2013

I would like to make a wish, a prayer... if it is ever heard.

Please, make 2013 not the end of the world, not the end of my world, of ours... please make it the beginning of a new age.

I wish a happy new year to everyone.

Mundo Cansado

In silence...

It all started with a guy's picture on the stairs and a smile, or two.

This was going to be the beginning of my story, my happy-ending story. But it's not. I don't have a happy ending story.

I fought for it, to be honest. I tried my best for years, I failed. I failed so badly and I am conscious of it. I didn't see it coming. I don't blame you, although you want me to. I can never blame you. As it takes two to make it work, it also takes two to make it a tragedy. I saw it clearly, and now I understand it, because it destroyed me... I see now that everything I was looking for, my ambition, my dreams, were there because of you, because I had you in  my life. I sincerely thought that you were the only reality in my world, you were the only stable element that would never change. Everything could change, and it didn't matter at all, because I didn't care as long as you were there. I forgot that nothing lasts forever, and I believed that you would last forever for me. I was so certain of this that I made you the center of my life... everything else revolved around you. Did I share this with you? My memory is foggy, as always, but did I make you feel that you are just another element in my life? I do regret that if I did. You are... or should it be "were"?... the center of it all.

So many things unsaid, so many things left in the dark... so many things dead... in me, in you. Guilt? not really, regrets... wishes to change things in the past, mistakes, bad decisions... words said. I made an oath to myself to never live with regret and to always look forward, I can't do it now. I will live with this, silently I hope, when people stop saying "you can't go back in time, you can only move forward" and "in every good there is evil and in every evil, there is good", or "you will see, it will get better, you are not the first nor the last"... when people stop saying this, then I will live with it, in silence.

Need to learn how to live again...

15th of December 2012 is when life stopped and the world ceased to exist. Because you are gone, because you've chose to go.

The pain of the world in my heart

Because you are me, 

and I am you, 

I want you to live to the fullest, 

to live my life for me, 

instead of me... 

to be happy.

There is nothing out there... Or within us

A way home?

How do we look at life? Some people say that it's a joke, you need to smile and expect the best. Then, years later, you would laugh at how stupid you were for dreaming so high, for wanting to touch the sky.

I see it differently. I don't see it as a joke, life is tough. Life is sad, empty. It makes you feel tired of it all. We can never win. Maybe that's why I always expect the worst, this way I am never disappointed.

Life is so empty, and I feel like people can never actually be happy. Smiling or laughing is a way to either hide the pain or... a way to believe their own lies, dreams, happiness... We all try so hard, until maybe one day we think we are happy.

With all of this being said... what if there was nothing after death? What if there was no life, no consciousness... that this life time is the only one we have? That means that we carry on with a life that consumes us for nothing. All the pain is vain. And that is scary... void. And then they would say "just try different things, be fun, be happy". Oh yeah? What is "fun"? What is happiness?

When you think about it, it's all set up just right. A perfect balance. With every breath, you die. The more you live, the less you have left to live. It's all meaningless, worthless. There is no goal to achieve. And yet, we are in a society of ants... we wake up, go to work, to school, whatever... go back, and start again, every day, week, month, year after year. We reinvent happiness almost every decade, and the lie continues. You are happy because you work, because of whatever dull definition of success, because you have a partner with whom you share self defined emotions, because you travel, because you achieve your wish list of bullshit, because you have babies... or whatever it is for people to feel "happy". It is all part of an imaginary world we invented. It's all empty. There is nothing out there, and there is nothing within us. And with these wise words, I will wear my dull smile and go out to have what they defined for me as being "fun".

A dream, a clouded memory… or a bit of both

It was an ordinary lunch time during a working day... The company I work for own a huge building in the middle of an office park located near a forest... in a small town.

I usually go, mainly with the same people to the same cafeteria to have lunch during the mid-day break. I first noticed that the usual cafeteria had completely changed; the whole infrastructure and the design were different. I was surprised as none of this had been announced and that the changes happened from one day to the other... which was really unusual.

The cashier was also a different person. A middle aged bold man that actually looked like a banker was sitting there. He spoke badly to me and was shockingly rude, almost angry. I felt a rush of angry feelings that had probably been oppressed since the first cry of my life as a newborn. I controlled myself and put on my eternal smile that I try very hard to display at all times. The cashier mentioned for me to take a certain sauce that I could not recognize so, with that same smile, I asked politely if he could repeat the name again. The man looked at me with such disgust as if I killed his kids in front of his eyes and then said "don't bother me you b***h". For some dark reason, I finally lost my temper and was absolutely furious. I took my tray and threw it at him. For a split second, I was conscious of my acts, but my emotions were taking over all possible common sense I could have left. I saw the sauces next to him and then took one and threw it at him too, while he was paralyzed - not expecting me to react that way.

Suddenly, I've became self-conscious of myself and noticed that I spilled some food on my jeans while I was throwing all the food on the cashier - that was clearly the only aspect bothering me about that situation! I then went to the bathroom to try and remove all the stains. 

The second I've opened the door, I found myself - not in the usual bathroom, not even in a bathroom at all - in a sort of dark old Moroccan castle.

The walls were completely made of earth, mud and rocks, which explains the darkness in which I was. It was a very old building with old materials, very different techniques and architecture. I've noticed right away, once my eyes got used to the dark, that the only windows within these walls were very high and very small. Unreachable.

I finally came back to my senses and started slowly to understand the unbelievable situation I was in. Opening the door to another world? I forced myself to stop thinking about my mental health and concentrating on getting out of this scary building instead.

I started running. It felt as if I was running in a sort of labyrinth. All I wanted was to wash my clothes. Actually, all I wanted was to enjoy a moderately nice meal (food is generally terrible) at the cafeteria, with these same people, at that same place and at that same hour.

While running like a scared pray, I've seen a woman, fully covered but her eyes, following me. Scared, almost paralyzed, I stopped in front of a door that I decided to open. It was a bedroom. 

The decoration was very authentic, but I did not pay much attention to it, instead, I opened the drawer of a cabinet and found a long black Moroccan dress and shoes. For some reason, I took off all my clothes and wore the ones I've found. I had barely finished when a woman came out from the bathroom of that room I was in. I can still remember her very clearly, but what really stood up were her full big dark eyes. She then told me in the most unnatural voice: “You are not supposed to be here".

The combination of the eyes and the voice added to my state of fear, so I opened the door and started running again. The woman started running after me, which didn't help at all. No matter how fast I tried to be, she was always catching up behind me. I then saw a group of women in front of me, with weird tattoos on their faces. At that exact moment, my heart stopped... or missed a beat, I am no longer sure. I knew that it was all done, that, now, it was easier to give up.

One of the women caught me by the shoulder, and, without a word, took me to the Hamam ("Turkish bath/sauna").

I was screaming that all I wanted was to go to the bathroom of the company I worked for and that I myself did not know how or even where I was. No one paid any attention to what I was saying. They kept ignoring me while throwing warm water on my naked body. Four of the women came near to me, and each of them took either one of my arms or one of my legs. And I was naked there, on the warm floor. I do not remember if I felt tears coming out of my eyes, but I would believe I did. I was tight there, at their absolute mercy, when that woman that caught me kneeled down and started applying a weird liquid on the top of my back, just near my neck. I saw that it had a gold color and that my skin absorbed it as if it was thirsty for years. It was like if the liquid glowed under my skin. The strong adrenaline of fear and will to live kicked in while I thought it was the end, and I liberated myself from these women, then started running not knowing really to where, but at that exact moment, it simply didn't matter.

While running, naked and scared, I saw the woman I met in that bedroom following me and calling my name in that scary unnatural voice of hers. My full body and mind were concentrating on one thing: how to leave this hell! I started looking at rooms I encountered during my run, hoping to find that first room where I've took off my clothes. I've looked at many many rooms, and I finally found it. I took my clothes near my chest when that woman appeared. I fell on my knees to the ground, in front of her, and started crying, telling her that all I wanted was to leave this place.

Another woman appeared, out of thin air, and told me: "You will go back, but I have an eye on you".

A split second later, as if it was magic, I found myself outside of the building I work in, naked, with my clothes near my chest. Some people from the same company were smoking there; one of them was someone I knew very well. I started wearing my clothes while he was walking toward me, and he started talking like if nothing had ever happened, with that basic smile on his face, while I had tears on my eyes and was closing the last button of my jeans.

The ghosts from the past

I am going to sleep with a heavy heart but a clear conscious.

Memories play around and come back suddenly from that dusted corner of the soul. Without a warning. Somehow I knew the day would come, where we would simply be confronted with all these old ghosts that we ignored for a while, these same ones we left on purpose, hanging there, somewhere where we cannot see them. 

And then.

We feel that pain, that love, that loss that reaped our hearts, that took our being away...

And then.

Comes the wishes, the unanswered...

And then.

That burning need, the awakening, the thoughts...

And the heart missing beats.

Somehow, I knew. We knew, that after a long heavy silent, we will finally realize that these memories that felt so real, will slip away between our trembling fingers... because it can never stay, it can never be. Because, these bitter sweet moments disappear  with parts of us, of who we are, or who we were... and sometimes, we wish it could have stayed.

At the end of "Everything"... Fascination

Human feelings had always been that fascinating mystery that I could never understand. Even my own. It's as fascinating as the light of the moon in a dark but clear night sky... It calls you, it longs for you, it whispers your name.

We, humans, do like to make everything around us so complicated, and, although we know  the logical answers to all our questions, although we know what we are supposed to do, we still put ourselves in dilemmas and then blame the whole universe for it. Amazingly fascinating, isn't it? We have so many desires that are simply the opposite of what logic tells us, of common sense... and yet, we do enjoy these situations, don't we? Those forbidden emotions that takes our bodies and feelings to a new dimension, where every single feeling like fear, desire, love and shame are suddenly multiplied and amplified to the point where pain and pleasure are utterly the same, just alike. Or, our body starts reacting to it all evenly. Maybe.

I wonder if we do enjoy all of this? Do we have some sort of ancient gene in our DNA that makes us attracted to everything complex, dark and confusing? Do we enjoy living in contradictions, pain, as long as it brings us that confused feeling of joy, that forbidden pleasure? Maybe we just like to be "special", or cared for? Human beings are such weird creatures after all, we do need a language to communicate and yet we do not understand who we are. But, maybe, that is exactly the point, the beauty of it, to feel it, see it, and not understand it, to keep the waiting and prolong that fascinating pleasure.

My faithful companion

Fear is my daily companion, the sort of companions that you would like to get rid of but that you simply cannot. It is the only companion I've had for years, I do not know any one else. Knowing it might be a wrong way of saying things... What is fear after all? 

I've looked it up in Google, and it says "An unpleasant emotion caused by the belief that someone or something is dangerous, likely to cause pain, or a threat." 

An unpleasant emotion, it says... caused by a feeling of danger. Maybe. I fear the future as much as I desire it. I remember when I was a kid, I used to imagine myself having the chance to take a brief glance at my future, just to know what to expect, and, of course I've never had the chance to. It is a sort of "spoiler alert", but wouldn't it be fascinating? Wouldn't we be happier knowing what we will get and just going towards it steadily and surely?


Darkness is covering it all, and sometimes all hope runs away... It sounds a bit gothic, but don't we all have a bit of it in us? I never know how to deal with uncertainty, I do not know how to loose, it burns, and yet I cannot always win. I sometimes feel like laying down and stay there, and leave it to destiny to decide, to worry, to fear for what is going to happen... Let it finally do its job.

Sometimes, I look at other people's happiness and wonder if I could ever be happy.
I maybe fantasise about never being able to be happy, or maybe I really do believe so. I don't know... I have many dreams but I am not the dreamer, I am more of the realistic one, the one who is supposed to kill these dreams.

No saviour will ever come, although here again, it has been the fantasy of human kind for centuries. All I have to do is sit and wait. Wait for the end, when the mind is finally set free.

A dream on a heavy rain afternoon

I had a very weird dream when i woke up. I thought it was 6 am of the next day, while it was only a 1hour sleep on an afternoon where the thunder and rain didn't stop pouring on the empty street of that cold city.

In the dream, I was working at my desk at M********d and Kris, my current manager, came to my desk and told me, in a dark sparkle of illumination: "I want you to think of a new name for our product, a brand for sports clothing"

I was shocked at first  and surprised, as it is not in line with my normal job, and then said "Kris, this is crazy". He then told me with his usual nonchalance "just do it! I know what I am saying".

I told him, with my usual stubbornness "I will do it, but just take my advice : sports clothing has nothing to do with the core business of M********d, it will never work, believe me".

Anyways, I started working on the task at hand until late at night and then my manager came by again and told me that he will drop me home.
I followed him to the parking of the company, but it turned out that, instead of dropping me near my place, he dropped me in the middle of nowhere, near an unknown bus stop.

There, some kids were walking and a girl asked me "what are you doing here? My friend will go to France, so I want to know" (????). In front of my deep surprise by the incoherence of her question, I decided to explain, in plain words that I was dropped here, for, again, incoherent and unknown reasons.

After that strange small exchange, the kids left and I saw a small house with a light open. In front of the house, I then noticed that it looked more like an independent office than a normal traditional house. A sort of house that has been turned into an office, at least partially. I then knocked on the door, hoping that I could ask someone about the bus, where it goes, for how long I should wait, and all this information that might be important to me if I wanted to end up at home at the end of this long, tiring and bizarre day!

The door opened and I found myself in front of a man sitting at his desk. A man I've never seen before, but a sort of blond German but with a fake tan in his 30s. Very sporty I supposed. I was surprised - like if it was the only surprising event of my journey in this dream. I saw near his desk, on the ground, a printer that had just finished printing some business cards.

The stranger finally looked at me and said "N*****e, come on in, I was expecting you".

Of course my surprise grew bigger. I've never seen that man.

He then took the business cards, handed them to me and told me "you are now working for me! These are your business cards". Still shocked, I took them, looked at them and there was on the top the brand name I was working on when I was at work. My name was in the centre of the business card, and under it, it said "Assistant Manager".

He then smiled and told me "don't get cocky, you are only the second on command, a second me, not ME, so come back here early at 8 am tomorrow".

I held the business cards closer to my chest, and before leaving, he told me "by the way, have a car or you are fired".

I smiled and left.

And then I woke up.

I died on January 10th 2011

I remember I wrote that sentence on a piece of paper on the day of my birthday: "I died on January 10th 2011".

I might die again soon, or... I might finally live again. I have been in a state between life and death all this time. Maybe I am like a cat, with 7 lives. And I actually feel pain for cats if they feel the same pain I do when they die, when they say goodbye to life.

Everything starts to loose its meaning all of a sudden, everything becomes fade, almost erased. and then... a sad blues song starts playing in the background of your life, with a bitter taste, almost like a strong cheap Tequila and lemon in a dark lost motel at the end of the world. And words repeat in your ear, things you said, things you heard... The story just keeps repeating itself again and again, even if I've never pushed the shuffle button.

I wonder if we always remember why we used to love someone or not... Does time erase it all and only keeps burning memories? Or is it simple brain chemistry that rather chooses for us to feel stupid than sad and regretful? They always say that time heals everything. I am still waiting, so Time, please decide already, because I am tired of waiting for you and for your blessing. Decide my fate already because I am loosing all faith... I gave up even the idea that we build our own destiny... whatever, just decide for me, because I am exhausted.

If I die again soon, then that would be the end. Unless, like in movies, when all hope is gone, when all colours turn to black and white... then a hero comes, saves the day. I have no faith in heroes, I am only used to anti-heroes, as sad and miserable as I am. So, Time, Faite, Sad Hero, I am waiting for you.

I am ....

I don't know who I am.
I've been asked to define myself, to tell what are my core values... I didn't know. The person in front of me had it all figured out, they simply shared 5 core values around which everything revolves. I was amazed and amused. Amazed by how people know themselves so good and amused in front of my lack of words, of my incapacity of saying anything... I couldn't talk, but my heart was racing. My heart felt it all but there was no word to define who I am. It's easy to say that my core value was freedom, it's exactly like trust, it's such a lose word, a sort of bucket in which you can put everything. Am I that shallow? Maybe, but my heart was racing, I was feeling everything.

I've been told once that I am someone who, when I feel something, I feel it fully. I live happiness fully, and sadness as well. Maybe I felt who I was, but even now I am incapable of sharing it. Others say that I am an open book, we can see everything on my face, through my eyes. Was it supposed to be positive or negative, I don't know, and to a certain point, I don't care... Because of one simple question : do I really want others to define me? And yet, I am referring to what they say, to what they think, to what they perceive.

I think it's not that important to me to define myself after all. I am a sort of human ball of emotions, always changing but most importantly, always in a very real and strong relation with what I represent... yes, without being able to point it out or what it is in words.

It is easy to define ourselves by our origin, ethnicity, place of birth, age, profession... name... this is what society is doing to each and every one of us. This is their definition.

My definition would be, I am me, another human being in this vast and yet small planet. I am just another grain of sand in that vast deserted universe... a grain of sand that is incapable of defining herself... And is that so wrong after all?

Surpiiiiiiiiiiiise !

I had a really nice surprise at work yesterday...

It was sweet and elegant

God on Trial

I've watched that movie a couple of times already. I simply love it.
There are so many things to say about that movie, but it is a brilliant one; they actually didn't need a multi-million dollar budget to make it fascinating, it simply used what every one of us might think in his or her darkest moments.

Human feelings are complex, sometimes indescribable... but, when we take away our identity, our pride, our origin... when we take away what makes us human, when we are at the highest peak of disappear, then an amazing energy comes to us, an energy that brings us back to who we are, to what defines us as humans.

I do not want to talk about people's suffering, be it any minority that has been through group slaughter, slavery or even eradication. This is not about one specific ethnicity, faith or origin. This is about each and every one of us.

What I really loved about that movie is how we actually rebel against what is not just, what is not fair. It is human to blame others... maybe even to blame God. The dynamics of the conversations are not only moving, but it makes you wonder, think... look at their perception of the world, on these very personal, almost intimate relations that we have with God or the Universe.

When we loose everything, when even dignity is lost, we do rebel on who we can (God in that case I suppose), we do question everything. We define a self-centric justice, but ... what amazed me the most is, at the end, either you judged God guilty of charge or not, you come back to that only certainty that you have left, and you see both sides putting their hand on their heads, in a last moment of despair... and pray.

"- And now what? God is guilty, then now what?
- Now, let's pray"

I cannot quit speaking about this movie, about the deep feelings of experimenting suffering as shown... If I have to summarise it all, i would say ...

Beautiful.

Let's celebrate our differences!

Today I was interviewed by a couple of students around diversity… How do I manage the cultural difference both at work and in my private life. The discussion was actually quiet interesting, it always is. Discovering how others see you in such an environment is definitely enriching, but I was amazed though on how people tend to generalize everything.

I should say that I was a real case study for them! Young professional, woman, foreigner (and not any foreigner, I came from an Arabic north African Muslim country), so basically, I offered the whole package! That was all funny to me, I laughed when they expected me shocked, but hey, laughing is the best medicine.

As expected, we spoke about stereotypes, about Saudi Arabia, about being a young professional with all my cultural background in this country and in this environment… And what I’ve noticed is that people think that every young Arab woman will behave the same! Honestly, in that global environment we are living in, the differences start to be so thin, barely noticeable, and the whole diversity that you can see is no longer based on age, gender, ethnicity or even belief. We are diverse and different because our personalities are simply different, because our view of the world is different, certainly not because we were born in a place instead of the other. And I feel that this will be the tendency. If I can say that, at least by the way I perceive things, while I only had a PC at the age of 12 and Internet at the age of 15, what can we say about the other generations after us that actually start their lives with an iPhone at hand?

I have no lessons to teach, not even a thought of the day, I just want to share a view: let’s celebrate our differences, because each one of us is different, and we are all the same.

Trust?! what a weird creature

Last month, I was, for the first time, taking part of the European Management Meeting in the company I work for. It was an interesting event, what stroke me most was an exercise we had to do in the morning where we have been asked to draw some of the company’s values. Trust was one of them. Trust! That value that is generally treated as a big bucket where you can actually throw anything you don’t know.

It is an amazing concept that I still can’t define or put any sort of action plan on. How can we be build trust? What does it even mean to trust someone? What does it mean loosing trust, having trust, sharing a relationship built on trust? To me it says it all, and it doesn’t at the same time. Anyways, we had to “draw” trust. So after a very short conversation on the confusion around this trust and some comments like “we cannot speak about trust at work”, etc., some people gave an example saying that when you throw a baby in the air, he/she still smiles at you because he/she trusts that you will catch him/her back. Can a baby really trust? I am not sure, but we had all these senior managers that have years of experience in life, what do I know if babies really trust that person specifically or are they just enjoying the moment, flying with no wings?!

We had others who gave an example of shaking hands, like a customer and a supplier (really?!), and other examples confusing trust and integrity (and as hard to believe as it might seem, bankers were on the loop)… After these few attempts of “creativity” around how to actually draw trust, we finally decided to ask the worldwide expert in everything (yes, it actually does exist), so, thanks to Steve Jobs - and our salary, we had an iPad and we went to www.google.com/images, and looked for “trust”.

It doesn’t really matter what we had actually drew, although it was a competition that apparently has decided the team with the most creative mind (based on what criteria? That has been set for things that are beyond my miserable knowledge as well).

The competition itself was actually an opportunity to take the time and speak about what we felt around that theme, trust. And what I came out with, from the whole exercise, is that trust, either in our private life or at our work, is a very difficult concept, we generally tend to put everything under its banner and we generally have no solutions for it. Yes, maybe a lame conclusion and probably too pessimistic in the sens that criticizing things without trying to bring any answers is just a loss of time… But I do understand that, like a tree, trust is there, growing in its corner, as long as it has not been broken. Once it is, and it is an eventual turn of events anyways, then it will take the necessary time to grow back, effort to understand, and energy to get things where they had started.

Maybe a last advice, while you have a genuine trusted relationship, try not to loose it, otherwise, you will end up in that big confusion bucket, just like the European Union… a big corpus, throwing one thing at a time!

Just a passing thought...

I was thinking the other day about the previous blog I had (in French)… And I realised that, although I haven’t been writing for a couple of years, I am not capable of brining any inspired thought, or positive for that matter. When I read my posts again, all I see is saddness.

I am quiet skeptical, realistic with a tendancy of pessimism, but maybe this is exactly my drive. Thinking about it, human beings, seek comformity even in anti-comformism. At the end of the journey, all we want is to avoid being alone, dying alone, miserable. It is not something we can avoid, we are born alone and we will die alone, but we all want to have that comforting thought that we will have people around, people that love us and comfort us. This might be the ultimate fear, not being remembered, or even worse, not having anyone feeling the difference between our living state and when our existence just stops there.

We have just reached 7 billion people in this planet; not all of them will remember us or will notice any difference. This is just normal. The saddest part would be that none at all would notice. We all read about these old people, especially in Europe, who die in their lonely appartments without anyone knowing, until the morbid smell of a rotting flesh reaches other habitants. No one should have this kind of goodbye. Is life really worth living? Great question really, but it certainly is when we live our lives fully, with no regrets.

Do I have regrets? Maybe, maybe not… But I know that if I had to go through many things I lived again, I would certainly change it all.