Ahmed's Adventures

Thursday, December 21, 2006

Busy as an Ant!

Wow, I can't believe that I have only one entry for this month. I had been super busy this month with the Film Festival and my book publishing that I forgot to do lots of things in my personal life, like preparing for the big Eid which will be on new years!

A set date was set last night between me and publisher to when my book (Life is a Reason) would be released worldwide! Drum roll please!! So the book should be out on January 25th, 2007 a very special day for me!!

Ok, I have to go back to work!! It seems I won't be able to update this blog for a bit, so stay tuned :)

Posted by Ahmed Arshi :: 11:43 AM :: 3 comments

Sunday, December 10, 2006

A moment of Glory..

So finally the day had arrived, the day where I would show my film in a film festival. I have spent the past three days in my hotel room here in Dubai just contemplating! The rest of the crew were as nervous as I was, so that made me feel better. I didn't sleep last night, and no one else did. We all sat in my hotel room watching TV and making up stories of what would happen today! It was fun to imagine things and it would suck if some of the shitty things we imagined would actually happen!!

By 4pm, everybody left to their rooms to prepare themselves for our 6pm premiere of our film. My producer and friend, Rami came by my room telling me that he would be downstairs in the car whenever I was ready so we could go together to the theater. I took my time in getting ready like a chick in her first date!! When I went downstairs around 5pm there was no car, no one! I asked the receptionist and she told me that the entire crew had left!!

WTF?

I called Rami and he was already in the theater! He told me that he was told that I have left!!!
FUCK!! I asked the hotel guys to fitch me a cap but since we were in a 3 star hotel they didn't have that service....Are you kidding me?! I walked up to the main road and waited for a cap for 30 minutes!!! I was boiling!! And every taxi that passed by was full. One of the caps that passed by had a phone number so I called it, but they told me that they were too busy and would come to fitch me in half hour!! I had only half hour before the premiere starts!! The biggest problem was not finding a cap, I didn't even know where I was or where I was heading!!! I called Rami again and asked him where he was, the idiot didn't even know, he told me that he would call me back and that I had to hurry up because there are a lot of people who wanted to meet me, especially from the board!! This is just great!!!

All of a sudden, a car pulled over and a white guy came out waving at me. I looked closer at the guy, I didn't even know him. He walked to me and asked me if I was Ahmed, I nodded suspiciously. He told me that he saw me from the other side of the road looking all frustrated and that he recognized me from somewhere, then he remembered that I was on Television the other night being interviewed for my film and he saw the trailer on TV and went and bought a ticket for it!! What are the fucken chances!!! He offered me a ride to the exact same place I was going!! I wasn't in the mood to have a conversation with him the entire trip, I was just looking at my watch every 3 seconds!!

We get to the place, and I was sweating!!! I saw the crew and head their way, after thanking the nice guy of course. I was so pissed off at them but it wasn't the time for revenge. We walked in the theater and it was full to the teeth. The person who introduces us was already speaking, so I guess we walked in the perfect time. I waved at everybody as my name was called and took a seat at the front row and the movie started.

The lights went back on as the movie ended, clapping and cheering filled the entire theater. I was too nervous to wave thank you to everyone. I knew that there should be people who didn't like the film, that there will be people who will bombard me with questions very soon. I looked very closely at the audience and I was a bit disappointed. They were 90% foreigners, there were very few Arabs, which was my film intended to.

Anyways, I had some awesome conversations with those who liked the film and some questions about the idea that led me to make a film in this very sensitive topic (Which was Terrorism). The same dude who picked me up walked to me and shook my hand and told me that he loved this movie very much and hands me his business card. My eyes were as wide as an open gate, he worked for the film festival board in London, England!!! And he told me that he would work as hard as he could to get my film to play in London's Film Festival.

I was just too overwhelmed, I left the rest of the crew in the after party and decided to go back to my hotel room to rest and write this. It's been a moment of glory after all.

Posted by Ahmed Arshi :: 11:26 PM :: 6 comments