As soon as I sat on the helicopter, the pilot charged over and shoved a floatation device over my head and strapped it around my waist. He didn’t ask if he could touch me, but perhaps this is an airborne allowance which is universal? Needless to say, he pointed at me and said “It would be nice to not use this but you never know. Thank you. May I take a photo?”

Way to infuse my morning with a little sunshine, Mr. Pilot.

*****

Because I’m a tool, I made the mistake of wearing Strawberry Body Lotion en route between Beirut & Dubai. Everyone but yours truly knows not to do this in the heat and humidity of these countries.

Why?

Because your constant companions are flies and mosquitoes, who are drawn to the scent of product.

I was walking around like an open can of strawberry jam, swatting away the world’s stickiest frigging flies and mosquitoes, neither of which were the least bit put off by my very obvious distaste for them.

Sitting with the former Swedish Ambassador to Ryadh, he was talking calmly while I was swatting and spinning and very nearly falling off my stool trying to get the flies off me. At one point, he stopped in mid sentence and asked “what are you doing?”
“FLIES & MOSQUITOES.”
“Where?”
“HERE! ALL OVER ME.”
“Right. Ok. *beat:silence* So tell me again, Maha, why is it that Canada decided to so blindly support Israel?”
“Oh my GOD. What do you mean you can’t FEEL THE FLIES?”

…for an otherwise intelligent girl, I made certain to completely under represent Canada. Eventually, he stopped talking and just stared at me as I did the wild dance of Swat.

*****

While in Larnaca, I desperately wanted to speak to my best friend.

With flies around my head, I stood staring sadly at the telephone machines that had refused the advances of my just purchased phone cards. ’But the girl who sold these to me promised me I could call Canada,’ I thought. Not so, she exclaimed when I went back to tell her; “I no tell you call Canada”, she said and refused to make eye contact.

I was standing in front of an Orthodox Priest when I mumbled “You’re lying. And liars go to hell, isn’t that so, padre?”
“We can’t tell who goes to hell or heaven, child. Except all Muslims, Jews, Roman Catholics, Protestants, Lutherans, Buddhists, Taoists, fornicators and pedophiles. Oh! Hookers, too.”

And with my defunct calling cards in hand, I walked out of the hell hole that is a store and I made the following sign in protest: I BOYCOTT YOU

And stood holding it over my head for half an hour before I decided to leave, me and my flies.

*****

To cool off, I went to the washroom to splash cold water on my face.

I have a few questions about the toilettes:
(1) Why aren’t they air conditioned, when they’re the one place where you’re negotiating life or death between bags, toilette seats, dirty floors, and wiping your bottom (I mean, really)?

If there is one place that should be air conditioned, it’s the place where you’re trying to pull off your pants while not touching anything that’s within cm of your body.

(2) Why don’t people flush?
You don’t need a high IQ to reach out and flush the fkn toilette, so why don’t you? Is this a game? Do you people hide behind other stalls cackling when someone is forced to walk into a toilette which you haven’t flushed?

(3) How can you miss the gigantic hole that serves to swallow your pee?
I will never understand how it is that women miss the hole in which they’re supposed to plant their arse and wee. HOW DOES YOUR PEE LAND ON THE TOILETTE SEAT? And why don’t you take a small piece of tissue and clean it?

No matter what kind of poor hand/eye coordination you may have, that doesn’t account for missing the toilette seat.

All this to say that I was in a pouty mood while en route between Larnaca and Dubai. And…I’m looking forward to getting back to Ottawa.

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