Time has changed indeed

Mobile Music is so much easier these days!

Google Morse

dit dit dit dat dit dit/dit dit/dat dit dat/dit

As a girl guide for 13 years, I enjoyed google giving hommage to Samuel Morse...

Right there on the curve

While driving back from work, right there on the curve of the road, I saw a guy very jumpy and moving rapidly in a car driving towards me, I thought they must be guys probably enthusiastic about something. And suddenly I made out what his movements were, I looked at the person sitting on his side, and found a woman trying to be as far away as she can from him, clinging to the door as much as she can, and her arm placed in front of her face... defensive position.

And then as my car got closer to theirs, there he was at it again, he held his arm up high too fast and hit the air beside him, because she was as far as she can be, and he wasn't able to focus on hitting her and driving on a hard left. I know he saw me looking, the dude with the glasses, ugly as a monkey butt.

I slowed down, I was shocked, I saw from the bits of her face that was hidden by her arm how scared she was, how much of an animal he is. I didn't know if there was anything I can do, but seconds later, they were gone. Out of my life. I was going back home to get ready for going out, and she... she was living one of her worst moments in life.

I always wonder, will I be able to make out if a man is abusive? How can you know if your friend, boyfriend, colleague.. is abusive?

Some stuff I have to say!

1- I haven't had a migraine since more than a month (knock on wood)

2- 2 nights ago, while driving back home around 11pm, I had light fm
on and they put that old song and I was like "NO WAY"... it was East
17's song "Thunder"! And I started singing, more like screaming! What?
I was like 13 when that song came out :)

3- Relationships! It is just so amazing listening to people tell me
about their significant other, how much they love that person, but how
much that person is making things so hard on them. It is so damn
difficult to get along with your ownself and make up your mind about
something, how about making life-decisions with another person? I look
at relationships with awe, and at how people interpret things, their
different point of views, their different ways of solving things, or
making things worse or...

4- I want to sky dive

5- I no longer want to envy other people, I want to thank God again
for all the fortunes I have. I know I nag a bit, but that's just me
thinking outloud trying to find a solution.

6- I dodged an accident last week, was gonna hit a car in front of me,
that had stopped because 3 cars bumped into each other.

Okay enough for today. I've been blogging mucho mucho lately! Khalas bi kaffe.

Respect

We have been raised and told since we were little kids to respect older persons, to respect teachers, to respect the elderly, to respect disabled persons.

Well what if that person is just a nasty person, a nasty old man. Should you respect them still? Wouldn't you be a hypocrite for pretending while inside all you hold for that person is disrespect?

I will never forget my Arabic literature teacher back in high school, who used to tell us not to ever disrespect another person, because when we do, we're actually disrespecting ourselves. And for me this rule was enough to abide by all my life even though it was extremely hard to apply non-theoretically.

However yesterday, he said: "people should earn respect, and if a person offends me or does something that I do not respect or approve, yes I remain civil with them but they lose my respect immediately, be it older or younger than me".

As I prepared myself to answer back, I opened my mouth but no words came out, I couldn't disagree or argue with him, I suddenly realized that he's right.

Perhaps it took me 28 years to realize the difference between respecting and being civil.

Staying slim is good for health and for the environment

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8004257.stm

Well if it's also a good thing for the environment, then I will take
my diet more seriously now.

Earth Day, April 22

Needless to explain what Earth Day is, but in a nutshell it started in 1970, this day is dedicated to remember what Earth is giving us, appreciate it, and think about what we should give back.

Read more here about how you can participate in a way or another, at work, at school, at home..

I miss writing in Arabic

I used to write in Arabic. Actually this is how it all started. When I first got into university, you know, rebel, politics, life, freedom, new things, Lebanese University and its problem, teenagers going on adults, majors in Lebanon...

I started writing and writing in Arabic. It's the best thing to write when you are driven by something. I used to read a lot of political books. The first was "7oub wa mawt fi Bayrout" it was for a foreign journalist who said was Bachir Gemayel's mistress.

I tried to write for a student newspaper, I gave my article to a friend so he can give it to them so they would publish it, the article was about the disorientation students receive before picking their major that will define their career, the choices they have, and the lack of opportunities, etc... It was a long article. Anyway the article never really got there, but once, I was checking a monthly edition and I found a small piece of text written by that friend that was about the same issue as my article's.

So anyway, let me show you a poem I wrote almost a decade ago. It's in Arabic.


And in order for me to go back to writing in Arabic, I need to read books written in Arabic again. I have become dumb in Arabic, it's a shame.

We're supposed to be off DUDE!

What sucks is everyone I know has the day off today, well, because
it's a holiday. It's Easter Monday Mr. Sanyoura! Yes I know, everyone
is back to considering it as an official holiday, but not where I
work.

So it's sunny outside, with a perfect temperature, most of my friends
are out lunching somewhere in Bekaa or the North... and my colleagues
and I are here working.

This Thucks!

Saw this billboard today

Cute eh? What do you think?

Fast & Furious in Geant's parking

After watching the movie Fast & Furious 4, we went back to the parking to leave. I personally accomplished one of my dreams and it's sitting in the supermarket chariot, and going for a ride :P but then we heard some "toshfit", some wheels sqweeking on the parking floor, and not by one car, but by many. Apparently the fellow Lebanese young men were very influenced by the movie... Points I would like to talk about are:

1- The movie was not that good
2- The Lebanese people, especially the young are very susceptible.
3- They had sucky cars for that deed anyway

Google 3a lebneneh

I'm sure most Lebanese residents have noticed that when they type google.com they get google.com.lb, nothing new there, but what amazed me and I only saw this today, is that the Google Loubnan, has options to browse the Lebanese google in 4 languages :)

Google.com.lb offered in: العربية Français հայերեն And English of course

People, how cool is that? (3rd language in case you couldn't read it, is in Armenian) It says "hayeren" I think... should be :P

Coldplay in Lebanon August 2009

I am guessing it's going to be between 9 and 16 August, coming from the US to Lebanon then to Europe. I wasn't so happy because I already bought tickets to see them in Virginia in May! I had changed my training date at work, my plane ticket, kharbatet kil shi to see them, and now they're coming to Lebanon :P It's fine, twice is better than once ey!

Wel3aneh bi Lebnen! Once again, let us all join in prayers that no war would happen this summer.

That's that's that's all folks!

Writing and blogging

Some people are very transparent. Well from those people we can select
the bloggers as transparent folks. But not necessarily. A person who
jokes and is never serious might turn out to be an extremenly deep
person, and a reflexive person to be just plain vain.

People blog for so various reasons. Some are technical blogs, and thus
sharing experience and found solutions. And some blog to report, and
others to vent, and others to nag, and others to document, and others
to get attention and others to express their points of view of things.
Why? In hope to find other bloggers who might agree.

Why don't they express their points of view in real? among real
people? Well, merely because we are not always surrounded by the
brightest people, or maybe simply because we do not want to show our
complete true self to... colleagues who might judge, therefore
impacting your image at work, or uni or wherever.

Why do I blog? Of course I don't mind getting attention, but it's
really not my sole nor main purpose. I blog because it is a truly
unique experience, I do write, secretly, and in other places. But
besides the political/social/Lebanon blog (for obvious reasons), I got
this. I blog random thoughts, silly thoughts, rarely ideas, mostly
naggings, sometimes incidents that happened to me. Why? well it's for
two main reasons:
1- People's comments and their way of viewing things
2- Documenting this part of my life

And finally, why do I write? Besides the evident reason that I express
myself in writing better than speech.. When I was 17, my late best
friend told me, to write. For some reason she believed in me. Yes, I'm
no great writer, I know this very well, I get like a nice metaphor
every 5 thousands words or so... but nothing will ever stand in the
way of me writing.

...

Would you die knowing a secret and not telling it to anyone before you.. die?

Hello Motto

I always heard people say they have a motto in life. I never knew what mine is, tried hard to think of one, but to no avail.

It's been quite some time, maybe a year or so, that I have decided to actually enjoy every moment that I can possibly enjoy. I didn't quite get the hang of it easily, it took time, but it was always an objective of mine. To finally realize that it has become my motto "3an jadara" (well earned)...

"You live once, so fuckin' enjoy it while you can"

Beirut #1 no surprise, I retract what I said before

I once expressed surprise that Beirut was considered #1 place to visit among another 44 of which many for me are amazing places in NYtimes (check here). So today, I would like to retract what I said and definitely cheer and support this vote, because last time I spoke about downtown Beirut, which even if some restaurants closed since Hariri's assassination, opposition sit-in, all the demonstrations taking place there etc, I totally forgot (silly me) that Beirut consists of other amazing regions as well, such as Hamra, Ashrafieh, Rawsheh, Gemmayze, etc...

Hamra is really an amazing place, I can't believe I didn't see this before this recent month. My blogging colleague compared Hamra to Newyork, and had almost the same impression I had about Hamra. When it comes to me, Hamra reminds me of Paris a lot. I loved Paris because it had everything, and crazily enough I had missed seeing that Hamra had everything as well, for 28 years. Pubs, restaurants, cafes, shops and most importantly hotels all inside buildings in which people live, and other buildings where people work, such as centers, banks. Moreover the roads, the streets, the architecture of having old buildings, open and crowded all the time. It's there.

What about Gemmayze? Pubs street par excellence. I will talk thoroughly about the other regions when I'm not too sleepy, and hopefully have pictures to show you.

So yes, I really think Beirut has it all. I am really hoping that the elections go by with no problems, because if they do, I think we will have the best summer in decades.

Edited: I would like to add a link to Hamra's map that I found on Hannibaal's blog. Enjoy.

I gotta fast car

This morning I woke up to a weird dream (like most of my dreams), I suddenly see in front of me La Bastille, but in the dream I couldn't remember the name, I convinced myself it was called Baymen, quelque chose comme ca! I look at my boyfriend while he was driving and told him with surprise that Paris is only a 6 hours drive from Lebanon, and continued that we should do this more often, we can go have dinner for two hours and come back to Lebanon, it's really worth it!

And as I was analyzing in my dream, if you go by land, you won't need a passport or a visa. I was very happy to know that. Then we went to La Seine, there was a ship, that was throwing fun rockets, but one of them did bump into the ceiling of a car. I thought that it's normal, it's their show, people accept it. And I woke up.

From Lilzi to Lilo

I was always Lilo... thus the blog's title changing :)

Kylie - Part VIII

*"You see, I don't mind doing that at all." He looked at her with smiling eyes knowing that she still doesn't understand what he means.

She moved away, walked to the rocks and picked a flat one, sat on it facing the sea and listening to the waves crashing on these rocks hoping that she might find with each wave a letter in a bottle telling her what she should do.*

A lot of times couples find themselves thrown in front of the possibility of a long distance relationship, many couples decide to split before they part. Weird choice of words sequence. Split before they part. Why would people split before they part? What about the other kind of couples, who decide to try and make it work realizing
that's it's extremely hard and needs a lot of work and effort to be put in it, and there is the last type of couples, who think it will be a piece of cake.

Long distance relationships sometimes work, and sometimes it doesn't, and it has nothing to do with what kind of couples they were, or whether they really loved each other or not, or how long they have been together before it all happened, or what each individual is looking for in this distance.

Consequences? It can be break-up, cheating, break-up with cheating, break-up without cheating, immediate marriage, loss of feelings towards each other, development of stronger feelings.

People are scared to realize something due to the long distance relationship, they're scare to realize that they can actually live without their other half, or scared to find out that they cannot live without their other half.

Technically speaking, yes they can. But we're not speaking technically here. We're just talking about a person realizing that life isn't just about careers, success, money and traveling, sometimes life is about being with the person you love. A person wouldn't want to admit that. Does this mean there is really no need to work hard on accomplishing things? On personal development?

This is where math comes in. Math or Informatics, your pick. Both are amazing because both have and are based on logic. Remember the Union? The mutually exclusive Union? In computer words we say OR and XOR!

See, if you're afraid of something, let's say changing your location even though it is for the better of your career, you're scared to make this change, because you're not sure if this is because you might lose the one person you have ever loved and that really made you happy, or because you're just afraid to make a change. If you are afraid to make a change, does this mean you have been delusional and not really in love? And tadaaaa, no, not necessarily, possible, but not essential. This is where the XOR gets thrown out of the window, and OR does its magic. You can be both.

*Dany followed her to the rocks but said nothing. She looked up and she looked down. Kept looking up and down for God knows how long. Then she blurted thinking that she had found a solution with slight confidence though, hoping that maybe if she simplifies things, it can get simple

-"I think we can make it work if you leave, I really do. I will travel and visit you a couple of times a year, you'll do the same. Maybe I will find work there, or possibly find a scholarship and do that thesis I've been rambling about for the past years... We can make it work!" Said Kylie with complete denial, hope, passion and
hopelessness.

Dany lifted his arm, placed his fingers on her lips and shushed her. Even though she had stopped talking, he didn't want her to even have the chance of adding anything to what she had just said. He approached to her, removed his hand and placed both hands on her back, placed his cheek on hers and squeezed like he hasn't seen her for ages.

"I love you! I want to be with you! I know people say that sometimes love is not enough. Probably it's not. We'll work it out. Take a break and come with me, let's take a walk." He asked her and got up.

But she didn't follow. She was crying...*

Gotta get back to work.