Halfway there

I left Tripoli yesterday. My flight was an hour late and there was a huge argument going on in the departure lounge. I flew to Tunis on a flight that had lots of sick old people going for medical treatment. The old lady sitting next to me spent the entire flight burping and belching. She never puked but she certainly made me feel queezy.. ugghh...

The flight from Tunis to London was fantastic. The seat next to me was empty and the man on the aisle seat didn't belch, burp or fart even once!

Today I'm on the last leg of my journey. If all goes well I'll make it home in time to spend time with my mom before she goes in hospital for surgery tomorrow.

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Some Future Plans

I'll be having a break soon... I keep telling myself that, but I keep tacking on another week or a few days. I really need a break, I know I do... but I really like work too. Therefore, I've planned to do some work on my break!

One of the things I have planned for when I have a bit of free time is to reorganise things in my online life. I'm going to purge 'friends' that aren't friends on Facebook. I'm going to unsubscribe from groups that I never look at... why oh why does Facebook allow people to add you to groups? They should just send you an invite that you can decline. I find myself in a mad scramble, rushing to log-in to Facebook to unsubscribe before I end up with hundreds of notifications and silly comments in my email inbox. I've already uninstalled Facebook's desktop program... jeesh! What an intrusion! Do I need to be notified when someone liked one of my comments... especially one where I just typed in 'LOL!" or something just as stupid? 

And then there is the blog... I've already started to reorganise here. I changed the settings for comments. In the past I allowed anonymous comments because I thought that people (Libyan in particular) would feel better (safer) if they could comment anonymously. But in the 'new Libya' you can say what you like, so you no longer need to hide. If you've got an opinion, you're going to have to own it by signing in first. I'm still moderating the comments and there are still guidelines. Hopefully this will limit the amount of comments I get from idiots who don't seem to read the guidelines... always the ones who comment anonymously. 

but follow the guidelines... or get your own blog!

I've got some projects planned that will involve research and reading... and then writing.  

It's going to take a while because my Internet is on for a day and then off for three or four. It's annoying. It's hard to accomplish anything. And complaining does nothing.

I'm still working on getting a ticket home... actually I'm not really working on it that hard.... because I'm trying to avoid DRAMA and elevated blood pressure. Getting the man I married to cough up the cash needed for tickets and expenses is not easy. What a miser!... sigh.... And it will require having to listen to endless whining and moaning and complaining about who will take over my roles while I'm gone.

Who will drive the kids around? 

Who will do the grocery shopping? 

Who will do this, and who will do that?

.... quite honestly, I don't care! Let the whole place fall down around your ears while I'm gone. Honey, I held your hand all through the war, now it's time to let go for a couple of months. I need a break... before I have a breakdown! I don't need to recharge my batteries; I need a completely new set of them.

Mom's house

I'm going home... to a place that smells good, where the streets are clean and free of potholes. Where people drive carefully and wear their seat-belts and babies aren't hanging out the windows. There won't be machine guns there and I won't have to worry about getting caught in the crossfire.  

The beach five minutes from my mom's house.

It will be hurricane season when I get there. I'm going to sit on the back porch every afternoon and watch the rain pour down.  I'm going to go for walks on the beach and relax in the park. There is plenty of shopping on the agenda, and visits to museums and other places of interest. But most of all, I'm going to spend quality time with my mom, my sisters (and their kids) and my son.

A Poem... for Libya

Two weeks after the February 17th uprising began in Libya I visited a good friend. We talked about what was going on and she confided that she'd been inspired to write a poem. She retrieved the paper that she'd written the poem and read it to me and then put the paper carefully away. Later, after I had gone home, she hid the poem, secreting it away so well that she forgot where she put it. Recently she came across it again and rewrote it for me, presenting it to me as a gift, rolled into a scroll and tied with a thin, red satin ribbon. She gave me permission to publish it here on my blog.

I find it especially moving - she had written the poem during the first week and a half of the uprising. There is so much hope in the words, a hope for freedom and democracy for Libya. I hope that those Libyans who read the poem will remember to register to vote - it's so very, very important.

The poem has no title...

From the mountain tops

Across the valleys

From the seaside beaches

Across the desert sand

Rang the People's cry - 

Freedom!

The footsteps of our youth

were steady in their forward march

Armed with naught but courage

they refused to retreat from their Goal

The cruel foe endeavored to stand

and repel Democracy's march

Freely flowed the precious blood

of our Youth

Yet still they would not be stopped

The Flame of Hope burned bright

in their Hearts and would not die

Our eyes fill with tears

and our hearts burst with Pride

At the Bravery enacted in Freedom's cause

Let us ever revere the memory 

of the Days of Change

Which though dearly bought

Gained for our Beloved Land - 

Freedom!

Rhonda Ahmed

February 26, 2011

Feeling human

The internet is back on again... life is good... 

A Basic Human Right

I'm a disgruntled LTT customer. Their service is horrible and I am fed up to here and then some. Because of where I live I am stuck with having only Wimax available... which is pretty sad considering I'm only about a 20 minute drive to the centre of Tripoli, and just five minutes away from the university. Who is to blame? Those who ran things in the past, or the present?

I haven't had internet service for the past four days. Sometimes the little icon indicator says there is service (when there really isn't), but mostly the little icon shows up with a yellow triangle with an exclamation point inside it. I've paid 30 dinars for NOTHING!

What pisses me off is that sometimes the internet service works... and I can happily get on with Skyping my family and friends, checking my email and reading the news. But then all of a sudden there is no service what-so-ever... nothing.. nada.. Now NO SERVICE is lasting for days on end. I feel cheated and frustrated, especially as one of the things I want to use the internet for is to look for airline tickets (so I can get out of here for a much needed break!).

I've tried calling the company... the phone rings and then switches over to a busy signal. I've tried the operator on the company's 116 service - the phone just disconnects. There is no way to reach them other then to take time off to go to the company. The last time I went they had a big beefy goon standing in front of the door, preventing anyone from going in. He was rude, and refferred to me as 'Ya Mama' to which I told him there was no way on earth (or this universe) that I was his 'mama' (or even his aunt).

Guess what LTT? Internet service is considdered a BASIC HUMAN RIGHT! And the last time I looked in the mirror I looked human...... an angry, fed up human, but definitely human..... sigh...

See you tomorrow LTT. Bright and early.

(This was sent using Almadar's crappy, intermittent, and extremely slow internet service)

It's time

I'm wrapping things up so I can take a much needed break. Next month there are supposed to be elections in Libya and quite honestly I think this is gonna be a good time to 'get the heck outa Dodge'. Let them get on with it... without me. But of course before that can happen there will be major drama in my house. Sigh... you'd think I was asking to take a trip to the moon. It's been three years since I've been 'home'. I guess that's once in a blue moon. ... Mr Full Moon.... sigh....