Yesterday I watched this movie for the gazillionth time. If you haven't seen it yet - do it. There is something in it for everyone. Suspence, mystery, passion, beauty, crime, love, murder, betrayal, devotion, you name it... My favourite quotes (courtesy of IMDb) :

Luis: Whore! Liar! Thief! Don't you see? Don't you see that I cannot breathe without you? I cannot live without you? Don't you see that? Don't you see how much I love you?

Luis: And perhaps later on I will tell you the story of how we came to be here. It is an interesting tale. Some of it is even true. But for now, I can say that from the moment I saw her, I loved her. And no matter the price, you cannot walk away from love.

Julia: No this is not a love story, but it is a story about love. About those who give in into it, and the price they pay. And those who run away from it, because they are afraid, or because they do not believe they're worthy of it. She ran away. He gave in.

Oh my, looks like I haven't been here in a while...

So anyways, to keep the things moving, here is what I have for you today. We had a nice little discussion on our forum the other day, about cheating in a relationship. The actual entry post is here, written by my friend Kimchi:

Cat and I have just had a conversation about cheating and I'm going to share with you our realizations. Keep in mind that this comes from a married woman of 8 years and a singleton (but was in a commited relationship for 6 years and did cheat and was cheated on).

Boys, Girls, shit happens. We cannot control who we meet and our attraction to them. This is not saying you should go out and sleep with every person that you are attracted too, but just that you should not hold your significant other to a higher set of standards than you hold yourself. Can anyone honestly say that they would never ever cheat?

There are rules to infidelity though.
1) Don't tell your significant other! Unless you are planning on leaving them for this person keep your big mouth shut! Why would you needlessly hurt someone. You fucked up, you cheated, you deal with the guilt, don't pull your partner into it.

2) No prostitutes and no feelings. Affairs happen but deciding to leave your wife/husband for that other person is disrespectful and hurtful. And prostitutes do not just happen, not only do you not know where they've been, but you don't know what you're going to pass back to your wife or husband.

3) Make sure no one else knows! Even worse than your significant other finding out from you that you're cheating is finding out from your friends, or their friends. Have some common sense.

So pretty much that's it. People are people and inclined to do stupid things, especially with regards to sex. It's all about respect for your significant other.

The answers to this post differ drastically. The conversation moved on to what happens when we find out our partner cheated. Some (me included) admit that we would proabbly be able to deal with cheating, not necessarily breaking the relationship. Others were adamant their partner would get marching orders. The conversation heated up pretty fast, and here are few of the opinions for your entertainment:

1. Of course people make mistakes... and people pay for them. If my partner cheated on me she would be out of the door as fast as I could get her stuff out of the door AND I wouldnt look back. Good riddance to bad rubbish.

2. if u'r not yet married, the moment you start entertaining thoughts about cheating, i think you should question if you really love the person you are with or not. the moment you cheat, get out. dont drag your loved ones to whatever personal crisis you're having. i think u should be responsible for yourself, ur happiness. it's not your partners duty to take care of you and make you happy, but u can share ur happiness and growth with them. if u'r married and one of you gives in to temptation of sleeping with someone else but wants to work it out, i think people should stay and work it out. it's marriage.

3. I don't beleive that cheating on someone once consitutes disrespecting them. It's how you behave afterwards that shows respect or disrespect. Do you flaunt the indiscretion in there face, do you continue, do you leave them for the other person?

4. If you are willing to throw the whole relationship out cause your other got drunk and made a mistake or gave into a bit of temptation, what does that say about how much you love them?

5. If you cheat and you decide that you still love the person you're with and you don't want to leave them, you don't tell them you cheated. You live with the guilt. I think telling is a cop out, it's asking for forgiveness and releaving yourself of the burden of guilt. If you cheated you should live with the guilt.


What is your opinion? Could you ever forgive your partner if you found out? Could you do it yourself? What do you think about the thoughts of the forum members?

And finally, join the forum ;D

I was actually hoping that I could skip this, but you insisted, lol. So here is my (not very comprehensive) hate list. Mind it, it's more of a pet peeve list than hate list, I don't hate Qatar at all. Feel free to add to it or challenge anything on the list!


Qatar is a desert. My least favourite landscape of all, save perhaps glaciers. I so miss the trees! I love rivers and lakes and forests and mountains... and I miss all the seasons. Weather in the summer is deadly.

I can't walk in Qatar. I am not talking about driving to Corniche for the sake of strolling, I am talking about walking to places. I guess it's the European in me, I love walking. Absense of decent public transport and pedestrian areas is hard to cope with. I have to drive absolutely everywhere.

Which brings me to the next point: driving in Qatar. What with constant construction, traffic jams, imbecile drivers, suicidal road crossers, non-existant traffic police, horrible round abouts and generally very bad urban planning you can imagine what a joy it is to drive in Qatar.

No good bookstores, museums, galleries, video stores and generally very very little in terms of culture, art and adult entertainment. Heavy censorship of internet sites and printed materials.

The arrogant and annoying minority which gives the rest of (otherwise really nice, educated and friendly) Qatari people a really bad image. Expats generally don't get a lot of oportunities to interact with the locals, and those locals that we happen to interact with - on the roads, in the queues, in the governmental offices, etc. - could learn some manners and social skills.

Seeing the conditions in which the labourers work and live :(

Certain laws and practices which I don't agree with. I believe that what happens between consenting adults is their own business, not the government's; that eating in public during Ramadan should not be prohibited for those who don't fast; that flogging/lashing is barbaric. Lots more, but enough about that.

I can't understand why it is so difficult to find out what the laws and regulations are. The lack of proper procedures that apply to one and all. I do have to admit this is slowly changing for the better, but it is still there.

Being a woman in the Middle East. This means so many things I don't even know where to start. How about needing a husband's signature everytime I want to do something? Oh well, lets not go there.

Monopolies like Q-Tel. Arghhhhhhhhhhhh oh yeah and the services (or lack of them).

I hate my smelly coworker (she's alright otherwise, just REALLY smelly) and my neighbour who can't park her car properly.

:P

I guess this pretty much sums it up. As I have said the list is not comprehensive and there are a lot of other things that could be improved. So, what do you think?

Yay! A year of blogging! 140 posts. I have nothing much to say at the moment, so I will just copy my first ever Blogger post here instead :^)

Ramadan was in full swing then, too!