Me in the UK

The lantern

2012-02-15T15:37:00.000-08:00

16/2/2012

Cotton candy

2012-02-11T17:32:00.000-08:00

To me, it was like a summer resort: spacious balconies… bricks and stones on the entrance, a sign that "there are yet things to be done". In the sunset, I liked to go up the roof and contemplate the silence.

It took me a month to realize that we moved to the wrong place, I could no longer go to downtown Cairo as I used to. There were many mosquitoes at night; "what difference does it make if you live in New Cairo or in the countryside?"

At noon, I always heard his music; why would he care to come to such a quiet place to sell “cotton candy”; I asked my mother as I was reading a book. Busy arranging stuff in the kitchen, She did not reply.

My room overlooks the main street. When I hear the music, I know that "the ice cream man" has come; he would park and leave in short. Today was unusual, two children bought ice cream. On the Internet I searched for the music of a cotton candy peddler. I found one!

* Photo of the ice cream car, taken in Scotforth, England

Bic pen!

2012-01-27T19:23:00.000-08:00

I have tried this before: put a blindfold on my eye in our apartment for a couple of minutes. I was trying to write a short story about blindness; I grappled with it for some time and in my hope for writing, I came up with this idea. It took me minutes walking through a long corridor: from my room to the reception, it was dark but for a shade of light. The corrdior was stright; it was not an easy task, though. Passing by my father's room, I stumbled over cardboard boxes across the corner; I took off the blindfold.

Those few minutes may have helped me come closer to how a person feels when he loses eyesight, I did write a couple of paragraphs afterwards, but I could not complete the story.

When Ahmed Harara, the dentist who lost both eyes, one in Mubarak's time and another in SCAF's time, was on TV, someone wrote on facebook "just put a blindfold on your eyes for sometime and you will realize the sacrifice he has made". I mumbled to myself "Ah..!I have tried this before! I am a step ahead!". Sitting on my desk contemplating his sunglasses on the screen, I walked off the computer talking to myself on my way to kitchen:"some have to lose their eyesight, some do not.. that's life..it's all roles that we have to take part in".

Reading at night is a usual scene in my world. Quite often, I would fall asleep while reading a book with a pen inside. Recently, I developed hallucinations, "What if the pen came out of the book into my eyes while falling asleep? Will you be happy if you lose your eyesight as well?" I talked to myself when I woke up one morning and found a book quite close to my face. Between being awake and asleep, I would struggle to put the book on a shelf close to me, but I didn't always get it right. This morning, the first thing I saw was Bic pen, close to the wall, away from me...

papyrus

2012-01-23T17:28:00.000-08:00

Coz your face is on papyrus ...

The butterfly

2012-01-17T17:06:00.000-08:00

The butterfly

The boy peered at the darkness of the room. When he realized that the lights were all turned off and that his parents were in bed, he put aside the bed covering, lit the lamp and from a wooden box under his bed, he got the drawing copybook and the color box. He held the brush, mixed colors and when the butterfly did not appear, whirling around the light or feeling his drawings, it came to his mind that the butterfly was hiding somewhere, and that light would attract it.

When time passed and worry pierced through his heart, he looked at those places where the butterfly may hide: the pictures hanging on the wall, and the window from which a ray of light came as a car or bus passed. When he checked these places and he did not find it, he mistrusted the sound of his reason, telling himself that it did not fly away and it would come soon to share him his drawings. She used to come everyday and when he lit the lamp, he glimpsed her, flitting towards the light with her colorful wings. She kept swirling as if she was afraid from stopping and did not know where to stand. She would then fall upon his hand as if she found a place to rest on, only to fly again, fluttering her wings, touching a spot of colors here or a figure there.

When the butterfly was with him, he felt he drew beautiful paintings, more beautiful than his earlier drawings and the drawing of his classmates at school, more beautiful than the paintings of his teacher whom he loved, even more beautiful than the paintings of Van Gogh whom his teacher knew and talked about as if he was one of his relatives or friends. And the butterfly flitted around him all night as he kept mixing colors and drawing lines and figures. When tiredness and sleep overcame him, he would put his drawings in the wooden box, greet her, and turn off the light. And when he woke up in the morning, he always talked to her and sang her the morning song.

And when he got back from school and fell his shoulders burdened with books and homework, he worked and studied because he knew that when the night came, he would find the butterfly that shared him what he loved the most…to get the colors and draw.

At night, he drew whatever he liked: flowers, rivers and seas or he chose not to draw and stay up blending colors, discovering new ones. In his mind, he would think that days passed, and he became a famous painter. He stood in a hall, bigger than the hall of his school where he displayed his paintings. He would glimpse his parents at a distance smiling and clapping their hands in delight. But when the time passed and the butterfly did not appear, he felt that all his drawings and colors were pale and the sea would not turn blue and the flowers red until it fluttered around him and his drawings.

He looked for the butterfly everywhere: beside his drawings, colors and books, beside every ray of light creeping in his room. Even when he lit the light of his room curbing his fear that his parents could wake up and find him awake; even when he stood up on the chair, and examined the walls and gazed at the ceiling, he did not find it. Only then, he felt as if a heavy stone was on his heart and that the world turned to deep black color he could not erase whatever colors he poured over it. And whatever he would do, even if he went to the his parents rooms, cuddled up in their bed and cried all night; even if he stood up, wore his clothes, and went to his school to wait for his teacher whom he loved and understood…nothing could make up for the gloominess of his heart. He realized that the butterfly’s absence was real, that it flew away and would never come back.

Photo taken in Alexandria, Egypt.

Haunted...

2012-01-07T12:55:00.000-08:00

You really never know why a song haunts you like a witch...
An innocent act like waking up, turning your gaze to the dim light may turn soon into a spell, tunes creeping in your head like a migraine.

"Oh your beauty is beyond the sight, and your silhouette is everywhere".

Song by: Leila Murad
Tunes by: Raouf Zehny
Lyrics: Ma'mon El Shenawy

Hopefully Enjoy!