Gorgeous Alien

The tablecloth is damp. No matter..sit outside and enjoy the smell of rain on freshly cut grass..lose at virtual poker and run out of games to play..look up sewing classes..don't book any..you know you're never going to actually sew, don't you?..stare into your cinnamon tea for an eternity, witness it get cold, colder, then really cold..reminisce on the taste of sugar..take a deep breath..wet grass smells like watermelon from your balcony..it always has...
Reassess, it's a favorite pastime..revisit your bank account, anonymous donations aren't unheard of..daydream, at night;it's important..donate some of the fake donation you just received, get rid of your virtual guilt..and now travel.
Travel without bags, with no emotional luggage..go to mars and meet a gorgeous alien..forget about men with fake yellow teeth who dare disappoint you..audacity..what a fab word! Savor it..roll it onto your tongue and enjoy it, just like you enjoy all words..you keep running from words but words keep following you..what an adventure..the thrill of a chase and the volatility of an abstraction..you recently even had a dream complete with a word to explain it..even your dreams now come with a title, with a label, with the utter stupidity of confinement..inescapable confinement..you've tried, but you are confined..the less you say it, the more pressured you feel to admit it..the past is just not easy to escape..a horrendous task with no aids, none in your present anyway..
Tidy up your living room, it's said to lift up spirits..go back to your balcony and light your cig...look up to the sky, witness the passage of a machine..pretend it's a shooting star and wish for mars, for your gorgeous alien and his pearly teeth..

Christmas Battlefield - A Little Late I Know!

I know I am a bit late telling this tale, but it ought to be told nonetheless!

It was supposed to be a regular family Christmas gathering at my grandmother's house in the village, just like every year. And so it had seemed at first. We ate and drank ourselves silly, and then one after the other, the family members started dozing off. Some of us stayed up playing poker and trying our luck for the New Year. Eventually, everyone went to bed except for my cousin, my brother and I. 

Apart from the sound of our glasses clinking against the table, it was almost totally silent. The silence didn't last long though. All of a sudden, we heard a voice coming out from one of the bedrooms. It was our relative, talking in his sleep once again. He had done so a bit earlier when he had dozed off on the couch, so we moved him to the bedroom thinking that it wouldn't occur again if he slept on a comfortable bed.

And oh how mistaken we were!!! I am sure most of you, dear readers, are aware of the fact that Lebanon has had its share of wars and conflicts over the years, and my relative used to work as a security agent for the headquarters of a Lebanese political party. He didn't serve during the war years, but still, the job seemed to leave its marks on him, in his dreams at least. He started calling out for his colleagues. Rachid, Mounir, Bachir, Toufic!!! (And the list of names went on and on and on...)

From what we could gather from the fragments he said aloud, he feared an attack from enemies, and he was trying to warn his friends. That went on for about 15 minutes, but then the situation started escalating in his unconscious. Soon enough he had been captured by the enemy forces, and he was screaming for his allies to come rescue him. Toufic, help! Mounir, don't let them kill me!

Although this may sound sad to you, it wasn't. Not in the least. That may be because we were drunk of course, but still, we managed to turn this scene into a hilarious one! We turned the house into a war zone, and we started adding our own bits to the script and lived the dream with our relative. My brother started making gunfire sounds every time our relative spoke. Pouboupoubov! Pouboupoubov! Pouboupoubov! 

Gradually, the rest of the family members started waking up to the ringing sounds of our laughter. And the script just kept on expanding with vivid details. The memory of the war took an alternative turn, and when we asked another older relative to remind us of the signature Van Halen theme that was used by a popular radio station during the war years with the ever present words "Maktabou el tahrir fi khabarin jadid" - which translates to: the editorial office with a new piece of news - his interpretation literally came as follows: Bichtik Bichtik  Bichtik  Bichtik, Tararararaaaaaaaaa!

Our sleeping relative kept on living the battle, and our minds kept soaring with more and more imagination. My grandmother awoke and proposed to wake our relative from his dream. We advised her to hold a white flag before entering his room. And of course we didn't let her wake him up! This wasn't something we could live every day after all.

We started laying our heads low while moving from room to room to protect ourselves from the bombs. We built illusionary barracks of sand around us to shelter ourselves. We rationed ourselves with all sorts of food before going to hide undergrounds. We lived an imaginary war for one night. We made fun of war and we let our minds and our imagination create a better version of it, a less sour one.

This is by no means a tale to underestimate the gravity of war or to undervalue the bitterness and the sadness our people had to live through. It was just that the opportunity presented itself under relatively better circumstances for us to laugh at war and make at least one nice memory out of it.

It was a Christmas to be remembered. Sadly not all the family members were present due to traveling and work circumstances, so this one is for them, we wish you had been there with us to share these beautiful moments and have a laugh with us over a drink and a losing poker game (at least for me!). Wishing you all a happy 2012.

Because I Have Nothing Better To Do

I considered reading, but I am not in the mood. Instead, I decided to lose my virtual poker chips while listening to depressing songs. 

I am sure you have heard this advice before, but there is no harm in repeating it: Don't listen to depressing songs when you are already depressed. 

I am sure that like myself, you never listen to your own advices. 

Question: Are anxiety and impatience caused by depression, or is depression generated by anxiety and impatience?

Comes a moment when the only people you can stand are the exact same bunch who can't tolerate you at this very moment.

No need to elaborate on the ones you can't currently stand and who, for some reason, won't leave you the hell alone at least till it goes away. What would it be you may ask. I can call it depression but I am not sure if it is the correct term for it.

Whatever it is that I am going through right now, there are some adjectives that can describe it, but no scientific term that I know of that can give it justice by name. It is sad, pathetic and peculiarly mind numbing.

Did I bring this upon myself, or was it merely universal justice?

I am suffocating by the sight of the same people, over and over and over again.

Self esteem: Is it its lack or its abundance that is fueling this feeling?

I am in deep shit, shit caused by arrogance, stupidity and lack of analysis. I just throw myself into impossible situations. I am aware it is my choice. I still blame it on others. 

And where the hell is my stop button?? Just STOP!!

Lack of control. Lack of will. 

French rock tunes. I hope they help me out of this mood.

Do You Believe In Luck?

Do you? I do. I do because I believe in everything that offers both a thesis and an antithesis. 

The thesis goes as follows: You are lucky.

The antithesis is therefore logically: You are unlucky.

Luck. People crave it. People want it more than anything. They want it to interfere with every aspect of their lives. Work, family, cards, games, school, love, finding a cab, buying a house, traveling, lottery, etc...

People even depend on it. Take poker players for example.

Well let us get back to our constant subject, me. Me and my luck. Or my lack of it to be more precise.

Have you ever had the feeling that it is all backfiring on you? That somehow whatever you do and no matter how much effort you devote to your ends, something always gets in the way?

I am sure you have. But I am also sure you have never experienced it for 25 consecutive years.

I have.

My sole wish at the moment is that something, anything, works for me. I don't really care if it is as simple as finding a ride to work easily. Even that will leave me content and most grateful. I am that desperate for some luck in any shape, any.

I would love it if one day I would manage to skip the insomnia part and go right to the part where I snore.

I will wrap it up with this thought in hope it will come to life tonight.

On Boredom and Routine

I don't know how many nights I have spent at this forsaken spot in Sassine Square during the past ten years or so, but a good estimate would be "most of them".

The coffee shop changed. The people who used to come in here changed. The cigarettes shop changed. The taxi drivers who used to drop me off home after long sleepless nights changed. And yet, I am still here. 

My friends joke about it sometimes, they say I am a construction column in this square. They say they could give directions based on my position in here. The second building to the left after Mireille they would say. 

Even when I do have plans for the evening, I end up here afterwards. I can't seem to be able to detach myself from this place. 

This piece of land holds many memories, many souvenirs, good and bad, and the way I see it, I can't move on and leave those moments behind. What if I never get to experience similar moments again? What if in case I move away the memories would fade and I would have no other way to recapture them?

Unemployment only feeds my addiction. Insomnia creeps in on me like a lost shadow, a desired one. I have no reason to wake up tomorrow. I don't have to be anywhere at any given time. So I am here. In the forsaken coffee shop. 

I read a bit. I play some virtual poker. I meet some friends. I have coffee. Then I have Diet Pepsi. A cookie too perhaps.

I am immersed in the music buzzing in my ears. I am enjoying quirky melodies. I am not sure what my taste really is anymore.

I secretly wish something would change. Here or elsewhere. Mostly here though. All of me is screaming for innovation, for surprise, for a thrill of some kind, of any kind.

What is it that I would really like to have most now, I ask myself. Is it money? Is it love? Is it success? Is it merely a job? Is it health?

I ask myself and I don't find the answer. I am not sure what I am craving. I am not sure what exactly is it that I want most, most badly.

Would any of the above do? Would one alone be enough? Is any even possible for such a bored soul?

If a soul is still in there indeed.

I just need change.

The other day, I decided to shower without scrubbing myself. It is a random embarrassing fact I know. But at the spur of the moment, it felt so needed, it felt so secretive, so innovative, so fresh, so liberating. Would anyone notice? Would I smell or something? What would not using a loofah for a day bring to the day? It brought nothing of course, but in the heat of boredom, it felt like it would. It didn't though.

The next day, I decided to take it a notch further. I didn't wash my hair! It is the extent you would go to if you were me. For years, I haven't left the house without washing my hair. I felt itchy the whole day, but that was about it. Nothing else happened following the unthinkable act of not washing my hair.

Tonight, I am flirting with the idea of cutting my hair short. But I won't do it. I don't have enough guts for it. I am such a wimp.

Today I heard dad's war stories for the nth time. I hate to admit it, but to the resonance of those stories, I wish a civil war would take place. It does seem very exciting, thrilling even, all the risks and such.

Page 144. Just a note in order not to forget to mark the passage in the book. I can't seem to find my marker in the mess of my huge purse.

Oh how many sentences and paragraphs have I highlighted so far. To what end? The question hangs in the air.

My mother wanted to take advantage of my time off. She asked me to place my collection of postcards in 2 big bags so she could get them out of her way, and away from me. Not that I ever look at them anymore, but still, now they are far and I can't look at them if I felt like it.

I am just nagging. About nothing and everything. Nagging is in my genes.

I wonder when my phone is going to ring next. Probably tomorrow. But who will it be? What will it regard? A job perhaps? A date? Yeah, as if. 

I dreamed that I was driving my father's car the other day, and I was colliding with other cars to the point of almost causing accidents several times. I looked it up, I couldn't find a definite interpretation but for all it is worth, driving in your dream represents your path in life.

I am also dreaming a lot about cats lately. Before that it was mice. Go figure. A chase maybe.

I should get that tooth fixed, but the appointment keeps getting cancelled. Either the doctor's parents are in the hospital, one at a time or simultaneously, either he has a union meeting, either he is having kidney stones removed all of a sudden. 

Good night. Well maybe not immediately, but eventually.

Sometimes It Kills Me To Be Nice!

The guy's brother committed suicide a couple of years ago. He doesn't seem to be doing too well himself either. They never seemed all that normal to begin with, and with one of them dead now, the other has reached a new high. 

Here he comes, years later, he spots me in the coffee shop, he says hello, I say hello.

I say hello and I plug my earphones to my ears as a signal that hello is all I am going to say for the night. His new high doesn't allow him to pick signals. He sits down. He talks and talks and talks and then he babbles and then he talks some more. All the while, I am playing poker in his face. Yeah that is right, poker in his face, and he keeps on babbling and talking and talking and babbling.

I should be nice. It wouldn't kill me to pretend to be paying some attention to whatever he is trying to "teach" me. The guy has been through a lot already. I know for a fact he had very few friends when I last saw him and I am sure that he has barely any left with his new high.

Would it have killed me to have lent an ear to what he was saying, to pretend I was a bit interested? It sure wouldn't have, but at the time it did seem that it would. Poker seemed a much more important activity. Poker actually IS a more important activity considering the stuff he was babbling about. But. But I could have given him a few minutes of my oh so consuming addictions. It would have meant the world to him. But I simply didn't.

He came at a very wrong time. My not wanting to listen to him is a constant, but the timing just worsened it. He came in right after the poker guy left.

Now the poker guy. That is a whole other story.

Here I was, sipping my third cup of coffee, lighting my nth cigarette while playing poker, and he comes in and introduces himself. 

The story goes as follows:

I was playing poker, and a guy playing on the table says hello. I say hello. 

How r u?

Fine thanks,u?

Good thanks. 

So where are u from?

Lebanon,u?

Ahla! ( Lebanese for Welcome )

OMG! I sensed u were Lebanese too!

Me too!! So where in Lebanon do u live?

Achrafiyeh, u?

OMG!!!! Me too!!!

No way !!!

Yes way!!! So where in Achrafiyeh do u live?

Rmeil, u?

Syoufi, but right now I am at Sassine.

No way!!!! Me too!!!! Where at Sassine r u?

Fedex.

Hhahahahaahaaaaa u gotta be kidding me!!!

Lol, no, why??

Coz I am at Colombiano!!!!

No way !!!!!

Yes Way!!!!

Ok then I should come over and say hello!

Definitely!!! This is such an unusual coincidence!!

Now, let me break out the above conversation:

How r u?

Fine thanks,u?

Good thanks. I am such a liar, I just lost my job for God's sake! I am not well at all!!!

So where are u from?

Lebanon,u?

Ahla! ( Lebanese for Welcome )

OMG! I sensed u were Lebanese too! Half true.

Me too!! So where in Lebanon do u live?

Achrafiyeh, u? Since when was giving personal info to strangers on the internet a good idea?? huh??

OMG!!!! Me too!!!

No way !!! This guy must be lying, no?

Yes way!!! So where in Achrafiyeh do u live?

Rmeil, u? Mireille, would you stop giving out such info please??

Syoufi, but right now I am at Sassine.

No way!!!! Me too!!!! Where at Sassine r u? Oh you idiot!!! He is not even handsome, he looks old, why the hell are you showing interest at all??

Fedex.

Hhahahahaahaaaaa u gotta be kidding me!!! Very true.

Lol, no, why??

Coz I am at Colombiano!!!! Yeah blow your cover M, you queen of imbeciles! ( It is useful here to point out that Colombiano and Fedex are adjacent)

No way !!!!!

Yes Way!!!! Correction, empress of imbeciles.

Ok then I should come over and say hello!

Definitely!!! This is such an unusual coincidence!! What the fuck?????

And sure enough, he comes in a couple of minutes later. He is supposed to say hello. Chat for a couple of minutes, we would both marvel again at the coincidence, and then he is supposed to be out on his way. 

The above describes the best case scenario I had written in my obviously tiny little head when I realized what I had just agreed to when I told him to "yeah, sure, come over!". Now the below is the worst case scenario of what actually happened, the parts in red are the parts that went differently that planned:

And sure enough, he comes in a couple of minutes later. He is supposed to say hello. Chat for a couple of hours, we would both marvel again at the coincidence, he would find a higher, cosmic meaning to the coincidence, he would compliment my beauty every 5 minutes, we would discuss politics, religion, Lebanon, relatives, villages, his work, my work, work in general, people out of work, people looking for work, people who don't want to work, his car, my not having a car, Achrafiyeh, parking spaces, rent, food, coffee, cigarettes, smoking, not smoking, drinking, sleeping, insomnia, radio, TV, wireless, internet, wireless internet, passwords, poker, chips, friends, enemies, Africa, Europe, funerals, dancing, dancing in funerals, heritage, death, heaven, Easter, fasting, sinning, and then he is supposed to be out on his way. 

All the while, I am not nice. I keep looking at my laptop. I want to play poker. He asks if I would like him to leave, I say no, But Of Course Not!! So yes I was nice. Well maybe not nice but at least I tried to be civilized. 

Another recent not so nice anecdote. So my friend Zeina has sprayed her Jeep's rims in black. She asks me if they look nice, I blurt it out: NO. I am so mean!!! Would it have killed me to say yes they are, knowing that it would have meant a lot to her while not costing me more than a little white harmless lie?

Now since this is dedicated to you Zeina, before I give you what you are waiting for, I should explain what I am replying to first.

So the other day I came to Colombiano, and since Zeina and I had talked about meeting up earlier that day, I sent her an sms asking her where she is. And her reply came as follows: I am spraying my rims.

Now that was weird, don't you agree? I was understandably baffled by her reply to the point of not having a single thought to respond to such a bizarre statement.

Zeina wants me to reply in a blog, so here it goes Zeina, I have thought a lot about this, it has consumed a considerable amount of my precious time, and I couldn't possibly find a better reply than what I am about to say to you. Embrace yourself, and scroll down a bit:

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N2el3eh Zeina!!!! Bala Sorry !!!!! HhAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

I love what I do!

Do you know that feeling when you are dead tired in the evening, and yet you are full of an unidentified kind of energy somehow?

It is when you love what you do.

You love it in spite of what it puts you through, in spite of the long hours that seem to stretch forever. 

You love it because you were molded to do it. Because you were born with an instinct for it. 

You sometimes hate yourself for enjoying it, you hate yourself for being so glad for being so tired.

You are finally home after a long day of work. You are drenched. Still, you are restless. Your mind is buzzing with endless details, endless questions, endless doubts. 

You doubt yourself. You doubt others. You overestimate yourself. You overestimate others. You underestimate yourself. You underestimate others.

You feel depressed. You feel drained.

You are on the top of the world. You are the lowest of the low.

You are hypertensive. You are energetic. You are sick. 

You have a voice. No one seems to hear you. You scream. You shut up.

You compete. They compete.

You strike. You lose. 

You make it. You don't.

You like it. Oh no you don't!

They are nice. And they suck.

You are special. They are angels. You are a demon. They are too.

You can. They can. They can even better.

You compete. They compete.

You run. They simply hide.

You blame them. They blame you.

You will make it. They already did. 

You are beat. You are sad. You are happy. You are mad.

(a meager attempt to poetize an otherwise undercreative piece with two words I just came up with while explaining it)

You are singing. They are dancing... on the table.

You join them. Or you will, eventually.

You are a table dancer, I tell you. 

Oh man do I love it!

It makes every cell in my brain work at double speed. Working gives me such a rush!

I look forward to my bogus poker and reading evenings because when I have them I get to look forward to work!

Is there anything you can't do? Bullshit! There is nothing you can't do you wuss!

Did I just call my readers wusses? I am such a shitty writer!

Virtual Gambling

This is how it is: Texas Holdem Poker on Facebook is going to make me sick with worry and anxiety! I know it is stupid, I am aware that this isn't a real money issue - thank God for that or I would have been in jail by now! - but still, it is an extremely bad habit that is consuming me and my time!

According to Facebook, I have been a member of this application since 2008, but since I had no idea how to play before, and since as you may have experienced as well, I used to receive tons of exchanging chips requests, I had blocked it sometime between 2008 and 2011.

What had changed in 2011 you may ask? And even if you don't ask, I will tell you, hell this is my blog after all!

Ok, I understand the rudeness of that previous sentence but I wanted to be the boss at something because everything seems out of control somehow...

Anyway...

I have been spending New Year's Eve with the family for the last couple of years, and it has always been the tradition to play "Sab3a w Nos", which means Seven and a Half between Christmas and the new year. Sab3a w Nos is a small time poker game but it is fun and easy. Since we don't have actual chips at grandma's house, we use whatever kind of grains about to expire we have at our disposal. Therefore, our winning usually consists of a ball of lentils or a bunch of chickpeas. Every grain goes for 500L.L.which equals one quarter of a US Dollar. And yes of course we exchange them with money afterwards, just in case you were wondering, which you probably weren't... bah! whatever, I am rambling!

So where was I again? I got distracted with yet another round of virtual poker...

Alright, so for the last 2 years, my uncles have been teaching us new poker games because they are more "exciting" than Sab3a w Nos. Last year, it was Black Jack, and beginners' luck being on my side, I had won the whole pot.

Now this year, it was about time we had learned Texas Holdem, according to the experts of course. It was such a blast; not only have I really enjoyed it, I have also won it all once again with my now being cursed by the whole family "beginners' luck"!

This year though, small money rounds in the house weren't exactly enough. New Year's Eve is after all a "Try Your Luck" night, who hasn't stumbled upon the myth of having a great new year if you win on this fateful night? Well in case you haven't, I would like to welcome you to our incredibly superstitious society and its wild beliefs when it comes to luck, health, wealth, and you name it. 

This year we had to REALLY try our luck, and the only suitable place for such a noble endeavor was none other than the prestigious Casino du Liban. 

I had been to the Casino before, but it had always been for the innocent pleasure of enjoying a play or a concert. So far at least. This year, my after midnight visit didn't hold in its folding any artistic ends or contents for that matter, because when you go to the play rooms, you discover a whole new world of crooks, creditors and genuine assholes, either talking very very loudly, either, although not a lot of difference entails, screaming their guts out. You see night wanderers and night owls. You see addicts and fun seekers. You see insomniacs and geeks. You see the poor and the wealthy. You see people in their finest and people touching rock bottom. People ruined and people sitting on a cloud of fake glory and none-lasting fortune.Taxi drivers and estate emperors. People in silk and cashmere and others wearing practically rags.

I lost the equivalent of 33 USD in less than 10 seconds that night in the Casino. I was frustrated, flabbergasted, but I mostly felt ashamed for being so stupid to fall into this false, this destructive temptation. I had lost my beginners' luck, I had attempted to move on to the next step. Failure is the best cure as it seems. Losing the money I had won at home had a very sobering effect, I even replaced the double black whiskey with water for the rest of the night. 

Back to the subject. Five days after New Year's, I went to Qatar, and you have all read about that story I suppose. Anyway, with no money and barely any acquaintances there, confined to the solitude of my hotel room, I was bored, and the book I was reading at the time wasn't very interesting, plus basic cable doesn't do it for me. Like a lamp flashing over the head of a cartoon character, I remembered the Texas Holdem application on Facebook. I unblocked it and have barely closed it ever since. 

I am back from Qatar now, and I don't dispose of all the time in the world since I am currently working on a project, but somehow I manage to find hours on end to spend (in both meanings of the term) gambling my virtual chips in that game.

It is funny what boredom can make you do, to what lengths one can go to overcome it. I am having anxiety attacks and I am on the verge of nervous breakdown because of a stupid virtual game! I am mad at myself for letting myself get addicted to such petty things! Thank God I am against drugs, because it is possibly the only thing I am not addicted to! Anything else that comes to your mind, I am already addicted to it one way or the other. Trust me, and you get to name it. From cigarettes to mini cigars, from pipe to alcohol, from shopping to food, from diet Pepsi to sugar free Halls, I am on it! Well when I say alcohol, I don't mean I should be looking for AA meetings, but I rarely remember myself saying no to a drink. Are there anonymous meetings for shopaholics in Lebanon? I wonder, I really do, because I could seriously use them, especially since I am an almost broke one!