Why did I become so complicated? I used to be a simple person, but as I meet new people, they keep telling me that I know so much, I am so smart, and I know too many answers. Why? I don’t know why I know so much. I know so much because I can’t stand living my life day after day not knowing the answers. That’s my problem and always been the problem. I never let things go and let it be. No. I just want to know it all and not live another day not knowing it, and I will get my answers.

That’s what drove me crazy. Really, I became crazy because of the need to find an answer. When I couldn’t find an answer, I became subdued in my own world without a way to get out of it. I do live in my own world. At times I space out and another life goes in my head. A life I want, but only a day dream. I spend my day either watching TV or listening to music and drinking coffee or tea. I became so addicted to drinking coffee that one cup in a sitting is not enough. Two or three are normal. If I didn’t have any I will just lay down and fall asleep faster than a ray of light.

What am I to do? I try time and time again to find a solution to this life I created. I always wonder if I created my life and ended up this way with my own hands, or was it just fate and God wanted it this way, that this is what my life should be. I keep asking my self why me? What did I do in my life to deserve this? I was always good, although I was peer pressured into so many things. I live here, in this side of the world and I forced my self to not do anything wrong and try to live life the way I was raised and screw everything. I think stubbornness was the solution, but now, what do I have left? What did I gain from my stubborn ways, and not listening to anyone but my crazy thoughts?

I even got tired of this site that I told my best friend Lisa (by the way, not her real name) to write instead and keep the site alive. I guess at times I think to my self, “am I the only rebellious one? Is it me or everyone else that need to speak out?” If you need to speak out tell me. I will help get your voice heard.

I never used to talk, and I learned to speak slowly over time. I used to be shy and quiet, and unfortunately naive. I was very naive that I got hit many times by my negligence. I got hit so many times that it woke me up. It woke me up to this nightmare I created and I can’t get out of it. At times I wish I was still naive, simple, and carefree. I try so hard to be like that and go back to the way I was. Have you ever had a solemn dream within a nightmare? I live the nightmare, and dream the impossible dream. That’s what my life has become. I just dream because I got nothing else to do and it gives me a momentary joy that I need.

Moreover, I have been getting so many comments and emails lately of people trying to guide me, help me, or share their experience. I just read and I can’t reply anymore. I can’t even put two words together to answer a noteworthy reply. I just know how to write about my self. How I feel but not reply back to anyone. I know how to write the words that people can’t get out of them. I can write what you can’t. I keep searching all over for someone that can say something beyond the typical what I did today, what I am planning to do, what I ate, what I saw. Till now, I haven’t really found anyone.

I am not here to criticize other bloggers, or other people’s way of expressing them selves. On the contrary, we all have our ways that make us unique. For me, well, I just blew up slowly. I blew up at certain points in my life that I am the way I am today. I tried every possible way to find a way to get the thoughts out. To get all the pain out of me. I tried so many ways, and I resorted to this site. Some people say I am funny. Some say I am honest. Some say I am a good writer. Some say that they can’t believe they are reading an Arab girl’s real thoughts. Is it just an Arab girl’s thoughts? Am I speaking on behalf of what I am or who I am?

The most repeated criticism I get from people is that the reason I write what I write is because I am not married or I suffered from one relationship and had a negative view of things. On the contrary, I just don’t think about that much. Yes, I feel it is a problem or one of the reasons, but I learned to live with it. I learned to accept how life turned out, but I keep asking my self why? I think there is a good reason for everything. Would a person rather be heart broken than divorced? Almost 60% of the people now a days are getting divorced although they were madly in love before. So why bother to get married? I know statistics don’t mean anything, but life has changed. Life changed for all of us that we don’t know what we want. Please don’t sit there and think, “well Mona, I think you are just confused.” Of course I am confused, but aren’t you the same and you come here to read someone else’s confusion?

Honest to God, I think all of us are the same. We all suffer the same problems and are always confused. Some express it differently than others. However, a lot of people confuse me. They keep saying I am over dramatic and they keep coming back to read more. What are you waiting for? Are you waiting for me to snap? I snapped long time ago, so what else you looking for? The result of this insanity?

Do you think that I am making a big deal of things? Believe me, I met people who are 100 times worse than me that I get a headache from listening to the drama. When I listen to them I ask my self, “am I like this? Do people think that way of me?”

I still have this problem of not talking, or not being able to talk. It’s not that I am secretive, but I just don’t know how to talk so I resorted to writing. However, I am tired of writing and I can’t find joy in anything anymore because I don’t have any joy left in me. I try so hard to make others happy so I can feel happy. I don’t know why. I feel happy when I see others happy, and I try so hard in any way possible to do so.

Furthermore, I think my life has become pointless and empty. That’s what most of us fear all our lives; what do we want to do with our life and if we didn’t reach that goal, what’s the point then? I can’t even begin to imagine what I can do with my life because there is no longer a starting point. Just random paths that keep bringing me back to the same endless point. My problem is the voices. The voices in my head that make me scream from agony of what I have become. I don’t know why I ended up like this, and if this is the result of being unhealthy mentality, and not being able to resolve it.

There is no longer a solution, but there is an end to everything right? There has to be or life wouldn’t have made sense at all to begin with.

Anyways, I love listening to this song by Shirine. It’s Arabic, but the words are amazing..

Translation I got from this site:

Sherine Ahmed – I Gotta Live

I wanna pack up my heart
Embrace myself
And go far away
I want to heal my wound
Yes, I will heal my wounds for sure

I want your love to get away from me
I want your wounds to get out of me
I want your love to get away from me
I want your wounds to get out of me

I gotta teach my heart to be tough
And it’s gotta forget
And I gotta live

I was living all my years for you
I said I would live all my time with you
I was loving you a lot my darling
When you were far away I waited for you

I was feeling things I never felt before with you
You were the whole world in my eyes
I was feeling things I never felt before with you
You were the whole world in my eyes

I gotta teach my heart to be strong
And it’s gotta forget
And I gotta live

Blah Blah, Random Thoughts, They said what?

Haww haww
Moooooooooooooo
Tweet tweet
Grrrr
…..

That was how our conversation flowed before Mona asked me to write a post today. Fortunately (or not), you have the chance to read my post about “nothing” until Queen Mona the First decides she feels like writing again.

This is Lisa and the first three lines are courtesy of my two year old cutie petutie nephew. He absolutely LOVES animals. He will beg teeta (grandma) to google-image lions, birds, horses, pigs and will most definitely stare at the laptop screen till Teeta, 1-1.5 hrs later, realizes that her legs are so numb she can hardly get up. My baby boy is quite the clown, though. He will randomly decide on a particular day that he will be deathly afraid of gorillas. No kidding, DEATHLY AFRAID. Even a whisper of that animal’s name and his whole body freezes, he panics, his eyebrows curling in fear while muttering “Baba” in absolute agony! Now just imagine his poor two year old body when an actual toy gorilla comes out, hehe. I feel like quite the evil aunt to be honest. I bring out that little plastic toy for my shear curiosity as well as amusement because it just boggles my mind just how much it terrifies him!

Great kid, I like him.

In other news, its Carabana weekend in Toronto! I really don’t know what possessed me to go downtown in the afternoon, the traffic was ridiculous! Don’t even ask me about the amount of fountains I saw coming from the direction of men’s crotches on the side of the highway, wowwyy. Anyways, the parties are suppose to be really good today, I will always count on my West Indian friends for a good time man.

Luckily I got home in time to finish off the meal I made for my old and new siblings (aka. brother in law). I bet you guys are dying to know what the meal consisted of eh? Ok, I won’t tease you any longer, mostly because I have ADD. So here it is: Stewed mussels in a tomato, roasted garlic and basil sauce with deliciously buttered penne pasta. I also recreated a strawberry salad me and Mun Mun (Mona) had at Williams the other day; loaded with fresh sweet strawberries, cucumbers, feta cheese, slivered almonds, and my own wonderful vinaigrette. I must admit, it was quite the treat! On this deliciously appetizing note, I am off to offer my palette a scrumptious strawberry cheesecake milkshake. Chow!

Random Thoughts, They said what?

Akh.. I swear I have been living in this side of the world for so long, that anything beyond that is so foreign to me! I tried everything! I tried talking to Arab guys who have been living here for years, born here, and even ones that recently came here, and the worst ones are the ones that just came to this side of the world. They think that Arab girls here are so cool and so open, and living the western life. The moment you tell them, “no, I don’t do that, I am Arab and Muslim,” they reply back, “interesting.”

What the fuck is so interesting about being a good conservative traditional person? What’s wrong with living a normal life and being raised well? I am not saying I am so extreme, on the contrary, I am pretty normal and carefree, but I was raised a certain way; the Arab way and I stayed that way! Not only that, they think my blog has all the answers! My blog is not the answer to who I am. It’s a diary of what I think! I never ever represented my self negatively or ever had strange thoughts as an Arab living here since I was a kid. Never! I just talk about my self, who I am. I am me. A simple Arab girl that happens to be cursed since child birth to navigate the world and end up here!

So, when guys ask me stupid questions like, “how many guys you have been with?” Or, “how many you slept with?” Or, “have you ever dated a non-Arab and why not?” I would just be in shock from such questioning. This has not happened once or twice, but several times from guys I randomly chat with. I am sick of it by the way. That’s it! No more! I rather be alone forever! What do people back home think of us? Is this the image that Arabs back home have of us? I don’t think so! I swear that’s not us.. I think the problem is that I don’t understand Arabs back home. I think they are the ones that are messed up. So messed up that it makes us Arabs here wonder who is better? Who is still following the proper Arab way of life anymore?

It really makes me wonder, do people still believe in God? Or they just use the name of God to justify their actions? I don’t understand people at all. I always hated discussing religion or culture or politics with people, but some people seriously push it and I am dumbfounded by their interrogations.

Guys long time ago used to ask a girl, “what do you do for a living? What are your ambitions? Do you want to have a happy life and have a family?” However, now? NOW it’s an interrogation session from have you loved before? How many? How many you been physically intimate with? And why? And was it just Arabs? Do you consider non-Arabs and why not? What the fuck????? Seriously! The world is so messed up! I think I am growing old fast that anything new is shocking the hell out of me. I try to be open minded, but seriously, some things are not even worth the discussion. It’s a dead end. I am going in one direction, and they are going into another. We will never meet!

I am so confused and wondering what happened to the world. What am I rebelling about? The traditions? Or how the traditions have changed to the worst? Or how Arabs are not making sense anymore? I don’t understand them. What happened to Arabs? The good Arabs? Do people know anymore what it is to be an Arab? We are loosing our identity, and I.. I .. I just don’t know what to do anymore. I want to know what it is to be an Arab. I forgot who I am. Who am I? What am I? Am I still an Arab? Or are they Arab?

What is an Arab?

Ranting as usual!, They said what?, Whatever!

I grew up in an environment that is very different than my sister’s. My sister was born in USA, and raised in Canada all her life. She speaks Arabic sometimes like Armenians did long ago in Lebanon (ie. Masculine and Feminine phrases are always mixed up), and she cannot read or write. She recently took a voyage to the middle east, Lebanon to be exact to see the family. She saw and stayed in the Palestenian refugee camp that has been there for 60 years. She heard guns in the middle of the night, she saw how poor people are, no electricity, muddy streets, water to be bought because the sink’s water is not healthy, and people who barely were living day by day. She saw the war torn area of Beirut from the Israeli invasion in July 2006. She saw 2 weeks ago Hassan Nasrallah in his car with people cheering down the streets when the 3 prisoners were freed from Israel and over 120 bodies returned to be buried. She saw so much in 40 days than she did in her almost 13 years of life.

I felt bad for her because she saw everything that our parents have immigrated from country to country to avoid. She saw why we were refugees and separated from other family members. She saw what it is like to be a Palestenian and Lebanese and how such a beautiful land was torn to pieces by political war fare and a neighboring hateful country. I felt bad for her. That’s the reason I refused to go to Lebanon. I refused to go because I didn’t want to see what I lived my entire life trying to avoid and forget. Also, I refuse to go to Palestine because I will not step into a land that is mine but I am not allowed to live in. I just felt bad for my sister, she saw too much, and finally understood.

She came back sad, broken hearted because she saw most of the family. She saw cousins, aunts, uncles, and was happy to realize that the family is big and she had other people that loved her as well. That we are not alone in this world. But she asked, “why can’t we all live together?”

Funny how attached she got in 40 days… that’s what I tried to avoid. I didn’t want the attachment because I didn’t want to go back to Canada with the constant questions, “why God us? What have we done? An entire nation? An entire culture? Why did we have to be spread all over the world and cannot be with the people we love?”

Depressed, They said what?

I slept for about 2 or 3 hours last night, then I just sat there watching Arabic satellite till mom, my sis, my sis-in-law and niece came back from Lebanon! Yay! What did they get me? A LOT OF STUFF.

This is obviously my favorite. I just took a picture of it now with my horrible camera phone. I requested a Palestine necklace, but this one tops them all with love! (I Love Palestine (flag)) Mom also got me a gold necklace with my name on it and a flower. I also got watches and earrings and lots of other accessories.

Mom got me a brand new Guess bag also. She said it was $180 dollars but she got it on sale for a bit less than that. She kept saying that she wanted to get me Coach shoes but since I have big feet (size 9.5 or 10) that she wasn’t going to get 9 and risk it because it cost too much! Anyways, I got more bags but fake, and also wallets like D&G and Lois Vitton.

I would have taken more pics at home but forgot. They got me eye liner. Not one bottle. Not even two. Three? NO! I got about 15! I got all kinds of eye liners such as pencils, crayons and powder that is made to protect your eyes and help with infections and stuff. I guess that’s what Arab men and women use in the dessert from the sand storm. Hehe.

Blah Blah, They said what?, Whatever!