G flashbacks
Summer of '98 : I did my "Summer Training" in one of the respectable Consultancy Companies in Benghazi, Libya.... 7 weeks of going and coming to the Co.... working, learning and chatting with the engineers... I was really young... and so full of energy (still am :-P) ... ambitious, work oriented and verrrrrrrrry social ... made good relations with almost everyone.... especially with one engineer who was partly in charge of my training (5 yrs older than me) .. let's call him G.
Rest of '98 &'99 : Relation with G during the year continued ... used to see him when I dropped by the company to ask about things related to my studies...he enrolled to study Masters at Uni and needed someone who was still an undergraduate to help him get certain things... asked for my help .. glady helped and things went fine for him... we got really friendly and he even got to know my little bro who had just gotten in Uni as well...
Summer of '99 : Did my training again at the same company.... he wasn't in charge of my training but we'd still sometimes chat or he'd show me some work when he had time...
Rest of '99 & 2000 : Kept in touch coz he was studying his Masters .. so we'd see each other at Uni ...
Summer of 2000 : I graduated ... G helped me with getting some stuff ready for the graduation project presentation .. and of course attended ... by that time everyone knew we were friends... he knew baba as well (well ... being an Engineering University Prof.... which engineer didn't know baba !?!!?)
2001 : Didn't really see much of him ... but then I started working at an office .. and he did business with that office a couple of times .. so he'd drop by every now and then .... I guess it was then that we started feeling "differently" for each other... nothing direct or serious ... but I could feel it.. and so could he ... actually he was a very attractive personality (and good looking too...) .... anyway we both pretended there was nothing...
2002 : Was working at a Language Centre that G goes to...now Benghazi is a very small place and you keep running into everyone everywhere... but we were "running" into each other too often...
2003 : Here is where we both couldn't take it anymore ... we were on a very friendly basis by then...and we could see where this was heading .... something which just wouldn't work... for loads of reasons we both knew... so we decided to stay away from each others' ways .... and we did... we'd sometimes see each other by chance but we tried to keep our relation as formal as we could... even heard that he tried to propose to someone (the traditional way) but got turned down :((By that time he'd left the company I did my training at and I'd started working there !!!!) I was almost "cured of him" ....
May 2004 : Started calling me every week at work for 4 weeks in a row ... just asking how I was and if I wanted anything.... didn't know what he was up to... so I went to his office and confronted him...wanted to know what he meant to lead this to... got no specific answer .. so I asked him to please cut off our relation...and we did...completely out of touch since May ... no running into each other.. no emails...no nothing...
Summer of 2004 : I met my ex and we got engaged .... went back to Libya to finish off some work... small country .. so everyone got to know I got engaged.. even people I wasn't in touch with at all ... including G.... called to say congrats... were very formal ....
Haven't heard from him since then ...
Today : Someone "requested" to add me on Yahoo Messenger.... I could guess it was him .. the user name was something that could be him.... I politely declined... like I do when people add me and don't tell me who they are...Then got an email from him .... just saying hello and Happy Eid ... G .... so it was him adding me on yahoo.... thought we said we'd stay away 2 years ago? ... and we have ... why add me and start again? Why send an email ?
I don't know if I'm making any sense ... just that this small email made me get flashbacks ...wanted to let it out...
posted by Me @ 12:29 AM
13 Comments:
Sabah ElKhair ya Meme,
Nice post. I like the flashback stuff.
About G why don't you want to keep in touch?It seems a bit harsh to cut off all contact. After all you were close onece sort of. I can understand keeping him at a distance. But surely the occasional email on Eid or saying how do you do from time to time is harmless?
Let him add you. You can always control whether you talk to him or not using stealth settings in Yahoo. So there is no need to hurt his feelings.
Personally I hate cutting people off or being cut off. I like to keep in touch even if it's one email a year saying hey am alive.
Well, ME, i dont agree with lou, declining his requet on yahoo cant be hurtful, but it does send out a clear msg that you dont wanna talk to him.
i dont think its a good idea for you to keep in contact with someone you have been in love with and it didnt work out, keeping in touch might reignite those feelings, and im sure you dont want that.
I would suggest you striclty keep it only through emails, send him back with happy eid to you too and thats it, on occasions ya3ni, dont put yourself in the middle of a mess you dont want.
Dear Me, I was very sad to hear all that..glad u shared it with us.
something which just wouldn't work... for loads of reasons we both knew
There wasn't any hope?At ALL??? :(
Anyway..if it's sth very private i understand..and u made the right thing..but I like to put hopes ..who knows!
BTW , r u still engaged?? if yes,then declinging his invitation was the right thing...don't ever contact him while u r already commited to someone else.
God be with you (F)
Salam
Pour le but de rassembler le max d'adresse des bloggeurs"Carnet d'adresse", priere de remplir une tite fiche sur blog Merci!
www.islamkarim.blogspot.com
"just wouldn't work... for loads of reasons we both knew..."
Are these "loads of reasons" still exist?? If yes, and there is no hope of this relation, you HAVE to cut it off now.
I guess, you are not engaged anymore, you said your "ex". If you feel that you can work out this relation fine, then go ahead and give it one more chance:)
Good luck dear,
Me, i understand what you mean and I actually agree with chari,
Look declining his request or keeping in touch, it depends on you and how you feel towards him , if you have nothing inside you towards him now Absolutely, so a word of Hi or happy eid is not bad if done occasionally that if you really internally have nothing in your self towards him.
But if you still do or you found that the small email, just sparked something inside you , I would advice you to cut it short with him without hurting his feelings so that you won't get hurt.
If he wants something else , so he should approach the other direction and call you directly from your dad and avoid you from passing through all this again.
Rabena m3aki
Really interesting rewriting of history ,but I couldn't understand something ,why you confronted him in his office and asked him to cut off the relationship? ,from my point of view he didn't do anything wrong ,he may have been a mysterious ,unclear and secretive but couldn't you just be more patient for a little longer? ,I think you rushed alittle bit.
Declining his request is pretty normal ,I think you are one of the people who don't accept having FOGGY or SHADOWY relationships in their lives ,you can't accept any role for him in your current life and so you declined his sudden re-entry.
Thanks everyone for your support and advice... nice to know there are people around who care :-)
Loulou,
Saba7 elnour !! :-)
"Nice post. I like the flashback stuff."
Thanks .. that's what I felt sort of went on in my mind at that time ... but I tried to organise it a little....
I know "it seems a bit harsh to cut off all contact" ... but for both of us that seemed the best thing to do at that time... "makansh yenfa3 ned7ak 3alla nafsena aktar men keda" if you know what I mean ... pretending to be friends and feeling something else was just not what we could carry on doing...
It is quite harmless for me "now" to hear from him every now and then .. as I don't have "special feelings" for him any more... but it feels weird... I'm not too comfortable with it ... feel I turned over that page and don't want to open it again ....
I already "politely declined" his request to add on Yahoo ... but pretending I didn't know it was him... he hasn't tried to add me again .. but he sent that little email... I really don't want to hurt his feelings ya Loul... but I don't understand what he wants :-l
Chari,
I don't know if he got the message clearly that I don't want to talk to him though ... you see as I said I declined pretending I didn't know it was him ... the user name wasn't something so obvious it was him ... but for me it was ... now I don't know if "7atemshe 3aleih" that I really didn't know it was him ... or if he's going to feel that I knew and I declined ...
I know it isn't a good idea to stay in contact and that's why back in May 2004 I wouldn't let it start again coz I "masadda2t" that we had managed to straighten things out by then... I don't want to reignite those feelings khalas...
Rain,
Thanks sweetie.... well it wouldn't work for reasons the "mind" could see clearly and not the heart .... I may not be able to explain it clearly through writing .. but it was basically because of "cultural differences" ... it may sound strange but yes... actually this was the major problem... and even though I firmly believe in there being no differences between nations and people and I go around saying this all the time:
"O mankind! We created you from a single (pair) of a male and a female, and made you into nations and tribes, that ye may know each other (not that ye may despise (each other). Verily the most honoured of you in the sight of Allah is (he who is) the most righteous of you. And Allah has full knowledge and is well acquainted (with all things)." (Al-Hujraat:13)
Not all people see this .... he was Libyan you see ... and back there in Benghazi ... quite a lot of what I may consider "normal" is frowned upon ... I may post about that some time soon isA... that and some other issues are what made us both feel it was better not to go further in our relation...
I was only engaged for 6 months btw ... I wrote a bit about that here and here ... but cutting off my relation with him had nothing to do with me being engaged coz when I did back in 2003 and again in May 2004 , I was in no way involved with anyone else ... it was just a matter of principle....
Wonderer,
Yes, these loads of reasons still exist... and I guess they will always exist ... as I explained to Rain... and I will try to elaborate further in a separate post about social life in Benghazi as I saw it... it may clarify a little bit more ... I broke up with my ex last February after being engaged for only 6 months ... but I don't feel I can work out this relation anyway ... guess I'll hang around single for a while :-)
Roora,
As I said before I don't have any "special feelings" towards him any more el7amdulilah... to tell the truth and be completely honest though... I was rather flattered when I found him trying to add me on Yahoo and then sending that small email... that's about it ... flattered ...
"If he wants something else , so he should approach the other direction and call you directly from your dad and avoid you from passing through all this again."
I doubt that even if he wants this he'll approach my dad directly without getting back to me first ... coz he knows why we decided to go different ways ...
w Rabena ye3mel elli feih el kheir...
Nightlegend,
He didn't do anything wrong... but we'd decided it was best to stay away from each other... so I wanted to know why he was back this way... and like I said "ana masadda2t" that we straightened out our relation in what we "both" saw was for the best for us ... so why come back again? I didn't go and "attack" him ... but I wanted him to stop and think about what he was doing... which he did .. and that's why we went back to what we'd decided and kept a distance...
"I think you are one of the people who don't accept having FOGGY or SHADOWY relationships in their lives "
You got me here ;-)
After reading all your replies, I insisted more on my opinion. Put an end to this relation immediately, mosh 7eyegy menha .3air waga3 el alb.
Good luck dear,
Off point: I was posting a comment in Loulou's blog at the same time you were there commenting too. Did you notice the name of the country where I live in the sidebar, asl loulou fada7etny, hehehehe.
BTW, I am coming to Egypt at the end of December insha'allah, maybe we can talk on the phone since we won't be able to meet in Cafe Roastry as we planned, unless, you change your ming and come to Cairo for a visit:)))
Wonderer,
An end has been put to this relation a long time ago...just that him sending this email and trying to contact me made me want to write about it...
"mosh 7eyegy menha .3air waga3 el alb."
I know .. that's why we chose to end it 2 years ago :-l
Off topic: Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyy ... I missed a "golden opportunity" ya benti !!! I didn't notice the country ... I'm going to shoot myself !!!! :-P
Yalla ta3ali besalama enti bas and we'll see how to arrange meeting isA... would be really nice to talk to you :-)
Meme,
"I really don't want to hurt his feelings ya Loul... but I don't understand what he wants :-l "
Ya 7abibty why worry your head about what he wants?It's not your problem. Just do what you feel is right. Only reason I didn't want you to hurt his feelings unnecessarily is that if you do that you'll feel bad about it. And you'll end up with an unpleasant memory. And who needs that?
When my ex & I first broke up he would do things like that. Suddenly make contact without explanation. And I would try to figure out what he wants & when I couldn't I'd lose my temper & be rude to him. Then I would feel bad about it & feel I have to contact him to make amends. And I would be stuck after that wondering how to break contact that I didn't want without hurting his feelings again. It became a vicious circle. In the end I found the only way to break it is to be polite but elusive - not getting caught doing something that will give him the chance to ask me why are you being rude what did I do now & make me feel guilty again.
Just be light & casual. Let the incident pass quickly & smoothly without leaving too much impression. It will be better for both of you.
Thanks Loul !!!
You're right ...being "light and casual" is the best thing to do...
Really ... thanks for sharing your experience...helps y'know ;-)
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