Elshähabi Memorandum 05: What Morad Ate

Thankful is what I feel.
It is the first day in Phnom Penh. In our nice but cheap hotel, we could have breakfast and then a relaxed swim in the rooftop swimming pool with a great view over the city. I must admit, this was a luxury that I really enjoyed. It is always the same thought that comes to my mind: “Why don’t I do this more often?”. I have always waited for such trips when I had more time. More than a week off. So that it is “worth it”. These places are far and the flight tickets are not cheap. However, even if it was just a week, it is definitely worth it. Traveling is for me one of the most important investments. It is not only the knowledge, meeting new people or widening one’s horizon. It is the psychological health that results from unplugging yourself, going somewhere far and reordering your life.

Since I have been to Phnom Penh before, we decided to split and have parallel programs for the first part of the day. Morad went to check the Genocide Museum and I went to some cafe to get some things done.
I walked to the cafe. Reliving and experiencing the package of a third world country.. heat, humidity, smell of sewage leaks, bad infrastructure, dirt and garbage. However, i was in a good mood. Almost everyone I passed by or had eye contact with was smiling. Cambodian people (Khmer) are some of my favorite. I got lost, which is one of my hobbies during traveling. I slowed down, and started observing the scenes around me.
A cart full of durian.. around it 3 young men lying on different chairs in positions and using their smartphones.. A man carrying a stick on his shoulder. From each end of the stick hangs a basket with home made bakery that he is selling. He walked around and eye-contacted me without hope that I buy from him. Another guy riding a bicycle that is somehow also his food stall. One cooked chicken was hanging in the air beside his shoulder and shaking comically as he rode on the bumpy road. On its side was what seemed like a bunch of animal intestine that also was shaking. This is not very erotic.
A scene that accompanied us the whole day was seeing men rolling their shirts up and exposing their bellies. Today alone we saw 6 or 7 people doing this. It is hot and I assume they did this to ventilate their bellies :D. Well, these were not six packs.
I finally arrived to the cafe and rested there I met Morad again. He was shocked. Here is his narrative:

“Waking up in a large bed was a joy I missed for the previous two nights, where I could only fit in the entire room in a very specific spot! I might be, as Adham reckons, a spoiled traveler. Particularly when it comes to accommodation. Find a comfortable place to sleep so that you have plenty of your energy and time for activities.

We have different programs for the morning, Adham will do his thing and be reflective and deep. He loves people! almost all of them likes to get to know them and learn from them.
I went to the museum of genocide, a short background, in the 70s, a political group took over Cambodia and anyone who was educated or smart was considered an enemy. The highschool building, turned prison, now the museum, is the place where tourture and killing. It’s one of the most heart wrenching places I’ve been to. Very grimm and sad. Some visitors would pause and cry from what see and hear.

Walking to and from the museum to meet Adham was fun. Batteling the suffocating humidity, I noticed many similarities to Egypt. It’s hot, dirty and loud. People are very kind here. They smile at me, or laugh together at me. A large person walking their street, some even invited me inside (to do what!! :D) others just touched me with curiosity. Being a big man means you are rarely unnoticeable here.
My long walk ended what seemed like a “local Starbucks”, where I met Adham.
“

We relaxed from the hot and humid. A couple of chess games and then a few hours of walking.. to the central market which is just a market with many stalls.. and then the phnom penh riverside. Morad decided to indulge his tastebuds with a few disgusting things. On a cart in the street, there were heaps of fried spiders, bugs, crickets, worms, lizards.. yuk.. He bought a sorted collection of ugly delicacies and we found a place to sit where he can try the taste of each muddafukka.

On the riverside, were some park with gym devices where the public could go and do some exercise. There were many families on the riverside making picnics and having a relaxed time. There was also this woman that was doing a mysterious kind of exercise.

We had a very non local burger before catching our bus to Siem Reap. There the manager was Daniel, a swiss who wanted to travel/stay here for one year and ended up staying for 8 years. We talked a lot about Switzerland and Europe. He gave me also a few advices for the Cambodia trip. I took a super fast Tuk-tuk to the bus station while Morad picked the luggage from the hotel and met me there. We are going to take the sleeping-bus to Siem Reap overnight for 6 hours.

Elshähabi Memorandum 04: Hello Cambodia!

“Adham, wake up! Let’s go to the cable car”.. Morad and I got ready quickly before 9 and went to the street to look for a quick breakfast, checked out and went on our way to the cable car and Big Buddha, or namely Ngong Ping and Tian Tan :). It was a long ride with the Metro and then a long queue waiting for the tickets. When Morad gets bored waiting, he starts punching me in the back. He is passionate about boxing. This was an ice breaker for two american guys in the line, James and Dani, we started chatting.
The cable car ride was gorgeous. Around 25 minutes to the hills where the big Buddha sits 😀 I have a photo from the internet for you since we don’t have any better.

Stolen from the internet. It was a bit cloudy bit still gorgeous

In the hill, we met James and Dani again by accident. They are friends since 45 years and now they are traveling together. They stopped here on the way to Bali. James is married to another man since 28 years. They live in NYC and we had such a short but nice encounter. We exchanged contacts. It is a pity that afterwards we fly out.

Dani, Morad, James and Adham

We didn’t have much time to go up and say hi to big Buddha.. instead, we took somephotos and headed back to the cable car, experienced more rudeness from some taxi drivers and then took the bus to the airport. It was all last minute that we had to run in the airport to catch the flight. We made it to the gate a few minutes before the scheduled take off. Then the plane was delayed on the runway for 45 minutes. Normal, no?

It is the national cambodian Lanmei. Morad asked me if it was something like Ryanair since they didn’t serve us even a glass of water in more than two hours. The crew was very nice though. We tried to catch some sleep and landed nicely in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. My memories from 4 years ago were that it is a very poor country. Most of the smart people were killed by the Khmer rouge in the 1990s. A couple of MILLION people were executed. A sad story that still lives in the lives of many cambodians.
Crossing the borders was smooth, the airport surprised me by having some really beautiful and modern corners. A taxi ride to our hotel costed $15. On the way you could see minor girls riding motorbikes and seemed to be discussing their nail polish. Put your eyes on the road, girl!!
It was a huge contrast between Hong Kong people and Cambodians. Even after few encounters, the people in Cambodia were so polite, so friendly and nice. The taxi driver was very nice and we cracked a couple of jokes and laughed together. The hotel is cheap and great. We sat on the skybar on the roof for a couple of chess games and nice drinks. A few european chicks are also in the hotel but nothing good enough to mobilise our flirting tricks and put them into action. Tomorrow will be a relaxing day for me and maybe more discovery for Morad.

Cambodia is a Kingdom. Its people are Khmer. Which is the ethnicity of around 97% of the people. They are mostly buddhist. The Khmer language is “The language with the most letters is Khmer (Cambodian), with 74 (including some without any current use). According to Guinness Book of World Records, 1995, the Khmer alphabet is the largest alphabet in the world. It consists of 33 consonants, 23 vowels and 12 independent vowels.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khmer_alphabet
In the next few days, I shall try to learn these letters or at least to write my name in Khmer.

Buonanotte

  • With Big Buddhaaa
  • Hong Kong Airport

Elshähabi Memorandum 03: Where are the manners?

A bad sleep, we needed coffee. In a local restaurant we got some bakery and toasts. Locals were having the same food they would have for lunch or dinner. It is just the same food and they ate it anytime. Or so it seemed. After breakfast we went to look for coffee 😀 it seems that we repeat meals twice in a conflict between trying the local food and getting satisfied with meals.
A long walk, a ferry ride to another island, a stroll in the turtle-shaped convention center, going to Ocean’s Park but not going inside because it is too expensive and not worth it, going to Stanely market and finding it disappointing, Morad wanting to try snake soup but the shop was closed, Tattoo art gallery that was supposed to be open from 6 to 8 but the gallery itself closes at 7, a Jazz bar that was too loud and crowded for a pleasant experience. It was a day full of us trying to do things and not getting the destinations reached.. however, the journey was more interesting.. Our walks to these places exposed us to many small new things dispersed here and there. Alongside a lot of time for talking. Today, Morad and I had a loooooot of conversations. I am writing this post now at 1:30 after a long conversation for the past two hours or more. We discussed our perspectives on love and relationships, on different countries and cultures we have been exposed to and about different plans and dreams.

Hong Kong with the turtle-shaped Convention Center
Morad showing his not-so-special plastic bag
Waiting for Morad to use the toilette in a cultural center

It has been only three days.. but somehow it is tiring that in general, the interactions with the locals here have been deprived of manners. No greetings, and if we start, they are rarely responded to. Same with a friendly smile. It is as if we are two different species or two different “things”. Well, actually as Morad says, by observing them with each other, this seems to be a cultural thing.. people bump into each other in the crowded subway and then separate again without any words of pardon or sorry. Like particles bombarding around and separating to go into their ways again. Somehow this lack of beauty in human interaction dries my soul. I realised again how important eye-contact is to me. The little decorations of our days in form of “good morning”, “thank you”, “have a nice day”, and “good luck”. We had many transactions here but most of them were dry and forgettable. Well, we discussed this manner with Vincent and Cheng a couple of nights ago, do men and women flirt in the street or approach each other? the answer was No. This is highly unlikely and it is not in the culture. You never talk to people who are not your friends or acquaintances. Everybody is focused on their way or their phone. Morad wondered why is the body language so minimal? Could it be the that the language is so strong that they need little support of hand or body gestures?
Meanwhile, we saw an italian girl talking in the phone facing the door of the subway. She was talking to her friends and seeing her reflections and using a full-programmed body language that you would think her friend is running outside the subway (dangerous! nobody does that). We still have a few days in Asia.. let’s see how our impressions will develop.

There is a certain charm in signs in a new country. Morad is photographing many of them. In particular we found this sign “no spitting” at the elevator. I find it interesting when there are many other sections in two languages but the “no spitting” part is also specially written in Urdu. Directed message?

Mama, where is dad? he is in jail for not buckling up in the bus:

hmm.. 

Tomorrow we fly to Cambodia, it is my second visit. I plan to revisit a couple of things and discover new things with Morad. I never thought I would visit Cambodia again.. but here we are, four years later! You can relive my last Asia trip in 2014 through this link: http://adham.elshahabi.com/blog/category/travel-diaries/asia-2014/

Here are some of the photos that Morad took. He posts most of the pictures in his instagram stories:
https://www.instagram.com/moradsays/

Elshähabi Memorandum 02: Fish Lips

Landed in Hong Kong after a looong trip. Globalisation makes many airports look similar. While other passengers crossed the immigration smoothly and quickly, we had our “you-are-an-arab” welcome by having the officers close their offices and accompany us another area that seemed reserved for passengers with different shades of brown-skin. Nonetheless, the officers were extremely polite. We had to wait a bit while they checked all the documents and prepared what seemed to be the smallest Visa/entry permit in the world. Morad busied himself with tinder during our waiting. I sat beside him observing his swiping finger that moved to the left in a semi-automatic movement. Welcome to Asia! Left.. left.. left.. Seemed like he was swiping with the same girl to the left in different outfits.

Permit to enter Hong Kong

We checked in our hotel in the 28th floor. We hurried up downstairs (:D) to meet Morad’s friend Nelson who flew from Taiwan to meet us. They first met in Taiwan in 2011 and then a couple of times in Europe. Nelson brought his friend Cheng who met his own friend Vincent in the street and brought him along. After greetings and introductions they took us to a restaurant in the 7th floor in some building. We would have never been in such a place using tripadvisor.
Nice conversations over dinner. Nelson is passionate about aviation, Vincent about animals and Cheng about life. They explained to us a lot of things about Hong Kong and Taiwan, the differences with China and some cultural aspects about life and love. The food was delicious, specially a fish cooked with sweet and sour sauce. The table had also shrimps, duck, chicken, jellyfish and shark fins soup (!) which seemed like a celebration of human domination of other earth animals. Check this video 😀

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctPdITtFXFE
Vincent, Cheng, Morad, Adham and Nelson
Vincent, Morad, Adham, Nelson and Cheng 😀

After dinner, we bid the guys farewell, went to the hotel bar for a drink and chess and a happy night sleep.

Good morning, it is the 11th of October. We woke up and saw the view. Hong Kong downtown is composed of many thin and tall buildings. Like a pack of toothpicks. We found a place for breakfast and got an unusual combination of eggs, chicken breasts and toast plus the coffee that was unexpectedly good. After a short stroll around the city we went to meet Nelson again. This time he introduced us to Saravanan from Malaysia who introduced us all to Marco (from Taiwan). They both work in Cathy Pacific Airlines as flight attendants. They have planed to takes us to eat a local food called “Dim Sum”. Since Morad and I don’t eat Pork, they figured out that a good place for us to try the local food was the a local Mosque :D. We loved how these guys just took us where we can eat even without asking us about our preferences or if it was ok for us. Relaxingly rightly assuming trust. Again, great food with great people. We were exposed to fun stories from the lives of flight attendants as well as hearing about different aspects of living in Hong Kong as a foreigner.
After lunch and a stroll, Nelson took us with the bus to The Peak. A small shopping mall on top of a hill overlooking the islands with a great view over most of Hong Kong. Nelson works in a pharmacy that belongs to his family and is a very relaxed and smart guy. Warm-hearted. I found it entertaining that he met his girlfriend in a bread-baking course 😀 he has now a basic license to make bread. Cool, no?

The view from The Peak, one of these buildings was our hotel.

Nelson had to catch his flight back, we had to change the hotel. After staying the first night in a fancy hotel we moved to a much much much less fancy guest house. The fun started by the comic creature which I believe was a woman at the checkin desk. (S)he communicated to us that we will be sharing a 130 cm bed and that this is a “Standard double room” that we booked. Her not so enthusiastic assistent took us to the room that is probably the smallest room I have ever seen in my life. Morad could touch two opposing walls while standing in the middle. However, the room had an airconditioning, a fan, a hair dryer, a fridge, a small bathroom and even a clock (that does not work). Morad said that we will manage somehow!

Morad is excited about the room

It is dinner time and Morad wants to try exotic food! We walked to the Temple street where you find many stalls for handcraft and very dirty looking restaurants. I bought a new chess set (I collect those) and we chose a restaurant dirty enough to feel the local experience. We tried to chose the table but the old Hong Kongi (or Hongi) lady insisted we sit in a particular table. No problem. Morad ordered fried frog legs. I ordered Fish lips Congee (which is like a soup) or something. Us pointing at the english name of the order was the last of our meaningful communication in that place. The followup questions where not possible to understand nor to seek further explanations in sign language. Morad said “Well, whatever will come, we will eat it. Probably we will never know what we ate anyway”. Indeed, came the first dish, we were not sure if it was the fish lips since I imagined a bowl of lips ready to kiss. What came instead was one big fish head with some skull parts and some soft parts. At the beginning we couldn’t tell it was a fish. Morad thought it was the frog. It didn’t make since since there was one hard shell of bone which couldn’t fit any anatomical part of a frog. Unless it was the shoulder plate of some huge frog which I wouldn’t guess it lives in China :D. The second dish came and it was obvious that it is some creatures legs. So everything was sorted. It was delicious. Not as froggy as it sounds. We ate this strange combination, paid, and left to look for a real dinner 😀

 L

Vincent has told me that foot massage is something there. I should be looking for a foot logo. If the foot logo has a smily, that means you can get some sexual massage as well. We went for the non-smily foot, well plus the head, which turned to be a great relaxing and sometimes painful experience. After the massage I felt somehow strange and wondered if the masseur used some reflexology secret tricks to change who I am and play in my personality. I was nonetheless relaxed.

We decided to end the day in a steak restaurant. It was a much earned end for the day. I ordered a mix grill which included beef, a prawn and a pigeon, extending the list of my consumed animals in the last 24 hours.

Now we are both in the room preparing to sleep in the 130cm bed and looking for accommodations in the next days with an eye more attentive to details!

Elshähabi Memorandum 01: Hitting the road

I didn’t know the word “Memorandum”. Morad suggested it as a title for our travel diary. He likes fancy words!

Hit the road jack! It is us, Adham ElshAhabi and Morad ElshEhabi. Brothers with slightly different last names thanks to some clerk making passports and deciding the spelling in Egypt. Morad and I have traveled often together. Sometimes just us and often with other friends. Now we are set on a further and bigger adventure together in new lands. Here, I will be writing about our times together. Events, places, people, and conversations. Morad and I are very close but veeeerrrrry different. This trip is probably going to be a theater for these differences at play. Observing different events and sharing our widely different perspectives on life and living.

It all starts as usual, minimal packing while discussing two ways of doing the same thing. Morad loves standards. He wants to follow the state of the art in everything he does. He seeks to know the “rules” and use them to excel.
I hate rules! well, not true. I like rules. I hate to follow them. I don’t trust the “best way” of doing anything. I have, Morad agrees, the constant delusion that I could find a new better way of doing things.
The train to Frankfurt and many games of chess where Morad enjoys a higher percentage of winnings. He likes to refer to Bernouli’s law of large numbers. Which states that more times you repeat an event, the higher the probability to get a representing statistics of its different outcomes. He often wins and often shouts “Bernoooouuuli ya habibi”. He has read books about chess and its strategies. He is quiet didactic about it. I use more my gut feelings and unpredictability. Which often gets my king stranded on the board contemplating about the beginning of the chain of wrong decisions that let to his misery.

In Frankfurt, the Emirates flight was scheduled at 22:20 at night. The first leg is set to Dubai. Morad used his charm at the checkin counter to ask for more legroom. The lady behind the counter with exaggerated eyelashes moved things around and gave us the best seats in the economy section; at the emergency exit. While Morad says that this is one of the few times he flirts, I only saw him put a friendly smile! He didn’t really need more!

In the airplane we had a few hours of waiting. There is ice on the wings and somehow someone couldn’t manage to remove it. We won’t fly, they said. Then we will fly, they said. Then no.. really we won’t fly. It seems that a german official in the airport has given the permission to fly after 23:00 o’clock (which i came to know is the last time for takeoffs), and then revoked it! A huge plane with two decks had to go back to the terminal and all passengers need a hotel! Chaos! Emirates seems to have won “the best airline in the world” award. However, their on-the-ground management of this issue was disappointing. As if it happened for the first time and as if there were no protocols for such circumstances. Morad was out of glucose, I tried to convince him to consume a sugar bag that I have kept with me. He refused. He is very picky about how healthy everything should be. I am pickier about how tasty everything should be.

We spent the night in the Marriott and indulged in a long conversation over breakfast about the previous day. Emirates have rebooked our flight to 15:15 the next day which screwed up our Dubai plan. Originally we had around 12-hours transit and got Visas to check the city. Dubai scored 4th this year for the number of visitors worldwide. I guess we are not meant to increase the number. Well, as my mom always says, “Everything has its time, my son!”

Other than Morad, I have two companions in this trip, Jose Saramago with his book “Blindness” (thanks Merve for the gift!) and Daniel Kahneman with his book “Thinking fast and slow”. Morad reads “A Gentleman in Moscow” by Amor Towles and two audiobooks “The History of Jazz” and “Mind Gym”. As Morad says, It is holidays, with so little to do and all the time in the world to do it. This is what we will practice in our first destination, Hong Kong!

As We Leave The Shore


It is probably the way she shines..

Or the way I feel she’s mine..

The little shrug with one shoulder..

Or her smile..

At the sunflowers field..

Is it the bravery with which she sees the world?

Or her kindness..

And her muffins..

I felt her joy when she told me about the stars..

Where she belongs..

I wonder, how often can I fall in love?

One more time..

From the beginning..

Blow away the dust over your heart..

And be brave..

Surrender to her beautiful moments..

Drop the calculations..

There are no maps for love..

nor destinations..

Pack for the journey..

Get rid of expectations..

and your nihilism..

and sail!

Dysarthria


Gu gu gu..te- te- te- nnnnnn.. Mooooorgen.. doktor..
I am so glad you are here.. I have traveled long and have been waiting for an appointment..
I came here with fear.. I fear to stay the same.. With my thoughts just for me.. I fear to speak so slow, that no one wants to hear.. They all think I am fading.. my whole seems to disappear..
Year after year, I worked like a machine.. even when all retired.. I went on for 10 more winters.. I just couldn’t leave.. I could have gone to Cuba.. I could have sailed the seas.. I could have built a villa.. I could have.. i could have.. I could have..
Now I am stuck in myself.. with words as many as none.. I have lost the way to folks.. I have lost the meaning of all..
Please don’t think I am stupid.. the brain works faster than my tongue.. I used to scold the kids.. I used to sing and hum.. I used to do it all.. before my health was gone..
I know it is the end.. things won’t be the same.. I know the days are different.. that hope is rather lame.. I won’t ask for much.. it is little what I need.. I just would like a look.. of patience and of respect for whom I once was.. I will suffer, for sure, alone..
Acknowledgement would be fine..

Without a Smartphone

picture from https://domain.me/cant-imagine-day-without-smartphone-blame-dopamine/

My stepping out of the smartphone world was not intentional. Having accidentally killed my iPhone 4s by forcing it to learn swimming with me in the pacific ocean, I was left off the grid. A new iPhone was out of my budget and I didn’t like androids. I decided on a small call-or-text Samsung phone to bridge my downtime. Then life has changed!

This post is not to convince you to dump your phone. Rather a retrospective reflection on the past two and half years of smartphoneless life.

I do miss access to music whenever I want. An iPod shuffle partly solves the problem (thanks Christian). I do as well get lost a lot without google maps. However, two GPS devices (thanks Elke and Susanne) and asking beautiful ladies on the street eventually save the day. I do not have immediate access to google and consequently most of human knowledge. However, a set of Moleskin® notebooks (thanks Merve) are my usual company and capture most of my questions for a later google time. I can not check a restaurant, a book, a movie nor a product. Which is partly solved by asking people (Mostly they check their phones, thanks everyone!). More and more of things that I “miss” or do not have anymore.

However…

I grew to like this new life-style. I feel way more relaxed now than before.
When I had a smartphone, I checked it often. Facebook, instagram, twitter.. etc.. I had a constant nose in everybody’s life. I knew a lot about my friends and even people I didn’t care about. This was sometimes too fast that usually didn’t have enough time to emotionally process some events. A wedding in Italy, a friend’s mother in Egypt got cancer, a bomb in Belgium, etc.. Within minutes, my emotions were confused in a roller coaster. Needless to say that after a while, after knowing so many news too fast, you stop caring about all of them. They all become some post on your feed or a message in your inbox. Most of your connection with them is “reading” about them. I didn’t like this.. It reduced my daily experiences to a very minimal quality. And when I met the person that I read about him/her, I didn’t feel much. The first shock was absorbed by the crowded online input. I chose to reduce this to the couple of hours in the evening when I have access to the internet and social media.

When I am offline, I have more time to think, to reflect, and to be genuinely bored and left to myself. During my many years of smartphone use, I forgot how to deal with myself! The smartphone provided a constant escape from self. An easy distraction. Let me message him or her, let me check facebook, let me look at this or look at that. A constant seek for something to fill the void. After losing my smartphone, I had to re-learn dealing with boredom. I had to pickup the habit of thinking and daydreaming.. It is simply more time for me.. rather than looking at people’s lives or replying to their contact.
Besides, I have to memorise things now.. to calculate things.. to remember the road and directions.. these little cognitive tasks are very enjoyable for me..

This phase without a smartphone is very peaceful. I will probably get myself one in the future. But not now 🙂

Tell me all

Your photo of your candle

Shut down the world..
and sit here with me..
Only one candle..
One cup of tea..

Tell me all..
I am here to hear..
both your hope..
and biggest fear..

Take a sip..
then tell me more..
Start from the surface..
walk me to the core..

Spare no word..
I want to hear it all..
The day you hugged the world..
The day you let it fall..

Take another sip..
let me smell your hair..
let me see your smile..
revolt against the tear..

One last sip..
Have you finished your tea?
Put out the candle..
and make a wish to be..

For all our sorrows..
and all of our pain..
are lessons to remember..
and wisdom to obtain..