My Top 3 Idiotic Moments
Hello again, friends! Long time no see.
I’d been feeling very uninspired the last few months, but I got the idea for this post out of the blue while I was brushing my teeth yesterday. Why do all our best ideas come to us in the bathroom?
Perhaps when we excrete shit, we ingest wisdom.
I can’t believe I didn’t think about writing this post sooner. I have so many idiotic moments to the extent that sometimes people who don’t know me very well think I’m faking it to be the cute, ditzy girl. The sad part is, it’s never cute.
Before I begin, allow me to explain why I think this post is a good idea: it’s got something for everyone! Case in point:
- If you find me intimidating (which, apparently, some people do), prepare to never, ever feel that way again.
- If you hate me, prepare to laugh at my expense.
- If you have a crush on me, prepare to overcome it in four easy steps.
- If you have no particular emotion towards me, prepare to be generally entertained.
Are you ready to unveil the true idiocy that hides beneath this know-it-all exterior? Proceed at your own risk.
Idiotic Story #1: The Kinky Oximeter
If you don’t know what an oximeter is, bear in mind that I had to google it just to be able to tell this story.
The reason why I’m telling this one first is because this is the most recent idiocy event.
I was on the phone with a friend who tested positive for coronavirus a few months ago, and I found out he still isn’t feeling too great. He was talking to me about how his oxygen levels keep dropping, to which I responded with: “How are you able to monitor your oxygen levels at home? Isn’t that a hospital thing?”
He explained that he was using an oximeter, and I was genuinely astounded because I (thankfully) had no idea such a thing even existed. So I made the stupid mistake of asking him how it works, unaware that he would use the opportunity for his own entertainment.
Cue the shit show.
He told me it worked exactly like a thermometer, in that it can be put inside the mouth, nose, or where the sun don’t shine. “Really?” I exclaimed, “I had no idea you could measure your oxygen levels through your butthole! Maybe they make it that way for babies.”
He laughed and told me he was just kidding (but he was also – understandably – judging me for believing him so quickly). He asked me what I pictured an oximeter would look like, and I told him it was probably like a breathalyzer; something you’d blow into.
Apparently, that is also incorrect.
He tried explaining that it’s just a tool that presses on your thumb, and this is where I decided I was too smart to fall for more of his bullshit. How the hell would you measure oxygen levels without accessing the person’s lungs or blood? It made no sense to me.
Long story short, I have no idea how an oximeter works, and if he hadn’t confessed that he was kidding, I’m pretty sure I would have easily walked into a pharmacy, pulled my pants down, and asked for someone to check my oxygen levels.
What are you doing, step pharmacist?
Idiotic Story #2: The Egyptian Colombus
During my third or fourth year in university, I was an editor in the college newspaper. I was asked to write an opinion editorial and – in my never ending quest to attempt to stay relevant – I decided to write about a slightly touchy subject.
I can’t remember what was happening at the time, but we had some beef with Qatar for some reason, so I decided to write a bit of a diss piece because – as you can tell – I’m insanely well-read and definitely qualified to tackle an issue that touches on both politics and geography.
Anyway, I wrote the piece and it was added to the newspaper layout because we were about to go to print the next day. Everything was status quo until one of the other editors read it and commented on a very particular sentence, which went something like this:
“Why do we insist on copying Qatar all the time? Why are we so uninspired? I mean, can’t we pick a country that’s at least on a different continent??”
Yeah. So here’s how that conversation went:
“Mona, Qatar is, in fact, on a different continent.”
“What? You’re trying to mess with me, aren’t you?”
“No, seriously. It’s in Asia.”
“Asia? LOL. Hilarious. No, man, it’s in the Arab Peninsula.”
“Yeah….that’s in Asia.”
“LIES. So when I travelled to the UAE I was actually in Asia? Dude, do you have any idea how far away Asia is??”
In retrospect, I still stand by this statement. Remember how in all the cartoons they’d dig a hole so deep they’d end up in China? That was my reasoning.
That editor (along with two others) spent around half an hour trying to convince me that Qatar is in Asia. They pulled up maps, they did Google searches, they did everything they could, and near the end I was starting to feel incredibly gaslit.
They spotted this ridiculous mistake in my article before we went to print, but at what cost? I can never trust again.
Idiotic Story #3: The Creator of Languages
A few years ago, I went to a wedding by the beach. The groom was Egyptian and the bride was Indian, so we were all communicating in English.
I was talking to one of the bride’s friends, who commented that all the Egyptians seem to say ‘Ya3ni’ a lot in between sentences, so she asked me to explain.
I obliged, telling her it was our ‘placeholder’ word, like ‘like’ or ‘you know.’
She got super excited and exclaimed that they had the exact same word in their language.
Now, there are two ways to interpret this statement:
The normal way: Yes, every language has a placeholder word. It’s normal
The Mona way: OMG so ‘ya3ni’ is actually an Indian word!!
I made the mistake of asking no follow-up questions. She was just so excited that I legit believed we had just discovered a word that exists in both our languages.
This would have been a harmless assumption if I hadn’t made it my mission to tell EVERY SINGLE PERSON at the wedding about this newfound discovery.
Honorable Mention: The Mona Lisa Thief
When I was younger I went to The Louvre and bought a nice Mona Lisa print from the gift shop. When I came back to Egypt, we had it framed, and to this day it sits above my bed.
I was video chatting with a friend (the same friend from that oximeter story, mind you) and he noticed it.
“Oh, is that the Mona Lisa behind you?” he asked.
Without skipping a beat, I responded with: “Yeah….but don’t worry, it’s not the real one though.”
I WAS SLEEPY, OKAY??
To be fair, if the Mona Lisa got stolen, Maadi would be the last place they’d look!
