Egiziana In USA
Musings of someone who doesn't want to be a blogger
Sunday, September 10, 2006
Searching for the "Full-Option" Product
More and more these days I am realizing just how we are complicating everything in our lives. Marriage is a great example of this. Many people have reduced the most beautiful relationship in life to a shopping experience; they search for a wife or husband as if they were shopping for a new washing machine or car, dreaming up long lists of qualities that they search for in a spouse. Everyone goes around carrying their lists in their hearts and minds and judge everyone they meet according to them.
The guys want a beautiful, smart, polite, romantic girl who would be a loving wife, great cook, caring mother and kind friend. The girls want a handsome, rich, athletic, strong, smart, romantic guy who will be a caring husband and good father. Even "love chemistry" has been added to the shopping list of qualities. Selection of a spouse then becomes a process of carefully studying how each person's qualities fit their shopping list and weighing up the different options.
I don't want to be someone's option. I want to be someone's one and only, the girl who captures his heart from day one and makes him throw his list away and never think on another girl ever again.
Sunday, September 03, 2006
We've Got The Power
I really like this quote by famous anthropologist Margaret Mead:
"Never underestimate the power of a small group of committed people to change the world. In fact, it is the only thing that ever has."
May be it's because I'm an optimistic person by nature. May be it's because I believe that God helps those who are proactive and who work to postively change the world around them. May be it's because I, like so many others, have grown tired of relying on just words. May be it's because I know that a good deed is multiplied not just in reward, but also in impact. May be it's because I refuse to become depressed and resigned by the way the world is working. May be it's because I believe that there are many people out there who have a clarity of vision. May be it's because I fear no one but my maker. Whatever the reason is, I believe: we've got the power....the power to change what we all see as wrong, to develop this world for the benefit of everyone, not just a select few.
Friday, August 18, 2006
Concentration Crisis
I'm on fast forward, I start doing something and then soon enough I'm thinking about doing something else. I've been meaning to come back to this blog thing and write up on a few things that have crossed my mind lately...but poof..the time flies. You know what it's like, you're going home after a long day at work, or just as you start to fall asleep, you get this great idea, you start thinking of very eloquent sentences and logically flowing descriptions...yes this could be my next article...I promise I will write it when I go home/ wake up/ get more time. And then when you actually find the time to sit down and write, poof, it's all gone. You struggle to come up with a single sentence. And then the next minute you're thinking about what you should cook for dinner, or some inane thing. Yes, it's my own little crisis of concentration.
I'm not complainging that I have a richly filled life, or that I have found many things to enrich my time. But things need to be in balance, because very soon all I will have is a trail of half-finished or mediocre projects.
Concentrate butterfly, concentrate! If I can only be a butterfly, concentrate on the flower that I am on now, and then move on after I've finished....
Saturday, June 03, 2006
صباحك زي وشك يا مصر
Friday, June 02, 2006
Blogolution or blogaloney!
Anyways, I didn't start this post with the intention of analyzing blogging. The irony of it is that I am writing a blog...God only knows why.
Last night I had a nightmare. It wasn't anything horrific or surreal. I dreamt that I was crying and saying: they destroyed the body, mind and soul. See here: Al Meezan: What Happened in Egypt ?....II
Such a short piece, such logical analysis and yet such a heart wrenching reality. It's not that I was shocked to read it...more so it confirmed something that I had been trying to unconsciously deny. Who are "they"? and why did they do it? and what can we do about it?
So I guess, my interest in this blogging thing is as a result of what is currently happening in Egypt. An uproar has erupted as a result of the jailing of Egyptian bloggers who criticized the government, held protests demanding democracy and were put in jail and tortured as a result or so the story goes. The result is a widespread condemnation. One blogger urged people worldwide to boycott Egypt by all means: stop buying Egyptian goods (as if they've flooded world markets anyways ya sidi), and stop tourism to Egypt (oh so you really want to inflict more pain on the country). Anyways, the pleas of this annonymous blogger were promptly picked up by prominent international newspapers: Christian Science Monitor and the Guardian. And this kind of peaked my interest. I wanted to find out more about these "heroic" bloggers and what they stood for. I'm sad to say I was disappointed by what I found. I am not here to pass judgement about anyone but quite frankly I found many of them to be lost souls. Even those who had been jailed and continue to send out posts while in jail (how on earth do you do that?--is this a 5 star jail?). Anyways, a quick look at these sites revealed that the majority are penned by rebelious 20 somethings, who on the one hand shout out for democracy and on the other don't have an alternative to offer. They are true rebels without a cause. Others are disheartened and depressed, writing their thoughts in a witty sarcastic style, lest they stop themselves from completely going insane.
Of course I've come across a few mature bloggers (e.g. ZanGooLaaa and Ana Shayef). But for the most part, I am not very optimistic about what I see. Blogging will get us no where. We are all just talking to ourselves out here....Talking ourselves into paralysis...
I pray that I am wrong.