A lot of contemptible creatures in my home…



Several who know me would think that this would be another ranting episode about a roach creeping to my apartment… but no. It’s about finding out how much my Lebanon is infested by those. Not roaches but people proudly posing for roaches. No shame at all!

I will try to explain this methodically:

I love Syria and Syrians. They are my people, my friends, my family and my History.

I am Lebanese. I love Lebanon. My Lebanese identity is the major facet of who I am. I love, hate, talk, breath, react Lebanon. My family is all the Lebanese. My family is from here and there. The epitome of what Beirut is about, all of them came together to leave their mark on my very being. They are Muslims, Christians and Druze, they have all the culture of the old world, and they are making that of the modern. They know who they are, and they don’t need any further explanation about the roach infestation of my home. They share my silent rage…

My friend wrote in Assafir about the Syrian workers who are abused in Lebanon. And someone gloated about that. Someone expressed fear. Someone expressed hate. Someone indifference. And several contempt.
I expressed rage. Would we never stop being the bloodthirsty savages who eroded the earth in a civil war? “not us all the others”; because as always our values are above any reproach…

I read a post from a Syrian father who is wishing his daughter a happy birthday, and telling her how much she makes him proud. The sweetest blog I’ve read in a long time. A ‘Lebanese’ commented:
“WOW...you dumb syrian monkeys can actually write! congrats!! moooooooo??!! LOL! anyways, why would you be this dumb (other than being syrian) to write a WHOLE article about your daughter? did you think we care like you?! "hala graduated from university, bla, bla, bla,..." who gives a rats ass! listen SYRIAN, do us all a favor and shave your hairy moustache. GOD BLESS LEBANON”

I talked with a friend whose friend accused her of being ‘3ameeleh’ for having a Syrian friend. The irony…

Should I say more… In fact probably you know more stories than I do. And you do.

I know this is not Lebanon. I haven’t been there in a long time… but last time I checked people were in touch with reality. The reality about who we are, who we hate, how we loathe the Syrian government, and how the Syrians do as well! This is what we need to know… where do they stand in all that, the Syrian people, my people!

… and she was dubbed ‘raised-by-the-wolves’!



She narrowed her eyes, parted her lips, revealing two pairs of piercing fangs, and barked, “You’re always here!”
“How do you know? Are you… always here, I mean? Lurking around the kitchen?” he said hesitantly, mustering all his courage and defiance, examining the dot pattern on the kitchen linoleum, like one does when avoiding eye contact. He remembered his friend’s advice to him before venturing outside to the kitchen “never look them in the eyes, never ask direct questions, always keep your ears alert, remember their infrasonic signals, you can’t hear them but you can feel their vibrations in the air if you concentrate enough, you need to concentrate…”
Hearing his voice for the first time, she looked at him quizzically. She let out a wheezing noise, like a singer taking a breath before performing a long phrase. He felt the air becoming more and more rarified. He chocked. And then she laughed, a loud thunderous laughter that shook the window panes… small pieces of paint chipped of the walls and the ceiling, the cups rattled on the racks… she roared again, rummaging through the drawers like a rabid dog looking for buried bones… She seized the sharpest knife in her clutches, and briskly approached his chair. He kept repeating his mantra (no eye contact, no eye contact, no eye contact….) and felt frigid droplets of sweat forming on his forehead. She came closer and closer, sniffing his brow, tasting his fear.
Time froze.

He talked about her to other workers in the field. But no one had the audacity to speak their mind. No one dared to say what she did to them, when, and where… No one talked about the indignity, the shame… and the pain.
“well, maybe she was raised differently. She is not… like we are.” The older wiser woman of the tribe has said.
He shuddered, remembering that day in the kitchen. He lifted up his gaze and said to the wise one “yes, the legend has it that she was raised by the wolves!”

MY HUCKLEBERRY FRIEND



We're after the same rainbow's end
waiting 'round the bend,
my huckleberry friend,
Moon River and me.

NO MOON AT ALL!

Are we the ‘quasi-pseudo-intellectuals’ that we fervently loathe?



In explanation of my last blog…

I got an email from a friend about some of the poems that he reads on my web log. It starts with “Interested in birthing your own bastard of diabolically morose proportion? There's nothing simpler…” and goes on about how to use a website where you pick your preferred gothic flavor and it produces your morose poem, your gothic self-expression…
And I tried the website: http://www.deadlounge.com/poetry/poems.html (hence my last blog)
I didn’t value my ex-friend-to-be’s dripping sarcasm of course, but I have to say that he is absolute right! and actually the website was so fun for me when I tried it… I truly felt some of the poems it generated are in fact, well… meaningful!
And some of the stuff I post does really sound like ‘mental masturbation’ as he puts it (although I prefer to call it mental diarrhea, and this is what I meant in my March 15 blog… ‘J’existe sans exister’).
So my friend is spot on with his website.
But what does it mean? I write text that I thought it’s truly heartfelt, and expressive (and some of you did appreciate it and commented positively) but a randomly generated poem from Goth-O-Matic could have the same effect on me… strange isn’t it?
Well, not really. I think that probably I just became more receptive to some aspects of art, or expressions or scribbles...
I’ll try to explain this better: It’s like a minimalist painting. You look at it, and you say to yourself “yeah, well. Anyone could draw that!” and honestly a big portion of this art is generated rather ‘randomly’ just like our poetry website. The point is that we refine our senses so we are capable of understanding this art, I believe. Personally, early on, I was unable to ‘understand’ minimalism. 3 years ago, at the Met I was completely riveted by a painting that up till then I would have thought it’s part of the wallpaper, and I almost cried! I felt all the anguish that the artist was trying to convey, and this is partially because I myself at the time was depressed and thought that my own life was reduced to a minimalist projection of life! I felt like hugging the damn painter and telling him how much I understand, that yes his work had an impact on me, (and no, I am not buying the stupid thing for $15000)…
So it’s not about the quality of the work it’s about ones ability to feel the work, about the work conveying a message. If the message didn’t come across loud and clear to someone (or muffled and shady?), there’s always someone else sobbing helplessly in front of a blank canvas! (naturally I’m exaggerating, don’t have me committed as yet)… and no, I am not saying that one is better than the other in any way shape or form (please no ranting comments about elitism R.) but one work ‘spoke’ to one more than the other. That’s all.

stolen emotion



what have you taken away?
a shadow of misery as memories creep.
once we savored innocence,
untainted and wide-eyed,
but your desire perished.
a vengeful fever of bitterness -
drops of blood follow pain, follow death,
love dissolved
in a torrent of hate,
i condemn you.

(courtesy of Robert Eddy)

WHEN DID YOU LEAVE HEAVEN??

La valse à mille temps…



The colors autumnal
The music atonal
And no smell at all

(beat)

The rhythm brutal
The senses watchful
Moans muffled by a shawl

(beat)

The bodies colliding
The smiles fading
On a bed against the wall

(beat)

The tempo rhythmic
The pace epic
Throes echoed by a growl

(beat)

The breath labored
The strokes savored
Perceptions merge on a snarl

(beat)

The smell acidic
The bodies frantic
The wave dropping to a fall

(beat)

The mood sedated
The strain evaded
The shadows melted in a sprawl…

LOVE? A GLOVE?





‘… love turned inside out like a glove to reveal it’s ugly stitching. And what is love stitched from?’

Yesterday, I was riveted by this question I read.

Is love like a glove? No, not that kind of glove… but when love materializes as a perfectly fitting exquisite glove, could the stitches that hold it together be by contrast anything but ugly?

I know the answer is yes it is possible. But I believe there is no deception at that. What keeps us together could be revolting, pretty, confusing and of course ugly… this is not ‘blinded by love’. This is how mature love is nurtured.

Don’t ask me why you stayed. Ask me how she laughed. How she breathed when sleeping. Ask how she gets my headaches and I feel her cramps. How I slammed the door. How she drank her coffee. How I lit my cigarette. How she broke the glass. How she broke my heart. Last time she cried.

Some of our relationships are leather, some crochet, some are soft silk, some are rough wool… but we weaved them all from small threads, small stitches made of wounds, mistakes, guilt, and a thousand beautiful small memories…

Let’s hide the needlework and the scars, and only show the world the pretty gloves we make. Let’s bring out our taffetas, embroider them with small buds of roses and keep the stitches on the inside… keep them inside warm, pulsating close to the bare skin. But always know they are there. Always know they are the stitches.

- what are your love stitches made from?

Fading from my mind…



Bach. the unaccompanied cello suites, again…
dawn, again and again and again…
another dawn. the last dawn. and I remember.
I remember the sorrow. mine, hers… Heaps of sorrow. brutally penetrating my soul. vibrating inside me like a cello. burning inside me like an agony… a slow rhythmic agony… Jacqueline Du Pre alone. I, alone with a wounded cello… Ah! The cello!
I follow that music again… and I remember.
I remember crying, alone in the corner of my years, unnoticed, no one to see my tears. only she, tasting my grief. striking a cord, then another, then another.. drawing her bow like a swan.
I remember my lassitude. I remember now…
Decomposing like a long dead animal in the open. Raw and jolting. welcoming the worms. Turning on myself. Smelling the pus of my darkness… I felt it. moldy, repulsive to my mere senses…
there I was before, like a tree in desert, proud, resilient, spreading branches in every sky, embracing the sun with an eager burn..
there I was after, I lay down the weight of leaves, I dry my roots in the soft sand of my years, and wait to dwell in the decaying dampness of that fall…
There I can’t fight the urge to vomit anymore
There I wrote a suicide note
Charming I thought
to disintegrate in the fall…
to join the slime. to hug the cold…
This is not to die, I thought, this is to vanish… to become more minimal and basic… like an existence turned into dust, and dust amalgamating with nothingness… nothingness, a word to resonate in my non-existence for eternity…
till my echo is lost. and my shadow is ghost…
I embrace realty with no shame, no regret and no courage. I join life in its nonchalance, a grain of dirt swaying along with the tempests over the seas…

And streams of life flow over the soil underneath, taking away my conscience, with no return…

And I lose consciousness with the needle in my grip, the powder on my lip, and the smoke still clouding my sky…

PERSONAL COMMUNICATION

‘Did I Say That I Loathe You?!’


My resolution of late was to ‘try to see the good in people’ (Goodman et al 1972). Well, it’s not as palpable as it may sound, because there is very little good left in people. And I say this after careful research and analysis.

The relative value of ‘Good’ was measured in a sample population of 500 people (between the age of 7 and 77) over the course of 21 years (1985 – 2006). Values were expressed as percent minimum (standardized over 1985).
The plot of relative good versus years after 1985 shows that good exhibits a growth phase until 1989, plateaus at 1990, and starts declining at 1995 (figure 1). Good decreased by 50% from 2005 to 2006 (11% decrease in reference to 1985).


Figure 1. relative change in Goodness versus time.

The rate of change in relative good was calculated from the slope of the change in good versus time: (Good n+1 – Good n) / (Year n+1 – Year n). This analysis demonstrates that the rate of decrease in good from year to year since 2000, is 1.3 ± 0.51 %/yr every year each year since 2000.
Since I am the only person assessing the decline in good, two major concerns are raised in this study: a) the homogeneity in the sample population in which good is measured, b) the possibility that good values remain stable and that my ability of good detection is declining.
Regarding the sampling process, the studied individuals are chosen from 3 different cities: Beirut, NY and Boston. The problem however is that no complete data set is gathered for individuals in the same city. This increases the heterogeneity of the population, hence increases the sampling capacity. The ability to follow the same individual over the complete time course, however, is compromised. This decreases the potential sampling capacity over time.
Concerning the second issue, several factors actually affect the assessment capability of the researcher. First, the personal change in the character of the researcher over the period of the study: this includes added factors such as cynicism, sarcasm, and general negativism. A constant factor was calculated to account for these changes. Since these changes are dramatically affected by the environment in which the researcher is placed, the constant factor was calculated in the three different locations (cities) in which the study is conducted. The three different constants are as follow: Beirut 3.2; NY 7.2; Boston 5.1. Note that the constant value for Boston is still under study and might be changed subsequently based on the expected changes in the weather (personal communication with Ra et al stated that Spring is expected in the upcoming months).

In Sum, this study shows that the relative value of good is decreasing at a rate of 1.3 % / yr ± 0.51. This proves that the expectation of people from each other should be altered accordingly, which would relieve personal strain in several real life situations such as courtship, friendship, and several workplace related interactions.

Acknowledgement: This work has been supported by funding from the NIH (grant#666). Rumor has it though that the current administration will be disconnecting all funding to research centered on ‘good’ topics. We plead the masses to support us however, and send money directly to our institution, Department of Mental Hygiene at Harvard Med.


References.
Goodman J., Zen X., and L. Hypomanopulus. 1972. Interaction between psychological cues and positive reinforcement in science postdoctoral fellows. The Journal of Optimistic Souls. 13:257-9.


PS: Dept of Mental Hygiene is the actual name of a dept associated to Dept of Health in NY (1984ish, no?).

DO YOU MISS NEW YORK?



Do you miss New York?
The anger
The action
Does this laid back lifestyle lack
A certain satisfaction
Do you ever burn to pack and return
To the thick of it
Are you really sick of it
Like you always say
Do you miss the pace
The rat race
The racket
And if you had to face it now
Do you still think you could hack it
When you’re back in town for a quick look around
How is it
Does it feel like home
Or just another nice place to visit?
And were those halcyon days
Just a youthful phase you outgrew?
Tell me
Do you miss New York
Do you miss New York
Do you miss the strain
The traffic
The tension
Do you view your new terrain
With a touch of condescension
And on this quiet street
Is it really as sweet as it seems out here
Do you dream your dreams out here
Or is that passé
Do you miss the scene
The frenzy
The faces
And did you trade
The whole parade
For a pair of parkin’ places?
And if the choice
Would you still choose to do it all again
Do you find yourself in line to see Annie Hall again
And do you ever run into that guy
Who used to be you?
Tell me
Do you miss New York?

Me too

(Rosemary cloony)

Home?



He broke her brushes, spilled her paint, soiled her canvas and left.
How brutal one could be to an artist!
She puts her right hand up to her chest, gently touches the pearls round her neck, looks at the mess, and gasps. She raises her hand to her lips and lets out a silent cry. Smeared colors. She picks up a canvas, and with tremor, realizes that this is about art. Life has made art. She wanted a pale painting with water lilies, but life has never been exactly mellow of late.

I met her for coffee.

“… I stopped looking for romance. I only want someone to feel home with.” She laughs, and then takes a sip of wine. “I am looking for home. I am a homeless spirit trying to find asylum in someone’s being.” She gazes pensively outside the glass window as if talking to the city racing on the sidewalk facing us, “This is not codependency at all that I am looking for, not even…
I will try to explain it through an example about music; this is my language after all.
Bach. This has changed my interpretation of Bach, in fact. Take his concerto No1 for instance. When you reach the Adagio, don’t you feel a fall, a… a collapse?! You feel that you are afraid of something, but cannot quite make out what it is… this is not a panic kind of fear, this is a mystic fear you breath through your veil of a modern man… a scent… trespassing hundreds of years to reach your inner being. This is an ancient urge to human contact… you just sense a tremor that only one touch could make you feel safe, and this “safe” is what you identify as “home"…
Life is exactly like a concerto; it takes you through joy, love and happiness very rapidly, then leaves you up there trembling in the cold of your fears trying to reach for the safe hand, trying to go "home". Go play Bach, you’ll figure it out…”

Una Furtiva Lagrima...



Una furtiva lagrima...
Negli occhi suoi spunto...
(L'Elisir d'Amore)

One tear that falls so furtively...
from her sweet eyes has just sprung...

I missed you darling. I love you as always.

PRYING CAT...



There’s a prying cat.
A closed window.
A lamp shade.
A shade.
A life.
She.
I.
She.
A sun.
A light.
A day light.
An open window.
There’s the prying cat.

Fais Comme si...

Mon manège à moi, c'est toi



Je ferais le tour du monde
Ça ne tournerait pas plus que ça
La terre n'est pas assez ronde
Pour m'étourdir autant que toi...
Edith Piaf

Picture: snap picture taken from a spinning swivel chair in my old lab in NY.

OUT OF THE WOODWORK



Today is my ‘picture’ day. I got this love of pictures from my father. I don’t like taking pictures though and always felt that pictures are mini dead moments that we freeze down from the passing Time. I feel that frantic tourists, who want to photograph every second of vacation, are time assassins, bottling Time into glass frames… like entomologists, going around picking insects and pinning them under a glass covered box, for people to see…
I like looking at pictures though, and could not reconcile these contradictions in myself… And today, I found this picture. A picture I got from a friend, who named it “darjeh-1” (Step-1)… and I remembered. I remembered the steps where we used to ‘chill out’; I remembered the cigarette breaks, the cell phones, and the cold coffees. I remembered my friends and I felt better about today. I still love them as I did before and distance and time didn’t change me a bit!

Where do you go to my darling?

Give me your lips for just a moment



Give me your lips for just a moment
And my imagination will make that moment live
Give me what you alone can give
A kiss to build a dream on

Louis Armstrong

My friend the ‘walk’ guy.



Would I make it to work before 10 today?
‘Walk’
I am going to stop at the breakfast cart for coffee. (Or espresso in the office? No, coffee from the cart… espresso… No, big coffee with a cigarette.)
‘Walk’
Why do people stop at cross sections? Stupid traffic. Thank you iPod…
‘Walk’
I hate this song… And this one too. Ah, this one is good.
‘Don’t Walk’
AAAAhhhh! that was close “… you too Asshole!”
‘Walk’
Did this girl just check me out? Come back. Come back. Didn’t turn, oh well.
‘Walk’
Black no sugar. No, no. Café negro, no. Si, NO azucar. Si. Gracias.
‘Walk’
Marlborough. Not light, RED! (Isn’t red the default, idiot!)
‘Walk’
“GOODMORNING”. “(start), gdmrnrrnrg”. (Why does he have to be so shrilled in the morning – new security guards always are, it’s not even 10. Why do people talk in the morning anyway)

Why do people talk in the morning? They should only be writing their blogs.

Making love in the shadows…



Yesterday, attempting to work, listening to Gainsbourg… “Yesterday” passes on… I remember. ‘Madame Claude’, the movie, and the song becomes serious, probably tender?!
Madame Claude, last scene, in jardins de Tuileries, coming out of the turmoil, alone again, tucking in the photographs, picking up the pieces…
Yesterday, like any day… The sun went down without me; suddenly someone else has touched my shadow…
What did you do without me? Why are you crying alone on your shadow? I know. The sun went down without you…
Because they all live without it, without making love in the shadows; today, I know.

Work. I should put in another hour.

But then, L’herbe tendre passes on… I remember. Childhood, Beirut, innocence, first loves…
D’avoir vecu le cue dans l’herbe tendre, et d’avoir su m’etendre quands j’etais amoureux… en gardant le coeur tender le long des jours heureux… S’avoir se fendre de quelques baisers tendres sous un coin de ciel blue.
And they laugh, and I laugh… with nostalgia, with melancholie.
Such happiness when I love the past… such tenderness… simple warmth.

Why do we often love life only after it goes by?

J’existe sans exister…



Of course I first want to apologize to my fervent readers for the disconnection in my blog. And no, I did not die like many of you thought, especially after reading my last blog, which could be classified as “morbid” (rightfully so); I was in Cape Cod for a retreat, and did not have access to internet, nor ‘reception’ on my phone (what’s with ‘raising the bar’ crap that Cingular talks about!). But thank you for the thousands of emails, phone messages, and flower arrangements you have sent me over the last couple of days. I am overwhelmed. Really.
Well, since I’ve been away, and in such a romantic dreamy place as the cape in March no less (scorn), I wanted to tackle existentialist problems and opinions, like the rest of you do, to fit in of course.
But I thought better of it, since I, especially today, don’t know anymore how to ‘look’ at (for?!) philosophical dilemmas and questions without a slight hint of sarcasm (well, a barrage of it to be honest, but like always I try to be polite).
Of course I too am a tortured soul sloughing of my skin on my journey through purgatory. I have my demons and ghosts, and deep dark sides like everyone else…
But am I superficial today? Well, yeah, maybe I am; more earthbound probably? Uhh, no – downright superficial. And last night, I read something I wrote when I was young, more than a decade ago, and thought that yeah maybe I got what I asked for.
I am there… here… where I want to be.
It is part of my ‘spiritual’ evolution, and it’s nice to recognize the signs. I’ve copied below, the text that I am talking about; I didn’t get a chance to translate it from French, but will do if more than one reader asked me to.
‘…
Il n’y a plus que toi, qui seule peut entendre le silence de ma solitude…
Peut etre tu es partie, mais pas pour moi… IL y a beaucoup des choses qui nous liennent!
Dans tous les trains qui partent, je t’ai laissée partir…
Dans la foule des quais, je t’ai laissée disparaître…
J’ai tourné mon dos sur tous tes souvenirs, j’ai vidé mon ame de toutes tes histoires…
J’ai oublié ton non. Je ne te reconnais plus…
Je ne reconnais plus ni ton amour, ni ta tendresse… Je ne voyais même pas les années ni le temps…
Mélancolique était la rose que je t’ai donnée, sale, fanée, môche et désespérée… Fatiguée sur sa tige, elle s’est pliée, donnant un air de timidité inexplicable…
Loin de ton cœur, ton cœur s’arrête à se battre, près de ton cœur, il sent la paix…
Pour comprendre la raison de ne pas pouvoir vivre sans amour, il a continué à vivre sans aimer.
Pour ne pas se plonger dans le fond de sa vie, il a décidé à vivre sur l’écorce… La surface lui plaisait; sentant la chaleur d’un soleil, il a commencé à inventer une prière.
«Oh Soleil! vibres dans mes idées, rends les cendres et poussière.
Oh Dieu Soleil, sèches mes rêveries… Fais mon existence un éternel vide et absurde…
Soleil, prends-moi sur ton trajet, fais-moi marcher tes orbites fermés pour la vie…
Oh Chaleur , brûles! brûles soucis et ambitions! brûles toutes mes roses et mon humanité…
Quel est beau le temps sous ta lumière!
J’existe sans exister…»
…’
I exist! I exist! I exist!

Picture: Wilfrid Hoffacker from Le Monde (blog 11/3/2006)

MINISTRE DE LA MORT...



THE MUSIC: ‘Divinites du Styx’ (Alceste by Gluck)

THE PAINTING: ‘Souls on the Banks of the River Styx’ (Edward Burne-Jones)

THE TEXT: ‘As for life on the other side, he has no faith in it. He expects to spend eternity on a river-bank with armies of other dead souls, waiting for a barge that will never arrive. The air will be cold and dank, the black waters will lap against the bank, his clothes will rot on his back and fall about his feet…’
(The Master of Petersburg by Coetzee)

Oh Lazy day...

Les Somnambules…






“…wide was the wound,
But suddenly with flesh filled up and healed.”
—John Milton, Paradise Lost, VIII 467

Another wound healing experiment, and I am at the lab at 6 in the morning… Now those who know me know that I am not a ‘morning person’, and that the only way I used to know the world at this obscene hour of the morning was when I might be finding my way back to bed not out of it!
But I mastered the art of getting up early. Now, I trick my body into thinking that we’re going to the airport to catch a plane. That there’re the sun and the sea waiting for us at the end of the day… ‘I’m late! I’m late for the flight! For vacation, run! Run! O palm trees of the Caribbean, I’m coming, I’m coming!’ and I jump in quest for coffee like a diligent vacationeer… Obviously by that point I realize the poignant fact that I actually do need a vacation, and that I haven’t had any in over two years. Suddenly my body understands the trick, slows down to a slug like speed, autopilot takes over and I become a sleepwalker, trying to find my way to my bench…

They are the only ones to stay,




They are the only ones to stay,
Like April flowers
Only they pick up the shattered pages of my life
Closed up in their forests
They never stop tapping on my windowpanes
Tapping like tireless droplets of rain
Time! Moss scattered on my walls,
I put my lights on, and wait,
The pigeon grot is haughty and far
All the pigeons leave… and I stay alone,
You, who wait for the snow, won’t you come back anymore?
I scream their names every night, every storm,
But they can’t hear me anymore…

‘Wahdoun beyeb’ou’
Fayrouz

Now I remember why I don’t go to rock concerts!





Well, when they told me I should go, it’ll be fun (why do they always say that! No one ever says come, it might not even be remotely entertaining… but are you into leather?) I explained to them that my idea of a concert is when people a) sit in numbered seats designated for the occasion, b) don’t talk, and c) most definitely don’t consume alcoholic beverages from plastic cups (the bartender informed me after I screamed at her why she’s giving me a draft when I asked for a bottle that she has to pour my Heineken into a plastic cup because I am not “allowed” to have the bottle in case during the evening I was tempted to “throw” it; I was about to ask her for some clarification about the throwing thing when a big uproar shook the building – the first band is on – I ducked, she laughed, I managed a thank you, and have a good evening, she answered with a shrug, and I wanted to explain to her what she could do with the empty bottles…).

We get to the club, and surprise of surprises Mr. Bouncer wants to see an ID. Now I am not against this concept, but do people here actually think I am under age? I mean the bouncer himself looks almost 10 years younger than I am. We go in, and they have to “stamp” us. Now this concept I am very much against. First I believe the act itself is demeaning (and honestly it doesn’t shower off very well and stays there for 2 days), and second it means that the crowd is kind of mixed, because some people did not get stamped and must be… (gasp) under 21!! Then they also put a tag – yes a plastic tag like the ones they use on in-patients in hospitals – around my wrist (as if the stamp was not enough!), now at that point I was wondering if they’d also like to paint my face purple, or probably put a ring around my nose (I think people at the door enjoy this!)

For me the night had two important elements. First the crowd, which I amused myself all evening by observing, until I felt like an anthropologist, and stopped myself short from going up to someone, pock them and study their reaction. It was a room full of pseudo-intellectual-look-at-me-I-am-one-with-the-proletariat sort of people. I mean it’s a rock concert (a hard rock concert no less) and I spotted only 1 mohawk and 1 pink hair, come on! The second element was of course the music. Well, when we first arrived, a friend suggested that I get earplugs, of course I sneered at her not wanting to sound like a wimp, and because I went through 15 years of civil war (sometimes living in the middle of a combat zone) without earplugs; I have trained ears! Well, I was wrong. But let me tell you it’s not just the music… the loud uproar that seeped into my brain, but the vibrations from the floor! I tried to stand on one foot, on the carpet, on the linoleum, no escape! And what only worked was jumping… like them. And there and then, I understood what’s meant by if you can’t beat them, join them. And I did. It was fun, except that I couldn’t get my mind of the pain in my back. Excruciating pain, going down my legs… and I realized that I am old now, middle aged before my time.

Last night was about turning the last page of my youth…

"Life imitates art far more than art imitates Life."
Oscar Wilde

And the other one? The other one is my cello.





I listen to her music night after night. Languid and dreamy. Reluctant to please, but pleases to the very soul.

Her music flows down my hills, like a lazy, lazy melody on a still Beiruty night… atonal, confusing, then rhythmic and enchanting… She enthralled my heart and will never give it back. I love her. And she loves me.

Today, she’s happy.
She sits on the balcony, sips her coffee and embraces the sea with a gaze. She plays her music. Her lazy, lazy music. I see a smirk on her lips. She is content. She knows life now. She knows how to play, and she’s ready to strike another game.

I was a boy who gave a girl a kaleidoscope.





“Here”, I said “look at the colors, they’re so pretty! It’s like magic!”
She put the kaleidoscope to her eye, giggled with thrill and said “it’s full of butterflies, dancing butterflies!”

- I’ve always pictured you still flying your kite in the lush valleys of our village in an endless spring… you’ve always been ‘spring’ in my heart.
- Darling, life’s molded the boy I was into the cynic I am, and nothing is left of my childhood…
- Except a kaleidoscope. I still have it.
- Except a friend holding on to a kaleidoscope.

I looked at her face, slightly withered with age but still as bright as a child’s. As if she never aged at all. She deceived time, I decided, and stayed the way we were, the way we always promised each other to stay… So carefree her life must have been. So above life you must be to stay, well, a child!

Do you still like butterflies?

Who signed your passport?





I was reading in the paper this morning that Gamil Elsayed was taken to the hospital from his prison cell due to problems in his blood pressure. Then, it occurred to me that last time I renewed my passport he signed it. And indeed I could see his signature on my very ID, my identity… my passport right now!

And the question arises: do these people from the murderous political arena in Lebanon leave their marks on our identity? They sure did on our identity cards!

During the last two years, I did not partake in any of what was happening in Lebanon. I read the papers, sometimes I formed opinions… but I mostly stayed neutral if not even blasé about it all (“nothing new, it’s the same over and over…”)

But now I wonder, are we to go through this political turmoil intact, revitalized, like strong-headed revolutionaries after a war? For how long do we endure their influence on our identity without being affected? So no more Syrians (?); but Americans and French again? Israelis? Or are we finally alone? Then who’s signing our passports?! I know that you think of me now as the epitome of post war Arabism… and that you yourself are above this, you’re decisive opinionated and could take over the world with your nationalism… but are you? and me, was this last year of events my undoing? Will I always look at my passport and see their names?

I had a Palestinian friend in Beirut. She always had a Hanzalah pendant. Hanzalah with his back turned on all of “them”. They killed Naji Al Ali, but they could never kill Hazalah too, she used to think.

How much this small sketch of a kid, his back turned, describes me today. How much I missed her, and would like to tell her now that I understand, that now I understand.

Today I am Hanzalah…

I know how women’s insides sound like…



A friend of mine is pregnant, and she got an audio recording of the insides of a pregnant woman. This recording was done in Australia by some new age doctor who believes that this new technique helps babies go to sleep faster. “When the baby is born”, she said “I will play this CD to relax him”. He even recorded music “heard from within”, which is admittedly disturbing (if not downright creepy) when it figures that fetuses eavesdrop on grown ups “all the time” (gasp).

Some of you perhaps share my shock/horror from the reflection on how this ludicrous recording was possibly taken. On the sadistic doctor who attempted this, and the mother/martyr who didn’t have a chance but to give herself up for science, a selfless creature who’d risk life and limb to deliver this… this “message from the uterus” to the world. Or perhaps this doctor only used a stethoscope and I am the one with the wicked dirty mind to think such monstrosities!

If you must know, your insides sound like a car rolling wildly on a bumpy round.
And babies don’t like silence. “You should always have background noise in the house”, or if you are fortunate and have the actual soundtrack at hand, play it “it relaxes him!” (she emoted).

At what stage of development I wonder do we start appreciating silence? Hell, even fighting for it, posting Do-Not-Disturb signs, giving strangers dirty looks…

But honestly, the roar of fast moving cars still soothes me. It relaxes me and helps me go to sleep faster.

I don’t know, I might go take a ride in the bus later today, ask the driver to go fast, close my eyes and dissolve in a slumber. Or shall I ask my friend for the audio?

“Silence is golden” but I sill miss my mother!

I wait for Spring every year…



Today is one of those days when I truly believe that this winter is never going to end… The Cold is seeping into everything now; and what if it never ends? When would be the next time I see the sun, the real sun, the Mediterranean sun, the dear sweet Mediterranean sun, the one that burns, leaving its mark on your very soul (or at least second degree burns on your body)… I know “the sun is the sun everywhere”, but it’s closer to us in Beirut, here it’s far and cold, very cold!

Since I moved here I came to appreciate the sun more; now I understand why people in cold countries shed their clothes and embrace the sun in public squares… I always thought it’s in bad taste but honestly I wouldn’t do anything less if I see that sun today!

Spring starts and I will be a raving Ra’ian (or is it Ra’ist? Well, a humble selfless worshipper of Ra). I will resurrect Ra (blessed be His name) and spend my days in servitude at his temple; yes a Ra’ian monk! Glorifying the sun god for eternity.

In the name of Ra, Horous and Atem, may Spring come earlier this year. Amen.

Well, I just figured out how post pictures! So this is how I look like Mel! well at least how I used to be.. anyway...

(the Mediterranean, August 2003 - last time I saw it)
Just trying to see if I could upload images this way...

The Blue Danube on an icy morning in Boston…

I am listening to J. Strauss today… No you don’t understand: the valses! Granted I am bored since I’ve been working on computer for two days (after yesterday’s debacle, hopeful she’ll not crash and eat all my analyzed data, or play dead… Am I spending too much time chained to my laptop? I wonder).
Well, some people would consider J. Strauss downright corny; I say he inspires some sort of enthusiasm, and after all he reminds me of Tom and Jerry – you remember the episode when Jerry freezes the kitchen floor for ice-skating, and he plays “Voices of Spring” (as far as I recall). I think Jerry was really a man of the world; Tom was different, more earthbound, and crud, all he cared about is to eat his friend - I hope I’ll never get friends like this.
I don’t know, maybe I’ll do a poll on the people in the lab, and see how many think J. Strauss’ music is beneath their intellect. I’ll let you know how that goes.

On another note, I want to tell you why PowerBooks are females like I promised to do:
Well, when I got my first apple computer (may she rest in peace), I discovered the option of “speakable items and applications”. In brief, instead of opening applications (and I believe you call these “programs” in the PC world) you could speak to your computer and tell her to open and close stuff. So I activated this option, and one day I was working on a paper, and you know how sometimes you get writers’ block for a couple of centuries in the middle of a sentence, and you start tackling existentialist problems like the meaning of life, or “maybe if I focus long enough, I could have an out of body experience” (and this is by the way how I start to astral project)… Anyway, so computers usually think you’re dead or something, so she feels compelled to wake me from my reverie by a joke, so suddenly she says “knock knock”, after picking up my heart from the floor and catching my breath from the start, well I said “who’s there?” (of course entertaining the idea that my computer came to life like in Sci-Fi movies, or like Pinocchio). Then she answered “Thea!”, and you could imagine the rest on your own (let me not sound so corny in one day)… Now, since then I decided that my computer is a female (well of course she is, since she speaks in a woman’s voice, very lilting by the way and not robotic at all), named Thea (since this is how she identified herself)…
And after she died and I got a new PowerBook, the persuasion remained…

Now, I have to go back to my data analysis and of course Johann (Danube blue – god! That’s sappy…) – and if the poll was a success, I’ll let you know how it went.

Ghassan
Boston, March 06 2006

“Did life slow down, or did I become faster?”

Not sure what to write about… well, it was a friend's idea to have a weblog in order to belong to civilized society, and surprisingly it was not such a bad idea… until I actually tried to use the site, I mean this is one of the slowest sites I've ever encountered! Great, just another thing to add to my day-to-day frustration and my genuine hate for my computer, which I hope cannot read me at this moment (could computers read what’s on their screen or do they just use the screens as their eyes to stare at us staring at them all day long? I wonder).

But trust me I am literally seething about the 512MB extra RAM card that I got, going down the drain. A desperate attempt to make it faster, and you would think that a total of 1 GB should be mind-blowingly fast; I mean a giga is a billion bytes - right? - that's a lot of bytes in some circles, especially to my generation of people who grew up with a 16 MB PC running on DOS, and thinking you're the coolest kid alive...

Anyway, I digress; but how can I not and here she is (yes my computer is a she - long story, but all Mac PowerBooks are females at essence, and I can prove it, but that’ll have to wait till my next blog) here she is downloading these pages at a pace of @#&*@$&@(&(!! well, at a rather slow pace.

You know what, the only way to reconcile with these situations without having minor heart failure every day, is to go back to thinking that my computer, the coffee maker, the printer, and any person at any cash register in any corner of the universe, are actually functioning at a normal, average speed. But it is I who actually became faster (just like in “The Matrix”, you know). I am faster, so life appears slower, simple relativity (thank god for Einstein) and I feel better about myself, pity all these inanimate objects and people for the lethargy that envelops their very essence, and leave them in this… this inertia! (OK, well now I just feel like running back to the cafeteria, slapping the woman at the cash register to save her from her life as a vegetable and I already feel better)…

“Are people slower in Boston than they are in New York? Well, what about my computer? She might be adapting to Boston faster than I am after all!”

G.
Boston, March 1, 2006.