Should I have intervened ?

Yesterday on the way back from work, all bored out of my mind and just wanting to get home I sped out of the office trying to reach home and lay down on my bed as soon as possible. Coming up on the way in Rabyeh I cam across a Srilankian maid, as I assumed, she was signaling out a driving instructors car to stop. So I smiled at the fact she was doing that and thought she confused it with a taxi but wondered why the hell is she doing that in the middle of the street rather than on the side.

So it came my turn to pass her, and she signaled me down and that raised up a dozen questions in my mind at "what the hell is she doing?".Then I noticed an elderly man, in his late fifties I assume, he was standing around her holding her from the shoulder and seemed to be talking to her (rather than screaming) and trying to stop her. So I passed them but a part of me felt guilty so I parked a bit ahead and decided to observe. Things were escalating and it seemed like the man was getting impatient with her and more forceful in his request for her to come back with him. Then she started hitting him and although he tried to restrain himself, from what I saw, he did lash out a bit... at this point a younger guy, probably the guy's son, was heading towards them and things calmed down a bit so I decided to drive off.

The whole incident just made me think for a while about quite a few things and I tried to honestly recognize why I reacted to the whole thing by trying to avoid it.

So first observation was why did I first consider that she doesn't know the difference between a cad and a driving instructors car; that was because I perceived her a foreign made and I am biased to think that they will be less cultured and I consider maids to be less street smart than the rest.

Then it came the fact of why didn't I stop and help resolve it. The conclusion that I reached is a chain of thought whether moral or not it's how I came to do what I did, or didn't in this case.

The perception I have in my head is to side with the employer of the maid rather than the maid herself, that is purely based on my personal experience with maids. While I recognize the injustices that might befall them I still also can't distance myself from the crap the maids caused me and I had to put up with and the troubles they caused within my immediate family. So while she might be an honestly genuine victim the cost of verifying that and my skepticism were too high of a cost for the reward.

On the other hand the realization that, really it is non of my business to step in to resolve this did pain me to say the least. When I said the cost of verifying, I meant the fact that if I had stepped in it might have escalated the altercation and shifted the focus to me instead of her and I won't be glad about that since I know how volatile people in this country are when they see a stranger butting into their business. Thats beside the fact that there is a high probability that the maid erred them rather than what I would initially assume, that would put me in more heat in that case.

Thoughts about racism scantly skipped through my head at that point, would I have stopped if it wasn't a maid(someone who is more prone to be victimized). quickly the answer jolted in my brain with a resonating "NO, I wouldn't have even thought about it as much !". I usually don't like to involve myself into the troubles of two strangers and even people am familiar with since my experience is that they end up ganging up on you rather than appreciating the fact that you are trying to calm them down to rationalize the issue, so at an early age that was the rule whenever i observe something of that nature.
The only exceptions I have to that rule is when it involves a child or someone unable to stand to himself (for instance some of the special kids) . In that case it is irrelevant to me who wronged who, the child has a leeway not allowed to others.

So I guess inaction is what I found to be the best action, but is it the morally right thing to do ? and is it worth the risk and cost ? What would you have done ?

ENJOY!

* art by Spalenka

Viral pawnage

best I've seen in a while, click (or copy paste) the link

http://www.quieroverunfantasma.com/eng/

Enjoy!

"I'm the scat man" ..... NOT or maybe ?!

Hey you girls & guys remember this song ? Scatman ? remember how every kid around was trying to sing it ending up just uttering "I'm the scat man" .... lovely song, ain't it ?


while the meaning of scat seems fitting for that song, Jazz singing in which improvised, meaningless syllables are sung to a melody, my debaucherous mind just goes on a tangent and i start laughing when I recall kids singing I'm the scat man, oh the ignorance of children and adults at that... then the next image in my brain is that of a doodie.com cartoon ...

Either way, why the hell am I talking about that ?
well since I really don't want to talk about other things (well lets just say its not the most healthy option for me to do so), like the republishing of the cartoons and what happened on al jazeera on my blog, or whats going on in gaza, or the economic situation of Jordan and the United States and all the other lovely things going on around me and in my head. which honestly I can summarize my thoughts of them all with that talk above, what a bunch of scat loving men do we have in the world .... oh .... in case your not horrified and vowing to never open up this blog again I'll leave you with this, should do the job :P



and for anyone having a writers block like i was having this proved to be of some help to me :D


ENJOY !

Why does crap fill the airwaves and how consumerist pop culture creates societies...

Me like this, you watch this ! please ?



bambam is being nice today, give me a cookie ...

don't ask me how the next one is related but it is, and thou shall watch if e have read thus far.



Help ?

The forgotten tag

Tala & Kinzi tagged me ages ago with the pre-18 tag, Although i think life starts after 18 and whatever you do before really doesn't matter all that much (hmm yeah that includes the crappy tawjihi or whatever else there is in you life as a rights of passage)
so here it goes ...

to list 6 things one should do before becoming 18 years old.

so am just going to say the highlights of pre-18.

1. Ignore the popularity contest that is school, you are who you are make that bloom: so much damage and false expectations in life stem from the fact that life in school mimics real life. If you don't develop the skill to connect with people beyond whats hot right now forget about ever being anything. Accept your differences, start thinking about who you are as a person, that is you, not which religion, family, country, color, and class. take a peak at the raw you.

2. if possible, sleep through it: oh sleeping in school is a must and i enjoyed that part thoroughly, if you feel you are not getting the education that you need from school that is the best protest you can do, while on the other hand you should not lax off and you should carry the burden of your education.

3. Go to a test without even opening a book: There are many types of intelligence in the world, don't make them brainwash you into thinking that you are irrelevant if you suck in any class. try to exercise your own system. by going to a test without studying you are measuring your recollection ability, your independent thought, your retention abilities if you paid attention in class, and you are also testing your stress tolerance and handling. screw a couple of grades points if you manage to get a positive experience in those areas which are far more important later on. you will never always have the whole answers in real life so might as well start now.

4. you are grade what ? i don't care: If you think that you shouldn't know something because its for a higher grade then i suggest that you lock yourself up for life and forfeit the dream of ever becoming more than what you are. You are only limited by the system, so screw the system. If you find that you have interest in something that goes beyond what is offered by the system then go after it, even if its at the peril of other courses that you yourself hold no interest in. Even

5. WHY ? just keep on asking others that: it bears repeating, KEEP ON ASKING WHY. If the answer is "heik" or "its just the way it is", its worth asking "why" again. While getting an answer and learning from others is great, what is even more beneficial is discerning half-truths and uninformed answers from the rest. You will face a lot of bias when you ask for an answer about anything, anywhere. so the sooner you learn to distinguish which ones to keep and hold on and which ones to fight and decimate the better. Always do that with the knowledge that you might be wrong and you aren't always right. Also a warning for the wise, limit the parental "Why" to 5 a day otherwise you might be experiencing some financial hardships.

6. you know money ? You know the thing that you get for just breathing, eating and by now you should know how that sentence finishes: Learn the value of money, money is what makes life easier but its never gives meaning to it. Learn what its worth to not have, and if you can learn how people that have a lot of it act, and how people change which the fluctuation of the amount of money in their pockets. learn what it means to save, learn what it means to over spend. just mess with money, earn money, try to do everything that you can possibly can with money before you hit 18. For it is the only 18 years of your life that your financial mistakes won't come back to haunt you later on.

oh and btw, life starts after 18 so if you want to mess it up try to do it by then ... and like one really annoying presenter from my school days used to say "age is just a number it doesn't matter how old you are, what matters is how much you know in this life"

ENJOY