The World According to Abufares of Tartous

Tartous , the dreamy little town by the sea is no more. It has physically mutated over the last three decades into a pathetic jungle of concrete. Moreover, on the social and cultural levels, the sweeping changes have been more colossal. By and large, we are no longer the cheerful seculars, open-minded Mediterraneans, provincial-metropolitans and discoverers-adapters of colorful ways of life. We were a unique and distinct group, transcending socioeconomic lines, facing the mysterious sea and always seeking the exotic delights lying beyond. We grew up in a Joie de Vivre ambiance unhindered by class, free of political guilt and insouciant to mass religious indoctrination. We heard the politicians and preachers like everybody else but we never listened to them. We lived and let live on the most basic human level, unshielded, unconcerned and unprepared to come face to face with overwhelming political hysteria and collective religious zealotry. So it came about that I belong to the last gen

I shot this clip at an art exhibition in Venice, Italy during my visit of June 07. I don't remember the name of the artist who designed the manikin ( one of many each doing a senseless act over and over again ). However, this one striked me the most. It did not move me at all. It stopped me in my track.

Being the simple man I gladly admit to be, I would like to write about one of my benign pleasures. I want to start from the very beginning. Prior to my “arguably” early infatuation with the Big 3 ( the Tic, the Tac and the Toc ) and even before I started dreaming of Flying, motorcycles captivated me with an inextinguishable ardor, an abundance of exhilaration, an irresistible sense of independence and an absolute, unlimited, unending rush of private freedom. It would be totally inaccurate to write that I grew up around motorcycles. Not a single person in my entire family had owned or ever ridden a motorbike. However, I did find my way to be on or around them very early on. One of the unsolved riddles of my childhood is the way my father and mother had let me made these radical choices, totally ignoring complaints and consternation of the omnipresent extended family. I was the blackest of black sheep, and in a way, I still am. Amongst my earliest auditory memories is the whining

I’ve been away. I haven’t deserted my blog for such length ever since its conception. As a matter of fact I haven’t been away from a PC for over a week since 1993. I have a good alibi though, I was on vacation. For the first time in over three years, Om Fares , the kids and I all went on vacation together. We left Tartous on the morning of Thursday the 2nd and headed to the port of Lattakia . There, we boarded a ferry boat and sailed away to Mersin, Turkey . It took the 270-passenger catamaran a little bit under four hours to cross the 95 nautical miles. Come early evening, we were riding in Ugur’ s taxi to the Hilton in the quiet Mediterranean city ( Ugur is the Cabby’s name, and since I like to put a name on a face, " what is your name?" was my first question on my first time visit to Turkey). While waiting in the modest passenger terminal at the port of Lattakia I was taking in phone calls from the office. There was one more important email I needed to reply to. Muc