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736 days ago
"DO NOT come in late, tired, sick, or hungover." - my GM on tomorrow, the official opening day of the commercial Christmas season. Thankfully I got any drinking I meant to do this week out of the way last night. The malls open at 6 a.m. or earlier. People in my family are planning to go shopping. I cannot imagine the appeal of such madness. Who looks forward to long lines, competing with other people for the things you intend to buy, not to mention for personal space? I can seethe as much as I want about the senselessness of a mass designated shopping day and the commodification of Christmas, but the truth is I directly profit from it. More people out shopping means more people at the restaurant, and more tips for me. If I was not working tomorrow, I would refrain from coming anywhere close to a parking lot of a shopping mall. However, sure as your Target wake up call, I'll be there in the middle of it, with people collapsing into their seats as if ...
744 days ago
The transition from being an aimless 20 something to an academic is something like being at the top of a roller coaster, in the sense that I am going head first into what's before me, and I cannot really stop because, if I put the brakes on and look around, there is nowhere else really to go. After 4 years of denying myself my true interests, I jumped on the opportunity to begin a life that will likely bring me more fulfillment. Occasionally I ask myself if I might be moving too fast, if I am making the right decisions, if this is what I really want. Then I recall why I am going for this. I love culture, language, and talking to people on intellectual levels. I love to travel. And I realize that most of my reservations have more to do with the idea of "future" itself. Sometimes it's hard to get my head around the idea that I will exist in 10 or 20 years. When I was 15 I couldn't imagine myself at 21. I don't know how to picture myself living differently than I ...
746 days ago
"...you need someone who speaks Arabic." "I know, that's part of the problem. I have nothing to offer anyone, I'm just a college slob." "You can use your femme fatale." -my friend & me, on complications of doing research in Morocco
748 days ago
Another 12 hour Saturday sets on my stiff shoulders, worn feet and heavy eyelids. This is a tip of the painful Christmas season iceberg. Even 2 weeks ago was considerably more masochistic, and I can expect something likewise in the weeks to come. Typically at this time on a Saturday (although it's now Sunday, we still consider it Saturday in terms of when our last shift ended and next starts) I would be sipping on the glass of wine that I never finish gossiping about work. They opted to play pool at a different bar than our usual, though, and for some reason I don't feel too sociable. My excuse for not participating in the social life as I should be is that I'd rather not be somewhere loud like said bar. I would love a glass of red wine, but I am trying to avoid the habit of drinking at home, though I think I would excuse myself tonight. I realized lately that most of my coworkers, at least the ones I am closer to, are in their late 20s and early 30s, many with kids. They ...
816 days ago
It is amazing how fast one can find a comfort zone. Dar Afram is one of those places that you keep wanting to go back to just one more time, to see who checked in and who is checking out and to bum around talking to Taz Abdel Oulamine and Tim (for the time that he is there) into small hours. So how do you take your leave? Difficult as it is to say goodbye when we are limited by laws of mass conservation, it is such a relief knowing that we can keep in touch in so many ways now. And it is more of a strange thing how often we do not keep in touch, even with the ones who are physically close to us. Some people say it takes so much work energy and courage to travel but I think we have it so easy. When I do travel about I keep thinking about how people used to pack up and leave their homes or families in search of riches or business, or even more a wonder, out of an itch to go and see the world despite all its unknowns. What were these relationships like, where you could ...
