Pen Thoughts

I had the honour to meet yesterday one of the greatest cleric social workers in Lebanon, currently the Archibishop of Zahle for the Christian Catholic family, his Excellence Issam Darwish. I heard so many stories about him before the actual meeting. His reputation is as white as it could be. He created Dar El Sadaqa technical school and orphanage, in his own words: "to answer the needs of the communities". After he initiated the orphanage (Al Dar) in Ksara area, he fought to change the support system within the Ministry of Social Affairs, which they were surprisingly positive to his proposition, terminating the work of orphanages and support families to keep their offsprings at home (of course the positivity died with time passing, for it, was a successful initiative, like every success in this miserable country that was put to sleep). This initiative could have affected negatively Al Dar. Yet, in his excellency's mind, the prosperity of the association that he crea...

Two men were travelling from one town to another. They came to a stream that had risen due to heavy rainfall. Just when they were about to cross the water, they noticed a young, beautiful woman standing there all alone, in need of help. One of the men immediately went to her side. He picked the woman up and carried her in his arms across the stream. Then he dropped her there, waved good-bye, and the two men went their way. During the rest of the trip, the second traveller was unusually silent and sullen, not responding to his friend's questions. After several hours of sulking, unable to keep silent anymore, he said, "why did you touch that woman? she could have seduced you! Men and Women cannot come into contact like that!" The first man responded calmly, "my friend, I carried the woman across the stream, and that is where I left her. it is you who have been carrying her ever since."  "Some people are like that" "They carry thei...

Useless information that I would like to share! Larry wasn't the first to discover copy paste. In 1940, scientist Barbara McClintock discovered that if she damaged the DNA in corn maize, the plant would reconstruct the damaged section by making a copy of other parts of the DNA strand, then pasting them into the damaged area. DNA was the first to use copy past # JustSaying   # DealWithIt   # GoogleIt   # TrueStory

A fish was swimming one day in a cool pond at the high western mountains of Lebanon, happily and peacefully. A frog came along and asks the fish: "Heyy, how is the water". The fish look at the frog surprisingly and blankly, responding: "What's water"! If you live in Lebanon, you don't need wittiness to understand who's the fish and who's the frog might be. Yet it is always surprising how resistant some Lebanese on seeing clearly the true colours of our crisis; thus, are completely blind on who hold the responsibilities. It could be blindness, collusion of interests and/or a mixture of both. In any case, this never stop being a perplexing dilemma for Lebanese citizens who have freed themselves from the slavery of sectarian autocrats, or to whom have never given their knees. Even when it comes to advanced liberal forces who have fought against the tyranny of neighbours, they have fallen, as their pride did, into the cracks of the sectarian sy...

Organizational Development was always part of what I do. Many disciplines that I went through during the university years, being a double major student in Accounting/Finance and Software Engineering, developed my abilities to understand organizational structures and dynamics. It allowed me as well to continuously learn and change perspectives about how things work in an organization. The learning years have rewired my brain to understand everything in a structured fashion. Accounting and Software Engineering are two rigidly organized sets of learning that are essential pillars for any organization to do business. My background allowed me to work in positions that profited from all the skills I learned during my study years. Even now, in my current job as an operations manager, the combination of skills and knowledge base gave me an edge, an advanced lookup on the optimistic ways to organize the work and obtain results. However, almost always the project management success remaine...

I was born in Lebanon in 1981. until the day I started to gain consciousness about my surrounding social paradigm, I learned two things. Our reactions as a cultural entity highly depend on emotions. We can be stupid and illogical. A lot of things changed during my 38 years of living in this shit hole. but the abovementioned facts never changed. In fact, it got worse. We believe silly lies. We discuss meaningless subjects. We do useless jobs, though we hate it, we never try to change. We say whatever it comes from our one cell brain without owning any responsibility. We are fearless and full of fears at the same time. Utterly sectorial. Full of empathy and careless at the same time. We have to admit firs that our downfall, the current one more precisely, is a direct implication of our destructive mindset, contradictive and irresponsible behavior. Lebanon, this is what we are, own it

I find it really weird! On the outset of the 17th October uprising, I started a daily ritual of packing a bag and going to Riad El Soleh area. Though the first day of the uprising I was angry because what motivated people to react on unbelievable, shameless actions of the political elite, was mainly the proposition on Whatsup tax. For me, people reaction was more insulting than the proposition itself. Yet, after the fourth day of the uprising, I only got the sensation of hope and beauty in this new strange movement. I even was fearful the whole thing would end at any second. I woke up every day with an urge that took me to the screens hoping to see roads are blocked, people are in the streets shouting angerly, defying and fighting for their most basic rights. I find it weird, finally courageous and hopeful! In its seventy days anniversary, with lots of ups and downs, resistance, perseverance, and commitment, this uprising still breathing. It was reduced, however, no d...

Though it was the worst year of my life, I can still see the positive things that happened to me, on a personal and professional level. This year, I had the chance to take part in wonderful events and traveled twice to western countries, London during August and the USA/Maryland Baltimore during October and November. At work, my team organized countless training, camps, and activities during this year, that gathered people from different sides of the globe. it was exciting for me to witness cultural bridges being shaped, dialogue and friendship in the making between people that have absolutely nothing in common, except humor, love, and humanity. Even now, at the moment I'm writing this blog, my colleagues arranged a workshop for humanitarian workers on conserving wellbeing in the distressful environment. most of the participants are from Syria. for the last two days, I'm having a wonderful time interacting with them. For these little blessings, I'm grateful  ...

It has been a long time since I wrote to this blog. on many occasions, I wanted to write but felt that I have nothing serious to share. The last couple of days, I started reading a book about ancient Chinese wisdom. I got the book while I was in Paris, in a visit arranged by UNESCO. at the same time as the conference, I participated in, there was a Chinese cultural seminar within the UNESCO building. I got the chance to see actual monks and to speak with wise elderlies. one of whom gave me a movie on a USB stick and a bunch of books about religions and wisdom. I shelved the books for a long time before deciding to start reading it. Now I regret every moment I left these books in solitude and didn't get into it sooner! yet I believe that books have their own spirit and from my experience, it calls you to the read. The first book I snatched from the counter, was "The Governing Principles of Ancient China". the book is based on 360 passages excerpted from the origi...

In the 73rd memorial of the Lebanese Independence Day, still, a deep surge of wonder and uncertainty circulate my shallow conception about the country I was born, raised and reborn many times into. A question mark keeps lingering in my head while no definite answer can be reached. Is Lebanon as we know it today, deserve to be an entity inclusive to all its indigenous residents? I was born in 1981, a considerably dangerous year to be alive, or at least to be aware in Lebanon. As it was mentioned on my ID, my residential birth was the nearest hospital possible to the shelter where my parents used to take cover. Up until my 9th birthday, most of my childhood memories were made either in shelters or in a 5 Km radius away from. The crystal clear images in my head remained from the year 1990, when I had my first communion and the battles between the Christian faction “Lebanese Forces” and the Lebanese army. I remember the shelling, I remember death, I remember the voices o...