I get a lot of emails and majority of them have a common theme. I know the frustration and lack of knowledge of a culture that makes everyone wonder why. Do I recommend you falling in love with someone with the boiling blood of a middle eastern? Do I recommend you falling in love with someone who loves you but the culture cannot fathom you both together?

Actually, I get a lot of emails from non-Arab men. They ask me for advice because they cannot understand how they fell in love with an Arab girl, but her family says no. I do not have an answer for that other than Arabs live in their cultural comfort zones. They love tradition, their culture, their middle eastern heritage, and only understand and want one to be the same.

I know you will say that it is the girl’s choice. I am marrying the girl not the family. Hello! Yes you are marrying the family, but for us Arabs, you are marrying the entire culture! It’s like seeing life in black and white. There is no middle ground for us. If you can break old habits and mesh in some way and be accepted, then you are successful. Otherwise, it is just so hard. It’s like Greeks and Italians and other eastern European countries. It’s a culture that is so intact and close to one another, that it is hard to penetrate.

I do feel your pain though. I really do. However, the other person should have been clear from the beginning before all this escalated to this point. I don’t know what else to say. It’s just a hard situation to deal with. Really hard.

Blah Blah, Culture, They said what?

Dear mothers who think that if you don’t like something, or something that is not great for you, that it should not be great for us.

I won’t give examples. I won’t generalize to every single mom out there, but honestly, I, like many others out there, cannot live my life and make choices based on your likes and dislikes only. If you don’t like something, or your not comfortable with something and have not been comfortable for years, that doesn’t mean I CANNOT BE COMFORTABLE WITH IT TOO! I can make my own adult choices, and I am known to be stubborn as a goat, so why even bother to tell me what is right or wrong or what I should like or not.

It is best for me to make my own FRIGGEN choices. For me to come up with a conclusion that I like and classify it as right or wrong. I make the choice! Every single choice!

Dear God give me the patience to not scream today, and just accept life, the humidity, and a mother’s expressive way of eternal love! Amen.

Blah Blah, Ranting as usual!, Whatever!

I will tell you a little story of how a very quiet girl evolved to this!

I was very shy. I couldn’t talk properly, I couldn’t put my thoughts together in coherent sentences, or knew how to talk in public, or to others, because I just had this incredible amount of fear inside of me. I felt that whatever I say I will be judged and ridiculed by others. I felt that I had to portray my self in one and only one particular way and that is it! I lived that life up to my mid 20′s and then something changed me. I no longer liked me.

We all battle our inner selves, but it is only natural. However, in my case I was actually ridiculed for the most mundane stupidest unmentionable things. I didn’t know why or understand the reasons behind it, then one day, I put 1 and 1 together, and I realized that this is my life living in an Arab world but not on Arab soil.

Arab mentality drove me to the limit of insanity and extreme depression. Till this day I say, “whatever, YOU ARABS!” Don’t get me wrong, I do love being an Arab with high morals and great fundamental values. I appreciate that and I would not trade my culture or ever want to be someone else. I am grateful, but some things did not play well with me. I had to just end it right there and convince my self that this is not right. Who said it is right to begin with?

I am never going to try to change my roots. Never ever. I wouldn’t trade it for anything else in the world.

But how did I change? When did I change? What helped? What didn’t?

I will not say this blog helped. This blog was a side kick to end the problems. It was more of a tool to find a solution and learn from others. I talked to the most incredible people and I have read the most intriguing stories from Arabs that helped me figure out what the real problems were. I know what the problem is now, and I cannot for the life of me figure out why most of you, although you know what so many of the problems are, cannot focus and tell your self that you had enough.

I am not telling you to stop or deny who you are, but I just want you to realize that you cannot continue living your life based on a culture instead of living your life based on YOU! Yes you!

This is my advice and I want you and I will be making it my mission in life is to make sure that Arabs break out of their shell. Break out of that multi-layered very thick Arab infused mentality of thick moldy exterior and wake up. The world around you is totally different and keeps changing, but the principles and habits are all skewed, and cannot keep sustaining you in this world. You will just end up being frustrated and angry all the time, as we can see now in the middle east. Just break that shell!

As I mentioned earlier, making this blog and writing in it since 2005 was really hard. However, it took me 5.5 years to break out of the shell. To be me, and not care about this person, or this mentality, and I just go up to anyone now, even a stranger and I can have a conversation. I can just say hi with my head held high and not care what they think of me or who I am or what I look like that day or why I even talk to a non-Arab or even another random Arab. I don’t need to justify everything, I just do it! Just do what you think you can do. If God judges us all individually, then why do we all have to live our lives the same way and judge each other collectively?

That’s why earlier in my previous blog post today I asked others if they can contribute something meaningful, truthful, honest, and can help others as well. But I found so much resistance from other Arabs because they were afraid to think or even break out of their shells. They are content. Fine. As long as you are happy, then that’s wonderful. But I know deep down inside of you, you wish you were someone else. Isn’t better to just be you then living in some dream. Don’t you think?

Angry, Blah Blah, Culture, Random Thoughts, Ranting as usual!, Thank you, They said what?, Whatever!

I am trying to do something here, but I need a bit of Arab corporation.

I have been asked a lot in the past to make a site for Arabs to express themselves. I don’t know how or why I should do that. There is an Arab voice site and so many community argumentative sites out there. I don’t want that. So, I am gonna start something a tad bit more personal, but it is by invite only until I build a community of people and release it live.

It is not an extension of my blog or anything. It is totally separate, and I want to make it big and prove to the world we are something else.

Email me rebelliousarabgirl@gmail.com, message on Facebook or Twitter and I will explain a bit more.

This could be a start of something beautiful, or nasty. Like who cares! We just want to just come out and say some things you know.

Stay tuned..

Blah Blah, Random Thoughts, They said what?, Whatever!

I need to learn to focus.

It is probably the hardest thing I have struggled with in my entire 30 years. I am easily distracted, and I am the one that causes these distractions. I feel life is too short to just do one thing at a time, so I go over board and end up doing too many things at once, then I exhaust my self and end up dead tired and unmotivated by 5pm. It is sad, but I need a new routine in life.

I solved one problem by acting like my true blunt self today, went up my boss and told her, “I NEED TO FOCUS! STOP GIVING ME TOO MANY SIDE PROJECTS AND EXPECT ME TO GET ANOTHER HUGE PROJECT DONE! I WANT FOCUS FOR JUST ONE DAY!”

That went well! Yikes! No wonder managers are afraid of me!

So, I know many of you have emailed and messaged me on Facebook saying to stop talking about work if I don’t like it and just look for another job. Yeah, jobs are all lined up for me waiting with just a snap of my finger for me to say, “Yeah Baby! Booya!” Reality bites, and I live in a city where technology is just a secondary source to do business.

On a more positive note, yaaay! I am positive and focused. Beat that suckers!

Oh, side note! For those marketers that keep emailing me asking me to put up poker ads or sex toys advertisements on my site, really need to get a reality check! Arabs don’t gamble publicly and have a great poker face when they go home at night, and they don’t need sex toys, they always have a whip or belt ready at their disposal!

Also, what’s up with the Saudi lady posting her driving skills on YouTube? You break a messed up law, you will get arrested. She was being way too rebellious and kind of stupid. Women throughout the world have fought for their rights, and maybe KSA is the last country to consider women as anything but mere objects, but posting on YouTube is not “the modern way” of expressing your self in such a strict convoluted man ruled society. There are other ways you know. Like don’t get married. Period. Or abstain from sex! Lower the birth rate! And since women live longer than man, then the problem will be solved in 50 – 60 years!

Oh, umm.. there are other problems in the world about the Palestinians and Israels and all these peace talks, but I donno. I refrain from politics on my blog. Maybe some day in my life time I will visit my real home, the holy land. Until then, people need to find a way to get along and stop using hatred and negativity as the main driving force for peaceful talks.

By the way, I only know about world news from people I follow on Twitter. It is easier to read blurbs from others than reading or watching politically biased news reports.

Follow me on twitter: @rebelliousgirl
Add me to Facebook, I promise you won’t regret it!

Lots of hugs and kisses on this Tuesday evening! Mwaaah!!

Blah Blah, Culture, Random Thoughts, Ranting as usual!, Thank you, They said what?, Whatever!