Entries this day: Dear_Buddha, Niveen! Sarah_cards

Dear Buddha,

10:46am IST Saturday 08 October 2005

Dear Buddha,

There's this babe living in the hostel and part of me wants to jump her bones, but I recognize such an action would not be in my best interest in the long run.

_if the Buddha dated_ has captured the core of many of the issues I have experienced regarding women. There are several homework items in the book, and I'd like to work on some of them here.

However, I recognize a fear within me. Something like, "I don't want people able to read how fucked up I am." Which begs me to note the self judgement that I'm fucked up.

One of my ex-girlfriends told me I am okay the way I am. People can love me as I am, and I don't need to change to be loveable.

Hmmmmm.. Interesting concept.

11:00am

Right now, instead of writing the homework, I'll try to describe slash uncover the brainwaves in my brain.

Just a bit ago, when I saw the object(*) of my interest, I just wanted to hold slash have her, like a doll that necessarily loves me back. (I can see a fantastic market for realistic sex/love-robots that always cherish their owners.) When she smiled and gave me a bit of attention, I thought awesome and felt happy endorphins inside my brain.

(*) women are not objects.

Just just now, a woman walked by who has not smiled toward me; I feel a lack of interest in her, as if she were just some man or animal walking by.

When my infatuation walks by, I get a bit of a internal jolt, and hope she'll pay attention to me. Sometimes I find myself following her or setting up situations so that I'll be near her.

- - - -

Once it's confirmed that she likes me, we will play together a bit. But before too long, the end begins. I lose interest; I look for the next one to like me. Endless cycles.

I am ready to start a new cycle. I'm ready to love myself.

Niveen!

4:47pm IST Saturday 08 October 2005

Wow wow wow wow! I got to see Niveen today! She brought her old cellphone and took me to a shop where I could get a sim card so now I have a call phone in Jerusalem. I can apparently receive calls all over Europe, but I'm not sure about details.

She forgot to bring the power supply, but she'll look for that and bring it next time.

But *that* is not the best part! She took me to the Pal Vision office where I met Ramy, the official middle east coordinator for P/B! He talks about 1millionmilesanhour and got three phone calls during our 10 minute conversation.

I said I was interested in helping P/B in some way, and he was like, "not P/B; you can help us," or something and "what can you do?"

At first my brain thought, well, not much, given that I only know 3 words of Arabic [thank you] [you're welcome] and "Ramadan" and speak much more slowly than he does, but I was like, "I can write," and he goes, "I love you. Writing is enough; we need you." and I was like, woah.

He told me he would definitely give me a headache if I try to do everything he suggests, but that I should definitely come into the office on Wednesday at the latest and we'll go to Ramallah (sp) and Nablus (sp) and he got a phone call and I listened to Adam tell me I shouldn't believe all the media and everything I hear, but should just explore for myself, look around and see what's real. Before I start talking. And by that I think he meant before I tell people "who's side I'm on," etc.

I told Ramy I'd have to talk to Hisham about schedules and whatnot, and he said that was cool, but guessed I would grow distinctly bored of picking olives if I tried to do it for a whole month. He welcomed me back any time, including without appointment, including if he wasn't there.

Wow.

Niveen showed me the best way to walk to their office from the hostel, and I think I'm set. Way way way awesome.

Sarah cards

11:17pm IST Saturday 08 October 2005

Played cards with Sarah tonight. First her card version of Monopoly, a game which hadn't been well tested, for we quickly found an unanswered question in the rules. We agreed on a rule and played a few rounds; she won all of them, winning with over 10,000 points. (I got 750 points).

Then we played a game with a regular deck of cards. Basra, I think might be its name. Basically we try to end up with as many cards as possible, making sets of cards that add up to identical amounts. She beat me quite well at first, but then I had a great hand and caught up. She finally won 11 to 10.

Tomorrow is going to be much different than today; I wonder what it will be like.