Back to Cairo

After India and Basata, I've come back home finally. (come and home don't rhyme eh?) (imagine if they did, then come would sound like comb - digressions digressions).



Anyhow, I'm just very restless, as always happens when I have nothing to do, I'm filled with supernervous energy as if I have some really important task at hand, and writing is the last thing I should be doing. On the contrary, writing is the most relaxing thing hehe.



So, well, good things seem to be coming my way. Darn, I was supposed to call this person and I totally forgot, but I have a few job prospects - in teaching and publishing and possibly even NGO work, which would be great. I have tons of stories about India and a few memories of Basata I want to put up on the web.



These days I'm just taking a bit of time to be in my own mental land I guess. But I'll be back with the stories. I will share one for now: its called "Paanwala kidhar hai?"(where is the paanwala? ie the person that sells paan - nice stuff to eat in india)



So one fine day in Mumbai i decided i wanted to eat some paan. I confirmed with Jayu that the place was opposite this restaurant Trafalgar Chowk. I expected it to be some tiny affair, and I saw one of the sort closed, so I went up to this other shop and asked "Where is the paanwala?" in Hindi. The guy just looked at me and went, "Its here". Figuring it was nearby, I peered, "Here where?". The guy looked even more befuddled, and just didn't say anything... so after like a few long seconds, I saw all the paan-making paraphernalia right there, all the leaves and tins. and I was like "OH! Oh hahaha, sorry, I just didn't see". And the guy went, "No matter, (mai bhi confuse ho gaya tha) Even I got confused!"



So, smartass that I am, I went home all laughing and told the story to Jaya, and it hasn't stopped spreading I suspect. And gave people all the more reason to persist in calling me vaaydi (absent-minded in Sindhi).



Not that it stopped there. When I visited Hyderabad, and I took my poor cousin along to net center ... well, to be continued...

Back to Cairo!

Yes, I was gone. I spent a great vacation in India, including a trip to Ajanta-Ellora caves, a brief visit to Nasik (on our trip to the caves), another trip to Hyderabad, and now that I'm back to Cairo, I'll be going to Bassata for the weekend - a trip I've been wanting to take for years.



I'll talk about that trip once I come back (obviously). As for what I did in India: lots of cave gazing, hanging with kids (cousins and nephews/nieces; gosh aren't i old?), watching foreign films with Jayu, wrestling on playstation with Manoj and Sunil (and in a few they were beaten!), going to concert at gateway of India, and using the services of the male restrooms at the Taj hotel facing it!! All these wonders and more I will recall once I come back from Bassata...

Faces we wear

Last night I went to “The World of Music” to watch Kailash and Assabghy sing in the tribute to Larry Catlin. It was a really nice event. The night before I invited a few other friends to the documentary screening of this Algerian movie followed by a Palestinian movie. My impressions of people keep changing. Goes to tell you how unreliable my first impressions are. “There will be time / there will be time/ To prepare a face to meet / the faces that you meet”. We’re all faces at the end of the day, and like a teacher once said you wonder if there some real core or if its just one layer after another like an onion. Onion-face. At Cairo Jazz Club last night, I met some people, and it was a refridgerator-reception I got. Always girls. Makes me wonder why on earth I bother even going up to say hello. I really won’t do it next time. It tires me; it actually saps me of my effort. I’m just going to go Taoist now with it all, and go with as it goes. I’m glad Sherif Nakhla agreed to let Assabghy and me work with him on some future video project, because I really want to learn stuff.



So for a while now I’ve been feeling aimless. I suppose its understandable right after a big transition like graduation from a degree like Comparative Literature. I meet a lot of people going through the same thing. Some people say they’ve never reached a sense of being in a place where they should be. At the concert yesterday, a girl was singing this country song, “Time will do the talking / and years will do the walking”. She was good.



So I will be going to India tomorrow. I’m really looking forward to meeting Jayu and spending some time relaxing. I hope the trip overall is confrontation-free and relaxed. oh and since my last wah-wah complaint about people growing distant, things have patched up between an old friend, and I've got this new bunch to hang out with off and on, and now the new are becoming somewhat older.. :) as it goes.



India, here I come. Leaving one home for another.

echolalia?

I am perhaps very close to creating a fictional character to talk to. Or write. Perhaps they serve the same purpose. I am meeting a few new people and it makes me rethink all the time. I miss the old folks I used to hang out with. Nothing like the comfort of things old, old shoes, and old jeans to slip into etc. I even finished my old perfume so I have to try out all the other ones that have been lying around but nothing can replace “Dune”. :)



Even when I meet all these new people, I wish I had someone ‘old’ I could call and talk to about it all. Doesn’t seem to be possible at the moment. I really miss you guys, so reply to my blogs or email me or something. I’ll be heading off to India on Dec 3. Looking forward to that. After much back and forth tishing tossing of ideas finally Jayu and I agreed on a couple of destinations (more than one!) in India. Now, whatever comes of it, we both want to relax, and that’s what we’ll try and get done. Although, I’m so tense these days figuring that trying to relax is one of the most un-relaxing things to do. Need to get a masseuse to help me out!

Here I am in a rage again,

and like a cheesy movie I begin to sit down and collect myself by reading a book, or writing my ‘masterpiece’. I didn’t imagine this at all; a few days after graduation and no sense of direction and complete boredom. I suppose I have no one to celebrate it with. I feel completely alone. Like a friend once said, going through the pages of my address book wondering whom I can call. Who who who?



Kafka said despair turns you to writing. I should bring back all those books I buried, and breathe/read through them again.



But I am tired of books. I want to sit with people. I want my old friends back. I want to squeeze these continents back into Cairo, back into the little puddle of AUC – I want my youth back. At 25, I say that.



Then again, too much despair because I’m not ‘having a good time’. I will just look at the horrid news on BBC and comfort myself with the relative luxuries of my life. Or try really hard to do so.

Maybe all this angst is just because I’m currently unemployed and without direction. Am considering doing a TEFL course with my cousin. Also am considering jobs overseas, mainly in Asia, areas like Taiwan, Japan, will consider Korea etc. All recommendations welcome :). I haven’t been writing much… wonder where that will go. Need to write to Calarts with a portfolio thingiemajig. Actually should have a website I can post stuff to, but I’d have to find one that is accessible only to owners of a certain password; an exclusive website.

Reussit

That's success in French! Alors, I'm soooo happy I PASSED MY EXAMS. I'm an MA now in Comparative Literature! Yay! Yay! I'm so proud of myself, and so very thankful to everyone - start with mom dad and bro :) to teachers friends and all the jazzy bunch. je miss you je thank you. je love you.



had a lovely trip in cali and met some really lovely people. am seriously considering moving there, but will have to see if i can afford that. Am in Illinois now in urbana-champaign and will be heading off to Cairo tomorrow. yay yay!



salam aleikum to a new life ;)

exams over, in the gold now

Those three traumatising events (well 2 actually really, one was okay) called exams are over. No more no more I hope. I think they went okay... I hope the teachers do too, and let me go. I'm having a good time in California, but still feel like I haven't had enough sleep, not the way I used to hog it in Cairo, so in the afternoon, after lunch I really feel like setting up tent and dozing a few, but it never really happens.. I'll make up for it once I reach Cairo. Can't believe I've stayed away from the blog for so long too!



So the golden state of California is quite breathtaking. Lovely sunsets, beaches, nice green grass, lotsa trees and people with smiling faces.. except today there was a tiff on the bus between a tall lean African-American with a huge cross and a white middle-aged man who kept showing him the finger and calling him names across the bus way after their yelling was over. interesting to watch really.



anyhow... the other day i went to a lambardi farm festival, where they sold pumpkins for halloween, and corn on the cob (yumm buttered) and trinkets and there was a band dressed country playing rock 'n roll songs which was fun fun fun! i've been attending myriam's classes and its going well, i like the people... i'll try and get a picture before i go so i can remember them.



cheers all i'll be in cairo soon. :) november 9 to be precise

chitra