She smoked her cigarette in silence, and couldn’t help but smile inside. “You’re going to miss your train, Madame.” The chauffeur’s eyes were blue, and that’s probably why she started shivering every time he looked at her. “So be it! There’s nothing more soothing and valuable than having the time to finish your cigarette in silence, with no burdens on your shoulders. So what if I miss the train? There’ll always be another one. Don’t you think, Oscar?” “Certainly, Madame.”
Oscar. What a weird name for a French man. A French man that had charming, magical eyes. She turned around to take in her surroundings one more time. Breathe in, breath out. That was the sense of life! She finally found her purpose.
But the next train never came. And she just sat there. Reluctantly accepting that she had gone through great loss that she could not regain. The matters of the heart were never easy to grasp. But there was Oscar, the man she had spent the night of her life with in Venice. The man with the most penetrating eyes she had ever seen. “Oscar, do you believe in your own fate?” “What do you mean, Madame?” “Oscar, stop calling me ‘Madame’. I’m Elizabeth, as it were last night.” “Then, Elizabeth, I would highly appreciate you calling me by my real name.” She paused, waiting for his explanation. “My name is Luchino, as it were since I was born.” “How come I wouldn’t know something like that?” “You never asked, Madame. You assumed.”
Her surroundings blurred, the lit cigarette slipped from her hand onto the floor and was immediately extinguished by the falling rain. Another loss, another cigarette going to waste, another Oscar that she enjoyed. She didn’t know until that moment that her search for her real man Oscar was over, since she wasted the years of her, oh so precious life, looking for Oscar and not the man.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Friday, February 26, 2010
There's always...
"There's always a little "TRUTH" behind "JUST KIDDING", a little "EMOTION" behind "I DON'T CARE", a little "PAIN" behind "IT'S OKAY", a little "I NEED U" behind "LEAVE ME ALONE", & a lot of "WORDS" behind "THE SILENCE.""
Wow, why can I SO relate to this??
Wow, why can I SO relate to this??
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Lack of Faith
Today, in our MUN-session, I actually noticed how fed-up people have become. They don't believe that they are capable of changing something with willpower, discipline and pure belief. It shocked me for a moment. What has happened for a young generation to get that far??
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
My Photography...
One of the photographs I did for my Advanced Photojournalism class. See how the words Art (الفن) and Culture (الثقافة) are covered by the value of money. Also notice what is written around the coin (دعك من الثقافة - برنامج مبارك للترشيح للرئاسة). The book is Ibrahim Eissa's "كتابي عن مبارك و مصره و عصره". The headline "أعز ما تملك" ("The most valuable thing you own") refers - in my own context - to the 50 piasters.Saturday, February 13, 2010
Break the Habit
Where to start? Or stop? Let's be honest: we don't know beginning from end, truth from lie. We have reached a point where all that matters are 5 things: Fame, money, connections, popularity (as in social integrity) and power. And they bring us everywhere, if we have them. They open sealed doors, they feed starving egos, they offer luxury and a lifetime of superficial satisfaction. So it seems. And it's what we blindly believe.
Mankind has reached a very worrying state of mind and state of life, if not to say that it's funny. I can't remember the last time I walked the streets of Cairo, simply to unwind, to see joyful faces, without having to think about the burden that this population is going through all the time. And I get sick when I hear German artists rapping and complaining about their country's corruption, the unsafe life they're living, and about the thousand problems that they have to face daily. If they complain and claim that they have such a hard life, what should an ordinary Egyptian citizen complain about? He wouldn't even know the start of his problems, nor the end of them. The end is uncertain and its timing is unavailable. He cannot trust his authorities, never learned to anyways. How have we reached this state? People are too worried about finding their daily bread; they don't even care anymore who's in charge and what he's doing for them - or against them.
To the left, we can see the simple farmer (فلاح) who cannot harvest his crops - due to the lack of proper resources given to him by the government -, with his 11 children running about the streets of the poor village,and he's silently thanking God for giving him a life filled with family and a home that would be considered a matchbox in other places of the society.
To the right, we can see bunch of rich couples, enjoying their lives at a fancy charity event - that cost more than it will gain -, drinking their champagne, complaining about the oversalted food or how the bad weather ruined the hairstyle they had done for a bunch of banknotes in some overpaid hairsalon (كوافير).
Straight ahead, we can see some business-men (رجال الأعمال), passing thick envelopes from under the table, smoking their cigars, with a map rolled out in front of them, revealing a hierarchy of utter disaster and a map of the country they're ruling, deciding on what move they should do next to get even more money and power, and destroy even more lives than they already have.
Behind us, we can see a bunch of people in uniforms, with some golden figures on their shoulders, ready to attack, take in and torture anyone who seems to dance too freely and truthfully. Needless to describe them even more bluntly.
Right here standing with us, is the rest of the population, staring at everything with open mouths, yet reactionless.
But why am I describing what we all know already? It won't bring us anywhere. The important thing is to act. Give an extra fifty pounds to your caretaker (بواب), driver (سواق), or garbage collector (زبال), because it might save a life and because you, as you read this, will not die from it. Join Human Rights Organizations, demand your rights as a citizen, so others will follow you, join simple charity events and decide not to live a good life while others are at the edge of starvation and complete negligence. Take you rights, whether politically, socially, or other-ly. Instead of closing our eyes in order not to see the pain, we should decide to open them and do something against it! Break the habit of fame, money, connections, popularity and power.
Mankind has reached a very worrying state of mind and state of life, if not to say that it's funny. I can't remember the last time I walked the streets of Cairo, simply to unwind, to see joyful faces, without having to think about the burden that this population is going through all the time. And I get sick when I hear German artists rapping and complaining about their country's corruption, the unsafe life they're living, and about the thousand problems that they have to face daily. If they complain and claim that they have such a hard life, what should an ordinary Egyptian citizen complain about? He wouldn't even know the start of his problems, nor the end of them. The end is uncertain and its timing is unavailable. He cannot trust his authorities, never learned to anyways. How have we reached this state? People are too worried about finding their daily bread; they don't even care anymore who's in charge and what he's doing for them - or against them.
To the left, we can see the simple farmer (فلاح) who cannot harvest his crops - due to the lack of proper resources given to him by the government -, with his 11 children running about the streets of the poor village,and he's silently thanking God for giving him a life filled with family and a home that would be considered a matchbox in other places of the society.
To the right, we can see bunch of rich couples, enjoying their lives at a fancy charity event - that cost more than it will gain -, drinking their champagne, complaining about the oversalted food or how the bad weather ruined the hairstyle they had done for a bunch of banknotes in some overpaid hairsalon (كوافير).
Straight ahead, we can see some business-men (رجال الأعمال), passing thick envelopes from under the table, smoking their cigars, with a map rolled out in front of them, revealing a hierarchy of utter disaster and a map of the country they're ruling, deciding on what move they should do next to get even more money and power, and destroy even more lives than they already have.
Behind us, we can see a bunch of people in uniforms, with some golden figures on their shoulders, ready to attack, take in and torture anyone who seems to dance too freely and truthfully. Needless to describe them even more bluntly.
Right here standing with us, is the rest of the population, staring at everything with open mouths, yet reactionless.
But why am I describing what we all know already? It won't bring us anywhere. The important thing is to act. Give an extra fifty pounds to your caretaker (بواب), driver (سواق), or garbage collector (زبال), because it might save a life and because you, as you read this, will not die from it. Join Human Rights Organizations, demand your rights as a citizen, so others will follow you, join simple charity events and decide not to live a good life while others are at the edge of starvation and complete negligence. Take you rights, whether politically, socially, or other-ly. Instead of closing our eyes in order not to see the pain, we should decide to open them and do something against it! Break the habit of fame, money, connections, popularity and power.
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Teacher and Disciple (2)
Teacher: It causes great countries the severest depressions. And can set a human being into an ecstatic state of mind and life. Too much or too less, it will always cause you trouble. An immature mean of rewarding and punishing. Its idea is the greatest, but it does not synchronize with human nature, just like communism. Its mere existence drives people to forget their principles, morals, religiong, laws. Yet, it becomes the most important principle in life.
Disciple: Teacher, does it relate to enlightment?
Teacher: No, it does not, although its possession causes other people to think big of you. It measures things, but not the soul or the mind or the heart. It's the source of everything good, and everything bad.
Disciple: Teacher, does it give me freedom?
Teacher: Freedom is a relative term. Define freedom, and you will need it. Live through the state freedom, and you will need it. Kill freedom, and you will still need it. But it will give you satisfactory freedom.
Disciple: And what does that mean?
Teacher: That it makes you the victim of its very own self.
Disciple: Does it have a soul?
Teacher: Your soul feeds it. And it feeds your soul. Yet, as a matter of fact it's nothing more than a piece of metal or a sheet of paper.
Disciple: Teacher, do you talk of money?
Teacher: This is the enlightment I did not want you to have. But indeed, it's the purpose of what I have said.
Disciple: Teacher, does it relate to enlightment?
Teacher: No, it does not, although its possession causes other people to think big of you. It measures things, but not the soul or the mind or the heart. It's the source of everything good, and everything bad.
Disciple: Teacher, does it give me freedom?
Teacher: Freedom is a relative term. Define freedom, and you will need it. Live through the state freedom, and you will need it. Kill freedom, and you will still need it. But it will give you satisfactory freedom.
Disciple: And what does that mean?
Teacher: That it makes you the victim of its very own self.
Disciple: Does it have a soul?
Teacher: Your soul feeds it. And it feeds your soul. Yet, as a matter of fact it's nothing more than a piece of metal or a sheet of paper.
Disciple: Teacher, do you talk of money?
Teacher: This is the enlightment I did not want you to have. But indeed, it's the purpose of what I have said.
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Bam...
Anger swells above what's left of this love. No, not anger. Maybe confusion. Or indecisiveness. Two roads. Both of who's goals and ends are unclear and unstable. But which to choose? Such decisions should not exist. Bam! @#$%^&*!
Monday, February 1, 2010
The hypocrisy of our middle-class and high-class life
Egypt arose in a flood of black, red and white. People cheering. Screaming. Celebrating the victory of a soccer game. And the gain of yet another African Cup.
Even those who hate the country and await their departure into the foreign lands start cheering "Egypt" and are joyfully celebrating what the Egyptian National Soccer-Team have achieved. Just to wake up the next day to remember what they detest about this country and going back to their state-cursing, population-hating, visa-searching, western-culture-worshiping attitude.
The hypocrisy of our middle-class and high-class life.
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