To Forgive

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Because we are more than our mistakes.

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OTHER POSTS BY NESSREEN:

Swimming.

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Sink or swim. Everybody needs friends to go swimming with. To remind them of the things that make them happy despite bad decisions, despite misfortune, despite turn of events. Some friends don't know how to swim, they just stay in the shallow end. Some are excellent swimmers and teach you how to swim or tread water in the deep end. Some sit by the pool and wait for you, or come and sit on the edge so, feet in the water, and chit-chat with you about video games while you enjoy the water on a hot day. Some tell you to pull up your bikini top. Some get competitive in the water and just want to race, and whoever wins or loses doesn't really matter, as long as they had that rush of competition. Friends bring their kids and trust you to look after them while they go change into their swimsuits. Some don't even swim, they just come over in their regular outfits to have a smoke and enjoy the weekend. With you. The stuff you will remember in the future. Swimming pools are a lot like...
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The Right Answer.

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Interesting thing happened to me today at the salon. So I go with friends to have things done at the salon we always go to, where most of the ladies are Filipinos. We've been going there for most of our nails and eyebrows for a while now, so the ladies know us, they know our stories, our backgrounds, etc. I'm always mistaken for a non-Filipino. Sometimes, Filipinos come up to me asking me where I'm from, because they kinda feel that I'm Filipino, but aren't so sure. Other times, they just assume I'm Saudi or Malay. That's when it's funny, because they start talking about me and I understand everything they say. ( I heart gossip. ) So this one customer, who was Filipina, starts gossiping about me and my friends. She was saying something about how "our kind" (Saudi girls) are too lazy to groom ourselves, how bratty we are, etc. The manicure lady shushes her quickly. "Shh, shh," she says. "This one's Filipina, no! She understan...
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Parents.

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It's never easy when parents die. For obvious reasons. They are the people closest to you; they know everything about you, and their love is unconditional. It's a big loss. There goes your comfort zone. Your safety net. Your Plan B. In our culture, being an "ulila", an "orphan", is something that all children are warned about. "Take care of your parents, because if you don't, you will lose them, and when you lose them, everyone will walk all over you." Parents protect you. It's even harder when your parents are dying. To witness their pain. To be helpless. To want to protect them in return and yet be unable to. My condolences to anyone and everyone who has lost a parent. Especially to those who are far from their parents, who have no means of closing that gap and paying their last respects to the people who raised them. My condolences to my brother Z, who was raised by my grandmother, who is devastated by this feeling of helplessness. My co...
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Fear vs Faith

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We don't always know where our faith lies. Or even what it looks like. Or if it's ever enough to sustain us. We stumble around in our meaningless existence, with our gadgets and that endless babble of apps running in the background, straining against religion. "We are atheists!", we cry. Silently. We are not for the rigid walls of any religion, we don't subscribe to these restrictions, these violations on our freedom, these killings of our true selves. We are young, we are invincible. We are such strong people. We are so strong we refer to ourselves in the collective. There is no abstract idea that can break us, not words, not heartbreak, not betrayal, not fate nor any series of unfortunate events. Except maybe something so basic and so physical as literal, unbearable pain. And only then do we draw on our faith. "God SURELY wouldn't give me anything I wouldn't be able to handle. For He is All-Compassionate, He is Most Merciful." ...
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