Serendipity

With the on come of the new year, the media has given us a review of the events of 2005; and it seems that at least in my current part of the world, 2005 has been nothing but a series of life-taking events…
Last night, the Egyptian police tried to evacuate Sudanese refugees who have for months now inhabited a park in a busy and high-profile part of Cairo, demanding that the UN, Egypt and the world lend an ear to their pleas. Many of these southern Sudanese have fled the persecution in their own country and have arrived in Egypt legally or illegally. Their stay here is temporary, but ‘temporary’ in these cases can mean years. Still, they have no concrete rights in their current ‘in-limbo’ situation. They are often mistreated and taken advantage of by those who exploit their situation. I understand that Egypt alone cannot help them until all the necessary forces in the world put their heads together and find them new permanent homes in other countries. Still, the order of the nation has to be kept, and the police decided it was high time to move them to a refugee camp and out of this park in the middle of busy Cairo. Naturally, when you’re pushed to the limit, you will fight back. The Sudanese obviously fear that by moving to a refugee camp they will be out of sight and out of mind and so they resisted. As a result, over 70 people of Egyptians and Sudanese were injured and 25 Sudanese were pronounced dead.
Yesterday morning the headlining crime of the day was the killing of 10 people from three separate families who lived on the same street. A mentally ill person (as the police reported) came into their sleepy homes and slaughtered children, mothers and fathers, disfiguring the men and women and gutting the children and taking their organs. The day before, 11 family members of a Shiite family were slaughtered in Iraq. The day before that, three innocent girls were murdered by their father in an act of mistaken honor killing in Pakistan. And to top it off, last night they showed “Saving Private Ryan” on TV – as if we don’t have enough war and death in real-life we need to escape into another war movie, no matter how good it is! When “Saving Private Ryan” first came out in 1998, I couldn’t wait to see it and see it again. Last night all I could bare to do was change the channel, for it was just too much to see art imitate life in this manner.
This morning I woke up early and decided to watch some TV with my morning coffee, hoping that the media would be finally cheering us on to enjoy our New Year’s Eve, encourage us to have fun, be merry and plain silly when the clock strikes twelve. Instead, it continued to serenade us with the devastating events of 2005. The paper didn’t help much either, for the headline read that the two most significant events of the year were the Tsunami and the Iraq war.
Finally, as I was flipping through the channels, I saw a trailer for the movie “Serendipity.” I had seen this movie a few years ago. It’s a cute, not quite realistic, mostly chick-flick movie, but being a girl myself and in need of some entertainment, I enjoyed it immensely along with my popcorn and coke at the movies. Today however, just the trailer and the memory of that movie had quite a different affect on me. Have you ever wondered what the word ‘serendipity’ means? The dictionary says: the faculty or phenomenon of finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for. Exactly what I was doing (only I was seeking it) and EXACTLY what I so desperately needed! I need something that is pleasantly unexpected, happy, positive...agreeable to hold on to and help me welcome the New Year! No, the movie wasn’t that thing, but it explained exactly this longing, searching feeling going through me. Can we be forced by the world to observe all that is unpleasant, angering and sad in the world that we almost fail to remember even one good thing we can take out of this year? Is it the world, the media or our minds that react so strongly to disasters and forget the hopeful moments? I always thought that nature gave us the gift of forgetting because if we were to remember each and every event in our lives, the sad ones would so overwhelm us it would be impossible to continue living. But it seems that somehow we’ve messed with our internal protection system that we now remember the BAD and forget the good!
I asked someone the other day what kind of year it’s been for him and he said: “It was a good year! Nobody “real close” died!” At the time, I laughed because I thought that is the most warped joyous expression I’ve heard in years! But come to think of it, he’s right! If we can twist this urge back around somehow to go back and see things in a good light - you know just MAKE ourselves do it - then maybe there is hope.
This year, my life took a 180-degree turn and I have yet to see where it will lead. It has been one of those “questions” years for me. Still, I saw my father come through an open-heart surgery alive and well. Granted, he now is a lot more aware of his other ailments (back pain, sciatic nerve, etc.) but we are one life-threatening problem down, OK?! And this is what I will hold on to when the clock strikes midnight tonight! May all you who have had “questions” years (and it seems that in the world there are many) have this coming year be an “answers” year for you!

Happy New Year with Love and Blessings!

Cats Celebrating Thanksgiving...?

Having lived in the United States for close to 10 years, Thanksgiving has become tradition for me, too. While the origins of the holiday may not mean as much to an Egyptian as an American, we all can find something we are thankful for and therefore have reason to celebrate this holiday. In fact, that thought came to me the other day as I was watching a street cat. Since I've been in Cairo - being a pet owner and animal lover - I've been feeling very bad for the stray cats and dogs roaming the streets here. With issues controlling the human population of this country, it might be too much to ask to have people spay and neuter their pets to control the feline and canine population. Add to that the smaller amount of people that actually care for animals and the "bigger issues" at hand here, it makes it an issue too high on Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs for people to even consider discussing. All you can do are isolated incidents of rescue or feeding or cleaning of these animals and hope they don't find their end under the wheels of a car. But alas, back to my cat story: the other day I found this street cat walking off with a plastic bag. Naturally, I was worried about what's in the bag and felt bad for the cat for having to dig for food. Upon closer inspection though, I found the bag full of meat trimmings, skin, bits of fat...the kind of stuff that looks disgusting to me but probably tastes wonderful to a cat! Of course my next thought was to be mad at the people that were throwing their garbage all over the place, intoxicating us with waste and not caring about their neighborhood, let alone their environment! But then I began to watch the cat more closely. The cat was walking head up, proud and with a menacing eye to all the other cats watching it. Her coat was shiny and clean - and that's a street cat! She walked over to a corner between two cars and started to tear open the bag, reveling in the huge meal, the prey, she has gotten herself. For a moment, I was glad these trash-throwing people had managed to make this meal possible for the cat. The circle was complete! Stray cats and dogs would be LOST without the trash people discard in the street!! Everything has a purpose!!! Even a stray cat will find it's nourishment where it is unwanted. Although WE still have to educate people about trash control, population control, animal control...everything control (!!), one cat can at least be thankful this Thanksgiving! ; - )

You Mean Ya Didn't Seeeeeee?!

A few days ago, a program on TV showed a 1072lbs man being literally cut out of his apartment and driven to the hospital. His family said he was always hungry as a child, and weighed 240lbs by the time he was in 6th grade! People told them it was 'baby fat' and that it would come off as he got older. As we know now, it didn't. To describe the man as anything human-looking is insane. He looks like a giant balloon with a knob for a head at the top. I don't mean to sound mean or anything. I felt terrible for the man! He said he saw himself as the 'Michelin man'. He couldn't move out of his bed, they had to tear down the bedroom wall to get him out of the place, and it took half a dozen people to do so. And while they were doing all that, he was smoking one last cigarette. Now, OBVIOUSLY, this man has some sort of disease, if not an addiction to food that has been overindulged over the years. He suffers now from several more problems due to his obesity. He didn't live alone. He's married. And here's the crazy part: his wife said she realized he was overweight, but didn't understand how bad it really affected him until they told her now! My first reaction was to think: How could you not see that?!! How could you not say or do anything until now?! But then I thought about how many times we are in denial when an illness or addiction clearly is affecting one of our loved ones. It happens to "other" people not us or our close ones. Loving someone is accepting them as they are. But to really love them is also to be their eyes when they can't see that they are tumbling head first into a darkness of disease, addiction or mental illness.The 1072lbs man has undergone gastric by-pass surgery and has lost 513lbs so far - nearly half his weight! Here he is "half the man he was" but with the best fighter mentality a man could wish for. Patrick Deuel, we all wish you the best!

I'm on the Net!

YES! I finally have a website! I've wanted to create one for so many years, but do you know how you always have something "more important" to do that "takes priority" over your personal stuff? Well, I learned how to create sites through a class back in college. Back then I was busting at the seams with pride and thought: I WILL CREATE MY OWN ONLINE PRESENCE!! Yeah right! Five years later, I still hadn't done it and website creation had developed so much, a lot of what I learned was obsolete! In five years?! Anyway, I tried one of those do it yourself software programs that come with your computer. Word of advice: don't bother. Unless someone can tell you which one is good to use and doesn't create unnecessary extra code, etc. just bite the bullet and have a professional do it for ya! Besides, after you've wasted your time, energy and nerves in front of the screen because it JUST WON'T do what you want it to and you have to keep redoing stuff, you still have to shop for your domain name and then for a host provider to host the site, blah blah blah. Exhausting! Thank God for connections! My friend who I KNOW isn't that much more computer savvy than me, was smart enough to be "friend"-savvy. His friend, who is GREAT at building sites, created this awesome and easy to navigate site for him. Of course, after I wasted my time, I fianlly tucked my tail under and asked for help. His friend gave me this great deal on my own domain name, website build and hosting for one year. AND I'm connected to a great network of artists, comedians, agents, so we all are connected online and can use each others expertise and even find work! It's greatness!! Check out my site at www.SherienZaki.com . I'm still adding a lot of music and info on there, but I just couldn't wait to tell you about it. After all, it seems that once you're "searchable" on the net, you've arrived! :)

It's good to have a voice again!

It's so good to be here!! I finally feel alive. I know you must think I'm crazy, but when you've been cooped up in the hell hole I've been for the last 9 months, you'd be crazy, too. No, I wasn't pregnant, silly! I moved to Egypt - Cairo to be exact - and it's been quite the trip. Sure sure, the monuments are great. But how long can you talk to stone and look at dead people's tombs? It's really not that bad, it's great in some aspects in fact, if it weren't for the fact that I live at home again with my parents. Just kidding, they're great! But I thought I kinda liked being an adult. Anyway, since I can't be one right now (hee hee), I resorted to my BLOG to talk to my grown-up friends all over and remember what it's like to be independent - in thought at least! I'll have more insightful things to say next time, I promise. Thanks for coming along this crazy ride in my head!