I’ve been tagged!

I have been tagged some time ago, by both Abufares and Karin. I have to admit that I have always found personal questions, and specially the “What is your opinion?” ones, very difficult. Maybe I wasn’t trained to answer them at School. I have always had something ready for the answer, which I didn’t have to formulate or even criticize. Or maybe I am better at writing the inflection of my own thoughts than forcing my mind to go in any specific direction. Anyway, I’ll try my best at this challenge!

1. Which is the single best post you’ve read on any blog? Please provide link.
Well, that’s easy. Since my introduction to blogsphere was through Abufares, I always liked his post: Born Behind a wall. I am not wrong if if say that I haven’t read any better post since.

2. Which is the best post you’ve written? Which is your worst? Please provide links.
To myself, the better post that I’ve written (well, I have quite few posts to choose from) was the one about writing.
When I want to write something, I think about it for a long time. Or maybe it’s the other way around: when I think of something for a long time, I go ahead and write it. I always thought about writing, then I decided to start my own blog. So it’s not a surprise that my best post will be the tought that made me go blogging in the first place.

Oh, the worst one? For the same reason, I think my worst posts are the ones I haven’t written. I hate the idea that some of my deepest thinking moments are gone and will never be back again. I should have written those down.

3. How about a place you’ve never been to but would very much like to see.
That’s easy too, because it includes the whole world!

4. If you were a member of the opposite sex, what would you have done differently?
This is a confusing question. I cannot really find a good answer. But as we say in Arabic: “everything is beautiful in its time!”. But surely, I wouldn’t have pumped iron for 2-3 years!

5. Do you remember a childhood recurrent dream or nightmare? Good or bad, tell us about it.
I always (even recently) had a dream, or I should say a nightmare, where I feel like I need to run very quickly but couldn’t manage it. I think that stands for all my unfulfilled desires

6. Make me laugh or make me cry, put your words to use.

That is the most difficult one. I haven’t been any good at making people laugh. But on the other hand, I am not boring! What can make you really crying is the real suffering of people, which is not very hard to find in this part of the world. I don’t have such a story yet, sorry!

7. Do you regret the unfulfilled dreams, the inaccessible roads, the uncharted lands?
Each experience in life can teach me something new and valuable. Had I not had the missed opportunities, I would never have been able to know the real value of anything. I don’t regret anything I had missed, but only the opportunities that I wasn’t able to learn anything from.

8. What is a friend to you? And what are you to a friend?
Friendship is one of the few things that gives meaning to life. A friend is someone who I can trust without hesitation. Someone who I can spend my time with and enjoy it, without me or him getting bored. Someone who can offer a shoulder to cry on in the hard times. And a little bit more…

9. T.S. Eliot measured his life with coffee spoons, how about you?
It’s quite difficult to measure life. Let me say I would consider the number of friends, real dependable friends, as a meaningful number in my life.

10. Write your own epitaph, or if that is too hard, how would you like your epitaph to read?
I can say no better than: “Remember man as you walk by, as you are now so once was I, as I am now, so you will be, so prepare for death and follow me.” In Arabic, I would write what AlMa’arri said:
خفف الوطأ فما أرى أديم الأرض إلا من هذه الأجساد

Are you happy/satisfied with your blog with it's content and look?
I’m not totally satisfied with the tepmplate options. I don’t care about the look, but about the accessibility. I want my blog to be as easy to read as possible. For content I have a list of thoughts to write, but no time!

Does your family know about your blog?
Not all of them. Only those who can spend some time reading my nonsense know about it.

Do you feel embarrassed to let your friends know about your blog or you just consider it as a private thing?
I can write my posts and keep them in my notebook! I’m writing for people to read, comment and share ideas. I only seem to care too much about my e-anonymity.

Did blogs cause positive changes in your thoughts?
Sure. Blogging has helped me to know that it could be difficult to let people understand how exactly you’re thinking. It’s a great source of learning how to present your ideas in an acceptable way.

Do you only open the blogs of those who comment on your blog or you love to go and discover more by yourself?
I love to discover new blogs and new people. I can easily find an interesting post, but finding an interesting blog is more difficult.

What does visitors counter mean to you? Do you care about putting it in your blog?
Number of visitors has a great meaning for me. But the more important is the feedback I receive. A single comment worth 100 visitors. You can never tell if all those visitors enjoyed what you’ve written or not. But when some one can bother to write two or three lines, that means a lot.

Did you try to imagine your fellow bloggers and give them real pictures?
This seems like judging people’s appearance by the way they write. Everybody tries that, but it can hardly be successful. I’ve had many e-mails friend who turned out to look in a different way than I have ever imagined.

Admit. Do you think there is a real benefit for blogging?
I think yes. Even if nobody is reading what you’re writing, you can read it yourself after 10 years or so, and sure you’ll enjoy it. If you didn’t, it is simply a way of getting things off your chest!

Do you think that bloggers society is isolated from real world or interacts with events?
Bloggers can get their ideas from nowhere but real world. Our lives affect what we think, what we say, and what we write. Even when we try to imagine something, our imagination is based on our reality to a great extent. However, I think bloggers doesn’t affect real world that much, they only interact with each others and those who actually read!

Does criticism annoying you or do you feel it's a normal thing?
I am happy to receive any critisim. I would like to know how people receive me or think about me. I only don’t like critisim in public.

Do you fear of some political blogs and avoid them?
I enjoy reading different blogs of different kinds. I like to know how different people think about different things. That includes politics and everything else.

Did you get shocked by the arrest of some bloggers?
I truly belive that everyone has the right to say or write what ever he/she wants. Arresting bloggers is something like depriving them from their rights, or like punishing someone because of what he/she has written. I really detest that.

Did you think about what will happen to your blog after you die?
When someone dies many things are no longer of any importance for him. I basically try to deliver my ideas to people and to have them written somewhere before it’s too late. When I die: No ideas, no blog.

What do you like to hear? What's the song you like to put its link in your blog?
What I like to hear depends on my mood. I like classical music, and I think the one I like to put in my blog is Fur Elise, for Beethoven.