The Toilet Dilemma

Picture this, you just entered a public toilet! So do you walk to the one at the end or do you just enter the first one?
You could say that the cleanest one would be the last one because people are too lazy to walk and often just enter the toilet nearest to the entrance. But then, what if they all think the same way and use the one furthest from the entrance? So maybe you have to use the one nearest to the entrance right? But then what if most of the people who enter are in a rush and don't have time to carry out a cost-benefit analysis like you and just walk into the nearest toilet?

I no longer have good days

      I don't remember the last time I had a good day because I simply don't have good days anymore. They don't allow me. They kill my good days. They make me feel inferior. They make me think that I was a mistake, that I don't deserve a good day. They take away my right to be happy. Who are they?

 They are random people I come across when I'm walking home. They are men! Very creepy men. Men who insult women or girls walking on  the street. Why? Why am I being insulted by these people? What crime did I commit? Going to university? Not having a car? Or is because I am a female? 

    And when I say men, I mean men of ages that range from around late teens to sixties, from all races. Why? They may say religion( (Islam in this case) says that a woman shouldn't travel alone but my reply to them is no religion in the world allows you to verbally harass people for no reason. I'm not the only one who suffers from this, many of my friends do. Its a problem in many countries. Why isn't anyone talking? Why isn't anyone trying to solve this? Until when will women have to pay the price of having 2 X chromosomes?

Why do people turn a blind eye on this? Why do they choose to keep it locked away? Why are we supposed to suffer in silence? 

   After suffering from this for a long time now, I have figured out ways to reduce the number of creeps who verbally harass me. I now always wear a hoodie, put on sunglasses, put on headphones. I think it makes me look unapproachable. A little advice to all the women and girls out there, take different routes everyday, you never know who may be following you.

     And my message to all the creeps out there, you can be creepy all you want, this will not stop me from walking, this will not stop me from getting education. No it will motivate me to work until I reach a position where I can rid the world of people like you!

Food for thought: What is right? What is wrong?

What is right? What is wrong? Who decides what's right and what's wrong? Society? Religion? Individuals? Can things be right and wrong? Or even somewhere in between? Can the right turn into wrong and the wrong turn into right?



I don't have any of these answers and I don't think I ever will.

Where are you from?

      'Where are you from?' When someone asks you this question, what do they want to know? Your race? Your origin? Where do you feel at home? Really, where is one from? Where am I from?

       Both of my parents are Lebanese, my passport is Lebanese so you'd think I'm Lebanese. Yes, legally I am Lebanese. But where am I really from? Deeply where do I mostly feel at home is not in Lebanon, it is in UAE, the place where I was born and raised, the place where I have lived my entire life. But does that mean that I feel Emirati?

       Of course the heat of the UAE, its sky crappers and gigantic shopping malls will always be part of me no matter where I end up living later on in life. It is the place where I met some of the greatest people, it is where I have memories, it is the home of yummy dates and Chai Karak, I'm never letting go of this part of myself. But of course, this doesn't mean that Lebanon isn't part of me, the Cedar trees, the fresh air, the long walks on the beach, the tea and gossip with the ladies of the village, the flirtatious guys on motorcycles, the fireworks when there's a football match, the smell of Turkish coffee in the morning, the old men playing backgammon on the sides of the street, the women in shadore walking with women in miniskirts, the 'Allahu Akbar' and the ringing of the church bell are all part of me. So I'm Lebanese?

       No I am not Lebanese or Emirati, I am both and a little Indian and Pakistani and Palestenian ... I have grown in a multicultural environment. I am a blend of many cultures but mostly I am Lebanese and Emirati. At first, the fact that I did not have a clear identity used to make me feel as though I had no belonging, but now I feel previliged to be part of so many cultures. I look at myself and I see a bond that unites many nationalities in one person.  So no I do not have  an answer that the person asking  'Where are you from?'  would understand because that person assumes that I have only one single identity, that only my ethnic origin is what matters.

So this was my journey in finding my belonging, how was yours?

       

Sequences: a beautiful mystery

When I see a sequence, I don't see a set of numbers, I see a challenge, a mystery to unravel. Whether its to find the next number or the nth term or the nature of the numbers that can be in the sequence, I always get lost in the beauty of it all. Its like there's something magical about a group of numbers that are related in the most unexpected ways. 

Then there's the time spent trying to make sense of the numbers scattered across the page. During that time everything else seizes to matter, its as though my whole life depends on figuring out this sequence. I fail one, two, three, four,.... times until that moment, that golden moment when I figure it all out. Its pure ecstasy, sometimes even an adrenalin rush. In fact I often feel unstoppable for a few seconds! Yes, that's what cracking a sequence does to me. It gives me a high and I even wonder why would anyone do drugs when they can try to figure out sequences. 

So this is my hobby or passion or  love or whatever you want to call it, its what makes me happy and more often than not I end up getting too engrossed in maths that I get disconnected from the world around me but I still do it anyway. No one makes me happy like numbers do. Nothing in the world appeals to me like a sequence. Point of this story is not to tell you to turn your back to the world and go do some maths but its to urge you to find that thing that gives you euphoria and do it regardless of how it makes those around you feel. BE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR OWN HAPPINESS!