No_Angel

suspended

2008-10-15T11:58:00.004+03:00

thIs is My blOg and the Vote is to suspEnD and CAn iT, Can'T Have it Magically Erased. shucks!
ps. puzzles and more are back

Stuff to Steal

2008-08-19T13:20:00.003+03:00

stole this from 7aki, so thought to fill it up...

I am: Always trying to learn a new thing.
I think: Its about time to get off my ass after being lethargic for more than two years.
I know: that i am doing better now than 6 months ago.
I have: been away from this blog and the internet for a long time
I wish: That I can figure out how things are going to be 2 years from now. Since by then a lot should have changed by then.
I hate: how I had been lied to, spied on, manipulated, and generally not being myself.
I miss: my partner of 4 years it will never be the same at work without him
I fear: Disclosure and the mayhem it might bring, oh and going back to Yemen.
I hear: that you can shoot someone 4 times and get off with close to nothing if your last name is birdy (asfour), but i guess the same can't be said about being a pedo those birdies get caught on camera and go to jail. so birdies shoot away.
I smell: little to nothing, pretty much lost it at a young age.
I crave: A cordon bleu.
I search: to grasp an rope's end.
I wonder: what others that are close to me are thinking, especially the ones that i can't ask directly.
I regret: what ? me ? nah !
I love: the fact that I wore a skirt this morning, soooo comfy (me3waz, wizra whatever you wanna call it .... this thing in case you people start thinking I'm more of a pervert than i already am...) I ache: sometimes when I think too much and end up not sleeping at night.
I am not: a lot of things that people think I am, and I'm a lot of things they never think I could be. All without being a liar or a hypocrite, and just by capitalizing on peoples ability to be in denial
I believe: that I need to be less of an asshole to people, regardless of the fact that i think they totally deserve whats coming to them ... that's why i never am nicer ;)
I dance: atleast once a week, to get the jitterbugs out of my system
I sing: at the top of my lungs while I'm driving (and dancing too)
I cry: rarely now, i think i dried my ducts as a kid (Big boys do cry!)
I fight: with myself quite a lot ...
I win: at losing ? does that qualify ?
I lose: when I feel that it would make others happy while I could careless about it, that's quite often. competitive sports aint my thing
I almost never: fully comprehend anything, there is always more to learn about it.
I always: try to keep the people i care about close to me, closer than most and it sometimes spreads me thin
I confuse: others by my unwillingness to fit in one of two polar camps
I listen: to others and genuinely enjoy.
I can usually be found: at my home(s) .... or online ...
I am scared: of being in my thirties and its totally unrelated to my age.
I need: To be complimented every once in a while (even though i act contrary to that and might bitch at you for doing it)
I am happy about: A lot
I imagine: my area if specialization will be drasticly different than what i studied years ago.

Prices only go up in our version of the the "free" market

2008-07-28T10:05:00.006+03:00

cartoon by payne

I told u so ... prices only go up in our version of the the "free" market
So the prices for gas have been priced at $140 per barrel in jordan and it took them like 10 days to actually price it at that after it hit that mark ... now after 18 trading session of falling petrol prices and it being at $123 (a 16% drop from the peak) we are told that they might think about lowering the price and fixing things if it hits $90 a barrel! &@ck#%% $#^! $u^& licking ^%$&* #%^&#%&^ #%#&%^ @#!#!@#
This concludes our short report of "you should've known betta!"
ENJOY!

Disturbia p.IV

2008-07-23T15:08:00.004+03:00

haven't done this in a while and this one is different since its only one site !
go there for a dose of truly disturbing whispers -- http://www.commonties.com

sample 1:

Sample 2:

Sample 3:

2il 3asfora 2alatli (the lil robin told me) ...

2008-07-23T10:16:00.002+03:00

Sick and tired to having to pay your bills for water and electricity ? are you tired of being to have unlimited access to water and electricity and then paying for it (sometimes optional or heavily discounted) ?
Well soon enough you won't have to! introducing the pre-paid electricity and water system coming to Amman by the end of the year. no more worries, need water at mid-night because your water quota has been consumed ... you should have known better beaver, you should have been prepared and kept some pre-paid cards reserved.
Welcome to the new utility horizon !

So diesel costs for the winter are going to be a pain, gas ? not a chance you might as well take out those Romos and sell them while you can ?
So what are the people supposed to do ? well easy turn to electricity and wood... so hail on the new deforestation age and illegally cutting trees for timber (yeah thats like so last year). Actually the interesting phenomena this summer, i believe that it will get worse in winter, is that people are actually stealing electricity from the main lines and overloading the stations in the process (because its not just 1 or 2 people it is the whole damn neighborhood). so come winter expect this piece of news to make its rounds.

The future of the internet, will you bend over please ?

2008-07-23T09:46:00.005+03:00

This is what they are trying to do, kill off the free medium of expression that we all have and cherish. If you think "meh... this is canada its not going to affect me!" then you are wrong ! once the model is applied in one country, other ISP's will be slobbering to cash in. They already started that with mobile internet websites and soon they will embark on decimating the internet.
Stand up !

Source - Ipower

Extra Reading - Article by mike finch

ps. while this seems to be a hoax its still a viable future ...

Jordan; a 110% behind entrepreneurs. sho bitgol ?!

2008-07-22T11:11:00.001+03:00

Nassim was Talking a while back about issue blogging so I thought I'll pitch in to the cup, what I want to talk about today is a fairly simple issue; how regulations, the blessings system and bureaucracy blocks and crushes entrepreneurial spirit in our community. It really is interesting for me to be living in a country and always hearing people say that they are a 110% backing entrepreneurs. while, in reality, they are just paddling backwards when it comes to it.

well the story goes like this, a group of Jordanian individuals came up with an idea that had a lot of potential, something that would raise the level of services in the public schools.

The idea was to centralize the food production for schools, to arrange that all the food that will be provided for the public school to be produced and packaged in a central stations located in proximity to a group of schools and delivered fresh daily to the schools. each meal will compose of a balanced diet, the centralization of the meal will reduce the cost on the students and there will be subsidies and aids. Even 10% of the profits will go into a scholarship & aid fund for the students, without effecting the current break-ups. The element that will be effected is the system in which the teachers at the beginning of the year cut a deal with the falafel store at the corner of the school to provide the cafeteria with sandwiches around the year .... YUM !

So since the project involves the public school system you have to go do the rounds of blessings from various people and more importantly the department of education.
So you go and do your presentation rounds and the atmosphere is mostly reactionary... they will attack you on every front if they feel that you will curtail on their authority, reduce their income streams or be a serious competitor to anything on the market. On the other hand if you have a genuinely profitable idea that hasn't be implemented then you will certainly be blocked, without a reason or justification for that rejection. It's the attitude of "2i7na awla" (we deserve it more) that prevails.

By the way if anybody has the leverage to implement the idea, please make haste and hit the ground running. It's already in the pipeline.

ps. this was supposed to be one of those long posts that dissects things but it kinda never made it there.

Meh .....

2008-05-11T10:25:00.005+03:00

"Obviously fighting against the Israeli's gives you the right and the backing to do whatever you want, and guarantees you a clean bill regardless of what you do. So by that logic it is perfectly fine for me to be peccant and the evilest being on earth as long as i promise that i do it for the sake of justice ? And people nod happily to that ?"

"You know how they tell you a cup is either half full or half empty ? I say bullshit ... the whole concept of the cup is an illusion for the masses to be fooled into thinking that there is any substance to what they are seeing at all ... in fact there is nothing. And the group that gets on my nerves the most are the ones that think although it's half full it is really full since it's bottomless cup of water."

"Moderates should really die, i suggest a mass seppuku it would be quite the spectacle.... reason.... well they are the wolf's in a sheep cloth, pandering around that they are centrist and peaceful people while allowing extremist of both sides to transgress.... worst kind are those damn religious moderates! "

" It must have been a very sinister guy that coined the term "blowjob", so that he can crack up every time a girl tries to blow his whistle"

ENJOY!

Only I.F... (Inflation Fornication)

2008-04-28T17:00:00.001+03:00

So after discussing some background about inflation, and heaps of people complaining about it (of course not on here!) and the people discussing whether it's ethical or not, or whether it's an international phenomena that our revered government can do nothing about or not. There have even been voices about holding a strike on May 4th, and discussion ensued on whether it's even a good idea!

With all that talk about inflation I have not once read, from a Jordanian perspective, what are the actual options available for us to fight inflation, or some forecast to where we are heading. The most common thing that gets repeated is "the government is doing the best they can and the population should bear with the situation right now since it will pass"

Inflation is a perpetual problem that faces every economy and it's addressed by the fiscal policy of a country in order to expect it and put measures to control it and meet those expectations.
To fight a sharp rise in inflation both short term and long term plans must be adopted after identifying the main cause for the inflation, which i'll attempt to zero in on later on in this post.

In what follows I'll try to the best of my ability to answer most of those question, atleast from my perspective.

Is sharp increases in inflation an international problem ? if so how are other countries dealing with it ?

simply YES ! inflation rates in many countries have rose to critical level during the past year. Taking a look at inflation rates of countries around us and those who we do considerable importing from:

So we note that Gulf countries have experienced a huge inflation (with Qatar having the lead with its 13.8%) that is expected due to their economical boom and increases in oil prices. The main cause of inflation in those countries are their currency pegs against the dollar, with booming economies and the continued lowering of interest rates on the dollar it is forcing those central banks in the gulf to lower their interest rates instead of increasing it which is causing more inflation. The current method adopted to fight inflation in those countries is to raise wages and cap commodities prices, and they are intervening directly in real estate loans since real estate is the other major contributing factor of inflation. Kuwait broke its dollar peg in may of last year for basket of currencies, although it remained heavily weighed. there is growing pressure on other gulf countries to drop their pegs too in order to be able to maintain the economic growth rather than adopting band aid solutions that will contribute to future inflation. While the other option is to allow their currencies to appreciate against the dollar.

Given that 23% of Jordan imports are from Saudi Arabia, a 16 year high inflation rate is sure to translate into our markets. On the other hand China (inflation of 8% by the 1st quarter of this year) with a share of 8% of Jordanian imports (a figure that sure sounds too low in my opinion) is sure to translate in even higher rates. The inflation in China is a combination of four major factors, the fixed exchange rate with the dollar, the increases in oil prices, the super booming economy, and the developing middle class with the ability for spending.

Currently China is fighting inflation with little success, they are using commodity price controls and fixing the price of gas, they are raising their interest rates and bank reserve requirement and hoping to hold out from attacking the main culprit for inflation which is their undervalued currency against the dollar. if they decide to reevaluate their yuan (Chinese currency) by selling off their dollar reserves (in the form of T-Bills) they are bound to bring down the house of cards.

Focus! so what about Jordan ?

Well For Jordan, as discussed in the previous article, the causes of inflation in order of importance are as follow:

Increased taxation and lifting of subsidies on commodities which contributed to market uncertainty and sharp increases in the prices of commodities.
A Bubble real estate market that is fueled by speculation due to the low interest rate and enticing loan arrangements which is not reflected with an equal rise in demand.
Increase in commodity prices globally regardless of the first point, coupled with a depreciating currency

Taxation is becoming the sole contributor to the Jordanian fiscal budget, after the privatization of many governmental income streams based on the requirements of free market adoption recommended by the world bank and IMF. The country found no option to reduce the deficit without increasing the taxation and lifting the subsidies, the problem with both is twofolds; one is the timing which came at a turbulent time where there is no stability in global market prices, two in the mismanaged transparency in lifting up the subsidies based on schedule rather than surprise which was the case.

Now that the subsidies have been lifted totally, it will most likely be followed by an increase in taxation, most likely an increase on an already high sales tax.

Since real estate speculation has been a major contributor for Jordanian economy and we are already reached the peak in that market, it will most likely put even more pressure on the speculators translated by higher level of defaults at banks and a slow down in the real estate market akin to the one experience in the early 90's after the second gulf war estate boom.

Short Term solutions

Currently those are some of the short term solutions that might be able to curb the inflation rate and help elevate the consequences on the citizens.

Lifting of subsidies and revaluation of commodity prices that are set by the government should be fixed to a schedule that is transparent to the citizens while taking into account the shortages that might occur before each increase. That will help price stability in the market. stabilizing the prices of certain staple commodities as was done with natural gas is also encouraged but not to overburden the budget. (prices of natural gas, bread, livestock's grain and hay prices have been fixed)
The increase in productivity and private sector profits haven't been translated in higher wages coupled with low interest rates encouraged debt while discouraging savings. The salaries for the private and public sector should be increase accordingly and the minimum wage to be reevaluated based on current prices. (lip services increases in salary that doesn't meet the cost of living increases)
To maintain the investment in real estate which is a main driver of the economy in jordan it is encouraged to fix the price of iron. ( the government reduced the sales tax on iron from 16% to 8%)
Limiting the amount of loans given out by public banks in order to limit the supplies by a requirement to increase the reserves.
Encouragement of farming and agriculture projects that are provided with governmental protection in form of loans and tax exemptions to satisfy the country's local needs for staple commodities especially grain. To ward off the inflation and speculation of the global market and to make it viable to be competitive locally with the governmental backing.

Long Term solutions

On the long term the major problems that are facing Jordan are ever increasing petrol consumption without any semblance of independence or capitalization on years of dirt cheap oil. The shortage of water supplies and the dependence on seasonal rain reservoirs, and wide economic restructuring.

Re-investment of the privatization capitol in forms of alternative energy, in terms of nuclear, solar or wind energy sources in order to provide part of the countries energy needs and to drive up a new sector into economic growth. The solution and pipe dreams of oil shale and petrol wells being found in Jordan do little since they will come at a time period that will demand more cost effective solutions for Jordan and Shale oil as it stands currently will provide little of our energy needs at too exuberant of a cost, and talk about petrol beds being found conveniently at this time is a bit too frowzy for my taste.
A solution to the ever dwindling value of the dollar, which with the current adopted policy of the fed will continue on deteriorating. So a solution to this problem will be necessary to remove some of the downward pressure on the Jordanian economy.
A tightening of the budget is required, and by that I mean to act like the economy we are and not put up appearances for appearances sake. Till now, year over year our fiscal budget has been mushrooming endlessly.
Economical transparency of the government budget and investments, plus the democratization of the process as has been worked on since the year 2000 is required to be followed upon, and careful attention needs to be given to the water shortage issues and methods of circumventing the problem with diplomatic ties with neighboring countries is needed.

Conclusion

Well I tried to be optimistic as much as possible. but i Got bored towards the end and had to wrap up, My only hope in the short term lies in the workers and people of jordan. It would be of extreme importance to start a co-operative consumer watch to help market forces and bring down commodity prices. That would be done by sharing consumer price information and boycotting the higher priced retailers. All that it requires of the consumer is to share their grocery bill with an aggregator and follow up on market prices and shop at the cheapest available option based on the data. that will surely control the supply cartel from increasing the prices too rashly.

On the other hand wages needs to pushed up from within the institutions, and the lowest paid workers need to organize in order to realize their fair share of the profit to translate into higher wages. Anyways am writing in English so all this falls to deaf ears in my opinion.

What is interesting is the latest brain storming session came to the conclusion that everything is dandy and the denizens have been through worse so there is no need to do anything to rectify the situation and we need to stay the course.
So dear denizens, please drop your pants and bend over cause you might as well start enjoying !

ENJOY !

feverish mind, scorching skies, and spontaneously combusting income

2008-04-22T14:22:00.006+03:00

A long overdue post that has been fermenting for like three months and when do I decide to finally write it and post ? Yes, you guessed it (err probably not), when I'm operating on a fever with multiple system failures (not my computer, I mean my body with that) because it's the best excuse to have when someone calls me raving mad after this.

So whats the most appropriate topic to rave mad about when your temperature is setting new highs ? well inflation of course !

so lets start of with what is inflation ?

Economic condition characterized by an increase in prices and wages, and declining purchasing power. Inflation is usually measured by changes in the Consumer Price Index (CPI). The result is diminished purchasing power, and frequently a lower rate of savings as wage earners put more of their disposable assets in consumption, and less in long-term savings. Inflation is a monetary phenomenon. It occurs when there is too much money in circulation relative to the production of actual goods and services.

thats pretty self explanatory so essentially it means that everything becomes more expensive.

So what causes inflation ?

hmm... in that definition they mentioned something about an increase in money supply (that reminds me of something that happened here in '03, I wonder) , but what the hell does that mean anyways ?
thats just the tip of the iceberg of causes and only half of the views available from an economical point of view, but I'm just another average mo so lets consult with them pundits and see what they say since am mainly interested in sharp increases in inflation I'm gonna focus on that only.

So turns out that sharp increases in inflation beyond the fiscal policy estimates (about 3-4% for a growing economy) is attributed to the following:

Depreciation of exchange rate
Rapid growth of money supply: An increase in loans by banks and building society borrowing due to low interest rates or incentives.
Food shortages, increase in oil prices and lifting on subsidies when a country is Dependant on imports.
Increases in consumer confidence and home prices translated in a increase purchasing power.
Faster economic growth in other countries: economical growth is tied to inflation so while their services and prices are going they are not matched by the country and hence that is reflected in an increase in price of goods and services that isn't matched.
Rising labor costs: an increase in wages that isn't translated in an increase in productivity with strains the demand and supply relationship.
Higher taxes and increase in raw material costs.

So yeah I guess it was nicer when it was simply an increase in money supply, but those are the main reasons for inflation

So now that I'm done with that bit of background --rolling up my selves-- I'm gonna dig in and try to localize all of this in a nice way(as much as my delirium allows) . Hell i'm even talking Jordanian economics ... i just hope i don't come off the same way "dr." fanek comes off to me.

So what's up Jordan ( thats a definite hat tip here) ?

So let's see what is the inflation rate in Jordan ? It's 5.4% in 2007 thats a nice drop from the 6.25% in 2006, thats damn dandy !

2007? like last year ? like the year when i first started to feel the pinch. prices didn't increase ... oh wait ! remember in the definition of inflation they mentioned something called CPI (consumer price index) , what the hell is that ? do we have one ? how did they calculate the inflation in the first place ? Well lets pay the department of statistics a visit and see if there is anything about it.
OK, it's here . Great more numbers ! so essentially the CPI is calculating how families spend their money and how much is the increase in price of the commodities and comparing them to the prices of base year.

So lets take a look at the Jordanian CPI break down:

The break up of household expenditure is 39.72% on food, clothing and shoes 4.85%, housing and living expenses 26.40% ( of which is notable fuel and lighting is 4.29%, home related expenditures 16.93%, and rentals 15.77%. did i mention that rentals are mentioned twice in every year ?).
those expenditure break ups are based on survey done in 1998 and hence taken as the base year. they never change in all of the CPI calculation so it means that expenditure break ups are disconnected from inflation. hmm... maybe that last point is due to my fever ignore it.
After 1999 the base year is taken as 2002 in terms of prices of the products. so the base year for the CPI of 2000 is 2002. Our main export should be clairvoyant economics researchers.

I guess its just my tendency to be a philistine and be confused by number so i might have misunderstood somethings there and in the end they make perfect sense and the 5.4% inflation rate of 2007 will hopefully be reduced to around 4% this year, and i'm happy that i didn't let my fingertips go on and write the rest of my thoughts about the CPI.

Number munching gives me indigestion, give me the meat !

So I looked at the CPI and left me in more confusion ( I hope it made more sense to you), so lets look at the factors for inflation and how they relate to Jordan shall we ?

First of all the depreciation of currency, some how i feel like i talked about this before, so our currency is still worth 0.709 $ since it's pegged. So the depreciation must come from the dollar ? how is that doing lately ? Well the dollar lost about 38% of its value against the euro since 2003, and as of today it lost 11% of its value in the last six months. that means that saving accounts at banks are loosing value rather than gaining. In turn that is putting some pressure on the purchasing power of the JD since accordingly Jordan is an import heavy country when it comes to staples, food and oil. So check, we definitely are experiencing a considerable monetary depreciation.

In the past 5 years the number of banks offering their services to the consumers in Jordan has quintupled or even more. With that easier access to loans and other debt instruments became available, coupled by the real estate bubble and influx of immigrants helped to expand the money supply pool considerably in the span of a relatively short period of time. so definitely CHECK, we did have that plus the interest rates since they are pegged to the dollar have been near zero rates through out the decade and seem to continue based on the FED's latest woes and trends.

If you haven't noticed the consumerist shift in Jordanian society in the last 5 years then i'll just apologize on behalf of my fever, but for now i'll just say double CHECKS on that. As for other countries, lets see Europe ? china ? Saudi Arabia ? did I miss anyone of our main import countries ? or did I misunderstand that year over year they have performed better and better ? anyways I'll leave that as undecided just for fevers sake ( apparently, one symptom of fever is the repeating of the word fever. I'm so gonna suggest that to webmd)

While consistently higher taxes since 2004 has been the bi-annual diet of us denizens, the wage increases have only started lately. Did I miss any of the points ?

Oh right, there was that thing about food and oil prices. OK, so international oil prices increased more than 400% since September 2003 that must do something for inflation. While local prices have increased by more than a 100% (hey i can't remember/find how much the price of gas in jordan was in 2003 so if anyone knows please tell me). As for food prices, the problem has been brewing since early on in the turn of the century since the acts of deregulation and adoptiong of free market economics couple with "global warming" lead to a decades law in food reserves and it just happened that those condition kept on piling along others and only hit us real hard recently...CHECK !

So essentially we got a full mark on the inflation check list, damn we are good! so now that am done with the background, I'll tackle what has been done by the government and the citizens and other such things.... but i'll have be lucid for that so am off to nap and get better.

ENJOY!

ps. note a 4-5% inflation rate is expected and doesn't require a government to take drastic actions to fight inflation since fighting inflation comes at the cost of economic growth

Should I have intervened ?

2008-03-27T13:08:00.005+03:00

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

2008-03-24T16:57:00.002+03:00

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 ?!

2008-03-13T15:17:00.004+03:00

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...

2008-03-10T15:59:00.004+03:00

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

2008-03-10T15:22:00.006+03:00

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

Why japanese people are more likely to commit suicide

2008-02-25T13:57:00.002+03:00

Well Japanese boys grow up with amazing stories of the normal high, middle , grade school kid who some how became "super" preferably by being associated with a mecha. So they think that is the norm and they grow up with delusions of grandeur.

If I don't have my Mecha, I am a failure as a human being and I should cease to exist

So they commit suicide.

As for girls, they dream of wider eyes and wish that when they are older their eyes will grow wider. Manga style wide .... so they die too.

Since we are on the subject of Anime, I am going to so make my kid watch this cartoon.... he is sooooo cute
I introduce you to the word Manko !

ENJOY!
ps. With the last discussion here I needed to throw a curve ball and lighten up

An example of where Quranic Science might get you ?

2008-02-21T14:48:00.004+03:00

OK, maybe its a bit uncalled for there, but the fact that he found a podium to honestly discuss things is what makes me more sure that not all voices/ideas should be entertained equally.
It's making me grind my teeth that am linking to a memri video, one of the most ultra zionistic unprofessional organizations that translate selectively for the only purpose of shedding light on Arabic ignorance and twisting things in Israeli favors but this video was just too much of a WTF moment to let it go unposted
I bet Galileo is turning like a maniac in his grave at the thought of people in the 21st century still arguing for the earth is flat idea. although I kind like having earth on a big giant turtle, it's cute eh ?

Just to be fair... he's not the only one to be arguing for such a hellish idea

ENJOY !

Microsoft marketing at its best, when you can't fight the parodies join them ...

2008-02-20T17:26:00.004+03:00

OK I had to pinch my self to make sure that am not seeing a parody of MS products...
people meet the source fource

My favourite is the SQL server gal;

Anyway, I just wanted to say hello, in person, in my own voice. I'm positively thrilled to be asked back for another round. You like me. You really like me!

Yup I do, atleast more than the visual studio guy whose reply to the question of his favourite TV show is ;

TV? He killed his TV long ago. In fact, he'd probably be more than happy to come over and kill yours too.

wouldn't let him close to my TV for sho.

Now how the hell is that supposed to be a marketing campaign that doesn't make feel like am dealing with bambinos in grown ups clothes is beyond me.

ENJOY

Quantam philosphy - Implications

2008-02-20T14:39:00.007+03:00

Out of the window is the law of noncontradiction, simply we have a physical proof that something can be in two states at the same time that are contradicting. it is evident not just from the this experiment of particle and waves but from others including quantum spin.

This staple of a premise being logically impossible to be true or false, right or wrong, dead or alive removed from any subjective view does dent universal logics (there are universal truths in our world philosophically) since it says that we each "create" our world rather than participate in it.

Secondly that our subjective influence on one such system influences other systems that are entangled with it. In quantum physics there are entangled particles, particles that have made contact with each other, think of it like 2 billiard balls hitting each other. When a measurement is made on one of the particles the other particle is exhibiting the opposite. So this spooky action states makes fertile ground for some new age ideas, think telepathy of particles or perhaps evidence for remote viewing.

Being the subjective interpretation that it is, in essence it is inferring that rather than the universe is being, it is becoming. To an extent it is alluding to the fact that our consciousness is shaping our universe into what we perceive as reality. Dare i say that it tells us that we might have a soul ...

Need I say that absolute determinism is out of the question at this point, since the idea that the universe is like a big machine where everything has been set in motion from day one with no influence that a person can have on his past, present or future. Since simply that holds out to be false experimentally :P It is the more of a free-will universe where to some extend determinism deals with out past but holds little influence on our future and doesn't predict our future .

In fear of making this post more disjointed than it already is, I'll stop this series at this in hope of expanding on it later on, sorry for making it long but I tried to cut it up as much as possible. I tried to limit my explanation as much as possible too, so I don't know if i made any leaps of logic.

Thanks to Observer for serving as the inspiration to these posts based on you post about determinism and the view that you can build a computer big enough to map out the paths of all humans if given enough information, and I hope I made you re-think that possibility. Sorry it took so long to write this too.

Quantum philosophy - What it means

2008-02-11T16:33:00.004+03:00

In the previous post, I mentioned the double slit experiment. In that experiment the Results are determined by the subjective outlook of the observer. If he wants to see light as waves it will be waves and if he wants it to be particles it will act as such. but never both at the same time.

The results of that different experiments were replicated in several more complex ones, that address any other possibility of experimental error, the mathematical models correspond to the results.

So What does this all mean ?

Interpreting the experimental findings has been the unorthodox part of quantum, since it threw determinism and the mechanistic view of the universe out of the window. It is the attempt to bridge the gap between what happens at the subatomic level and why it isn't observed in our universe at a larger scales.

The most widely supported view is that of the Copenhagen's interpretation which simply says that every particle is described by its wavefuntion that dictates its probability to be found in any place, and upon measurement that wave collapses placing the particle into what the subject is expecting of it with that measurement and that every measurement influences the end result. wave function in this interpretation means more of a non-committal mode rather than an actual wave like movement of particles.

Just in terms of reference to other interpretations in case you are saying that what this suggests is way too woo like and way too far fetched that it can't make sense (who said the universe should make sense). I won't discuss Hidden variable interpretation since it is old, and mostly a discarded attempt to hold on to classical mechanistic view of the world

Many World interpretation
this is the interesting interpretation that explains that instead of what happens after something is observed and all the other possibilities are discarded to form the current reality. It says that all those probabilities actually occur and we are only able to perceive one of those realities.
Those realities (universes) are part of a bigger multiverse which encompasses all those universes. If it happens that any 2 universes happen to intersect then they would end up merging into a single universe. It helps remove the fact that we are participants in shaping the universe (atleast the one that we live in) and back to participants... Do you remember Sliders.

Quantum Philosophy - Prologue

2008-02-11T15:13:00.002+03:00

My knowledge of the subject is rudimentary, from my perspective, so I'll try to explain to the best of my abilities. Plus I'll try to place my tendency to go to the moon and back when discussing something on a leash.

To start the subject up, I'd like to quote something that was said in the course "introduction to quantum mechanics". The professor started the class by saying this (paraphrase):

Look, if you teach an introductory course on quantum mechanics, and the students don't have nightmares for weeks, tear their hair out, wander around with bloodshot eyes, etc., then you probably didn't get the point across.

A lot of great thinkers in the past had a tough time swallowing what quantum mechanics indicated about our reality, Einstein was quoted on the subject saying "God doesn't play dice with the universe".

Essentially while classical Newtonian physics can predict every fall of the sparrow, quantum mechanics can only leave us with possibilities. The real trouble with quantum mechanics doesn't arise from the fact that we can't predict the future in it ala classical physics. The real trouble arises from the fact that not only is that the future is indeterministic, the past is also indeterministic. Also that the probabilistic nature of quantum mechanics doesn't arise from our own ignorance like statistical probabilities it is an inherent attribute of the system .

Still reading ?? REALLY ?

Since the days of Democritus it was thought that everything tangible in this universe is made up of atoms that form the building blocks of our reality, Well quantum mechanics is the study of subatomic particles, the building blocks of all the universe.

So lets look at a simple experiment. you remember the science experiment where you have a tank of water and u place and object with two slits and turn on the wave generator to see how waves interfere with each other ? And do you remember them referring to light as both wave and particle in nature.
Well that experiment can be done with light.

double-slit experiments reveal that photons,
the quantum entities giving rise to light and other
forms of electromagnetic radiation, act both like
particles and like waves. A single photon will
strike the screen in a particular place,
like a particle (left)- But as more photons strike
the screen, they begin to create an interference pattern
(center). Such a pattern could occur only if each photon
had actually gone through both slits, like a wave (right).

If that isn't baffling enough, if you only permit one photon to pass through the slits. The interference pattern is still observed suggesting that wave went through. But when you add an apparatus that can detect which slit the photon passed through the interference pattern disappears. This experiment can be replicated on electrons, neutrons, atoms, and theoretically to other bigger things.

It is as if what we are experementing on is making future predictions and providing us with the answers that we want to see.

I'll stop here for this post, and let you think about what implications such result can have.

Hey muslims are Making headlines ...... AGAIN !!!

2008-02-06T21:55:00.000+03:00

So Muslims are in the headlines of the Herald Tribune (shame seems we are moving down the scale now in media haute couture) . This time it is to remove a depiction of Prophet Mohammed (PBUH) ... either go to Wiki or here (Close your eyes now I wouldn't want you to be "offended")

Can somebody please explain this to me ? we never went around banning and petitioning Britannica as far as I remember. Look if you ever want to be genuinely accepted in better light stop being so antagonistic about every single little thing. You want to recreate your image then recognize that you have to play according to the rules, it's like the 12th player on a football field cursing his mates for not passing the ball sheesh.

If there is anyone offended by seeing a picture that was drawn in the 13th century please tell me how you are offended by it. Now I draw, and I have always drawn characters and people thats what I enjoy drawing. So I remember the issue being brought up to me back when I was in school early on. For one, even as a child I thought it was absurd and irrelevant to our day and age. I am not gonna end up idolizing my drawings and praying to them ...

So here are the hadiths and the futwa on depictions , since Quran doesn't mention the issue;

الرسم له معنيان :
أحدهما رسم الصور ذوات الأرواح ، وهذا جاءت السنة بتحريمه ، فلا يجوز الرسم الذي هو رسم ذوات الأرواح ، لقول النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم في الحديث الصحيح : " كل مصوّر في النار " وقوله صلى الله عليه وسلم : " أشد الناس عذاباً يوم القيامة المصورون ، الذين يضاهئون بخلق الله " ، ولقوله صلى الله عليه وسلم : " إن أصحاب هذه الصور يعذبون يوم القيامة ويقال لهم : أحيوا ما خلقتم "

ولأنه صلى الله عليه وسلم لعن آكل الربا وموكله ، ولعن المصور ، فدل ذلك على تحريم التصوير ، وفسر العلماء ذلك بأنه تصوير ذوات الأرواح من الدواب والإنسان والطيور .

أما رسم ما لا روح فيه ـ وهو المعنى الثاني ـ فهذا لا حرج فيه كرسم الجبل والشجر والطائرة والسيارة وأشباه ذلك ، لا حرج فيه عند أهل العلم .

ويستثني من الرسم المحرم ما تدعو الضرورة إليه ، كرسم صور المجرمين حتى يعرفوا وحتى يمسكوا ، أو الصورة في حفيظة النفوس التي لا بد منها ولا يستطيع الحصول عليها إلا بذلك ، وهكذا ما تدعو الضرورة من سوى ذلك ، فإذا رأى ولي الأمر أن هذا الشيء مما تدعو الضرورة إلى تصويره ، لخطورته ، ولقصد سلامة المسلمين من شره حتى يعرف ، أو لأسباب أخرى فلا باس ، قال الله عز وجل : ( وَقَدْ فَصَّلَ لَكُمْ مَا حَرَّمَ عَلَيْكُمْ إِلَّا مَا اضْطُرِرْتُمْ إِلَيْهِ ) الأنعام 19/ 1

Translation:

visual depictions refers to two types:
The first type is referring to depictions of creatures with souls(all living creatures except for trees) and that is forbidden because of the prophet's(PBUH) saying "every depicter is in hell" , also quoted saying "[one of] the people most severely punished on judgment day are depicters, those who compete with god's creation". finally adding "the authors of those depictions are tortured on judgment day and are told: give life to your creations"

And because the prophet (PBUH) cursed the usury, her agents, and depicters. that points out that it is haram (forbidden). The people of knowledge explained that this prohibition applies to depictions of anything with a soul.

Depictions of the soulless is the second, that includes trees, mountains and other inanimate objects. There are no issues in this regard and it is permissible.

The exception to the depiction of creatures with souls is in cases where it is deemed necessary and helps in protecting the muslims from harm.

Reading the above, it is not particularly depictions of the prophet per se, although those are deemed extremely offensive. It is anything and everything that has a soul. (I wonder do viruses and bacteria have one ? and poor trees are singled out ... dammit, sunflowers look happy in the sun to me, they even lean forward to greet it )

So there you go, for anyone that ever took a photograph of his friends, drew a cartoon character or did anything that is loosely related to illustrating anything that would have a soul. I'll see you in hell for the remix !

ps. i picked depiction so it will include sculptures, drawings and photographs. even though its not a proper noun, so if anyone has a better word for it am welcoming suggestions. plus the translation is my own so if there are any mistakes please do point them out(I omitted some because i got bored).

ENJOY!

Why would they cut the internet --- a tinfoil theory

2008-02-05T02:17:00.000+03:00

Internet underwater cable don't just get cut by themselves, nothing short of an attack by a militant nessy would cause four of them to be cut off in the span of a few days. All in our lovely region of stability.
The first rule of modern warfare is to disrupt the communication, which raises the question of foul play. So that makes you ponder who could possibly do it and why ? then a light bulb just burns bright in your head .... IRAN !

So why now ? Mr. bushy was here at a peculiar time in his presidency and surely it was to instigate a new botched up peace process you know, in the last year of his second term. For me it was all about embezzling some friends at gun point to front up some money (20$ billion you might say sounds like a nice sum) and more importantly to bitch slap some sense into them into forgetting about ever dreaming about removing their pegs from the dollar, like that idiotic folly of broadcasting a private meeting of OPEC discussing just that. Also to get their mouth pieces working to reassure the people that sticking with the peg is for the best. All you have to do is tape your eyes, plug your ears and stuff your mouth shut and bend over for some kinky time with big bro inflation which is at a two decade high in most countries. that should do the economy some good.

All that occurs at a time when Iran is about to launch "Iranian Oil Bourse", which is the first bourse in the world that will deal petrol in non dollar currency and undermining the last crotch to the Dollar. The petrodollar would be under even more pressure, as if it wasn't already. So when was it launching you ask ? well during the period of February 1-11th, interesting eh ? now you would think you want to delay that, dontcha ?

It gets even better, who just happens to be holding war games around this month. well non other than the Russians , the french, the emiratis and qataris. Really now ? you don't say the Russians will hold exercises for the first time in 15 years in the area for nothing.

Now I remember another country that messed with the petro-dollar before and within the span of 6 months it was kaboomed back to the mongrel invasion. So you don't say he would ? It must have been god speaking to him again you know. It is funny how when normal people start hearing voices we place them in mental institutions but when its a bushy they make him a president.
Alas for after all its just seems like am the one hallucinating since there is no way in hell no one would have been talking about it by now ? meh, either way welcome to our fun filled '08 strap you safety belt tight for it's gonna be one hell of a ride.

ENJOY!

h/t : Mike Whitney ICH

Disterbia p.III

2008-02-04T16:00:00.000+03:00

Been a while since I did those ... so here we go again.

This one made my jaws drop to the floor, not that I have never seen kids smoking before (i've seen them on the streets a bunch of times). What was totally flabbergasting about it is the fact that he is genuinely enjoying it ! I wonder what is troubling him

If this was made for kids as it is claimed to be (even though I highly doubt it and more along the lines are all animations appropriate for kids), the that kid will definitely be damaged for life if he comprehends fully what is being portrayed here... it even made me scared just thinking about what was being said here.

This is funny and offensive at the same time, the disturbing thing is that they didn't have to go too far in their framing of it to make it that way.

"Saudi Arabia's religious police stopped schoolgirls from leaving a blazing building because they were not wearing correct Islamic dress, according to Saudi newspapers.
In a rare criticism of the kingdom's powerful "mutaween" police, the Saudi media has accused them of hindering attempts to save 15 girls who died in the fire on Monday."
"beating young girls to prevent them from leaving the school because they were not wearing the abaya".

You know public decency has priority over human lives, since you know how poeple might start humping at the first sight of female hair ...... aya caramba ! link to the full story

Fianlly, some exotic delicacies of the world. In case you were wondering what you are looking at. the pictures above are of Cuitlacoche . "Cuitlacoche is a black fungus that infects corn fields, making the kernels bulbous and swollen as they fill with spores." a delicacy from Mexico. now that is food worth indulging in wouldn't u think ? for more yumminess click this link for some pupas and snot beans "natto"

Enjoy ! really I hope you did ...

A Knowledge Vertigo

2008-02-04T15:42:00.000+03:00

It was always fascinating for me to read up on how in the past people were very observant of their nature and their surrounding. How they have been able to pin down the equinox, calculate the ages(epochs) map the star and a plethora of other scientific discoveries that sound almost alien influenced for the sheer complexity of achieving that level without what we consider as the basics empirical science.

It even boils down into a much closer perspective of how fast science has progressed in the past century to the extent that if you sit down with your parents (if they are old enough) of how life was back in the 30's and what where the normal household utilities available to them you would be shell shocked by the amount of indispensable innovation that occurred.

The other day I was chatting with a friend of mine and it came down to this question "why did humans lose their hair?", I was like WTH ! Beats me if I know. Maybe metrosexuals aren't a new thing and our ape grandfathers were the first metrosexuals of all. So just like anyone that is faced with a question they can't answer they fire up their trust worthy google window and dig into the answers available there . So I reached the following article, and in a matter of minutes I got the gist of what possible answers are there for that question.

Then I moved on, but it got me thinking. One thing the people in the past had a lot of is time. Nowadays we barely have enough time to do anything. work hours are longer, leisure time is less, personal time is stretched too thin and personally speaking I found the only way to "create" more time to do the things that I want is to condition myself for less sleep time.

Never before have it even crossed my mind that nowadays more than ever before it seems that we don't even have the time for independent thought. A seemingly complex idea like why would be loose our hair through evolution was resolved in a matter of minutes rather than the life time it would have taken in the past.

The fact that the cost of acquiring an answer to a question became so cheap made the information more valuable than the journey and prerequisites that were classically required to obtain it. In a way our whole education system has been structured on the answer and providing answers rather than encouraging critical thinking and independent thought regardless of the result reached.

In that manner a fairly infantile technology such as the internet(late 90's is when it started having a global impact) that is only a decade old had such a profound impact on our chain of thought that it offered a limitation to the amount of time we are willing to spend pondering an answer. At least we knew a time before the internet so we didn't lose all our abilities to let our creative energies loose.

The current generation who never knew the world before google or the internet, they will be less willing to sit down and ponder on an issue and more time trying to find the quickest and shortest path to the solution. That would mean that the whole process of innovation will have a slow down when it is their turn to take the wheel of progression of science. It is already evident from the statistics in the developed nations that less and less people are willing to go down the scientific path, and more and more people are facing difficulties in subjects that require critical thinking.

All is not lost, while vertical innovations (making new things out of already available objects) seems to be slowing down. Horizontal innovation is really picking up pace, things that are fundamentally the same since their inception are becoming better at a maddening pace. So without readjusting our educational expectations and total reconstruction of the institutes to place more value on the journey rather than the "holy" truth, we will be living among a society that is gullible and crippled in their independent thought. For they see the cost of attaining knowledge rather than information as too high of a cost to pay.

The funny thing is that deep down inside i didn't want to write this post, and i felt it was pointless because after all, there are definitely hundreds and hundreds of others that thought along the same lines. So why waste my time ? I wonder how many kids will rather drop down their console controllers to go outside and gaze at the stars and ponder ? I bet not many at all.

ENJOY!

Bloggers Celebrity look-a-likes

2008-01-30T23:19:00.000+03:00

That was supposed to wait till February since I extinguished by karma points for this month but oh well, its snowing and no one is writing about anything but that here so thought I'll just put it up ...

So Karma you can dish it out at me which ever way you like ^_^

Roba from andfaraway.net:

Lisa Loeb

Moey from Moey.net:

Baikinman aka qit 2al bakteeria
2al ragheef al 3ajeeb
(Anpanman)

Randy from
"my name is earl"

Nas from black-iris.com

Agatha Christie

Qwaider of sweetestmemories.com:

Tooter from the snorks

Ibrahim of oceancreep.com:

Jared Nomak
from Blade II

Lastly although I couldn't find a pick for him but there is a blogger that looks a lot like Oddjob from james bond can you guess who it is ? First time that I met him in person I couldn't get that image out of my head....

ENJOY

I am still speechless and flabbergasted !

2008-01-27T15:39:00.000+03:00

When I was reading 7aki's post I couldn't help but be reminded of a little incident which I still can't fully comprehend till this day.

A blink of an eye away. When I was a bit younger , think right around five years old, my parents enrolled me in the bus for my first grade. So like the good responsible first grader kiddo that I was I was expected to ride on the bus and go home and have lunch after school and maybe go out and play with the "other" kids... ok thats what i was supposed to do.

Honestly I was never much of a good sport and playing with other kids in the 7arah was a total bore, and one day I broke the rest of the stereotype in one of my rare instances of impulsiveness. I came home from school and I was anxious to see my mom for some reason, which slips my mind at this age. So as usual I come through our garden to knock on my door, expecting my mom to open up the door. Instead its my eldest sister who was visiting from uni back then. So we say Hi to each other and i drop my bag next to the door. Since I scoured the house to find my mater but to no avail I came back to the only other person in the house that I didn't have to use my sri linkan skills to converse with, my sister...

"Sis, fein mama, leish heyeh mish bil beit ? " I asked her. After looking up from the magazine she was busy reading with a look of how do I dare to disturb her meditative reading with my childish question (ok, ok, she's no ice queen. she's a very warm person but when i still can't overcome the age difference to this day. Back then anything she spoke to me sounded a bit authoritative) . She simply told me that mom went away to clean my grandma's house because she is coming in a few days.

Interesting i thought to my self, why would she not tell me ... weather is nice, check. do we know our destination, check. is there anyone worth informing at home on what am going to embark on, nope. Door open, door closed and on to the open roads. my grandmas house is about a 30 minute walk from my home. So I go on to walk which i thoroughly enjoyed. The first experience of total detachment from those "adults". For some reason all the way up on that hill that leads from gardens street to Rabieh people were looking at me weirdly as I recall, didn't make too much sense to me. For I was going to see my mom and there was nothing that would come between me that goal.

phew, so after walking down the hill, the gardens street, up the hill, then down the hill and up the yet another hill I manage to make it to grandma's house. Hey sis was telling the truth ! there's mom's car outside. So up the elevator we go...
openning the door to the elevator, super excited and accomplished in my euphoria ... "shoo bitsawe 7oon, keef jeit ? keef okhtak khalatak titla3 !" I was thinking to myself ,huh ?! why is mom at the elevator door screeming at me ? . "wala shee, 2irji3et min 2il madraseh 2o sa2lt reem 3anek 2alatli 2inek bi beit teta fa jeet hon".
Lets just say that there very few instances in my life were I've seen my mom that scared and angry with me. My mom was just getting done with the clean up and heading home to make it before I came back from school. So I guess if only the timing was a bit off I don't know how different that would have turned out.
Its a given that I was screamed at all the way back home, only to be welcomed by my frantic sister who was worried sick about me and over reacting. only for her to be blamed for her negligence for not paying attention while I sneaked out on my quest.
With all those emotions flying around there were two things on my mind back then. What the hell is so dramatic about me going to tetas house, dad always said that he used to walk 15 kilometers when he was a kid and he was proud of it.
The other thing being, what was it exactly that i wanted to see mom for ??

So moral of the story moms, provide them kids with cellphones so that they won't have to go walk to get in touch with you since we demand you to be in the expected places at all times. we are ritualistic beings and we require prior knowledge of changes in the routine. In case of emergency you need to be reachable on your cellphones.

On a more recent blunder that left me totally flabbergasted, someone told me that I am actually taking different identities and blogging under them. namely chikapappi and moments of clarity. No offense to those blog owners but my reaction was
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!! NEVER !"

ENJOY!

Remember Black Tuesday ?

2008-01-22T16:21:00.000+03:00

(Update: Beny boy panicked and dropped the interest rate by 75 basis point in an emergency measure, beny boy is not instilling a sense of stability, beny boy will have his ass handed to him, i don't feel like adjusting the futures index since this will be short lived :P but i'll change it from the 516 to 396 as of 3:57 Jordan local time

Update 2: MUAHAHA, not even six minutes later the futures index is now up ? down ... whatever ... its at a nice -481 points post rate cut. yup its prime beef waiting to be bled dry. ~4:15 JLT )

Don't worry by days end you might be reminded of it. Trading will resume today after MLK weekend. After the stellar performance of foreign stock markets spiraling uncontrollably yesterday with the majority of them dropping by 5% and the NIFTY (Indian stock market index) dropping a sweet 11% before closing at an 8% drop. The DOW is going to be one hell of a ride today !

The US Stocks futures index is marking a 481 point drop, which is in the top five of worst market days ever ! You can count on me being fixated on my screen today watching it turn bloody red
This will drive it into bear market territory (A bear market is described as being accompanied by widespread pessimism. Investors anticipating further losses are motivated to sell, with negative sentiment feeding on itself in a vicious circle ~ wiki) for the Bull has been slain.

Either way this will be a chance for me to live through a black Tuesday, and I can't help but be reminded of those pictures of stock brokers lining out side of the stock market in October of 1929, so I won't bore you with any econ jargon or reasoning for this. Lets hope they give us quality pictures like these !

Did you pack your parachute ? Then ENJOY the RIDE !

I can only post .... Gaza :`(

2008-01-21T16:40:00.000+03:00

If I send donations, they are blocked
If raise my voice, it is unheard
If light a candle, it is blown away
If I write a letter to my representative, it comes back unread
If I voice my opinion about it on the internet, I am told they brought it upon themselves
If I argue that those rockets killed a measly 2 Israelis in the past 6 years, i am told that is still too high of a price
If I look over the blogs i see dozens upon dozens silent, for they prefer to speak about the saudi that got locked up rather than a nation held hostage.
What am I exactly supposed to do with that hole inside my mind ?
What is left for me to do but to write ?
Why the hell isn't anyone doing anything about this ?
How much more shall they suffer for us to do something ?
Anything ?
Anyone ?
No one
Alas
And they recline on their religions of peace
They sit there
Praying
Idoling
Waiting
If thats what it takes
Then i hope they hear their answer soon
For it seems to be already too late
But then again we are told that our faith isn't strong enough
Faith, religion, politics, economics, philosphy, psychology, pathology, criminology, and all the olegies that we study to make sense of this world aside
Look inside of you and tell me if you are still feeling anything ? for i know i don't
try pinching your humanity ? for i think i lost mine
I just can't really think of a single thing i can do about it but type incoherently .... AGAIN
Just a lone voice, a whimper, hell its not even that. more of a shy whisper that will go unheard
When it's all is said and done, and a million or so are gone.
Maybe, just maybe something will be done.
Or perhaps we have been reduced to wanting a life over a land
After all that has been done, that sounds like the fairest deal
The seal to our ordeal
The only thought is of a meal
A light
a blinker
but the electricity is gone ...............

Hiding In Vulnerability, H.I.V.

2008-01-20T13:25:00.000+03:00

It is nothing new to us to turn a blind eye to behaviors that we deem immoral and we even attest that those are not present in our cultures or societies and they are by-product of western and Zionist corruption of our youth and digressions from our holy religion of Islam that offers the solution to all these problems are the cause of all those problems.

From that it follows that we don't have extra marital sex relationships, sex workers are non existent, injection drug users are not our children, brothers or sisters, and we surely don't have men who have sex with men for that is a western thing you know.

The sad thing is that ignorance towards those behaviors and others converge in aiding the prevalence of HIV/AIDS. So its only natural that we consider HIV/AIDS prevention to be a fringe issue, and we even have the statistics to back this up. For according to the ministry of health, as of 2004, there have been 361 recorded cases of which 136 cases of Jordanians contracting the virus. Looking at those numbers you would think that they are doing a splendid job in prevention !

While major strides have been taken in the campaigns under taken since 2002 in this field, the major problems faced by those campaign are still the same. Some of the good things that they have implemented were mandatory testing of foreigners staying in the country for longer than a month, this has helped to limit the exposure of the increased traffic that crosses the country and limit the exposure to the virus through that means. The testing of blood donators and blood bank supplies to ensure that they are contamination free.
Also the establishment of the HIV/AIDS hotline does help in answering any questions or concerns that people might have.

Now these are all fine, but taking a look at their site I couldn't happen but to notice a few issues; for starters the website is out of date, its naming not the previous health minister but the one before him. The data on there is more than 3 years old, plus they tend to preach morally when it comes to the issue which is not the best way to go about it( men having sex with men, sex workers, prisoners and injection drug users aren't even mentioned) .

There might be an explosion of HIV cases because its seen that there is no need to do the preventive work and encourage people to do voluntary testing. There is a higher percentage of people who test out only because symptoms appeared which might take anywhere from a year to 10 to appear. That means that through that period they have been able to infect others along the way.

So one of the main things that should be established is to try to reach out to those high risk communities, to get their trust enough for them to be educated about preventive methods.
One thing that they have done to achieve this is through peer education program. There isn't any statistics to measure the success or failure of such programs but I can't truly understand how a program that preaches the moral high ground as a preventive method would be hugely popular among sex workers for instance.

The preventive methods suggested by the ministry of health are as follows (by the way, they are not even mentioned in the English version of the website) ;

Abstaining from pre-marital and extra-marital sex and being committed to one uninfected partner (they do indicate its a sin from the religious point of view)
Using a condom correctly (whats the point if i did your previous step ? )
Verifying that blood transfusions are free of the virus (is there any indication to tell whether the blood has been tested or not ? especially in heamophelia cases ?)
Using disposable needles (Do they provide any free needles ?)
Disinfecting medical equipment in the proper manner (to layman like me how am i supposed to know if they are doing it or not ? )

Based on the preaching embedded here it is highly unlikely that the campaign had any meaningful penetration of high risk groups.
Some of the solutions that come to mind are as follows;

Establishing true anonymous testing (i.e. random number are taken and no follow up from any governmental arms, yes they do that now invading all ethics of patient confidentiality) . preferably this initiative to be removed from the ministry of health.
Provide pre-test and after-test counseling and sexual education to high risk groups and students, either through seminars or through providing materials to interested individuals to help reach out to high risk groups that is void of moral preaching since that will do more harm than good.
Abstinence approach to sexual education has been proved to be impotent, leave that to religious leaders and teachers rather than health educators.
establish support groups and family education to HIV positive individuals, for they are mostly having to suffer on their own. while currently they are forced to suffer alone in silence atleast some support of a fund and legislation against discrimination at the work place will help to provide better living standards to those who fell ill.
The hotline should have regular advertisement and emphasis should be noted that none of the calls are monitored to insure that the people who need it the most, they are mostly the groups that are ostracized and persecuted, are able to reach it paranoia free.
Testing of prisoners to limit the prevalence of the disease in prisons. Also to educate them.
Educating the health staff to deal with cases confidentially and humanely, rather than stigmatize a patient who came to them looking for aid.

I wish they would establish a free anonymous testing days in order for people of those high risk groups to voluntarily go and get tested, and establish the habit of ongoing bi-annual testing in order to reduce the chances of any insurgence in HIV cases.
While the efforts of the ministry of health are commendable and admirable, the national stigma of the disease is far from overcome and treatment of HIV positives is far from what it is hoped to be.
Although they are provided with free access to anti biotic cocktails they don't have access to the latest and more effective drugs which help to keep the symptoms under control. Also due to moral objections & cost, access to medications such as PEP and PREP is not available. So we still have a lot more work to do as a community.

To get more information about testing and information regarding AIDS/HIV:

Jordan Red Crescent: Safety first AIDS/HIV program

Telephone: 06-4765660 Email: safetyfirst@cyberia.com.jo
Ministry of health: National AIDS prevention program
Telephone: Amman 06 - 5697933
06 - 5673436
Zarqa 05 - 3936060
Madaba 05 - 3243008
Jarash 02 - 6353545
Balqah 05 - 3550752

ps. One thing to note, there is a high correlation between economic booms and prevalence of HIV cases due to the fact that travelers tend to be one group that spreads the virus and these are usually that come over for periods shorter than a month. They are the ones that are not getting screened and it is highly likely that they would engage in sexual acts, or drug related activities with the locals. I already made this incoherent article long enough even though i have alot more to talk about, hopefully i'll do that on another occasion.

pps. the pics either include the source on them or they are from ACT UP paris campaigns which i especially like.

Random musings

2008-01-16T15:39:00.000+03:00

Well just so you know that I haven't given up on this blogging thing yet, it's just that am developing a nasty habit for drafting my posts rather than posting them because they are becoming a bit more edgy and personal ...
On the other hand there are just way too many things I want to talk about and whenever i get to put my fingers on the keyboard I get brain chills.

Part 1 :
One of the main things I have been trying to do is to format my posts to be shorter (yeah seems I'll be doing a dandy job of avoiding that here) . somehow I have always been attracted to reading really long articles rather than short ones, but after rereading some of my posts I find it way too easy for me to loose people along the way and make me scatter shoot rather than bulls eye the ideas I have in my head. Since it will make it more difficult for me (especially with my limited writing abilities) I will try to limit my posts and break em up into smaller chunks and more digestion friendly bites. The thing that would scare me from doing that is its affinity to attract layman clappers which drive me mental.

Part 2:
I've been becoming more of a mean spirited troll of a commentator on other blogs, and that would be bad if I actually gave an ape *dump* of a value to what other ether based entities thought about me, but the thing is that people when they are actually challenged seem to just draw up their firewalls and block all processes of thought to be able to counter attack with the most philistine sarcasm you can ever stumble upon (yes am speaking from an elitist point of view here sure me!) . For instances I commented a bit harshly on a post about that poor soul that lost his life in that hit and run case, what Irked me to no end is the direction it took. it went on to high light that there is discrimination among east and west Amman denizens like it was an article of shock news while to me it sounded like pointing out that zebras are striped. spice in a bit of congeniality religiousness and drawing no conclusion on the matter and my tolling meter just hit max. There are two things that I didn't like about the incident, the first is the coverage it got. Dying for me is a fact of life it happens, and the longer it stay in the memory the harder it gets. So all that posterizing of the incident and first page news nature of it, which might come off as a case of national security to a passerby reader, makes it ever so harder for the family and my heart aches for them in that manner that they will be constantly reminded of it all year long. It's not the matter of catching the perpetrator since it is not one person but a whole system which drives people into behaving in that manner. The funny thing that not even a couple of weeks go the parliament revoked a new traffic enforcement law which made them look the fools, but the problem we are having is the lack of enforcement rather than the lack of proper laws. plus that law that was revoked contained so auspicious fines, the highest penalty is that of a DUI , when we lack the equipment to verify the charge, while a hit and run is half of that and akin to crossing a red light. It just sounds off to me, and also am never fine with having a law that allows law enforcement agents to fine somebody without notice since am not really trusting that its the just way of doing things so I hope that they modify the law before passing it again. The core problem we face is a lack of ethics when it comes to driving and over cramming of cars in our ill equipt streets, so maybe increasing the fines on non ethical driving and increasing the driving age to curtail new perpetrators might help a bit but at the end of the day i don't see anything can be done regarding that matter and I just accept it as a fact of life personally.

Part 3:
Although it took a page or so to get to the other point, the other interesting thing about it is how gossip ridden our society is, of that story in particular within the span of one conversation of a 16 year old kid getting hit on the way to ZwZ ( at 4 am or so which makes me blame bad parenting for that one honestly since i don't care how liberal you are that is just not the time of night to have an unattended minor out in the streets) to a 16 yr kid sleeping over his friends house getting hit with the side mirror flipping in the air hitting the pavement and going into a coma by a women in a silver mutsubishi whose husband lives in saudi arabia driving a saudi plated car while she was drunk. with no one except the person who opened the topic having any credible information regarding it, its just nuts. it was like witnessing a really twisted version of add a word to create a story game.

Part 4:
US politics and economics are really occupying my reading lately, and its looking more dismal by the day. For the politics the whole thing stinks, we have wishy washy patronizing candidates on both sides that really are more of the same. while the ones that truly offer change rather than taking it as their election slogan are being side lined and stand little to no chance of making it. The fact that poll rigging rumors have been circulating as early as the first primary makes the stinking corpse under the mat stink with an ever stronger stench (yes its been there since FL '00 and ohio '04) . whenever exit polls and results are starkly contrasting there is a valid reason for a recount, and no one raising as much of a fuss about it of the candidates makes me wonder why the hell not. with the only sane person in the demo nomination (Dennis Kucinich) asking for a recount being called an extra terrestrial loony, and here I thought his hot wife might earn him some good point with the superficial MSM that went loco on the ice queen's melt down of alligator tears.
There is nothing more shocking to me than the utter irony of the candidates understanding of the state of economics in the US and the statements they make regarding what they will do when they are given the mantle to the empire, which in all honesty will only help to compound the problems that its currently facing.
Either way just so that I won't forget am formulating my events calender of what am looking forward to in terms of news in that arena, since this year will promise to be the beginning of something big, whether bad or abysmal am not totally sure yet.

Part 5:
"marketing is the art of making you feel so worthless about your self and what you own and that buying that product will usher in the days of "happily ever after".
I am becoming so utterly nauseated by that cover up informational signs and directions to make space for more advertisement campaign. It is totally beyond me how expats are able to find their way around Amman never mind the rest of Jordan, even as a person that grew up here I still get lost sometimes and seek those signs aid. now am growing even more frustrated when am lost and am faced with an advertisement instead of a direction signs.
Then you get another apple bloody product that promises to revolutionize the way we view laptops by making the lightest laptop so far, the fact that the bestest trend is so cliche and played out that I really don't understand what makes it any different when apple does it, is it the religious lite cult following that they made for themselves. OK i'll admit that the ipod was sweet, their design are nice, but for gods sake apple is still a fringe market and producer in the computer industry and its for fancy shmancy folks when something like the Zonbu 99$ PC or the ASUSE Eee laptop ($199)
Flys under the radar of most, which to me its a lot more relevant to a region with such a low penetration such as ours due to the cost (and don't get me started on the financing initiative to provide computers for Jordanians that cost more than their original marketing price as if they are doing us a favor)

either way this one would have went on a bit longer if it wasn't for the fact that my work day is over, so i guess i was forced to cut it "short" eh ?
ENJOY !

Disturbia p.2

2007-12-30T13:42:00.000+03:00

I think the idea is evident by now, so first up this time...

What a lovely lunch party !
in the European launch party for God of war II you could enjoy one of many activities by the denizens of nether years. some of the activities...

[you can] reach inside the goat’s still-warm carcass to eat offal from its stomach.
At the event, guests competed to see who could eat the most offal – procured elsewhere and intended to resemble the goat’s intestines – from its stomach.
They also threw knives at targets and pulled live snakes from a pit with their bare hands.
Topless girls added to the louche atmosphere by dipping grapes into guests’ mouths, while a male model portraying Kratos, the game’s warrior hero, handed out garlands"

Way to go sony, thats a truly ingenious "what the hell were they thinking moment ", that aside I want me one of 'em sheep skin overalls they look nice !

The latest alter boy coloring book !
Its not the thing that this is a coloring book distributed by the church to fight the pedophelia endemic they are suffering from but the fact that the pedophile gets to have his own smiley angel ! Serves them right for such a convoluted method of fighting it, targeting the victim instead of the perpetrator, I hope i get to see a pastor coloring that page in a church near you...

Golly Jesus what are you doing !
Here is a very intriguing painting by Lars Justinen of the Justinen Creative Group, now the funny thing is how many so called religious people can never really look beyond their egos and tend to stumble into the pit that they were warned about. Its disturbing because actually people are disturbed about it rather than just getting what it is trying to say (for that look at the link) .
Remember Judas ?

Who has the oil ?
And they ask why they are troubled in the middle east ... only if we weren't cursed.

I think someone discovered an earthly worm hole !
yeah click on it and see the license plate, evidently the guy came unscathed ... now what am really interested is whether he will participate in a Russian Rollete next!
What are we exactly waiting for ?
with how distressful the environmental problems when something comes along that promises an even cheaper alternative to coal(used to produce electricity still) and based on a technology that has been available for decades barely gets the backing while some are still living in the 70's thinking of starting their own nuclear facility... perfectly disturbing. check out the link for more info ...

Honorable mention: Bhutto's eyewitness account and pictures

Another more artistic taste on the Creationism vs. evolution debate

2007-12-27T11:14:00.000+03:00

Since his majestic tentacleness has been busy at work in yet another school debate for the infusion of meta physics into the educational system this is one brilliant video that should not be missed
Watch duality (just watch the duality one with the two versions playing side by side, if that isn't divine I don't know what is)

ENJOY!
ps. i recommend watching it on the website linked above much better there.

Catch 22 of structured financing

2007-12-26T15:54:00.000+03:00

So - the insurance company is guaranteeing the value of the banks mortgage loans, using money that it borrowed from the bank, which the bank had to borrow because it’s got these bundles of leans insured by the insurance company. In other words, the banks are insuring their loans themselves, using the loans to pay for the losses on the loans. It’s circularity on circularity on circularity - cycles within cycles of stupidity, relying on stupidity to prop it up.
And there are people - lots and lots of them - who are falling for this as a scheme to save the banks from the bad loans.

full article

Opening windows

2007-12-25T13:44:00.000+03:00

Earlier on, Kinzi in a comment dropped a certain term... Johari window. At the time i never heard of the term and as usual it was on the list of things to read about (its an obscure list in my mind of random curious lil tid bit for instance the etymological root of arctic is arktos, the greek word for bear. back to the subject matter)

Now according to wiki;

A Johari window is a psychological tool created by Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham in 1955 in the United States, used to help people better understand their interpersonal communication and relationships. It is used primarily in self-help groups and corporate settings as a heuristic exercise.
When performing the exercise, the subject is given a list of 55 adjectives and picks five or six that they feel describe their own personality. Peers of the subject are then given the same list, and each pick five or six adjectives that describe the subject. These adjectives are then mapped onto a grid.

The grid is based on four quadrants based on who knows what, so you have stuff that others know about you and you don't know about your self (blindspot), others that you know about your self and others don't (facade). At first I thought it would be an interesting tool especially in teams to establish a common ground of familiarity between the team members and help then connect on a personal level which, in my opinion, helps a team operate more efficiently when you consider the other team memebers more than a 2-dimensional paper cut outs. Turns out that it also helps identify problem elements in an easy going exercise which sounds interesting.

OK so thats not exactly what I want to talk, but it served as the inspiration. Now if you notice there is a quadrant for secrets (things that you know but others don't) but what spun around in my head is that a secret is not problematic until a person you don't want to share your secret with knows about it.

After thinking about a bit more I tried to figure how would such a situation come about; First thing that came to mind is intuition and stumbling on them. For me its a big part since I do trust my intuition about things and it serves as an insight about the person am dealing with that won't be readily available otherwise. when it comes to its accuracy its relative but it always serves as an impetus for what follows.
Second thing that occurred to me, well the six degree of separation in Amman has been cut down in half. It is not that hard to learn about the life history of a person and his family in Amman, all you have to do is ask anyone. whats funny about that is usually you will be looking to gain as much information without raising any alarms.

The Third and last thing that occurred to me is to ask the person about what you are thinking about, the gutsy option. Usually i would say this is the most honest and better option out of all, since you don't have to beat around the bush.
The problem and the reactions that occur from it is what is problematic, people tend to not mind sharing their public information but as soon as you step on a private only topic a red flag will be raised. Since it will raise the question of how did you find out about it, rarely does intuition and stumbling upon them fly as a plausible answer since the person would have invested a great amount of energy in safe keeping that part. That usually starts to fester issues of mistrust.
Then the second logical path would be "why are you so interested in knowing that ? you want to black mail me or something?" which, I'd like to think, is rarely if ever the case. Non of us are really that important to be worth blackmailing.

So since the reaction will be mostly negative if you do go about the direct path the best way is to take the indirect one and drop hints about it candidly. Till the trust level reaches a certain point that he/she is willing to confide in you.
Though honestly if that level is never reached it really doesn't mean that you are not trust worthy, it might simply mean that somethings are better left off from the conversation.

I kind of lost my point along the way, the thing is that brought all this up is just how small Amman is and people by nature are curious. those two options combine for a lethal combination is that if you ever confide to anyone the news will travel like fire in august.
So happy secret safe keeping and enjoy life.

ps. nope don't think about that you know who you are :P muwahaha

Abrupt fall season finale review

2007-12-06T14:22:00.000+03:00

Given that the Fall season has been cut short by the writers guild strike this warranted a preemptive season finales to most of the shows, so here is a review of things so far that will be edited in case they change their mind.

Just for the record I fully back the writers guild strike and it is their right to do what they did and they better answer to their very reasonable demands and allow us to enjoy our shows. if you are interested in reading more about that read here

Heroes Season 2:
Verdict:watchable (orgasmic on the last 4)
Actually if anyone benefited from the strike it's this show, after a train wreck of a premiere and plots stretching too thin with the introduction of not 1 not 2 but 8 main characters, in 6 separate plot lines. The people were losing interest and losing it quickly. then comes the strike and they decide to clean up the mess that they started and try to recapture the glory of the first season.
And Boy did they do just that, the final 4 episode were heart racing adrenaline on TV, we all knew someone had to die because they can't maintain that many characters for the story to be meaningful (highlight for spoilers) but why did they kill Nikki, what do they have against Mika. Even though I didn't see Nathan's death coming and i thought that Partman should have captured the assassin atleast ... oh well things are finally shapping up for the individuals to group up and stand against the corporation. on the other hand did Adam serve only as a detour to the plot to get us watching syler whacking some heads off again ?(spoilers end) we'll have to wait and see whats going to be happening in Volume 3.

The Secret Diary of a call girl:
Verdict:must watch
that was one of my favorite shows and a pleasant surprise, hailing from the UK with the sexily matured Billie Piper in the lead as a sassy call girl and her escapades in the sex workers world. It is both hilarious , avantgarde and only something the brits are gonna make.

the IT Crowd season 2:
Verdict:watchable
just as hilarious and qwarky as the first season, and it even warranted Maurice a cameo in nickelback's rockstar music video. Since am not that good at conveying comedy here i'll just leave it at that both "work outing" (Ep. 1) and "moss and the German" kept me cracking up for so long that i thought I'll need an inhaler

Dexter Season 2:
Verdict:orgasmic
(on going but finale should hit us soon during the next week)
Can we say Amen for the heartless serial killer(though he is most certainly discovering one) and for the writers for pulling through a remarkably well written season that both developed all the characters, and even incorporating "the secret" and making fun of it. The introduction of Lila was amazing, she is one of the most intriguing and blazing characters to hit the screen in ages, she embodies the spirit of Eros in every meaning of the word. I hope he doesn't kill her

Prison Break season 3:
Verdict: touch it with a 10' pole
I honestly think it lost its sparkle and lost any interest I had in it after they did something very stupid with the plot and (spoiler)killed off Sarah, i kept on watching to find the twist and hoping for the twist but that evaporated eventually and i lost interest(end spoiler) so its most definitely going to be off my to watch list.

Weeds Season 3:
Verdict:orgasmic
I already attested my love to Nancy Botwin, and having some evangelical religion thrown into a cali community proved to be interesting to say the least, and did I mention that Mary-Kate blew me away with her depiction of Tara, a pusher with a religious motif of spreading love !
so we get beatings, gangs, a foot fetish porno, lesbianism, mammograms, ghosts, flying poop, ingenious usage of crosses, more milf weed and much much more. now what show can touch on all that and remain funny and not get serious about it.

Reaper Season 1:
(ongoing)
Verdict:watchable
My light hearted fun, plus I like sock he's hella cool every work place needs a "sock" to make it a much better world. So parents sell his soul to the devil and now he's his lackey, and boy does the devil like to mess up things. So you capture the souls with vessels, my favorite was the pigeon now think how would that work ! supernatural comedy, kind like Buffy before it started to get too convoluted.

Honorable mention, supernatural (for being consistent and a good filler) & Claymore (which has been the best anime series i've seen in a long long long time)

ps. links to torrent files and search are on the title.

Disturbia p.I

2007-12-06T14:11:00.001+03:00

eh ... as usual I like to disturb my self from my comfort zone on weekly bases, so thats the summary of the things that disturbed me during this week...

Mr.Benedict XVI encyclical where he discussed atheism and equates it to hopelessness and stalinism, not only have you proven time and time again that you are a bigot and have no semblance of credibility of the comparative religion degree that you hold. I would have atleast thought you(and the whole catholic church under your hands for that matter) can come up with a better argument than a 13 year old catholic boy surfing the internet and set out an example of tolerance and love to all(rather than the conditional one you set) ... so much for spreading the message of Jesus. and whats that about forbidding the thought of "images" of god (Ex 20:4) while your churches are littered with portraits of him . I guess you're just horny :P

seriously ? a bear called mohammed ? REALLY NOW, is that uproar called for ... yeah, true islam is real peaceful, i just wish someone would tell me whats true these days

if this was satire it would have made me reluctantly put up a smile, sadly it was meant literally. It definitely brings back memories of religion classes in school when were told that sickness on earth will deduct from our bill that we will have to foot in hell, how nice eh ? no wonder I preferred biology class when it gave a reason and said it just happens.

Why ? ! seriously it isn't even aesthetically pleasing which is the whole point of it, na ? well I guess I like that I still have decrees curbing me from getting one even though I like em.

Really who the hell in their right mind would buy this stuff ! I guess only the ones that want their children to be "from the womb to the war". Never mind placing it on their Christmas tree, and beside the point that a fetus embracing a machine gun is an image that disturbing doesn't even begin to describe.

Grrr... ENJOY!
h/t:stumble(zuza fun blog), daily irrelevant and Greta's blog

Of monkey spheres and Gaia

2007-12-03T14:30:00.000+03:00

You remember the first time you met a teacher of yours outside of the school walls. the flabbergasted sensation you felt that these people actually HAVE A LIFE and are not shoved into school lockers in the after hours ? (not my line ... from here but not creative enough to come up with my own point proving 2 liner)

The fact is we still do that no matter how old we get, beyond the few dozens of people that we interact with regularly the rest of humanity is reduced to one dimensional bit representation of labels. They are no longer human, they are our politicians, garbage men ...etc.
That served us well back in the day when we were solely dependent on the hundred or so people in our pocket of the community.

Abu khamees was having a hard time so I don't mind him raising his prices till he gets through with it, I better clean up that oil spill in the street before 2il hajeh 2um jom3a passes by on her way to market and hurts her self. those sentiments actually were common place, and even though we had rules and we were still tempted to break, them the repercussions of our actions had a tangible weight that will hinder us. They simply will hurt people that are real to us.

Alas, industrialization had to kick in, and the image of goody spewing machinery was forever ingrained in our psyche. people started adopting the motto of "it's non of my business" more and more and who can blame them. it is human nature to simplify our lives, and its certainly far easier to think of Nike the "nice" sneaker maker rather than the 21 year old Filipino single mother of 3 that gets paid 5 cents on the pair to make them.

That ability that we have developed to attempt to simplify infinitely complex matters is the bane of humanity, we are quick to jump the gun to paint the world in our adopted version of a 2 framed cartoon. It is far easier to paint every homosexual as a vile misguided fudgepacker, or to just judge every Jew as a stingy big nosed bigot who is bent on the subjugation of gentiles and specifically Arabs. We honestly can't be arsed to bother getting to know each one of them and make up our own opinion so we adopt the stereotype and go with it having faith in our monkey sphere's dogma. Even the mere mention or attempt, "god" forbid, of painting them in a more human picture is highly offensive to people.

So on comes the information age, it systematized the manipulation of people through the exploitation of our simplicity. Efficiently mobilizing hordes of yay sayers that will nod after you without a second of hesitance. For after all we placed our trust in those "holy grails" of the system for they have transgressed beyond our petty little mistakes and follies. "the president has sex ! how presidential of him", "foreign Zionist agents are behind every bad thing that happened to the Muslims, its for real I heard it on the Al-Jazeera". That schism of Us vs. Them will inevitably lead us to conflict, for we are no longer able to maintain our contact with in our sphere. whether we like it or not our modern lives depend on more people than we are able to comprehend.

On the other hand we developed an insatiable thirst for information, the societies of alienation drove us to want to connect on an emotional level to revered figures. who's at a better position to feed that addiction than our medias, they don't challenge us any more they just shove us full with what we want to hear and sensationalize on our emptiness. Or you can just run to the other side and actually try to check up on everyday people and what they are going through, like for example hearing the stories of rape victims in Sierra Leone, or Sarudzai Gumbo the kid that was found weighing only 36 pounds, disfigured by cancer and aids and left to rot not because of the neglect of her family but because her country failed her and many others like her. The world is riddled which such tragic bed time stories coming from Iraq, gaza, from home to the ends of the earth.

Albeit, they are just that stories. we feel our 5 minutes, if so, of sorrow and pity and move on in our rainbow bright reality that we are blessed with and go parading that we pulled a lever claiming that we have changed the world and did out part by participating in the charade we call the elections. After all I can't give up my "coach" bag just because some unlucky bastard happened to be abused while making it, anyways its their own ignorance that made them do that job in the first place anyways.

Time after time getting hit with such stories & attitudes might awake an archaic notion of empathy in us, but alas we feel helpless to do anything and we are left to spiral into our own helpless depression. Only to be caught back in the cycle, being told that the latest cure is the magic elixir that holds the key to our happiness .

Honestly speaking if the world and us as people "hold the course" we might usher in our extinction way before the prophesied Armageddon, hell we wouldn't even need any divine intervention to get to that point. the idea that we have been bestowed "dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth" is partly to blame for where we are now. The disposability of earth makes us care less of the footprints that we leave behind, for its non of our business. After all why should we hold any attachment or care for this earth if it is only a transient place in the greater plan of the universe. so a little global warming is just sensationalist mania for god has bigger plans, meh.

We don't have dominion over anything, we are just a small part of Gaia. Albeit the most damaging and selfish part, so far. As part of the biomass we hold it to our self and to our planet to wake up from this slumber of apathy, we are certainly not as helpless as we like to think. we have just grown accustomed to the leisure of our life that we forgot to look closely at where it has got us and the only thing we have been taught to do is to ask for more, more more more, more hate, more fighting, more food, more bling, bigger better stronger faster. Neglecting the effect of our debauchery on us as people and on our planet that has been generously harboring and trying to correct our ignorance and cope with.

I am not asking you to pray for Gaia, if you managed to make this far, am not asking you to worship her, and not asking you to be a hippie, or turn into a cynic tree hugger.
All am asking you is when you want to drop that wrapper in the street rather than holding to it till you reach the next bin is to think of what impact it might have on your surrounding(I used to do that thinking am creating a job and helping unemployment). when you buy the next buzz item at the store. think of who made it, where and what they might have been through. Never take the simple side of things and don't let anyone simplify it for you, read, learn and try. Try to not remain a pawn, shake off your shackles and stop fooling your self that you are removed from all the chaos going around you and try to make your impact. for no matter how small it is, even if is picking an anime instead of a disney movie just because their Modus operandi doesn't align with yours, then you are starting on the path no matter how silly that sounds.

For the times coming ahead of us are not going to be smooth sailing in any sense of the term, and if there is anything we can do about it we need to do it now. Drop your schadenfreude and adopt mudita.
Some might say am "bestowing my wisdom" on you, hell we all belong to varying species of hypocrites. So yes I am hypocritical in a sense, but am trying to find my path I'll let you know when I do. On the other hand don't take my word for it, or anyones for that matter, go and try to find things on your own and do what you think is right in your own heart.

Mount the Pixelated revolution

Poem by Anon

2007-12-03T00:01:00.000+03:00

Counterfeit emotion
Thats what I thought for the longest I guess
Whirlpool of motion
Something stirred in me causing a mess

A moth drawn to the fire
Fluttering ever closer that it burns
Enjoying the pain of immolation
Bound to meet Icarus's fate in the end

Mesmerized by the affliction
Out of body experience is what I felt
Watching myself asunder
Unfamiliar blood blushing my veins

The abyss of devotion
This sense of attachment is what i don't get
Senseless belonging
The reciprocation of which i won't get

Egregious acceptance
My bosom is wide open for you to rape
Embracing expressions
Having you near me is all I necessitate

Serendipitous acquaintance
The stars must have been aligned when we met
Perpetual nebulousness
I wish I can see me through your heart so I can rest

Beleaguered by your strings I falter
In this game of fate I forfeit
Words on the tip of my tongue dissever
Your loss is a throe I won't tempt

Counterfeit emotion
I only wish that was it
Whirlpool of motion
Words have new meanings that I wish to forget

- Anon

sorry for the lack of proper posts lately can't really help it but atleast I happened to rediscover poetry lately.
ENJOY!

What do you do with 18 minutes left to your work day ?

2007-11-27T17:16:00.001+03:00

look at stupid junk emails, so i came across this nutty illusion
Can you see the person in the picture there ?
Can't ?
step back a bit from the screen ?
Can you see it now ?

ENJOY!

Why not take the bus ?

2007-11-27T12:49:00.000+03:00

Been highly disenchanted lately with saying what i have to say, so i've been back on poking and antagonizing hoping it would be impetus enough for me to react. Maybe it's what I have been reading around here in the community and especially what I have not being seeing reflecting an anemic state of thought ...

So short and quote is how it's going to be

This is a nice social experiment documented in this picture on the contrast in our choice of conveyance

Till then ENJOY !

Consumerism at its best

2007-11-26T15:08:00.000+03:00

For every single person walking through that door I see a Debt tag
Until you rive you cranium from your maximus you will succumb to
Conniving institutions instilling false righteousness
Killing individuality for the dream of acceptance
Tumescent shells trying to fill the void
Hallowing this mythology of
Evanescent Identities
Simulacrum chimeras of "As seen on TV"
Youthanasia of the mind
Stifling antithetical expectations
Trifling generation sucked up in the system
Enough of this debauchery
Mount the PixelatedRevolution

ENJOY!

but remember ...

ps. puzzles are back

A Poem by Anon

2007-11-16T05:20:00.000+03:00

To Be ME

so many years in denial
its hard to see what is mine
peeking through the mental cloud
of what it means to be ME
seeing a glimpse here and there
ever denying what is there
It just can't be ME
for that can't be right
been brought up to be the same
just another rightous man
some who does and talks
just like others might
but that just can't be ME
So i took strides
ignoring demeaning eyes
and it hurt inside
just to be ME
looking and glaring
here and there
for a bright spot
that is already there
to rediscover ME
to heal ME
to find out what it means
TO BE ME

-Anon

Rules of engagement

2007-11-14T13:04:00.000+03:00

I'm your friendly neighborhood commentator, seriously am the first to clap along to any
mainstream idea. I love to just express my accolades to all the conservative thoughts and posts that manage to come my way through the Jordanian blogosphere. For i think progress is just a trend that will pass and the idea and traditions that we have are not well known and adhered to enough so a smile is drawn upon my face every time i read some idea or post that reiterates what I have been hearing for the past two decades of my existence...

Since I try to be so nice when I comment and be perfectly PC with everyone, and I even comment with my name to help link to my blog and promote my ideas i thought to let you on some of the rules i don't adhere to when i actually get into a discussion. Not that i like to do that at all...

I think it is well known by now religiously where I stand, so unless I am talking about religion (not something that religion has a view on since thats just about everything really) please don't bless your position with credibility based on your religious views. That usually bestows your logic with as much credibility as someone telling me that the reason we see thunder is that Zeus had a bad day and is angry so he's just throwing his anger spears down at us.

When am discussing religion my main intent is to learn, so i will try to not do comparative examination of religions or trying to debunk it by quoting another religion that claims its the one and only truth. surprisingly theology is an interest of mine, and i like to always learn more about all Abrahamic religions so when am discussing a certain aspect of a religion am trying to see if my understanding matches that of a practitioner of that religion. don't attack me because of my other religious views

As soon as you throw a personal insult or you try to undermine my logic in an utterly illogical manner to me that just means you lost the argument and i will usually not bother arguing any further or I might rarely throw it back at you

do i need to quote trolly here ??

If I write a hearty & beefy comment that is not militant or aggressive and I don't get a reply that will translate to more than usual snide and Snarky remarks in the future

I don't write fortune cookies' fortunes and i don't understand them. so gibberish talk that makes little to no sense to anyone but your self and claiming that you trumpeted me and doing your celebration is your right. I hold mine to LMAO

Case file: the existance of god

have the courage to answer in a logical way instead of just turning roles, I always discuss with you the E=MC2 theory, and I proof to you that if mass reached light speed then the time effect will be 0, and the mass will be infinite, keep this theory in mind, and you will know you and all other bloggers and posters, that Allah is faster that light speed, and then there is no impact for time over him, and he is infinite.

Clappers and lets be friendly and peaceful crowd. I understand your stance, you are generic moderates and i actually like you, but when 2 people or more are discussing something its because they are trying to run their ideas (which they are generally proud off) against the wall and see if they break. It is not an act of aggression at all and shouldn't be taken personally so don't jump in and say why can't you all be friends and why are you arguing. face it life is not fair or friendly deal with it on your own time.

When I spend time to write down some questions or inquiries I am actually interested in how you reply to them, I take personal insult when you overlook them totally am move on to other points without heeding them as much as a notice. It is even worse when you track back to a previous premise just because after reading that you found out that you might have been mistaken about your logic.

I try as often as I can to admit my mistakes, so i would appreciate the same from the other party. don't hop over them or throw me some tinfoil theory about how the world is ruled by immoral scientist just to not admit that you made a mistake.

Talking about conspiracy theories, I like to entertain them personally but i check in my tinfoil hat when i enter a discussion. so skip a lot of the common place theories that are holy in our region (yes am speaking of that one too, they are not behind every bad thing that ever happened to us)

An apology might be just words but it can go a long way, apologize when you hurt someone wrongfully or without intention. It's not going to pop one of your balls, and I testify that mine are still intact.

When discussing a specific point and when we have both agreed that there was an error about the initial premise of the argument, don't go about expanding the argument or digressing to a related topic. that always reminds me of when i used to play consoles and whenever I would lose a lot of games i would keep on asking for one more chance...

I try to make my definitions clear(i know i mostly circumlocate normally hence the bold i try) so that there will be little doubt about what i am talking about, and i take care about what word i use to describe something since i believe in the nuances of a language. In this situation it is a capitol sin in my eyes to use an English word and an established western ideology and tell me that this specific English word has a localized meaning in Jordan that Arabs use that is in total contrast to the original definition.

Case File: definition of NeoLiberalism

In the Arab world, neo-liberal means fake liberal, the complementary political movement in the Arab world that exists to service the American neo-conservatism agenda..

If i find an idea so ludicrous and unbelievably wrong, then yes am going to be sarcastic and a bit harsh. you have the right to hate me i can live with that.

Case File: consequences of drinking

How pretty is it to wake up and find that you've killed your own kids by driving while drunk? That you may put your country at risk by what you mouthed while drunk? That you may have gone to bed with your own sister while both of you were drunk?! And all of that does happen, a lot.

If I disagree with you it doesn't mean I don't like you personally, i like to believe that i am a nice person contrary to what others say. you might hold a different perspective than might it doesn't detract from you as a person and neither should my position detract from my humanity the world is a colorful and vibrant place it would be too boring without that gradient so learn to appreciate it with an open mind.

I don't believe in trends and am not a trendster, if some of my ideas are trendy i don't hold them to gloat their popularity and i won't drop them when they cease to be so. My ideas are who i am, they are a mirror to what i see in mind, just the same way i don't see my self getting chin implants because my chin isn't appealing to others i won't bandwagon on an idea to be popular with others. That doesn't mean that i won't change my position, it just means that the idea evolved based on new evidence.

Case File: lack of religion

Many are “Atheists as a fashion” ESPECIALLY in Jordan .

I Am not a scholar, I don't hold degrees in half a dozen fields. when i want to have real life evidence I turn to statistic (and i am really careful to pick the least bias ones), now i understand the reality that statistic can be used to prove anything so i take care to see how these statistics where collected and that they are of a well established and recognized source. So you have no right to discredit scholars and experts with either your smudged case studies or *aghast* personal observation and experiences. I respect your personal observations and experience but they are personal and you can't generalize based solely on those especially when they contradict every scientifically accepted opinion or study. they hold peer reviews in statistics for a reason.

Case File: relevance of genetics in psychological disorders
poster:

Now explain something to me. If something is Genetic, how come a psychologist is making the claim that it's inherited! I haven't heard anyone inheriting depression so why this? Wouldn't this be actually Outside the psychological realm?

explanation of mine:

since one of the most common causes of psychological disorders is genetics, and that is the bases for the diathesis-stress, and genetics is the cause for the predisposition you have been talking about earlier but that is triggered by the environment and experience in the case of alcoholism.... [with alot more following that]

poster:

Genetics are becoming every one's coat hanger these days. Even Aids turned out to be genetic with some people having higher tendencies to have it more than other.
I think for modern science. Anything we can't explain, we attribute it back to genetics

To all the gadflies and Galileo's, having an opinion against the mainstream or getting under people's skin and annoying them doesn't automatically translate into you being a genius with a brilliant and right idea. It just means you are a woo. so do your homework and stop being so stubborn and if you value your science then try reviewing the scientific method. As history has proven there aren't as many Galileo as is commonly claimed. plus its shameless boasting too.

Happy discussions everyone and I'll try my best to follow my rules am not asking anyone else to, just saying thats all

ENJOY!
ps. it was tougher than i thought to collect the case files, and don't object to me including them here since they are things that are available and a lot of us have passed by. If you don't like it don't claim it then.

I hope they speak Norwegian in Hell !

2007-11-12T19:53:00.000+03:00

One of the most recurring arguments against people who distance themselves from religion is that religion is the guiding post for living a peaceful and righteous life. A light house of morality.

Without the moral compass of religion, society will fall into chaos and immorality. Also that it will give a proper fostering ground for totalitarian regimes that will abuse the people and will enact genocide on the population, and more often than not the examples sited to back that argument is that of Stalin's USSR, Mao's china, and to a lesser extent Hitler's Germany (not that the country was anything but religious, although his personal religious belief do draw some question marks)

Now that is all fine and dandy, and ignoring the separation between a dogma and state systems since they view them as one and the same from a religious point of view. The biggest elephant they overlook is that atheism unlike religions for instance has no set and predefined dogmatic rules its essentially the lack of those that makes it what it is so you can't draw a 1-1 relationship based on that label to throw a blanket statement to encompass all what is atheistic.

so the argument is Mao, Stalin, & Hitler were evil and atheists so atheism is evil

Lets look at a country of heathens and disbelievers who boast a population of about 26% to 71% of atheists depending on your definition of the word. Where regular church service's attendance is about 10%. this is a place where the church has been reduced to a place were you hold some cycle of life(read birth, death, & marriage) events and has little to no relevance in the day to day life of people in the classical sense.

According to that argument you would expect such a country to have a rampant crime rate, since if there is no divine punishment there is no inhibitor for people's evil deeds. essentially we would expect it to be what we call a hell on earth *wink* *wink*

So what do we have here then, Norway (in case you missed what we have been talking about) is
The most peaceful nation on earth(the economist global peace index) ! with the top honors in a quality of life that is environmentally friendly and one of the best places to raise a family in terms of quality of living for women and children. It's also a given that they have exceptional press freedoms and rights movements. Also it just happens that due to this environment they have the second highest GDP per capita in the world. So at this point someone might jump and mention that Norway is an evangelical lutheran country with 83% of the population affiliated to the church of Norway but the reason behind that is simple. registration to the church is done at birth so the statistics are not representational of personal belief.

In no case is that an anomaly, there is a high correlation between how secular a country is to how high it ranks on these indexes that measure the quality of living. You notice that the more a country tries to adopt a religious inline political & economic legislations the further it drops in that scale (take the United states in the past 6 years and compare its rankings) . Nordic countries, Canada, New Zealand, Slovenia and other similar countries always rank consistently high on those indexes.

That just goes on to prove that slogans like "fill in the blank religion is the solution" or "without religion you can't have a moral and prosperous society" are bunked.
Or the alternative you can hope that Norwegian will be the official language of hell, and the prince of darkness is brushing up on his Norwegian.

ENJOY!

How deep is the abyss

2007-11-06T15:40:00.000+03:00

Really week after week the USians seems to out do themselves in their quest for the boor's holy grail, A while ago when someone told me a person could change so drastically in the span of 5 years i would've been atleast skeptical. After witnessing a whole population and country change so drastically during the span I can no longer believe in that things remain the way they are even if they managed to last unchanged at the core for 230 years.

Really has contempt for the document that single handedly defined the US's course through history for more than two centuries that we are witnessing a surreal discussion right out of the world of idiocracy of whether water boarding is torture or not ? and we are not referencing a philistine here but the candidate for the highest judicial position in the US. What is even more sorry that we have a spineless chairman of the democratic committee going against the consensus of his party to endorse such a partisan candidate that has been a long time supporter of the republican party. What we have here is a wide open eye of justice looking only one way and that is up to god" and his mouth piece. The scary part is that he seems much more capable of obscuring his lawlessness than Mr."i don't recall", and during the session that proofed anything but evident.
Let that go through and we may be heralding the age of King George the VI, on his empire of theocracy with his trusty side kick, I know its unfair to make it look like he's harmless, the guy that even google couldn't dare to display his residence, that set up just has such an uncanny resemblance to one Louis the XVI.
So we have King george playing the same 6 year old broken record of war, and upping it up a notch with the fear mongering term of World War III, promising to deliver us from the great satan just like he promised to deliver us from him and show us the scary WMD's he had stashed up.
Of course the situation is nothing like six years ago, never mind that his approval rating is similar to that of the spice girl's reunion. The US economy ran out of bubbles to run on, the housing went bust, the national debt and trade deficit is just gargantuan, consumer spending is bleeding, and manufacturing jobs have rotted away in favor of outsourcing.
After all that we have Bernanke dropping the interest rate again seemingly oblivious to what even a super blond model managed to realize, you are obliterating the confidence in the DollaR$ Foo.
He seems still trying to wish on a star and give the banking industry a piggy back to the financial institutes hoping that they fair their injuries instead of letting the system correct itself. Even with that they manage to be knee deep in shit , and the big cojones are dropping like it half off mutt's nutts sunday !
All that and boy does the next presidential term get much better than that ! We have the bonified '911 every other word' cross dresser, the women of the race is trying her best to reduce the differences between her and the men (damn she's hot tho.. ) , and what sounded like the sanest one of the bunch, if you can put aside the fact that you might be voting for a leprechaun, has gone coo coo saying he saw a UFO during a presidential debate. Hell, when a reference to november the 5th is the motto for a fundraising run that manages to raise more than 4 million dollars in 24 hours you know that sheeple are shaking from their slumber.

Hey and the lovely thing is that i haven't even stepped on whats happening within states or even the quagmire that is US foreign policy.

Now i'll go back to my fypigs watching for am certain am bound to catch one soon given the reality am in right now.

ENJOY !
ps. for the uninitiated fypigs is the most recently discovered species of flying pigs, they are to be observed under the afternoon stars of the peaceful part of iraq .

Music at the movies - Greatest moments

2007-11-05T14:03:00.000+03:00

As I was making my way to work today Mama Mia was on the radio the funny thing is that while listening to the song parts of that video was flashing through my head and thats how the idea for this was born :)

Movie: Grease
Song: Cast of Grease - Your the one that I want
if only the bloody drama class didn't tarnish that wonderful image in my head of the movie...

Movie: Aladdin
Song: Peter Andre and Katie Price Jordan - A Whole New World
this songs holds a special place cause it reminds me of a time when my voice wouldn't shatter glass, oh well a whole new world ...

Movie: Mary Poppins
Song: Mary Poppins - SUPERCALIFRAGILISTICEXPIALIDOCIOUS
If I only had a penny for every time I heard that world ! nuf said

Movie: Almost Famous
Song: Elton John - Tiny dancer
Am not a big fan of the movie, but when it came to this scene i was just flabbergasted. nothing sums up the live in the moment feel of the movie like this, after all the shit they have been through ...
"You Are Home !"

Movie: Priscilla, Queen of the Desert
Song: CeCe Peniston - Finally
*munch* *munch* y-y yeah-eah, yeah-eah Uh-uh-oh-oh yeah-yeah-ow cracks me up every time, actually there are a bunch of nutty moments in this one.

Movie: Wayne's world
Song: Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody
rockage and stupidity, Schwing!

Movie: Dirty dancing
Song: Bill Medley and Jennifer Warnes - The Time of My Life
I swear back in the 80's they had the highly infectious dancing bug, whenever someone starts dancing some how there are a dozen others who follow his suite shortly for no apparent reason, plus that "I can impregnate the crowd with my eyes" look at around 2:10 is the mutt's nuts !

Movie:Flash dance
Song: Michael Sembello - Maniac & Irene Cara - What a feeling
I wonder how many twisted ankles those 2 routines caused ... that bloody panel is a classic especially the one trying to hide her excitement. Random fact of the day you know that part where she is spinning on the floor (2:11) thats a guy by the way, sorry if I damaged any fantasies out there

Movie: 8 Mile
Song: B-Rabbit vs. papa doc freestyle

1, 2, 3 and to the 4
1 pac , 2 pac, 3 pac, 4
4 pac, 3 pac, 2 pac, 1
You're pac, he's pac, no pacs, none
It's all been said there is lil left to be done
HOLLA !

observers, lions, helpers and goats... a look through the kaleidoscope

2007-11-01T20:36:00.001+03:00

I was going to name this post perceptions but I have been posting too many single word titled posts, so I went with something more bamboozled.

It's really fascinating the faculty of our brains to fill in the gaps of what we think we see. Whenever we meet someone for the first time, we already have a grid in our brains for the things that we look for in people that we would like to know.
So as soon as we see as much as a shadow we blistery start forming and filling up that grid of ours, whether we like it or not (we try to not like it since its prejudiced and judgmental) all of us start churning our gears as soon as we something eye catching :)

It's always a challenge (atleast personally speaking) to put that grid and try to match it to the reality and see how you did. Lets face it, do we really want to spend the time to get to really know everyone we meet ? I'd like to think not, so that ability is fundamental social filter and being PC about it is just faking civility which is worse in my book that being blunt. (god there is this co worker that always start a conversation with "keefak sadeeqi (tr. how are you comrade)" while she definitely doesn't stand dealing with me"

The way others perceive us is a very important gauge to who we really are to the world. So for the past few years I started doing something that was fairly weird to people around, I'll go asking them "who am I?" with a series of question to highlight good points, faults, eccentricities whatever they are willing to share and for as long as they can bear me.

To not come off as a total boltless nutjob i limit it to a once a year fiasco. One thing I explain to them is that no matter what they decide to share I will not be offended and I will not hold their honesty against them (alas that is rarely enough reassurance) and some of the things you find out about your self are really interesting. especially the motifs they see in you, and some of the disinformation that you can't help but emanate which requires a bit of working on your self to clear up, call it tightening up you character bolts.

The main reason i do this is that, for the people I care about atleast, I would like the person that I know I am at this point to be as perfectly aligned with the person that other people see.

So while I was writing the last post about people who I interact with here I felt like doing that, I just thought it would be fun but on the other hand I am worried that people will get offended. So whoever might be offended or they just don't feel like sharing what am about to write please tell me and I'll remove it :)

The challenge is that moving online we lose facial expression which are usually more honest than the person would like to be, but words and especially the adjectives used are a huge indication to what type of personality an individual holds, well read ? inbred ? sociopath ? emo ? blond? you know what am talking about. factoring in some info, and the ideas they hold and you can connecting the dots... so shall we experiment ?
(the order is chronological btw and its of the people that I interacted with the most)

Summer
Zodiac according to bambam: Leo
Summer is definitely a unique breed, if am going to assign a personality type it would be a type 3 Achievers, Performers, Succeeders. a very healthy one at that, she is highly adaptable to whatever environment she is placed in and a social chameleon, and through it all she hasn't lost her own unique personality and has her priorities straight. the proof of her adaptability and courage in confronting the unknown is the mere fact that she is here ! its not an easy thing to tread the generations as easily as she does.

She is an extremely caring individual, and draws a considerable amount of satisfaction out of helping others and especially her family. I think who ever is in her inner circle a lucky person and it would be really hard to fall out of favor with her, not for dependability but because she genuinely cares and will attempt to set them on the course that she thinks is the best one for them with her very own style of gentle persuasion.

Just don't overburden her with bad news and depressing issues all at once, for you might get a glimpse of a total different part of her, not in the confrontational manner but in a longing for solitude attitude.

Through it all I think she can become highly preoccupied with glamor and sparkles, for she certainly likes the pretty things in life and can be highly particular about them. (excellent shopping company if someone else is shouldering the bill if you ask me :P)

finally I think although i didn't notice it at first, but she actually loves being with her family having a quite time at home, and she is certainly bashful or it might be just good old fashioned lady manners that are quite rare these days for me to be able to distinguish.

Seeker
Zodiac according to bambam: Libra
She is the most pure character two (Helpers, Givers, Caretakers) I know. Now she has the ability to genuinely care about the people around her to the extreme which makes her forget about herself quite a bit. Also being doubtful about she is capable off keeps her from truly trying and attaining her potential. shes susceptible to fall in a spiral of despair & low self esteem, don't be afraid to share your feelings when that happens. Its better to do so rather than bottling them up on the long run.
She undermines the amount of help she provides to others. you have an ability to relate to what other people 's needs and you are a very caring person.

The remedy to all that is reassurance, and if there is any criticism, its a must for it to be delivered in the gentlest of methods.
You have to eventually learn to say "no" sometimes, you have to set your priorities and take steps rather than trying to jump to goals. It's also OK to be selfish sometimes, you need to do things that you like to, otherwise you might risk being overburdened and drain from doing so much for others.

All that matters is to try, Its OK to have failures its not the end of the world and at the end of the day we won't appreciate success unless we can contrast it with out failures!

7aki
Zodiac according to bambam: Capricorn
She's an eight (Leaders, Protectors, Challengers)! with a character that refuses to be boxed ...
On the cover she is a life loving easy going person that likes to have fun, she can truly brighten anyones day. The hardworking type but prefers to do so in the shadows, not looking for much reassurance and fiercely independant, I imagine when she was a kid she never really did too good in school but when it came time for her to step up she shocked !
Also on the other hand she has a fierce imagination at certain points i feel like I found a real life calvin, and I bet as a kid she could see a Castle out of a blanket covering the space between two beds.
She's a goal setter and strive to get those milestones, although fleeting moments of hesitation regarding her abilities to tread that road occur from time to time and she will stumble but move on with life for its too short get strung up about such things.
I think she relies on first impressions when interacting which are not always aligned so I guess there were bitter moments due to that. Also sometimes her honesty has a bit of bluntness to it, and being honest i don't think she'll take well to betrayal or someone talking behind her back and if that happens you will forever be in her black book. Curiosity is certainly a driving force to be reckoned with her, and don't to step over some toes but on the other hand it earns her better allies and a more personal connection with people.
Oh and finally give her space to be alone and don't try to control her or she will rebel.

Observer
Zodiac according to bambam: Taurus
A vibrant and gentle soul, and is never seen angry. I think you are a character 9 (Mediators, Peacemakers, Preservationists) and I think if anybody has a problem with you will not be satisfied unless you atleast try to talk it through with them. I think at this point in your life after some(...) turbulence you have found peace in your inner circle and that gave you the guts to try to expand that circle. The weapon of choice being edgy and pushing the comfort zone to the brink, given that its not something innate in you even the controversy is laid out in a thoughtful and gentle manner.
Now what i really like about this is that i feel you have a tendency to inaction, and probably the easier path for you to take is to take non and do nothing to not disturb or piss off anyone but you choose otherwise. For you can see the two sides of any coin and you empathetic to both. Alternatively you haven't over come a slightly tendency to delay making big decision especially when you feel pressured to. Don't be too critical of your self and try to sort out what you really want(i think you already did) and go with it without being too pessimistic. I think some external encouragement and reassurance will take you a long way and I hope you genuinely get that

The other thing, which might be weird to me, is that you have an affinity to the physical realm, I think you don't exactly like chatting online for instance and would certainly prefer to meet face to face with people and interact with them there. So you maintaining a blog is different for you and probably you had to take it in steps to actually maintain it regularly.

Now there is a saying "2ihthar 2il 7aleema izza '3adeb" (*tr*beware of a gentle person if he got angry), and i think that describes you. It's not easy to anger you, and you are able to forgive others for their slights but if it happens that someone pushes you beyond your limits all rules fly out of the window. So I can't really imagine you getting angry

Kinzi
Zodiac according to bambam: Gemini
Enthusiast a character 7 without a doubt, a Puella. I would be seriously interested in where she has been and what she did, for am sure she has a volumes full of life experiences and she should seriously start writing a biography like right now !
Still pretty much a part of her, and unlike most people she has faced her past and moved on, now she is no longer chasing after experiences like she used to for she has set her self to be dedicated to one life long experience of following her framework for life based on what she's been through. So the focus is shifting for me & I to the we and us, but sometimes what she wants to do and what she thinks she should do are contradictory. Especially when it comes to self expression, given how I imagine her as a young rebel I admire the commitment that she has to play it safe.
some people fear showing their true intentions so they feign kindness, she is more likely to be more worried about people thinking that of her when her kindness is truly genuine. I think it does weigh heavy on her how people ascribe a lot of Ulterior motives to her behavior when as far as I see it is that she made revise one stereotype I had of a certain group of people or maybe she is an exception.
After searching endless she sees that she has found her purpose, I think even with the slightly tight grip on house rules her home is a warm and welcoming one. she will definitely go the extra mile for what she believes in which is also a departure from her fickle commitment to finish what she started and being spread too thin doing too many different things at once.

Qwaider
Zodiac according to bambam: Virgo
Am split to whether he is a character 5(Observers, Thinkers, Investigators) or 6(Loyalists, Devil's Advocates, Defenders), his pride and fort lies in his knowledge and others wanting that knowledge. On the other hand there is certainly boundaries to which that acquired knowledge can impede on his traditions and belief system. Its a lot harder for him to stretch those boundaries for the single reason that he sees no purpose in that.

He certainly has a considerable amount of knowledge, and always tries to base his remarks based on that. Which to some might seem like he is flaunting it but I think he sees it as it provides his the credibility to say what he did.

He is a person that relishes system, give him a system and he will follow it to a T. Its what provides him security, he is committed and hardworking. On the other hand when confronted with random happenings that are outside the rules he might overreact and be indecisive and procrastinate for the fear of failure. So its not a natural ability for him to gauge his reactions in his relationships, and he might lost some friends along the way but on the other hand the ones that stuck with him he is faithful to them and a source of aid.

Fear for him stems out of insecurities, things that happened aren't forgotten easily and can linger for a while. If any of those are exploited there is no guarantee what might be unleashed on the perpetrator so i will stop there...

Now I tried my best to side step any land minds as much as possible, so there is no reference to any personal history, acts, religious affiliation, or any other thing that might earn a label or be called skeletons, laundry or baggage. Even though i already wrote my perceptions of everyone here am not going to post them without your permission. thats why only summer's is visible cause i already asked her and if there is anything you want me to remove and more than willing to do so.

Oh and yeah i know that its not your zodiac probably and you don't believe in that maybe but I just felt like putting it up there since i like to guess those, a pet peeve of mine (which I suck at btw).

Please am not doing this to start any wars or create rift am just trying to call it as i see it, and no am not a sycophant am just doing what i felt like doing you can call me selfish. so skip the name calling if you please

ENJOY!
grr.. hopefully
and no puzzle today since i don't have any in mind after writing this
ps. nour i haven't interacted with you much hence i couldn't come formulate anything :)

Why is it that the majority of my readers are women ?

2007-10-30T22:44:00.000+03:00

That question has been on my mind lately, as it was very evident to me that the majority of the people who read my posts and comment are women (except perhaps for observer & the occasional qwaider) , then it kind of hit me today when I came across a comment by enigma on ChiKapaPPi's post that went like:

LOL all we have to do is boycott the male blogs for a day and see what happens to them!!! I bet you they won’t get more than one or two comments!! yalla girls BOYCOTT THE MALE BLOGS!

and I thought to myself how true is that ?

Now really its so evident now, maybe I do have some other readers but am sure as hell never hear from.

So since I read that this afternoon I was trying to think of reasons, now one thing that came to mind first and for most is that women in the blogosphere when they read something that they like they let you know. Now some might say a "thank you" comment on a post doesn't add much to the conversation but it sure is nice as hell to read those after spending some time writing a post. It's such a rare event for me to come over a post where it was a guy posting such a comment.

Most of the posts that i see on daily bases are mainly light hearted posts, maybe the reason is that women are more in tuned with their emotional side and are able to express their emotions more freely. Or as I like to think of it that growing up as a man in this environment it wasn't one of the skills that we were encouraged to develop. So naturally when its a light hearted post when you go over it and read it as a man you might have something to say but most of the time you wouldn't since you feel like the way you parse those series of events or happening are particular to you and your comment will not add much substance to the conversation.

Which brings me to the next point, post something political and you will notice the testerones drawing their guns quicker than a jarhead in Falluja. Thats the other thing, guys love confrontation. nothing beats the sensation of being able to place your head a micrometer higher than your peers. It's the type of factual regituration than we excel at. To boost we get to express our opinion, which we are a bit on the narcissistic side when it comes towards how we feel about it.

So naturally the conversation devolves quickly into snark attacks and women steer quite clear of that quagmire.

Now one playground that we tend to meet at is the sexual and religious playing ground, which observer excels at capitalizing on something that I really like about his blog is that it melds the boundary between the two camps. Even there it is quite amusing to see how each behave, in that area especially while you would expect the V camp to be quite timid and shy they tend to be the more encompassing and accepting of new outlooks and ideas. On the other hand the T camp tends to be their same old self of "what I say is the right thing and there is no comprise about it. if you are not willing to bend backwards or shut up am going to start the insults". Now am not excluding myself from that saying since at certain posts and blogs i tend to be a big pain in the @$, and i draw a certain pleasure out of being a smart @$ especially when the blogger is a bit full of himself (yes, am thinking of one blog that I like the posts and the way he tackles things but his personality of being so high and righteous really irks me)
I only came across one case of that when it was a female blogger and she is a special case i think, a couple of screws got loose in her head and she holds a grudge against so i go and bother her every once in a while :P

Also one other thing I noticed about bloggerettes is that they are never content with a paper thin representation of anyone that they are curious about (I cross my heart i meant this in the most utterly benign way and even though stating it so bluntly might put me in a grey area i would prefer it rather than leaving it up to interpretation). They are actually genuinely interested in constructing a 3-d perspective of who that person is, and they tend to look at him more as a person than an faceless avatar. With guys i rarely feel that they are interested beyond that specific instance of interaction and although there might be previous interactions it doesn't hold much weight in consequent communication unless it caused a stark polarization...

Thats what occurs to me so far, maybe am just over analyzing and guys simply don't fancy anything am writing about.

would welcome any additional, or even counter points regarding this.

now for the puzzle of the day... perception

M N P O F I H Z S L H S L I
Y E D P O S T I U L D A L G
K X R E A D E R S G R G I E
Y T M E N T I O N R I H W I
M G X K N O I T P E C R E P

Hint: what am i going to talk about next

Childhood theories and musings

2007-10-29T23:20:00.000+03:00

When I was a kid trying to make heads and tails of the world I always came up with amusing and pretty wild theories for why things are the way they are. Somewhere along the line of knowing more about the world it managed to unhinge the imagination and tuck away in the back of my mind.
I am not really sure what made recall those weird theories today, but am sure as hell proud of every single one of them.

The theories:

We had a really bitter French teacher (if anyone went to the bishop school then i think her name was Fatikha) for some odd reason she had one of those hair pins and it always looked like a femur bone to me. so the deduction that i came to is that i shouldn't be annoyed because she is a total bitch and very mean after all she has lost a child and thats the source of that peculiar hair pin.

There is a vast difference in behavior between girls and boys, and I also couldn't help but notice a considerable difference in behavior between Christian and Muslims. since I figured out that girls don't have dinosaurs in their pants I went to look for how Christians were different since i associated behavior differences to physiological origins. I found one main feature difference, Christians got a couple of more visible veins that are green in color in their foreheads while Muslims don't so thats how i used to identify Muslims and Christians as a kid

I used to love dinosaurs as a kid, and was always fascinated by the fact that they went extinct. I even had my own theory of how they went extinct and every time I was in the bathroom I was reminded with my theory, here it goes.
It is as follow, a certain body part of mine really resembled a Triceratops' head. So that means dinosaurs didn't go extinct they got so friendly with humans to the extent that they became part of their body and thats how we don't have any dinosaurs around. thats One reason I took good care of my Triceratops :P

There was a deep innate belief/wish in me that I was adopted, or if that wasn't the case then am atleast an alien spawn that was transplanted into this family (hmm actually that still sometime cross my mind till now). So I was always was anticipating the moment when my parents are going to break that news to me, and how I would be devastated and live the homeless tough life and triumph over all the hardships (\earn me a dancing dog and clamping monkey friends along the way) and dramatize that whole thing in my head. I attribute those symptoms as an emotional reaction for the sheer amount of depressive ass shows that i was made to watch as a kid ! Think Remi, lady lady, sally, Bell & Sebastian , Adnan wa lina, Sandi bell and a few more that were all orphans living the tough life .... good what were the dubbers thinking when they picked them.

There is a way to gain super powers, all you need is pain tolerance and perseverance. Here is how it goes, you have to gradually expose your body to higher and higher heat levels for longer and longer periods of time. Eventually over time you will be able to teach your cells how to generate heat by themselves and you can be a flaming man just like the human torch. I think that lasted about 6 months then my heat source was taken away; read it was winter and my bed was smack stuck to the radiator.

In conclusion I was damn kick ass kid, no wonder that my parents just left me to watch TV rather than me asking them question. Also If you didn't know TMNT when I was in first grade you deserved to spontaneously combust in my eyes!
ENJOY !

thf fjrst rfbljzbtjpn cbmf bs b shpck bt brpvnd thf bgf pf twflvf
hint: a twist on the crypto

Addiction

2007-10-28T22:44:00.000+03:00

There is no way I could know what you experienced, right ? I couldn't possibly feel that need... Like a 1000 hiding voices whispering "this is who you are!" and you fight the pressure the growing need rising like a wave.
prickling and teasing and prodding to be fed but the whispering gets louder till its screaming "NOW!" and its the only voice u hear. the only the voice you want to hear, and you belong to it.
to this shadow self...
to this dark passenger.
Yes, The dark passenger.
~Lila

I am in love with that passage lately, to the extent that I wish I was able to write something on that caliber.
anyways, the other thing that was playing in my head lately is that I came across an article a while back regarding changing habits that i totally loved and wanted to have my go at but given how efficient i am it took a few weeks to get to it and now I can't find that article to atleast give credit to it since it was the inspiration.

So sometimes you come to a point when there are certain habits that you picked up along the way, that regardless of how you view them, you feel that you might be better off dropping them or may just want to adopt new admirable habits that you think you will be happier having.

1. Ask your self why you do it ? Unless you know why it has became such an internalized need for you to do those thing(s) you will not be able to summon that extra will power at the instances when you are the weakest. It does take some introspection to find those reasons, its not such a bad idea to monitor yourself for a period of time, or recalling how you happened to pick up that habit at first and why you like it right now.
For me that would a time filler, a relaxant, a medium for focusing and clearing my thoughts, and
a nostalgia for lost things.

2. Decide Why you are going to be dropping the habit: first thing along the way, there is really no need to venture too far for reason. If those reason are not innate atleast reason with yourself to make them so, if you are not convinced that this is the right thing to do for yourself there is no way you will be able to persevere.
For me its slightly brutish and silly but the reason for me to do what am doing is that i hate to have a shred of a doubt of me not being able to do it. Call it jakara bi 7alee, but usually thats the biggest motivator for me. Some others might find health reason, some others might have the benefit it instills into others around them... to each his own but all must internalize those reasons.

3. Fill the void: Its not called a habit for nothing, this is something that has been pretty much part of who you are for years. Don't be naive to think that you can just forget about it, YOU CAN'T.
So best way to do that is to try to fill the void that will be left, try to replace it with something else. Think cough drops if you smoke, you bite your pencil buy a whole bunch of pretzel sticks or twirlers. I know its not the same and am still trying to work on better solutions.
Try to find replacements that would be able to satisfy most of the needs you have identified.

4. Remove the temptation: what's out of sight is out of mind, if its not going to be in front of you, you will reduce the amount of time that it will be calling for. you have to also minimize the exposure to things that are associated with your habit (e.g. ashtrays, "people")

5. Don't be discouraged: what you have been doing for the past 12 or so years you won't be able to over come in a week, month or even a year. you are certain to have some setbacks but there is no reason to be discouraged not even if you lose control and binge a bit. Hey after all you don't really hate it, actually you like it a lot so its understandable (<-- my dark passenger speaking there)

6. Set milestones: check progress on the firs week, month, 3 months and year. see how much you manage to achieve at each point and when you break it down it gives you a foreseeable point that you can look forward to. (please no obscure 12 step crappy milestone styles those sux)
It's like being on the tread mill for 30 minutes and your losing your breath and about to collapse on minute 28, because u know you have it in you to wait the extra 2 minutes it helps to tough it up and finish them. although on the other hand if you didn't know you had 2 minutes to go you are more prone to just drop it. same thing could happen if you start obsessing about how much time passed it will just remind you more about what you are doing and will be a counter productive process.
the best method for me so far is just to forget about how long its been, and only when am feeling a bit discouraged to check how much time is left for me to reach on of those milestone and take solace in that

7. "My favorite" Reward yourself: what a better motivator than that :) and if you normally reward yourself regardlessly its an excellent excuse to pamper yourself even more. (a new hard disk, me wacom, and a trip, it's gonna be lovely !)

8. ask for accountability: tell a few people what you are trying to do, ask them to ask how you are doing every once in a while. They have to be people that you are honest with atleast, so that when asked you will no avoid the missteps you had and face them. Thats one thing the AAA got right having somebody that you are forced to be honest with not because you want to but because they know better. Get yourself and accountabuddy! ask him to not go easy on you even if you ask for it.

9. are there others like you ? the sense of competition in us is so great that if u can find somebody else going through the same thing you are it will give you a major boost to not fall behind that person in progress. It doesn't matter if you know him or not, you can find somebody on the internet and keep track with them, and that will be a good time to get to know someone new.

10. If you have a loved one do it for them: this might be a bit of a twist, but if your loved ones would be happy with you quitting your habit then even if it doesn't make much sense for you to quit it then do it for them.
For if you are the type of person that takes a great deal of pleasure out of seeing your loved ones happy then there would be no better reward than that.
and if you don't have a loved "one" might be a good time to preoccupy yourself with getting one :P

yeah it sucks that am writing an advice column sounding post .... but it seems writing about it will atleast help me keep tabs and serve as a reminder.

ps. I beg you, please oh please no encouragement. I already told you that am jiker (is that gile ?) so it might be counter productive but thanks in advance if thats what u had to say :P
pps. Quit the pep talk already, so out of character
ppps. Tougher luck ! I love to use those ps's even tho some grammar police bloggers might digress & object about that one too
pppps. $hit, i can't think of a puzzle ... that sucks .... oh wait might already did the puzzles something looks amiss with all those ps's
p...s. Never use this one again, by the way japanese people read differently from us traditionally
p...s. Got to say this thanks to the people who actually had me on their mind for the blogger thingy, i think u know who i like to read and i try to make my presence there even if there are still some of u that confuse bambam with a female for some odd rzn, and turns out that am funny, weird ...
p...s. Bitter quitters who were proud of their will power to quit a habit have manage to eradicate a part of them and that made them what they are today. thats what i think happened for them to be so self rightous and think they are better than the rest because, pitty them, they managed to quit and become over zealous bitter people who turn off any others from quitting for the fear of becoming like them

Come Along - Titiyo

2007-10-25T14:54:00.000+03:00

For some rzn that song was playing through my head while i was ranting on my previous post :P

Come Along Lyrics

I feel like an ANT again !

2007-10-25T14:24:00.000+03:00

or maybe one of the slew of zombified workers who just click away their days, a proud member of the working dead.
You know how john lock used to press that button every 108 minutes, I feel I serve as much of a purpose at my current job as he did...

Am I lazy ? nope I wasn't. do I totally waste away my time ? not really, but there is a finite amount of personal projects I could come up with.
So why am I still working here ? I can't be bothered to move to another dead end job again, if am going to move this time it will def. not be for the money. I WANT TO WORK.
So you didn't have that in mind when you moved to this job ?
ARE YOU KIDDING ME ? I was utterly pissed off with my previous job because I didn't have any tasks to fill up my 11 hour day for a couple of months, so i wanted a job with alot of work and a bunch of tasks to occupy me and allow me to have as little idle time as possible so i picked this job.

So what happened?
Well the same story repeated itself, tards placed as managers that don't know the first thing about team work or management, corporate bureaucracies that fuck up what little work you are given because other retards are not willing to cooperate and do their share of the work.
Even when you try to start up work project and self improvement projects for the company for some reason the managers seem to find that as a threat and shut you down or adopt those projects themselves. of course since they rely on the working dead task force things take eons to finish, while you are done and your project is collecting dust.

Eventually over time you get infected by the zombie virus and you become as dull and unproductive as the rest which is fucking driving me mental !!!!! yes am slightly far from rational at this point, and please don't tell me its my own fault, as anyone who actually knows can probably argue that point on my behalf better than i could right now.

PLEASE GET ME OUT OF HERE ! AM EVEN WILLING TO DO RANDOM PART TIME JOBS ! ANYTHING AS LONG AS YOU CAN PROVIDE ME WITH MEANINGFUL TASKS AND ARE WILLING TO UTILIZE ME RATHER THAN PROPPING ME UP ON A CHAIR WITH A COMPUTER SCREEN IN FRONT OF ME DISPLAYING PRETTY COLORS OF THE SCREEN SAVER ALL DAY LONG !

Tough love

2007-10-21T23:01:00.000+03:00

We have forgot how to tough love, somewhere along the point of trying to create the safest environment for kids to grow up in we forgot how much life sucks at certain point.

We raise up our kids with an idealistic expectation from the world, where everyone is honest and no one gets hurts. we shield our kids from the slightest of harms and encapsulate them in a bubble till they are ready to get married.

Kids growing up nowadays are really a sorry bunch, they are getting ready for the shock of their life once they start to look life in the face. It's entirely different to the view painted by their parents on how life should be. For they are the most beautiful, intelligent adorable and utterly one of a kind children that need admiration from everyone they meet because its just what they are accustomed to. then comes life to ruin everything and they find out the truth that there are more beautiful, adorable, intelligent and truly exceptional kids in the world, and they are not all winners. poor kids !

Not just in that sense, we forgot to tough love in the sense that kids are not allowed to be kids anymore. Kids are supposed to go out and play, break stuff, get hurt, bust a leg, get in trouble, feel sick and get dirty ! We raise kids in a highly sanitized universe thats about 500 square, the meters in size, the lucky ones get to play in their back yard. if they dare to do anything remotely dangerous and fun they need to be crippled with protection and pads, and if they do it anyways. oh boy if they dare to climb a tree, for instance, they are going to be reprimanded HARSHLY. I just love this next bit, whenever there was a kid in the class that used to be active and the life of the class the comment was that he was a lively and social kid and he used to be tolerated and even admired at times. now that kid is run over by doctors and diagnosed with ADD along with other fun acronym and his system is overloaded with pharmaceutical drugs to conform to our view of idealism -_-'

We seem to have forgot that without those experiences of failure, pain and the pleasure of earning successes and conquest we are robbing the kid of one of the most important character development tools. We are restraining kids to a limited reality were we teach them that they are the best and if they are hurt by the rest of the world then that world is just jealous of them and they can always defer the reason for their failure onto others.

The funny thing about all this is that latter on, us grown ups, start complaining about the younger generation how they are a bunch of wusses that can't handle life and its responsibilities. how these days kids are depressed and are cry babies when they are faced with failure.
News flash we created them that way, the reason we did that is that at one point we believed our own delusion that the world today is a much dangerous place than it used to be and we need to protect the younglings from it for as long as socially possible.

In fact the world is a much safer place these days, kids having a higher chance to live to their 20's than any other point in human history. Yes there are the occasional unfortunate events and stories, but it shouldn't be the case for us to confine our children even more every time we hear of another kidnapping, accidental death or whatever other news that makes you want to bubble wrap your child from the harms of the world. It's not true that those occurrences are more common these days than they were in the past, in reality the media these days are able to play on the parents fears and blow these stories out of proportions, and they are better equip to access and propagate such stories.

The right way to go about it is to equip the greenhorn to deal with life and all its ugliness, for without experiencing some hardship in life they will fail to appreciate its beauty and in contrast they will find it utterly boring and bland. They shouldn't be given mixed signals either, don't teach your child to be modest when you actually demand from him to be the best at everything regardless of the means. Teach them tolerance, and that everyone is special in their own way and they shouldn't be discouraged by failure it should server as their impetus to find what their specialty is.

For the time being I am happy that they are raising a generation of overtly medicated, deeply depressed, delusionally frustrated, safe players. who for their lack of acceptance to the harsh realities of life will remain eternally childish and not accept the responsibilities they are meant to shoulder. that in and off its self makes me happy because it guarantees that my generation, even truer to older ones, will maintain their edge over those child like adults for a lot longer than we should ! keep up the good job alarmist parents for am cheering for ya :D

IX EQG PBWK YDISTRNW KQ LNNF KDNIR XNNK QW KDN URQGWT FGK MQVN RNMFQWMIOISIKE QW KDNIR MDQGSTNRM
~ Abigail Van Buren
hint: cryptogram I=I, K=T, and Q=O

Marriage

2007-10-21T20:38:00.000+03:00

Why is marriage the epitome of growing up ?
Growing up and after you have finished your education the next on the wish list of parents is that their son/daughter to get married and have a bunch of kids for them, thats how our parents grew up and thats how we were brought that.
After that you live happily ever after and rinse and repeat the cycle. It is a huge stigma in society if you reach a certain age and you didn't get married, or worse ! if you are married and feel you are not ready to have kids yet.

The way I see things is that marriage is for certain the partnership that we come in least prepared the deal with, all through life we are discouraged to polish the tools and means that will be most helpful to us during the major part of our life.

So our first experience living away from our comfortable nest is during marriage, that is usually one major obstacle that faces newly weds. They find it hard to comprehend how much tolerance and effort it takes to live with someone else, things are not always supposed to go your way. Thank "god" for our culture for it makes that part easier for men, atleast they don't have to deal with that part since things are supposed to go their way regardless. not just that but the wife should always be competing with the first women in that man's life, his mother.
So that comes with its fair share of problem creating potential.

We send partners on a quest to the unknown, armed with naivety and full of themselves to replicate two different environments rather than coming up with their own. each partner is meant to replicate the environment he grew up in, hence its only natural to except clash of the world from that, the probability of that happening increases exponentially with the proximity of one family over the other. Since the rope is being tugged in one way more so than the other it helps put pressure on that relationship and straining it to the point of fatigue. I find it one of the most beneficial experiences for newly weds to be as removed as possible from their own families it tends to paint the relationship with its own tint.

touching on relationships, most commonly and in the traditional sense, the two parties are expected to be virgins. both literally and in the sense that they never had a relationship that they strived to protect since they consider everything before tying the knot as a dispensable practice. So we have two people that essentially don't know how to deal with a sexual relationship which no matter how much of hypocritical society we have to face that its a totally different playing field than that platonic playground of youth. Ergo, the result is that we have a relationship that has living under one roof and mechanically procreating kids at its center rather than having a loving and intimate relationship at its center the way marriage (IMHO) should be.
Marriage is never considered a true and equal partnership, we were just not brought up that way. whether thats the right way or not is something I'll leave to better equipped people to decide, but am certainly of the belief that when you decide to intertwine your destiny with somebody else's both parties should have equal say on where, how, and when things should progress and no party should have a final say on things. Mutual agreement is the only way to make that destiny move forward rather than self destruct.

Traditional marriage tends to serve one of two purposes in my eyes (honestly am all for it actually) either its the easiest method to side step some of the problems that might show up if the relationship was allowed to bloom under normal circumstance, or that in our day and age those people haven't developed the proper social skills to be able to actually achieve that level of relationship on their own. both cases are guaranteed to cause problems in the future.

On the other hand its so commendable to marry at an early age, for me that serves a great hidden purpose in the case of women. when they are young they still trust the institutes and you have on your hands a lesser chance of rebellion, and as some people say you can mold her as your wish. Do we really need that child like mentality when facing life and its problem, the uncompromising attitude of children that either nag till they get what they want ?

So the final tools to make sure that those marriage golems remain in one piece is that we have to push them as much as possible to have kids, for if the marriage is meant to be broken that might give them a good reason to stay together, for they will be doing it for the kids. What a great loving environment for the kids to grow up in. We can also call upon divine intervention and decree to either not allow divorce or give the man a chance to try his luck a few more times since he might have picked a bad apple. too bad we don't protect the family or the women in either case whether its by dogma or law, for it is always their fault for not being obedient enough.

It shouldn't be that way ! Marriage is an evolutionary step in life, you can't skip steps. It should never be for everyone, but everyone should strive for it. To those who never find it are not to be outcasts of society for they might have been answering to a different calling. We are not just mechanically procreation machines, that shouldn't be a reason to marry someone. its called mating in the animal kingdom so why do we degrade marriage to that state! marriage should be a life building exercise where both parties put everything they have, all their baggage, on the table and honesty look forward to creating a better life.
Not to enforce the familial ego, not to please the elders, not to look acceptable in the eyes of society and its customs and religion BUT to enrich the partners lives and create a better reality for themselves for they only have each other and no one else should meddle in their business and how they carry on with their lives for they are starting a new tree.

Without that in mind, and with all the previously mentioned reasons no wonder that married life is always depicted as a miserable one. It is truly rare to find a couple that attest that they are in bliss, and most commonly it will be the married men giving the advice, half jokingly usually, to the bachelors to never get married and live their life like its supposed to be the eulogy of our life.
So you end up with broken home, adulterous partners who lead double and triple lives to please society, their partners and themselves with their happiness never fusing those three realities together.
May you all live happily ever after and choose wisely !

o jp[r yp gomf ,u [stymrt om ;ogr dppm gpt oyd ypp nptomh yp ,pbr pm gpt ,udr;g

Hint: transformations :D

What happens when BamBam is bored out of his head at work ?

2007-10-18T14:47:00.000+03:00

This

& This that made the cut so far ...

And more of the same to finally end a long long long day....

Me Vs. I : Ramdan & Eid

2007-10-16T19:37:00.000+03:00

Now that both Ramadan and Eid are over i feel a bit at ease about posting this without being lynched since everyone has been so lovey dovey about Ramadan and Eid I didn't want to ruin it(or risk getting lynched for that matter).

As I was growing I had high hopes for Ramadan, you gain a lot of "points" in that month plus u get to earn money at the end... SWEEEET
Now its just the biggest month of hypocrisy, you pretty much know that the religious mask that everyone puts on is just for this month.
Even though pretending to be pious for a whole month does take its toll on their system so they naturally translate their frustration into anger !
so you end up with a month full of over zealous angry people who are just starved and parched instead.

Oh Boy! I love the already religious people in this month too. I'll give it to them that they are less hypocritical Since they are devout year round, but they don't fair any better. Not to be outdone by the former group these guys literally flaunt how religious they are during this month, they find it their right to give you a piece of their mind of how utterly condemned and corrupt you, "fa 2allahoma inni sa2im" is like the priests repentance writs in the middle ages. ABSURD!

Really I like to fast, some how it is relaxing so you don't have to think of all the essential and instincts for half a day and that clears your thought. what i don't like is the way people become oversensitive little twerps that feel the world owes them something because they are being "good Muslims".

Then we have Eid, oh lovely Eid, Really why bother trying to connect with a seasonal family ? for what selfish reason do people do that when in reality you can't rely on them in times of need the way you rely on your true family !

I guess all that matters in our world is to be modest and save face in front of others for the sake of others

9 1 13 14 15 20 18 5 12 9 7 9 15 21 19 19 9 12 12 25
ps. you might win the lotto with those !

Gratitude tag

2007-10-16T14:25:00.000+03:00

"The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning "
Friedrich Nietzsche

"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation"
Oscar Wilde

This is an old tag that was done by Hayat And I got it through Observer, what am supposed to do is pick a quote that expresses gratitude and pick 5 things that am grateful for.
being me!
As Usual i couldn't make up my mind regarding which quote I like more, but they are of the same spirit so I went with both.

It might not be evident how they express gratitude, but to me I feel great gratitude for being an individual. For nothing is more monotonous than living life without always chasing after the answer to the question of "who Am I ? " If at any point I settle for adopting any of the labels thrown at my feet everyday I will lose my individuality and be assimilated into the faceless/nameless crowds.

On the journey of trying to find the answer to that there is one truth that I adopted along the way which has been of a tremendous importance to help me stay the course, which is "I still don't know much about anything". I Strive to learn more about my self, the people around me, and the world hoping to come out with a better understanding that will inch me closer to who am supposed to be to others and hopefully the world.

Since as the previous two paragraph might infer, I am very grateful to every person who is patient with me, who don't write me off at first encounter and help me along the way by tolerating and criticizing my antics who do cross a few red lines every once in a while.

I am grateful for the Arts, for it serves Pandora's box that stretches the boundaries of the conceivable and is the closest celestial appiration that I laid eyes on. For the ability to transfer part of your soul, that endures immortality, and takes a life of its own in other peoples hearts and souls is divination.

All that would not amount to anything if it wasn't for one important thing that makes humans what they are, the most important facility to a greenhorn like me. Ergo, I am most grateful for the ability to reason.

I tag whoever feels like being tagged :D

333 88 777 777 999 7777 444 777 8 44 33 2 66 3 7 666 7777 7777 444 22 444 555 444 8 999 , 7 2 55 444

hint; hey did u figure out the other possibility :P

Me Vs. I

2007-10-11T03:24:00.000+03:00

YO!
bambam: What are you doing at 3:30am writing couldn't this have waited till tomorrow dammit ! i got work tomorrow you know.
No Angel: *crack* * crack* damn those fingers feel a bit rusty, this has been a pretty short Ramadan, but i feel inspired for some reason...
bambam: yeah yeah try to get it done with quickly the pillow is calling me
No Angel: Anyways, was watching the daily show and something brought a smile to my face and warmth to my heart. It was the last part where they had the interview with Tiki Barber the RB and he was talking about a story that touched him and the words "Jordanian fugees soccer coach" where just bolded in my ears. So I just had to find out a bit more so thats what am doing here, as for why now well it just sounded like the right thing to do at that instant. It has been so long since i heard someone genuinely speaking of anything coming from our region that was not just positive but quickly wamed up my heart.

So i started reading about it the team, the kids, and more about coach Luma mifleh. I was really grabbed by the whole thing. I was even more pleased when I stumbled on a post by Natasha (mental mayhem) , i missed that story somehow, but soon i became dismayed by the comments. We have become so xenophobic of media and read a bit too much into the wording that instead of having admiration about what this jordanian woman was achieving some got stuck on the way they mentioned her origins and religion(islam) and even a hint at how she had easy in her life which felt like it was a stab to her integrity in some way. The way the story came out to me and the need to clarify the origins of the team is to put into perspective that this is the south, Atlanta to be specific, these are people who live in bubbles and hate to have them disturbed. The reason the origins of the team matters is because they would/have/are being fought on all the levels, if you have a rosy lovely imagine of white suburbia in the US when you are part of a minority then please dispel it.
bambam: wait wait .... aren't you doing the same thing your are criticizing by reading too deeply into their comments, then again so far all this sounds pretty rosy to me. Hell its too damn rosy, it is even mentioned that there are talks about a movie they are going to be rich !
No Angel: Ya Ya, that aside now you are looking at things skin deep, what she did is truly inspiring to me at least. Here is someone, who with no doubt in my heart, faced her fair share of discrimination. Who still happened to stumble upon her place, where she is at home. she went beyond coach and metamorphosed into a mother to a family of 120. here are a bunch of kids, into a totally foreign environment that is not exactly welcoming them with hugs and kisses. two things are tying them together, their miserable past and they passion for soccer. this women has been able to go beyond all that required to go into really taking care of the families, even starting a small business to help raise the family's earning potentials beyond minimum pay. We all say that we like to help, some of us actually do help but only a few are able to truly help others and that is what is remarkable about this to me.
bambam: Chill out on the dobey there, what next you dissecting Jang's theory ?
No Angel: don't mind that, thanks for the heads up :P but don't digress dammit its already 420 u know !
What am trying to say is that some go out and help out a family, some go and feed an orphanage full of kids, some more do some more of those different things. we go do those and feel good about ourselves and head back to our little bubble. What Ms. Luma Mufleh did is glue families that have been snatched out of their trees and thrown on the ground to practically fend for them selves and give them a fighting chance. she didn't just stick to coaching, she didn't just help the kids out, she didn't just discipline the kids and teach them self reliance. She made their problems her own and their happiness her joy, she is them and they are her ! and here is the shocker, she didn't do all of that on ramadan's only.
You know bam what really left a chill in me, is that the one thing i found common among the Fugees. They mainly came from Muslim countries who were torn from conflict, and instead of stepping up to help, really help, we belittle ourselves by being worked about how they talked about us, how they are not giving us a fighting chance, how they belittle our culture with their caricatures, mainly incoherent angry talk.
bambam: True dat, I just wish u didn't miss the irony that as far as i know ur only good at talking too so just get me to bed and lets lay the philanthropist attitude to rest now.
No Angel: BASTARD !

ps. the puzzle of the post is among the lines

Hello! my name is BamBam and I am an introvert

2007-09-10T11:47:00.000+03:00

What is an introvert ?
in·tro·vert (ĭn'trə-vûrt', ĭn'trə-vûrt')
A term coined by Carl Jung to describe people who reflect inwards and are drained by being in a social activity and need time alone to recharge. Simply they get pleasure out of solitary activities, given a choice they prefer to sit down and think rather than chit-chat the day away.

Is there someone who just sits down and eats his meal silently without participating in the conversation, that every so often has a smirk on his face that creates an air of arrogance around him ? do you know someone who, to your bewilderment, can be tucked away in his own corner and still come out as the happiest person on this planet without any social interaction for days on end ? then chances are that person in an introvert, and he is most likely not arrogant he just can't help being amused by the utter nonsense that comes out of some people's mouths when it is detached to their brains (muahaha yeah i countered my point i know :P)

It is highly draining to sit down for hours and hours talking about absolutely nothing, that makes me cringe to no end. yes evidently I do hate family gatherings cause you always end up being asked the same bloody question with the same "I care" attitude from people who really are just trying to be nice for the sake of it. Then to be tormented by the same topics over and over for the rest of your life. Now socially that comes off as shy, anti-social, some even go to the extent of labeling introverts as being agoraphobic(fear of public spaces) or some other colorful assortment of disorders, in actuality introverts are not necessarily any of that, they just value silence in the absence of something worth saying, hence when an introvert speak it is better to shut up and listen.

All my gripes aside (and being an INTP I can be really anal & taciturn "sometimes"), the reason I had to sit down and have this talk with one's self is the series of activities that I was involved in the last couple of weeks which shed light on some sides of me that I was in denial about. The reason for those according to my deduction is that currently I created my world to minimize annoyance to the extent that now am vulnerable to annoyances to the extent that it polarizes the way I should act with the way I act, that in a way is the reason that I feel that am faking and acting out my social interactions rather than living them.

With the amount of choice we have nowadays no longer can we live in the same world as other, we think the world is getting smaller but in fact we fragmented the world to even smaller pieces were our perceptions are irreconcilable. Then we profess bafflement and bewilderment and how can others react the way they do towards things.

Slightly loosing you there in the previous 2 paragraphs ? let me bring you up to pace with an example. Being in school you might have been the only one with the interests that you have, for the sake of the example lets say you had an infatuation with fury cuddly teddy bears. So in the past you were forced to interact with others because you had no other option. So you were exposed enough to annoyance that you became immune to it to a certain extent, people then were watching the same shows and hearing the same news. Agreeing or disagreeing based on a single reality. When you wanted to reach out to other fury cuddly teddy bear lovers, you had to expend the effort, and most likely it would be vis-a-vis. Which made the joy of finding them that more real and enjoyable. You had to be more accepting and tolerant of your environment and taking people as is, with all their flows and imperfections.

Contrast that with the reality now, you are no longer the only fury cuddly teddy bear lover.
blast up your computer and you can reach out to plenty, who are exposed to media that is dedicated to fury cuddly teddy bear lovers which shapes their perception of the world based on that perspective. They naturally presume others to atleast have the basic understanding of the culture hence when communicating to outsiders they truncate years of integration which results into them having starkly different views about things. Also for convenience the majority of their communication with other cudbears (thats what fury cuddly teddy bear lovers call themselves) is based on text which detracts from the life of the conversation and aids misunderstanding (boy how sarcasm on paper is hard to achieve!) . So as a result they end up interacting with less people than they would have in the past. Because "they just don't understand".

So how does that tie in with being an introvert (an INTP one non the less) ? well a lot really, mainly the realization that I need to raise the level of noise in my life. I am not going to be "friendlier" or be a chatter box that never stops talking about thy self, and am probably not going to join into a small talk anytime soon.
What I will do is just get exposed, no longer shying away from places I consider to be "not my type", no longer shy away from groups where there might be some people I loathe. Just be around different people.

RAISE MY LEVEL OF TOLERANCE TO THE ANNOYING THINGS IN LIFE & BREAK THE BUBBLE

ENJOY!

ps. fury cuddly teddy bear lovers has some context and it is not purely random
pps. chats and IM's still rule and I love them for stripping the human out of the conversation, but will refrain when given the choice now *psyche*
ppps. I am not an emo.

The one and only truth

2007-08-27T13:51:00.000+03:00

Well in light of reading about Mother Theresa being a total hypocrite (now before you start flaming me, I am just quoting her own words)
So since every religion is the one and only truth, and they all seem to be geographically centralized am going to play on an idea that was just ricocheting in my head for a while.

So lets see since they are all "the one and only truth", I am going to try to separate them using other metrics.

For the sure the one with the biggest number of followers stands the highest chance of being right ?

That should be fairly easy then I would be a Christian (2.1 billion), a roman catholic(1.05billion) in specific though being a Sunni Muslim(940 million) comes at a very close second. So the one with the largest number should do it, but how did it get to be so that they have the largest number of followers since it is really intriguing that it seemed like the missed a spot on the world map.
So it seems the major catalyst to the spread can be traced to the roman empire and Constantine's conversion, and having similarities to already established and popular religions (Mithraism, The cult of Dionysus to name a few) to help in the slow spread of the religion among the populace. During the persecution of the Christians they had to blend in and adopt a lot of the pagan holidays as their own in order to celebrate their religion unnoticed (Christmas and Easter to name a few). then came the establishment of the catholicism which centralized the governance and aided in the spread of the religion utilizing missionaries (with some not so "godly" practices).

So it seems that it took alot based on what is established in older religions, so ....

The oldest religion that is still recognizably followed today must be the truth, since it withstood the test of time.
Hmm so that would be Hinduism (1500 BC or 2500BC according to references compared to 1300BC for Judaism) , with 900 million that is certainly respectable. A long and established list of dualism of the matter and self, about a dozen deities and the longest running mythology of superheroes in pre-existing literature.
All that is dandy except for from previous interactions with Hindus they seem to be pretty private and unwelcoming about letting anyone into their sects , so I guess they are not that welcoming of newcomers. this evident that although it is one of the oldest religions it has remained well anchored around its birth place and not expanded beyond its local population.

Maybe the youngest religion will be more welcoming lets give that a shot. I'll make sure to thank them for exporting yoga along the way.

So the youngest most recognizable religion that would be ...
Baha'i faith (19th centurty), nope. Cai Dao (1926) don't know what that is but it doesn't qualify.
There we go Scientology (1952) , now lets see what it is about.... OK seems interesting, positive and negative energy, they are always on the look out for new members, hmmm i have to pay to move along their levels, thats fine sounds like donations to me. So far so goo..... wait xenu ? intergalactic confederacy, body thetans, am orginally the tortured spirit of an alien prisoner.
Aight i'll pass, but seriously even for a religion that is bloody weird.

So too many ppl didn't work, oldest didn't work youngest is just loony, what is left ... I could go by what is the fastest growing one but these seem to be either pure propoganda (Falun Gong), birth rates (Islam), or just because it became more socially acceptable (non-religious) . could go for the most complicated(Etruscan religion) but whats the point they are all dead and archaic.

Honestly coming back to reality it seems there is really little choice, as a matter of fact rarely it is when you ask an adherent to any religion do you get an answer that they choose it. the majority revert to what they are familiar with originally or some denomination to it. this is never truer than it is in Islam, the idea is that everyone is born "Muslim" so they are not converting but reverting. So since there is little choice and we frown about discrimination regarding things we have little choice about ( skin color, language, sexual orientation ... etc) why do we still consider religion out of that context and we vehemently despise others in opposing faction ?

In the end it is a solitary journey, so journey on ...

ENJOY
perhaps

If you consider yourself to be creative then read this

2007-08-27T11:15:00.000+03:00

I hate "linking to post" posts but this is too long but just about the best advice I have read regarding how to go about dealing with creativity. This is not talking about art or writing it is about being creative in what you do the passion firing up inside of you whether its in photography, programming anything that you consider yourself to be passionate about, "your own brain-child".

My favorite 2 points

6. Everyone is born creative; everyone is given a box of crayons in kindergarten.Then when you hit puberty they take the crayons away and replace them with books on algebra etc. Being suddenly hit years later with the creative bug is just a wee voice telling you, "I�d like my crayons back, please."

So you've got the itch to do something. Write a screenplay, start a painting, write a book, turn your recipe for fudge brownies into a proper business, whatever. You don't know where the itch came from, it's almost like it just arrived on your doorstep, uninvited. Until now you were quite happy holding down a real job, being a regular person...

Until now.

You don't know if you're any good or not, but you'd think you could be. And the idea terrifies you. The problem is, even if you are good, you know nothing about this kind of business. You don't know any publishers or agents or all these fancy-shmancy kind of folk. You have a friend who's got a cousin in California who's into this kind of stuff, but you haven't talked to your friend for over two years...

Besides, if you write a book, what if you can't find a publisher? If you write a screenplay, what if you can't find a producer? And what if the producer turns out to be a crook? You've always worked hard your whole life, you'll be damned if you'll put all that effort into something if there ain't no pot of gold at the end of this dumb-ass rainbow...

Heh. That's not your wee voice asking for the crayons back. That's your outer voice, your adult voice, your boring & tedious voice trying to find a way to get the wee crayon voice to shut the hell up.

Your wee voice doesn't want you to sell something. Your wee voice wants you to make something. There's a big difference. Your wee voice doesn't give a damn about publishers or Hollywood producers.

Go ahead and make something. Make something really special. Make something amazing that will really blow the mind of anybody who sees it.

If you try to make something just to fit your uninformed view of some hypothetical market, you will fail. If you make something special and powerful and honest and true, you will succeed.

The wee voice didn't show up because it decided you need more money or you need to hang out with movie stars. Your wee voice came back because your soul somehow depends on it. There's something you haven't said, something you haven't done, some light that needs to be switched on, and it needs to be taken care of. Now.

So you have to listen to the wee voice or it will die... taking a big chunk of you along with it.

They're only crayons. You didn't fear them in kindergarten, why fear them now?

27. The best way to get approval is not to need it.
This is equally true in art and business. And love. And sex. And just about everything else worth having.
About 15 years ago I was hanging out in the offices of Punch, the famous London humor magazine. I was just a kid at the time, for some reason the cartoon editor (who was a famous cartoonist in his own right) was tolerating having me around that day.
I was asking him questions about the biz. He was answering them as best he could while he sorted through a large stack of mail.

"Take a look at this, Sunshine," he said, handing a piece of paper over to me.

I gave it a look. Some cartoonist whose name I recognised had written him a rather sad and desperate letter, begging to be published.

"Another whiney letter from another whiney cartoonist who used to be famous 20 years ago," he said, rolling his eyeballs. "I get at least fifty of them a week from other whiney formerly-famous cartoonists."

He paused. Then he smiled an wicked grin.

"How not to get published," he said. "Write me a frickin' letter like that one."

So here is the link of the post by Hugh Macleod on "How to be creative"

Guys & Dolls.... I am scared for life now

2007-08-20T23:09:00.000+03:00

bored, and not doing so good and I just had to stumble upon this. Am disturbed, really really disturbed now. Has it become so hard to live life that there are people that resort to this :S

absolutely and utterly speechless. I just hope one of those dolls pulls a Cherry 2000 on them.

Fall Season Roundup

2007-08-20T12:22:00.000+03:00

Summer is over and regardless of how ironic it is that am doing a roundup of the Fall season while am in Jordan ( I love my torrents) this season so far seems to pack a big punch and there are quite a few new shows to look out for. So here is the round-up per day

Green is a new series - Red is a returning one

Monday (translates to Tuesday nights in our Case)

Battle Star Galactica (October 1st) - The final season and probably the best well around series, I hope it goes out with a BANG! me wants smashed toasters...

Prison Break (September 17th) - should be remained to break in & out & back in again & hopefully out or something but will keep me tuned

Heroes (September 24th) - well the more Hiro I get to see the happier i'll be. The best new show of last season is back for another run of the best super hero sweetness on TV !

Weeds (August 13th) - that is if you were waiting and didn't see the Pre-Air episodes

Chuck (September 24th) - now this quirky drama laced with witty humor according to the previews is a flip-flop. the premise is a geeky twenty something downloads goverment secrets into his brain is seeked out by the CIA to lead a double life as a sales man and secret agent. the download to brain part is the only things worth mentioning about an otherwise pretty cliche plot so will check out the first episode and see how it goes from there.

Honorable mention - K-Ville(September 17th) - a drama about a bunch of cops in post Katrina New Orleans worth flipping through when commercials are on ...

Tuesday (translates to Wednesday nights in our Case)
House (September 25th) - Dr. Gregory House is back again, rude crude and always so for us he always keeps us coming back for more.

Carpoolers (October 2nd) - a comedy about Four men ranting about life, relationships, money & work for 30 minutes on their way to work. might be a good time waster after a long day at work.
Reaper

Reaper (September 25th) - A 21 year old whose parents sold his soul to the devil has to pay up and be a bounty hunter for Beelzebub. Oh and thats a comedy by the way so also worth a glance.

Wednesday
SouthPark (October 3rd) - Well I personally can't get enough of 'em

Bionic Women (September 26th) - Those who remember the show from the 70's will be surprised that other than an accident and bionic parts there is little else left of the series. from The preview of the first episode it was entertaining enough and had the feeling of watching a hybrid of Buffy the Vampire hunter and Dark Angel so far so good. Oh and the first bionic women is the nemesis this time.

Honorable mention - Dirty Sexy Money (September 26th) - Cluedo meets falcon crest, a drama thriller.

Thursday
The office (september 27th) - one word... SCHRUTE ! I wonder how long they'll keep Pam and Jim playing footsy.

Supernatural (October 4th) - Sam & Dean at it again, both have already died for god's sake what will it take to kill them off ? Armageddon that might do it, so we'll get to see the writers try that out

Honorable Mention - Drawn Together (October 4th) - quirky comedy of a "not so super" heroes, never checked it out so this might be the year.

Friday
Nothing! Enough TV all wee,k go out and have some fun. If you stay in there isn't anything worth the time, so go open up a book or something. Though Real Time with Bill Maher(August 24th) might be worth checking but on a different day.

Saturday & Sunday
Dexter (September 30th) - can't say more than what I said here.

Never got around to enjoy Simpsons(September 23rd), Family Guy (September 23rd one-hour premiere special) , or American Dad(September 30th) since I got too used to just flipping channels and stumbeling upon them but those got their fans. Now if I get to see more Stewie then i might tune in to Family Guy. I never really understood what's so great about Desperate Housewives (September 30th) either.

Lost (3 more seasons till it's over), 24, Jericho, one-tree hill, lipstick jungle(think ala sex and the City) and a bunch of other shows will not premier until early 2008.
One hottest new comers is 'Sarah Conor chronicles', yes if that name rings a bell am sure you have grin on your face right about now, thats the post terminator 2 story should be interesting to say the least.
Also lest I forget, The IT Crowd(January 1st) is coming state side which is based on the British comedy that you can watch here , if you are slightly involved in IT then its a must watch !

Over & out.
ENJOY the season!

We all Want the US out Iraq but...

2007-08-20T12:17:00.000+03:00

I never was very clear on this, so what do you people think should the US get out of Iraq and if so what do you think will happen afterwards ?

Edit:
So the general idea based on Bilal's and mohanned's comments ( thanks for contributing) is that it would be better for them to leave Iraq and it will sort it's own mess out but that will never happen.
The way i see it is as someone who is living in Jordan I am against the United states cutting and running out of Iraq the same way it did in Vietnam, there needs to be a negotiated agreement with some international forces to take control from the united states and through all of that a deposition of the method of governance and renegotiation between the Iraqi sects that aim at maintaining the country as a single entity and at the same time allowing some Independent governance of the different areas. otherwise instead of a endemic warfare its going to be a pandemic warfare.

If they do leave, and yes mohanned it is the most likely scenario by 2009 if not earlier, and the situation in Iraq is not contained. that will mean trouble for the whole region that is far greater than what we are facing now. The country to take the majority of the damage due to that will be Jordan.
so if they cut and run out of, the killings in Iraq due to sectarian violence is bound to increase in order to secure power. Now those sects will establish ties with the neighboring countries in order for them to contain the carnage within Iraq in exchange for supplies. Or they might rely on the bases in their country.
Now the more you rely on American aid the more prone you are to a terrorist attack and the more refugees you take in the more prone that sectarian violence will resurges with the tensions rising between those refugees in their host country.
So it is a lose-lose situation either way, if you lean too much toward either side you are inviting violence.

Whose the country that is most willing to accept Iraqi refugees ?
So as it stands currently ironically although am totally against the war in Iraq, i feel its far better for the whole region if the United states stays there since it acts a buffer so far. The weird thing about Iraq that the violence is discriminatory, you are never too sure if it foreigners, liberators, terrorists, fanatics, sectarian or just blood lust. Some how reminds me of conflicts in Africa, Rwanda style.

see why that wasn't a comment :P
what do u guys think ?
ps. mohannad the US can't maintain the war in its current form neither economically or politically.

Priemiership 07/08 season & the Anfield robbery

2007-08-20T09:35:00.000+03:00

Well I was planning this post before the season starts but I only managed to get it through now. The latest installment of the battle of the 5 poles started and their have been alot of shake-ups that happened during the summer break. So lets look at who's in and who's out.

Arsenal - Arsenal probably took the biggest hit out of the big 4. They lost their leader, their snipper and their star. Thierry Henry is out, and boy am I glad when I heard that he is off to Braca.
So Arsene Wenger as usual proffered to go after anonymous young players and their is no mentionable addition to the team but considerable loses. I think their chances of earning much this season is slim to non, especially that they are pretty thin on quality reserves and have already been hit by the injury of Galas. Did I forget that the promising Reyes and the staple Ljungberg are out too ?

IN - Eduardo da Silva ; Lukasz Fabianski ; Havard Nordtveit ; Bacary Sagna
OUT - Thierry Henry; Jose Antonio Reyes ; Fredrik Ljungberg ; Fabrice Muamba ; Jeremie Aliadiere ; Mart Poom; Arturo Lupoli ; Matthew Connolly ; Kerrea Gilbert ; Johan Djourou

Chelsea - Well they didn't spend much at all, the main squad is slightly weaker on the defensive end this season which might cause them trouble as the season goes on.

two mentionable additions to the team, Florent Malouda from Lyon for 13.5mill (now thats not much compared to how much they spend usually) and Tal Ben Haim in defense to alleviate the loss of a couple major defensive players Geremi and Boulahrouz . couple of ongoing rumors are they are interested in acquiring the services of Daniel Alves from Sevilla and Arjen Robben is heading out to Real. It is still a solid team and definitely a major contender but I think it's starting to crack.

IN - Alex; Florent Malouda ; Steve Sidwell; Claudio Pizarro; Tal Ben Haim ; Danny Philliskirk ; Stuart Searle
OUT - Nuno Morais ; Yves Makabu-Ma-Kalamby ; Geremi ; Khalid Boulahrouz; Michael Mancienne ; Ben Sahar ; Scott Sinclair

Manchester United - The champions seem well poised to maintain their title, with the addition of Anderson, Hargreaves & Tevez they added even more depth to a team that seemed to be a bit of the tired end last season and boy did they spend some quids. Since they are the Manc am not gonna say much else other than Give up Gabriel Heinze already and you can go get Renato Augusto from Flamingo.

IN - Owen Hargreaves ; Nani ; Anderson ; Tomasz Kuszczak ; Carlos Tevez
OUT - Tim Howard ; Kieran Richardson ; Giuseppe Rossi; Alan Smith

Liverpool - Can you say a reshuffle ? A lot of quality additions solidifying offense and mid-field hopefully defense soon (with the acquisition of Hienze) and that might finally be the year !
On offense Bellamy & G9d (robbie fowler) are out, Fernando Torres and Voronin are in who promise to be a lethal combo in addition to Kyut and Crouch. At mid-field we have Benayoun and Babel who hopefully will adjust pretty quickly to the Anfield vibe. On paper this promises to be the most coherent and solid team we had in years and it's gonna be a blast watching it

IN - Fernando Torres ; Andriy Voronin ; Ryan Babel ; Yossi Benayoun; Lucas Leiva ; Sebastien Leto ; Nikolay Mihaylov ; Mikel San Jose ; Krisztian Nemeth; Andras Simon ; Charles Itandje
OUT - Robbie Fowler; Jerzy Dudek; Danny Guthrie ; Florent Sinama-Pongolle ; Luis Garcia ; Craig Bellamy ; Djibril Cisse ; Boudewijn Zenden ; Adam Hammill; Mark Gonzalez ; Scott Carson ; Lee Peltier; Miki Roque

Last night was Liverpool - chelsea clash in which the reds decimated the mercs but we had to be robbed of our 3 points by a stupid card happy referee who gave 2 yellow cards to a player but no reds, and with a line right out of genesis he created a penalty out of nothing !

ENJOY the season !

Phil Rockstroh .... a philo-political bard of the empire.

2007-08-14T14:50:00.000+03:00

I love reading for this guy, his style and sarcasm are sharp and insightful it is a pleasure reading anything that he write so I felt like sharing a few quotes.

"Beware of Ophra-palaver such as "attitude of gratitude"-- these platitudes connote nothing. Rilke taught us: The language of soul is a terrifying angel: it does not comfort-- it decimates our daily concerns because its vocabulary consists of the eternal; it's grammar and syntax connects the narrative of all things. It speaks: Star, Ocean, Storm. It does not say: "Good Boy: You've been so well behaved, so filled with dignity and decorum, so utterly appropriate for your age and era. Good boy. Now: Here's your reward: A life free of doubt and uncertainty. Are you feeling better now? Good-- Now back to work!"
- Unknown work

to be viable as commander-in-chief, Hillary must prove her toughness, preferably, in some he-man display of resolute stupidity. Since the flight-suit on the deck of an aircraft carrier gambit has been played-out, perhaps her handlers could set-up a photo-op involving the masculine iconography of the World Wrestling Federation. It should be arranged that she wrestle and then body slam two midget wrestlers portraying Dennis Kusinich and Ron Paul. Such an act of political stagecraft could prove to be Hillary Clinton's so-called "Sister Souljah moment."
-The U.S. Normalization of Mass Murder, A Disneyland of Militant Ignorance.

These streams of inspiration and renewal silently flow between those who have glimpsed this: That each generation must struggle against the soulless seekers of absolute power, that each era is a wasteland, that every person learns life is unfair, yet must seek to drink from the waters of hope -- so that our tongues will not wither to cynical dust.
- America Has Left the Building: An Open Missive of Anger and Hope

We're devouring the life-sustaining resources of the earth as if it were a bag of Doritos.
- Expanding Markets and Dying Oceans: Eating the Planet Like a Bag of Doritos for Jesus

Hence, it might be instructive to look at the mode of being evinced by the pioneers of Punk Rock ... Tired of endless guitar solos and of Arena Rock and Roll's egomaniacal inanities, they learned to play three cords -- real fast -- and would play for little or no money in shot-out downtown clubs -- thereby reintroducing the danger and allure of the subversive intimacy of early Rock and Roll to a new generation -- and forever establishing the enduring principle that being an imbecilic Rock and Roll egoist should be a democratic process -- not limited to only corporate, guitar technocrats (or even those individuals possessed of the tyranny of talent).
- Prisoners of Envy: Wal*Mart Nihilism Versus the Punk Rock of Blogging

Meanwhile, online, we struggle in a Jack in the Beanstalk Insurgency, hoping that from things as tiny and seemingly trivial as mere beans -- our postings, exchanges and periodic meet-ups -- the fall of tyrannical giants might begin.
- Mcmansions, SUVs, Mega-Churches and the Baghdad Embassy: Life Among Dim and Brutal Giants

His articles are not the most accessible but they are (to me) the most voraciously read literal songs.

you can read the entire articles at his blog Phil Rockstoch

In case you were in the market for a new car ...

2007-08-14T14:13:00.000+03:00

Don't buy one of those :D

This is the certification crash test for the Cherry A15, which are available in Jordan. There is little surprise in the results, for after all they are Chinese made. (by the way this is the 40mph/64kmh test)

Now the real question is why they are allowed on the streets?? oh wait, now I get this IT! it is our out-o'-da-box solution to solve our congestion problem.

ENJOY
ps. for other brilliant Chinese car crash tests click here & here & here ..... you get the idea.

An outlook on things

2007-08-09T23:32:00.000+03:00

Lately my ideas have been jumbled and I can't really write clear cut and focused posts so bear with me :D

Have been occupied with quite a few things and hopping that they go well. Actually for the first time yesterday I got to hang out with some bloggers, that turned out pretty nicely I would say(bad movie tho). With everything that has been going on here it has become really annoying reading the same vanity from a lot of people. I vow if i see another poll coming on, am really going to do something cynical about it. That following the previous childishness really are leaving a bitter taste in my mouth, am not gonna go psychoanalyzing people cause honestly it stops at the childish attribute in my humble opinion.

phew thats off my chest now, moving on.

Came across a nice documentary that deals with the Palestinian issue, it is called Occupation 101 .

Now it didn't offer anything new, but i like the way they put it together and what they choose to put in it, a lot of ancient clips of the refugees were included which was interesting to watch. Now that watching got me started on thinking of why do I look at the whole issue in such vane. When I was younger (yes I can get younger and still spout out my mouth politically) I was a believer in that if we try to bridge the understanding and think logically on a solution that helps to compromise the difference and try to keep our emotions at bay.

Well after more than a few run ins with both sides I found that this idea will never gain traction when both sides are conquered by fear they are unable to detach from their immediate emotions so as long as there is fears in their hearts they will run to the first exit. Hence we got our lovely Oslo agreement (or maybe cause they have just ran out of countries willing to have the PLO run amok) . So at that point I was hoping that there will be an honest and credible leadership on either side that is able to rally the masses into a solution....

Yeah that lasted long, and looking at how things are now I can only feel vane towards the case. We have lost every ounce of respect for ourselves, we have two inexperienced ego megalomaniacs dealing with the most delicate political & idealogical situation in the world, and boy are they giving us a good show.

Now what is even more bleak is that the level of the education of my generation is so dismal that there is little hope for any worthy leadership to be born and that is one of the major reason why we are where we are (yes Arafat is not a counter example) so am at loss of what could be done. I won't go to touch on the Israeli side but what i don't understand is that cocooning that Arabs do whenever there is a chance to gain first hand experience in talking to an Israeli or a Jew. I still believe in talking if not to meet on common ground at least to learn their point of view, without doing at least that there is no way to be able to negotiate and we will have to negotiate.

The only solution I see in the horizon is to level the playing field and that could only be achieved if the funding they receive from the US is cut off, and that could only happen if the economy goes down the drain which brings me to this ...

OK, maybe something is wrong with me but I am getting really aroused by all the news I have been tuning to ....
Dow down 300 points again after French bank freezing 3 funds that invested in U.S. sub-prime loans, now that places the Dow at 88 points up from the last week's scare. The real catch is the unprecedented move by the European central bank to inject $130 billion to banks at the very low 4% rate, and on the federal reserve side they added $24 billion in temporary reserves to the U.S. banking system.
Simply saying while hedge funds already are sinking one after the other, now this is all spreading like a cancer in the financial circles and this is promising to be bloody. Treasury bill investment is the hot ticket with people banking on the Fed reserve will have no option but to cut the rates.
With all this mess we have china telling the US to its face that you either do what we want you to do or we just sink your stick man of a currency into the pages of history, the nice thing is they can do very little about it since china has the largest reserve currency (due to them financing the American wars by proxy) and can be pretty loony and do just that !

So Dow U've been doing great just 1200 more points to go, "U CAN DO IT ! ". September here we come (dammit i wish i had some money am missing a cash cow).

On a more entertaining, we had one of the secretaries from the front desk (the person that greets people who walk into the building) now she got promoted recently to what is effectively head of HR. It never fails, they start wearing different cloth, the new achieved power starts corrupting them. They get snappy and bossy and that got the cynical me grinding and the decision was .... Give her HELL!
So you need tech support, well you will have to wait really long. Can't understand the new policies ? oops read the email ain't gonna explain them again.
Enjoying your new responsibility ? believe me am going to take a sweet spot to that, means I can chug more work your direction, and if you ignore me I will highlight it at every meeting.
Why am being so mean, because I fully know that she incapable of filling the job but usually that doesn't make me behave that way. The real reason is that she is going to dismantle a perfectly good HR system that i was looking forward to be implemented into a broken piece of crap !

So the crusades are on and it's giving me some lighthearted daily entertainment, poor new workers that have been hired the atmosphere is "ElEcTrIfYiNg" at the office.

Anyways over an out...

ENJOY!
ps. people if you listen to my playlist i reduced the quality of the music so that the streaming is smoother, so is it good enough or should i go back to the original better quality ?

Make up your own title

2007-08-07T00:16:00.000+03:00

Well a whole bunch of ideas flowing through my head as usual but since i haven't posted in a while i feel like just flooding them in a single post. since they are non coherent to say the least (well other than just jumbling brain waves in my head) its pick ur own title post.
Helical Governance:

Economical & social ideals seem to be always at schism with reality. It has been pretty much established that communism is not a workable system (Am not gonna go push some Marxist's buttons now) it has been able to last for barely 50 years which by any standard is a short time.
While capitalism and its make-up kit "democracy" have been just able to make inroads in the global sphere and through that process the mask is starting to peel-off.
The current problem that is starting to be faced with a "I want" society is that the "I's" are really
looking out for them selves and through that process the "we" are collectively loosing power.
i.e. while you are out looking to make more money, and establishing an easier life while delegating the governance to someone else, that person is also looking out for the same thing hence collectively the government is not longer concerned about what is best for the people.

The other side of the equation is that during our pursuit of "happyness" we forgot what the value of money was. It was never a goal but a mean, so when you are being enslaved to the means of some body else it will make you a disposable tool once a better and cheaper one comes along, that drives people into a competition of forgoing quality of living just to live.

so why am I talking about all this barely legible nonsense there ( i did warn that this is barely coherent and just brewing).

the idea is not novel by any standard, the short coming of communism that it didn't allow people have the little extra things that makes life a little colorful so it made the people too gray but on the other hand it provided some sense of stability and security (please tell me you want to argue that point) .

On the other hand capitalism allows you to have the world, but the catch is that you have to afford it.

The problem with both is that there is little tie in between the country and the people, we as the people are still the sheep that need the herder to mobilize us.

What is happening currently is that regardless of protesting or civil disobedience the government and the people are not aligning their views. After the election of a representative, which takes all of 1 hour normally, you kick back into you lazy routine and keep getting droned by the monotonousness of daily life. In the meanwhile there is someone that is taking your future and microwaving into into rubble, but it's alright for you are living well right now.

Well that all needs to change, the government needs to subsidize and take control of the essentials. Medical care, education, basic commodity agriculture, utilities need to be under governmental control. those services need to be to essential to make the general population focus on "life" rather than living. when the population is under less of a stress and not worrying about securing the essentials they will have more time on their hands to establish a participatory democracy, no that doesn't mean waiting from election cycle to the next and hoping for the best. Participatory democracy means having the people involved in the governance, in the sense that issue that affect a wide segment of society don't only get passed by the vote of the elected officials but they need the consent of the people.

The connectivity today is what will facilitate the system, for right now we have the ability, education of the masses and tools to accomplish what the Greek democracy set out to achieve. Hence a marriage between democracy and governmental control, with the wisdom of the crowds having the highest level of oversight.

ok that took longer than it should and ate away from the space for other things and its not even detailing what I want.

Some other fliers:

The ever disappearing boundary between the internet and my life; the way things that are happening online are leaving their ripples on my life and vice versa. still undecided whether its a good thing, for i did gain a lot compared to what i could consider that i lost. This idea was brought on by the entertaining scuffles going around which i did find amusing although i abstained from participating.

Eagerly watching the stock market, the currency markets, oil and general global economy is so much fun. i hope my predictions come out right, only a couple of months left and so far everything seems to be on schedule. Bear Stearns bailed ship on the sub-prime titanic , but the CDOs and all that landfill "new age" financial instruments are moving their zeros to the left quicker than investors can drop their pants and bend over. i was looking forward for todays performance after Fridays slippery slump but i think the Plungers are back at it again will see what the reserve meeting will issue tomorrow.

Foreign movies are so much more entertaining that american ones these days. Finally got to watch Nightwatch (a russian sci-fi movie), transformers, and the science of sleep (especially surreal) they were all exceptionally well done. On the other hand been trying to watch Zodiac and black snake moan for a while.

I do feel bad since i haven't updated my playlist, haven't posted much on arabexpats, and haven't done the weekly playlist for the music blog. need to get on top of that as soon as i have the energy.

Also University of Aqaba(yes we are going to have our very own university of las vegas in jordan YAY!!!) is holding off a design contest for their logo with a grand prize of JOD4000. This is open to everyone all you have to do is design a logo (up to 3) jpg (800x600min, and max 250k) have it done by August 21st and send it to us(at)adc(dot)jo
it should be nice to see if people like moey, 360, roba or all the other designer/bloggers give it a shot since it sounds interesting.

and final header......

Emotionally attached types are really a peculiar species, they are always in the "I want" and never in the "maybe circumstances got the best of the situation". Need to stay away from them for a while. Please, please, please let the summer be over ! I had enough of the traffic, the visitors, being nice to people, and the eternal 5-12 vocal tornado that goes through the house on daily bases..... need to invent "silencer" milk drops. I'll even offer to teach them sign language if they are really bent on "screaming", wait how do mute people scream ? how inconsiderate of me.

Ramblings of a bored, tired, sleepy, incoherent on the border of sanity bambam hoping that didn't cause you a migraine if you actually managed to read it which i didn't bother to since its not even proof read, but am grateful for even checking here and hope we will be back in bliss soon and sick of the childishness and immaturity that has been tainting our space.

Cheers & Enjoy

Weeds Season 3.... pre-air preview

2007-07-24T17:25:00.000+03:00

Well another show for the fall season that has made its way to the layman's network. Is this the latest in viral marketing and buzz engineering ?
Weeds is back for another season of our lovely suburban community, with Nancy Botwin(Mary-Louise Parker) with the cliff hanger ending of last season its anyone's guess how this one will start and frankly no need for that just go watch it.
The plot in a nut shell is the struggle of Nancy, a single mother of 2 boys, trying to make ends meet by becoming a weed dealer in the suburban community of Agrestic.

One of the things to look forward to is the inclusion of Mary-Kate Olson as an evangelist that is the new love interest of Nancy's eldest son, Silas.

The allure of this series is not just the theme, or how close to reality the depiction of the story is. It is the top notch acting by Parker along with a great assembly of actors that do this story justice.

The series will premiere officially on August 14th.

Now practicing on cats was fine to celebrate the return of dexter (though it will mean the stray cat population in Jordanian streets will drop drastically by September 14th), I wonder how I should celebrate the return of this series appropriately ..... HMMM

Weeds S1
Weeds S2
Weeds S3E1 Pre-air
Weeds S3E2 Pre-air

Weeds S3E3 Pre-air

ENJOY
After thought 1: I think I should start adding weekly what to watch list since I do view alot of things during a week
After thought 2: I think I should lay off the filler posts of a while, haven't had a meaty post in a long time and i know exactly what would do the job.

Edit:Episode 3 has been added thanks to severus.

Dexter season 2 ... pre-air dvds are out !

2007-07-20T01:15:00.000+03:00

THIS ONE !

If you are emotionless, and the word "emotion" means to you that its just an opening to exploit other people. Plus it is too much of an effort having to fake all those emotions that others demands but if you plan to get away with murder you gatts to conform.
Simply put go watch it ......
Dexter S2 E1
Dexter S2 E2
Dexter S1
I'll go practice on some stray cats ...

"Ever wondered what a heart attack tastes like ?"

2007-07-18T13:33:00.002+03:00

Pizza hut's "double dip"...With a honey maple syrup dip for your cheese stuffed crust

Pizza Hut's "australian meat pie pizza" - Yummy looks like something I left in the WC last night

Idaho special - Mayo, potato, bacon bits, corn and parsley (why don't we combine an entree with salad hmm..)

I can't wait till they announce the latest creation of pizza hut Amman, Mansaf Pizza & yalanji stuffed crust filling

ENJOY!

ps. trolly I wonder if you are smart enough to highlight the white text and read this. You are the most wonderful rabbid troll i ever stepped on

drogato, drogué, φάρμακο, droga, 薬... My take on it

2007-07-15T12:55:00.000+03:00

During the weekend I opened the newspaper (which is a rare event these days), and got interested in a report of a Awareness campaign by the 2amn 3am(Jordanian security service?!) . What I find amazing in those reports is that they haven't really changed, EVER !

They are always making progress in their fight, that abuse is virtually non-existent, that we are a transitional country and not a user country, and that we should commend our security forces for protecting us from this evil that causes moral corruption , & lewd behavior.

Now I am pretty familiar with legislative history regarding this issue in a number of countries, what I am ashamed of is that I can't say the same regarding my country. Who was it that decreed that we need to invest in this area of security.

In the case that we actually take ourselves seriously regarding this issue can we please ground our selves in reality !
Drug use among the Jordanian population is actually rampant, let us not ignore the huge plantations that are spread across the country only because they are protected with a larger arsenal than the one that the security forces possess and for honesty sakes let us not fudge every bust that the security forces make (4 million pills for instance ).

Why I think it is pointless worldwide to invest in a war on drugs:

Culturally speaking, the people who are going to use and abuse drugs will get their hands on it regardless of laws and regulations.
No country will be able to thwart a product that sells for 1700% of its original price
The war created a much more dangerous activity which is money laundering, it is practically much harder to move around the cash that is earned through illicit means than it is to move around the drugs.
There will always people willing to take on the risk if the profit is high enough. When you legalize the drug, the price will drop and the cartels will not find it profitable to market that drug. That way the supply will diminish
Technically speaking there was no laws or regulation, religious or not pre- 1900 that demonises drugs. To the contrary it has always been part of popular culture and in certain places it still is.
Drug abuse also includes abuse of pharmaceutical drugs, which is actually more dangerous (synthetic alternatives of a drug are much more potent than their natural sources). This is in fact the easiest type of drug to acquire in Jordan, and hence the most popular among users.
Regulating the market will be much more cost effective than it is to remain on prohibition terms with it. With regulation you will raise the average age of hard drug users (here) that incidentally means that the gate way theory of drugs is not true, and the allure of moving to higher drugs is reduced. Also it means that there are less new users in the population which is exactly what you want to achieve but was never able to.
You will reduce the innovation in the field of drugs, the demand for stronger and harder drugs causes the innovation in the field. take out the demand by legalizing softer drugs.
The legal system will have to shoulder alot less of the burden due to criminalization that pose no danger to the society, the money saved from this and other drug drains of the budget could be applied to strengthen health and education programs.
I hate to add this point, but there is a great amount of money and revenue that could be earned in this area.
Regarding Addiction, tobacco is proven to be the most addictive drug. In general tobacco is more damaging to the health too.
If you allow tobacco and alcohol to be consumed even though they are not exactly socially tolerable (atleast not until 10 or so years ago) , why is it that you single out soft drugs.
I am in no way advocating total free market with regard to drug control, but actually having governmental oversight which is a much better tool than prohibition. That applies mainly to soft drugs but that doesn't say that it is an ineffective tool against all drugs.
The best way to combat a side effect of drugs, i.e. the cartels, is to reduce the price to a point where it is no longer feasible to invest in the business that is the bottom line. They are in it for the money.(I repeated that point again)

One last favor i have been looking to find a single fatwa or hadeeth that dates before the 1900's that classifies drug use as "haram", since it was prevalent during that time but only alcohol was mentioned. I am just wondering regarding that since I can't find the link between the hashasheen and where we are now.

Kids remember drugs & Alcohol are bad for you, unless you take them under the supervision of an authorized adult :P

ENJOY!
ps. I hope my lil' Egyptian troll gives his blessing to this post too
pps. I wonder how many slanders i will get for this. yes i can be blamed for troll baiting.

Troll Hunting ... a spectator sport

2007-07-15T12:02:00.000+03:00

troll² (trōl)
n.
A supernatural creature of Scandinavian folklore, variously portrayed as a friendly or mischievous dwarf or as a giant, that lives in caves, in the hills, or under bridges.
or
Trolls are recognizable by the fact that they have no real interest in learning about the topic at hand - they simply want to utter flame bait. Like the ugly creatures they are named after, they exhibit no redeeming characteristics, and as such, they are recognized as a lower form of life on the net, as in, “Oh, ignore him, he's just a troll.”

We all had our share of those! It is one of the best spectator sports that the internet has delivered to us. There is a certain pleasure to be drawn out of having the playing fields so skewed that a person devolves into a troll.
It is a pet peeve of mine to "feed the troll" it is just too amusing to see him creatively spew out one hateful post after another Amre El-Abyad, he is definitely a special breed(he is not an anon) that I want immortalize with post. Amre please visit and leave a comment if you read this.

Here are some of the gems (I apologize for his limited lexicons, he just has the urge for revert to cuss words);

no angels I know that you are low-but why do you like to interfere with your masters the Egyptians????? is it out of Jealouy piece of $$$$ or what.

if i get to see you gace to face i will put on the ground and crush that dirty head of yours with my foot

why do you care so much about Jews in Egypt? If you like crap then that is your own business, but everytime you insert your tongue inside your $$$$ ### you end up spewing your $$$$ on us.

Keep your dirty hands off Egypt low dirty freak

Now people usually delete those and forget about them, for who likes to re-read this ? I on the other hand like to keep a troll list so that in case I come across them again I would quote them and then move on with the discussion. Now what caused him to say all that about me ?
this comment on here

actually the ones that moved to israel are still pretty much iranian.
As for Egyptian jews whether you like it or not they [had] a great influence in early Egyptian cinema,

What is funny is that as soon as I mentioned "Hets mot folkgrupp" (which is the hate speech law in sweden where he lives) he was muted, what a shame...

Are you entertained !
ps. here i start the Troll watch anyone who wants to contribute is welcome

Just in case... Begging

2007-07-12T13:27:00.000+03:00

With the recent passing of the law by GAM that bans beggars and begging from areas of Amman, which I find absolutely reprehensible since they are not exactly providing a realistic alternative.
The apathetic attitude they carry on that the majority of beggars are already rich and are exploiting the kindness of people is a joke, yes there are exceptions but the majority of them are really in need of a source of income.

What baffles me even more is the fact that this spreads to the "guerrilla shops" that open up around mosques, these people are doing a legitimate thing since they are not provided with a vibrant farmer's market they created their own. I am not sure if they were included or not but they disappeared from infront of the mosque next to my home.

Even though I am against the passing of the law but I have enough trust in their incompetence to not be able to enforce it effectively.

So just in case I fall into that situation myself, here are a few ideas that occured to me on how I would show my "micro entrepreneurialship":

carry a bag, and a broom going around cleaning the streets and any of the offices or shops and do it with out verbally asking for money. Having a sign on my back that states my purpose and that makes it fall under donations and not begging (a guy in Canada does that and thats where I got the idea)
Stand near crowded areas and guide people to the closest parking spot. (also with a sign to avoid run-ins with the law, and to allow people to identify your use and need)

These two are the things that occur to me readily that require the smallest skill set, doesn't involve hassling people for money, and actually benefit the society :D
Of course street performers are about as colorful a cultural icona as can be and they do fall under that class, the idea is that not all begging is "2ate3 eedo 2o bish7ad 3aleyha (he cuts his hand and begs)". Begging is a cultural reflection of society, how well you treat the "untouchables" of your society is a reflection of how civil your society is.

Would love to add any suggestions anyone might have

ENJOY!

UTUBE hopping

2007-07-11T13:00:00.000+03:00

Just some crazy videos on utube that are worth revisiting later on...

A whole bunch of Haruhi otakus dancing in the street till the cops break them off (talk about choreography)

Remember the test when stimulants were given to spiders to observe their web building... this is what really happened

More crazy asians dancing

Something that might happen one day, although am not sure on which end I will stand it in

Finally some squirrel skeet

I just had to take my mind of the little girls video that has been making rounds around the blogs lately, I have no clue how I would be of any help (translates to not enough contacts in the medical field for me to make a difference) hope justice gets served.

Edit Missed one:

ENJOY!