The CFS and the Dubai Metro: Distant Memories and Vague Analogies

Very few modes of travel beat the glamour of traveling by train. Perhaps it’s the spaciousness of the cabins, and the ability to move around without having to buckle your seatbelt and twist your backsides between the shoulders of fellow passengers (like in an airliner). Perhaps it’s the ability to sit in the café car and watch the scenic view glides by beyond the picture windows. Or maybe it’s the allure of Aghatha Christie and her Orient Express murder mystery.

Speaking of which; did you know that Aghata Christie wrote that renowned novel in Aleppo, my hometown? She’d even stayed in the quaint Baron hotel, another good reason for me to be a fan of both trains and mystery novels.

So perhaps again, it’s not a coincidence that Aleppo is where the headquarters of the Chemen de Fer du Syrie (Syrian Railways) are located. Geographically speaking, it’s a hub, and it’s the closest major town in the Levant to Turkey and Europe. It’s where the Railways track that stretches all the way from Western Europe, peels off to the east to continue its arduous trek to Baghdad, and dips to the south to eventually reach Mecca in current day Saudi Arabia.

But the evolution of the railway business in Aleppo was organically haphazard. There is a central station on huge plot of land downtown. Alongside this station you’d find maintenance depots, the simulator building, the painting workshops, the tanks, the shunting tracks, the railway institute, etc, all smack-bang in the middle of town. The central station itself is reached through an elevated track that cuts through town. Nothing like the Dubai Metro that is elevated on proper pillars and post-tensioned slabs, it’s actually much more plain and basic than that: the rail tracks of Aleppo run on an elevated mound of earth augmented with ballast and volcanic gravel, compacted together with the weight of million trains that had trudged over them throughout the decades. To the unassisted eye, the earthwork looks like a defensive rampart that belongs to long-gone ear.

I have many friends and family who work for the CFS (Chemen de Fer de Syrie). When I was little, my uncle was an inspector, and I used to take the round trip to Lattakia with him frequently. I’d just go and come back on the same train; I wouldn’t even depart the Lattakia station. But the trip was always worth it, since the natural scenery is breathtaking along the track. It’s fascinating, although, admittedly, the good part of the route is the one that falls within Lattakia’s province....:)

Homam Al Hut is a stage actor and comedian from Aleppo. He’s a graduate of civil engineering from Aleppo University. He’d started his acting career in drama groups and party events in college. And then he’d gone to set up his own theatrical scene. He’d swept the city by surprise and awe with his ability to employ Aleppine accent at the service of comedy. Anyway, how is he relevant to the Railways business? In one scene in one of his ‘in’famous plays, he adopts the role of a German expert who’s dispensing advices to officials from Aleppo municipality. He smugly suggested that the railway track that cuts through the city should go. And that the lands on which the track runs and the central station sits should be better exploited for something else. Something more feasible or profitable or convenient to the city. The passengers? Let them disembark at the suburban station 6 km away and bring them in to the city in buses.

Homam Al Hut is a very popular guy, and he’s an engineer. So for years his suggestion, albeit delivered in a comedy set up, was a widely held belief. A Japanese expert who is, alas, not as famous, had once shattered this myth forever. A friend of mine who works for CFS told me that an expert from Jaica (Japanese International Cooperation Agency) had had a meeting once with engineers and planners from the Syrian railway, and my friend was present. Now Jaica is almost a charitable organization, it helps developing countries by giving expertise and sometimes even financial assistance if there are worthy projects. Jaica’s experts are mostly retirees, since there are no timeframes and no targets to be met; it’s whatever-you-can-do-to-help-these-struggling-countries kind of work. But nonetheless, Jaica’s experts, according to my friend, work as hard as an ambitious fresh graduate. So when this small, frail man from Japan was asked whether it was feasible to terminate the railway at the suburban station and bring passengers in by buses, he was soon on his feet pointing to projected charts he’d called on his laptop. He explained that trains are the most environmentally friendly and most feasible modes of transport. That the number of busses you’d need to transport a train-load of passengers would end up emitting more poisonous gasses, more noise, and causing more traffic than the train itself.

But the railway czars present in the meeting were incredulous and suspicious of this little man, how could they not be?! Homam Al Hot said something else!

In reality, though, the Jaica expert is right on the money. And mind you, that’s just the case with comparison between two modes of public transport. Imagine the contrasts and the disparities when comparing trains with, say, cars. There is absolutely no competition; trains would always win hands down.

And this is exactly why I’m so thrilled about the Dubai Metro. I love public transportations. I miss the times when I didn’t have to drive myself around everywhere. When you just sit back and let someone else do the driving (in Dubai Metro’s case though, the drivers are going to be computer microchips). Especially with a city like Dubai, with traffic clogging up every other road and the maniacs plundering the blacktop at night. Public transport is like: relax, submit, resign, watch and enjoy. While driving your own car around is like: honk, curse, tailgate, flash, squeeze, cut off..etc..

I’m a little disappointed though; the feeder bus route nearest to where I live is good 15 minutes walk away. I could do that in mild weather conditions, but not under the severe sun or the dusty air (which are, unfortunately, most often the case). So I'll put on my own expert outfit and dispense some unsolicited advice to the RTA, they may want to try to think of bisecting and splitting the feeder routes to cover more areas. Most of the feeders’ routes are short anyway, so instead of having one bus serving 10 blocks every 5 minutes, why not have two busses serving 5 blocks every 10 minutes? At a first glance the difference might sound marginal, but it’d really encourage the lazy and fastidious population like myself to seek the Metro instead of driving.

I have more stories to share and suggestions to make. But the post had already run long, so I'll leave the rest for another occasion. Be safe and stay tuned!

-------------------------

Update1: here are two links with fascinating photos of the Orient Express. Link1. Link2. (thanks Saint)

From 'Anbar -- an Egyptian Movie, 1948

(The beautiful lady with the tormented soul):


He, who can win my heart

let him kidnap it

I will run after him



He, who can win my love

let him keep it

I will live with him



I want my lover, without me asking

to answer me,

and I’ll answer him



And when my hands touches his

I want to sense through his heart

And see through his eyes



(The first Suiter):

This is me, this is me!

No one will do but me!

It’s true my looks are untreatably ugly

But I’m an expert in love!

Mom left me in the village,

an endless number of estates

She, my mom, had 12 kids

And I’m the only one that’s left!

There’s this farm in shubra Al Yaman

And I’m selling it tomorrow in advance

To buy the engagement rings of our love

But please have mercy!

But please accept me!

Don’t waste my future!

(the lady again):

Beautiful words

Sensible words

I can’t say anything about them

……….

but it’s the shadows of my unknown lover

I can see none of them in you!

Starring:

Layla Murad (the lady singer)

Ismaél Yasin
Azeez Othman
Ilyas Moádeb
Shokoko (the suiters, respectively)

The translation was, as always, with discretion.

Turned Out My Fasting Isn't Waterproof

I woke up couple of hours before Iftar. There was nothing to do and all the headlines on the internet news sites were as grim as ever. So after little loitering around the flat, I put on my sexy swimming outfit and headed to the pool. I thought some swimming might help pass the time.

True to their diligence, the squad of life guards were training, individually, in the pool. But this time there were only two of them, and they were females. I swam for a while and then we struck this casual conversation. They told me most of the things I've already known about them (the squad). The exercises and the rigorous training they had to go through. As I said, I've already known about this because I've spoken to couple of their male colleagues before. But people take pride in what they do (well, almost). And it's universally courteous to allow them to talk about it and not to cut it short with something like "I know", or "your colleagues told me". It's actually inspiring, in a way, to observe people talk about their work and their passion. But let's cut the crap here, it's always inspiring to watch a female talk about her passion, especially in, ahem, a swimming pool.

The weather was perfectly clear and despite the heat and the humidity, there was a slight breeze. The sun was about to set behind the distant sea and its last rays of the day were reflecting off the glazed towers of SZR. Perfect setting for a harmless conversation. We then came upon the inevitable subject of rescue. And they talked about different approaches to rescue dependent on the weight, age, physical and emotional status of the subject. Now this, for reasons beyond my comprehension, was a little too hard for me to understand. So I kept asking questions that betrayed my ignorance. I grew more curious by the minute, and more dumb even faster. At one point one of them offered to do a demonstration for me, by that time her colleague had already showered and was drying herself up under the pergola. So the subject of demonstration had to be me.

Now, it was only half an hour before Iftar, I told my new swimming instructor. And you know, I'm kind of fasting. So you've got to be gentle with me lest I spoil my fasting. She gave me a mischievous smile and told me to turn around and stay still. I resigned and did as instructed. She then hooked her open palm around my neck (below the jaw) from the back and drove me to the edge. I was surprised. I thought the drill involved more physical intimacy. So I asked for an illustration for the approach in case of a nervous subject. I again reiterated that she be gentle with me, since we were very close to Azan (call of prayer) and it'd be a shame to break my fasting just couple of minutes before I ought to. She gave me a reassuring smile and I turned around again and pretended to be nervous to fulfill the role of a stressed-out drowning man. It turned out I didn't need a lot of acting, I was nervous already.

So I started floundering around and predicted to be pulled form my neck yet again. I was wrong, apparently, a nervous sub has more inertia and jerking his/her neck might injure it. Instead, she kicked my butt from the back, wrapped her arm around my chest and paddled us both to safety. I was rescued then by the sunset and the darkness. I thanked my instructor profusely and walked stealthily out of the pool. I was in no condition to be seen with the sexy shorts clinging shamelessly. I showered quickly. Wrapped the towel haphazardly around my wet self, and ran home to break my fast.

Have You Met This Kid Before?

This boy saunters around the UAE blogs pestering bloggers and making, as the cover demonsteates, meaningless comments and ad hominem attacks.

Met him before?

When Medicine Leads to Death

I'm not a big fan of celebrity news. But the recent revelations about Michael Jackson's death are worth a pause. It seems, according to the assessment of the medical examiner, the police is now treating his death as a Homicide. The cause of death being a mixture of Propofol (an anesthetic used in surgeries) and two other sedatives, this had prompted the police to consider charges against the doctor, who'd administered these drugs, as the main suspect of man-slaughter.

To understand the differences between the charges of man-slaughter and medical malpractice, there's an interesting interview which Newsweek had conducted with a veteran medical examiner by the name of Dr. Vincent DiMaio, here are some excerpts:

By classifying this death as a homicide, what is the Los Angeles County Coroner’s Office saying about the actions of Jackson’s doctor?
What they’re alleging is that [Michael Jackson’s doctor] gave [Jackson] a medication for a non-medical reason and that caused the death…The reason they can classify this as a homicide is that there is simply no medical reason for this drug to have been administered. Suppose he was in surgery, and the doctor had given him too much medication. That’s a different situation which would probably be signed off on as an accident. But in this situation, it’s clearly a homicide.

In general, how do you define a medical homicide? What makes it different from medical malpractice?
There are five ways that forensic pathologists categorize deaths: natural, accidental, homicide, suicide or undetermined. Essentially, homicide means that somebody has caused the death of another person…In terms of medical homicide specifically, I think the simplest way to say it is that it’s a medical decision that’s outrageous, that you could not justify your actions medically. Or you just go to extremes, like deciding to do an operative procedure for which you don’t have the support, doing an operation on your kitchen table. That’s essentially the way to say it: if you have a medical situation, where you’re using things inappropriately and have no medical justification, that’s homicide.

........

Original interview here.

Now, having read the article, I have some big questions about these conflating manslaughter/malpractice claims:

First, if the police could really establish that there was no medical reason why these drugs should have been administered, and that the Doctor's action in doing so was totally unjustifiable, how could they rule out intentional homicide?

Second, given how usually hard it is to prosecute Doctors for malpractice (especially in cases involving insurance liabilities), then again, how could prosecutors in this case prove beyond reasonable doubt that death wasn't accidental (but then again, not intentional)?

It strikes as a no-brainer for a professional Doctor to know which mixture of drugs could lead to cardiac arrest. Especially with a wealthy man like the late MJ, who could hire the creme of the crop. One wonders what goes on with the normal unsuspecting folks out there.

The Basic Strategies for Harvesting Your Ramadan Iftar

Your guide for all-you-can-eat & open-buffet Iftars.

First of all, it’s important to remember that while you can make a good proportionate dent in the balance books of the concerned restaurant for the day, you’d probably end up in the hospital before Sohoor or suffer throughout your fasting of the next day. So please, resign yourself to the fact that the restuarent is winning, they’ve studied their customers hard and they’ve put their prices accordingly. And they didn't only have you in mind, just look at all the losers and douches who start their Iftar by shoveling Sanbosak and other confectionaries (low cost items); they get done within five minutes and end up nibbling on the sweets and smearing their faces in the Jelly O……So in short, stop obsessing about the money you’re paying.

The best approach is to have a group of four friends (you included), although two will usually do as well.

You pick a table to your liking, doesn't matter where. Though if you’re into checking out the females, and since other diners and Iftarists aren’t usually sitting to their tables (they’d be piling up food on their plates), it’d be useful to check out the hand bags on the tables around the one you have in mind. Designer bags means hip girls who compensate for their mediocre looks by the expensive bags. Ordinary bags means you’re in a good company.

Next, you need to line up in a single file with your friends. Your progress up the serving tables shall be through the tactical military retreat (aka leapfrog withdrawal, I think): when a comrade goes down and leave a gap in the formation (i.e. when he filled his plate and must leave it on the table and come back with a fresh plate), you don’t allow the insertion of foreign elements into the formation. You consolidate, bringing the front guy backward, or, more preferably, bringing the rear element up to fill the gap. And you linger around in the your place, pretending to be confused or just plain slow.

When the falling comrade comes back, you give him back his old spot by either expanding the formation, or by using the leapfrog technique as mentioned before. Which means a comrade in the center will move ahead and overtake a comrade in the front, while the comrade in the back holds off the progression of the enemies in the back. There, your fellow Iftarist slips back in nice and easy.

Don’t worry about missing one item or two, one of your comrades will have gotten it on his plate eventually. You can always eat off each other’s plates. (if you feel disgusted or uncomfortable doing so, then you’re a pansy who doesn't deserve to be in the game from the beginning, go eat with the Jelly O population.)

Most often than not, people will not find out about your underhanded tactics. But on the off chance that they do, be prepared to ignore their glowering looks. If they voiced their anger to you, ignore them totally. Have you ever noticed how stupid a person who starts an altercation looks when no one responds to him? Just move on and pretend to be praying fervently under your breath. ‘Praised be Allah’ is highly recommended in this case.

When you’ve stacked enough food to feed a battlion, you retire to your table where you start eating with grace. That means you should only use one hand to shovel food inside. Lively conversations are recommended, but don’t get too funny, especially if you are, like me, someone who chokes easily on food.

When you’re done eating, it’s important to remember to mess your plates so badly, no matter how much food is left in it, so that nothing can be slavaged from them, and the restaurant loses. Don’t be fooled by promises that charities pick up leftover food afterwards. And even then, why should you allow the restaurent to get charitable at YOUR expense?

Finally, it doesn’t matter how you evacuate the restaurent. As long as you can do it willfully on your feet and not tethered to a stretcher. Hope you’ve enjoyed your Iftar.

Ramadan's Reflections

They're funny those first few days of Ramadan. They leave you completely drained. Today, I am/have been on the verge of dehydration. But I can't tell you how close I was/am, since I've not been there before. I had to walk outside for a while, and there is no way to program your body NOT to sweat in the heat. I guess physiological micro processors are pretty dumb, and what's more, you can't override them. Sweating in a humid environment is counterproductive and counterintuitive. There's absolutely no benefit. It'd be cool to be able to control your pores and your perspiration glands (or whatever they're called). I remember when I was in the fifth grade how I used to sneak in to the kitchen while fasting and drink water from the tap while pretending to be washing my hands. I couldn't miss a single football game, Ramadan or not.... And when thirst struck afterwards, there was absolutely no resistance. I'm glad I've toughened up a little when I've become an adult. There's this merciful concept in Islam, it's called being a 'Mukalaf': which means being a responsible adult and answerable to one's actions. Thankfully, this period doesn't start until after puberty and minimum mental maturity (there's no age threshold, though). A fifth grade football-loving kid isn't a Mukalaf, and hence he's relieved. An almost 30 years old engineer running errands in one of the hottest spots in the world IS pretty much a Mukalaf. It's presumed that man can and should handle himself with grace while fasting. It's presumed an effeminate and infantile thing to complain about thirst or hunger. Come to think of it, most fasting masses are such troupers. When God have chosen to us, Muslim masses, a ruling classes that, by and large, throw hissy fits left and right. We tough it out. There are always abundance of evidence. Take the recent tantrum thrown by Saudi officials, for instance: now they require all UAE citizens to have passport while entering into the kingdom. What is this all about? you ask, well allegedly: it's about the map on the identity cards of Emirati citizens. Saudi officials don't like the shape of the borders on that map. Borders for God sake? You'd think that Saudi Arabia in particular would keep its tantrums in checks while Ramadan is approaching. You'd think they'd look for reasons to bring people together and propagate love and respect between the brothers..... Instead, they choose the worst way possible to handle the situation. Another example: take the recent horrific bombings in Baghdad (95 dead and 1300 injured for God sake?). If the op-ed by Abd Al Bari Atwan in today's Gulf News is to be believed, then we're looking at different factions within the Iraqi government playing power struggle with each other and exploiting political and security failures to score point and advance their own agenda. And the tools they're using? the lives of non-suspecting, embattled and embittered Iraqis. What could be more despicable than that? we were still on the verge of Ramadan, I beg you to remember.


Hold on, it's time for Azan. I'll drink some and eat some and come back...

-----------------

........ And so far in the two days that have passed of Ramadan, I've witnessed couple of awful outburst in real life too. Apparently, the lack of morning coffee and nicotine puts everyone on edge. Although those two substances are the farthest thing from being healthy or relaxing. I guess it's dependency. Human bodies are ill-equipped when it comes to cutting off on toxic intakes. I pity those who think they can lose weight in Ramadan. I think it's theoritically impossible. Your body is habitual to the (almost) constant stream of food intake. When you fast, your body-- like with the autonomous, stupid sweat pores-- gets the impression that you're in a state of famine. So when you have your Iftar (and no matter how good you are at self restraint, you ARE going to eat a good meal at Iftar), your body is still under the impression that famine had struck and it could strike anytime soon. So it stores fat. This continues for a while. Our bodies are highly adaptive but they can't keep pace with the speed of change around us........

Tell you what, now that I've finished my Subway foot-long sandwich and drank a litter and a half bottle of water, I don't feel like writing anymore. I want to go out smoke some argileh and meet my pals. Each will have his rant, and some might throw fits. Believe me, none of us looks or acts like a Mukalaf, I guess it's because none of us like to take him/herself seriously. For your sanity's sake, seriousness is the most ridiculous thing to have around with the headlines of today. I'd rather live like a fifth grade football loving kid.

Ramadan Kareem

Wishing you all a Ramadan Kareem. It's been officially announced that the first day of Ramadan will be on Saturday Aug 22nd. I'm planning, quite cautiously, to take advantage of the less working hours by working out and de-toxing. Not sure how that will work out though, since the first thing that comes to mind after a glorious iftar meal would be a puff of shisha.... And the heavyness of the meal combined with the high of the smoke will take at least few hours to clear, by which time it'd already be late and time for Sohoor (daybreak meal; the last one before starting the fast of the day).

Not sure I'd make much use of the time between getting off work and Iftar, either, since it's hardly couple of hours. So I'll most probably just sleep. But I will not fall without putting up a fight; I will try to drag myself to the treadmill or the pool. If I'm not totally dehydrated, that is.

But what the heck, even if I put on few pounds during Ramadan, I could lose them later. Some things are just too yummy to miss out on.

Sweets from Aleppo, my hometown.

IDF: The Most Moral Army in The World

Israel is outraged. Anti-Semitism has reached unprecedented levels around the world. The victims are being persecuted for the zillionth time. Racism towards Israelis has become alarmingly widespread.

So you ask, what’s all this fuss about?

A Swedish freelance journalist has written an op-ed in a Swedish newspaper on Tuesday claiming that IDF soldiers harvested organs from dead Palestinians.

I have no evidence of this claim. So arguing its veracity is futile, unless one gets to inspect all the evidence presented by Donald Bostrom (the aforementioned journalist).

Couple of points are of note here, though: first, notice how the Israeli government dismisses all these kinds of articles and claims off-hand. They are never serious about investigating any wrongdoings by their ‘morally superior’ army. Or wait, they’ve investigated its conduct in Gaza, and the army weathered the thorough investigation well and came out clean. Right.

"The article was a shocking piece of blatant racism," Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor told CNN on Wednesday.

You get that? you can’t accuse Israeli army of unseemly acts. Because accusing them would entail implying that they’re capable of committing such acts. And the Israeli army, as you well know, is morally superior to the rest of the world’s armies.

Forget tales about Israeli border patrol soldiers insulting Arab Bedouins and physically abusing them (and then recording the whole thing on video and posting it, proudly, on youtube). Forget stories about IDF soldiers wearing T Shirts eliciting hate crimes against Arabs. And let’s not dwell too long on war crime accusations by shady organizations like Amnesty International or Human Rights Watch which claimed IDF killed Palestinian civilians in Gaza after they’ve established they were indeed civilians. With men raising white flags and women carrying babies.

Forget all that. It’s pure racism, you know.

Or wait; there could be another reason why Israel had got its knickers in a twist over this particular accusation. They probably only intended to kill the Palestinians, so it’s outrageous to suggest they also harvested their organs.

Signature Smell

I was walking by F, our Sri Lancan office boy, when he turned around and mumbled:

"...... smell"

"What?" I said.

 "detergent smell"

I thought for a second and then said:

"No, it's not detergent, F bhai. It's Downy. I use a softner. It has a flowery smell."

"yeah, something like that.." he said approvingly.

"What? is it a bad smell?"

"No, no. It's a good smell. A Filipino smell"

Lauren Greenfield And Her Photojournalism

"Deserts have a way of reclaiming whatever is built upon them."

Really? How? are we talking about a supernatural powers peculiar to the deserts that enable them to swallow 'everything built upon them'? or are we talking scientifically; like with quick sand phenomena and environmental unsustainability? It's not clear, but then photo-journalist must be an enigmatic profession or just pointless literary expressions bunched together.

""They have no oil, no culture, no history," says Peter Harradine, a prominent landscape architect in Dubai and manager of Harradine Golf."

My God. 'no culture, no history'? Now, when you tell long-term expats that they are not in a position to judge the local culture when they've themselves spent no effort trying to understand it and get to know it, they'd get annoyed. And it doesn't stop here, some will end up labeling the place as having 'no culture, no history'. Indeed, if you're in a constant state of drunken obnoxiousness and bitchy hangovers, then hardly any culture would stick on your brain.

Another fast conclusion here, it must be a requisite in photo journalism to interview clueless people.

"Now, with cash scarce and many of Dubai's expats moving away, the cranes (a quarter of the world's supply) have quieted and the streets are all but empty."

I don't know about you, but I'm starting to like the standards of photojournalism. It's not clear whether Lauren Greenfield had visited the city or not. But either way, it's utterly stupid to claim that the cranes had fallen silent or the streets had become empty. There is absolutely no denying the fact that some projects have been put on hold. But on the other hand, huge number of projects are STILL UNDERWAY. And how do you determine whether the streets are empty or not? Like, I jogged last nights through the back streets of Al Bada' area, and the narrow streets were indeed empty (I presumed the residents were indoor), but from where I was running, I could glance at Al Wasl road and see it was swarming with headlights. The time was 11:30 PM.

The rest of the article is a mixture of stories about expats who couldn't meet the mortgage payments on their properties (so they simply fled the country, and you're supposed to feel sorry for them since they've left feeling like fugitives), and then the months old claims that 3000 cars were found abandoned in the airport with maxed out credit cards in the glove compartment and fast food paper wrappers on the backseat. In this case, though, I can't blame photo journalism, because even when the fleeing expats are being interviewed by a journalist worth his salt, nobody asks the obvious question: "why did you decide to live beyond your means?".

There's also the sewage reference. No Dubai-bashing article could see the light without touching down on the subject of public sewage and the long queues of sewage tankers and how some of the sewage still ends up on the beach. That was right after a story about an extravagant beach club for the obscenely rich, and how it's flourishing despite the crisis. You're left wondering why those wealthy patrons aren't bothered by the sewer dumped into the beach right next to them?!!!111

probably because they're filthy rich. 

Or so photojournalism could claim.

Meet The New Prince!

ABU DHABI // Hassan Baiti was crowned the prince of Arab poetry on Thursday, winning both the title and Dh1 million (US$272,000).

Mr Baiti, from Syria, won the third season of the Prince of Poets television contest. In the final episode, he saw off competition from five rivals to take the crown.

Mr Baiti also won a burda, or cloak, symbolizing Arab historical heritage and a ring denoting an emir or prince.

...

Mr Baiti said poetry would be his focus in the future and that he would consider leaving his job in Syria, “which is far from poetry and culture”, to dedicate himself to “writing, culture and poetry”.

“My poetry is still shaping up, and I am not deciding which direction I am going,” Mr Baiti said. “It is somehow mature, but not fully. I would say my poetry is based on contradictions. It contains emotional, intellectual and mental contradictions.”

He described the televised competition as a landmark event.

“The Prince of Poets, as a contest, is one of its kind in history, and I am not even exaggerating. It is the most important poetry contest throughout the Arab history, because it is the only contest through which you can reach the Arab audience everywhere in a matter of a few episodes.

“This has never happened before. It is happening, thanks to Abu Dhabi. The contest also had a high-calibre panel of critics.”

Mr Baiti’s wife, Zubaida Dayyoub, said her husband had been anxious but determined throughout the contest.

“I felt he was going to win when we got into the hall today,” she said.

“The feeling comes and goes, but I felt, somehow, he would be chosen. When it happened, I felt it was not real; it was like a dream.”

One judge, Nayef al Rashdan, praised the poem that Mr Baiti recited on the final night as having great artistic value and said it marked him as “a masterly poet”.

Dr Salah Fadhil, another of the judges, described Mr Baiti’s poem as “the best cure for the soul”, and that his words were “like a song with beautiful lyrics”.

...

I think It's absolutely marvelous that the interest in classic Arab poetry is being revived in such a spectacular manner. Big Thank You to Abu Dhabi Authority for Culture and Heritage (Adach) for coming up with a sponsoring this initiative.

Here's a video of Hassan Baiti in action (not on the final night, though):

Stories From the Classroom

My school years had been stable, I've always been a good boy and amongst the top three achievers in the class. When we were first asked to compose stories in English (that didn't happen until the 10th grade--welcome to Syria), mine had the undivided attention of the class and the teacher alike. Not because it was heart-wrenchingly romantic or filled with potent literary expressions. I was told later that it was creative and suspenseful. I was good at trigonometry too, and was most of the time the first one to crack the difficult Sin & Cosin filled equations put forward by the teachers to challenge the creme of the class. Physics? I loved it. I reached a point of obsession in physics and math where I started making up my own dilemmas and then solving them. I loved chemistry too, although the banality and lack of proper labs made Organic Chemistry a great turn off. And, up until we had it in our curriculum-- before it was dropped to give space to the more scientific material, I was fascinated by history too. I scored full marks throughout all my history exams (I used to have a good memory), and was a friend with all my history teachers.

Through these subjects that I'd loved, I sat quiet and attentive in the classroom. Sometimes not even uttering a word unless it was to the teacher. You watch me through a math session and you'd think I'm an exemplary student in behavior and interaction. That would have been truly the case if my love for the subjects was equally divided. It wasn't. I loathed biology and hated Arab literature (that would later change though). So how was I behaving during these two subjects? You'll judge for yourself.

At the beginning of the 11th grade, and after a student had opted to go for scientific branch of high-school (instead of literary), there's a revolutionary shift in the content of the subject of biology. No more descriptions of lame cockroaches and their tentacles. No more long-winded accounts of how sea creatures are predated by each other or how a the digestion system of a fish that I will probably never meet works. We went for the jugular in the 11th grade: the nuanced difference between DNA and RNA and how each of them worked, chromosomes, proteins, genes, cells..etc.. It was no-holds-barred to the extreme. Now when you listen to a TV program on how DNA works, you will most certainly find it easy. But it wasn't easy in the Syrian 11th grade, I assure you, I can still relive the confusion and frusterations that struck me at the time when DNA function was being explained. A delicate process that didn't make much sense to me at all; bio-transmitters with funny names and quirky behaviors, stages with varying durations and developing components. It was tough, the least of which because our teacher (at the time I thought all biology teachers were required to be douches)-- had a peculiar way of grading. He had what he called 'key words'. If you fail to mention the key word, son, then your marks went down the drain, even if you've got everything else right.

Now, even though I was a good student, I wasn't socially dumb. I had a variety of friends from all walks of life. The bad group of students huddled together one morning in the break between session around the diesel heater, watching the roaring flame behind the glass and deciding upon a plan to screw the biology teacher. Firecrackers were very common in Syria at the time. But the conventional type, the one which you set off by lighting up the tip of a thread sprouting from the load, that type was risky. Least of which because we were regularly frisked for lighters and because there's an element of delay between the time of flicking the lighter and the booming sound. We didn't want that. Sound could be traced to a certain student. A resourceful friend of ours in the group had a cousin in Lebanon who had supplied him at the time with what was known as 'garlic' in the street jargon. It usually set off upon contact with the ground when thrown with enough thrust. Now this was music to our ears. Faces, still list by the roaring flame, smiled. We clasped our hands together in agreement and vowed to carry on with it to the bitter end.... the biology class was the next day.

The first piece of 'garlic' didn't go off. And it went unnoticed by the teacher, who was turned to write at the blackboard (which was actually green). But the first bad garlic was then followed by a salvo. The salvo was followed by deafening successive bangs. To ensure a hit and a camouflage, we had deployed the garlic among three student seated at different corner of the class. But it didn't really matter, it was very hard for the teacher, who spent 30 dumbfounded seconds trying to figure out what had happened, to discern where all the firecrackers had come from. Mainly because they only made sound upon contact with the floor, and they'd all landed in the space between the first row of seats and the blackboard where the teacher was standing. The bangs were followed by cheers and jeers and uproarious laughter. The session was ended 10 minutes before schedule by a very exasperated and red-faced teacher. He went straight for the school master, as we knew he would. We didn't care, as far as we were concerned, it was a total victory.

The next morning, after the ceremonial "Flag Salute" at the school yard (during which we'd recite the Syrian national anthem, the Syrian Youth Anthem...and couple of other things); our entire class was held in the yard. We were standing erect and at attention, for the Flag Salute is in a way a military practice. The school master, two principals, two PT teachers and the military training teacher were all present. We were then frisked and randomly questioned. Threats were hurled, obscenities were used. I remember at one point how the school master , who was really a short, fat and ugly man, raised his gleaming shoe in the air and them stomped forcefully on the ground, invoking a gesture of what could happen to us if we carried on with our rowdy behavior in the class:

"issma3o ya Manayek (listen you bästards)" he'd shouted, "I've disciplined hundreds of 'tough' guys like you before, if you think you can overpower this school, think again. I can very simply dissolve this class and scatter you all over Syria. You better behave or your fathers will be called next.."

..... Before sending us on our way to nurse science from the bosoms of his great citadel (our school was frequently referred to as a citadel), the school master promised a full investigation. We were totally nonchalant and unconcerned. We knew we'd sent the right message to the biology teacher and that nothing else would happen. We'll just lay low for a while.

But something had indeed happen. We were caught totally off-guard. After the first break, the bad guys' gang was being torn apart and picked up one by one and brought in to the schoolmaster's room. We were all lined up before the man behind the desk. Heads bowed and hands interlocked behind our backs. He was swiveling left and right and beaming with menace. He'd made us. I was questioned first. At that moment, all the vows and honor oaths could as well kiss my ass. I had a future to worry about and parents to please. My excellent performance record was cited, and then one of the principals asked me if I had thrown the firecrackers or had any prior knowledge. I said I didn't. Which was half a lie because I had the prior knowledge. Then, with all the courage they could muster, the three guys who had thrown the garlic stepped forward and confessed. The rest were scolded a little harder and then thrown out of the room. The remaining three were punished with wooden stick beating on their palms, 20 beatings each. Human Rights Watch would have cringed. But they took them like men and were let out of the room, except for the guy who had supplied and 'smuggled' the garlic to the school. He was held for further questioning.

The questioning was soft and the tone was lax. But the undertone was deliberately scary, as my friend who had supplied the garlic would later tell us. He was asked questions like "where did you obtain the explosive material from?" and, "who had pushed you to detonate explosives in the classroom?"...etc... Now, if you were a citizen of the Syrian Arab Republic at the early 90s you'd know this is NOT a joke at all. Your DNA and RNA would dance to such music, your neurotransmitters would clash and the loose testes would shiver and play marble in your scrotum. Your eyes would have an orgy of their own. But thanks to God and loose change, nothing happened except for a transfer of our friend to another school.

Now, we were truly scared to shit and worried sick about our future education, but you don't miss with the bad guys and get away with it. We had a very sullen conference at a street corner after school that day. We had received some intelligence through the grapevine earlier that day that some blond bastard شقيري had ratted on us to one of the principals. Later recollections confirmed that the half-crazy and dumb blond guy (we were gender segregated) with the smelly mouth and bad teeth had indeed slipped into the principal's room during the first break after we were held in the yard. Someone from another class -- an ally and a sympathizers-- had spotted him. I don't know about you, but to us, the testosterone saturated teens, this was an actionable intelligence.

After a week (we had to wait until our comrade friend was completely transfered and the story had cooled down a bit), the she'rie (the dumb blond) would come to school with swollen eyes embellished with blue rims of skin. The beating wasn't delivered by anyone of us, we couldn't afford to be seen hitting him, but was contracted to a street-wise guy who was on a good terms with our transfered friend and was deeply saddened for his story (we had dramatized it a bit ). But his usefulness didn't lie in his sadness or in his sympathy, it lied in his black-belt Taekwondo qualification. Not that we wanted a severe beating, on the contrary, we were assured that the beating would be painful but with no lasting effect. (got to love martial arts).

Curiously, the behavior of both the biology teacher and the dumb blond would substantially improve throughout that year. Who would have known that years later I'd meet a very retired schoolmaster and remind him of the story...... I'd teasingly asked him whether he had been able to discipline us or if we, the student, were the ones to discipline his teacher and his rat.

We'd both laughed to that... :)

Let's Bash Dubai, It's Easy!

Another piece of disingenuous, Dubai-bashing journalism.

Herve Jaubert is a French National. He’s a former naval officer and a former agent of the DGSE (French intelligence services). According to the article written by Andrew Higgins of the Washington Post, Jaubert was commissioned by Dubai World to build a submarine workshop in the Gulf. And then in 2007, Jaubert was allegedly interrogated and later convicted in absentia for the embezzlement of $ 3.8 million. He was also handed down a 5 years jail sentence. However, in between his interrogation and the sentence, the ex-spy had managed to escape.


According to Higgins, Dubai officials and French Consulate in Dubai didn’t comment on the case. So there is only one side of the story: Jaubert’s.

The first sign of dishonest reporting by Higgins is demonstrated in his rather shrewd reference to when Jaubert’s trouble started, he said:

“Jaubert's troubles began two years ago when Dubai's then-booming economy was showing the first faint signs of strain.”

Absolute nonsense. Two years ago, August of 2007, there were absolutely no signs of economic down-turn, nor there were faint signs of economic down-turns. There has always been the chorus of party poopers and Dubai ill wishers. But as economic indicators go, 2007 was a year of boom for Dubai by all standards.


So why would a journalist for a newspaper of international standards such as the WP make such a (deliberate) mistake? The answer to me is obvious. There’s an underhanded attempt to associate Jaubert’s trial and his sentence with the lawsuits that had cropped up in Dubai AFTER the credit crunch and the downturn. What a sleazy business, being a journalist with an agenda. Higgins then goes on to recount several cases where executives and business owners were tried or being tried on various financial charges.

Don’t get me wrong though, it appears to me (although I’m not an expert) that Dubai bankruptcy laws could use some revisions and updates. Unmet liabilities and debts had lead to the rising number of lawsuits, which itself could become a burden on the economy.

Yet, this is absolutely NOT the case of Jaubert.

At the end of the article, there’s a narrative of the ‘fascinating’ escape plan the ex-spy had conjured up and then executed. And then we are told the whole thing will go into a book titled “Escape From Dubai.". How fascinating.

So Jaubert, who had probably swindled the hell out of the submarine building enterprise, is also going to skim some more money by publishing a book about his story, and giving the uninitiated readers a hard-on about this enigmatic ex spy protagonist who managed to con the Arabs and get away with it. Higgins, of course, was ready to provide publicity.

Well, welcome to the dark side, I guess.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Edit 1 - 17 Aug 2009 : here's an interesting bit of Jaubert history:

CAUGHT IN THE TRAIN STATION
Their plans began to unravel on Sept. 1, 1994. On that day, the French police anti-gang squad received information from a source that two men planned to commit a robbery that afternoon. Police set up surveillance and followed the men to the Gare de Lyon where they arrested Hervé Jaubert, who had retired in 1993 as a French army captain, and Stéphane Pommier, also an army veteran.

The two men were carrying two bags containing wigs, gloves, handcuffs, a roll of tape, a sawed-off shotgun, a 9mm pistol, shotgun shells, brass knuckles, sunglasses, a truncheon or blackjack, smoke and tear gas grenades. They also carried 19,000 francs in bills of 500 francs and two train tickets to Béziers.

A search of Jaubert’s flat turned up a loaded Smith and Wesson 357 revolver plus 50 cartridges, a Mossbert 12-gage shotgun, a Remington pump action shotgun with shells and 2 two-way radios.

Under interrogation, Jaubert eventually told police that he was on is way to Béziers to intimidate Jacques Michel on behalf of a client whose name he claimed not to know. He said that he had been contracted in July 1994 by his former employer Cayron to conduct surveillance and intimidate Michel. His payment would be 40,000 francs cash. He claimed he hired Pommier to help him because he is a big intimidating guy. Pommier confirmed Jaubert’s story. 

How You Come to Know Tzipi Livni is a Whore

And a proud one at that?

It’s a simple process.

The circumstantial evidence is too strong to overlook.

Once upon a time, an American Zionist neo-conservative (and you have to acknowledge these are much more dangerous and ignorant than your average Zionist, since they don’t live in the region and don’t understand its geopolitics,) tried to make fun of sexual suppression amongst Arab youth. How was he doing that? By citing the sales records of an internet-based Israel porn producer and distributor. He said that most subscribers to the afore-mentioned service were from Egypt and Jordan, age 18 to 35, and were quite satisfied with the service rendered. Their favorite scenes were of IDF female soldiers indulging in sexual pleasures in-between training sessions and terrorists-hunting missions. Some of the subscribers even wrote ‘thank you’ notes to the website management and sincerely wondered if the porn stars were indeed IDF soldiers. The answers in all cases were resounding YES. So this shows, according to our American friend, how sick-minded, sexually repressed and perverted, Arab youth are.

So my response to our friend was simple: no man can stop his wiener from getting hard at the sight of a whore in action. I told him that even the Israeli higher echelons were infested with whores. Including the 'gorgeous' Tzipi Livni. He then started seething with anger and asked me, rather impolitely, to prove these allegations.

I told him I can’t prove it 100%. But the circumstantial evidence is too strong to overlook.

So let’s start amassing these circumstances:

We do know for certain that the above-mentioned female was a Mossad agent in the early 80s. And we are further told (by Wikipedia, no less) that she was a player in the so-called “Operation Wrath of God”. The objective of the covert operation was to “ assassinate individuals alleged to have been directly or indirectly involved in the 1972 Munich massacre.” The dance floor was mainly western Europe. But there are usually no boundaries, ethical or otherwise, when it comes to Mossad assassination. Let me elaborate.

The Kidon, or the department of assassins within the Mossad, was/is comprised of various units of different specialities. Each unit operates independently. Number of agents in a unit varies from 8 to 6. (look at this, for instance “Six Mossad agents, including two women, were captured by the Norwegian authorities “). I read two novels in which Mossad covert operations were thoroughly explained. One was ‘The Fist of God’ by Fredrick Forsythe, and the other ‘The Broker’ by John Grisham. I’m usually interested in those novels not because they tell of the heroics of Mossad agents, but because the elements and information upon which the story is told (like the structure of the unit, their ethical boundaries, their Modus Operandi ..etc..), are substantially true. In both novels, we are told about a ‘young, attractive female agent’ within each unit of the Kidon. The above excerpt from actual events corroborates this. Their missions were invariably boring and straightforward, to use their womanly endowment to obtain information by luring an ugly civil servant, or run (or obtain) certain useful items through airports and borders’ check-points by bringing the fat customs officer to his knees. Now Tzipi Livni was in her early 20s when the Operation Wrath of God Was in full force. You can see where this is going….

Why is this important? It’s not. It doesn’t matter much to me that the afore-said female was making her living by turning tricks or by seducing potential targets. To me, the pinnacle of her whorish career was this: while the children of Gaza didn’t have enough food to eat or medicine to medicate or electricity to turn on the light and study at night, when bombs and white phosphorous was falling upon their heads indiscriminately, this bitch had the audacity to stand before cameras and microphones and announce that:

"There is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza"

Enough circumstantial evidence, I suppose…

The 'Anti-indecency' Campagin and Cultural Dialog

In a response to Samuel P. Huntington’s book, ‘The Clash of Civilization’ (in which he argued that people’s cultural and religious differences will be the main source of conflict in the post-cold war era), Mohammad Khatami, former Iranian president, proposed an alternative concept; “Dialog Among Civilizations”. No-one, except a hardcore extremist like John Bolton or Elliot Abrams, can deny the power of dialog vis-à-vis a clash. No sane human being willingly chooses clash if given a chance at dialog. But there’s an important proviso for dialog; it has to be honest. You can conduct hundreds of conferences, shake hands, exchange words of flattery and diplomacy, but you won’t get anywhere unless you ask each other the honest questions.

So this whole anti-indecency campaign got me thinking: why is there a cultural clash here? The components are obvious, a large ratio of the UAE’s citizens feel uncomfortable with the collective dressing habits of the expatriates. One culture is feeling apprehensive of the other. It accuses the other of being inconsiderate and insensitive. On the other hand, and although it’s wrong to portray the expatriate population as a monolith, I’m going to assume their reactions are uniform: so they retort by stating that the rules aren’t clearly displayed, the laws aren’t well known, some of them assert that they are free to wear what they like ..etc..

To me, there seem to be something missing here. Questions aren’t being asked. Words aren’t being exchanged. Probably due to fatigue or wariness or apathy. But these, in my inexperienced opinion, are important and vital questions. Starting with the issue of imposing a formula of decent closing, one has to wonder how can we, as Muslims, demand that people dress to our liking, when we vehemently protest Sarkozi’s statements and the head cover ban in France? What’s our contention when we protest these rules? Isn’t it that we think that people are FREE to wear whatever they like? and that we always never fail to counter by asking the obvious question: why should my sister’s Hijab offend you? I mean, we DO ask these questions, don’t we?

Similarly, aren’t people who, according to you, are wearing indecent clothing FREE to wear whatever they like? and if your answer is no, then aren’t they entitled to an explanation? Why is what a woman or man-- whose culture is obviously different to you, why is what their wear is a source of chagrin and discomfort to you? why is it offensive? Why are their actions, when they’re totally irrelevant to your well being or to your physical existence, matter so much to you?

Although I come from a conservative family, I am not overly religious, so I posed these questions to a colleague of mine. Y isn’t even an Emirati, he’s a Jordanian national and a provider of a small family. He recounted for me once how he’d been in the Emirates Mall with his family –wife, 12 years old daughter, 8 years old son—and this guy starts fondling and kissing a girl on a bench in the walkway across Carrefure. He told me he wanted to walk up to him and give him an earful, except that he was tired and busy with his purchases. I asked him why did he feel offended or disturbed by what he’d seen, since it doesn’t at all affect him (all he’s got to do with the action is that he can see it). He said that it’s not ‘healthy’ for his daughter, who is very near her puberty, to see such affection in action. I told him that he’s having unrealistic expectations of the world when he demands that nothing unhealthy (again, according to him) be exhibited anywhere near his daughter. He said that unlike most of other unhealthy actions in the universe, body exposure and display of affection stir up certain desires in human beings that are better kept in check. And that SATAN will play unfair games with the feeble minds, and seeing such scenes doesn’t help at all……

I had no further questions of Y.

….

On the other hand, one could very much ask: why do you, western (or generally foreign) expatriates and tourists, choose to wear revealing clothes? I understand that this is probably entrenched in your culture so deeply that you don’t question it anymore, but come on, think of something. Also, is your culture really totally sexually permissive? What’s your definition of ‘decency’? What do you know about the Arabic/Muslim view of decency?



Before wrapping up, let me just reiterate that it’s not me who’s asking the questions or who’s expected to come up with answers. I, personally, don’t feel offended either way. Strip off naked and walk by me in the food court and I won’t feel offended (it would be nice if you could cover your pubes though, I don’t fancy motes of hair landing in my Humos): I’m just posing these questions in this context because this is how I think we could have a real dialog. Everything else is a photo-Op or a missing opportunity.

Inside the Mind of a Psychopathic Killer

George Sodini

Age 48.

DOB 9/30/1960

DOD 8/4/2009

5-10, 155 lbs.

Never married.

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania USA

That's how George Sodini had defined himself in his diary, his creepy online log, which he kept to document the build-up of the dark thought process that had lead him to storm into a room full of women practicing Aerobics and to shoot at them indiscriminatly. He ended up killing 3 (or 4, depends on what source you read) and injuring 10 women, before killing himself.

George was not poor. His net worth, according to the diary, is 250 $ K. He had a college degree and a decent job; a programmer in a law firm. He'd survived two waves of lay-offs in his firm and managed to get a raise and a promotion!

George's problem? well, according to him, it was women. They never liked him, he'd not got laid in 19 years (since he was 29 YO). He wrote:

Women just don't like me. There are 30 million desirable women in the US (my estimate) and I cannot find one.

It's not only women who hated on George. According to him, his family hadn't been kind to him either; his father was a bully, his brother was a bully, his mother was bossy and dominant. He blamed his brother for his shortcomings with girls, yet he looked down upon all the girls his brother had been with, he wrote:

On the same thought, things occured to me today. Michael NEVER had an attractive girlfriend. Debbie, Barb, Kim, ... then I lost track. Not to say I had any (execpt Pam, who was about a 7.25). He married a Chinese-descent, petite woman with no body, no ass, no chest and no personality. She never laughs or smiles, neither does he. But she is highly intelligent and an excellent cook. I can testify to that! She home bakes her own DELICIOUS wheat bread! But who cares about that type of small bull crap? Mike even mentioned when we were visiting dad that "she's not very attractive".

Now you might be wondering why am I wading through this sick, misogynistic, racist, criminal, mind-wrenching sewer of excremental thoughts of an obvious psychopath who lived his life under the radar of law enforcement (he had a clean record). Well, it’s because of one disturbing pattern whenever an event of this magnitude happens anywhere in the world. People will be quick to snap to judgments and issue collective verdicts even before the detectives had lift prints off the crime scene. The non-religious will blame it on religion. The religious will blame it on apostasy. The married will blame it on single-hood. People of other religions will blame it on the said person’s religion. Some might blame it on his upbringing. I also guarantee that some misogynistic asshole will come along and blame it on women. Societies are quite efficient in issuing judgments.

Missing from the discourse, though, is George’s own screwed outlook on life. Let me elaborate: notice, for instance, how he made an estimate of 30 million desirable women in the US. The US has a population of 280-300 millions. So out of 150 million women, only fifth are desirable , according to him.

So what about the rest? I think at one point in time a mature man would have outgrown his fantasized molds of beauty queens and fairies and get down to accepting realities and really seeing women for what they are. To be honest with you, objectifying the female body had always disturbed me. But I never thought it lead to such ugly destinations. Don’t get me wrong; we are all (well, almost all) infatuated by a voluptuous, full-breasted goddess, especially when they come supplemented by useful sack techniques. But let’s get real, not all women are sculpted to our tastes. Equally speaking, not all men are Brad Pitts (........ we’re way smarter).

You could easily detect this cognitive dissonance by examining George’s impression of his sister in law, quoted from above:

He married a Chinese-descent, petite woman with no body, no ass, no chest and no personality. She never laughs or smiles, neither does he. But she is highly intelligent and an excellent cook. I can testify to that! She home bakes her own DELICIOUS wheat bread!

See what I’m saying? Woman is either the type you wank off at in your head or she’s “no body, no ass, no personality [..etc.].” So what about those with non of the above mentioned qualities? are they incapable or love too?

At the end, you gotta love it when people blame George’s madness on loneliness. Get over it, I say. There are many, many life-long singles in this world. Even more who had been brought up by abusive families. Not all of these belonging to either denominations turn out to be disgruntled criminals.

I bet if George’d ever got around to getting married he’d abuse his wife and end up disfiguring her. He didn't, so he ended up lashing out at the opposite gender in some other way.

Emaratis react to 'Green Roof' regulation

I was mighty glad Yesterday's morning when my colleague told me of the live talk show on one of the Emarati Arabic radio stations (I don't listen to Radio often). He said most of the phone calls were bitterly critical of the new obligatory "green roofs" regulation.

Most of the questions asked were spot on, and were more or less the same ones that had occurred to us (sane architects) after we've studied the circular. And we've even voiced our concerns, on behalf of owners, to the DM hot-shot who'd met with us to explain and to elaborate on the circular. His answers were so frivolous he almost sounded like he was mocking us, and absent from the whole discussion was the owner's side. I was certain that this thing will not go un-noticed or un-protested by the owners. At times like these, when you need to find the best investment value for every single Fils you're spending, either privately or commercially, it's imperative that new laws are feasible and sustainable.

1 First caller's question was this: How come we, as villa owners, are not obligated to have any gardens on the un-built grounds of the plot, yet now it's obligatory to have it on THE ROOF? does it not make more sense to have green landscape on the ground level, where everyone could enjoy it, than to have it on the roof, where the access is almost always restricted? oh yeah, that takes us to question no2.

2 Municipality regulations does not allow having an external staircase to the villa, (i.e. one where you could access the roof from outside without being intrusive on the residents. i.e. the main staircase must always open up to living halls, dinning rooms, night lounge...etc...) therefore, whenever the gardeners need to access the roof and work on maintaining the expensive green areas, the owner of the villa will have to clear a path for them. All women, as is traditionally and culturally known, will have to retreat to the bedrooms or the kitchen. That is leaving aside the dirt, grime, dust and oil stains that maintenance workers leave in their wake. Of course, there are AC units and water tanks on the roof as well, but those are only approached once in a blue moon. While gardens require daily care.

3 Imagine the frustration of a young Emarati, who is financing the construction of his/her villa (through Amlak for instance) to the very last Dirham, imagine when this new rule pops out and include villas that are under construction as well. First, the consultant will have to whip up proposals for the green roofs and get them approved from DM. But the contractor won't move jack shit in a construction site (beyond what is in a contract) unless his additional claims for them are agreed upon by all parties. So there will be hellish back and forth correspondences between the contractor and the consultant until the messenger drops dead. The owner will be watching in despair, while being constantly assured by DM that this is all for his own good. When a number for the additional claims is agreed upon, the owner will have to get further finance for it. This will always take time, even if the process was smooth and approval guaranteed.

Now, if you mention the above scenario to the DM hotshot as a criticism of the new regulation, he'd blame it on the collective incompetence of contractors and consultants in Dubai. He? He always proposes regulations that could only be dealt with and understood by perfect, and highly qualified, professionals, big question marks about his own professional career notwithstanding. He’d expect the green roof areas to be accommodated with 6 hours.

That, of course, is leaving aside the fact that some, if not most of, villa owners won't be able to make use of the incentives that came along with the circular. (for the same financial reasons)

4 A caller, with almost a pleading voice, had said that her daughter is asthmatic. And that she (the mother) takes utmost care to keep her away from dust, soil, insects ..etc.. She said she's really considering bartering her villa, which is under construction, with some existing old villa where roof gardens aren't obligatory. Imagine the disappointment when you've spent a year sitting across the table from a creepy architect, going through details, features and nuances of the design, and then you end up having to drop all that and move into a villa that was the brainchild of someone else?

My colleague's commute is only 10 minutes; so this is only a small sample of the total complaints during the two hours live broadcast. Did I tell you I have my own crystal ball? It foretold me of the problems that will emerge with the implementation of this law. Now my crystal ball is telling me the law will get abolished soon, or at least substantially revised.

Military Service

We are all indebted to our home countries one way or the other. In fact, there are probably no other people on earth who are more indebted to their homeland than Syrians. Why not? Free education. Free health care. Free transportation. And you end up working for the government for free. After you've served the obligatory two years military service (also for free ).

Once a young man turned 18 years old, he will be endowed with a small military service booklet, with a rough pink cover and coarse yellow pages. On this little booklet will be written all the places he will have visited during his service, and all the stints and training he will have gotten. (along with all the other token information: unit, speciality, deployment, physical features, bench-press records, 1000 meter sprint record...etc..) The booklet is 50 pages (if I recall correctly), indicating how eventful and engaging the service is going to be. Now, if you decide you want to avoid the service altogether, it's not easy, your place is already booked and paid for. Overhead costs are already in place. You can't just turn and walk away without compensating for that. But there's flexibility on the side of the army, so they give you a deal: spend 5 years in any Arab State (except Lebanon), pay 5,000 $ US, and you're done. Exempted from service. (exemption is probably not the exact legal term for the situation, but I digress). This has been going on for a while, and platoons upon platoons of Syrian youth have been/are being dispatched and deployed to the trenches to earn the money they owe and don't have.

Later, though, our auspicious government had decided they want to add a tweak to the established deal. They realized that the platoons upon platoons of Syrians in Gulf have gotten old enough that they now have a progeny of their own, and that their kids may also be entitled to the same deal. But since the kids have gotten the deals nice and sweet (with daddy slaving it out to make ends meet and pay for his own militay service), and since the kids don't have an income of their own, the requisite period's been elongated to 12 years. However, the requisite money have been adjusted to two categories:

1- Children who have started out their expatriation when younger than 11 years of age will end up paying 3000 $ US only.

2- Children who have started out their expatriation when older than 11 years of age will end up paying 8000 $ US only.

Another proviso here is that the applicant's residence shouldn't have been interrupted by durations longer than 4 month at a time*. (e.g. vacations, leak breaks..etc..)

I tried to get my head around the idea; I pressed it, rattled it, patted it on the back, turned it around, turned it inside out, turned it upside down, flipped it over and over like an eggplant slice on a frying pan, and still I couldn't understand why one category is paying more than double the other. I scratched my head, pinched my nose, massages my temple and pulled my ears and still couldn't understand.

A friend of mine has a very interesting case. His family had moved to the UAE when he was 4 years old. He spent 14 years 'uninterrupted' residency here and then moved to Syria temporarily to finish his college. He then returned to the UAE after 6 years of 'high' education. And after 5 more years of residence (work) in the UAE he applied for military service excemption, opting for the "5 years, 5 grands" plan. He was told he will have to pay 8,000 $ US. He was astonished and perplexed and begged the Syrian Consulate in Dubai to elucidate. There must be some mistake here or ther, he said. They told him he'd stayed 14 years prior to the 5 he's applying for, and that upon reporting this to the concerned parties in Damascus, the Consulate was told the tab would be 8 K, payable in cash. He told them he doesn't want his 14 years earlier stay in the UAE to be included, and that the Consulate should have conferred with him before including it themselves in the application. The Syrian Consulate in Dubai (and you've got to give it to them, they're one of the finest Syrian diplomatic missions in the world.........not) patiently told him they don't have a choice, even if they don't report the 14 years to the Sho'bet Al Tajneed (that would be the military HR :) ) the latter will corroborate everything sent to them from consulates around the world with logs obtained from central immigration database. The system is foolproof, bullet-proof .... My friend retorted that the system is not fair, the Consulate then told him to fuck off. He did.

Now, there's absolutely no denying the importance of having a strong, reliable, sufficiently-staffed army. And I'm sure when the push comes to shove (we all hope it won't) very few people (Syrians or otherwise) will cower from defending their homelands. There's absolutely no argument from me there. What I'm concerned about is the obvious unfariness of the system. I hope the sane voices in the hierarchy (and I know they exist) will look into this matter.

_____________________________________________________

* there's one final category, those who were born in Arab countries (except Lebanon) and lived there continusouly for 18 years, will only have to pay 500 $ US. I didn't mention it because it's irrelevant to the case at hand. More info (in Arabic) here.

"she's leaking" ?

Face The Wall Shorty, Put Your Hands On It
Bounce That Ass Up And Down Like A Nigger Want It
Face The Wall Shorty, Put Your Hands On It
Bounce That Ass Up And Down, Make A Nigger Want It

Roll That Ass 'round And 'round Like A Mothafuckin' Wheel
Shake That Shit, This Ain't No Mothafuckin' Drill
Roll That Ass 'round And 'round Like A Mothafuckin' Wheel
Shake That Shit, This Ain't No Mothafuckin' Drill

……..

Sixteen Bitches With Thongs In One Club
The Home Of The 5th Rated Bones And Big Butts
Nice Big Pussys Splittin' All Over The Floor
Hornified, Can't Deny, Certified Pro
On A Pole Upside Down (this Shit For Real)
Did The Sixty-nine Plenty Of Times To Pay Her Bill
Brawd Say She A Clerk By Night She Turn Stripper
You Don't Wanna Date Her You Tryin' So You Can Tip Her

……..

Ooooo...shorty Crunk On The Floor Wide Open
Skeet So Much They Call Her Billy Ocean
Row, Like A 18-wheeler
That Ho is Fine, But This Ho’s A Killer
She's Leaking ,
She Soakin' Wet
She's Leaking ,
Soakin' Wet

Shake It Like A Salt Shaker

Who writes these things?! ..... apparently, someone who's on cool terms with the opposite sex.

Fire Fire

You could probably do a little research and learn which civilization was first to have collectively used fire on daily basis. But you will never be able to pinpoint how, when or where the first man-made fire had occurred. That knowledge seems superfluous right now. But I guarantee that it was essential to our forefathers. Because with the fire came the smoke, and with smoke came the fatal gases of carbon-monoxide and carbon-dioxide. The group of our forefathers that didn't recognize the perils of these gases died out over the millennia. But those who had been wary enough of inhaling smoke had survived its dangers and passed on the wariness to us. Along the way, though, it was discovered that a smoke emanating from a fire isn't always homogeneous. Certain herbs, when put on fire, produced sweet smokes, and our forefathers inhaled and rejoiced. Other herbs produced less sweet but more mentally enhancing smokes. Later, another generations of our forefathers criminalized the first kind of smoke and glamorized the latter. The current generation of homo-sapiens is yet to come to terms with how it want to deal with either kind of smokes. (leave it to Sharon of Dubai Eye though, she will probably sentence all smokers to the hemps of the gallows).


My pharynges had posted bacterial sentries all over my throat. Imposing an entry tax or a transit visa for everything that must come through. Worse than western immigration agencies in their bias, those bacterias. My pharynges don't realize the need for a compromise. They won't allow more smoke through without making me pay a price. I sent two battalions of Strepsils down there to quell the riots. Did I tell you how powerful my anti-bacterial troops are? They wiped the floor with the reneging pharynges. They nuked the traitors and gassed the collaborators. They don't care. The problem is, all that refuse of the battles will eventually trickle down to my stomach, and you could only dispatch so much of Strepsils before your stomach start to ache. I try steamrolling the uprising with hot, boiling liquids. I only get burnt gum and a blazing esophagus in return. A compromise must be reached. Ban Ki Moon starts his shuttle diplomacy and a deal is clinched. The amount of smoke passing through shall not surpass this much. We all agree and shake hands. Then, under the mercy of lust and desire, I lose another battle to my craving and take a pull of smoke. Which by now light up the gunpowder trail all the way to the explosive chest in my lungs. The pharynges go bananas once again.


I don't mind the stupid, I only despise the insensitive. You see, I told you I'm having a bit of trouble sounding my voice. And that every syllable is a torment to get out. You may kindly try to keep your witty stories till a later date, Or shall I just listen and nod, please? because it's easier for me to pretend to be interested in your fantasies when I'm healthy. Oh, your fantasies, how I love to be let in on your sick little world, which is invariably comprised of sandy beaches, hammocks and clit-tickling, muscular black guys. But that may not be enough since you need ears to cram your infantile stories into. I apologize. I can't permanently keep my eyes away from your donut padded fat backside. And eventually, when my gaze fall on that zone way back there, I will have to decide. So it must be easier to decide now, don't you reckon?

_____________________________

Sorry for the rant guys. My throat hurts like a bitch. By the way, did you ever wonder how much does a bitch hurt?

The Great Sage of Recession

The car door shut with a violent thud and my girlfriend was momentarily startled. But then she recovered quickly and smiled sheepishly at me as she closed her door neatly and walked around the hood towards me. I would not have been here except for her. She's my ultimate friend and confident, and there are no kept secrets as far as our relationship goes. She'd been with me when it happened; when several calamities, each one of them the size of an angry avalanche, came tumbling down the steep downhill path of unemployment. I'd been made redundant, true, but don't get me wrong. I'm a tough cookie when it comes to employment. I'm multi-talented and versatile, and can acclimate myself to any set of conditions the World Bank and Wall Street might see fit. But the ensuing events, truth be told, got to me eventually; my foreign language course-- requisite for my immigration application-- was going badly, my application for an exemption from military service (for which I'm obliged to pay a handsome money in terms of an allowance) was mishandled, and to top it all off, my girlfriend wanted commitment. Well, she was supportive, alright. But she'd sensed that, given all the afore-mentioned pressures, I could be on the verge of bailing out of town soon. And she needed assurances that that won't happen without her in tow.

She'd seen me becoming a little angrier than I usually am. I'd gotten morose and bad-tempered, she said. And she was going to do something about it. She'd heard of this great specialist; an expert on untangling bodily energy nodes. Chakras, I'd heard her say, are vital for the well being of human body and mind. I'd reluctantly agreed to experiment with the Chakras' expert. Slightly encouraged by the cool coincidence that 'chakra' in Arabic means 'a blonde', and I've always had a thing for blonds. (my girl friend isn't one)

And so it was arranged that, on this hot and humid early July morning, I would haul my sulky self, with my girlfriend in tow, all the way to this lovely, yet far away, neighbourhood which goes by the name of Arabian Branches. And down the walkway to the door we sauntered, me and my girlfriend, hand in hand, ready to meet my savior. I swung the outer door open and was treated to a view of a well-maintained lawn. And down the walkway by the lawn we proceeded. An unseen fountain was bubbling somewhere. And high on plinths on both sides of the walkway were statues and miniatures of several creatures. One of them had caught my attention: two frogs engaging in an act of cunnilingus. My girlfriend squeezed my hand and looked furtively, probably embarrassed. The door opened before I even hit the buzzer. An old woman with huge shawl, white hair and frail figure shook our hands. She had a relatively strong grip and was very economical with words. She motioned for us to follow her inside. The dark entrails of the villa sucked us in, my eyes took several moments to adjust and I bumped into several artifacts (or so they felt like) while I followed Madame Bovary into what looked like a living room. There were several living things there, alright. A hissing sounds, emanating from a wicker basket close by the door, almost made me lose my cool. The water bubbling was even more pronounced, although I still couldn't see a fountain.

The room itself was modestly decorated. The ceiling was a spotless off-white paint job. The walls, adversely, looked like a zoo in their dark olive green paint. Several posters illustrated what looked like charts of some sort, with an assortment of seeds, herbs, exquisite fruits and other symbolism that I couldn't comprehend. Probably Chakra-related math equations. There was a anatomical poster of a man, with bulging muscles and a bent elbow. His body was dotted with many red marks which lead to circled note by the margins. Chakras. The penis was missing though, and my girlfriend squeezed my hand again. However, the most prominent feature in the room, by far, was a head statue mounted high on the wall above the poster of the human body. Upon enquiring, Madame Bovary said it was the head of some great Sage. And I gotta tell you, it gave me the creeps right there and then. It had a part-smile, part-sneer look of wisdom to it. There was a touch of innocence, too, largely contrasted by the overpowering malice that was emanating from the diabolical eyes. I was then told to take off my shoes and lie down on the recliner. The recliner was positioned right in the middle of the room. Madame Bovary sat next to me, and turned a little so that her face facing mine and the Sage's at the same time. She took my left hand in hers and rubbed it lightly. Inspecting all the ridges and crevasses of skin in my palm. She then dug her fingernails in my wrest and a loud grunt escaped my mouth. She looked gravely at me and implored me to concentrate. I nodded and she went back to looking at the Sage. When her fingers finally settled in the recesses between my wrest tendons, she asked me what I was there for. I looked at my girlfriend in surprise. I'd thought that such a crucial knowledge was already exchanged between them and the matter taken care of. My girlfriend shrugged, and I answered. I mentioned the difficulties I was facing in my venture to hunt for a job. I mentioned my military service status, too. But Madame Bovary, who hadn't taken her eyes off the Sage, looked confused. She wanted to go back to the subject of my employment. But she had some preparations to do first; a process she called Vital Diagnosis.

She said she'll mention certain words to me, and I was to think of them for a bit while she assessed my vital reactions and then gauged my components [sic]. When she said 'sexuality', the first image that leapt to mind was that of the two frogs frozen in their act of eternal pleasure on her doorstep. I saw her jutting down notes. Percentages. But I couldn't see clearly. She then uttered 'security', and my mind drifted to the UN Security Council. She dug her thumb nail deeper in my wrest to measure my security vitals, her eyes never meeting mine, and jotted down some more notes. Next on the list was 'insecurity', and I was about to suggest that she could simply conclude that by subtracting the score for security from 100%. But I kept my hole shut, while my mind conjured up all kind of insecure scenarios. Her hand kept sliding down the note pad while she wrote, until I could see that my sexuality vitals, according to her, were 50%. What? I silently screamed. If it hadn't been for my girlfriend's presence, I would have shown that bitch a piece of the 50% right there and then.

When we were done with the vitals, she told me to draw a deadline in my head for when I wanted to find a job. I did as instructed and a laser beam appeared on the spotless ceiling. She told me to follow it with my eyes as I repeated certain phrases after her. The laser beam then danced around and I tried hard to catch up with it while repeating the requisite chorus. I couldn't take it anymore. The laughter, when it came, started up with a pinch in the bridge of my nose and heavy convulsions in my stomach. I managed to keep my voice calm and wrest steady, though, and Madame Bovary, laser pointer in hand, kept looking gravely at the Sage. The Sage looked right back at her. I reckoned he could have been on the phone with Alan Greenspan or Warren Buffet. Telling them to stop fucking with my career. Madame Bovary fell silent and nodded ominously. The laser beam on the ceiling got more jittery, and I thought I'd better stop repeating the same words stupidly. But I was concerned that that might disrupt the connection with New York. I kept blabbering away for ten minutes until my voice got hoarse and my pharynges scraped at each other like a pair of worn brake pads. God, I needed a cigarette. And I desperately needed this torture session to end.

As if on a cue, Madame Bovary dropped the laser pointer and stood up abruptly. 'That would be six hundred DHs', she announced. And my girlfriend handed the money over, a move we orchestrated earlier, hoping we'd get a discount of some sort. But the Sage was unimpressed, and we were given naught in form of a discount.

I put my shoes back on and rubbed their soles with my palms before shaking Madame Bovari's hands goodbye. But before I left the room for good, I took a good final look at the Sage. He looked back on, his grin getting even wider with time.

I wondered how much of a kickback the bastard was skimming off me.
_______________________________________________

This story was inspired by a conversation I had with a friend today.