Is it coming to an end or is it just starting?!

I haven’t been writing for a while… life has been crazy. It feels like yesterday the year has just started and it’s already the end of August. As usual the turnover of people in this place is higher than any other place I’ve even been to. Looking back at the beginning of the year I find myself with a completely new set of friends. Of course, some people from the old group are still around (thank god) but the majority has either left or gotten married and got busy socializing with married couples rather than singles like myself.

In the past 8 months, and as I experienced this society deeper, I was amazed by the level of freedom that I found in this small country. It is supposed to be a conservative country surrounded by fundamentalists but yet the level of personal liberties is considerably high.

I guess this would be attributed to the diversity of nationalities living here. To get a good picture of how diverse this society is, I'll tell you a small story. When my Bahraini friends were visiting me in Egypt, I was driving them around and then one of them was staring out of the window and kept saying "3ajeeb"(amazing) and when I asked what is? He replied: "The streets, the life, the people AND ALL OF THEM ARE EGYPTIANS"

In here, with all these nationalities around, there got to be some sort of tolerance and coexisting scheme… you mind your business and I mind mine.

Wish Egypt had the same.

A deadly start of the year …

The death toll among the people I know spiked this past two months, I lost three people, two of whom I was close to. I can’t really find peace when it comes to death. Although I come from a background that believes in destiny – let alone my own beliefs – I’ve never been able to understand why people so young have to die.

One of my friends who passed away was an American living in Egypt. He was living alone and he died alone, days passed before they figured it out. What makes me any different?? I am living alone in a foreign country and if anything happens to me it would be days before somebody realizes something is wrong.

There got to be a reason for this mess they call life… there got to be some logic behind it all.

Camping in New Year’s Eve...

We headed out to the desert and we reached the camp by 10 PM after doing some shopping for our night in the desert. My first impression was that this camp is really close to the road and you can see cars passing by all the time. But what really caught my attention is that that’s not a camp at all. Its three big tents with all the facilities you can imagine; sofas, big screen TV, satellite receiver, carpets and even chandeliers.

We gathered around the fire, talked, laughed, ate and watched the fireworks. Tomorrow is a new year that carries new hopes and pains that will affect each and every one of us. But today it’s the good company that we enjoy, we might not be here tomorrow, everybody would be busy with his own life, we might not see each other again but today we are here and we know that’s all what matters.

Last year this day was very hard on me but now it’s a far and unpleasant memory that I meet with more sarcasm than thought. I am much better off now than a year ago and I pity whoever left me to join others. But the train moves on, and the list is too long to read from the start and it can only get longer.

What a ride it has been? If only you realize what you have missed.

Happy New Year everybody, may you keep what you’ve earned and may you earn what you deserve.

Of Home... Again...

I just realized that in a year and half I’ve been traveling back and forth to home every three months or so and every time I go I tour at least another city other than mine. It’s really intriguing how you get to see more of a place when you don’t live there anymore. I guess this would be attributable to your emotional change towards such place. When you reside there its home, it’s the place where you work, see your family and meet up with your friends and that is all time consuming. But once you seize to reside there, you get the feeling of a tourist going to visit this place, it won’t be long before your leave is gone and you are heading out of the place you so – once – called home.

Last time I visited, I went to Sharm El Sheikh with some Egyptian friends of mine. We had a blast over there. I always do when I go to Sharm. The whole city gives you the feeling of the resort to which you can only respond to by enjoying the leisure time you will get to spend there.

Later on in Alexandria, I met up with some Bahraini friends of mine who came over to visit. It was their first trip to Egypt and although they traveled to other places before – mostly western – they were amazed by the difference of cultures that Bahrain and Egypt do have. Although both countries are supposed to be of a common culture and background but they are worlds apart. I, myself, haven’t really touched upon that fact, for me Bahrain is the same like Egypt but more calmness and less stress but in eighteen months I came to a realization that Bahrain is more like an expats city in the Gulf and locals don’t get to enjoy it as we expats do.

of weddings, tours and friends...

It was a regular travel day, my taxi has arrived I am all packed up and ready to go. My nostalgia was kicking in as usual, looking forward to the airport blues as ever. I took one last look at my place, smiled at the photos of family and friends stacked on my reception tables. It won’t be long now before I see them in person and add couple of more photos to this chronological photography of my life.

I arrived at the airport exactly two hours before my flight as I usually do, I walk up to the lady giving the boarding passes, smiled at her, and handed my passport and ticket, she returned my smile with a nervous one and explains to me that my confirmed ticket is no good because Gulf Air has over booked the flight. At first I thought she was joking but by the looks at her face I could tell she wasn’t. The poor lady thought that I was going to take it out on her, which I didn’t. I felt my throat shocking in disgust of the Bahraini airliner which does that on regular basis around holiday’s seasons. My day was ruined and there is no point in ruining her day as well over something that she didn’t do.

In the mist of rage and frustration of over twenty people who will be missing on their vacation plans and reservations, I met some very interesting people whom in the course of my normal daily life I wouldn’t usually meet. We agreed to break our fast together since our plans of so doing with our families were sabotaged.

Despite of the bad start of the day, it turned out to be one of the best days I’ve had thus far in Bahrain, after breaking our fast we went for coffee and then went carting, we were as if we were trying to overcome our depression of missing out on our families for one more day than we have to.

What happened that day was unorthodox; it was really remarkable how people who just met few hours ago can turn out to be such good friends, some how it felt like I have known them for years. I am not the type that can bestow the title of a “friend” over somebody easily, but I just had to break my rules this time. I can’t really say I am happy I missed the flight that day, but it certainly turned out for the best.

We traveled the next day and split ways in Cairo.

I went to Alexandria and had a long and eventful vacation. The headliner was my twin brother’s wedding. I danced that night as I’ve never danced in my entire life, I danced differently and continuously, for some reason I was overjoyed may be because I was happy for him and happy for his wife who happened to be one of my best friends.

I felt settled somehow; I had this feeling that nothing in life could go wrong past this moment.

But perhaps it wasn’t just the joy, it was the joy combined with the change of character that has been accumulating through the past 18 months. I quote a dialogue between my mother and a friend of mine:

My mother pointing at me on the dance floor: Who is that?
My friend: Well, I think he is your son.
My mother: Nooo, I don’t know this person

The irony in this small humorous dialogue – which I think have not crossed the minds of my mother and my friend – is that it so righteously implies the extent of change I’ve gone through; right now I have more character profiles than my mobile phone. It wasn’t that far ago when I was being - literary - dragged around the dance floor in my own ex-engagement party by friends and family while I kept my composure at all times.

Perhaps I need to examine that in a separate post one day or even in a separate blog… who knows?

After the wedding I spent one day in Alexandria and then flied to Luxor with a friend of mine we went to Luxor, Aswan, Kom Ombo, Edfu and finally Cairo.

In Luxor we stayed at this small hotel on the West Bank, it was more like somebody’s home somehow converted to a hotel. The manager and the owner was a great dynamic guy who can arrange anything and everything like a Swiss clock, by just looking at him you can tell how much he resembles his ancestors. We really enjoyed our time over there. We took a ride in a hot air balloon around sunrise to see the sun rising over the ancient ruins which was breathtaking. My friend had this book on him and we used it as our guide: where to go, where to eat and what to see. And since we were staying on the west bank we were using a private motor boat to move around, otherwise it is 60 minutes drive to just get from one side of the river to the other. We went to everyplace in Luxor that is on the touristic map. That was totally worth our while. Attempting to describe those places will be undermining.

How can you describe places as old as time itself, places that probably have the story of your entire bloodline engraved on its walls.

Few days later we drove to Aswan. Because my friend was a foreigner we had to drive along with a big convoy of tour buses and police escorts. As I understand that became standard for tourist protection since the 90s. On the way we visited Edfu and Kom Ombo as well.

In Aswan we stayed at a hotel on a private island on the River Nile and we had to take a boat whenever we wanted to go anywhere. Again my friend’s book came in handy and we visited all the places there.

Later on we took a flight to Cairo and I got to see and enter the pyramids for the first time in my life. That was quite an experience. I’ve read about Egyptology as much as I read about law and I know the design of the pyramids like the back of my hand and I got to see them for the first time after 27 years of age.

That was by all means the most enjoyable trip I’ve taken around Egypt so far.

In conclusion of 12 days in Europe with a good old friend…

This trip was a turning point in my life… it was revealing in many aspects. It helped me realize there is too much beauty to life to be wasted on regrets or feeling sorry for paths in life that I did not take willingly and which blinds me from taking the paths that I am willing to take.

The resemblance between my friend and me was abnormal. We read the same books, we are both a middle child, both Leos, we are both the rouge one of our families and we even have the same preferences when it comes to shoes. And let me elaborate on this shoes coincidence because it was quite funny. When we first met, we were wearing the same brand and only figured out the next day, which so happened to be another day in which we were wearing a different brand than the day before but still the same brand as each other!!!

The resemblances in our choices and preferences made me question, and affirm, some of my basic concepts in life, and right now, I am more convinced than ever that there is no such thing in life as chance. However, I started to believe in the concept of “meant to be” although I am still searching for the answer of why things are meant to be the way they are?

Life just keeps giving us clues but always forgets to give us the keys to interpret them… I guess it is up to us to find those keys.

A predominant subject that we have been discussing a lot was “relationships”, some how I still know a thing or two about these, and apparently, I haven’t lost my faith completely on the same. In fact, I haven’t lost my faith at all, somewhere deep inside my clouded heart I still believe that there is more to life than one big-time screwed-up relationship.

I right now believe that we should not miss on life because we are scared or not sure. We should build our criteria upon our needs and not our desires because the former are durable but the latter are ever changing. The need is the driving emotion of the human heart but desire is the byproduct of such need. That’s, basically, what makes us differ from animals, and ironically that what makes some animals differ from most – so called – humans.

The farewell moments were emotional, some how we bonded within these twelve days as we could have done in the twelve years, had we been interacting in real life. She told her friends one day that “some how we had this soul-mate thing going on between us since the start” her words crossed my mind while I hugged her and kissed her hands goodbye. I felt proud of her and myself for proving to the world that humanity can still prevail despite of all the madness that is going on.

We’ve already made plans for our next meet and I am very much looking forward to that.

Who knows where life will take us from there?

Norway - God's heaven on Earth...

Norway is god’s heaven on earth, you can tell that from the first encounter. My friend says “god had a very good day when he created Norway” I guess that should be enough to convey the meaning.

It is impressive to see the mixture of the four elements of the human origin combined in one massive painting that shows god’s creativity. For those of you who have not yet seen that in their lives … perhaps Norway will be the best demonstration.

It maked me wonder about the message god wanted to convey to humanity by giving some people deserts and oil and giving others rivers and forests…

We visited many places, and have been to more than half a dozen of forests looking for mushrooms and cram berries. That was fun. The landscapes here are breathtaking, and the fresh air is like nothing I have experienced before. One of the things that is worth mentioning is the mailbox at Nisseloft Brevhus, which they process once a year only around Christmas time so that all greetings messages have to be christmas related... a nice cheerful idea.

Something grows inside you as you stroll along the Norwegian countryside, I wish I know what that is.