Naz City Tales: A Wandering Party (Apt. G938)

The night before, I'd been in the Naz City apartment complex, but in a different apartment. V and SJ threw an awesome joint birthday bash there with lots of people from the expat community. I took a couple shots of Yager- one with the NYer and one with SJ- and that was enough to give me a good buzz for the rest of the night. The Brit and I stood over the 9th floor balcony with our arms leaning on the ledge, watching the cars zoom by below, the tiny red light of a cigarette flurrying down 9 stories, hitting the ground and going out without a sound or a struggle. I was reminded of that one night during our way to Muscat that SJ and I spent in Dubai on a balcony, eating cheetos and grapes and watching the Arabs in their starchy white dishdashlas pacing and lounging around in the balmy night. This time, however, the Brit and I saw something even more interesting than Arabs in dishdashlas. We saw Gregory Mendel in the flesh. He was one floor below us, dressed in his brown monk's robe, and serenely watering his pea plants and simultaneously eavesdropping on the party conversations one floor up from his balcony (that would be our balcony). I contemplated watering his plants from above with beer. “YEAH, let's do it!” the Brit cried with zeal. I grabbed his bottle before it could tip upside-down. Idiot! Only he...only he would agree to such a stupid idea like that.

Wandering inside, I started up a dance party with a Baby Mickey Mouse stuffed doll, soon to be joined by a few real people. The birthday girls, for instance, the DJ, and a French expat who was here doing an internship in international law. She was the one with gorgeous, long dark curls I'd met at a previous engagement. Wandering around some more, I found myself chatting with many interesting people about their work and my work and Kurdish politics and even found myself confessing to a complete stranger my nervousness about committing to studying one thing for so long when I have so many other interests, which is exactly what I'll be doing in a year if all goes as planned. Oh well, by now, I figure I can do anything intensely for a year, even if it means hunkering down and studying my ass off at one subject- nursing. The fact that I'll get to heal sick babies and the fact that this is a universally-needed skill will be my motivation. Once equipped with it, I can take it with me wherever I go and put it to use. Oh to feel needed and useful.

Wandering back out for some fresh air, I sat on the ledge with my back against the wall, one foot on the ledge, and the other on a chair in order to keep my center of gravity on the inside of the balcony, as the unusually high-shouldered host put it. At night, this was a fairly pretty view, with lights twinkling from the buildings, many only half-constructed, or fully-constructed but vacant. At one point, the generator shut off briefly, all went dark, and I imagined the collective sigh of all the occupants in all the buildings across the city. Rising higher than any other building was the round form of the ancient citadel. In a few weeks, all this will be nothing more than memories, eh Ang? Of course this was the fate of all events no matter how major, no matter how inconsequential. Time marches inevitably on, and whatever is, was, and whatever will be, is, like an endless procession pointed in a single direction forward- or backward if you're from the Aymara tribe. Why did I find that so damn interesting? Too bad useless philosophical wonderings like this won't help save lives.

“I've never met a girl like you,” said C. Oooh, he'd hit me in a weak spot. It's been awhile since anyone's said that to me. I jumped off the ledge, suddenly nervous about the closeness.

“Wait 'til you meet my sister- we're twins.” I walked away laughing. Taxi was here. Time to go home.