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    Яαgιи Яαvєи
    Cairo, Egypt
    Wanting people to listen, you can't just tap them on the shoulder anymore. You have to hit them with a sledgehammer, and then you'll notice you've got their strict attention.
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Tapping at my chamber door



In 2008, I'll Get Me A Shotgun


I will also:
1.
Yield
2. Get closer to
God
3.
Job hunt some more.
4. Get closer to my
family.
5. Learn a new language.
6.
Finish at least one screenplay.
7.
Lose the extra weight.
8. Get a
driver's license. I will not buy a car.
9. I will
rule my world.
10. I will have my
revenge.

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

At Sucking

It’s the same everywhere in this country. Emad Met3eb (Ahly soccer player) at sports, a zillion bad actors who happen to be related to old directors or actors, the president’s son, and the guy who sits at the desk at your right hand side at the office.

Last night, Al Ahly, celebrating its centenary, played against FC Barcelona and massively lost 4-0. No… it wasn’t basketball. It was soccer at its very best. Of course, the TV and newspaper critics failed to even mention that Emad Met3eb had over three chances to score. He can’t aim. He can’t run. He can’t dribble. He refuses to pass the ball… and all he does is fall down and sink in his own oceanic sweat. Even his name means ‘tired’. I’d like to believe that we lost because of him, but I can’t. We lost because of the connections that he’s got; the connections that got him a place on the field… YUP… those connections.

If you know somebody, you can suck all you want. There are no odds against you. You become the winning horse, the full house, the monthly paycheck, and the king of the world. You’re untouchable.

The shit only starts rising when you realize that you are untouchable.

People with the right connections are all rich and employed. People with no connections are all waiting in line for some schmuck to die.

If you’re employed, then you must have connections. MBA, GPA, fucking CIA… whatever letters you got in your big folder you carry around to impress your parents or to flash in front of your future in-laws. They don’t mean shit in the real world.

Oh well…

And the one million question is…

Would you help your own fucked up son get a job if you could?

That wasn’t a rhetorical question now, was it?

Sunday, April 22, 2007

Lucky Wave

So I’m getting transferred next week, off to a brand new branch of my bank. The new branch building is apparently designed to be the new HQs of the bank in the Heliopolis-Nasr City Zone.

No… I didn’t get promoted, although I was introduced to my new co-workers and co-corporate slaves as a “senior”. WOW!! Funny!!

Everyone’s really sad where I work now. Everyone’s avoiding me, hating me for betraying them, leaving them, selling them cheap. I didn’t mean to. The LONO said my name. The corporate gods called my name… with a promise for better things. Can’t lie to myself. I am devastated. I’ll be leaving friends that I’ve known and held on to for the past four years for one of those corporate pass overs we call promotion potential. Not to brag or anything, but I’ve always been there as a spiritual supervisor for my colleagues to go to when they needed help or advice… and even though I’ve always hated the pressure of doing a higher ranking job for a lower title and a lower salary, I seem to have underestimated the joy that I used to get from helping out my friends at work.

Oh well… I’m sorry.

Today I met some 50 something year old woman at the manager’s office. She wanted to open a special account at our bank, one of those holding a balance of over one hundred thousand Egyptian pounds. Right before she left she dropped a coin that looked pretty unusual to me; and this is coming from a coin collector. One side of the coin had a picture of a cowboy or a cavalry officer on his horse and said Austria Casinos. That’s right, lady. Now I know where you got your money.

The other side said Lucky Wave.

I never believe in luck… but I think that I’m going to hold on to the coin for a while.

Monday, April 09, 2007

Identity Crisis

I loathe nights like this one; nights when you sit down with yourself, confront yourself… it’s just you against… the other you. The problem with such nights is that amidst the inevitable psychological challenge you’ll kinda lose track of who you really are.

ODD NEWS. I think that I’m about to embark upon one of those arranged marriages ordeals. About four months ago if the subject of arranged marriage was ever brought up in my presence I would have probably laughed and left, but I’ve come to realize that if a person really, really trusts Allah SWT, trusts that no one except for Him will ever find a person’s perfect someone… then there’s nothing to worry about really. Al niyyah is what it is all about.

Even though this is MY BLOG and I’m allowed to lie my ass off… I’ll be honest. I deserve a bit of honesty.

I’m scared shitless.

I’m scared that after all these years of ego manipulation and glorifying my perfect human form… that I’ll waltz into my worst nightmare, the one where I’m exposed, revealed for who I truly am. They’re kind of different, I reckon, arranged marriages. With arranged marriages your imperfections can become the foot that kicks you out. They can be the rejection stamp, the Exit sign, the Game Over line, and the wave goodbye.

Well, here’s the thing. I think that’s how it works in Egypt anyways. The first meeting is usually a get-to-know-you-before-I-can-squeeze-you kind of meeting I think. They allow you the chance to talk your ass off. Say what you’re interested in and highlight your competitive edge if you have one… Of course if you don’t have one then you’re basically screwed.

You can talk about the Egyptian three course meal: Religion, football, and politics. The point is… if I measured myself against that scale, I’d probably get a D+. But then again a D+ wouldn’t get you into the faculty of Medicine, Engineering, Pharmacy, or whatever. It can land you in Commerce… but the line’s too long you’d probably retire by the time you get there.

The point is I don’t follow football, I don’t follow local politics very much… frankly, I don’t care anymore. And, well, religion-wise… I work at a bank, and believe me a million questions can pretty much follow that one. You can always lie, but I wouldn’t do that. It’d be too funny and cruel… not to mention haram of course. You can say the truth, that you’re not interested… but I don’t think that my over-inflated ego would be welcomed on stage there.

It’s too messed up… and my comebacks have gotten very, very limited on the subject.

I never cared about what people thought. One of the many reasons I always hated the idea of proposing was being put in a situation of judgment and assessment. I used to think ‘Who gives that person the right to evaluate me? I should be evaluating him.’ Yes it’s sick. I know. Yes, I have a sister. But things change, apparently. I was another cliché with a reason, much like a flamingo that stands on one leg thinking that if it stood on both, Earth would fall off its grid, much like a worm that never finishes its food in fear of eating up the entire world. That’s ego my friend. That is the sickness that’s been blinding me.

Now the answer to the question of ‘Where do you see yourself in five years?’ is basic and simple. It’s a well known clichéd question that interviewers everywhere never get bored of using. In fact somebody should write a book that contains all the possible answers to that question. It’s like the tagline of the Interview Bible. The excerpt that interviewers believe would actually sell the goddamn book. Unfortunately, when it comes to proposals, one can’t really sing the old tune of ‘Sitting in your seat, Sir’. I dunno. Don’t ask me, it just doesn’t work. You gotta be clear, direct, honest, bullshit-free. At least that’s how I want it to be.

The only problem is that I still don’t know where to see myself in five years. I know I want to be a better person, better job, better pay… the whole nine yards. Oh well…

And the ‘Why do you work at a bank if you think it’s haram?’. Well, I haven’t thought of an appropriate answer for that one yet. I am job hunting, but then again… if I were a father. I would say NOT GOOD ENOUGH.

I do know this. I know that I was sane and awake when I went to study commerce at Ain Shams University. It was MY CHOICE. I transferred from the faculty of Pharmacy to do it. Yes. That I did. Maybe I don’t always know what’s best for me. Maybe I’m not one of those people who got to ask about the HIGHEST SCORING FACULTY before filling out their faculty “choice list” illusion forms. I remember I only filled out four spots on that list and handed it to the guy.

And the point behind this last paragraph is for it to be a reminder for myself that I will be ME if I ever go for it and propose. I know that I don’t really fit into the typical husband-gonna-take-care-of-my-daughter frame, but I am not willing to falsify myself in order to impress anybody. I’lll just put my trust in Allah SWT, pray Estekhara and see where the endless stream will take me this time.

Life as a single is a bitch. I’ve really had enough of it… but at least it’s still my life. I won’t follow football or memorize the names of our bullshit disguisedly unemployed ministers. I won’t lie and say that I chose the banking profession because ‘If we all leave it, then…’ or ‘Banking is the backbone of a country’s economy’.

I’ll just bear my name, my identity, and my faith in Allah and waltz in.

Monday, April 02, 2007

Spine

I try to wake up, but I can't. It deems impossible to resist the temptation of lying in bed forever, with nothing to fear and nothing to want. If only we could get that while we're awake… the desire to dream wouldn't be so addictive.

I turned off my reasons, my ration, and my mind

Unaware of the things that my tongue might say

That red slimy bastard told all my secrets

A mix tape of nonsense I'd stashed away

My eyes shifted from one void to the next, interrogating suspects, doubting their silence, questioning their spines. Pleading for mercy and living for revenge for an act undone, I stare at the ceiling. The spider webs casted across the corners of the walls, seductively inviting, and begging me to fall. Frozen yet I am; unable to scoot.

My RBCs absorb the rising smoke and burn. Those brave little soldiers amidst the flames. I mourn their ashes and search for reasons, but alas, in vain they are gone. I build a memorial that speaks in my brain. All they do is hush me off the grid of conversation. I drowned myself in a pool of shame and listened to the deafening call of the sea pressuring against my ears, welcoming me home, reading me my prayers. Deep into the abyss I gravitate; deep enough for my Fossil watch to break. A watch designed to resist 50 m of depth, but not more; if more is faced then I've probably sunk and drowned.

I push myself off my bed of secrets and fall and hit the abysmal ground. Bottomless and uncanny, it marks my presence with whitish chalk. Guilty yet I am of the dreams I have dreamt, I sentence my darkest of matters to eternal captivity in a bar-less cage of vague and controversy.

A magnetic impulse of unwind clocks
A shattered glass eye, I wouldn't mind
I'll sketch conversation clouds, they're empty still
Such foolish things I did for perfection, for pride
I'll even draw trees and rainbows and smiles
I'll draw hope and salvation and such things you can't get
A ninja, a dragon, and a boy who could fly
Zzzz, said the cartoonist that slept

I write her name on toilet paper and flush her down the drain with the rest of my wastes. A seven digit number that connects to nowhere. I set the automated redial techno and wait for a hope that never ever picks up.

I'll cast off my very own endless stream of light
And wonder how maybe things just might

I am still what I am… spineless, lost, and favored over all.

My ultimate adversary… I hate you.


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