my dad. He'd always lost to her, and I didn't understand why because when I played him he used to wipe the floor with me. It was only when I looked at his cards and saw him deliberately using the wrong cards and missing out on chances that I understood that he was letting her win, and of course she had no idea. This reputation that she was unbeatable was carefully cultivated just to make her feel adept at something. All he cared about was that she laughed and felt good when she beat him, and that's all that mattered to him.

That, in a nutshell, is what I think love is.

The greatest deeds in love go unrewarded.

Real Beauty

She is so much more than just beautiful.

Our notion of beauty derives from standing out. In any given society, in any given country, most people have a certain look, derived from its people's gene pool -this theory obviously excludes largely cosmopolitan populations such as the populations of New York or Dubai or London. Usually each country has certain defining genetic characteristics regarding height, build, eye color, hair color, etc. We usually view a person as beautiful or attractive when they stand out from the group. Again, this is not always the case. This is not to claim that ONLY people who look different are attractive, and other people can suck it. It is just an observation... for example, someone with a tan isn't looked at twice in Argentina, while in Norway they would be considered very attractive. That doesn't mean that all white people living in Norway are considered ugly scum unfit for love and compassion, but odds are that a tanned person is more likely to be attractive to Norwegians than just another white Norwegian. Perhaps a radical view, but one which I've come to notice in most countries I have visited. Similarly, in most of the Arab world, being white is usually synonymous with being beautiful, due to the fact that being white is not very common.

Due to that unfortunate fact, some Egyptians would not call her beautiful. She's cute, certainly (they would say) but she looks so "normal". Ordinary. One of a million- or rather, one of 90 million. Since it would take a very long time to track down each idiot who says that and punch them, I'm going to do it here in writing instead. You see, you ignorant, pathetic, equally-tanned, hypocritical excuses for Egyptian males (whose taste I share, shamefully), it takes much more than a tan to make a girl "ordinary". We live in Egypt, we're all tanned. If you don't get tanned, you die of skin cancer; it's an evolutionary mechanism. If anything, from a Darwinian point of view, your going for a white girl decreases your offsprings' chances of survival and hence -from a purely evolutionary standpoint- natural selection is gonna have some fun with you and yours.

I can't expect you to see beyond your veil of koshary-fuelled ignorance and notice how beautiful her eyes are. No, they don't have to be wide blue eyes. They're almond shaped  brown eyes, juuuuuust  the right shade to make you crave something chocolaty. Highly intelligent eyes, which seem to have the ability to figure you out and see right through you within five minutes of meeting you. I can't expect you to appreciate how playfully seductive she is when she plays around with her ringlets of wavy, brown hair, twirling it further and further into tighter curls that spring bouncily back to their original artful tumble; unpretentious and fun and low-maintenance while still managing to look elegant. I can't expect you to see how even her "common" tanned, dark skin is unblemished, smooth and soft as velvet. But most of all, I can't expect you to notice her smile, o clueless unworthy Egyptian male idiot. When she smiles, her whole face smiles. You can tell, because she gets that twinkle in her eyes and her right cheek twitches slightly as her lips part to show a pristine set of gleaming, perfect teeth -in stark contrast to her dark complexion- complimenting the glint in her eyes and compounding the effect to make you inwardly moan because any time now, she is going to stop smiling and you will fall back in the terrible, dark abyss where you dwelled before she started smiling.

But as I said before, she is so much more than just beautiful. And far from being "unremarkable", she is -no matter how you look at it- extraordinary.

When I look at her, I see a burning passion for what she does. In her eyes, I see more than pretty, smiling, intelligent eyes; I see a fiery will and determination burning as bright as any star, announcing to the world that "I am here and I am going to succeed". I see a constant need for self-improvement. I see a strong, assertive character that manifests itself in a nonthreatening way that instead of antagonizes other assertive personalities, manages to win them over to her side willingly, where they are glad to cooperate as peers and equals. I see a very helpful person who will go to extreme lengths to lend a hand to whoever needs it, but still makes sure not to be taken for granted. I see a girl with all the tools to succeed in life, who does whatever it takes to get things done, yet still manages to make it look effortless and laugh about it. I see an intellect that is so obviously a match for my own, which in all modesty is not a common occurrence, yet she never comes across as arrogant... and while we're at it, her laugh is extremely contagious and her sense of humor is so well-developed that I can honestly say that she is one of literally four girls I know who can actually make me laugh.

Every time I see her, she grows more and more beautiful in my eyes. And every time, my respect for her grows. She is not one of 90 million Egyptians- she is one IN 90 million Egyptians.

Conventional beauty will fade, but what she has is infinitely more enduring.

So you see, my visually (and mentally) impaired Egyptian friend, beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder.

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I know several girls who are going to read this post and think it's about them, and I find it very ironic that you're probably not gonna read it. But maybe one day I'll show it to you, and you'll know I meant every word I said.

22/10/2014 Edit: No, I will never show you this post now. For both our sakes.

Bondok's View of Life in Your 20s

Please note that this is simply my point of view, which you have the right to agree or disagree with.

Right off the bat, I'm gonna go ahead and shoot the elephant in the room up its massive butthole with a shotgun that shoots little shotguns;

I may be biased.

The fact that I am currently not hopelessly and irrevocably in love with anyone -anyone who isn't fictional, that is- might slightly cloud my judgement. Maybe this article would go a lot differently if I were one of the lucky ones who met their soul mates on a rainy day when they offered to share their umbrella or at a restaurant when they were both stood up by their blind dates or on the titanic when it sank and there was only one plank left floating and the bitch claimed it all for her fat, selfish ass- I'm getting sidetracked. My point is, the hopeless romantic in me admits that there maybe another valid point of view, which I would only agree with if I were in a loving, committed relationship with a girl I couldn't wait to spend the rest of my life with. But I'm not, so here goes.

I personally know several people who got married. I personally know even more people who are currently engaged. It's a person's basic right, they're quite within their rights to do it. I wish them all the happiness in the world, and I hope they enjoy the wild journey they're about to embark upon, and I'd really like to ask them out for dinner some time so they can give me tips on how to handle this pesky cardiac arrest habit I seem to have developed in response to whenever any girl starts getting too commitmenty with me. However, this is where it ends. I cannot see myself in their shoes, and even if I'd already met the girl I knew I wanted to marry, I doubt I'd be getting chained down at this point in my life.

What I've unfortunately felt recently is that the concept of marriage has devolved into some kind of competition. That's not to say that all people who get married do it to win some game, but it's definitely embedded into the psychology of 8 out of every 10 girls I know that she needs to draw the winning lottery ticket as quickly as possible before some imaginary deadline. I happen to personally know several examples of such girls, and I've had many pants-shittingly terrifying experiences with a couple of them, without going into too much detail. They all seemed to want to force a connection between us -a connection that wasn't there- just to meet some imaginary obligation only they could feel. 

In no time at all, the concept of marriage has changed from a proclamation of mutual love to the entire world to an opportunity to change your relationship status on Facebook and post some wedding photos with annoying captions like "my one and only, forever together <3" to try and make as many people as possible feel lonely and unfulfilled.

Speaking as a member of your target audience, I have to say I'm unimpressed. The fact that you're happily in love should matter only to you, not to your entire Facebook entourage. News flash: the pictures you share either induce indifference, jealousy, depression or "hide from newsfeed". If you were truly in love, you would generally not feel the need to obsessively share it on every social media outlet you have access to. If, on the other hand, you are only settling for the best option you currently have, then I feel sorry for you and go ahead and share the pictures so you can blunt the pain of the mistake you're going to have to spend the rest of your life dealing with. You'll have to forgive my bluntness, but that is exactly what people seem to forget about marriage.

If you're secure in your knowledge that you've picked the right person, I congratulate you. If you still haven't picked, then here are some warnings I hope you'll bear in mind:

MARRIAGE IS FINAL.

THERE IS NO GOING BACK.

YOUR LIFE AS YOU KNOW IT IS OVER.

IT'S NOT ABOUT TAKING SOME SELFIES AND MAKING BABIES "BECAUSE HOW HARD COULD IT BE"?

Imagine, if you will, going to buy a pizza. You go to your favorite Italian pizza place and order a Quattro Formaggi pizza. The manager -who is running a terrible business model, admittedly- asks you to make sure your decision is final, because he will only ever serve you Quattro Formaggi pizzas from then on. One could argue that you could go to a different pizza place, but then one could get the fuck out of my narrative because this is MY tortured metaphor. Anyway, even a decision as trivial as this one -if you think about it- is not easy to make. What if I crave a pepperoni pizza? What if I get tired of blue cheese? Would I really like to spend the rest of my life eating THIS PIZZA, and nothing else? Wouldn't I eventually swear off pizza altogether?

The point is that a person's point of view changes a lot between the ages of 19 to 25... what was acceptable to you a year ago could make you roll your eyes or have a fit today. We are in a phase when our brains are maturing and we are deciding who we are, what we want in life and who we want to share it with. Maybe you hate blue cheese today but then a couple of months from now you'll start liking it. God knows, this exact thing happened to me this year. I'm sure you're not here to explore my adventures with blue cheese, but it's relevant: nothing is certain in this age range because we ourselves are ever-changing. Our tastes change, our wants change, our needs change. To choose a life partner at this age would be like getting a tattoo of a burger on your forehead because it seemed like a good idea at the time, when you were a (hungry and retarded) teenager, except that you're stuck with it for the rest of your life... unless you undergo a very painful and expensive procedure; divorce, in this metaphor.

Where is the logic in getting married before you know what you want in life? In my case, for example, I am currently working in a field that is as far removed from my college major as it gets. I'm at an uncertain stage in my career, and am unsure if I want to continue down that path or change my career altogether. I'm unsure where I'll live; maybe in Egypt, maybe in Europe, why not the Gulf, possibly the States. With so many variables, I would be insane to make such a decision now, when even my livelihood can still be called into question. How could I commit to supporting a family when I'm not even fully capable of supporting myself yet?

And you know what? I like that I have no idea what I want to do with my life. I like that there is no user's guide that I should follow. I like that I can do anything I want because I'm in my 20s. Now is the time to explore all the viable options, and make an affordable mistake or two. If not now, when?!

Marriage is responsibility, marriage is saying goodbye to your nonchalant spontaneity and independence. Overnight, you've suddenly forfeited your financial freedom and your control over your own life, and all of a sudden every decision you make affects two people, and it only gets harder from there if you decide to have kids.

Compare that suffocating reality to the life of a young adult bachelor, whose only dilemma is what to try next; where to live next; what to do next. No strings attached, no one to answer to. If you should decide to pack up and move to Europe tomorrow, who's stopping you? If you were to decide to go backpacking through East Asia (Europe is too mainstream), who would you have to convince? No one. You only answer to you, and that is priceless. At least to me. Over the past 22 years, I've visited 16 countries and I don't intend to stop there. In fact, the more I travel, the more I ache for more travel (maybe my blog's background picture should have given that away). I love getting familiar with foreign culture and history. Most importantly, I love meeting new people abroad, and that is never going to change for me. I live in a permanent state of wanderlust, and even though I was in Greece three weeks ago, I'd jump on a plane tomorrow and go anywhere else if I could take a few days off work. The day I stop travelling is the day I die, and it's something I've learned about myself because I've allowed myself to explore rather than got chained down at a needlessly young age.

Again, if you already know who you want to marry, I'm not convincing you to break up with them... but give yourself some breathing space! If you both know you're in love and getting married, why do you have to do it now? If you have to prove your intentions, then it feels more like a financial transaction than a marriage. Which I suppose is a huge part of marriage anyway.
Don't get me wrong, I'm the most hopelessly romantic guy in the world. My endless quest to find my "the one" often ends up in my being compared to Ted from How I Met Your Mother. I want the dog and the white picket fence more than most people who actually do have them. But I'm not gonna settle for any girl, she has to be perfect for me and we have to be in love. And I firmly believe that there is a time and place. The time is not until I'm at least 25. And the place is God knows where, because I'm in my twenties. The sky is the limit, and I'm gonna milk that feeling for all it's worth.

And there you have it. That, ladies and gentlemen, is why I will always be against picking out baby names when you should be exploring the world... and more importantly, yourself.

Thank You

*This is a pointed letter, continue at your own risk. Or maybe it's a work of fiction. Meh, your call.
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Thank you.
This is what I realized I hadn't said to you yet.

***

I'm a very passionate person, and anyone who knows me well could probably roll their eyes and provide you with about five stories about that, off the top of their heads and without batting an eyelash. It's true, with girls I'm either indifferent about them or head over heels for them. Not that I show it, mind you, but it's still there. If a girl gets under my skin, she lives there like a parasite leeching off my thoughts and emotional capacity for a life span about as long as this tortured metaphor's. Not only that, but I'm extremely unpredictable. It can take me days to get over a girl who locked eyes with me from across a busy room, hours to get over a girlfriend, months to get over a girl I met for three days.

In other words, you.

Without stressing the point too much, I've only ever been in love once and it didn't end very well. And when I say it didn't end very well, I mean it in the same sense that playing the bagpipes to soothe a raging grizzly bear wouldn't end very well. Long story short, eventually I realized that I hadn't felt that way about any other girl because I'd put up too many defenses and completely given up on the idea of trusting a girl enough to allow myself to like her. Yeah yeah, mushy mushy stuff, blah de blah de blah.

My point being that I was completely unprepared to deal with how you made me feel for the very short period of time that we've known each other for. Not that I felt it immediately, mind you. At first, as always, I was indifferent. You were just someone I had to deal with. It didn't take long to warm up to you, but I'm a friendly guy so I put it down to that and left it there. As time went on, I frequently caught myself looking at you without quite knowing why I was doing it... maybe I was bored and your face was the most pleasant thing around to look at -which it was- but it doesn't make sense because I had to crane my neck to look at you. When we talked, I was actually listening and not secretly thinking about chocolate cake. Whenever we playfully touched, it didn't feel forced. I didn't understand why it bothered me when you were being flirty with other guys.

 Bit by bit, as I started coming out of my shell, I started appreciating how beautiful you are and how there seems to be a haze around you, hiding the immediate universe around your face, overshadowing your surroundings as they fade into complete insignificance beside your radiant smile. Suddenly I'm not just hanging out with you because meh there's nothing good on television -which is my usual motivation to do stuff- but because I actively seek you out because I actually want to be around you. Subtly, without even knowing it, I crossed the border from indifferent to smitten. And I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure you felt the same way.

And just like that, the real world stepped in and it was all over.

I had to take a 37 hour trip back home, which was every bit as exhausting as it sounds- even more so. I didn't have any money because I'd lost my wallet and I'd vowed not to ask my dad for any extra cash. Well, I had a $100 bill I didn't want to break because I wanted to give it back to dad because it was his money (I'd promised myself I'd pay for the trip on my own) and a couple of dollars and a pocketful of cents. I spent 6 hours on the floor at JFK, hungry and sick, surviving on tap water and the stale popcorn and candy bars I bought for my $3.89 (I still remember the number).

But I digress.

You'd left such an impression on me that even as I sat there, coughing my head off and eating cheap popcorn, I had to take out my tablet and start jotting down notes about how I was feeling. I was afraid I would forget the feeling and I wanted to put it down in words as soon as I could. Before I knew it, I was on the flight, and it was all I could do to wait  until I got to Amsterdam to... party, you ask? Get some well-deserved rest from my 37 hour-long journey? Hang out with my best friend who I hardly ever see?

All I wanted to do was get to his house so I could sit down and write that blogpost I wrote a few months ago.

Jet-lagged, hungry, penniless, homeless, sleepy, sick and in fucking Amsterdam, and all I could think of during my 12 hour transit was you and how I couldn't even wait to get back home to write down what I was feeling because I was afraid words would fail me if I waited. I wanted to save that feeling; immortalize it... preserve it. If I could, I would have framed that feeling and hung it up on my bedroom wall, because it was nothing short of a miracle.

This is what I'll always be grateful to you for. I thought I'd never feel that way about anyone else, and you proved me wrong. You proved that I could have chemistry with a girl and like her and be a smitten idiot. You'll always be that girl to me; the girl I wish I could have been with if circumstances had been different. The girl who showed me that there is still a chance for a broken someone like me to -in the everlasting words of Joey Tribbiani- "grab a spoon". You gave me the most valuable gift you could have given me.

You gave me hope.

Which is why you'll always be special to me, and why I will always wonder what could have been.

Cloudy with a Chance of Politics

I woke up.

Let me explain why that's weird.

I am not exactly what you'd call a lucky person. I was born during the Egyptian revolution of 1919 against the British crown. And when I say during, I of course mean while it was happening, but I also mean where it was happening.

The Egyptian Revolution of 1919 is widely accredited for being the first revolution in Egyptian history with active female participation, and it just so happened that my 8-month pregnant mother, God bless her soul - in all her infinite wisdom- decided to participate. Apparently, giving birth to a cumulative litter of 12 children over a very long and productive life of almost 30 years makes a woman... battle-hardened, for lack of a better word.

 At any rate, my mother was marching all over the place, as only a pregnant woman can, lashing out at people with her ample uterus and presumably my head within (which would account for many of my decisions in later life). Her entourage of similarly battle-hardened friends/midwives helped -more like pushed, shoved, pulled and towed- her forward, clearing a wide circle of emptiness around her, much like a penicillin pill would do in a petri dish of E. Coli bacteria; give a person too many tastes of your elbow/knee/my head within a huge uterus, and they would eventually learn to steer clear of the raging pregnant lady and her bodyguards. As if people really need to be warned against that.

It was in that charmingly soothing atmosphere that my mother had her contraction. Just one. One could just as easily cough up a gob of phlegm as it was for her to give birth to me. While standing up. One of the midwives tried to catch me before I hit the ground, but had no such luck. Presumably holding true to the five second rule, she picked me up anyway and wiped me on her galabeyya (traditional Egyptian clothes). There was also the small matter of the umbilical cord, which the midwife was kind enough to bite off. My mother then reportedly pushed ahead through the demonstration to get a larger share of the gunfire, and was rewarded by about 7 poor bullets which probably ricocheted off her balls of steel because she survived and lived to the ripe old age of 90.

What happened to me, you ask? One of the midwives stuck me in her bosom for safe-keeping.

Flash forward 23 years, and the year is 1942. Where am I? You guessed it!

In Alamein, recruited by the British Army to fight in the North Africa campaign, against Rommel, the Desert Fox.

The story of how I got recruited is quite amusing; was I drunk when I applied? No. Was it to pay off a debt? No. Was it to support my wife and 59 children? Also no. My illiterate mother, God bless her soul, got hoodwinked by a desperate British recruitment officer into signing me up, thinking it's a Welfare form; my mother basically fell victim to the world's first Nigerian Prince scam. Well, actually I'm the one who fell victim for it, but that's neither here nor there.

So the 13th of July, 1942 found me in a ditch in Alamein, preparing for a German Panzer offensive. In case you're historically illiterate, the Germans' ace in the hole in World War II were their tanks, and they employed them in Blitzkreig tactics to overwhelmingly efficient results. Efficient for the Germans. Bad for us.

Suddenly, a hand grenade took care of my entire squad, except me because I was conveniently curled in the fetal position behind a concrete wall and singing lullabies to soothe myself. One would think that makes me lucky. One would be wrong because I was then captured by the Germans as I tried to explain that I was only there because my illiterate mother signed me up and I'm really quite a nice guy once you get to know me and would you please stop pulling me so hard.

Not being a stranger to all the stories of what Germans do to their non-Aryan prisoners, I decided to die heroically with a gun in my hand and I snatched one from the soldier who was dragging me along. Just as I prepared to cap a mother fucker, I realized that he was smiling and jabbering away in incomprehensible German. I pulled the trigger, and the pathetic metallic click that followed was almost as comic as the sound a balloon makes as it lets the air out when it's untied.

Just as they were preparing to put me down like a particularly amusing rabid dog who's been chasing his tail for 3 days, I got caught in the middle of a surprise British counter attack and was instead captured by the British, who thought I'd turned traitor because I had a gun and yet failed to cap a mother fucker. So I was then captured by my own army and put to questioning. The only thing that saved my unlucky ass was that they realized the gun was empty before they started the questioning, and that I must have either fired it or run out of ammo. I was dishonorably discharged not long after -which was a way of cheating me of my pay, I suppose- when the North African campaign was over and they rightfully realized that I was useless.

Who should happen to hire me now as a palace guard? Why, King Farouk, of course!

Perhaps thinking that a WWII veteran battalion of palace guards would be more intimidating than 3am 3abdo (the palace doorman), the king then hired all the Egyptian survivors of the Battle of Alamein and posted them in strategic locations around his palaces. I was posted on the doors of Kasr 3abdeen on the 23rd of July 1956. Perhaps that date rings a bell. Perhaps it rings a dozen bells. Perhaps it drives a battalion of tanks towards Kasr 3abdeen, because that's exactly what happened next. You might be surprised to know that staring down the barrel of a hostile tank is not as spiritually fulfilling as we've been led to believe.

The king, being a truly patriotic man (no sarcasm here), surrendered the palace and refused help from the British, famously saying that he would much rather not be king of Egypt than let a single drop of Egyptian blood be spilled. Which was noble and heroic for him, but not so much for me because the next thing I knew was being hit on the head with the butt of a soldier's rifle who seemed to have been sore at his being cheated of his daily quota of Egyptian blood and decided to take it out on me.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I woke up and I wasn't in the palace, or in a prison, or in 1956.

You see, I seem to recall that electricity was invented in 1956.
But I woke up in a dark, candle-lit room with no other source of light whatsoever.
Wow, I must be in the middle ages.

There was an old man sitting by my hospital bed. He didn't seem to know me; he was just there because he was napping and the hospital had no other places for him to sit. I shrugged. Egyptian hospitals will always be the same.

After a few minutes of hoarse yelling, the old man stirred at the cacophony I was making. After a few more minutes of hoarse yelling, he still had no idea what I was saying. I pointed at a calendar on the wall and shrugged, meaning "what day is it?". He said "Wednesday". I pointed at it again. He said Wednesday again.

This went on for a while.

Eventually, he understood me, and to my eternal surprise he said "Wednesday, the 20th of August, 2014". I found a notepad on my nightstand, and I scribbled "how come we don't have electricity anymore?". Thankfully he was literate, and he replied "May God protect our Sissi". I asked why the hospital was so busy. he said "May God protect our Sissi". I asked who Sissi was, he replied "SHHHHHHHH, Do you want to get us both killed?". He then whispered (yelled at the top of his lungs, but he didn't know that) that he's our president. I asked him if we were free of the British, and he said "May God protect our Sissi, he protected us from the Muslim Brotherhood". The man was brainwashed cleaner than a microwaved hard disk. I asked if the hungry were fed and if the unemployment rates were down. He gave the same reply and added that he was hungry and unemployed but as long as Sissi is his lord and savior he shalt be fine. Since Sissi seemed to be such an impressive leader, I asked him the only question to come to a pan-Arab's brain from 1956;
I asked him if Palestine was liberated yet, and the old man laughed so hard he died in his chair. Literally.
I then yelled for help, and the man's family thought I'd killed him and they stabbed me. But I died happily.

You wanna know why? For one thing, it's because it was probably a nightmare and that I would probably wake up again in prosperous, classy and wealthy 1950s Egypt... but also because even the unluckiest wretch who lived in presumably the darkest era of Egyptian history couldn't stand to see 2014, Sissi's Egypt.

May God protect him, of course.