Transformed by Love...

Muneer was late, as usual. And Sahar sat and waited, as usual...

He will come soon, it’s only past midnight. I am sure he is stuck in some meeting. He works so hard...

Deep down, Sahar was getting fed up with her own lies...She knew that Muneer was in no meeting, she knew she would smell some perfume, see some lipstick on the collar, spot a hair that is not hers and he will walk in, with a straight face, with his usual – it’s been a long day today, am so tired. He may or may not eat the food which she prepared and that has been sittiing on the table for the past 4 hours, waiting...

Later on, he may or may not touch her, depending on how hard she will try that nigh...and sometimes she’d just lay awake, pushing images of he and them -- away into the darkness, feeling herself withering without his touch...and sometimes she would bury her face in her pillow until it was drowned in silence with her tears...

She could not understand, they‘ve only been married for 18 months...but this has been going on well before their marriage...she knew it and she had lied to herself, daily, for 2 years...

So why did he marry her ? who was she in this film that had no plot ?

She sought comfort from those she could trust with secrets....change your hair style, dress differently, try new positions, withdraw, hold back, punish him, make him jealous, play indifferent, he will grow out of it, be patient, be nicer, be sexier, seek a sheikh’s advice, it must be black magic, confront her/them...be more romantic, try this potion, get pregnant, take a holiday together, divert his attention with more parties, outings...talk to him...

The opinions differed, each one gave her a tip and none worked...and she could not talk to him...he was either busy, travelling, tired, or just when she would find the right moment, he would charm her, change subjects, switch on the T.V, make a phone call...

Why was he still with her ? A question she kept asking herself, throughout the day and late into the night...while she was sitting, waiting...

The opportune moment arrived...

It was a Friday afternoon. Muneer had just received another one of his obscure phone calls, he had this rejected look on his face...He threw his body on the couch, grabbed the remote control...and screamed:

- Sahar, Sahar, what’s wrong with the bloody TV, why is it not working ?

Sahar rushed,

I don’t know Habibee, it was working earlier on, maybe a fuse or something...

Damn it, he shouted, I hate it when things don’t work when I want them to...Yalla, habibtee, make me a coffee.

Anything wrong Muneer ?

Sahar, you always ask too many questions. Just get me a coffee and call Abu Wissam to come and repair the T.V first thing tomorrow.

Sahar retreated to the kitchen, almost tiptoeing out, lit the cooker and watched the flames dance...she poured some water in the coffee pot, waited for it to boil, added sugar, the exact amount he wanted, not too bitter, not too sweet...added the coffee, the exact amount, the way he liked it, not too strong, not too weak...

These sentences kept repeating themselves in her head – not too bitter, not too sweet, not too strong, not too weak....they repeated themselves while the coffee was simmering on a slow fire...repeated themselves like a tune, a song, a new melody...

Muneer was not a bad guy. He used to be loving when he wanted to, he was affectionate when he wanted to, she lacked nothing, really...except a husband.

She walked back into the living room, and served him his cup. She bended forward with the tray, as he was slouching on the sofa...she noticed the dark bags under his eyes, his face looked as if it had aged suddenly...he looked almost haggard, fatigued inside of his soul...

That was the moment. She had to grab it.

She looked straight into his eyes, those beautiful eyes she was so in love with...her voice was even, almost flat..it felt as if she had rehearsed that moment a hundred times before...it felt as if she had been preparing this moment, brewing it on a small fire, for two years...

Muneer, I know.

You know what ?

I just know everything and I’ve known all along...

Nothing but your imagination. You must be getting your periods soon...

He realized he stumbled right there and then...trying to catch himself before his final fall, he turns on his charm and gives her one of his smiles, a smile that meant -- you will not win this one either...

What are you talking about habibtee...come sit next to me and tell your husband everything...

I want a divorce, Muneer.

You must have gone mad, for sure ! What on earth has got into you, all of a sudden ?

I know everything and I want you to divorce me.

Listen now, don’t pull this one on me !

Muneer was losing his grounds, Sahar noticed his agitation, an agitation which he tried to contain...

Sahar, sit down and let’s talk like two mature adults...

Sahar did not flinch. She repeated the magical phrase.

I said, divorce me.

He grabbed her arm and pulled her down to his level, on the couch.

Woman, what has gotten into you ?! Why do you want me to divorce you ? Am sure it must be your parents again, or those stupid women you hang around with...

It’s none of that, Muneer.

Are you crazy, you are my wife. You lack nothing. Tell me what is lacking in your life ?! tell me !

You are lacking in my life.

Me ? Me ? I work so hard for both of us...to give you a home, you know how busy I am...so am tired sometimes, what’s the big deal ? all men who work as hard as I do, get tired...look at Hashim and Abeer, he’s going through the same thing with her...

She put her hand gently on his mouth, on those lips she absolutely adored, drowning herself in the black of his eyes and repeated...slowly...

I want you...to divorce me.

He grabbed her hand and pulled it down, holding it into his lap...

You are my wife and no one will take you, do you understand that ?

So is the sofa you're sitting on, Muneer. That's your’s too.

Stop your nonsense ! What do you want exactly ? I know your games. You want a holiday, we will go on holiday. You want a new wardrobe, you will get it. What do you want, God damn it !

I want you and I don’t have you. I know all about them...all of them.

You want me ? So you want me ? Why can’t you just accept me then, just as I am. Why do you want me to be someone am not, this is who I am and this is who I have always been...why can’t you just love me as I am...this is me -- take it or leave it !

I leave it then.

Oh no, you will not! You are staying right here. This is your home and this is where you belong. And I will hear none of it anymore !

He grabbed his vest and slammed the door hard behind him.

The walls shook and the echoes of the slamming door reverberated in the room, like some sound from a Tibetan Dong...sounds that linger, well after the offerings are done...

Sahar heard the muezzin’s voice getting louder as he called all the faithful for the sunset prayer...

Her sun had set two years ago, it had eclipsed from her life, she had to find it again...

She made her ablutions, unrolled her prayer mat, faced Mecca, and raised her palms toward the Unseen with -- God is Great...and as she prostrated, she heard herself say out loud – something has to change.

She ended her prayer with the traditional salutations to the angels, the prophets and prayed for all her ancestors, her family, her friends, for him and for herself...

She stood up, rolled the prayer mat again, like she had done a hundred times before...

Something felt lighter in her. She felt lighter, much lighter. She thought it must be her blood pressure dropping again...

But this feeling of lightness did not leave her...it was there, day after day, as some new found companion...

She found herself waking up with excitement, playing her favorite music again, smiling more often, taking time to pamper herself, catching up on things she had left pending for almost 2 years, laughing from her heart, she even caught herself singing a couple of times...

Muneer did not change his habits. He still came back late. The food was there waiting for him, but she wasn’t. She was either asleep or up busy with some of the stuff she used to love doing, but which she shelved on the side, when she married him, devoting herself to him, instead.

She no longer wondered where he’d been this time and with whom…...she saw him from afar, from a benevolent distance...he still had this haggard look that worsened with each passing day...Some days, she almost felt sorry for him...He looked like a prisoner, caged within...

Sometimes in the middle of the night, she would sense him moving closer to her body...she no longer contented herself with a small part of the bed, so as not disturb his sleep...she took the space she needed...occasionally, she felt his hands brush her body, occasionally his hands roamed like a thief...she didn't want to refuse her desire for him...it was part of her new found freedom...



Sahar was getting ready to leave the house, when Muneer stopped her short...

And where do you think you are going ?

Auntie Khadija is back in town and I want to pay her a visit, then am meeting with Abeer. Do you need anything from outside ?

And do you need to dress that way ?

What way ? shaking her head in disbelief...

Why are you so dressed up for a simple visit to your aunt ?

I am not dressed up, there is nothing dressed up about me.

What about the make up, the perfume and the hair ?

This is my usual make up, my usual perfume and my usual hair...

Okay, don’t be late then...he ordered her firmly, sensing he was making a fool of himself...

Sahar was late that evening. Aunt Khadija had hilarious stories to tell and meeting with Abeer was full of giggles...time passed by...

When she returned that evening, Muneer was sitting in the living room, waiting...

Hello darling...goodness, its been pouring down..

And you noticed the rain ?

Can anyone not notice the rain, it has not stopped...

Where were you ?

I told you, I am going to visit auntie and then catch up with Abeer...

You look as if you had a really good time...so how was it ?

It was fun, you know auntie and her stories...

And Abeer, how was it with her ?

She’s fine, she landed a new job, she’s all excited about it. My, I feel so tired, I need to get sleep. Good night.

Sahar, he said in a commanding voice, come her, I need to talk to you. Is there anything I should know ?

Know about what ? what are you talking about ?

Just answer my question – is there anything I should know ?

Muneer, I understand nothing...

Sahar don’t play games, is there anyone else ?

Anyone else as in what ?

You have changed...you are different...you, you just don’t love me anymore.

Sahar reached out and stroked his face, the face of a boy who has just been abandoned...

Darling, you asked me to accept you as you are, and love you just the way you are...and this is what I am doing...am tired now. Good night.

She turned her back and walked out leaving him to absorb the new her...

She prepared herself to welcome the night...undressed, switched off the lights and threw herself into that big bed, with that same lightness, just like an innocent girl who has just discovered her first and only true love...and with a smile on her face, she fell into a peaceful sleep...

Truth in a Coffee Cup...

It must have been a Saturday, Abu Hanna the florist, was open that afternoon. He usually closed his small shop, where the familiar fragrance of flowers lingered on, filling the street with their scent, well after closing hours, on Friday and Sundays. Yes, it must have been a Saturday.

He called turning on his usual charm, like a button knob, that he switched on and off at leisure, depending on the occasion.

“ Let’s talk before your rash decisions…let me explain, you can do that for me, for old time’s sake. I deserve another chance…”

He always referred to old time’s sake, like some handy slogan...he sought to frame Time and make it his, an expendable commodity, where the past, present and future were at his disposal, where he framed memories, events and her -- like in some painting, in some photo album...a collection of timeless pieces.

He did the same with the future. He decorated it like one decorates a newly bought house, he added things to it, in a scenario he scripted, in his own mind...and he took pictures of his final product, and added them to the photo album of his mind, framed them into immortality, and framed her into immortality, another piece in the immortality of his own mind.

The present did not concern him much, he was oblivious to it. The present was his playing field, where he plotted more thrillers, thrillers from the past and thrillers for the future...despite the so many chances given.

She agreed.

He suggested that same café where they met the first time, close to Abu Hanna’s flower shop.

It was a clear café, luminous with windows overlooking a small patio filled with green. A contrast to the immaculate white table cloths and the white porcelain cups. A café, subtle in its aroma, in the atmosphere it lulled its clients with.
Not overt, not covert, just the right place for budding stories and maybe their end…

She arrived 10 minutes late, she timed the minutes, she took her time, unlike all the previous times where she rushed to see him, not wanting to miss a second...

He must have guessed about her deliberate tardiness, she tried reading any signs in his eyes, the minute she walked in, but as usual, and with his usual self, he smiled, a broad smile, stood up in his usual gentleman manner, as if nothing had changed, as if he was immortal, as if she was immortal, as if Time stopped, as if Time froze on a certain date marked in a calendar, a date he had set, like the dates he had in his agenda...

But this time, this air of familiarity felt like a stranger to her.

She felt strange seeing him again. She was his love puppet and he did pull her strings. But today something had snapped, one of the strings that pulled the love puppet had snapped... Maybe this time round, because there have been many rounds, he lost his usual dexterity, he lost his balancing act, walking on a tight rope...
He must have pulled too hard or maybe not enough.

He ran his fingers through his thick black hair, in his usual manner, turning on the knob, the all too familiar knob...

“I suppose it will be the usual…Coffee right ? “

The usual…the familiar.

She loved their frothy cappuccinos, served in those white porcelain cups, with powdered chocolate and a touch of cinnamon dancing on the white milky surface, like a few dark clouds squeezing themselves in between white ones...

One gentle blow to the surface of the cup and the mousse dispersed, like some fluffy cotton...She used to enjoy doing that, blowing the clouds away and he would laugh “you have a white mustache, come let me kiss it away...“

This time she did not blow the clouds away, she just watched them hanging over her cup of coffee, like some heavy rain about to fall...

“Sugar ?”
“Yes ,the usual…”

He offered the brown, she liked brown sugar in her coffee, he settled for his usual white...

She picked one brown lump and let if fall slowly, dipping it first, tasting it and abandoning it to fall to the bottom of her cup...

She waited till he stirred first. She watched his hand, his all too familiar hand stirring, would she recognize the stir? She noticed a slight trembling to his fingers, his all too familiar fingers...

“So how have you been ?”

She did not reply...she kept staring into her coffee cup wondering how far down the lump had sunk...she wondered if it dissolved by now, she wondered how to stir the coffee without disturbing the pattern of clouds on the surface. She wondered…

“Listen, I will get straight to the point”

What point...there have been so many points.

At which point did she realize the clouds in her coffee ? It must have been a month or two ago, when stories were no longer holding together. He tried hard holding them together, gluing them with more stories only to see them part, ripping themselves apart and away from each other, disintegrating to the bottom, like the lump of sugar in her coffee cup.

He was quick to reach out for the lighter and light her cigarette, he never missed the right moves, they were part of the story...part of the persona, part of the mask.

Each time she uncovered one, another lay underneath...she kept uncovering one mask after the other...

And today she no longer recognized the man sitting in front of her.

Who was he ? was he anybody, anyone ? Who was this man she embraced, kissed, opened to, like the budding rose in the small vase in front of her, on that white tablecloth.

She no longer recognized him, he was a stranger to her despite his familiar ways...
He was his stories and she fell in love with a lie.

Suddenly his face took on another mask, the wounded little boy, his voice changed from the self assured suave portrait he painted of himself. She detected despair.
She refused to stir her coffee. She took the shining silver spoon and dipped it slowly in her cup, took one spoonful of the white and brown froth and bought it forth to her mouth letting her lips embrace the clouds one last time...

She detected despair, like a small boy caught stealing...stealing once too many.

She brushed aside the silent plea in his eyes. She noticed he was gulping his coffee in an unusual manner, not his slow, measured, tasteful, delicate sips...

She kept clearing away the mousse in her cup with slow deliberate moves, until she finally reached the black of the coffee, bitter with a touch of sweetness, the sugar lump must have dissolved, she thought to herself.

As she held the cup to her lips and took the first sip of the black, she felt a wave of nausea swelling up in the pit of her stomach, swelling up like a wave.

She saw the deceit and the despair did he notice the disgust ?

His voice was getting fainter and fainter, like some distant melody in a far away land, broken up by static. She could no longer hear it, nor hear the stories that he was weaving like some spider preparing a new bed of webs...

She could hear nothing. All she felt was this wave swelling up inside of her, crashing against her cup, like a water current, a whirl drowning a swimmer into the bottom of moving sands, into a muddy sea...like the coffee mud at the bottom of her coffee.

His eyes, his face, his gestures were being pushed away, pushed away by a wave that no longer accepted anything standing in its way...

His self immortalized portrait was being pushed to the far end of the café, against the wall, where a painting of some harbor with quietly floating boats was hanging. The wave pushed him right into the painting, beyond the harbor, into the sea...no sails and no anchor.

She looked and she no longer saw him sitting in front of her, even though his shadow was still there, moving, gesticulating like a clown, fabricating one more story...

She found herself in the street...a chilly breeze slapping her face. She buttoned up her raincoat. It must have been the first week of November. It must have been raining because she felt some water drops on her face, or were they salty tears, from this gushing wave that just washed over her, over him...She was not sure.

But she was sure it was a Saturday, this she could not forget, because Abu Hanna, the florist, had just closed shop for the day, and there was no usual, familiar fragrance of flowers lingering on...filling the street with their scent.

Ghosts on Wheels.

"By Allah, she is so beautiful" exclaimed Fadel Abbass.

"By Allah, she is so beautiful" he repeated..."just look at her, shining like a diamond".

He spat in his stained handkerchief and polished a small stain fearfully hiding behind the side mirror.

He passed his rough hand on the leather dashboard, making sure not to scratch any of the fine leather, that felt like the smooth skin of a woman, under his fingers...he made sure not to scratch it with the silver rings adorning his right hand...Three of them.

The one on the small finger had a turquoise stone, he brought it back from Qum when on a pilgrimage. It looked good on that small finger with a long nail. He polished that nail every morning...it gave him allure. His boss had the same ring and the same nail. He was on the right track.

Occasionally that nail was useful, he would flip open his cigarette box with it, or dig out the wax from his ears...his boss would do the same. He must be on the right track.

He glanced in his back mirror one last time, before igniting the engine of his beautiful...He caressed his mustache and his newly grown beard, cleared his throat from the catarrh that was permanently stuck there like a pebble.

"By Allah life is good" he thought to himself, hoping that no one in the neighborhood will give him the evil eye.

He remembered that Abu Hassan asked him the other day "Tell me Fadel, where did you get that car from? ". He asked his question with much suspicion, a suspicion that left Fadel uncomfortable.

" I bought it, ya Abu Hassan "
" You are not working, how did you buy it?"
" I saved some "
" Ya ibnee, your mother needs an operation, you could have spent that money on her instead..."

Abu Hassan irritated him with his endless questions. He knew that Abu Hassan believed none of it.

"To hell with him" he said to himself, " an old man who spends his time praying, he knows nothing about life. Life is an apple you need to get your teeth into...grab it and bite it. The old man has no teeth left..."

He grinned, and glanced in the back mirror one last time. His life was about to start, no Abu Hassan will spoil it for him.

As he did so, he saw a shadow of a man, on the back seat, dressed in white, smiling.

His smile was too serene. A smile that shook him. The face said nothing, it just smiled...

"Ya Abu al Abass, Ya Kazem" Fadel cried out..."Ya Ali, Ya Ahl Al Bayt"... And the face kept smiling...

" I take refuge in Allah "...he shouted. And the face draped in white kept smiling.

Drops of heavy perspiration covered his forehead like a mist from beyond...

" Who are you ? What do you want ?"

The face kept smiling as if to say - don't you remember me ya Fadel Abbass ?

Meanwhile his cell phone rang. The boss.

" Ya Fadel, where are you, the Husseiniya has already started. We need to discuss some urgent matters..."

" Maulana, boss, there is...there is...."

" Fadel, get over here quick, we have more business to finish"

" Boss, there is a..."

" Fadel, I made you. Get here quick..."

" Boss...boss..."

Dead at the other end of the receiver.

And the face seated in the back, draped in white, kept smiling...

Sahara Club , street no.52.

It's nearly 9 pm. In a couple of hours, the usual clientele will be landing here again, for another night, that will stretch until the Dawn prayer...

Hassan, the waiter, hurried past each table, ensuring to reserve the ones overlooking the stage, for the regular clients. He did not fancy being reprimanded again in front of the guests for failing to reserve table no.1, like last week.

He checked each table cloth, the stained ones were turned upside down, the owner said they can't afford fresh ones each night. With the dim lights, no stains will show, he reassured himself.

The place stunk of old stale cigarette stench, that stuck to the worn out red velvet curtains like some old lover...the cushions on the chairs were equally worn out, riddled with holes from cigarette burns, decorating the faded colors which in turn were holding on to their wooden edges with the stickiness of a hundred hands that touched and moved them...

The stage was drawn like half a circle, the owner wanted it that way. Everyone gets to have a good view, he'd say.

Right on the far end of the stage, with the back to the wall, was a wooden podium, that cracked when the musicians climbed to take their seats, plastic white seats.

Right above them, hung a row of small colored light bulbs, like some Christmas decoration. When the music starts, another phosphorescent light hanging right in the middle of the ceiling would blink, giving off like some waves of electric shock, a stainless steel grey white alternated with complete darkness...

Across the stage, was the bar. Ali was in charge there. Every night, he made sure to add water to the whiskey bottles filling them up, and once he diligently completed that, he'd start preparing the mezze with his pudgy fingers, running his palms every once in a while over his dirty trousers to wipe away their heavy sweat..

Right next to the bar, was a small entrance, a doorway, that led to a narrow ramp of stairs, up to the first floor. The first floor was a narrow hallway with two rooms on each side and one bathroom at the end of it.

All the rooms were furnished the same way with a single bed, a red lampshade, a mirror, and thick maroon curtains. Except for room no.4, this one had a pink lampshade and a pink light bulb that went with it. The sheets in room no.4 were also cleaner, not the usual stained ones, like the table cloths downstairs.


Voices could be heard coming from room no.1, which was slightly larger than the other ones. Room no.1 was owned by Sahar. Sahar was the eldest there and oldest. She'd already been there for over 3 years.

Sahar, Lamia and Najla were putting on their make up, taking turns in front of the chipped mirror. Sahar applied her red lipstick making sure it drew lips larger than hers, she re-arranged her hair and dabbed some cheap perfume behind her ears and in between her breasts. She was wearing a black polyester satin dress slit on the sides, revealing her thick calves and thighs.

"This dress is getting too tight" she sighed. She pumped her breasts up, to show more cleavage and Lamia helped her pull the back of her dress down, so the length of the hems looked even on both sides...

"Don't worry about it", retorted Najla, "they like big asses...the tighter the better" And the three of them shrieked with a sad laugh...

Lamia was couple of years younger than Sahar, in her she saw a sister and a confidante. Sahar taught her all that she needed to know.

"It's my turn now, move to the side"...and she jokingly pushed Sahar and stood in front of the cracked mirror. She was wearing a golden colored paillette dress. "I will be shining the most" she teased...

"You, shine the most? you must be kidding" said Najla, not hiding her irritation, "and what about your rounded belly...you think the men don't notice?"

"I'll say it's flatulence from too many fava beans for lunch" joked Lamia, again.

"And you think it's funny? we eat nothing but fava beans"pressed on Najla, in that same exasperated tone.

"Ohooo Najla you really have to spoil everything. Come let me comb your hair" said Lamia, trying to appease her. "You can't go down looking like this."

"I am tired...I can't face another night..." said Najla in a beaten voice.

"Yalla Najla, enough of your caprices, we've all been through that, you will get used to it" butted in Sahar with a stern voice. The voice of a matron.

"I just pray that Abu No'man does not show up tonight again, I hate what he asks of me..." pleaded Najla.

"Forget about all of that, it will only last a few minutes, you know how they are, come let me fix your kohl, you're smudging it again"...Lamia trying to appease again.

"Yalla ya Banat, we are in it together, remember ?!" commanded Sahar, "tell me where is Omnia, she has not returned yet? It's past 10 pm."

Omnia is the youngest. Her name means "wish". She was sent to Umm Abbas for a total body wax. Her first total body wax. And the room with the pink lampshade and cleaner sheets was reserved for her, reserved for that first night, her first night in Sahara Club on street no.52.

A Perforated Shirt...

Amal - Hope in Arabic - sat in the entrance hall...Their main door gave to an entrance hall, straight in the heart of her home... right where everyone entered...

There were some hooks on the left, right on the left where you walked past, where she hung her son's coat and his shirt.

On the right, was an open space...she kept it open. It overlooked some sitting area, where the furniture was old, despite her scrubbing it with the new look product as advertised in the free news, the news bulletin that fell into her mail box once a week...promising her change...for free.

Amal dusted the small apartment that looked too big for her. She even dusted the white stained shirt with perforated holes that has been hanging in front of her for 3 years now...

She stopped, yet another moment, and looked at it - this is all that is left of you , she said.

And she continued dusting...

The Short Life of a Summer Cricket

- I love you, I love you, I love you, he kept repeating senselessly. I have been waiting for you all my life. I am a Summer cricket who has hibernated and now is out, in the open air and fields...

- A Summer cricket ? she laughs

- A Summer cricket who will burn itself for Love

- I hope you don't turn out to be one of those ugly frogs that never metamorphose into anything despite a thousand kisses. Mind you, I can always kiss you but I need not jump into the pond with you...

- Why all this mistrust, he sighs. I am not asking you to trust me fully, just give me a little of your trust.

- Trust is earned, not given.

- I will never give you reason to pin me down.

- Pin you down ?

- No, no, I meant I will never give you reason to doubt me.


She knew that slips of the tongue need always be reckoned with.

A week later she pinned him down, full view...pinned like an insect on a slide under a microscope.

Turns out that this Summer cricket was nothing but a frog who hopped in filthy ponds...

Turns out that this Summer cricket was nothing but a cockroach crawling out of his gutter...hoping for an eventual Kafkaesque metamorphosis.

She pinned him down alright along with the illusions. She metamorphosed right in time, before the advent of the hot Summer nights.

The Revolutionary who lost his hat.

The alarm clock rang at exactly 7.30 am. It shook Saad from his deep slumber, like a war siren. He woke up startled. Was it a coup d'état that just took place whilst he was asleep ? He rubbed his eyes with his pudgy knuckles, no it was just the alarm clock.

What a hangover ! His head felt heavy and his legs numb. He calculated how many hours it will take for the alcohol to be broken down into vapor. He could not afford stumbling into his classroom like a drunkard. He had an image to keep. A popularity quota to preserve.

It's just that last night's discussion was most important. Dialectical materialism and its application to Globalization. Saad felt he articulated his point of view in a very neat fashion. He did impress his peers who appeared clueless. But so was he. Except he made sure that nothing of his own cluelessness transpired. He was a good talker and nothing saves the moment but some corny humor which he was renowned for in his circle...

Damn, he has no time for all of that now, he has a class to catch and an impression to safeguard...

He rushes into the shower, his hair is too long, streaks of grey hang around his puffed face - no time to wash it. Fuck it, he thought to himself, don't become bourgeois Saad, you are above all of that. Just cover it with a beret he thought to himself. A polished image of a Che Guevara with all the respectability of Academia attached to it. Yes that's it. This is the image. A red shirt and the Lacoste socks are well hidden beneath the old washed out jeans, no one will notice. The Ralph Lauren flannel, is well covered by the Red shirt, too.

Damn, where is that fucking beret ? He was sure he had it on yesterday night. Where is it ? Time is rushing, he has an act to play in 30 mn, a piece of theater, a political drama to plot...where is that fucking beret ?

Damn, damn, it would have gone so well with the Red shirt. Perfect for a Monday morning. It was the beginning of a semester after all. Damn, damn...

He will have to do without it. Pony tail is in these days, tie it. That should do as well...not as good as the Che look alike hat, but it will still give off the same effect...

He glanced for the last time in the mirror hanging right across his main door, glanced one last time and thought to himself - Yes am ready, am ready for the applause.