The Man with the Green Eyes

This deserves a re-post. It was one of my first posts before I left for Egypt and reading it now is so refreshing.
UPDATE: I still mentally consult Uncle Green Eyed Man, wondering what he'd do in certain situations and think about what I'd say to him if I ran into him again in New York. I also remembered that his name was Malik.

Update Update: I'm going back to Egypt this week.

" My eyes I green cus I eat a lot of vegetables. It don't have nothing to do with your new friend" - Erykah Badu

"I must admit this entire process; preparing to go overseas, doing hours and hours or repetitive Arabic a day, felling the anxiousness of living with people I have never met, has made me feel rather apprehensive to go to Egypt. Nervous, but not in a good way. But yesterday, I met a green eyed man from Harlem who told me of his experiences in Egypt. He reminded me of one of the crazy cool protagonists I'd read in a funny novel about coming of age or something. Once I got passed how BEAUTIFUL he was and picked my mouth up off the ground and began to listen to what he was saying I was spellbound captivated enchanted and for the first time in a while excited once again. He told me of the time he stumbled into the modern day city of the dead, his encounters with con- artists, the power of the pyramids, the mid-town manhattan business of Cairo, and raved about tomatoes, lol. Honestly, I had the urge to act like an excited kid during story time, you know, sit Indian style plop my face in my hands and just listen. Perhaps it was because with each story he told, it was complete with sound effects, accents, broad hand gestures, and when he would get to the good part or when he would imitate someone his eyes would get SO big you'd think they would fall right out of his head lol. Just imagine these big huge clover green eyes staring right into your soul, intense but not in a bad way, it was more like hitting your funny bone, you know it hurts but you still have the urge to laugh ( Ha! perhaps this metaphor makes no sense, i guess you had to be there lol) As the minuets passed, I suddenly felt strangely comfortable with this man, like I'd known him for years and at one point I had the urge to say " Uncle Green Eyed Man its so great to see you again!". The epitome of the phrase "Familiar Stranger" I guess....
Maybe I'll right a poem about this encounter, maybe a short story, maybe I'll continue this blog post but for now, thank you green eyed man, who I had the urge to call Uncle Green Eyed man, for answering all of my silly questions, for the dope discount on all of those books that I bought, and for making me excited once again for this adventure in Egypt."