i had forgotten how fucking hot musicians are :) its one of those things that when you're around them constantly you know all of the idiotic things they do and their bad habits - and you can avoid finding them incredibly attractive. but not tonight, they were hot tonight.
this weekend has been, quite simply, perfect.
it started out a bit rocky on thursday, but friday was lovely. a bit of a sleep in, some quick shopping (buying things i wanted and not what i needed - spoiling yourself can be such fun sometimes) and then the afternoon on the beach. a quick lunch, then lazing on the sand working on my tan. so lovely and relaxing and just absolute decompression time.
and then heading back to jerusalem for my bday dinner. which was amazing. i had made a reservation for 12 and by the end of the night we had about 19 chairs gathered around the table. it was great, i felt so loved to have all of my friends take the time to show up and celebrate with me.
it was lovely just to sit back and watch everyone together, old friends and new acquaintences just chatting and laughing and enjoying an evening together. and knowing that i was the common denominator, it was so special. and being presented with a bowl of mashed potatoes and a tea-light as my bday cake. omg, hilarious and so dustin. i miss him and seeing him everyday.
and then the restaurant catching on and having this lovely chocolate cake with a candle in it. and several renditions of happy bday being sung to me, until pretty much everyone there was singing. priceless. and then the ongoing vodka shots... and this was before we got to the club!!
and then drinks and dancing and seeing more friends until the early hours of the morning. and wandering home with J and gavin, and for some reason sitting on the bench outside of our building musing and dozing in the early hours of the morning, until we could rouse ourselves to climb the 4 flights to the flat.
and the hangover this morning. wow. i have not had a hangover like that in ages. but it just attests to the night before, and how amazing it was! and spending the better part of the morning sleeping it off, in bed or on the couch. and then the afternoon with a lovely walk through the park and enjoying being outside.
and running into eric and having this lovely lunch-y thing. and just chatting and being comfortable and so at peace. and then at the last minute heading over to the compound in the east for a bbq. and being waited on and yet more bday toasts. and just good times with good people, with friends.
its the people that make things memorable. they may drive me crazy and to despair, but they really are good people. which is so rare these days. i am so lucky to have found this at my age. sometimes i forget and just take it for granted. but i am so lucky. and when i remember that, i marvel at my good fortune.
and then it occurs to me that i am leaving. voluntarily. there is wanting change, initiating change and accepting change. and they are all such different things.
wanting change is natural. its so human. we are never happy, never really, really all encompassing happy with what we have (or very rarely) there is always just one more thing, or one other component. and thats wanting change, wanting that little bit more or one different thing.
there is initiating change. the movement to find that difference that you want. the realisation that its time for a change and then finding where you're going next, what you're doing next. it takes work and dedication, and its a little bit scary, to put yourself out there and just not know.
and then there is accepting change. accepting that while something is comfortable, that it is time to go. that you have learnt what you can learn, and met these people for a reason. its accepting that it hurts right now, but you will see them again, be here again, that things happen for a reason and you have to accept that. accept change.
i am not one to trust in fate or leave things to fate. but sometimes, sometimes you just have to accept that it all will work out. that, provided that you have put in you portion of blood and sweat and tears, that the universe will look out for you, that things will fall into place.
you have to accept that whether or not you're sure about it, you have to take that jump. and the mists will clear, and hopefully you will be able to see where you're landing - likely while you're in mid-jump, usually not before you jump, only once you're in the air.
and its scary and exciting and so many other things at once. but knowing that you have that support. that there are people there. your people. who frustrate you and anger you and drive you up the wall. and take the time to tend to your wounds and celebrate with you and mourn with you. that you have your people.
its good. it makes a difference. and this probably makes no sense - perhaps i am not quite as over my hangover as i thought - but its what i am thinking and feeling right now. the winds are turning and change is coming. i have no idea what kind of change. but i have my people, and i will not only get through it, i will land on my feet and make the best of it with their help.
today was long and vaguely surreal and made me feel my age. it doesn't happen often, but when it does, it just hits you. how young you are and how much you have to learn. there's only so much you can fake it, and as good as you are it will catch up with you. eventually.
but for those few moments of peace, those minutes you can catch by yourself and if you can just tune everything else out, it becomes worth it. you can live an easy but unhappy life, or you can deal with a somewhat tumultous existence but have those moments of sheer un-adulterated joy.
and i suppose i made my choice. i made my choice a while ago. but standing this evening on the mount of olives, wind whipping my hair and scarf about, and watching the sun set a red-gold ball of fire above the old city. sparkling off the dome of the rock and illuminating that gorgeous jerusalem stone.
being surrounded by the call to prayer and kids running around shouting in hebrew. tourists from all over snapping pictures and chatting in a dozen languages. grabbing those moments to yourself, remembering - for all it frustrates you - where you live and the beauty of it that people simply cannot detract from.
then its worth it.
somehow i managed to get up and clean my place this morning and pack and make it to work with the regular convoy. sometimes my resilience impresses even me... that doesn't mean that i am being particularly productive or with it, thank goodness its thursday and the israeli's decided that they're closing erez early and i have to leave in 30minutes!
anyway, in the course of cleaning up i put some ripe bananas into a bag to put in the freezer (to make banana bread next week) and discovered that some genius had put two beers in the freezer last night to cool them...
this is beyond me, as there was still two sixpacks of beer in the fridge this morning... anyway, they had of course exploded (only slightly, more of sort of oozed out from under the bottle tops.) so i stuck in the sink to deal with.
5minutes later they started fizzing! so here i am in my dazed and fragile state, fighting with the bottle opener to try and open the frozen bottles of beer at bloody 0630hrs... my fingers were frozen at the end of the ordeal. but, the bottles sat in the sink and happily fizzed over... the smell of beer that early in the morning, however, is not so appetising. I think the worst was that i couldn't just pour them out because they were frozen solid.
so yes, keep an eye on house guests and don't let them put beers into the freezer - bad idea!
its my birthday. and that fucking rocks. and yes, its almost midnight and yes this is a gaza party into my bday celebrations. and eric made it in - which is a great bday present in and of itself - and we had a good gathering. lots of people from all sorts of agencies and ngos - the diversity made me feel special and good.
the comgen brought me a present. an the best part of it was the wine cover which was shaped as a francescian monk. maybe wehen i have my mobility back tmrw i will take a picture... you have no idea how long these six lines hvae taken - several bottles of wine and champagne later... good gaza style bday celebrations. i can still mostly spell...
so yes, franscian monk wine cover pciture tmrw... ookay. wilco. and maybe bed time. but i had a fuckin' awsome bday. i love everyone who wished me a happy bday and spent the evening drinking with me. and travelled through erez to drink with me - if you've ever travellled through erez you'd appreciate it too..
and everyone in general who wished me a good year, thank you.
i've mostly booked my italy trip. its been a while since i did a real holiday, with actual preparation and leg work. its kind of nice. the anticipation heightens everything, rome better not suck after this!
times are changing, another icrc friend is leaving. he has 6 weeks off and then he's off to iraq, i don't envy him that but he seems content enough with it. i suppose after congo, sudan, chad, somalia that even iraq is not that bad.
there is something wrong with my washing machine and it makes it sound like the entire apartment is about to fall out the side of the building... its vaugely alarming but at least i've gotten used to it, i can only imagine what the neighbours think.
i missed eurovision again. i'm sad about that. its silly, frivolous fun. i miss that - no, what i really miss is dancing around k's living room doing our own impressions of the songs... omg that was ridiculously funny.
and yes, this is an odd conglomoration of thoughts. my mind is all over the board, i think its kind of a reflection of my life right now. or maybe my life is a reflection of that... i'm still working that out. its all over the board but its not working too clearly. spot the difference.
so, its london next weekend, then rome, florence, paris and london again, big bday bash second week of june (i know its late, long story), then it looks like bahrain the third weekend in june, milan the first week of july for the snow patrol-U2 concert, then our crazy european adventure last week of july/first week of august. then i'll have to find something for the end of august (stockholm maybe?), and something for september, hmm....
and somewhere in there i have to figure out where i am going next. pack up my stuff and move on... argh, how i hate packing and un-packing. lame.
my tagline (sometimes home is just a feeling) has never been so true. i am so ready to leave. and yet there are moments that make me doubt my choices and decision. there are some really good people here, and i really hate to leave them.
it makes me question my decision to even look at hq positions over field ones. will i even work in an hq position? do i understand anything other than being in the field? i crave the slice of civilisation that comes with an hq posting, but am i ruined forever? thats what they say. once you live in the field thats it. and i have certainly lived in the field.
its odd, how you can sit on the roof and look out for miles. and in your head, you could be anywhere, any developing nation. but its the naval gunfire, and the responding hmgfire that tips you off. i love this place and i hate it. i love the people and they frustrate me immensly. i have grown so much, and at times i fear who i have become.
and somehow, after this, i have to make my way in the world. its scary. they say you can't have ptsd if you understand and recognise the symptoms within youself. sometimes i think that course was the best and worst decision i made of grad school.
this place, it ingrains itself in you. it integrates into your psyche. i will leave, but i will never really be gone, that is the truth of a posting in gaza. its not what you need to bring with you, but what you have to be prepared to leave behind when you go.
this hasn't quite been the week from hell. its just been long. each morning i have woken up hoping that its at least one day later in the week - preferably the end of the week! its been a week that i have just sort of had to drag myself through....
and guess that sort of frustrates me, because i don't want to just drag through weeks, i want to live them. there is nothing fun in just getting from point a to point b, which is how i feel right now. its supposed to be everything in between that is the good part.
but honestly? the thing getting me through the week is knowing that in two weeks i will be on a plane heading back to london for a weekend that can't possibly be anything but wonderful! and then a week in rome, which, if my sister and i don't kill each on the train journey over, will be amazing!
yes, there is something so supremely civilised about train travel through europe. i have not partaken of too much of it, but i am so looking forward to it :)
so yes, i will drag myself through tomorrow. with the goal of making to tomorrow night. of dinner and friends, drinks and karaoke. and then a weekend of sleeping and watching the season finales of all my tv shows (its the small things in life). and then a mildly manageable week (as my boss is on leave), a week that involves trips to the gym each evening!
a weekend out to celebrate my bday with people i haven't seen in ages and miss. a short four day week, filled with the trepidation of upcoming travel. i don't care how much you travel, or how jaded it becomes, there is always that feeling in the pit of your stomach before the plan takes off.
it doesn't matter if you've been there a hundred times before or its a new adventure, there are always those butterflies of not knowing whats coming, but knowing that no matter what it is, good or bad, it will be some kind of adventure, something to be relished. i like that feeling. i miss it.
its amazing how after a relatively awful day an evening with your people can make all the difference. chilling over dinner and a glass of wine - going to bed with a full belly and a mind at ease. it helps like you would not believe.
i am beginning to remember how i managed to survive college, and it was because of the same thing. going home to a glass of wine and dinner and dissecting the day with my roommates.
all of a sudden everything seems so much more manageable. lets hope that the feeling lasts until tomorrow...
in this madcap world, its nice to find a kindred soul. and, oddly enough, when you feel you are most surrounded by them they can actually be so very, very far away.
this weekend was madness personified, and sadly enough oh so routine. we showed up at the border at 0800hrs - when its supposed to open - and we were patient until 0845hrs. then we had kind of had enough. remember, friday is my saturday, so having to get up at 0730hrs to get to the crossing by 0800 (after a rather raucous thursday thai night was quite and undertaking).
but, what are our inquiries greeted with? the dog is not feeling well. no, you would not be wrong to mistake this for some kind of code. this means the explosive sniffing dog that sniffs all vehicles leaving gaza. they are really lovely dogs, a gorgous fluffy german shepherd named dog (it apprently means something else in hebrew) and a lovely belgian shepherd name fish (still no explanation to this, but maybe i misunderstood his handler). needless to say the dogs are the only decent part of crossing out.
any way, the dog is not feeling well is a code of sorts. it means his handler had a hell of thursday night out and can't be bothered to come into work because he's hung over. who can blame him? its saturday afterall. but then don't bloody well official post your 'international border crossing hours' as 0800-1400hrs. no, i was not a happy camper.
but, i got to have a lovely cream cheese smothered bagel and discuss ridiculous things with unexpected people - who would have thought that a rough and tumble eod aussie would have an appreciation for classic musicals - and be able to relate stories of having seen hugh jackman as the lead in oklahoma? people never cease to amaze me...
anyway, shopping was done, i have fresh dairy and broccoli and tofu! and a big thing of ketchup for the front office. apparently they have run out in gaza. yes, i know its selfish, but you can only control what you can control, and at least my immediate colleagues can have ketchup iwth their chips. its the small things in life.
and then yesterday was sheer bliss. i spent decadent hours curled up on my couch watching my tv shows and reading. i love saturdays like that. and then it was 4 hours of volleyball. i was once again recruited to icrc, and amazingly enough, didn't totally embaress myself! but, my wrists are literally black and blue today... whoops.
and today. my clue of how today was going to fare should have been the wake-up serenade of the idf navy shelling the coastline. i mean, really, when you wake up to naval shelling, how good is the day honestly going to get?
