... And Thank You For Reading

Strive and Live

Thu, 13 Mar 2014 03:56:07 +0200

Why haven’t I written here in months?

Well, I thought it was because I wasn’t feeling and had nothing to write about but I realized I was feeling too much. It was quick and fluctuating malleably throughout the minutes of the day.

I couldn’t keep up, or rather I didn’t want to and I comfortably detached.

I no longer feel as strongly as I used to and it’s a blessing as feelings usually pass through me like a raggedy old knife. Each feeling is acerbic on my frail heart and leaves a nasty wound that scarcely heals.

It’s been an educative year. I learned a lot and mostly things I never thought I would learn or wanted to learn.

I discovered the shock that comes from finding corruption in the stems of your family and the fear of having someone trying to take over your life and death… literally.

I also partook in the merriment of the reunion of friends and family, and being thrust back in time with a single glance or word from them.

Of course, I didn’t miss being taught a lesson in love. Loss and love; the two are almost individually unidentifiable. They always seem to pair up and hit you where it hurts the most; in the heart.

Love gives but takes much more than it should. It solely delivers you the promise of companionship and support but it’s confoundedly difficult when you reach that stage of needing the aforementioned only to find out the promise is only just that.

An IOU with no “I”.

I learned things I wish I didn’t. And why? Because I’m sick of being taught lessons. I’ve toughened up with hard experiences throughout the years and softened right back to adapt to a different point in time.

But It seems a toughening is in order again and I’m going through the school of life once more.

It’s not optional. Like death, you can’t escape life. Life follows you to your grave and your grave follows you in your life. It’s a vicious entity, life, but we must strive and live on.

Strive and live.

Audio

Fri, 29 Nov 2013 15:32:59 +0200

Starless Ceiling

Wed, 02 Oct 2013 07:04:44 +0300

I don’t mind it.

Most people think I do, and pity me for it, but I really don’t mind it.

It a blanket; it’s a cool, thick sheet of night blanketing me from whomever and whatever’s outside my window. I control the mise en scène in my room and when I’m finished I flick the light off drenching myself in a total charcoal-vision.

I’m free to lose my head, my thoughts and my body in the darkness. The shadows are there even without a light, and the shadow makes me move. It takes my hand and leads me, guiding me forward.

It hugs me tight, comforting me like an adopting parent with a confused child. But I don’t suffer when darkness looms. I’m comforted; I’m safe; I’m secure.

Whenever I stare at the light emitting from a light bulb, I challenge it for life and I vanquish it with the light switch.

But sometimes I flick the little light switch off, and it doesn’t work anymore.

The light, it ambushes me as it finally escapes the artificial electrical shield my light bulb created.

It’s morning.

I weep.

Happy Times' Triggers

Wed, 04 Sep 2013 21:13:08 +0300

I was in a rush this morning to get some official papers translated and make it in time to make another appointment. I saw a McDonald’s across the street from where I was and it was serving breakfast. I saw it and said “Hell ya. It’s been a while since I had a McMuffin with a side of delicious hash browns.”

I found myself magnetically pulled. The taxi driver drove me to the restaurant, where I rushed in to the empty dining hall and made my order. It looked weirdly deserted even though it was operational.

I sat down to wait from my order, checking my phone to see if it was picking up a WiFi signal. It didn’t and I had to sit down and do nothing, except look around at my surroundings.

And then I saw it.

I had caught a glimpse of it a few times since I had walked through the restaurant’s door, but it hadn’t registered in my head. A Happy Meal’s toys’ display case.

It was like a I was shot with a gun fully-loaded with nostalgia.

I remembered that those little manufactured pieces of commercialism were the reason I dragged my parents to those fast food joints when I was a kid. I would study those displays and plan which pieces I would get; how and when I would go about collecting them and study the intrinsic value of each toy and make a careful analysis of the situation at hand. It was serious business back then.

Childish aloofness.

I would also study the posters and see the life in each character as it posed enticingly to us children, drawing us in with their wide-eyed animated personality.

But no more of this now as an adult. I hardly even noticed the display, and it pains my lachrymose heart that that part of our lives never returns even though those emotions had reoccurred to my person one last time; meaning those feelings are still there but there’s no trigger to incite them.

Oh, how I long for those triggers. How I long for them.

A Word, My Mate

Sat, 31 Aug 2013 02:31:00 +0300

My most cuspidal weapon is my written word, not my spoken word.

The words I speak are dull like an unsharpened sword and even in a fight they would save me none. No, my only sustenance is my written word.

I’m in a trance while they flow and when uninterrupted, they emerge just right.

And you know what?

My words have spoken to me. They have told me the secret I’ve been keeping, a secret I didn’t know I had.

They told me about my mate.

About the mate I longed for and continually looked for. The mate I would rush home to and would share every detail of my day with. The one whose waking moments were agony without me, just as mine were without him. The one whose heart would break when he saw my tears, as if he’s witnessing a rose destroyed by cascading lava. The mate whom I’ve dreamt about and whom the universe had promised to me as a reward for all the heartbreaks it had furnished me with. The mate who’s my best friend and my lover. Just me and he against the world, and not only me against the world any more.

To whom I am a diamond and he’s the ring to carry that stone.

Or maybe I knew all this all along and it was no big secret. But the words have finally emerged and the heart wants what it wants.

An IELTS Experience

Fri, 30 Aug 2013 15:23:00 +0300

Yesterday I had my IELTS exams. It took 3 hours of testing but an overall 8 hours with all the unnecessary waiting, fingerprinting, photo-taking, and paper processing.

And then I had my speaking test. A middle-aged woman with a great accent and pronunciation told me to take a seat. It seemed pleasant enough. Although I was nervous, she put my mind at ease.

And we started talking and then the conversation took a weird turn, and it went a little something like this:

Examiner: would you look to someday move back home?
Me: I am home (thinking she meant my family’s house)
Examiner: no, would you like to someday move HOME?
Me: *pause* I’m sorry. Wh… What? Do you mean my family’s home?
Examiner: *creepy smile* would you like to someday move HOME?
Me: But I am home. In my family’s home here. I live with them.
Examiner: would you someday like to move back hoooome *hand gesture to indicate moving* (apparently that explained it)
Me: *thinking she means country* Oh, I am home right now. This is my home.
Examiner: *looks at me* would you someday like to move back home?
Me: I’m sorry, what are you talking about?
Examiner: moving on…
Me: FML

Money, Money, Money...

Fri, 23 Aug 2013 01:06:14 +0300

What we learned boys and girls from what’s happening in Egypt with Mubarak’s release and in the USA with Chelsea Manning’s imprisonment; those who have money, no matter how it was obtained, can do and get away with anything.

A disgrace to the human race, money and its wealthy owners has become the source of salvation and a get out of jail card to the terrorist of the world.

All I can say is… seriously…

Expired Milk

Mon, 05 Aug 2013 21:03:35 +0300

For the past few weeks I feel like I have been jumping hurdles, only to find myself faced with more hurdles to defeat than less.

Here’s how a typical day goes:
I wake up upbeat, try to find solutions to my seemingly ever-present problems, discover more hurdles that are impossible to beat, get depressed and jump back into bed.

Life is easy going, filled with man-made obstacles.

It’s like a race where people are ahead of you, only instead of letting you complete the race in peace they keep booby trapping the road ahead of you.

How long can a person withstand being mistreated as a human-being and why does one put with it?

I keep thinking one day I’ll turn on the TV and find displayed on it’s crystal-clear screen the secret of life; why we were born and the reason we hold on through these heartbreaking turbulences. Or maybe hidden in the folds of an old book, forgotten with time, the reason why humans have to endure such suffering at the at the hands of other humans.

Instead, I sit like expired milk in the fridge, past my sell-by date and waiting for a burial in the trash. Finished and waiting.

Not knowing and waiting.

Just… waiting.

My new sounds:

Tue, 30 Jul 2013 04:24:35 +0300

My new sounds:

Unholy War

Sat, 20 Jul 2013 09:10:21 +0300

In all honesty, I never really got what Ramadan was all about; is it about personal cleansing or experiencing the turmoil of the less fortunate through abstinence from food and soul impurities?

But to me, Ramadan was more than just eating, praying and loving (no copyright infringement intended, Elizabeth). Ramadan to me is about battle.

It is about battle of survival and battle of gaining self-respect.

My senses kick into overdrive, processing so much around me; sounds, lights, smells and emotions. Submerging me fully in the anxiety of it all, and I try so hard to stay afloat. I never think I’m good enough for this world anyway, but in Ramadan that feeling is multiplied by infinity.

Every waking second is judgement day and a horrendous nightmare. The disquietude of activity in my house, outside my room is palpable from behind the closed doors and it twists me in many unimaginable ways.

The interaction, the expectations and everything else that I feel is expected of me is soul crushing. I just want to cower under my desk and make it until the end alive, but it is not an option.

My brain keeps working, working, working and never stopping for a second to rest through the struggles. Then, it’s the end of Ramadan, and it’s Eid.

However, faster then a speeding bullet, a year passes, and it’s Ramadan again. And my brain picks up right where it left off again. Frantically putting up my battle shield to guard me from all the pain that resurfaces on this holy month, but it feels almost unholy.

Pain on the outside of my body is impossible that month, only on the inside. Like someone keeps stabbing at my inner self for thirty days. I’m supposed to be at peace, like the rest of the Muslim population. But it feels the exact opposite, the pressure’s too high.

The pressure’s just too high. But what pressure?

I just love the harp and been dying to incorporate it in a piece...

Sat, 22 Jun 2013 00:51:59 +0300

I just love the harp and been dying to incorporate it in a piece somehow.
Pure, sweet and angelic.

Sorry ... (sarcastically)

Thu, 20 Jun 2013 12:36:00 +0300

I can’t remember the last time that someone apologized to me sincerely and not in a sarcastic or comical way.

You know why that’s heartbreaking? Because my loved ones hurt me… all the time, they do. But it’s not that they don’t apologize, it’s that they don’t feel the urge to apologize to me.

The feeling of remorse doesn’t overcome them when it comes to me, I’m just not someone they need to think about because they know no matter how many times they hurt me I’ll come running after them like a puppy whenever they need me.

Hell, most times I’ll be the one to apologize when I’m the one who’s been hurt and degraded.

Why is that? Am I really worth nothing? Have I no value? No cares?

No feelings?

When someone does wrong to me all I look for is a simple apology, that’s it. Three words: “I am sorry”. Uttered with complete comprehension of what’s been done and how it affected you and me.

A simple heartfelt apology is the ultimate gesture of love.

Just a simple apology.

People who pretend to listen to you over the phone while they're in fact tweeting

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 23:41:00 +0300

Am I right?

Felicity

Wed, 05 Jun 2013 10:28:35 +0300

She was the epitome of every high-school and college student trying to find themselves. There is an innocence to her and bravery in her actions.

Sounds like a eulogy, and in a way it is as there will never be a character or show like Felicity, because it was unique.

And that’s a difficult thing to say about anything nowadays.

Everything about this show I loved; the genuine persona of the characters, the awkwardness, the noises of the city in the background and the constant alert frenzy of education made it much too real.

When they tried acting like adults they weren’t obnoxious like “Awkward” or any of the CW shows today, instead, they did it with massive palpable apprehension that even the viewer could sense. When they were too self-involved, they would be called out on it and they tried to change right before our eyes. Just like real life.

She had her dreams, and we wished every week that they would come true because if she succeeded, we would too.

And the show wasn’t centred about the sex-appeal of the character, instead she was beautiful because of her thoughts and actions.

Felicity tried being her own person, tried branching out from her parents’ expectations and over the course of four years built up a character that most people would be proud to be. Gentle, elegant and most of all, caring.

Taught me about life, about love, about the future and about picking myself up after the inevitable pitfalls. What show teaches that today?

In case you haven’t heard it, here is...

Wed, 29 May 2013 00:53:45 +0300

In case you haven’t heard it, here is “Smut”.

A fusion of rock and burlesque music.

The Ant

Wed, 22 May 2013 04:36:34 +0300

The ant thinks it matters. Life is all about its work, its system and how it goes on living.

In the grand scheme of things no ant has mattered.

We think we matter, do we really? When we want to leave our legacy in this world, what exactly are we leaving and to whom are we leaving it to?
And for how long does it last until it’s discarded or discredited?

Do we matter or are we just ants?

Disappointment

Sat, 04 May 2013 07:20:02 +0300

I asked my inner-self and it tried to betray me. It wanted to sell me down the river, throw me to the timeless hole of infinity.

With just a handful of chemicals, the suffering would end. With just handful of pills, the pain would cease. The endless, all mind-consuming pain. The lies I tell myself to keep me going would fall to their eternal resting places.

I’ve seen all there is to see and I don’t want to see no more. I’ve heard all there is to hear and I can’t speak no more.

It all comes down to one word: disappointment. My old enemy, my new enemy, my ever-lasting enemy.

Frayed Feet

Wed, 01 May 2013 02:54:00 +0300

It has been a long day. It was unendingly mind-consuming and laden with hidden frustrations, mostly due to the fact that while other people in the world are complaining about not receiving their privileges, we’re still silently putting up with the embezzlement of our rights here in Egypt.

Without going into further details and just when I was on the cusp of finally organizing my vagrant thoughts, the power went out.

The lights, the TV and the fan that was ventilating me on this warm night all turned off. But it was so hot and my thoughts, or the warmness of the room, started suffocating me and I had to escape.

I took my mobile phone with me to illuminate the way upstairs to the roof. A surge of wind resisted my attempts to open the locked door at first but then I found salvation in the grasp of the cold night air. The heat was just trapped in the house apparently.

My feet were aching every minute I walked due to my elongated inactivity for the past few weeks, but I kept walking. I walked and thought about all my problems. I walked and tried finding solutions. I walked, non-stop for 2 hours and by the end my thoughts had calmed and I was breathing and thinking more clearly.

But my feet were mess.

I had worn open sandals and walked through the dust and that built a thick layer of a white callous substance on my feet. It was gross and it hurt. It was like my skin had become too tight.

I scrubbed off an area with my finger and it came off and it took off the layer of skin beneath it and a clean red rosy sole was radiating underneath all that ache.

Maybe that substance which accumulated on my feet due to the strenuous walking resembles the road we must walk and the things we must endure to finally reach that rosy place. But the scrubbing in between the two junctures is also a necessary step because without it I’d just have dirty aching feet.

We always work and strive for the reward but we maybe that step in between,is where we see the fruits of our labours and get most satisfaction.

A work in progress of a song I’m working on called...

Mon, 15 Apr 2013 01:05:25 +0300

A work in progress of a song I’m working on called “Follow your dreams”.
Not even remotely done or mastered, but I was excited to share it because it gets me right in the heart.

Trust

Sun, 07 Apr 2013 22:05:58 +0300

I’ve never been one to trust anyone and it’s because I’ve been raised with people who are suspicious of ticking clocks on the walls, but also because I’ve been screwed over more times than I can count.

Recently I’ve been acquainted with the most kind-hearted and simple person I could ever meet and it made me question everything.

I have walked with my back against the wall most of my life and for my sanity and peace of mind, that’s not so bad. But for my interaction with the human-beings it’s not ideal.

Walking with our backs against the wall works fine for most of us but every once in a while it’s great to let go of your bodies and relinquish all control and trust that there will be someone there to catch us when we fall and take care of us.

So here I go letting go and here’s hoping…