Thursday, October 29, 2009

Barely a country and a lesson never learnt

Driving calmly in my car today, I was thinking about the famous stupid statement by the former pope about Lebanon that is being echoed in almost every official document here, stating that "Lebanon is more than a country, it is a message". The Lebanese, so in love with vagueness and vague statements about their country, like "Lebanon is a cedar", or "Lebanon is too small to be divided and too big to be swollen", or "Lebanon is... is... is... more than words can say...it is very big", as a famous singer once said, etc. etc. etc. examples are innumerable. So I was thinking about the pope who said that Lebanon, barely a country, is more than a country, when I pass by the famous Holiday Inn. I look at the huge holes in almost every square meter of the building in every single floor, and I could imagine the mortars firing on real human beings inside not so many years ago, but before I was born. And I thought that in wars (maybe strictly Lebanese wars) people survive by mistake. They don’t die by mistake. That's when I remembered that I have heard somewhere before a similar idea. Only now I know where; Sami Hawwat once said it "I live for lack of death".

Eography

Finally, someone acknowledges the beauty of this blog's name. Diana wrote: "awal shi (first) i like the name.. second i knew there would be a photo of ali somewhere... third it's got interesting stuff!".
Did I ever tell you where eography comes from? First, the name is my creation (copyrighted as well). Second, "Informally, an ography is a field of study or academic discipline ending in the suffix -ography. The word ography is therefore a back-formation from the names of these disciplines. Such words are formed from Greek or Latin roots with the terminal -graphy derived from the Greek verb γραφειν (graphein), to write. The word ography is thus misleading as the 'o' is actually part of the word stem that receives the -graphy ending.". Third, based of this definition, maybe Egraphy would have made more sense with the "e" standing for "electronic". However, for aesthetic purposes, the misleading suffix is hereby used.

Monday, October 26, 2009

I Like You

To like someone is usually the lesser state of to love someone. Yet, when you love someone, to like him (still) becomes the higher state.

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Of Mice and Men

"I seen hundreds of men come by on the road an’ on the ranches, with their bindles on their back an’ that same damn thing in their heads . . . every damn one of ’em’s got a little piece of land in his head. An’ never a God damn one of ’em ever gets it. Just like heaven. Ever’body wants a little piece of lan’. I read plenty of books out here. Nobody never gets to heaven, and nobody gets no land." John Steinbeck

Monday, October 19, 2009

Out of nowhere

A good massage has to have a sexual touch.

The Crossroad of Love and death

The first thing you realize when you fall in love is that the one you love is ephemeral. For some reason you think you are not. The first thing that comes to your mind when the one you love falls out are the rivers of tears shed on your death bed.

Now somewhere

Now somewhere there is a lady positioning a gun on her forehead
And another pulling the trigger
Now somewhere there is six year old boy wetting his bed
And a 60 year old
Now somewhere there is a delinquent driving full speed on a highway
And a valley waiting to swallow
Now somewhere there is a mother and a last push and a first cry
and a father in the hallway
Now somewhere there is an apple, red, ripe, and full
And a starving African in the desert
Now somewhere there is a rapist looking, wanting, and lusting
And a boy in the corner
Now somewhere there is a rope and a man’s neck waiting to embrace
And an audience
Now somewhere there is sand on a shore and two lovers
And more
Now somewhere there is someone watching them all in silence and boredom
And stretching his legs

Friday, October 16, 2009

More than a couch

Every single couple I knew including newlyweds have told of at least one time where the husband had to sleep on the couch, the same couch they happily bought together and fantasized about its uses and romantically had wine and sex on it on the first day. Why doesn't a wife sleep on the couch some men would ask.

The God of Small Things

If reading is the bread for the soul, then this book is its best bakery. "They broke the love laws. That lay down who should be loved. And how. And how much" she writes. I wasn't reading a book, I was rather remembering. The wordplay Arundhathi Roy often used in the book very cleverly narrated through the eyes and mind of a child, or more specifically the twin souls Rahel and Estha, awoke the child in me. I was dazzled by her ability to still remember and tell a story with the same feelings of a kid without losing the poetic touch. A breathtaking story beautifully told in the sad and happy parts. Once again, one of those books that make you understand the complications of the human nature and remind you of how cruel the human can be and how soft his soul.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Intimate Prophecy

There are things I believe in that are not purely logical and that have no scientific ground (although some would argue that they do). Forget about Osho, or the silly "Secret" book, or the million theories on energy, I believe that:
1- If I wish and when I decide, my guardian angel would visit someone (I want) in his dreams and would ask him to do something, and he will (This applies strictly and solely to me)
2- Whatever harm (intentional or not) you do to someone, will happen to you. One day, when it happens, you will know why it happened and you will remember the person you harmed. vividly (This applies to all)
3- Positive attracts positive. Negative attracts negative (hell with my Physics teacher)
4- Attraction, evaporation, and melting, are chemistry not physics

Hamra... to be continued...

Hamra, I believe is not a word that refers to a place, rather to a phenomenon. A friend of mine who hangs out in Ashrafiyeh, Kaslik, Jounieh, Monot and Gemaizeh from time to time (for its proximity to West Beirut, I guess), was telling me that he went yesterday to Hamra for a change. "I like diversity," he said, "but this is too much." He described wittygraphically a lady who was sitting on the next table: her nails painted four months ago had grown leaving "des marque en haut", as he put it. "I dont mind hippy, but there were spilled oil tâches on her shirt. Her boots, yes winter boots, smell. Bon, une saleté"
I laughed but it seriously made me think. The reasons why I love Hamra are exactly the same ones why I hate it because Hamra is different yes, but Hamra is no exception to the Lebanon psyche of exaggeration and ranking obsessions (As As’ad Abou Khalil graciously summarized it). A hippy in Hamra is the hippi-est, a leftist in hamra is a Mao, a drinker in Hamra is a Homer (Simpson), a philosopher in Hamra is an Einstein-looking, a beauty in Hamra is a dazzling beauty, and sex in Hamra is talked about loud as loud as can be, that's it, as openly as can be, as blatantly as can be. Talked about. Full stop.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Unspoken Thoughts

Often you are influenced, touched, impressed, or inspired by someone else's spoken ideas. That's because at one point they were your own but you never put them in words.

Monday, October 5, 2009

Al-Qaeda dont chew

Unfortunately, there's one group that could solve Yemen's khat problem. The angry puritans of al-Qaeda don't touch the stuff.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1926015,00.html