Inaccessible....

Dear Friends,

I was having a hard time thinking about this post. It is after much contemplation and mulling over, that I decided to close down my blog, albeit temporarily.

When I had started this blog, my initial idea was to keep an online journal, whereby my friends and cousins and family could keep track of what's happening in my life. The idea seemed fabulous to me. It allowed me to write everything here, and relax on sending out mass emails to everyone telling them how I am doing. However, only one friend was interested in checking up on my blog.

I still continued to write on it. With time, my intial idea of keeping a blog developed into other things. I started writing about my life in Saudi, since I was working in Jeddah when I started my blog. I searched for other blogs online, and I found two great ones, Saudi Jeans and Jowhara's Chamber. No doubt, my favorite one was my friend's Zeina.

Soon, other people started to come online and leave comments for me here and there. Many did not like what I was writing about, because they felt I was anti-Saudi or something. Funny because whenever I wrote something nice about Saudi, these very people would not even say a simple thank you. I have been forced to write a post specifically about why I write about Saudi and all.

But, of late, all of this has descended into mudslinging and all. I have been attacked by some people who doubt my intentions and character. It's sad because in today's age, there are still some intolerant people who cannot take criticism into their hands. I did not mind people criticising what I wrote about or my ideas, you were more than welcome to do that, but an attack on my character and me as a person is certainly not acceptable, unless I gave you solid reasons to do so! This descended into the worse situation that my friend Zeina felt like she had to close down her blog which she did.

So, in short, I will be away from here. God knows if I will ever come back, or if I will switch over to some other blogging site. Maybe, I might return to the same address, I don't know anything yet. I just to have some time our and re-assess where I went wrong and what I have done to have people write such comments to me personally! I know there are some of you out there who tell me to be strong, to ignore the rude comments, to delete the rude comments and all, but there is only so much I can take in a week.

I offer my apologies to all those people who thought I was rude, mean, offensive to them or their sensibilities. I am sorry if I hurt you in any way whoever you may be. I hope you realize that it was never my intention to hurt or offend anyone in the first place. To all those who have been amazing, I am sorry I am doing this. I so wish I could continue to blog as I do so, but I am not in the mood to tolerate any more nonsense from some of the people out there.

With love,

Mansur