Category Archives: 20-Somethings

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Excavation of a 20-Something’s Bedroom

After rearranging the furniture during a recent fit of insomnia, my bedroom was a labyrinth that poked at my latent OCD that I had buried deep inside me along with my secret unexplained urge to want to pinch the ass of a nice car. A5s be fine. Anyway, like most humans, I tend to get too caught up in the everyday routine. By the time I get a moment of peace, I will rarely want to waste it organizing the chaos that I have come to call my sanctuary (Kudos if you read that in Quasimodo’s voice). Because tomorrow’s always a day away, I rather just shove it all aside so there’s enough room for me and my laptop to fall asleep. What can I say, we’re very close.


Eventually, the time comes when enough is enough. As I was digging through the rubble of the accumulated possessions, I realized that this process has a Time Capsule Effect. This only occurs when you really dig though, like when you’re moving to a new house or trying to find your Fifa World Cup Brazil scarf from ’98.

A time capsule, for those who are not familiar, is an activity usually reserved for high school reunions and other moments where one may want to literally dig up the past. Participants can place mementos, tapes, videos, etc in the time capsule which will then be buried or locked away only to be opened at a later date where everyone can share in the reminiscing. 


Oddly, no matter how many times you rummage through your belongings, there will always be remnants of a close friend or flame that are no longer a part of your life. There’s no shame in it, they were once important to you and for whatever reason – be it a fight, flight or just life – now they’re just somebody that you used to know. Maybe it’s a nice reminder, maybe it’s bittersweet, or maybe it sucks. Whatever it is, there they are again. These artifacts usually come in the form of old birthday cards/notes, dried flowers, photographs, or a keychain they got you when they went to Prague once. Disposal of such things is a personal choice. Getting rid of the material presence may help the emotional presence if needed. But not much. 

Speaking of keychains, that’s another thing: souvenirs. Shot glasses, snow globes, postcards, figurines, lighters, magnets, and other trinkets that you collected as you and people you know traveled the globe. A lot of these destinations will be places you’ve never been to and may never go to. Some will be places you mark as your next stop. Souvenirs have become the new I-thought-of-you-when-I-was-here instead of the Here’s-proof-I-was-there.

Another collection- syllabi of completed classes, old exams of dropped ones. Original copies of textbooks you swore you’d need as a reference at some point in your career only to come to find that you wouldn’t use them because:
1) they’re not up to date 
2) they’re still incomprehensible even after you graduated
3) the effort is futile, you’ll just google it
4) all of the above.
You rationalize that these will still be good references to have, buying them another couple of years on your shelf where they will collect dust and no resale value whatsoever. This is called guilt. It’s okay, we all paid $85 for a book we were too afraid to use a highlighter on. Just recycle it and stop hoarding.

As you continue your exploration, even Howard Carter wouldn’t be able to fathom why you still have notes from an elective you never liked. If you have already graduated, you will be looking at these and wondering how you ever survived a whole semester/quarter of that professor and her stories about waiting for food stamps during the Cold War or the other guy who always smelled like a cocktail of garlic and Nescafe. The best part of these notes though, will be the doodles and random scribbles that were added by classmates that you forgot you knew. Maybe you will look for them on LinkedIn just to see if they’re doing anything remotely rewarding now.

Old boxes for electronics you have already replaced, manuals you will never read and software you will never install. There’s probably a nylon bag of instructions in 4 languages for a printer that doesn’t work or is out of ink. It’s either sitting under your desk or in an electronics place in Dahieh as of 14 months ago. 


If you’re lucky, you’ll find a present that you have yet to have the chance to gift. It may be one of those just-in-case gifts you’re mom stocks up on or a gift you got someone while they were abroad. Sometimes, the latter may not get the chance to see the intended recipient because too much time will pass. You inherit a goody bag. That would explain a set of teaspoons, a candy-filled yoyo, a wooden model motorcycle, a phallic glass Eiffel of cognac, and a bar of honey soap shaped like a bee with a minijar of honey swiped from the table at that swanky cafe that had overpriced chocolat chaud.

Novels you haven’t had the chance to read, free samples of perfumes/colognes/creams, receipts from late nights at the Hamra pubs, one teddy bear, and a NY Yankees cap. All the little things that you cling to because “I might need this later”/”I can’t throw THAT away!” will be packed away only to be found on your next journey where you will say the same phrase and save it from the grasps of a sukleen truck or charity bin. 

Looking back is an interesting odyssey especially when you know what happened after those periods in your life. Sometimes, but not always, it is good to see what and who got you to the now. 

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7 Dilemmas of 20-Somethings

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1. You want to be independent. You want to be able to pay for everything on your own without your parents’ help. You want to sleep till 1pm and watch cartoons all Saturday afternoon with a bowl of Cheerios on your lap. Wait, what?

2. You want to be in a meaningful relationship with someone of substance. While in this age range of unstable uncertainty, you want to have your person, the one who gives you something concrete to hold on to. But you’re too young for that Grey’s Anatomy crap. You’re not going to officially commit to anyone or anything now, why risk getting hurt? 
3. You want to have a job and a bank account that has more than enough money to buy 6 meals at Burger King. You want to be able to abolish Mondays, vegetate through Tuesdays, see live band performances on Wednesdays, sleep off the hangover on Thursdays and go to the beach on any non-Sunday*. Your boss would love that.

4.  You want to graduate with honors/keep your scholarship/brag about your GPA on your resume. You want to be a beach bum in the middle of your finals because God decided now was a good time for the sun to laugh at your pale ass.

5. You want to get in shape for the rare moment that you might actually make it to the beach…on a Sunday. After all, you’re not a kid with magical metabolism anymore. Puberty isn’t going to make that jiggle disappear because you’re “shedding adolescent baby fat and growing into your body.” Now you have to work at it. You also like cheesecake. And BBQ Pringles. And Oreo Cakesters. Damn them.

6. You want to be taken seriously by parents, professors, and/or other professionals. You want to make “That’s What She Said” jokes until you’re 85.

7. You want to think rationally and have a plan. A 5-year one? A 5-month one? You want to be able to go to the ticketing counter and just go to any destination the bored employee randomly chooses because you’re young and spontaneous and you just CAN. You can’t afford to financially. Maybe in 5 years.

*Sunday is the official day off in Lebanon.

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Our Letter to Globalization


Dear Globalization,

You have caused me so much unneeded pain that I decided the best way to address them was through a letter for I cannot bear to speak to you face to face. As I spent my days drowning my sorrows in a coma-inducing feast, dipping my French fries into an Oreo McFlurry (which wouldn’t be available if it weren’t for you by the way) while Sarah McLachlan made my soul eat itself, I realized that you are the reason my life has become what it is now. You have taken everything from me. 
You are the reason I have so many online identities that even the CIA think my generation is eternally high for serving up so much personal information voluntarily. Perhaps cellular phones actually did damage the adolescent neurodevelopment of fetuses born in the 80s but I, like the rest of the cyberfolk, comply with Timelines and full digital biographies just because it is the way of the future. Your way.
You are the reason I have grown an extra appendage that keeps me connected to everyone at all times. I cannot part from it as if it were caught in the Peter Parker webs that grow from my wrists but are made of indestructible Admantium spider-silk. The little device that shares a spot near my bedside soothes my addiction to social networks that keep me in touch with people who I might have met once that time with those friends in that place. And it’s all your fault.
I have been separated from those I actually care for because they had to seek greener pastures elsewhere and they managed to do that in separate cities on separate continents for fluctuating periods of time. I’m a slave of messenger services and videochatting just to feel like my posse is still in my jurisdiction, let alone hemisphere, when in reality there is always someone sacrificing precious hours of sleep just to hear the other complain about how many hours of sleep they recently sacrificed.
That’s another thing: sleep. With the constant competitive race that I am in, always trying to be one step ahead just so I can get the career I deserve, it feels as though I am committing an adulterous affair every time I try to stealthily squeeze in an hour of pleasure: an hour of slumber that is. Don’t even get me started on romance. You need me to survive but give me nothing but loneliness in return. You should know that showering me with supersize meals and toffee nut lattes will never satisfy my hunger for intimacy. I put so much effort into what we are building together but all you do is take, take, take. I’m too young for anything serious with you, and yet, I’m too old to just be casual. But that is my relationship with you because you’re all I have left; I am trapped in isolated purgatory. You always motivated me to push for the top tier so I could move away and make millions just like everyone else in my little circle has done. However, I don’t want to play anymore. I’ve been doing this under the illusion that you are helping me because you want me to succeed. I was wrong. All you want is your own success; you want to take over the world and I’m just a pawn in your devious plan. Well, no more. You’ve taken everyone away and I want them back. I’m going to expose you for what you are: a multibillion dollar scam artist that braindrains my poor little microcosm of all its fine young talents under the guise of “opportunity” and “24/7 electricity”. Soon, the world will know what you’ve really been doing, not only to me, but to them as well.

We are so over,
Lebanese Twenty-Somethings