My flatmate in Athens woke me up at 7:30 today. Work officialy starts at 8:00 but we’re rarely there before 9:00. Anyway, he woke me up, so that we could get there on time for once. I didn’t see that coming. He’s just like me, when it comes to waking up early in the morning. We both hate it. So, I wake up, and I’m already considering why he was up so early, and why he was waking me up. Surely, it’s not about work. So, I turn around slowly, expecting some surprise, but, alas, there was none. He was waking me up early, to get to work on time.

Oh, incidentally. I turned 22 this morning.

Now, I was expecting a whole lot of emails, and sms’s and whatever from friends and family wishing me a happy birthday. Turns out, I’m not that popular.

The only two people to remember were my Cousin, and my girl. I expected her to remember, of course. So, technically, Mark was the only person who did remember. Thanks dude. You helped make a weird day a bit nicer.

Now 22 is a crappy age. Sure I’m in a good place academically. I’m in a good place carreer-wise, etc… but I’m celebrating my birthday for the first time ever abroad. Surrounded by strangers, etc… And that’s just scratching the surface of it. Aside from all the confusion that I am facing, wrt my future and stuff, 22 is like the beginning of the end, somehow. Before, there was the 16 bday, the 18th, 21st, each having it’s own form of significance, and each offering the next to look forward to. Now, it’s the beginning of monotony.

I got to work, and went online. Disappointed that no one was mentioning my bday, I changed my nickname dramatically to remind people. That got me a few, half-hearted greetings…

Yahoo! sent me a greeting. They remembered. I felt so special. Their greeting included a list of special events that took place on Sep.20th in history. Check this out:

One year ago: Aquila al-Hashimi, a member of Iraq (news - web sites)’s Governing Council, was shot in Baghdad; she died five days later. A sightseeing helicopter crashed in the Grand Canyon, killed all seven on board. Five of six children riding on an all-terrain vehicle in Coffee County, Ga., were killed when they were hit by a motorist.

Seriously. What the fuck were they trying to do!?!? Way to cheer me up!

Anyway. Later, on my lunch break, this Syrian was having lunch with us. Somehow the conversation turned to history, and the guy claimed that Pheonicians were Arabs. And muslims. Now without going into details. The Pheonicians traded with the Egyptian Pharoahs. A few (THOUSAND) years B.C. The Muslims, and arabs, came a little bit later, I think. That has nothing to do with my, ahem, special day. But it kinda ticked me off. THOSE DAMN ARABS!

But you know, the guy’s Syrian. I would be the ultimate optimist to expect anything better from him

So, it’s a little past noon now, and I can’t wait to see what other crap this day shall bring.

Coincidentally, I have decided my blog needs something dramatic. Although I am having fun here, from time to time, the day to day events of my life have gotten even more boring, somehow, than the first few months in Germany.

So, I will either take the whole thing offline, or write about stuff that happened ages ago, when life was more than the sequence: wake up, work, eat, shower sleep.

I used to dream of growing up. If this is it. Man, was I bamboozled!!!

stay tuned… or not.

Posted on Monday, September 20th, 2004 at 1:21 pm and filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.