Monday, December 31, 2007

Divorce in Egypt

There are 88,000 divorces annually in Egypt , 35% of which in the first year of marriage. Currently, there are 2.5 million divorced women in Egypt . That was an ad on the Egyptian newspapers forwarded to me by my dear friend Camel. What he found sad is not only the figures, but the focus on women. Unlike my friend I was not surprised at all, I would have been surprised if our newspapers involved men as damaged persons because of the divorce, I would have said "Wow, seems like we're finally admitting that women are equal to men" but no, we have a long long way to go, a way that hasn't started yet and I wonder if it will ever start... Our society regards divorce as a crisis for women only, a woman would endure a horrible marriage with all kinds of unhuman things starting from lack of money, dignity, sexual satisfaction, emotions and up to being totally responsible for her family just to stay "married" because she would rather be married and miserable than divorced. Divorce is still considered by some families as a scandal to their daughters, society regards a divorced woman as guilty by default, blamed by most of the people because she had to endure and there are always a thousand and one reasons and possibilities for this enduring. Furthermore, a divorced woman is regarded a very good potential for sex by sexually frustrated men around her (and they are a lot), as -according to them- she is not as untouchable as virgins having lost her virginity already, she is more accepting to the idea and now being lonely she definitely needs a man! Divorce is rarely an issue for a divorced man if he thinks of another marriage, and many single women who have never been married before would gladly go for the proposal, he is a man! A divorced mother is always a question mark when her daughter starts her own marriage with the primary research about the families, the suitor's family would be seriously concerned that her mother is divorced and like mother like daughter, but the father, he is a man!

Wednesday, December 26, 2007

Are you the one?

And suddenly in the middle of a stressful working day I get this wave of passion that drowns me bombarded by flashes of memories haunted by a painful past hoping of a better future torn between two ways forward or backward shall I get out of the shell shall I follow my heart that only brought me drops of happiness followed by oceans of pain and in my head I still hear John the Baptist sending his messengers to Jesus: "Is it you or shall we wait for another?"

Tuesday, December 25, 2007

The Birth of Light

It's Christams day, the world is celebrating the birth of the most wonderful human being ever walked on earth. His Birth was a birth of light and the world needed him and still needs him, his words have changed the life of many people and still do. I'm proud I was born in the same days and soon I will be celebrating my 29th Birthday, with hopes and wishes and happiness to be that related to Jesus.... Merry Christmas

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Life is Strange!

There is no standard for human nature. And this strange life even makes it more complicated. Yestreday's lover is today's enemy and today's enemy is tomorrow's friend. People change, things get misunderstood and then clarified (or not) actions get misinterpreted, sometimes we see things as we want to see them not as they really are. A painful past experience can keep haunting you forever and changing your perceptions of everything, you start caring for things you never noticed before and you tend to ignore things that used to be priorities and the list is endless.... It is a strange life that we have to live till the end, do we have a choice?

Saturday, December 01, 2007

Alexander The Great and how the Iranians see him

Still following the footsteps of Alexander, I took the chance and mentioned his name to my Iranian friends when I was in Tehran last week, regardless their background and religious beliefes, they all agreed on one thing: that he was an evil person and their main source of hatred is that he destroyed the Takhte Jamshid, or Persepolis, the ancient capital of the glorious Persian empire of the ancient times. They regard him as a symbol of evil and hatred, they deliver these to children and even in their history books and at schools, they see him as equally evil as Satan. According to them, Alexander was a strong leader who wanted to conquer their empire and destroy it out of pure jealousy and because he wanted to defeat them to claim himself the world leader. He did and he even destroyed their beautiful capital, burned many cities, killed many people including women and children, destroyed their temples and holly places. They hate him absolutely that just mentioning the name "Eskander" as they call him, their faces really turn very angry. The Iranians -unlike many nations in the world- are still in a very close contact with their history, they love their country and they are proud of its heritage, many of them still call their children ancient names of Persian heroes and names that are stemming from their ancient history. No wonder that they will hate Alexander in such a way. But there is always another face for the truth, Alexander did defeat the Persians and destroyed their capital and sacred places, but many historians see this as actually liberating Greece from the Persian occupation (at that time Persia was ruling the world even Egypt was part of the Persian Empire) and burning the Takhte Jamshid is nothing but an act of revenge for the Acropolis Temple of Athens that has been destroyed by the Persians! Well, I guess it's history, you can see it from different ways and you can actually hear people saying the same events in totally different scenarios, having a winner means there has been a loser, and the two stories would never be the same, at least from the emotional and human point of view. Again, Alexander, an angel or a devil, a hero or a villain, call him whatever you like, still he is one of the Greatest men in history.