A Palace and Men Galore

Ok I had the craziest dream last night.

I remember it beginning in the theatre. I’m not sure if I was watching a movie or if it was some kind of awards presentation or concert or what, but it was in a theatre and I was wearing a nice black sweater. There was a kind of handsome early 40s man sitting next to me (kind of light hair and not SO much my type, but very warm and nice chiseled face) who started talking to me and, to my surprise, kind of grabbed my arm while we were talking – like to see if I’d pull away.

The dream is really scattered so you have to try to follow.

So I’m not sure what kind of community this is that I was living in … like maybe some kind of academy or something (I remember feeling like we were all professional students, or at least a lot of us were) and I lived in this huge old building that was, rightly called, the “palace.” You know when you are in a dream and you realize that an element has been recurring? Well that’s the palace for me. I went “home” and discovered that my room had been moved and saw the guy from the theatre down the hall…like if I was standing in my room with the door open then I could look down a long hallway and see his room, and I remember that we kept stealing looks. I was really disoriented that everything had moved, probably to make room for him, and I remember thinking how silly it was that I felt lost in my own house just because my bed had moved one room over (and as it turns out it hadn’t, but that’s not an important detail). When I was walking on the grounds one of the administrators/attendants (like someone who worked there and who treated me with respect but was himself middle-aged and also obviously a character of some weight in the community) asked me if “Robert _____” (don’t remember the last name) had moved into the palace where I was living, and I remember thinking that I knew the answer was “yes,” because I’d seen him in his room, but calling where I was living “the palace” really threw me off. When he walked away, the history of the building came back to me (it used to be a palace) and that’s when I realized that building had occurred in other dreams.

The dream (unfortunately) moves away from what could have been a pretty hot romance lol, because we were all assembled in the palace and it was announced that there would be a competition akin to one of those dinner party mystery games. Robert was looking VERY handsome in his tuxedo, and we had this kind of silent flirtation like “this would happen but right now we are competitors” going on, and of course everyone had growing suspicions about the role everyone else was to play in the game. The dream lost a bit of coherence in this part because I just remember going up in a very modern elevator, after our roles were announced, with the game master (who himself was playing), and he was given a clue about me to the effect of “don’t trust him because he has knowledge things that other people don’t and has done all of this before” or something like that, but, true to his warning, I knew that he had received that clue about me and could kind of read the situation. We had this sort of odd conversation in this long elevator ride that would be fitting for some kind of experimentalist French play or something where I was trying to figure out my own clue, and where I should get off the elevator, and he was trying to feel me out to see exactly what his clue meant – like saying to me that I must already know the solution to the mystery, and me saying that I didn’t know what the solution was, yet, but I knew what it wasn’t. It was very weird. The elevator stopped, and I thought for a minute it was broken, but then it was clear that I had to climb out of the elevator through a false passage into one of the chambers of the palace where there was this smokey room full of black dancers dressed as 1920s flappers. I had some kind of test with them that I don’t remember, but I do remember sort of grinning, at that point, because it was clearly going to be a very interesting game, and it was fun to see them a bit dazzled by my sudden appearance from a secret passage.

The dream totally changed gears, I’m not sure how, when I made some kind of emergency visit to my mother, who I was shocked to find out had remarried. Not only had she remarried, but she became the third wife of an Iranian man living in Dubai (like I said, the beginning part of the dream with Robert was the best lol). I entered into this setting of domestic chaos, as one of the children of the second wife was getting married and there was a huge celebration that my mother wasn’t invited to (being sort of the black sheep who was resented and looked down upon by the first two wives who were better in rank and because they were Muslim). I was totally puzzled as to why she would enter into that situation, because I thought she was fine single, and being married hadn’t even changed her life substantively. She kept her place in California and he occasionally visited her. She was only in Dubai for this celebration that she wasn’t allowed to officially be part of. When the party guests returned to the house, and in my mind I was thinking of how to make her husband answer for making her a pariah and treating her like some secret mistress, and while I was also trying to figure out why my mother had made such an awful decision, they wanted her to perform some kind of ceremonial dance with the daughter who was getting married (which was mysteriously like a pairs figure skating spin, so I’m clearly watching too much Olympics!) and my mother caused a huge scene by refusing. The problem was that she was so emotional and this huge drama was caused, but she wasn’t interrogating her husband in a productive way, and I intervened to really grill him on how things turned out this way. I remember telling her: “You still have your place in California…we can just go home and forget about this.” I also gave her a funny speech about how unjust it was that if they were going to exclude her from the ceremonies, then he could at least send her on an all-day shoe shopping trip to compensate. I’m not sure exactly how the dream ended, but I think I persuaded her to come back to California with me.

OH! I almost forgot – when I was in Duba,i someone from the palace called (Robert?) and I remember saying: “This will sound crazy, but my mother became the third wife of an Iranian man but she doesn’t even live here, here being Dubai….” and I said I’d have to call him back. I also almost forgot about another kind of interesting part – during the whole scandal about my mother refusing to perform the dance, she was SLOWLY claiming her place in the house and insisting upon mingling with the guests (awkward but bold) and we were sitting at this bar when I heard two guys (kind of hot brothers) speaking Dari to each other (and of course since it’s a dream, I could understand it). I immediately knew that they were Tajiks from Afghanistan and was waiting for them to make their way closer to my mother and I so I could introduce them, surprise them with my knowledge of Afghanistan and my Tajik friends, and finally have SOMEONE (my mother) get to see how hot Afghan guys are. I remember they both had really, like, almost blond hair, and were young (like my age) but muscled in that way that you might not notice at first but then when you realize what their bodies are like you’re like “wow, he is BUILT!” The hotter of the two brothers, interestingly, when he saw me (before I even had a chance to approach) said to me in Dari: “You are Tajik!” and I told him no, but that I knew what he was saying and that I’d predicted that he and his brother were from Kabul, which they were. He told us that they had just moved to France two years ago, and I woke up when I was asking him why France, as he spoke such good English (his brother did not).

That’s my dream!

VC

Gross Olympic Update

Ok I know you all want to hear about Istanbul and my 24th birthday, but guess what? I feel like blogging about my favourite German biathlete and then I might even blog about belting divas and the already-long-passed Grammy awards. SO THERE!

(all my photos of Istanbul are on my phone, and I can't load them onto my PC until I get back to Cairo, so you can wait until then for me to give you the WHOLE picture, literally, of my Turkey trip)

Just wanted to say the while it might SEEM as though Gross is not having a very successful Olympics, as the first two races were one by Germans and neither of those Germans was my Ricco, but I'd like to point something out to his doubters (who totally don't read my blog, in fact I've never read negative press about him, so he might not even *have* doubters, but LISTEN UP anyway!!):

In the first race, he finished 11th, while the German who would win the second race finished a pathetic 17th, and missed THREE targets (to Gross's one), and in the pursuit race today missed FOUR targets (the winner only missed two, although I should qualify my bashing of this guy -- Fischer is his name -- that he is skiing with INCREDIBLE pace, as he still won bronze, today, missing four targets and finished less than 16 seconds out of gold, so he skated A LOT faster than the gold medal winner...BUT THIS IS BIATHLON -- if you want to ski fast then go to cross-country...this is about skills...like...for hunting bears and stuff...and Gross can totally hunt bears and Fischer can't -- he can just ski really fast AWAY from the bears!). As for the German who won the first race, he didn't even compete in the second one (or didn't place in the top 30, which are the only results I have).

When I spoke to Ricco on the phone (I came to Istanbul, rather than spending my birthday with him in Italy, because he has to stay with the German team and they don't like me very much because some of the things I've said about Gross's teammate-competitors on my blog...) I told him just to focus on the 7.5km relay, since I think he can win another gold there, and the 15km mass start is just bonus, and if his back hurts just don't even bother with it.

So that's it for my update about Ricco! Take if from me: the man is a consistent performer who knows how to use a rifle :)

VC

Growing Up and Moving On

Edit: Ok I’ve written this entry and it’s SO all over the place that I want to diagram it for you – Account of three people I was jealous of in college and why, broken up by a discussion of how I used to feel about myself and why, the fact that I got over it (with a recent anecdote to prove it), and then a return to the main point of the blog, which is me chuckling at the expense of one of my former objects of jealousy (no offense to him intended!).

I was sitting here, between quite impressive pairs short programs from Torino, thinking about college and a few of the people of whom I was TRULY envious (there were only like three). One of them, an American guy (French father) from Beverly Hills ended up, oddly enough, becoming a friend of mine. He was a cyclist/track frat boy who appeared in GQ (it was a really boring article about Ivy League frat boys) who I was absolutely awful to our first two years of college. He was loud, show-offy, and I found him totally despicable and quite jealously-worthy. I remember my girlfriend sort of trying to coach me through my moments when I'd, like, seize-up if he got in the elevator or otherwise flaunted his "better in every way-ness" (she was EXTREMELY tolerant of all of my mental issues...most of which I am thankfully over!).

Two VERY bad moments related to him:

I was on my way to econ class (when you see how many of my bad memories relate to economics you'll probably understand why I sought solace in art history and ditched so many econ classes!) and I saw him in the distance. To contextualize, between the ages of, say, 16 and 22 I wasted a good portion of every day finding things to hate about the way I looked (from body, to skin, to body and skin, to hair…) and THANK GOD I managed, I think really with the help of a really supportive ex of mine, around December 2003 to just WAKE UP and stop losing my life to wishing I didn’t have one. I think about SIX YEARS of sometimes grave misery and how pointless it was and it’s just really sad…there were times when I had to have a no mirrors policy, because that was the only way to let myself forget about how I looked.

To contrast that with my current relative stability (and I didn’t think I would blog about this, but it’s relevant here as a positive point, rather than a description of something negative), a week ago today Shakira and I had brunch with someone who I don’t think either of us will be seeing again, who showed up to meet us at the Four Seasons totally plastered (to the point that he was spilling wine, falling down stairs grabbing onto people, etc.) and swinging wildly in mood between feeling like it was ok to sexually harass me (I’m talking physically grabbing me in front of people in the restaurant and making EXTREMELY inappropriate comments about the ONE time a LONG time ago that he got so lucky…) and being extremely mean and diminishing. Imagine someone wiping his drunk hand down your face, telling you that you are sexy and beautiful, and then following that up with something like: “I don’t know why I think you’re so sexy when you’re actually sort of ugly.” That is NOT an exaggeration. It was a literal laundry list of my faults, and Shakira sat there in shock while I was basically dismantled. Now, to be clear (since I totally have a backbone and quite a lot of ‘tude), if it had been just the two of us, me and the Ass, I’d have thrown a drink on him and walked off after one nasty comment. The problem, though, being in a group three is that the perfect 10/10 model for social gracefulness and class kind of undergoes a paradigm shift – when you’re one and one, you should be boldly confident and storm off…when you’re there with a guest, you need to keep it under control, be placating but firm, and basically demonstrate that you are impervious to the other person’s nonsense for the duration of the encounter (rise above it) because what does your friend do when you storm out? Storm out, too? He made an ass of himself and, in his drunkness (and his insistence to pay even when I gave the waiter my card) cost him almost $400 at brunch, so too bad for him! Anyway, a little over two years ago my OWN obsessive self-condemnations would have done me in, let alone someone making a laundry list of all the worst things I tell myself, but that day, I handled myself PERFECTLY. I wasn’t even upset after the brunch (although I was a bit surprised someone could be so ugly…and I’m referring to him, of course). I admit that later in the evening my defenses wore down a bit and I maybe did some snickers binging for comfort, but I wasn’t about to walk in front of a bus, and I can still look in the mirror and at reality without having to blink or feel bad about it (I am what I am! The end!), so that is HUGE progress.

Anyway, that’s not the point. I’m not physically perfect; I’m great in a lot of ways. Less great in others. Sometimes I’m confident. Sometimes I’m less so. Usually, though, I’m as balanced as I should be and that’s FINE at almost-24.

Back to the story : ) So I’m walking to econ class, and I see him in the distance. Trying to avoid a self-hate trigger (but I’m sure staring madly from afar), I tried to dash up the stairs in front of me so I could turn the corner to class before him and have him out of my sight-line (and also in 2nd place in some kind of neurotic car race to class I’d subconsciously constructed between us…that’s healthy: “You’re hot and oblivious to my jealously, but I’m the winner because I can walk faster!”). Unfortunately, I wasn’t paying attention to my feet, and SOMEHOW my impeccable balance abandoned me and I fell into such a heap on the stairs (which is weird because it’s only like 4 stairs!) that I remember three people rushing over to me to see if I was ok. My leg was bleeding THOUGH my pants and this funny (and very typical, if you know Columbia’s Registrar’s office) sort of big black woman just said to her friend, amazed that I was still ambulatory: “If that had been me, I’d have stayed down.” I was DETERMINED to go to econ that day. I remember that I’d spilled something on myself at lunch and it was the perfect reason to ditch class (I can’t go LIKE THIS!) but I’d told myself that no matter what I was going…well I guess obviously after my fall I didn’t go.

For the second awful moment related to him, he and his friend (who, oddly enough, is one of the characters in my Arabic book! HOW WEIRD IS THAT!? -- they did a new DVD edition last year with new actors and HE is one of them!) were sitting outside the steps to the International Affairs building where we had econ class, and being "elevator peeps" (a phrase coined by another friend to refer to the people we've seen in the elevators in the dorms hundreds of times and seem to shadow but who we don't know) when I walked past him and his friend, anticipating in my head some kind of humiliating and jerkish comment (even though he had NEVER interacted with me before, nor had I ever seen him insult anyone...this was just my insecurity demonizing him and inflicting senseless dread upon myself), and he said: "Going into class already?" What I would later find out was kind of an insecurity -> eagerness on his part I interpreted to mean "You ugly nerd are you going into class 20 minutes EARLY? HOW LAME!" and so I looked at him and said, in a snotty voice that did not at all reply in turn to his rather civil tone: "Yeah. I am. If that's alright with YOU." Sort of taken aback, he just said: "Um. Yeah." (Poor thing, he must have been totally confused by my attitude!). I then proceeded to give him the DOUBLE bird (the finger with both hands) and said "THANKS!"

Luckily for me, he didn’t see my fall on the steps, and he didn’t really remember that I was the guy who was such a bitch to him outside class, when, two years later, we had accounting and finance together and, for whatever reason (read: His gaydar subconsciously beeping when he was around me, even though I didn’t even know I was gay, and him doing, and it is subconscious – poor guys – the “I am uncertain of my sexuality and don’t know it yet, so I’m oddly drawn to someone gay, even if he doesn’t know it yet, because I internally crave exit from the closet I don’t yet know I’m in and might never be able to leave” that I now have seen SO MANY TIMES…especially in Cairo!) he always wanted to sit next to me. He decided that our distant French ancestry, and the fact that the region his family name is from and my family name is from are next to each other in Central-South France that we were “brothers” and we became decent friends. It was an awkward dynamic, in that I was always confused and skeptical of his being friends with me, self-defensively condescending (although less and less so as time went on), jealous, and not wanting to grudgingly admit that we were total opposites but could be really good friends. I remember filing daily reports with friends who I expected to be equally stunned at the odd phenomenon: “And today, he actually TOUCHED MY CHEST and said that I had impressive pecs! I mean WHAT IS THAT? He’s gay, right?” Someone should have told me *I* was lol. In the end, he called me a few times while I was working at my law firm and he was working at a real estate firm, but we were bother really busy and I ended up not calling him back. Still hope he’s well, though, and wouldn’t mind catching up with him sometime (although I do hope, if he is gay, that he doesn’t struggle with the closet his whole life, as I suspect he may).

He’s #1. #2 and #3 insecurity people from college were an inter-related pair, because they comprised what I’ll call the “gorgeous European haute-bourgeoisie library-dwellers who are all econ majors and smoke outside the library while talking on their cell phones and planning trips to each others country villas and Ibiza.” Ok so anyway, there was a GORGEOUS (in the “sometimes gorgeous model and sometimes sort of brutish” way) Italian guy and his differently-but-equally gorgeous “roommate” (I now look back with skepticism), a French guy who, for all the Italian was the kind of six-foot beefy, was more of a slight super-defined but facially PERFECT (like picture the head of one of the Roman senators in the Met Museum) French guy. The Italian lived on my floor Freshman year, and I’m trying to remember why, exactly, I’d ever had discussions with the French guy. It’s really odd that I can’t remember in what context we’d spoken… my girlfriend’s best friend had slept with him…and of course I was made uncomfortable by rumors of his four hour marathon “only stop to get a drink of water and keep going” abilities [Ewww! Yuck!]…and I knew another girl who used to go and flirt with BOTH of them and come back to tell me about hanging out with them in their dorm room with them both only wearing boxer-briefs!...but why I ever spoke to the French guy and in what context really escapes me. Anyway, I do remember exactly HOW he spoke, and I do remember being invited, through a mutual friend (WHO? This memory gap is so weird!) to go clubbing with him, and I also remember that he was doing XTC…and I didn’t go…I also remember that what I hated MORE than the fact that he got to be French, and have really tan and freckless skin and REALLY blue eyes, was that he was one of those people with such defined triceps that they ALWAYS looked flexed (mine are now quite nice, for the record ;p).

Well anyway, the whole point of this blog entry WAS going to be that I googled French guy, just to see what he was up to, and I found something that TOTALLY made me laugh. I mean, let’s be clear: when we really grow up and gain confidence in ourselves, we don’t need to look down on others to get over our demons. If I’d googled him and he’d become a French youth ambassador or Olympic biathlete or something (speaking of: my Ricco didn’t win today but we are wishing him luck for later in the Games!), then I’d probably think “Wow, good for him!” but this did make me laugh…a lot…because it’s EXACTLY how I remember him. I guess what you should take from this blog entry is that you now know a LOT more about my “down” times in my late teens/early 20s, and you also will get to read a hilarious idiotic comment (although I make no profession of an ability to judge his OVERAL intelligence) by someone who (used to be) gorgeous and who I (used to be) really jealous of. Follow this link, and look for the quote by someone from France (do a cntrl+F search for “France”) and look for the guy with the initials J.F. (don’t want to say his name, because it feels kinda mean).

VC

Kwan's Health Uncertain

Blog readers, we need to send our collective strength to Michelle Kwan, who might have to drop out of the Olympics (NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) and is, I hate to break it to you, suffering from "YET LAG."

VC

PS: It occured to me that yahoo might fix the typo really soon, so just in case you think I can't spell (well actually, I can't, but that's not the point) yahoo news described Michelle Kwan as having "yet lag."

Strange Dream

I just remembered a dream I had last night. Very odd.

I was going to Shakira's flat, and while it's true that her flat is in the area that is next to AUC but quickly becomes VERY lower middle class housing within a few blocks, in my dream it was like it turned into an informal housing slum. I remember that the streets were sort of like cobblestone and totally dark and I was almost slipping on the pavement as I walked, thinking about how pitch black it was and how surprising it was that I'd never noticed how close she lived to the brick boxes with no water or electricity that you see so much of on Cairo's margins. I then realized that I'd somehow missed the turnoff to her house and had walked past it into this area, and when I turned around I also realized that I'd been walking in and out of the gutter (which was just a shallow depression along the side of the street -- and not how Cairo is in real life). It wasn't traumatizing or anything, but I did have mounting anxiety about how dark and late it was and how unfamiliar I was with the area.

I went upstairs to her flat and here is where the dream really changes. I visited with someone in real life who does not exist, an African-American guy whose relationship to Shakira I don't really recall. They sat me down at a table (almost like a botth at a diner) and introduced me to someone who I recognized (after a few minutes) as American rapper Dr. Dre (I think that was him). We were all playing it cool and not saying anything about Dre, until for some reason we decided to go to another location and the guy who sat me down and introduced me to Dre sort of asked: "Do you know who he is?" and we laughed about how I'd recognized him but was not making a big deal out of the situation or asking questions, and he and Dre said they appreciated that. It wasn't clear to me if they were lovers or something, but I remember that we were all just sort of happy and easy-going and it was like they were relieved to find another friend (like Shakira) who could be really down to earth and know the secret. It was funny, too, because they told me that when Dre first met up with this guy, they would pretend, when in public in the US, that it was this other guy who was famous (just to distract people) and Dre was his personal assistant, and so he would like shout orders at Dre in public, like: "And I told you I wanted that NOW!" so that people would never think to really look who Dre -- a servant, basically, in the lie -- was, but then he'd have to run up to Dre and whisper: "Wait, what is it that I want?" and Dre would give him direction about how to manage the public and this fake celebrity lifestyle.

A friend of mine from college who, in real life, I'm not in touch with was also there, and we decided to go back to my flat that I was sharing with her. I remember there being some scary moments leaving Shakira's flat in the elevator (which IS true to real life) and that it started rocketing from the top floor to the ground level without stoping and I actually jumped out into the shaft (it's one of these open-shaft elevators, like the old-style wooden ones, so you aren't really trapped at the bottom -- you just open the door to the metal cage and get out), and counted my blessings that I'd escaped that elevator, again (this was totally triggered by my odd experience with it yesterday...I swear to God one day that thing is going to kill someone).

It gets weirder. When I left the flat I was aware that they were watching from the balcony and sort of, like, smiling and commenting about their new friend, and I started doing this thing, which I can only describe as half flying half walking, running (it's like skipping or bounding, but I get more height and distance and can REALLY jump like 20 or 30 meters at a time), and when I realized I was doing it in the dream, to get back to my flat, there was such a familiarity in the movement (like I could control it well and it was just a very familiar way of moving) that I realized that it's something I've done in OTHER dreams! It was also weird because I passed through all kinds of terrain getting back to my flat, including snow.

At some point when I was bounding along back home, Shakira and this college friend appeared in seperate cars and told me that we should drive back and try to pick up cute guys in THEIR cars on the way back. I said ok (!), and got in the car with Shakira, while I remember this college friend sped off in her piece of junk can and Shakira and I sort of laughed and rolled our eyes. There were NO hot people ANYWHERE, and then as soon as I said that comment (and of course in the dream I said it loud enouh or telepathically enough that my college friend could participate in the discussion even though she was in a seperate car off in the distance), this car with two REALLY hot guys appeared, we made contact, and basically did the "follow us" thing and they were all coming back to our flat to hang out.

The dream ended when I got back to the flat and I saw that Shakira and the college friend had left a huge mess with old pizza boxes and things lying around (I remember that the mess wasn't mine, because I'd just cleaned in the morning for the maid to come), and I was like scrambling along with them to try to make the place look presentable while one of the guys was using the bathroom.

That's all I remember!!

Weird, huh?

VC

Quranic Gardens

No Comment.

Hingis: Yay, Gaydar: Nay

Amazing news! Hingis DESTROYED Maria Sharapova in Japan this morning in the semis of the Toray Pan Pacific Open (or something like that). You can read this article for more info, but basically she crushed one of the most dominating players on tour, and it's like this child prodigy is making an equally prodigious return to tennis. Talk about a learning curve! -- Every week it's like she's 20 times better than the last week. She surprising even me (and I'm like her biggest fan other than her mom).

I was a little concerned that Sharapova might pummel her (she's one strong girl), and I was worried that it might be doubly humiliating for Martina because of a comment she made when she announced her return like 4 weeks ago about how she wanted to play Maria more than any other player on tour because she didn't see what all the hype was about (she said something like: "Watching on TV I can't see what's so special about her game, so I want to play her and find out"). Martina has never been one to shy away from controversy, so everyone who hates her (which is a LOT of people) jumped on the chance to say she'd put her foot in her mouth, but I think she was just being frank: Sharapova doesn't have great volleys, forward-backward movement, or variety of shot, and she has basically no strategy other than "hit it really hard to wherever my opponent isn't standing." Anyway, Hingis killed her!! :) [you can check out this article for a cute photo of Hingis, a reference to her controversial Sharapova comments, and a funny description of her win over Sharapova as a physical and mental "beat-down" lol]

In totally unrelated news, I've deleted my gaydar profile. There are a lot of reasons, but I gues the most important one is functional: I am not interested in sex; I don't want a relationship with anyone but Pookie; and I already have too many friends (although not in Cairo) to properly stay in contact with right now, so "networking" is not really a reason to be online. I've found myself checking the site less and less frequently, and totally disinterested in the people who contact me, so the site has no purpose for me at this point. I think if I were to say "I'm so proud of myself" or "I feel like this is a new phase" or something then it would mean that I was investing a lot in the site in terms of what I was hoping to get out of it that I wasn't...this is hardly a watershed moment...but I did feel like it was worth blogging about just in this little paragraph, because I think that it does kind if point towards my imminent return to NYC (that for a while seemed impossibly far away), and my final decision that there is really nothing worth me exploring in Egypt as far as any kind of gay community is concerned (and "meeting people through friends" is not really an alternative entry point to online networking as it would be in other places)...which is fine :)

Still chunking on and plugging away!

VC

PS: (just to be controversial) --> Any thoughts on burning of embassies as a form of free speech?

My New Lover

Provocative blog title but I totally do not have a lover (especially not a NEW one...ewww).

I do want to say, though, that the only good thing about this whole defamation of the Prophet cartoon scandal THING (since it's clear that no productive dialogue is going to come about, or even articulate monologues, for that matter) are CONSTANT images of the Danish Prime Minister super hottie Anders Fogh Rasmussen in the media.

Why no one is talking about his hotness in their news reports is beyond me! He's definitely the hottest state head at the moment by far.

I'm thinking that if Pookie and I don't have a puppy by the year 2010 (HEY! I'm giving him FOUR YEARS to work it out!) then I'm buying a one-way ticket to Copenhagen. I can tell Foggy is a dog lover ;)

VC

Edit: I forgot to say (related to the topic of the cartoon scandal) that I think Jack Straw has NO spine. He's worse than Blair. I cannot stand the kind of egg-shell walking he engages in and think that his speech about how inapprioriate the reprints were and how the UK tastefully decided not to do that is ridiculous. I can't stand the US government for its irrationality and lack of diplomacy, but I can't stand the UK even more because it's BOTH the scared puppet of the US and the spinless uber-diplomat. Basically, both countries really disappoint me in terms of their highest levels of government at the moment.

Iran Nuclear Row & More News

(that's what the BBC graphic calls it)

I really do not know enough about the laws/treaties involved to make a judgment on this, but I have to say that the announcement that the foreign ministers of all the permanent members of the Security Council (including China and Russia) agreeing that the IAEA should refer Iran to the Security Council seems kind of circular. I mean -- if all the foreign ministers (who are themselves the ones who sit on the Security Council for the nations they represent) have already agreed that Iran should be referred to the Security Council then *I wonder what will happen* once Iran is referred.

When they sat down for the press conference Rice was BEEMING (they had been negotiating all day and late into the night, according to the BBC, but she sat down at that table grinning from ear to ear).

What I think happened is that the US and maybe the EU-3 told China/Russia that they would provide super high compensation for any processing work they could convince Iran to outsource (so it wouldn’t be, like, on a voluntary basis that Russia would be transporting and processing these materials), and once the price they named was met, they gave in.

I think US policy can be described by what I call the “Being Poor for Peace” plan. With reconstruction funds ending this year in Iraq, sanctions being placed on Iran, and aid being cut to Palestinians, it looks like from the Sinai to the Caspian Sea, we’re looking to have a whole lotta poor.

Finally – the most unlikely use of technology I’ve ever seen (I will try to find photos): Robotic camel jockeys. Small robots that can be used to “ride” camels in races across the Gulf (Sheikhs have traditionally raced camels against each other in widely-attended events not dissimilar to horseraces in Europe and the US) and are quickly replacing the small children (many of them boys as young as 3, according to the BBC) trafficked from South Asia and Africa to ride the camels. Imagine some Swiss engineer (the robots were designed in Switzerland -- another reason to love that country!) tinkering with a robot helping to end a form of child trafficking. Very cool.











VC

Emergency Announcement

I have to take another look at Revelations to see if this is a portend of the second coming or the apocalypse, but – and you might want to be sitting down when you read this – I have just cooked.

Because I have not yet posted the account (with photos) of my failed attempt, recently, to cook lentils, you probably can’t completely understand my bravery, getting back up on the culinary horse so soon after such a hard fall, but I am proud to say that I have just cooked and eaten my first meal at home since…well…the last time I prepared something in California, which would have been a really, REALLY long time ago (and about equivalent to the level of complexity of microwaving popcorn).

After a diet, today, that consisted of two Snickers Crunch bars, a canister of Doritos, and a row of full-fat Chips Ahoy cookies and milk (the lowfat ones just taste stale), even my body had reaches its junk food limitations, and was telling me that it needed some veggies. When I was so sick a few days ago and couldn’t eat, I did have one noticeable craving, and that was for corn, so today when I was stocking up on imported junk food, I also bought corn, mixed vegetables, beans, and basmati rice (is there any other kind, really?).

The key to the corn (shown in the photo -- no idea why my hand looks like it's rotting) is that it was already canned and in liquid and therefore did not require cleaning or water boiling (sadly, it was the water boiling step that I think led to the terrible disaster with the lentils). I had to seek SOME preparation advice from a friend in Amsterdam in the middle of a heated debate over whether or not Lara Fabian has an audibly-Belgian accent when she sings in French, and whether or not Barbara Streisand is nasal...I wasn't sure if I should use my saucepan or my pot (which I still regard skeptically after it failed to properly cook the lentils) and was instructed to give it another go with the pot.

I just plugged the electric burner plate in, within a minute it was hot, put the pot on the plate, dumped out the corn, and within literally 2 or 3 seconds it was already making scorching sounds (which to the amateur chef means: “Done!”). Both my sauce pan and my pot are way too big for the little mini serving of corn, and there wasn’t enough liquid in the can to even cover the bottom of the pot, so it was clear that the corn might start frying (and, now really understanding the full lifecycle of a corn kernel, I was a bit worried that the corn, although not exactly in kernel formation, might undergo some kind of popping process and I’d end up with burning-hot and totally soaked mutant sweet corn jiffy pop). I took the pot off the burner, got a spoon, and put it back on the burner stirring the tiny bit of liquid in the pot around with the corn for about another 3 or 4 seconds, removed the pot from the burner, unplugged my little “kitchen,” and was done! I even served the corn on the plate I’d gotten out to eat my pizza on last night (but which saw very little use – it’s straight from box to mouth for this Chunk!).

All the dishes have been rinsed, the corn was actually quite good, and the whole thing (including the eating and cleaning part) took about 5 minutes. Amazing. I’m a total corn convert.

Tomorrow I will make the mixed veggies, and then they day after I’ll try beans with rice (the beans are also already canned, so they will be easy, but the rice will mean a second go at boiling water, so wish me well!).

Random sidenote: How good does yellow sweet corn look on a fake black marble table!?

Oh – this is not related, but while I was eating, I was watching BBC Hardtalk with senior British politician Shirley Williams, of the Liberal Democrats (this is the minority party that is NEITHER Blair’s Labour Party, nor the resurgent conservative Tories). I found her to be *extremely* impressive, and regret that we don’t have politicians in the US who are so articulate AND straightforward. She has my vote!

VC

A Moment of Silence

...no...not because I've gotten more bad news from law schools. This is something MUCH more tragic.

This is the senseless burning of a Prada store.*

Of all the Prada boutiques Manhattan -- and there are 5 (and Dr. Juicy and I have been to all of them...together...in one single day...IN THE RAIN) -- this one in SoHo was definitely the most beautiful. Architecturally it was really stunning, and I think it's a tragedy that if something had to burn in SoHo, it was this Prada store, rather than all the atrocious art that is sold on the sidewalk (TOTALLY blocking the entrance to Emporio Armani) on the weekends.

If anyone reading my blog is in the NYC Metro area, please pass by Park Slope for me. I fear that Juicy may have thrown herself out the window of the only building in Brooklyn tall enough to have an elevator.

VC

*Obviously if anyone had been seriously injured, I'd have not thought it appropriate to talk about the "tragedy" of Prada burning. I also understand that a lot of people lost a lot of precious things in the fire, and that is very sad. You'll note in the article, though, that 200 firefighters can't control the flames, which makes me think that it's because of the uncontrollable hotness of the clothes in the Prada store. I also think that the fact that it's been burning for so long might make this, in the fashion world, comparable to the story of the burning candle in the Temple of David -- maybe one day we'll have songs and light candles once a year in memory of Pradannukah, the week that they poly-blends just would not stop burning.

PS: I totally wrote this post a long time ago but just noticed that I forgot to move it from Word to the blog. Shoutout to Juicy for the article!!

More Bitching

I had a realization, earlier today, about relationships that I think is worth sharing, but first: More of the Cairo gay life!

Just got a text message from the Swedish (and gorgeous, although repeatedly turned-down by yours truly) Assistant Manager of F&B at the Hyatt: “I am horny. Any recommendations?”

My reply: “The other hand?”

: )

It’s been a week of gay scene disappointment overload. In the same way that a lot of people find traveling through conditions of extreme poverty and squalor depressing, I find gay life here really unmanageable.

It’s also odd how much time I devote to thinking about how miserable gay life here is, since in New York my sexuality and the society that that aspect of my identity fit into was such an unimportant part of my existence. I think about dinners with Pookie in which there might be a table full of gay friends and amongst whom it was not even known, even after years of friendship, who was top or bottom or both or doing what with whom – not because sex was demonized or shameful to talk about, but because for reasons that I think are obvious, fascinations with gay sex and gay life are pretty much exhausted amongst a group of 40+ year-old urban gay men.

I could hypothesize about why that is not the case in Cairo, but I don’t think the obvious explanation (that men here don’t get to freely experience their sexuality and so there is a constant fascination with what *might* be) really holds. Not with the people I know. Even men with international degrees, full passports, and a blackbook that rivals that of any guy in Chelsea, still somehow seem contented in Cairo to spend their time endlessly gossiping and hunting for the next story or lay that will occupy their time and feed their supposedly “discrete” network.

That men here are satisfied (or even if they are dissatisfied: reluctant to change) with what most people get over in their late teens and early twenties is only part of what bothers me about gay life, here. The other major annoyance with gay life in Cairo relates to what I think of as the “sexual utility” principles according to which all men are judged. It’s related to class, discretion, aesthetic preference, and I’m sure a lot of other things, but in general in Cairo men will not befriend each other unless they are theoretically capable of (or have, at one time or another) had sex. Of course, some men are not sexually compatible even if they find each other mutually attractive, due to an incompatibility of roles in the boudoir, but even amongst friends for whom sex would be impossible for that reason, they normally still need to find each other at least mutually attractive (if unfortunately unsuited for each other role-wise).

I find this really odd, and it took me a few *months* to put my finger on the phenomenon, because it’s so completely divergent from the standards according to which I normally select my friends. When I am at dinner (always dinner with Pookie seems to be the moment of comparison for this blog, lol) with Pookie and four of his friends are at the table, even if some of them are exes, you can see a CLEAR variety of types, and there are not really questions being asked, looks exchange, or any subdialogue AT ALL of how each person could be or is sexually useful to the other people, there. In New York, you might have a “straight acting” muscular Chelsea who has a “screaming queen” of a best friend who is not AT ALL his type physically, but who he adores as a person. In Cairo that couldn’t happen. Sure, you have friends who will say “no he’s my friend…not my type at all…” but in general that’s more about background stuff than actual physically taste. If you told someone here that Italian models hang out with Filipino drag queens, leather daddies, and surfer boys, and didn’t think anything about the fact that their friends, for them, might be totally unf*ckable, I think a lot of people here would find it shocking. If you aren’t potentially interested in someone here, at least from afar, then you won’t even speak to him, let along befriend him (and be seen with him in public). That’s the “sexual utility” principle that I find so disturbing about Cairo. I cannot wait to be back at a dinner table with Pookie and his friends in which there is as little sexual tension (or judgment) in the air amongst them as there would be between a gay man and a woman.

Getting back to my life, though, I said it’s been a week of disappointment overload, and Swedish guy is the least of that (I had his number before he even had a chance to embarrass himself, so there were not real expectations to be disappointed – he still annoys me, though). Another part of it has been Leopold. I had started to actually think of him as a friend after we managed to have an entire lunch, last week, in which, despite speaking tirelessly about the Egyptian caste system, he did not revert to his infinitely-tedious speculations about who is hot and what they are doing and with whom they are doing it. He passed-on some rather interesting stories about his family during Nasser’s time and their relationship to the Saudi royal family, and it was a really enjoyable afternoon.

A few days ago, however, Leopold called me to tell me he was having coffee with a friend (who tells people he his Saudi, but who Leopold of course follows behind his back with the qualification: “Palestinian born in Saudi Arabia”), who I was introduced to socially in the past. Leopold wanted to know if I wanted him to hook us up. I told him no, that I didn’t need a hookup, and that there was zero chemistry when I met this guy in person, before, even if physically he wasn’t bad. Leopold pressed the issue and it ended with me saying “whatever, I don’t care” and leaving it up to his discretion (and this was just a day or two after I turned down another guy he tried to pass-on to me without request/solicitation).

Yesterday, while in the middle of my work marathon, Leopold calls and tells me that he’s with the Palestinian-Saudi again, and wants to know if I can give him the phone number of the American hussie who I blogged about having dinner with me, Leopold, and Lord of the Dance for Coptic Christmas (the one who was with us the night that we fought with Amr Bin Laden and his guards).

I told Leopold that I’d give it to him, but that I thought it was really tacky that he was calling me, in this guy’s presence, when he’d been trying to hook us up just a few days before, and was now asking for another guy’s number. He protested that it wasn’t tacky, and that I wasn’t Palestinian-Saudi’s type. I told him that it was irrelevant, since I told him I wasn’t interested in the first place, but that for the record the hussie and I are physically *exactly* the same type (which Swedish guy confirmed when I turned him down the last time, but passed-on the hussie as “same type as me but like a cuter version” – which for the record Swedish guy AND LoTD both said I was cuter…not that it matters!). Leopold tried to say something weird about how hussie has darker hair, and when I said that’s ridiculous (because his hair is light brown), Leopold was like: “Well Palestinian-Saudi likes bitchy guys and you aren’t a bitch. You’re a proper guy.” (for the record: “bitch” and “bitchy” means, in Cairo terms, not feminine or mean, or any of the things one would expect it to mean in the US, but means more like “trashy” or “low-class slutty”)

I found the whole conversation frustrating – particularly because it so neatly embodied exactly what I find impossibly disappointing about gay life here: the middle of a “work” day and the only few 40yo gay men in this city with any education who aren’t already married are sitting around passing around numbers and scheming for their next kill, and feeling totally fulfilled and entertained by that.

I sent him the following text message: “Do not EVER network me in your circle of bitches again. It’s pathetic that a 40yo with any class or intelligence spends this much time on these things. I don’t want X or Y or any of your other contacts and stop calling if all you have to talk about is bitchy bullsh*t. Hussie’s number: ____.”

Refer to my blogging about making enemies, below. Needless to say a day has gone buy and he hasn’t called.

The examples of my being frustrated with this THEME of social annoyance would take me hours to describe. Swedish guy and Leopold are but two pictures of my current frustration that decorate the awful museum of Cairo gay life (I’d make a joke about entrance to the museum being “couples only” but probably only Desi would get it).

There has been another frustration that I’ve been meaning to blog about, and I’ve kept a running commentary on the situation in a Word diary, but I’ve not updated in a few days, mostly because I’m too lazy to fish out all the old text messages for you to supplement the diary and give you an idea of the ridiculousness of it all. Let’s just say as a preview that it involves an Italian diplomat, a piano concert, and diarrhea on the Mediterranean.

In many ways, though, be it the lashing I gave to Leopold, my refusal to even minimally indulge Swedish guy, or my iron-willed resistance to the Italian, this week has been about the wiping-clean of my social slate. It’s odd that my angst is, in so many ways, a romantic angst, and yet with none of these people who are causing my angst did I actually have anything romantic. Just the environment in which romance WOULD occur, but is so quickly snuffed-out, distresses me…so it’s not that my romantic life is full of drama, but rather that the setting in which my non-existent romantic life SHOULD occur is itself so full of drama.

Ok, now I need to write about what I decided about relationships, today…stay tuned!

While you wait: Check out these links about PUGGLES!

VC

Thinking Genius Look

Well the BBC special on Billie Holiday was not as good as the one on Callas, but there was one really eerie thing that, unless you have watched “The Making of Miss Saigon” a million times with me like Wong has (who had her birthday yesterday! HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!), and she will unfortunately probably never see the BBC special, you won’t be able to understand, but Billie Holiday in her later years and Lea Salonga (even at 16) bear such similarity it was truly uncanny (one will note that it’s perhaps odd that an aged black woman could bear such a resemblance to a teenager from the Philippines).

It wasn’t just her eyes, but her look, her forehead, just EVERYTHING in some shots was so Lea. Very spooky. There is a part of the BBC special that has Holiday’s 1957 “Sound of Jazz” TV performance, where she sings the one and only blues song she ever sang (which she wrote, herself – something about how her man was bad to her), and her Nester Young, a dying saxophone player, was there, too. The looks that she has when she is singing in that part are SO much like Lea sitting at the piano in her first audition in Manila that I can’t believe it – its this thinking look (I described it once to Curie, and I don’t know if she remembers…there is a look that I call the “thinking genius” look and it’s actually the weird way in which someone like Lea can look like Martina Hingis, or Billy Holiday…it’s so hard to describe!). I really wish I could find side-by-sides to prove this! (I should say that USUALLY they look nothing alike, but just in these moments they really look the same)

Ah well. Better go to the gym. It’s so cold, still!

VC

PS: Alfred Brendel (pianist) special on, now. I really want to stay and watch. He said the cutest thing – he was like: “I wasn’t a child prodigy. I’m not, to my knowledge, a genius. I’m not from Eastern Europe. My parents were not musicians. I have a decent memory, but it’s not exceptional, and I am not a very good sight-reader. I have no idea how I made it.” *big grin* He seems VERY good-natured! His hands are SO still. God, Pookie was an ANGEL for taking me to so many concerts (probably because my après-box analysis was so on point ;p). Oh he just said another cute thing (reading from his diary…he’s also a poet and painted in his youth – they looked great to me, but he thinks they’re bad): “If I had a twin…a real-life double, my doppelganger could be used to save time by cooking and cleaning, and practicing…and in return he could be recognized in public, receive prizes, honours, and distinctions, charm ladies, smile coyly, and exude optimism…of course, he’d have to be kept happy, otherwise he might hide my socks, overdraw my account, or, worse yet, attempt to play the piano, maybe a Beethoven sonata, even…in the end he could run me out of business, completely!”

Meet Mr. Masry: Why I Have No Friends

I realize this will look like serial-blogging, because they are all going up at once, but I’ve been typing these in a Word document since my blogsite was not available, earlier (so these aren’t like PSs to each other).

I am really quite alone in Cairo. Assigning blame for that is tricky, since I’d say that it would be easy for me to be surrounded by smiling people all the time and have a different party or event or something to go to every night if I chose, so one could say it’s my fault for being alone, but I really feel that there was no other choice.

It’s weird to think that there are cities all over the world where there are people I feel comfortable calling any moment of the day or night if I am in severe distress (however unlikely it would be for me to actually do that), but the city where I live is unfortunately not one of those places.

There are people on the fringe, who with trust and cultivation and shared experience could go either way, but I’d say Shakira (who is not back in Cairo after vacation) is really the only person who I feel I can count on, here, and in a city of like 20 million people, that’s not a very high percentage!

Some of this is very clearly my own doing. In Cairo I have not just failed to make friends; I’ve made enemies. I used to always wonder, even as recently as my last year in New York, when I’d watch a movie or something with a criminal investigation and the question would be asked: “Well did he have any enemies?” how someone would ever answer “yes” to that. Sure, there were people who maybe didn’t think I was super fun, or interesting, or even respectable, but I never really had people who really thought I was a nasty person. Now I think there are a non-insignificant number of people who do think that. What I understand, though, and I don’t think I’m being too easy on myself, here, is that *before*, I was never in an environment where I had to deal with people who were, given my own personal values and social norms, such total a**holes, and being one who speaks his mind and doesn’t smile and roll with the punches (unless it’s a professional setting, and no I’m not willing to treat life like a job in which I’m constantly seeking good reviews and a promotion), I have told people exactly how I feel. A normal scenario would go something like this:

Chunk meets Mr. Masry (not to be confused with Slim Masry of former postings, who has never exhibited the behavioural pattern I’m criticizing, here). Chunk and Masry engage in a brief but not wholly unsuccessful exploration of amicable possibilities (ranging from having coffee, to seeing a movie, to something more romantic/datelike). Masry is interested, present, and mature/engaging to some minimally-passable degree until the point where he realizes that Chunk is either not going to be the ideal casual sex partner or is not going to be the ideal rush-into love (that means saying “love” but not doing anything about it since everyone is scared and closeted) – I’ve found meeting a Mr. Masry is like flipping a coin, and you’re equally likely to get someone for whom anything other than casual sex is as desirable as castration, as you are to find someone who will tell you he’s in love with you after a single dinner (and don’t think that you being clear about your OWN Chunky goals and limitations and offerings has any significant effect on what he will do/want from you). Once Masry is frustrated in his goal of getting EITHER a f*ckbuddy or a “habibi,” he will PRETEND (the movies are awful but the real-life population knows how to act) like he’s ok with the terms of your friendship (being straightforward or articulating one’s emotions in a straightforward manner would be far too sensible and ethical), only to persistently flake out, string you along, equivocate, confuse you and himself and then you again, and never, for one moment, engage in a healthy moment of self-criticism or productive reflection. At that point, when I see that we are at the “waste of my time and insult to the emotional energy I’ve put into this friendship” stage, I will normally confront Mr. Masry about his a**hole-ishnss, which *very interestingly* results in automatic and rote apologies and NEVER results in a logical explanation of one’s behaviour.

THIS IS WHAT KILLS ME: not UNDERSTANDING how and why things are the way they are (and I mean in general, not just socially…it’s like I cannot have MY logical rules satisfied, here, and I find it extremely mentally stressful).

I don’t *care* if someone apologizes to me or not. I don’t even understand what forgiveness means, because I’m not usually harbouring a grudge, but rather confusion. Forgiveness for me means understanding, and that I never seem to attain.

If you say to someone, for example: “Well why did you tell me that I should not make plans tonight because you wanted to go out, but then when I waited all evening for you to tell me where to meet you, you never called or replied to my text messages asking where you were or if we were still getting together?” Then you are really likely to get back an: “I’m so sorry. I’m really sorry. Please forgive me.”

That doesn’t interest me.

What I want is: “I was really tired and felt reclusive and didn’t want to go out.” OR “You are nice so I didn’t know how to break it to you that I’ve decided I’d rather hang out with my other friends more,” OR “I met a REALLY hot guy on the way to meet you and forgot to call you to cancel,” or just ANYTHING that remotely resembles an explanation.

If I then say (and one should NEVER use *diction* that can come off as insulting, even if you mean it as a dispassionate statement of fact): “Well it was rude for you to not call or text so I could make other plans. I didn’t even call you to make plans in the first place, but when you called me to go out, I said ok,” then the reply will (oddly, in my opinion, and it’s not a language barrier thing) be: “Thanks. Thanks man. Now I’m RUDE? You’re rude to say I’m rude.”

?? Huh? Not calling someone when you say you will is rude. 1000 meters is a kilometer. I am chunky. These are statements of fact that are not made as insults or compliments or anything in between.

Saying that, though, means that whatever level of discussiveness you had with Mr. Masry (which was already pitifully low) will instantly vanish, and an enemy will be made.

“I thought you were a nice guy.”
“I am a nice guy, but that was rude of you. That’s all I’m saying. I still think YOU are a nice guy, too, but last night you were rude.”
“So you just want to keep calling me names!”
“I’m not calling you names! You’re crazy – this is just me telling you the truth. You said you’d call. You didn’t. It’s not THAT big a deal, but it was rude.”
“Ok I’m rude and crazy. Thanks. Thanks.”

You can see it’s a downward spiral. Normally it ends with me TRYING to give a polite “sorry for the misunderstanding but I think it’s best that we end this discussion” goodbye, but it’s definitely how enemies are made, here. There are people who think that I am rude and mean, and I really can’t do anything about that (or rather: I don’t care to).

I think, then, about my “real” life in New York, and the AMAZING friends I have outside New York as well, the exes I’m still friends with, the people who KNOW that I *never* hit below the belt, sling insults, or engage in unproductive name-calling, and who KNOW that I’m a great friend and person, and I think: “How is this my life?”

That’s kind of where I am, today. I’m very frank and very undiplomatic (and why shouldn’t I be?), but I’m never unfair or abusive in the way I deal with people (except one or two times in my WHOLE life that were themselves just very unhealthy and much deeper than the interactions I’m describing, here), and it is NOT, when you’re not privileged enough to be dealing with a set of really cosmopolitan individuals who, one might say, tend to speak in emotional/socioeconomic/political urban unison (the only people I’d really been dealing with, before), a way to “win friends and influence” people as the saying goes.

VC

VC Goes Straight

Followup on hateful blogging:

I am also no longer gay. I’ve decided that whatever it means to be gay, here, and more and more I’m thinking “gay” is very much an aspect of one’s identity that is local, I’m not it. I’ll refrain from further hateful blogging by going on and on about whatever it is that I think gay is here, but suffice it to say that I am not it. I can still think of two or three self-identifying gays in Cairo who I think are decent people, but on the whole, at various ages, levels of wealth, looks, and geographical distribution, gay men here are pretty awful to deal with (in and out of bed). This is only to a degree about what families, Islam, Christianity, and Mubarak make people do, and is to a much larger degree about behavioural choices that don’t sit well with me (and I recognize that as a non-normative and personal statement that is free of good/bad judgment on some absolute global scale), and this is not the right place for me to be gay (or for me to be living, but that’s not something I can chance by blog declaration, so we’ll let that one be for now).

VC

PS: I’ve had plenty of sleep, watched some great tennis, got out of the house, had some good and yummy food today, and did a HUGE amount (about 6 hours continuous without distraction) of work, so I’m not being pissy for any of the usual reasons (boredom, low blood sugar, isolation, stress about lack of productivity).

Ode of Hatred for Cairo

I hate it here SO much.

I hate services here.

I hate the traffic here, which incorporates my hatred of BOTH the way people drive AND the way the streets are organized.

I hate gay life here, which is only in a small part a hatred of the way the government and various religious and cultural elements treat gays, and is in a much larger part a simple hatred of what most of gay life here looks like (I know the two aren't separate, but I'm holding people responsible for being what they are).

I hate my university and I hate my flat.

Hate is a really strong word, I know, and I feel (unfortunately) quite strongly.

I could never imagine a place, over such a sustained period of time (1.5 years) could so consistently annoy me, piss me off, bug the sh*t out of me, frustrate me, make me want to cry, to leave, to shout, and to write mean things on a blog. It’s SHOCKING how much I really do hate it here.

VC

Red Things

Well we've reached Chinese New Year, and as I well learned in boarding school, that means time to clean your house and give children money in red envelopes! (I'll note that "child" is defined as anyone still in school, and grad students therefore count!)

This is the year of the dog, and I'm a dog! Woof. Woof. *tail wag, panting*

According to China Today: "The Dog will never let you down. Born under this sign you are honest, and faithful to those you love. You are plagued by constant worry, a sharp tongue, and a tendency to be a fault finder, however. You would make an excellent businessman, activist, teacher, or secret agent."

No comment. A little surprising, actually. (Note that I think they are right on with the Dog, but I looked at the other signs and am not sure that you guys would think of the other categories as similarly on point)

That's one red thing.

The other red thing was presented by Bono in Davos, today, and that is Product Red -- a plan designed "to eliminate HIV in Africa." Check out this scathing review of the plan (rather stupid, the critique, I mean -- check out the parallel-syntax contrast between "rock stars" and "people who want to help the developing world" lol).

Ah hell...I've just spent like 40 minutes looking for an AmEx press release to promote it to those of you who could actually qualify (read: not me), but I can't find anything official on the Amex site. DAMN IT ALL! ;p

See -- being sick I get to be moody and complain in capital letters.

XO

VC

Sick Widdo Chunk

Well after two days of really intense workouts, not a lot of food, and an odd sleep schedule, I just, in the past like 1.5 hours, have gotten totally sick. I am achey, have chills, feel nauseated (like very close to vomiting), and have the slightest of slight runny noses.

The point is not to complain, but just to say that I really miss having SOMEONE who can hug me. My mom would hug me and tuck me into my tv-watching bed and call me her "poor widdo guy," and although I was never really sick with Pookie (I was really healthy, then!), I remember once when he got REALLY sick, and I loved being there just to hold him when he slept. We had been at a really fantastic play with his sister and nieces who were visiting, and he knew he was getting sick, but by the end of the show he hit a WALL (the flu comes on fast like that) and I took him home and he literally passed out in a feverish-lump. Since I know that he's someone who doesn't really DO the whole lovey-dovey interdependent relationship THING, I was trying to be really aware of when he'd want me to scram, but in this kind of cute and helplesslly sick way, he had me stay for a little while, and I just hugged him on the fold-out bed (which will be unnecessary in his new Eastern Palace).

Yeah...I have friends, but I have NO ONE who I want to hug me in Cairo, and I really miss that!

This reminds me of a bird flu joke I heard today (from the rather mindless assistant manager of food and beverage at the Hyatt who thinks he's god's gift to gay men -- he actually told me he didn't GET the joke at first!): "Concerned about the threat of an impending avian flu epidemic, US President George W. Bush ordered immediate air strikes on the Canary Islands."

VC

Held at Harvard

Well you guys are always asking me for updates, and here it is: Got my "Hold" letter from Harvard.

They basically say: "We are waiting to make a decision on your file until we have had a chance to compare you to a greater percentage of the total applicants," and the deadline for the rest of the applications is the beginning of February.

There is a new Director of Admissions this year, and it appears (compared to years past) that he is putting basically all of the non-"auto-admits" on Hold, and has said on his blog that "the vast majority of offers of admission will be made in the future," however it's hard to not feel like this is, as it was in years past, a fast track to the waitlist.

In any case, I can't stress about it, but I do feel a but puzzled by what to do next. From what I understand (I have not read the letter myself), its recommended that you send in supplemental materials, updated transcripts, and a "why Harvard?" statement.

My problem is that my application was already so full of supplements, including a "Harvard: A Perfect Fit" essay, that I don't even know what to send them. I don't think sending an updated AUC transcript where my GPA went from 3.94 to 3.97 will be particularly relevant, and I'm not sure who would write me a more glowing rec letter than the ones I already have.

I understand that there are some applications that are basically a GPA, an LSAT, an irrelevant personal statement, some uninsightful rec letters, and a resume, and that HLS and other ad coms don't have a clear idea, after reading such aps, who the student really is. That is not the case with my application. Whoever reads my application actually knows (perhaps sadly? lol) more about me than almost all of the readers of this blog, and I just don't know how to supplement something that really was complete.

As I've expressed to Pookie via email, part of what bothers me about this is that I feel like it still represents the consequences of some really poor decision making and unfortunate and sustained weakness in my last semester at Columbia, and I'm just so tired of there being so many consequences to that. It will ALWAYS have an impact on what I think of a lot of things -- how I relate to people, the Hamptons, how I feel when I hear Russian...just SO many things...and I wish it didn't also enter into this. The fact is, though, that my GPA dropped from 3.86 (autoadmit range) to 3.74 (below the median) in the space of ONE disastrous semester, and while the consequences on my GPA are the least important of all in terms of what that whole "moment" in my life means, it matters a lot (A LOT) for law school.

Yes, I'm going to go to a Top 5 law school, and yes I wanted to be in NYC for a ton of reasons, but (as I've also recently said to Pookie, so forgive me for repeating myself), I want my choice to go back to NYC to be because I've balanced a lot of factors in my head and made a positive decision to engage NYC again, not a decision made by default because I had no other option.

For the record, when I get out-right rejected from Stanford and Yale, I'm not going to bitch about it, because I totally expect that. I did NOT expect this.

And Mommy Wong, can you please stop throwing in "and when you get into Harvard and Stanford and Yale..." into your emails to me. It's not going to happen, and that's ok, but I'd rather YOU be happy with reality than happy with an unrealistic distortion of it. Not *everyone* in our family can dance, not *everyone* in our family takes great photos, and I am not getting into HYS.

For a bit of levity, here is one of the photos I mentioned before that I saved in order to use when I get bad news from law schools. This is a photo of the steps leading up to a Harvard classroom. Could it look any more ominous? No wonder people at Harvard are unhappy...




















VC

VC Lashes Out

...and makes an 8 cent profit!

Since I've managed to totally ignore things of global importance ranging from bird flue, to Sharon, to the Paris riots, I figured I'd use my intellectual energy and spare time to send my thoughts (mostly negative) to the author of this editorial piece about Michelle Kwan's quest go to her third olympic games (read it -- it's really short).

This was the email I sent him:

****************

Just read your editorial on the Kwan petition, and while I like your sense of humour, I think the journalism is far from rigorous (and I'm not even a die-hard Kwan fan).

The vast majority of voters who recused themselves did so not because of personal relationships to Kwan (although you make it sound like this was exclusively the case in your article), but because they had personal relationships with competitor skaters (eg: as coaches), or were themselves competitor skaters who held spots on the "international committee." This is just basic research.

Regarding self-aggrandizing manipulation of the system, I hardly think that that's what this petition is about. As the committee has said, it's their job to get medals -- no one is going to be impressed with Kwan if she can't land a jump, least of all herself, and that's what this petition-vote-test skate process is about. If ANY skater (Kwan or not) cannot skate, then they petition -- it's not an aberration of the system, but the system at work.

It's not like some skating diva said "I don't feel like trying out" and expected people to bow to her will. It's written into to skating bylaws that this petition process exists, and it exists for a reason (namely: last-minute injuries that might make traditional skater comparisons difficult); in fact, you might recall that the last time it was invoked was to bump 13yo Kwan off the team when Nancy Keragan was attacked. What is not written into the bylaws is that the US Nationals is a definitive "olympic trails" (as you say in your article). In fact, it's explicitly stated that this is not the case -- the top performer from US Nationals is to be taken as an auto-admit to the Olympic team, and the next two spots are to be determined by vote (normally the vote follows the US trials, but it needn't necessarily do so).

That is part of what makes your PGA and NASCAR analogies so erroneous -- this was not an ad hoc system made for Kwan, but a system that allows for the selection of a medal-winning team that is flexible enough to take injuries into account.

I also don't really understand your revelation that this is about medals. Of course this is about medals -- it's the job of the national competition to provide PART of the criterion for the committee to decide who is most likely to earn medals. You seem to have a vision of a system that should serve itself (and not have medals as its secret agenda), arguing that it's unfair for the third place national finisher to be bumped as part of a greedy Olympic medals quest. This is inconsistent, though, with your desire to have US Nationals be the exclusive Olympic trials. If you think that Olympic selection should be based entirely on one system, then that system needs to serve the goal of the Olympics, and that is winning medals. It would be a waste of all the money (including tax payer money) being poured into the training of US athletes for it to serve anything else. Kwan didn't petition to be awarded third place at nationals -- Hughes has that and it stands alone; she petitioned to have her candidacy for the US Olympic team be considered, as has happened in the past and is part of US figure skating Olympic selection rules, considered outside the domain of the US national competition, the burden on any petitioner being to prove that (s)he is the most qualified to win the US medals at the Olympics.

I like your sarcastic (almost snotty, actually) style, but I think it was a bit misdirected, and, in the few instances I've described here (eg: your description of the judges who recused themselves, the "olympic trials," and the comparison to NASCAR and golf) is simply incorrect.

I do appreciate any article that includes a dig at the Abramoff scandal, though :)

Just my two cents,

Veiled Chunk

*****************

Here is his reply (very prompt!)

mr. chunk,

thanks for taking the time to read and write back.

while i did not attend the nationals in st. louis, what i learned of the international committee and the reasons for the low number of votes was through the internet and from a bunch of news services and reporters that did cover the event.

from what i've heard and read, kwan is not some high-maintenance diva. she's simply using the system to her advantage.

maybe my golf and nascar analogies were off base. perhaps i should have mentioned other olympic sports trials. if maurice greene had been hurt going into the u.s. sprint trials or false-started his way out, did he have similar recourse? if swimmer michael phelps was rehabbing a torn shoulder muscle or dq'd at the trials for an illegal turn, would the usoc say: don't worry, you're coming anyway?

i also looked at the salt lake and nagano teams, where the top 3 finishers at the u.s. trials were the olympic skaters. as i told someone else, the kwan-kerrigan situation in '94 was justified. when you're essentially kneecapped by another competitor, that's about as extenuating as circumstances get.

i know the olympics are about medals. it would be more honest if those involved would just say so. say: 'these may look like trials, but they're not. the winner goes, and all of us suits then decide everybody else you cheer for.'

believe me, i appreciate your thoughts. they're worth at least a dime. take care.

dave fairbank

****************

I am tempted to point him towards Serena Williams's last selection to the Olympics over Lisa Raymond in doubles (keeping in mind that Lisa Raymond had been #1 in the world in doubles for a few YEARS), and the consistently opaque process through which the girl's (I use that language deliberately) gymnastics team is selected -- part trials, part behind-the-scenes training camp assessment, part smoke-filled-room debates. I would ALSO remind him that the sports in which we are most strict about trails (eg: track and field) are sports in which we are basically guaranteed a medal whether or not the trial accurately selects the top athlete (because usually our third or fourth best runner can get a medal).

Oh well :)

Feel a little bad that I lied about being a die-hard Kwan fan to gain credibility, but not that bad ;)

VC