The Glorious City of Shamiya

 

The Mill

 

Where We Bury Those That Don't Cooperate

 

When Harvesting Takes Place

 

100+ Year Old Eucalyptus Tree

Dad's Here On A Visit

My dad came for a visit about 10 days ago. He got me some clothes and another damn suit. He also brought me a Sony T7 digital still camera, which he, my brother and I shared the cost of. We went to the farm last farm and I took alot of pics while I was there. They've started harvesting and trying to get a deal from the government to mill some rice.

Our mill was offering to mill the rice from the government and to returnn 58% percent of it as whole grain rice. The other mills were complaining as well as the director in our region and wanted us to only offer 54%. We had to concede to their wishes and withdraw our offer of 58%. What's happening is that the other mills can't be profitable at 58% unlike us, and if we're the only mill working at 58% the government official will look bad.

I'm back to smoking two packs a day. Ought to take back control. But my dad's arrival shook up my system. Well that's my excuse anyhow.

University is alot more bareable this time around. My class is very friendly. And there's some girl, Suzy, from a different section of my year that in the first days of classes was the only girl from outside my class to come up to me to talk. Well she's some what cute and I found her friendly. Well ever since, we've been saying hello to each other and might chat about whatever test we have that day.

One of the guys in my class, Dick, because he ditched me twice when he was supposed to help me study for an exam. Not really his fault the first time because there was that serious car bomb in his neighbourhood. Well going back to the subject, he noticed that I liked Suzy, and I casually said yeah sure.

Yesterday, one of the guys of my class came up to me, not really sure of his name probably Ahmed. He comes up to me saying he wants a word with me about a 'positive subject'. He takes me aside and tells me that Suzy was saying that she liked me. We had no more classes, I walked out of the colllege and then turned around thinking that I might as well deal with the situation now better than later. Especially considering that the next day was a day off.

Go back to the cool girl of the class, Lilly to who Suzy was talking to and to who Dick also mentioned that I liked her. She gets up and starts helping me find Suzy. While searching about I get tips and stuff from Lilly on how to approach Suzy. Because I don't know how to do this thing in Arabic. Lilly asks me what my intentions are and if I've got any problems with Suzy being Christian. I didn't know she was Christian, and my intentions?... I told her I was scared of marriage and that I didn't want it to be just a fling (which is all I've ever had so far). I didn't tell her the part in brackets. We searched all over and couldn't find her. Which means tomorrow will be full of suspense.

Play All

So what's new. Not much, dad's arrival has been delaying for a week. He might show up at any moment. I'm drinking red wine tonight. I guess the booze it what it takes for me to bother posting something. Cause otherwise I'd be playing Mario. It rained today. Which is pretty cool. I had to open the sunroof on my way to and from uni. My just did the play all and shuffle my mp3 collection. Something I haven't done in a very very long time. Maybe over a year. It's promising to be an interesting experience. First track I hear, I've never heard before (some alice in chains song). Never could stand arabic music as a matter of fact. Sure the female singers are bodacious. But that leads me to ask why the hell would someone listen to music in English if they don't understand the words. Oh because music is a universal language someone says. Bullshit.

The old habits come back to life

Can't seem to fall asleep. It's 3 am, I've got college tomorrow. I've surrendered to the insomnia, popped open that bottle of wine. My stomach is being very outspoken. My imagination is jogging. Living incredible situations in my mind, an anxious habit. The Mario tune is haunting me. I could hear it so clearly when I turned on the tv a moment ago. A need for some new mp3s is making itself apparent again. But the old tunes have a distinct nostalgia of moments similar to these. I've got a button on my keyboard that calls up the calculator. How cool is that!?

30 minutes ago... I've got to lose my belly before the summer starts again. I'll run in the morning.
15 minutes ago... Crap, I'm already too tired. Might as well open that bottle of wine.

Today is also the second day in a row that I break my 20 cigarette a day rule. I would've stayed within bounds had I fell asleep. One sec, if it's 3 am I could count these smokes from tomorrow's batch. I think there were 21 cigarettes when I went to bed.

I didn't leave the house today. I think that's a first in a long time. The after-effects are terrible. It came down to me not going to out to buy my own cigarettes of course. Smoking is a bad habit, sending people off to get you cigarettes is far worse.

Happy Eid Alcohol Sells Once Again

Hell yes! Ramadhan is finally over! Truth be told it wasn't so bad this year. Smoking in the streets or at uni wasn't a problem. But today, the alcohol was finally open. Yes it was. And your faithful Shaggy woke up, got dressed and walked straight to the alky store to buy himself some booze. Shaggy bought 6 bottles of Miller Genuine Draft, one bottle of Ksara Lebanese red wine (and that's the good stuff) and a bottle of Smirnoff's extra strength Vodka.

Bleeding hell it feels good to be drunk again.

Freshly Baked Brownies And My Tummy

Maybe I shouldn't eat brownies still warm from the oven. My stomach is seriously disagreeing with it. Yesterday I ate a bunch of fried food, and crikey that was messed up. I regurgerating cooking oil for hours. I'm surprised that I'm not really suffering from any heartburn, because I'm really pushing it. I used to suffer from serious spells of heartburn but I think the acupuncture I did last summer put an end to that.

I didn't go to uni today. Nahida told me that today was a national holiday. I didn't confirm it with anyone and it's too late now. I'm trying not to spend anymore money on mobile phone for as long as possible. So far I'm doing pretty well. I spent over a hundred dollars during the last 3 weeks of last month. I think that's as much as I've spent during the rest of the year uptill last month. I should maybe buy a phone card and carry on me till I really need it.

I need to go to the toilet to let go more of those brownies. Nahida's brother's has been staying with us for the past couple of nights. He's really sick. I don't know what's wrong with him. But he's going to get an operation and I think he'll be fine after that. He says it common sense not to eat a cake until it's cooled down. I don't know why but even had he told me before I committed the mistake, I'm convinced that I would've eaten it anyway. And that's me, I have to learn things the hard way, I think I'm pretty good at that. Mice are probably smarter than me in that respect. I'm going to the loo now...

Feeling a little better, but not that much better.