You've Got My Heart In A Headlock

I need to update this more, details leave me each day.

I went to Bath 2 weeks ago. Habeeb, Maria, and me, and it was madness. Initially, a touch dull not to mention expensive (40something pounds just train!) but it really ended up being a lot of fun. Glorious just running through streets, laughing as we get lost and get ripped off at really terrible museums- and then just stumbling along the way (oftentimes, literally). I saw one of Jane Austen's houses. Maria kept pausing for pictures, and the town is on a hill of some sort, so walking is like walking continuosly on an incline. Tiring faster than you realize. The coutryside around the town looks like Switzerland. I'm really grateful we didn't do a structured tour of any sort. I think you miss a lot when you don't have the freedom to stumble and find your own way.

I talked with Manna and Soriya until 5:30 in the morning last weekend. I wish I'd known that although they're cool, they're not that infinitely cool that they always have something to do - I wish I'd known that long before because I loved their company. I don't think I've ever been so entertained so late at night acting out scenes, lol. Soriya, I hope, will get married and start a family when she meets the right guy. Sometimes you just meet people who make glorious wives and mothers, and I think she would. As well as her education, I just think she would be wonderful at it. Manna, I have a feeling, won't settle down for a very long time. She'll travel, go through some more cynical years, and then hopefully find satisfaction. Liberation. Truly a citizen of the world if I'd ever met one. It's funny when simple characteristics of people are the one's you remember and adore. I love that I never need to worry about her, be it in a crowd, or a rush. She'll find you, that independence, maturity really, is extraordinay to me. Hopefully I'll be there soon, too.

Manna, Soriya, Farwa and I went to a protest against Israel's actions in Lebanon this past weekend. It was absolutely massive! Considering the night before we'd stayed up so late, it was more than a little painful to wake up early for it, but I'm more than a little grateful that we went. The drums, and the chants, and the collective voices- there were moments when it became bigger than all of us, you felt truly part of a living, breathing collective. It was hot, and more than 100,000 people came together - it was massive. So many different people, different races and cultures- all united against injustice and inhumanity.

The Wind That Shakes The Barley - flawless. Glorious film. Easily one of the best films I've seen in the past few years. Cillian Murphy is going to be offering brilliance in films for a long time, I imagine. I thought it was a singular portrayal of the Irish Republican movement.

I'm going to miss Farwa. It's not just having a good time with her that's made me realize that, but I feel as if I've found someone that truly.. is the depth and humanity and breadth that I've always been searching for in a friend. I've rarely enjoyed talking literature with anyone as much as her. She's got so much to offer, too.. immense capacity for compassion and insight. I hold a number of people dear to me, but her, she is one I admire. If I lose contact with her.. I won't. I can't. And someday soon, I hope we can take that glorious trip into obscure regions of China. It'd be like nothing else.

Went to dinner with Habeeb, Nikolai, Farwa, and Niko's friend Carlos last night. We were intending to go to a play, but since we were late, there was a Chinese restaurant down the street and it was wonderful. I'm going to miss those small little occurrences more, dinner and good conversation in an obscure cafe in the middle of London. Some of the greatest insights, funniest moments, and glorious occurrences of disconnect- then and there.

"I can't do the walk, I can't do the talk, I can't be your friend, Unless I pretend.. So give me the song and I'll sing it like I mean it, Give me the words and I'll say them like I mean it..."