Hope, Jo'anna

This song has been stuck in my head since Monday! Reggae is so catchy…

Hurray for repetitive songs!

You can listen to it here.

Lyrics: 

Well Jo'anna she runs a country
She runs in Durban and the Transvaal
She makes a few of her people happy, oh
She don't care about the rest at all

Gimme hope, Jo'anna
Hope, Jo'anna
Gimme hope, Jo'anna
'Fore the morning come
Gimme hope, Jo'anna
Hope, Jo'anna
Hope before the morning come

I Won!

Every year, at school, grade 10 students have to choose a theme about society in Lebanon, and work on it for the rest of the year. Everybody picks theme like, poverty, homeless people, drugs, alcohol, but nobody ever tried to work on homophobia.

When someone in my group suggested this, I jumped from my seat and got all excited, the teacher said it was great, but the stupid responsible of the project had doubts.

So I grabbed my 10-page research about discrimination in Lebanon, and went to his office, and talked about how people get beaten up, how people go to jail, how parents send their own child to some creepy gay-to-straight camps where they use drugs and things I don't even want to know about.

He looked at me, the way you look at a stray dog in the street. He is so homophobic! He asked so many useless questions, he wanted to know every detail. He started to ask me about statistics and he even tried to give me other alternative like "How can different people cope in the Lebanese society". I told him different was too wide, he told me homosexuality was too narrow. I told him we had ideas, he told me it was stupid.

I got mad, I insisted, told him it was our project, it was something everyone was interested in, and it was something actual! I told him about gay teen suicides, I told him that we could make a change, a real one. I told him this subject was unique, no one ever did that before us. We were going to be the first stupid to work in this area, even if it is so taboo in Lebanon. And when I stopped talking, I realized he was looking at my hand.

He told me there was a reason why no one ever treated this subject. I asked him: "Are you this reason? Anyway, there's a first time for everything."

He looked at me with his pitiful look again, and told me to make wider researches. And then I left, I went outside and screamed: "I WON!"

And I continued screaming for like 5 minutes before people started asking me questions, I got too excited and started talking nonsense.

 

Then I realized I had a rainbow on my hand! (My friend brought a Ben10 pen -it's a show on Cartoon Network- with 10 different colors! A Ben10 pen during an Arabic lesson can be very entertaining… Don’t judge me!) Was he looking at this the whole time?

Anyway, this made me happy for the rest of the day, and I know I'm going to work on this project really hard! I am already taking Helem's center address, and phone number to contact them later. But what most surprised me is that everyone is really excited about it!

My friend even tried to choose this topic. When he said: "Maybe we could work on homosexuality!"

The teacher answered: "Yeah... but there are some people who like them so we can't." (Eh... bass fi ness bi habouwon!)

What did he think they wanted to do? Go kill every gay man they find?

Akhh.. Stupid homophobes.

My face right now! :-)

Zammour Addicts?

What's up with all the honking?! Why can't a driver wait 30 seconds for someone to get our of a car, or someone to park?! They start honking, in the middle of Ashrafieh! I can't listen to myself anymore!

I live in one the busiest part of the city, next to a very popular mall, ABC. And because of that there is always traffic in this neighborhood, especailly with school buses trying to get through the tight streets of Ashrafieh. 

Why are people so impatient? Why can't they just sit and wait? They all have this overwhelming urge to push their stupid horn! Don't they realize people live in these streets? People need some calm, some serenity! We can't just shut the doors and windows all the time! It's becoming unbearable!

And things are getting worse! A restaurant just opened in my building. So now there are two restaurants and a pub in my street, so the noise is continuous!

Argh! I don't know how I am going to manage during exams :-(

Oh! And the best part is when people park their cars on the right of the street and on its left; so when if someone can't pass, he honks à la libanaise, which is non-stop honking until the car owner comes and remove his car. Yeah... Hurray!


Luckily I have the perfect anti-stress: Rubik's Cube! The simple logic of a beautiful puzzle... Annddd when I'm stressed and mad, I have more chances to beat my records 8-) Yay!

The Curious Incident of the Dog In the Night-time.

So, I finished reading this book a couple of days ago and I wanted to share a little review with you :)

Christopher John Francis Boone is a 15-year-old boy with Asperger's Syndrome (Autism) living in England. This book gives us a clearer vision of this type of disorder, making us discover our daily environment through new eyes, with a new mentality, a new logic.
As the story proceeds, you will realise that Christopher can't understand the simplest things related to society and human emotions. For instance, he can't stand lies or even metaphors (which he condisers a lie). On the other hand, he can solve the hardest problems and equations as long as it's logic for him. Moreover, he has a perfect memory of whatever he saw or felt: every moment of his life is recorded like a movie in his head. His mind works like a computer: organized, logic and straight.

His mentality and his way of processing things will fascinate you. He will be forced to interact with strangers during his 'quest' and he will learn how to deal with situations he never faced before.

The book is written is a very simple way: Everything that passes through the boy's mind is written, with a very simple vocabulary and a clear description of his thoughts, which makes this book delightful to read and very entertaining.

Hello World.

Hello world,

I don't know who you are and why you are reading this. I don't know how you got here and if you're going to stay and read. I don't know who would be interested in the life of a normal teenager in Lebanon. This is an example among others of the redundant life of a kid in Beirut.
I'm a 15-year old Lebanese teenager.

I love maths and physics. I'm a geek, I love it and you'll love me for it.
I love protons, the CERN and the LHC.
I love baking, macaroons and cakes. I always bake when I'm bored.
I love reading, books are my little heaven on Earth.

I love music, The Killers, Coldplay, The XX and Muse. And Glee of course. I play the piano, the guitar and the bass.
I love series, Desperate Housewives, NCIS, Big Bang Theory and pretty much every series that exists.
I love peace, Martin Luther King, Gandhi.
I love rainbows, light, colors.

I'm gay, I'm closeted, came out to my friends.
I'm weird, or so they say cause I have no idea what's normal or not. I think that everything you do is normal... Cause you just did it.
I'm smart, I know I am and it pisses everyone off cause I don't mind saying it. But I am... So why can't I say it?
I'm atheist, but my family is christian, almost fanatic. There are a lot of reasons for which I do not believe in God, and if I start now I will never end.

I don't know why I'm starting this blog. Maybe it's because I'm bored, maybe it's because I have nothing to do. I've always wanted to do it though. Maybe because I enjoy reading blogs, because I like discovering people's life. Maybe it's because I think this blog will help someone one day, or it will help me see where my life is going...
But now, I've started it, so I won't stop now. I'll try to post something every day. What? I don't know... What I did this day, what I saw, what I learned, what I'll do again, what I'll never repeat, what I would have done, what I should have done, what I'll do the next day, the day after... What? My life.