Out of Type

Sometimes I tend to box a person into a certain character. Once in a while, a never-before-seen trait jumps out of that box and it's either pleasant or disgusting, but it's always a surprise.

Like how Mustafa insisted that I let him drive me to Villagio even if it's far and out of the way. I was ready to wait in the sunset and spend 15 QRs on a taxi fare when Mustafa saw me near the office. He told me to get in the car without even asking where I'm headed, which made him either genuinely generous or downright stupid. He didn't flinch when I told him I'm going to the mall--the far one--but I think I felt that we both braced ourselves for a long uncomfortable ride. The trip wasn't bad. The conversation we had was trivial but it wasn't forced.

He was leaving that evening for Saudi Arabia for a sort of pilgrimage. He may be an ass sometimes but you got to give him props for being religious. I was mildly interested with the topic and found that I had enough questions for him until we reached Villagio. At the entrance, and in between religious discussion, he asked me which gate I wanted to be dropped off, without blinking I told him "Virgin". He smiled as if he smelt instead of heard the word.

As I got off the car I thanked Mustafa and told him that his driving greatly improved from life-threatening to minor-injury levels. I wasn't kidding either because it was the first time I sincerely felt comfortable with him as the driver. He said it was his pleasure, and it felt like he sincerely meant it too.

Meanwhile, I've discovered something dangerous about Edmar's character. I thought he's just annoying sometimes with his brand of 'small talk' that blindsides you just when you were thinking how lovely your day was going. I do try to ignore that, err him, and I can live with it no matter how hard he tries to magnify the mundane into a catastrophic problem (ie no sleep = cancer, too short haircut = chemo therapy).

But to make up stories about people? I think he has crossed the line from boredom to insanity. He told me that Mustafa and Hosam, had a brawl in their room one evening. My journalist instincts started to ask him questions, and while he couldn't answer most of my questions to save his story from the trash--how he saw it, who told him about it, etc.--I still believed it enough to be worthy of tabloid space.

So I told the same story to Khalid and he told me that Edmar had told him the story already but claimed that it was only a joke, something he made up. Two things bothered me: 1. Why didn't Edmar retract the story when he told it to me, and 2. Why would he cook up something like that in the first place?

He knows that Mustafa and Hosam are two figures in the office who are least liked. Pitting them against each other would make an interesting fight on MTV's Celebrity Deathmatch. Still, a 27-year-old guy doesn't make up such bogus story in a supposedly formal office setting. Unless, he has an agenda. Could it be that he only wants me to smile? Could it be that he wants me to react and quote me on that for the Egyptians?

His motive is still vague. For all I know, he might be bored. But like I said, maybe he has crossed that line already. He does have a history of drug use and who knows how far gone his brain cells are now.

It's surprising how you discover more and more about a person even after several long months of being around them. I wonder if I also surprise them, too. I'm sure some readers have been surprised about my posts or comments in this blog.

Maybe it's too soon to put a person in a box. You never really know a person until you really know him. What I hear, see, and read about a person is only what he wants to reveal about himself. But what I should be in the lookout for are those unguarded moments when more good or bad traits spring out of the character. Nobody's perfect, but it does make a person interesting. I'm writing about two guys, and you're reading about them. Yep, interesting enough even when they're acting out of type.