Another one bites the dust

Do you ever wonder about your destiny? What is planned for you in this world? Where are you supposed to end up or with whom? Sit there and imagine your life, but the image you spent your whole childhood and a good deal of your teenage years fantasising about, disappears, disintegrates into oblivion.

This might ring true more with single people or single girls shall I say, people in relationships or married think they have it all figured out, a married happy blissful life they don’t see it ending, they don't think their whole “dream” could be shattered in their pretty little faces.

People come in and out of your life, some will mark their passage and some will be forgotten and you ponder the reason for their passage, but if you choose to be mystical, there is always a reason we cross paths in life, nothing is left to chance, some might bring in change, perhaps good or bad, but necessary change, some will be the cause of something wonderful or dreadful, and some you are left wondering the point of their intrusion, who gave them the right to come into your life, in what capacity, for what reason, who wrote this schema anyway, and don’t I get a say in it?

Of course you do, you have a brain and mental capacities to make decisions, right or wrong, thought through or impulsive, they remain also intrinsically part of the schema.
Are you with me or have I lost you?

Believing in destiny is a great way of relieving the strenuous guilt and self deprecation, it was written you say, it was maktoob, but if you attempt to use your dormant grey matter and think, you can also say: it was my fault, my actions, my past has again triumphed and got the better of me, but then again it was meant to be, it’s part of the schema of life;

Which one comes first? The chicken or the egg?

The guards came down yesterday and the hit came in time to annihilate me, ohhhh I want my mummy, but I am 34 and I can't run back to her to cry on her lap.  Guards have to go back up, patience and perseverance are the way forward, arm myself with them and carry on, writing seems to flow better when I am sad anyway.

Dz-Chick…back on the shelf

I do...do I?

God has created divorce for a reason, it’s not his favourite creation but he created it anyway, knowing there is a need, a place and a time for it.

Isn’t marriage supposed to be for life? I grew up in a tightly close family, parents are still in love with each other despite their attempts at hiding it, she calls him Azza for Abdel Aziz and he calls her ….can’t tell you! They don’t fight, they just stop speaking to each other for a couple of days and then we all know how they’re going to make up! YUK

So my idea of marriage is what my parents have, closeness, love, laughter and family but that perfect image is distorted when witnessing different examples of marriages out there, the unhappy couple, the cheating husband, the cheating wife, the runaway wife caught by La gendarmerie and brought back home, the abandoning husband and the open relationship, none of which inspire or instil me to start one of my own.

I have been thinking about this a while now, and even though I know that being in a relationship is better than not being in one for many reasons, but being single has also its advantages and I grew used to it, let’s compare shall we?

 When you’re single:

- Crazy things happen to you – which makes life interesting and blog more consistent

- You can take snap decisions and not have to confer with other half

- You don’t have to worry about shaving, waxing etc with military precision for microscopic check ups

- You sleep in your own bed and if you don’t want to change the sheets, no one cares

- You don’t have to persuade anybody about any travel destination being too far or too exotic or not

- Ranting with girlfriends or on blog about being single is fun

- You always talk in a singular "I, Me"

- I think I’ve run out….damn I thought it was a going to be a long list!

When you’re in a relationship

- Crazy things don’t happen to you – that is pretty boring...I hear! probably not though

- You will never be cold in bed again

- Hugs and cuddles on demand

- Difficult decisions are shared, which takes the pressure off

- You can have couples holidays and dinner parties (can’t believe I am saying this, I hate couples holidays and dinner parties)

- ran out...a little help here??

Hmmm my mind is not made up, I want both, but I can’t have both, god has created marriage and divorce but not open relationships, but I don’t believe in divorce or open relationships, so I either go back to being single or I get married for better and for worse.

A torn Dz-Chick

One week to go...

In a foul Monday morning mood, I keep imagining it’s Ramadan and gage how I’d cope with the tube situation, foul moods, withdrawal symptoms, headaches, hunger pangs, dry mouth and general edginess, but that sounds like a regular day for me…hmmm

I remember some wannabe-preachers advising I am not allowed to brush my teeth or shower because it alleviates the suffering and that is apparently wrong because if you’re not suffering then you’re not fasting or worshiping because our religion is the religion of hardship and suffering, what else? Am not allowed to nap? That’s right, you’re not allowed to nap, and you’re supposed to work and continue with your day as per normal;

So why do Muslim countries make allowances and adapt work and school times so they finish between 2-4pm? and they seem to decide when we fast and when we stop fasting based on someone who presumably has a telescope and has allegedly sighted the moon, whereas we don't really have a say in it because it's always cloudy here so we follow Saudi Arabia or Ghadafi, whichever is easier.

We practice Islam in a non Muslim country (time not adapted), fast the best part of 18 hours (if you include sleeping night time because you’re not allowed to nap during the day), you smell coffee everywhere you go, especially on your walk from the station to the office when you walk past Starbucks, Café Nero and Costa followed by Prêt a manger and the smell of freshly backed croissants, lunchtime in the office is an array of foods, your senses become very heightened and you can’t even escape to the gym for fear of collapsing on the treadmill, by 4pm you want to slide on your chair and slip into a coma, colleagues always think you’re snappy because it’s Ramadan (whoever gave them this idea?) even though you’re smiling and talking very quietly in an attempt to save energy.

Truth is, I am dreading it, I dread it every year, I dread the first day migraine, dry mouth, incessant yawning and the tiredness but then by the end of week 1, I get a new lease of life and start feeling the detox working, and wish it would never end. 

Better get a few workouts this week and lay off the caffeine before Ramadan starts.

Things to do before Ramadan

-          Start the decaf and lay off the cafeine, nicotine, alcohol and so on...

-          Go to the gym at least 3 times this week

-          Freeze gym membership for a month

-          Stock up on Paracetamol

-          Find out which way is East so I can pray at home (I know, terrible but at least I do my best)

-          Dig out a more conservative summer wardrobe

-          Call mother to get the recipe for Chorba AGAIN

-          Think about writing Ramadan diary for blog

-          Get into the groove of Ramadan, i.e brace yourself and look forward to loosing 5 kilos

Dz-Chick: in Ramadan mode…already

When? Until when? how? why?

How many times do you hit a wall or an obstacle at work or in life and all you want to do is run away, give up, curl up in a foetal position and retrieve to your mums lap? No? Never? No one? Just me then…

Why can’t people just work together in harmony, why the backstabbing, the competition for the boss’s affection, the brown nosing, the scheming, I am too naïve for such practices, I usually don’t even see them coming until they hit me and by then it’s too late, it could also have to do with the fact that I just don’t care about my career anymore, I want a change of career, I want to explore my more creative side, you know paint a naked fat lady (I find the fatter the easier, something to do with big lines), write short stories, design my own wedding dress or other people’s since mine will probably never be, decorate my actual house and not some rented property with mismatching IKEA furniture, paint a mural on my wall;

Things that make me happy, never do I want to wonder if my office chair is ergonomic and complain from RSI because I blog a lot (well used to) or if my colleague is in with the boss complaining about me and saying dz-chick is not focused, which lets face it, I am not anymore and I find myself having to defend myself but not having quite the energy or the argument for it so I give up.

It has nothing to do with love or with my new man, I know where your mind is going, I am just getting bored with the rat race and the competition, and if I cannot do something I love, I will retire back to Algeria and live a life of a hermit, I am sure my dad will be happy to support me….for 6 months at least before he kicks me out.

Melancholically yours....Dz-Chick

Poke me!

From 310 to 309, hmmm who removed me from their facebook? Or maybe they just deactivated their account? No no someone removed me, damn can't find out who it is now, I have so many facebook friends I won't even know who is and who isn't my friend anymore. Oh well I am sure I would have noticed if they mattered.

I noticed however when someone I thought to have been a good friend of mine recently removed me from their fecebook, notice, she did not send me a message, angry or disappointed or saying "you pissed me off bla bla bla" she just went and removed me from facebook, at first I thought surely this has to be a mistake and I did a search for her thinking maybe she just closed her account, but found she was still friend with friends of mine (she doesn't even know most of them) and realised that our friendship of nearly 6 years was over, she decided to put an end to our friendship with a click of a mouse. No reason given, I am left in the dark as to what I did wrong or what I could do to fix it.

Is this is the new norm? Is this how we end friendships? Or show we're unsatisfied with our friendships? Is Facebook the new social platform to end relationships? What happened to the phone? Email? What happened to calling an old friend and telling her she was a b*tch?

What’s next? Divorce through facebook? Resign jobs through facebook?
What is becoming of our communication skills and what’s wrong with talking? Don’t poke me, don’t tag me, don’t facebook or unfacebook me, just talk to me.

Dz-chick…..facebook shy of late

Envy is a terrible thing!

Karma is an amazing thing, good Karma even better, despite my years of being cynical, I never stopped being an optimist, a closeted one nonetheless, I always believed in Love, always believed I would meet my match and be happy as the opposite was simply unthinkable.

It is time dz-chick moved on, it’s time she felt what it’s like to be happy and loved.

However, people don’t seem to be happy for her, everywhere she gets questioned in such a fashion it perplexes her, scrutinised as though a miracle occurred and they (so called friends) need to probe further to make sure they’re not hallucinating, some start to cry, worth a mention that these tears were not tears of joy, but tears of sadness, because she left her singleton friends behind in their singledom.

Your friends with the exception of a few, don’t want to see you moved on and happy, because they’ll have no more excuses, they’ll have to start looking at their own lives and relationships and acknowledge their own dilemmas instead of occupying themselves with yours as a distraction and a feel-better factor and your sadness and dilemmas are used as leverage, a mean of control.

In all the years you have been single, how many friends have actually tried to introduce you to someone you might like? Or set up with a friend or someone they might know? And if they did, was it not such an appalling effort it had no choice but to fail and add to your gloom?

Truth I found is that it’s not in their best interest to do so; our friends prefer to keep us to themselves, their clowns, their entertainment, the singletons whose diaries are always open and encumbered by must-do’s, “We’re going” and “we’ve plans”, The single friend is the distraction from their own lives and problems;

And declaring “dz-chick changed her status from single to in a relationship” did not win me many votes, how amusing to see how people react to their friends’ happiness, I never thought people would actually deny me the happiness I so strived for and so deserve.

This strange behaviour, call it, envy, jealousy, selfishness or just indifference, makes you question the very foundation of your friendships, why are we even friends? How did we become friends? Will we go on being friends? Will you ever be happy for me as much as I was happy for you?

Which makes me now understand why people only share bad news with us and withhold the good news to themselves, they obviously experienced this and have learnt to keep things to themselves, just like expectant women who won’t announce their pregnancy until three months have passed and bump can hide no longer;

Is it fear of people’s envy? Jealousy? Evil eye? or simply that we secretly know some of our friendships are flawed and must be kept at bay.

Dz-chick....does not care for the colour Green.

Running with Bulls

D day is today (and tomorrow), the JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge sets off, lycra blazing, sporting the highest tech running gear, frantic preparation, the best heart rate monitors on the market, each group representing their Bank and huddled like a pack of bulls (was tempted to say Wolves, but wolves are fierce and loyal, Bankers are not) about to attack in matching logo printed t-shirts.

5.6 KM(3.5 miles) of fun running around Battersea park with a bunch of Bankers, tis simply suicidal, testosterone is airborne, competition; rife and aggressive, fun; inexistent, smiles; banned, eye contact with other competitors is considered bad form and they are all taking it just way too seriously, get over yourselves and despite what they make you believe...you are not IT.

I took the challenge a couple of times, runing for my firm, I ran alongside a colleague who tried to kill me with his pace, I separated from him panting and wheezy with a look that says “what are you crazy???” then I got pushed and fell on my hip, scrapped my clothes and some skin came off, but the show must go on, they all jumped over me like a hurdle, they fancy themselves as Olympians, don't they know they’re just a bunch of lycra-wearing pack of bulls.

I had finished the race in under 35 minutes despite the limping and the incessant pain in my thighs, hips and head (damn I thought I was fit).

What I got out of it? Nothing

Is it utterly useless? why yes, it is to me and don't give me that crap about promoting health and fitness at work

Will I ever do it again? Over my dead body

Dz-Chick…She won't be fooled!