New Year's Party

Another year. Another party.

Anticipation. Fear. Worry.

Body hate, anxiety about friends failing me, of being raided and arrested. Of drugs not working as it should. Of not feeling a fleeting rapture.

What happened to the brighter side? Where is it? what made it so warped? So sinister and hidden?

Has trauma blinded me? Made me so disconnected from who I am?

They notice changes. I notice them too. I'm not the same, who could I remain the same? I'm harder, cynical and tired.

Would I leave the party bitter and confused? Being the smart one gets me nowhere. Being the sexy one works. Win them over by my brains? By my apparent morality? My genteelness? Oh what priceless bullshit.

My bullshit is so dear to me. I want it to become the norm. How can standing up for principles make you so hated? An outcast.

I'm just fooling myself. I want admiration and fame. I just have different tools. I'm using them for self promotion. The market is just so tough these days.

How long will I stay? How long will I let myself stay? Do I want to stay? What would I actually lose if I stay?

Does it only get darker from here? Guilt and bitterness ridden future ahead? What disaster this new year's eve bring?

I'll probably watch and burn.

The Cat

I will miss your beautiful face and your warm, unwilling hugs. It's funny what became of us. 

You used to anger me, annoy me. I pushed you and I was violent. I was questioning myself and surprised that I felt this cruelty towards you. How things changed!

I came to love you and care for you. I couldn't get enough of kissing and hugging you. I felt you're my daughter. How did I remove myself from your dying stage. How was I so cool? 

Your little young body was suffering. You made sounds I've never heard before.

I wake up to touch your body and life is gone. You look at me in your reclining pose. You say 

I was here, waiting for help and care. It never came. It was too late.

Another trauma knocks the door. It goes in without permission. How long are you staying? We never know. 

Tired

I need to draw a line. Where do I draw the line? I can't go on like this. I wanted to touch someone's life, now I can't get enough. Maybe I'm not getting validation.

I'll never be swept down by anyone or anything. so why do I expect to sweep away others?

It's not safe for me to go on like this. What could happen? Nervous breakdown, immunity breakdown, hair loss, weight gain, tense relationships, growing dissatisfaction, burnout, risky behavior, depressive episodes, etc.

I don’t want to know anything about Zeina. She's the embodiment of my nightmares. It's what makes me totally cease to exist.

I'm too hard on myself. I'm too unkind. I'm not supporting people around me. What the hell am I doing here?

I miss my sisters. My broken sisters. My teenage sisters. I don't think I'll get over the guilt. I wish I'd never get over it.

Mother, I want to tell you I love you but it's so hard. I'm afraid one of us would die before I do.

Am I still scared of death? Sometimes I wish it. I'm more scared of pain, torture, kidnaps and rape. I don't feel so dejected about death. I feel I'm concerned about the timing. As if I want to push it back until it's right time. No idea when that would come about.

Writing is therapeutic. Why don't I write often? It's writing stupid! Connect to myself more.

What is friendship? They're losing their meaning. It's always been my single most important activity of my life. To befriend, to understand. I don't feel you anymore, don't get you. Why are we still together?

I want out of here. I don’t know why, but I'm expected to want this. Should I just stay? I'm worried about my future if I stay. I'm worried about my future if I leave.

I'm afraid of earthquakes. Living on the 8^th floor doesn't help. Would my flatmate commit suicide? Will I be evicted soon? I want to have a house. I don’t want to live alone anymore.

I'm becoming a different person. Less radical. I'm growing old. I don’t want to live alone. I don’t mind dating. What's happening to me?

dream; alter ego

In this sha3bi dream, a man cross dressed into Amina alter ego and started performing her famous beshwesh 3alaya. The brother finds out and is enraged. He yells at her but then gives her a cigarette after she starts crying and she says I just wanted to have some fun.

In preparation for a wedding myself, I cross dress, transforming into a stunning Angham. I try to take a photo of myself but my mother keeps roaming around me and enters every room I go to. In the background, I see another Angham, a blonde one, and she's being photographed by Mona Eltahawy and my Moroccan. Interestingly, the photos I'm trying to take are much smaller than I'd like them to be.

I try to go the wedding but I had woken up late and it's only me and my mother in the house.

I end up talking to Sahloul in some space. He's trying to get me to touch his dick. I unabashed do but it's quite small. I jerk him off. He vanishes afterwards and I start to think of how afraid he is of his sexuality. I don’t know who saw us from this position. Ahmed Adel was around me but now he's gone. Did he see us and get angry? I go looking for him. I see him from a distance but when I get near it's somebody else.

I leave to the wedding. I'm walking on a weird fence. I see an old ugly and scary man haggling a family. He starts to chase me too. I throw things at him. There are more people who look like him. They're all after money. I start yelling back and showing that I don’t care about them and their ugly money collection.

rape

I think it will change my perception of penetration forever. It will no longer the initially unnerving, eventually pleasurable action.  It will come to mean submission and control. It will come to signal humiliation and contempt. My sexuality has changed because of it. Simply put, I'm more scared. I am more confident that it can happen again in the future. I would wonder if men who intimidate me want to rape me. I will look differently at consenting to being penetrated. I will realize how consent can be complicated. I will know the anxiety of disclosing the abuse I went through, and the fear of being blamed for what happened to me. I will not have to go through abortion, but I would have a better hint of the consequences.

I will always be surprised of how calm I was after it happened. I remember that I was mostly worried about my numbness. Did it mean I would collapse later? Did it mean I am resilient enough to handle it? I couldn't talk about it for long, until I finally disclosed, and it was a tremendous relief. I was mortified of my friends' reaction. Will they shout? Will they gasp in shock? I didn't want any of that. I just wanted understanding eyes looking at me and telling me "I stand by you".

Despite the fear and helpless, you come to know surviving and resilience. Part of you was taken away, but your strength wasn't. You're still here to venture more scary grounds on this earth. 

i want...

I want to talk to you. I want to spend more time with you. I want to pretend that eyes won't see us flirting with each other. I want to have sex with you without your boyfriend knowing. I want to have that coffee with you. I want to move to that rundown neighborhood and fuck all its men. I want to have you for myself. I want to lock you up. I want to be torn apart by you. I want to slap your bitch boyfriend. I want to inspire you and lead you. I want to argue endlessly. I want to change the world. I want to be important. I want to be respected. I want to own you. I want to be your role model. I want to be a hero. I want to be killed by you. I want you to annihilate me. I want to seek danger. I want to release my body. I want to be invaded and violated. I want to laugh from my heart. I want to banish you. I want to eat until death. I want my body to drive you crazy. I want to be penniless. I want to be rich. I want to grow my food. I want you to serve me for life. I want to be depressed. I want to stay in bed forever. I want to be forever young. I want to dance until I collapse. I want to be covered in sweat. I want to never shower. I want to watch you forever. I want to vanish. I want to read your mind. I want to see you naked. I want to be prude. I want to be wild. I want to weep. I want to save you. I want  you to save me. I want to understand. I want to take my time. I want to remember you. I want you to forget me. I want to begin where we'd left each other. I want to eat you. I want to watch you forever. I want to be your friend. I want to kiss you. I want to get over you. I want to overcome my fear. I want to be me. I want to be you. I want to touch your heart. I want to change your life. I want to be free of guilt. I want to love myself. I want to shelter you. I want to exercise my privilege. I want to see you randomly in the street. I want to start a conversation with you. I want to hold your hand. I want you to wink at me. I want to know if you're dead. I want to live forever. I want to collapse. I want to be different. I want to know myself. I want you to forgive me. I want to reveal myself. I want to see you in my dreams. I want to breathe you. I want you to worship me. I want to see you dance. I want to rest. I want to see your tears. I want you right my wrongs. I want to you to remember me. I want to read forever. I want to live many lives. I want to write my story. I want to listen to you. I want to be laid next to you. I want to drive you crazy. I want to relax. I want to have fun. I want to cry my heart out. 

Moving out and in

So what's wrong? Why am I not happy? Why is my colleague pathologizing me? What's the root of this disenchantment?

I moved. I should be relaxed and happy. Is it because the Syrians are all over town and it makes you think of their plight? Or is it because that beautiful Syrian boy liked girls? He may like boys too but would it be easy for him to date one? Or would he have time for it? Or he has to keep working to keep the family dignified?

Is it because those guys who live around Cairo University are too carefree and beautiful? It's already about a decade apart, is that what makes you bitter? You can't have what they have. It's too late, isn't it? They grew up here. They live here when they're 19. They were skinny pants and touch each other. 

I moved. I should be happy. I should have more time on my hands. I should bring whomever over. I should feel less rushed to go to work. I shouldn’t be waking up before the alarm goes off. I should be spending more time in my room. I should be having more quality times.

I am traveling, I should be excited. I should be content with where I got so far. Instead I'm tired and stressed. What would make happy then? What are the achievements for? What are the pains worth? When will be able to dance the revolution?

Exploring is what I do. Challenging is my middle name. Risking is what I know. What's the meaning? Where is the focus point? When is the release?

Two Gazes

I have to write down those moments. Despite the tiredness, the haziness, the desire to forget. Those moments that haunts me and confuse me.

A gaze.

What could the gaze do to me? How can it so penetrate me? Does it violate me or excite me? That moment when he opened my ass up. I thought he was just checking where my asshole was, in preparation for a penetration. The moment lingered on. He was gazing into my hole. He was watching. As I realized so, this warmth crept up me. I was slightly enraged and completely bewildered. I was being opened up to a new experience. He was good for other reasons too. Reasons I thought I'd dedicate a post for. His provincial humor mixed with sexual rawness and honesty. His lack of shame thoroughly bemused me. How the conservative forces in his society actually drew him nearer to his "true sexual" self. My friend told me he's a keeper. I don't know if I'd see him again.

Another gaze.

He just pointed the flash into my face. It was completely dark all around us. My face was the only thing lit up so clearly. I stood there, paralyzed, letting him scan my face. I didn't know what he was up to. He could have wanted to do anything to me. Was he jealous because I was in that bathroom with someone else? Did he want to fuck me first? He let us go and we continued fucking. I went out and then he started a fight with the guy I was fucking. I ran off. That gaze raped me. The helplessness froze me.

  The gap between thought and behavior? The extremes that we're willing to push ourselves into. Those moments are not opposing or contrasting, but something puts them in the same category for me.

An encounter.

From a demure smile at a documentary screening to a full-fledged hearty conversation, that 20 year old was something fresh amidst staleness. His cross-cultural background made him more, and his consciousness of it made him more endearing. We had the usual debate. Casual sex versus relationships. The endless division between heart and testicles! He wan ted to end up in a village in south France with a lovely house and lots of books. I talked embracing uncertainty, getting real, and the need for experimentation.

Edgy encounters.

The next night I was hounding men and men were hounding me. I went far, I put myself at great risk. I thought to myself, I won't even live to be a desperate 50 year old drinking alone at a bar. I'm going to get myself killed way before. A la Pasolini style.

I did put a condom on him though. I left on the floor. It made me think of who's going to see it. How would they feel about it?  

Abuse

You wake up in pain on a gory nauseating nightmare that involved morgues and torn organs. I have suffered abuse tonight. I was abused when I was inadvertently subjected to tear gas just because I happened to be downtown. I never imagined we’d suffocate on tear gas together but it happened.

But the emotional abuse came from him, when he decided to leave me to be able to continue flirting with someone else. Where is my dignity, I wondered. You kept whining about how late the time is and now suddenly you have the time for this shit? The chocolate bar won’t do and the sudden kiss in the middle of the street won’t do either. And then the crazy thing is when you feel that he’s the person who can mend it up and set your right.

I don’t need this shit, I thought. Am I jealous? I don’t think so. Wait. Maybe I am. Maybe I do want his full attention. But what I really want is respect. Why couldn’t he respect my feelings? And what does respect mean? That I become boring.

He made me feel so replaceable. It sucks. My deeply held anxieties are awakened. He’s much younger and he needs to experience stuff. Which is unfair because I feel like I only began experiencing stuff too. We’re supposed to be grounded and settled because we’re older. But I’m at the phase where I want to get mad.

And you feel like younger and skinnier bitches should die. Die bitch die. And you feel like you want to die, because you don’t want to take the humiliation. You want to annihilate yourself before it gets even worse.  

I don’t love him, I think. I think I’m excited by the way he makes me feel.  Does that make him expendable? 

Is he with me because I’m available? Because it’s fun? Because it’s pleasurable? Because it’s safe?

How do people endure abuse in relationship? It’s so damaging? We’re not that intimate and I’m already going nuts. Is this the norm?

Oh Sylvia!

Happy Birthday!

Work, work, work in between social media distraction sessions. I updated my cv. Man, that looks real good. Catching up on tasks old and new. Still much unfinished. I love it when I get so indulged in work. We are workaholics indeed. Looking at some photos from last year. My trip to Kenya was something. To Bali was even a bigger something. I am doing stuff. There is pride. I must be proud. I met people, interacted and influenced them. Why shouldn’t there be pride? The word Prime comes to my mind. It’s a beautiful word, isn’t it. I don’t mind social media birthday wishes. Yes, human communication has more to it. Isn’t it better than not bothering at all? These are the new rules. We should be grateful. There is content. Somewhere deep inside. It took a long time to get there. Own it. Don’t be afraid of it. There is beauty. Feel it. Show it. Seduce them. Play. There’s solitary beautifulness. Try. Enjoy. Dance. 

Sleeping with the enemy!

I had the courage to say hello. He said hello back. We went off for a walk. Away from the maddening crowd. Soon after, we were making out on the street. He was touching me all over. I was touching him too. 

Have I lost my mind? He was trying to see through me with his eyes and his passion. I was trying to see through him with my silence. Scared to reveal myself. Just wanting him to speak. I also wanted him to listen but wasn’t sure if I would make any sense or if I would scare him off.

He asked me not to fuck, although he’s the one who fucked me. Was it double speak? Why does he use all those idealistic words? Why is he being moralizing? Quit smoking? Yes, I want to but not because of you or because of God.

And why are you so beautiful and want to be with me? What do you want from me? You said you don’t want sex and then you do it. I do want to touch you though. You’re so young and stubborn. You’re opinionated and passionate. It’s hard to resist that. Why has it become so hard for me to believe I’m worth it. I’m worth loving.

You mentioned a party in your phone call. I only dare asking you about it after we fucked. I’m blown away. It’s FJP. Yes, you’re religious and so, but FJP? What does this mean? I’m sleeping with the enemy? Can anything come out of this? Can we be together? Can I reveal myself to you? Would you accept me?

You were close to tears. I saw that pain. He gave you hard time, didn’t he? He wouldn’t let you in and that wore you out. But it made you love him even more. Oh how ignorant you are. You have no idea how hard it is for me to let you in as well. But would I ever say that to you?  

What of us? And where will we be?