Weekend at Meeni's
May 02, 2004
Yay! My guest book is finally functional. Thanks Jing4 [which, btw, all you sickos stands for �mirror� and not sperm]. Anyway, so leave me a note! Great...thanks.
So the brilliant Notorious gave me a shout out in his diary, which was cool, but which also felt a bit weird because I�ve lost �control� now over the number of people I actually know who will be reading this. Which is fine, it�s just a bit squirm inducing for me, as I am a bit more shy about opening up with people/ talking about myself with people I DO know over people I don�t know. Anyway, thanks Notorious [notoriousrrz.diaryland.com, it�s in my profile, but I don�t know that anyone really checks that out. You should read him though as he is way more interesting than me].
As mentioned in my last entry, I went to the beach this past weekend with Meeni, and I wanted to write a little bit about that, because I always enjoy these weekend trips with her to her family�s beach house on the Red Sea. It�s located in Ras Sudr, which is kind of in the armpit of the Red Sea coast. This is not a comment at all on the quality or niceness of the place, like the �armpit of America� in reference to New Jersey is meant to be a comment on the general shittiness of New Jersey. I just mean that it is located in the curve of land that connects the Sinai to Egypt proper. It is, of course, really beautiful there as the waters of the Red Sea are clear and calm, unlike the northern Egyptian shore waters of the Mediterranean, which are murky and dangerous [high waves and whirlpools]. Also, it�s not at all densely populated so the whole atmosphere is really serene. Meeni, too, makes an ideal travel partner as she is always up for a good time, but also loves to just relax on the beach, beer in hand, and talk about all sorts of things.
So her family has a villa which is about 15 metres from the waters edge. Honestly, the weather was a bit too cold to go swimming properly [and I had my period. Ugh] but it was great for sunning with a good book. We arrived Thursday afternoon, and both of us went for a jog [separately, as Meeni is a much more seasoned runner] then we met up afterwards and started an almost interminable game of Trivial Pursuit. I love the game, and it went well with the drinks and the general relaxed mood, but it was a good thing when our friends Smin and Sara stopped by and interrupted us. We made some more drinks and then started up a card game [I think it�s similar to Hearts?], and then eventually we switched to a two-team game of trivial pursuit, which turned out to be a lot of fun. By the time Sara and I had won [go us!] we�d all achieved a nice buzz and decided to just kick back and watch some TV. We found the music channel, were you can SMS your friends or whomever and it appears on the screen, and started sending each other silly messages. Eventually Smin and Sara zonked out, so we woke them up and sent them back to their place. It was still pretty early at this point (before midnight), but Meeni decided to turn in and I took my book upstairs and read for a good while.
The next day was generally more of the same except at some point Meeni and I got into this really long conversation about love and relationships, probably because I was getting really frustrated with Bridget Jones�s generally silly attitude towards understanding her relationships. I mean, wtf? Either love someone or don�t, but you don�t need someone else to tell you how do it and when. Grr. I mean, the book had me laughing A LOT, but I still couldn�t understand why she would put herself through all that agony instead of being straight forward with her feelings and what she wanted. So I think I asked Meeni if there were actual real people who behaved that way, and that started an almost half day conversation [of course we started and stopped, and picked it up again hours later]. It was funny because at one point I was telling her all the things I DON�T want to hear from a man [don�t tell me what to do, with whom, how or when and trust that I will be faithful and devoted, no jealousy or control required] and she was nodding enthusiastically as I stated each point. Then after I was done she just smiled sheepishly and said � you just listed ALL the things I�d like from my man.� So that got us into all the different things that women want, and us both admitting that we can be pretty hard to keep up with. We also both came out with some amusing confessions top of which would be Meeni stating, �I�m so simple. I have two brain cells � one for eating and one for making out.� Heh. To a great extent I share her sentiments. Or, at least I�d like to.
It�s all good though. All good.
So, the weather was pretty nice all weekend, and it was just really good to be away from the city. It was so empty and calm and noiseless out there. Surprisingly, I was actually pretty happy to see Cairo again. As we drove into the city, it just seemed a lot more calm and clear than it had before I�d left. I guess I needed those two days away to sort of renew my feelings about the city and the whole situation here. By the time I got back yesterday I was feeling much more positive about things, and very happy to see my family. Sometimes I just need a lot of empty time in an empty space to sort things out. So I�ve been in a very mellow mood since I got back yesterday, but also motivated to some things done. We�ll see how long that lasts.