Beirut RATShodies: Fictional Friction

It's that time of the month again. I've asked the boys to weigh in and give their own views from time to time, so that every one gets a say and I keep things on an even field... This month's guest blogger is my dear friend, Lupe Don Pappa. I assure you, he is the one who came up with his own pseudonym, as I would have never, in my wildest imaginative creations, could've come up with a name like that... In any case, Lupe Don Pappa has decided to give us his own take on "friends with benefits," a topic I actually wanted to write about before, but had no personal experience on the matter... 

Today’s topic of conversation will revolve around a concept so often misunderstood, so easily misjudged, yet a concept that brings such joy to both parties involved .. the concept of “The Friend with Benefits”. 

For those who have never heard of it, friends with benefit(s) (it’s really only one additional benefit) are “friends by day, sex partners by night”, “typically two good friends who have casual sex without a monogamous relationship or any kind of commitment”. What a great concept. (Friendship + sex) – (commitment + feelings) - It’s basically a care free way of enjoying life.

Before getting into too much detail, it is important to point out that the concept of a friend with benefits differs substantially from a “fuck friend” or “fuck buddy”. The etymology of the words says it all - a fuck friend is a fuck before a friend. A friend with benefits is a friend before a benefit. Therefore, a friend with benefits should always be treated as a friend first and foremost, with the utmost respect. Other basics for a healthy “friends with benefits” relationship:

-       Avoid the drama - Pick a good friend, (not someone in a relationship – relationships = drama). You need to be sexually aroused by that person and need to be sure that person has, at some point in her life, pictured you naked

-       This is not a test drive – Throw expectations out the door. This is not a way to test drive the car before deciding if you want to actually purchase it. This is a mutually beneficial relationship based on SEX and FRIENDSHIP. You start on the wrong foot, someone is bound to get hurt

-       Lay down the law – Communicate with your partner before you start. After all, you guys are friends before “fuckers”. Be explicit about the needs and wants, you are not roofy’ing someone in a night club. Rules and regulations are good, don’t break them

-       Keep it on the down low – Don’t go brag about it to your friends; keep it a secret (at least in the beginning).  No one cares who you’re sleeping with. Seriously.

-       Don’t ask don’t tell – It’s none of your business where he was last night or who he was with. He is allowed to see other people, so are you... No need for explanations, just be respectful and don’t splash it in each other’s faces (literal splashing in faces not included)

-       Have a signal that’s just your own – Chose a word or an expression that insinuates you need it right now. Like at this exact moment. No one else can know what it is. It’s your little secret.

Now that you’ve determined how to build and maintain that relationship it’s crucial to make sure you are dealing with the right person. Ladies and Gentlemen, below please find 6 basic rules on picking the right friend with benefits:

-       Post-Breakup – Any girl that just came out of a relationship is in a state of fragility and needs some extra loving. She is lacking serotonin in her brain, that’s a smart word for the happy hormone. Make sure you’re there to fill her right up

-       Just Hot – Any girl (or guy for that matter) that is so hot that the thought of them not getting laid is just implausible

-       Daddy’s Girl – Any girl with serious daddy issues, because they always appreciate a good spanking

-       FM Pumps – Any girl that wears high heels more than 4 days a week / any guy that unbuttons 2 or more of his buttons and smells like he just got out of the perfume section of Harvey Nichols is a definite candidate (which basically means any Lebanese dude on the planet)

-       Fictional Friction – Any girl / guy you’ve masturbated to in the last 4 weeks should be included on the list … in fact any girl / guy that’s walked in on you masturbating in the last 4 weeks should be top of your list

So I say good luck to all in your search and quest, may you be blessed with a life full or friendship and great sex. 

And a final note, for the ladies out there, as you can see, there are definitely benefits with being my friend. Ping me.

Lupe Don Pappa

Cigar Sunday

Nothing like a Sunday afternoon spent with the Rats on their traditional "Cigar Sunday" to give me material for a post. Especially when guest-rats, who were visiting for Easter Weekend, were added to the pack. I could barely keep up with the stories.

It was kind of the "kick-off" for the Spring/Summer season, which in terms of dating is especially fun. Like Wiserat says, in winter, you just want to have someone you can curl up with and watch a movie under the covers. But when the sun is shinning and every other girl in town is showing off her legs and her cleavage, the Rats want come out to play. My friend the Masochist, who missed his plane a couple of days ago and was stuck overnight in a shitty hotel in Egypt, made friends with another unfortunate passenger, and to pass the time, she started telling him her life story. Including this particularly interesting breakup: her ex-boyfriend tells her one day "You know honey, I really love you... but it's summer now." Kind of says it all, doesn't it?


It is difficult to describe Cigar Sunday into words that would do it justice. At 5pm, it was three cigars, three Rats, and a couple of Almaza bottles at a corner table in Torino Express. By 7pm, three dozen shots of Tequila Gold had passed around, one round of AK47s, glasses of Arak, Jim Beam and vodka were spread on two tables and half the bar, as the party of three turned into a gathering of 15. My friend the Swiss, who is wired to flirt 24/7 no matter what, announced that he was currently dating an eighteen-year-old who is still in high-school. "I have the same conversations with her as with every other girl I dated who were my age," he said, defending her level of maturity. Tells you a lot about the girls he likes to date. He also managed to tell us, in the same sentence, that he "loved" his 18-year-old girlfriend, and that he had scored some girl the night before at three in the morning. Three shots later, there was talk about condoms and the tricks they play in order to get away with not wearing one. Educated men justifying the fact that if a girl asks you to wear a condom, to them that means it's pretty safe to do it without one. There was lusting over a gorgeous girl who walked in with her fiance. And, last but not least, there was a rating of girls in terms of how many drinks they need to have before they can "bang her." Like the Masochist says: "There are no ugly women. Just not enough alcohol."

There is no real morale to this post. Just maybe, I'd say, that although not all men are Rats, there is a Rat in every man.

the shadows of loss

There's been a lot of loss these past few weeks. A friend from high-school who succumbed to a ravaging cancer after a year of courageous fighting. A friend who lost her father. Another who lost his mother. Makes me pause and think about what remains.

The first person I know who died, was my grandmother. I was nine years-old, and she was my favorite person in the world. I remember how she hid chocolates under her pillow, and I would sneak in and steal them. I remember her hoarse voice, her hugs, her pineapple cake. I remember sleeping next to her and feeling safe. And I remember how she loved me.

The thing about loss, is that it tells you what's real. When someone physically disappears from your life, your realize what this person really was through the memories he leaves behind. When my mother died, my brother was 7 years-old. He doesn't remember what job she had, how she dressed, or how she wore her hair. But he does remember that she used to take him fishing on the Manara, with makeshift fishing-rod she put together with string, a wooden stick, and a borrowed hook. My sister lost her best-friend when she was 17, and when she thinks about her, she talks about her adventurous spirit and their late nights of confidences. Not what grades she had in school or she wanted to study at university. My 11-year-old cousin died, less than two years ago, and everyone remembers his smile. His sisters remember his mischievous eyes, his friends remember the pranks he played. His father remembers his generous spirit, his mother remembers the feeling of holding him tight against her.

Everything that is important, remains. The courage of those who fought, the smiles, the kisses, the I-love-yous; the moments only you two shared, like laughing your head off because of an empty toothpaste --something no one else will ever understand, but that still makes you feel like you share a joke, from across heaven and earth.

We spend so much time on things that will never matter. We get upset about materialistic objects that in the big scheme of things have absolutely no value. And sometimes we neglect the only things we will be able to take with us --or leave behind. The things that, in the end, make us who we are. Maybe the best way to learn how to live life, is to learn from those who already lived.

first date

I've wrecked my brains on this one, and the sad truth is, I can't find a single topic that inspires me to amuse you. I've run dry. I don't know if it's writer's block, but i can't seem to put two words together to form a sentence. So I've decided to go back in time, salvage a story from the past that is not tainted by my currently notorious anger/bitterness towards men. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the first date. Uncensored, and 100% based on true events.

New York, May 2008. I had never been on a date before in my life. Not because I never dated anyone, I just thought actual "dates" where more of an American movie type of thing... but then again, I had lived in New York for two years and I had never been asked on a date. Anyway, this was my first time.
Some background: I was a freelance journalist working in Manhattan, and writing an article about successful Lebanese businessmen. One of my interviews was over the phone with a Certain Fellow who was 38 years-old, huge success story, millionaire and what-not, and so obviously single. It's funny how these men who are obsessively career driven for twenty years wake-up at the eve of their fortieth birthday and sweat the fact that they are all alone. Anyway... this man who was across the world in Dubai asks me if he can take me out to dinner when he comes to New York a few weeks later. And I, feeling a little Carrie Bradshaw style, being a writer in Manhattan and all, got carried away by the thought... maybe he was my Mr. Big?
Three weeks later, the Certain Fellow arrives in New York, ready to dine me and wine me. We meet up at the Four Seasons hotel, and I recognize him from the picture he sent me for the article. Except he is wearing a leather jacket and trying to act hip although he is hitting 40, and he looks it... I tell myself this will be an interesting experience.  We are chauffered down in a limo to a new hip restaurant in Tribeca. I was nervous I could hardly breathe, so, of course, I downed the first drink he offered me as we waited for a table. What the hell are first dates all about anyway? For this man, apparently, it was an audition for finding himself a suitable wife. Did I cook? Did I love Beirut? Where would I want to live? I wasn't sure if I felt dizzy by the vodka or his questions. We were seated on a corner table, on a bench, which means we were right next to each other --awkward. By the time the main course came, I had had three drinks and my cheeks were feeling numb. He asked me to tell him something about myself. I told him a had written a book when I was 13. He asked me what it was called. I told him, "I believe in angels." He looked into my eyes, and uttered the single, cheesiest, most cringing line anyone has ever tried: "Now I believe in angels..." (did you gag yet?)
I kid you not. These were his words. I was so tipsy I think I burst out laughing, and he took it as a good sign, leaned over and kissed me. I ordered another drink. He was in a hurry to get the bill. I saw him take out his black credit-card, and laughed silently, remembering my roommate who had warned me I would see a black-credit card with this guy.
The ride back in the limo is a little blurry --there was some making out, I'm sure, because we ended up back at the Four Seasons, which is definitely not where I lived.
Now I know I said uncensored, but I will spare you some details. The bottom line is, I was beyond tipsy, I fell asleep on a super comfortable bed in a suite in one of the biggest hotels in New York, and there was one Certain Fellow who was fairly disappointed by the failed magic of his black card.
I woke up slightly confused about where I was. It was 7am, and the Certain Fellow was back in business mode, on the phone and typing emails and getting dressed all at once. I put on my heels, dreading the walk of shame I had ahead of me.
And as a grand finale, just as I stepped out of the Four Seasons, with the trailer of my own movie playing in my head, I tripped. I fell, at 7 in the morning, on the steps of the grandiose hotel, in front of all the concierges, valets, and taxi drivers passing by, wearing a mini black dress and high heel shoes.
And I smiled, because I could think of no better way to end this excruciatingly cliche moment of my life. 

the back-up plan

We're at that age now.
You know that time when you're about 16, and you start making the back-up plan to ensure you won't end up alone for the rest of your life? You don't actually think that you will ever really need to use a back-up... after all you're still a teenager and the world seems full of hopes and dreams that are about to come true, and you are one of those lucky ones who will surely find her great love. But you make the plan anyway, just to be on the safe side. You tell a friend or two that when you hit 28 (which we thought that was so old and far away) if none of you are attached, then you get married! And then you forget about it and only remember it at odd times when you want to laugh it off.
Then one day you wake up and you're 26. How did I get here so fast, I have no idea.
The other day, my sister witnessed a moment of sheer lunacy that has been stuck in my mind ever since she told me about it: My dad and a friend of his were talking, and the friend (a woman, in her early fifties) asks how old I am. He tells her, 26. And she says "Well! It's time to get her married!"
Notice how she says "get her married" as if it is a job for the general public. Oh my God, I'm at that age.
Already, when you hit 21, every time you're in the presence of a happily engaged couple or a newly married couple, or the ultimate worst, at a wedding, you hear the word "3abe'lik" a few dozen times. "3abe'lik," like your life's sole purpose should revolve around finding yourself that husband so that the world can rest and stop telling you that.
We're at that age when you look around at your friends and start speculating who will be the one to go first. Last year the poll would've probably pick me. The year before, it would've picked another couple who had been together six years. Now it seems that my back-up plan might be the first to go. How ironic is that?
Now we're at that age where the fear of ending up alone is kind of growing a little more. We're older now, seen what's out there, already have a friend of two with divorces of their resumes and your one serious relationship has gone to hell. It's a little scarier out there, I have to say. So you make new back-up plans. You and your gay best-friend decide to raise a child together at age 35. Or you and your girls decide you'll all live in a big house and adopt children from every country. You upped the age, of course, because you still want to give yourself a chance to find that shot at a nuclear family. But there's a slight chance the group of we-need-to-get-her-married parents are in for the shock of their lives.
Problem is, no one really wants the back-up plan. That's why it's called a back-up.
I've been accused of all kinds of things since I started writing this blog: angry, bitter, men-persecutor, revolted, negative, pessimistic... I've also very likely blown up all my chances of ever getting a man interested in me again... but even I can't help but hold on to the hope that I won't have to fall on the back-up. And even though the back-up plan might be a smarter-plan, I want the story you don't plan for at all.