"In Egypt, Turning Back The Clock For Ramadan"

"We have 30 days of Christmas Eve full of banquets and food," he explains. "Egypt consumes three times its normal food consumption during the month of Ramadan."

He adds: "They are semi-drugged by media, by food, banquets that are being held because religion advises that it is better that people eat together."


Really, was this guy high on something when he gave that statement? Something doesn't smell right; talking "Christmas Eve" and "semi-drugged" when speaking about Ramadan just ain't right. I mean, don't get me wrong, somebody yet has to set a new level for idiotic blunders after Al-Tantawy.

Who are these people?

"Mistrust Of Police Persists In New Orleans

"We had police officers involved in kidnappings, rape, murders, drugs, bank robberies. There was a guy who used to do, like, bank robberies on his lunch hour. It was just astonishing — at one point we had four police officers facing first-degree murder charges," she says."

Ah, so are they Iraqi by any chance or is it just bad luck following the American Law Enforcer around the globe? Who are these people anyways? Surely, not the same as those courageous soldiers defending Democracy in Iraq and other dark places? No, no, are you sure they aren't Al-Qaeda?!

Oxymoron

"Clinton Sees GOP Backing For START Treaty

Clinton argued that U.S. national security interests are at stake.

"There is an urgency to ratify this treaty, because we currently lack verification measures with Russia," Clinton said. "Our ability to know and understand changes in Russia's nuclear arsenal will erode without the treaty."

Isn't the idea behind acquiring a nuclear arsenal in the first place to keep others in terrified suspense? This nonsense is really getting on my nerves and being an Arab that takes a lot of nonsense!

What a Relief!

"Ricks: Afghanistan Could Turn Out Better Than Iraq

RICKS: I’m actually more optimistic about Afghanistan than I am Iraq. Iraq does look to me like an endless war, not necessarily one where a lot of American troops are going to be fighting and dying."

I'm thinking of a proper word I could apply to a person who has teh audacity of applying the words "optimistic" and "better" to either of the American wars. Sorry, gotta go vomit some...

How ironic?!

"Anti-apartheid activist Suzman dies" today: maybe it's just the cruel irony of the world that a lead anti-apartheid South African activist and thinker dies on the sixth day of the Israeli holocaust against Gazans. Or maybe she just dies of grief watching what the world had come to after her struggle for racial equality for decades.

Where's Obama in all of this?

So Obama is probably easing off some of the restrictions and sanctions placed over Cuba. Where does he stand on the Israeli genocide in Gaza again?! yea... he's the coming change, of color maybe but not in US loyalties to Israel and its destructive and hegemonic policy in the Middle East.

Israeli hesitation

Today the Israeli Army shows just how desperate they are. The toll of martyrs increases to reach at least 415 in addition to more than 2000 injured men, women, and children in Gaza. The Israeli army bombed the house of Dr. Nizar Rayyan, a high-ranking Hamas official and a condoner of human shield tactic, who refused to leave his house with his wife and children, killing Rayyan and his wife and three of his children. However, Olmert states that israel is not looking for a long-time war in Gaza belying the increasing anxiety in the Israeli ranks. Hama' missiles may be primitive but they proved to be far-reaching and effective in causing the Israeli administration to think twice about launching a land attack on Gaza, which they seem to be reluctant to start right now.

Perfecting idiocy, yet again!

Today Bush, finally and after 5 years, apologizes for the "Mission Accomplished" banner dislayed on the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln carrier on which he arrived to Iraq Mrch, 2003 upon the invasion. He declares, and by "declare" I mean opens his mouth only to utter and emmit more of the nonesense he has developed an addiction for, that the banner and the speech that revolved around the message of the banner in 2003 was a mistake. A mistake. A simple *toot mistake! "I regret saying some things I shouldn't have said,'' Bush blabs. Well, I regret he saying things at all! There is nothing this sad excuse for a Yale graduate and US President should have said in the first place. It's interesting hearing him admitting to a numorous ammount of mistakes in the war on Iraq and not actually the war itself. What he is actually saying is that I am sorry for the way that we invaded Iraq and destroyed and looted the country but the concept still stands as sound and humane. He is sorry that the world CAUGHT him stealing rather than for committing robbery (so to speak of course).
http://news.yahoo.com/s/bloomberg/20081112/pl_bloomberg/ahlrnlvfhsmc

Political Reversed Psychology

So Today is the US presidential elections!!! Yoooohoooooo!!! (ironic). Although I'm really interested in the elections from a cultural and social point of view, since the results will show how Americans have come to cope with racial and socio-economic issues and quandaries when it counts most. It's time for them to put their money (ballots) where their mouth has been for so long, paying lip service to political correctness concerning social and racial equity. But what's really interesting, on the political level that is, is the very recent and intense zionist analysis of the elections advantaging and preferencing Obama over McCain. Which seems to be very counter-mainstream considering the viscious attacks Obama was delivered because he is thought to be pro-Arabs and anti-Israel (very mistaken opinion if you ask me). Here is a good example of such a surprising opinion, http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3616797,00.html (I found this on Angry Arab). So anyways, I was just thinking whether it's an honest opinion or a new strategy zionists have adopted in desperate time. After all, although the mainstream opinion has coupled McCain with Israel for so long, McCain's presidential chances have been retrograding rapidly. So maybe it is this connection that is hurting McCain's chances and the American people are finally disenchanted with Israel and it's zionist cause. If that's the case, rooting for Obama right now and giving him zionist support might just do the trick and damage Obama's (big) chances and bring McCain back into the picture. They must be really desperate to resort to such a cheap reversed psychology tactic at a time like this. I, for one, think that the zionist preference of Obama might turn out to be very true and be proven correct, nomatter how unwittingly it is made.

Universal Standards of Civilization

Universal Standards of Civilization: "Outrage as cleric weds girl, 12" : So who gets to decide what's the appropriate age for a "girl" to get married? who says it's 16, or 18, or whatever? not to mention that the rates and time of physiological and psychological growth and maturity varies according to geography, climate, social traditions, etc, is it that bad for a girl to chose to satisfy her sexual curiosity and needs within marriage lock instead of going off and getting pregnant without either a husband or anything to her name? At least we know that she isn't forced to marry (since it's against Islamic Shari'a), unlike what might happen if she reaches sexual maturity and turns to the wrong person which could result in rape or something as bad. ah PLEASE! just leave it alone and try thinking about solving ILLEGAL polygamy in the US. Why is it really Illegal and why is it practiced all the same?

Joe the Plumber has shown his "color"

Joe turns out to be a Zionist Republican: "'Joe the Plumber' Backs Claim That Obama Would Bring 'Death to Israel'". So what is so exciting about that? I don't really know except that it shows how engrained and prolifirated this political, economic, and identity attachment between the Us and Israel (Zionism) in the American society especially middle class. I think this attachement has been forged since 1948 and not about to dissalude any time soon or just because Obama has gotten this far or even gotten elected! it's naive to doom this relationship just because Obama won or even be shocked at Joe's stance since it's representative of most Americans' opinion about Israel as well. the US has been authoritarian for so long now that, even though it might be salvageable, Americans' sense of responsibility towards and solidarity with the Israeli and Zionist, against the Arab or the Muslim, has been soldified for so long and normalized.

So much for Human Rights in Jordan!!!!

so today  i thought some talking about transportation to and fro the Hashemite University in Jordan is due. i am a student at the Hashemite University and i think the whole situation just sucks big time. Whether it's the educational situation or the communing one. i don't think the educational system is reparable, at least not on the hort-run that is. so i chose not to even go there. (many) professors are ineffecient, need some academic assistance.need psychiatric counceling at that too! but anyways, i shall return to the bus situation hanging over all of the students heads over here. the problem begins actually far before arriving at Raghadan or leaving the University but i'll start at Raghadan. whereas in most (under)developed and developing countries people stand in a line to get on the bus, we don't! we just stand there and wait for a bus to be (mis)directed in our direction so we can hunt it and get in. a lot (of guys) end up climbing into the bus through the windows rather than the traditional way, the DOOR. some end up trying to pull themselves from underneath the bus's wheels just in time for them to get crunched against the rail inside of which we are supposed to have stood in line in the first place. as we struggle and, literally, beat each other to get into teh freaking bus, the conductor (or the "control" as we call him in Arabish), counts us just like cattle until we are 60 heads in the bus and closes the door of the bus regardless of the limbs and heads sticking in or out of the door. we spend the 40 minutes it takes the speedy, smoking, flirtatious, cheasy, repulsive driver to get us to our destination checking our bodies for bruises and cuts and torn shirts, and of course trying to hold on to something and not end up plastered against the wind sheild while doing that. it's a daily journey of survival and humiliation. some girls even break down while trying to get into the bus among the waves of human bodies and start yelling and crying. not to menion that this (dis)order, observed and even preserved by the police officers usually on duty in Raghadan, is a violation and infringement of the basic human rights in more ways than i care to count and most of all of the "dignity" of humans, coupled with the tyranical and authoritarian educational system and practices at the school itself, this situation start chipping at the students' sense of dignity and humanity and empathy since freshman year. Hashemite University seniors graduate with ZERO sense of humanity and intellect which seems a little bit paradoxical to me considering that the purpose of the education is to produce better generations of  citizens. I'm just SOOOOO mad at the situation and the official disregard of it. it shows the official contempt of our generation and intellect. uuuuffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff

Drop it: So today I decided that I've given enough chance for one of my professor to start actually explaining the material Which more than half of the class can't even start to understand. It's some kind of a science class that was, apparently mistakenly, enlisted on the General Requirements list for graduation. Given that it is a General Requirement for all students, whether they are PE majors or medicine, the professor has an automatic obligation to explain what the hell are amino acids and how ther are different from lipids and why should we care. She doesn't seem interested in addressing students other than the nursing majors. THEY can explain the material to her if you ask me. So anyways, today I decided that I've just had it and I'm really fed up with her condescention and lack of integrity. So I go, innocently, to file a complaint againt her. I go to the registratr's office and somebody tells me that the best action I could do, without even hearing my complaint or why I'm so freaking upset about the class, is dropping the class. As if I just happened upon the 90 JDs I paid for the course and that I am the idiot who can't understand her explaining. So it's automatically my fault that I can't disinguish the different kinds of Lipase our organs produce because I'm not a freakin' nursing major. Well it's too late! I'm a senior English major and I well damn LIKE IT!

PS. Those events and many more of my daily life's happened and continue to do so in the Hashemite University of Jordan in Zarqa, just 20 minutes away from the Jordanian-Syrian borders. I don't know how to explain it (scientifically) since, you know, I'm such a failure at scientifc reasoning, but my guess is it's just the heat getting to our heads!

Tyra (walla 3omrha ma taret): Tyra Show just started on 'One tv. I just HATE her! I can't even look at her. i really think she (or her producer or whoever is responsible for coming up with ideas and topics for her show) tries really hard and generates mediocre discussions that speak to certain social stratas. middle class teenagers especially, or those who have the same mentality. But she is just an Oprah wanna-be. not that i like Oprah either. that egotestic, elitist, patronizing, xenophobic show presenter. but at least she is original. she is relatively more intellectual and rounder than Tyra. she is a typical bourgeois and thinks that because she struggeled with weight and other issues all of her life that gives her the right to give advice on reconstructing women's lives all over the world. i'm not trying to underestimate the difficulties and crisis she encountered all through her life. i respect her for surving and strongly fighting these hardships. but i'm sorry, surviving a crises doesn't mean that you've become an expert on women's psychology. she manipulates women and exploit her popularity to patronize and tell them what's best for them. at least we know Tyra is NO-WHERE near accomplishing that. she might wanna host Dr. Oz on her show sometime. air-headed women all over the world seem to enjoy passively listening to his bla bla bla at Oprah's. if this dude is a real doctor then i'm Queen Elizabeth and he's definitely banned from entering England while i'm alive. ha. doctor my a**.

P.S. the word "tyra" sounds SO MUCH like an Arabic word that means "flying" (f). the "t" is just stronger in Arabic.

i was just looking for some scholarly articles about Beloved on the internet and found something truly interesting about the African myth, or tradition, concerning the reincarnation of dead children. the article is "An abiku-ogbanje Atlas: a pre-text for rereading Soyinka's Ake and Morrison's Beloved" by professor Ogunyemi. She actually references Chinua Achebe in her article, which reminds me of his novel Things Fall Apart. he mentions this myth on several ocassions and ties it to other cultural traditions and superstitions in Nigeria. i'm thinking it might be a great material for a paper. i mean shedding light on this whole myth and conducting a comparison between the two novels on this basis and recognize teh different ways Morrison still visits African traditions in her novels.

Beloved: I've read Beloved by Toni Morrison several times so far and I find it one of these books that every time you read it something new is revealed to you. as you read more and more into the book and over and over the plot, new interpretations and meanings seem to surface. it's really amazing and intellectually intriguing. So anyways, this time, i'm reading it in from a postcolonial standpoint. it's for my Researcg Writing class' first paper. i still have at least two left and i think i might go for the same novel actually but each paper will have different theory dominating its analysis. i'm thinking Marxism, Feminism, and Psychoanalytical theories. it should be fun to see how differnt theories would implicate different elements of the novels and help me read the same book in so many different and maybe contradicting ways. i'm really excited about this project since i've been meaning to do this for quiet a time but never got around to it. i think it's fascinating how literary critics come up with so many creative interpretations and implications of the same work that even the author hasn't thought about or had in mind when writing...

Cultural Globalization. I'll be damned!: there is this Saudi hip hop-per who just surfaced on mbc around two-three months ago called Qusai. so anyways, i for one have never heard of him in my life neither here nor in the US (he mostly sings in English), neither anybody that i know actually. but it's as if mbc has just fallen in love with him and they are giving him his own talent show to help "discover" more young men like him with hip hop ambitions. you know, so they could "infiltrate" US culture and get to the hearts and minds of the american people and help "polish" the arab image there. okay i mean i'm a cultural studies major and i respect and am aware of the noble "nationalist" outcomes and potentials such a cultural hybridity (whether intentional or not) could have. after all pidgin hip hop could be implemented the same way pidgin english was used by the greatest thinkers and authors the world ever know. Achebe makes a nice example. but i just have a feeling that this project is not about that:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Re3NepWHaO8
I love Outlandish though. i think they are really committed to "come back at" the West as it perceives those who don't always "fit in" and fail to be Westernly human:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3P12aqVeZkQ

jackson the optimist: baba (my dad) just told me about Jesse Jackson's last controversial comment concerning obama.
"Jackson: “Zionists” will lose influence under Obama"the ironic reaction of both the commentators on this story as reported by Fox News and obama's campaign spokeswoman is puzzling, funny, and disappointing. so jackson says believes that obama's victory would put an end to "decades of putting Israel’s interests first.” obama's spokesperson rejects the statement and asserts obama's "commitment to a strong U.S.-Israel relationship" as if the two notions are mutually exclusive. the funny part is that Fox commentators, both good intentionally and naivly, attack jackson for being so "bitter and jealous of Obama." i think these people are the same ones tha got those "obsession" films with their Sunday papers last week. i told you not to watch those! it's like The Ring!
i (apparently just like jackson) thought that obama wanted strong ties with the middle east too. i don't either see or envision him putting the palestinian or middle eastern interests first! it indeed would be foolish of him anyways! just like it would be foolish to go after iran to ensure israeli security without considering US security. maybe, just maybe, the two are liable to diverge at some point.

Obsession: my american tutee just told me about this film "obsession." i looked it up and was and still am disgusted. the really flabbergasting and disgusting thing is that the "non-profit" (except for Zionists) organization that sponsors this piece of trashy propoganda describes itself as "non-profit, non-partisan organization whose mission is to educate Americans about issues of national security." see? it's definitely well meaning. i almost cried. their "primary focus is on the most urgent threat of radical Islam. By utilizing the following three mediums, Clarion Fund is helping Americans understand that the mainstream media is not adequately conveying the reality of radical Islam." i pity the americans who'll chose you to be their educators and mentors in this area. "Clarion Fund, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) organization. We are independent and do not accept funding from the U.S. Government, political institutions, or foreign organizations." okay. so who is funding them? they don't mention the organizations that they do accept contributions from. as if it's not obvious. but then, to the poor people who are ignorant and mentally numb enough to buy their stories and fabrications abou Islam, it doesn't really matter who sponsors them. as long as its neither arab or muslim. even satan would be perfectly fine.
it sounds to me they ar etrying to protect national security alright. that of israel and zionism mind you.
who i'm really mad at and disgusted by right now is the arab and muslim americans who are setting on their butts doing nothing and pretending that all is alright! YOU should find sponsors to publish DVDs and films explaining what it means to be a muslim or/and arab!
but i salute those who are doing something of course.

mercy: "اليوم العالمي للفقر احتفال يومي للمحرومين في الأردن"
it took the world that long and this amount of destruction to finally realize the utter failure and inequity of the neo-liberal mentality? well at least now that the crises has reached the US and the long-ago-developed world, the global governance organizations are certain to take action and rethink its rusty policies (my favorite book on that is Unholy Trinity). but will it deliver the poor of the "developing world" as well as the unfortuante "developed"? well i guess as long as the gulf states have oil they are relatively safe, in the next stage. but will the poor of jordan and syria, etc, enter into the World Bank, WTO, and IMF's calculations for the future?