• One eyewitness recounts a large crowd of youth (shabab) that run after a woman in her early twenties when she trips and falls. The men then start groping her and take off her clothes. The woman gets up, runs, and hides inside a restaurant. The men surround the restaurant until someone shouts, "there is another one at ....". The crowds then run to that location to find another woman completely surrounded by hundreds of men trying to feel her and take off her clothes. A taxi driver takes that woman in his car but the men surround the car and shout for the girl to come out. A Security Officer (appears to be non-government) tries to fend the people off by hitting them with his baton. The crowds do not easily disperse until they see two women wearing the overall Saudi/Gulf veil & abaya walking alone. The crowds then completely surround them, before touching them and taking off their veils. They attempt to take their clothes off while 10/11 year old boys get in their abayas.
• A well known actress, Ola Ghanem, was seen surrounded by her bodyguards fending off the crowds but were unable to completely protect the actress.
• A woman in a veil and abaya is harassed by men who take off her abaya before two building Security guys took her into the building and locked the door to protect her.
• A woman in tighter pants and a normal shirt is harassed and men take off her shirt and bra. A security person takes her into a shop fending off people with a stick.
• Much worse assaults are reported by the word of mouth but are not witnessed. One in which a woman was sexually assaulted against a wall after taking off all her clothes.
• Men cheered this before attacking a victim, "yaay, we will f***, we will f***". (yaay is my rough translation for 'heyeh').
• And when they find another victim, "another woman, another woman".
• And when they see women in veil & abaya, "go Saudi, go Saudi". (go is my rough translation for 'beep beep').
• And when surrounding a taxi and calling for a victim to get out of the car, "get out you sl*t, we will show you". The woman was later forced out like they wanted!
• Some bloggers warned women against entering the troubled areas, and most listened. Some women sought protection with the bloggers as they had cameras. The men did not assault these women fearing that they might be journalists.
• Some men were observed to use their belts to ward off the crowds and then take the victim in a taxi and flee.
• Some shop owners sprayed water to disperse the crowds and hailed for the women to come inside." (Mechanical Crowds)

"So far in this account I don't think Buddhism in practice comes to startlingly different conclusions about sexual conduct from those of balanced versions of other major religions. But the other religions also have lists of no-no's, of forbidden sexual practices. Some object to partial or total nudity, or masturbation, or cross-dressing, or sado-masochism, or homosexuality, or fetishism, or premarital sex, or oral, anal or group sex, or contracepted sex. Buddhism is notorious for its habit of putting points of practice and doctrine into lists. So where is Buddhism's list of naughty sexual practices?

The answer is short and sweet. Buddhism doesn't (for once!) have a list."

(http://www.buddhanet.net/winton_s.htm)

“When the Muslims used to disagree, they had different schools of thought,” said Sayed el-Qemni, another reform-minded writer who lives in a small city outside of Cairo. “No one would point to the other and say, ‘This is not Islam.’ But when one school of thought says, ‘I am the correct school of thought and everyone else deserves death,’ then you are starting a new religion.”

"MR. BANNA says one of the fundamental problems with religious leaders in Egypt is that they look to the interpretations of their ancestors and not to the Koran itself. To look directly at the book, and not at the words as interpreted by men living in a different time, would have a liberating effect, he says."

(NY Times)

It has been ruled with an increasingly iron fist since 1994 by President Alexander Lukashenko. Opposition figures are subjected to harsh penalties for organising protests.

In early 2005, Belarus was listed by the US as Europe's only remaining outpost of tyranny.

Belarus remains defiant in the face of Western pressure

The country became independent in 1991, following the collapse of the Soviet Union.

More than a decade later, the sense of national identity is weak, its international isolation is intensifying and the nature of political links with Russia remains a key issue.

In the Soviet post-war years, Belarus became one of the most prosperous parts of the USSR, but with independence came economic decline. President Lukashenko has steadfastly opposed the privatisation of state enterprises. Private business is virtually non-existent. Foreign investors stay away." (BBC)

I glanced over at Karl and turned to look the President in the eye. "Sir, we've given them virtually nothing," I said, "because we have had virtually nothing new to give." The President had been looking down at some papers about the event, but his head jerked up. "Nothing? What do you mean we've given them nothing?" He glared. "Don't we have new money in programs like the Compassion Fund thing?"

I looked again at Karl. He seemed stunned at what I was saying. "No, sir," I told the President. "In the past two years we've gotten less than $80 million in new grant dollars." The number fell shockingly short of the $8 billion he had vowed to deliver in the first year alone." (Time)

This rant is awesome - I find it hillarious.

"So when you look back and put all my documented POVs together, an ugly picture starts to emerge. I want to live in an homogeneous society, have a brutal military that ignores Geneva Conventions, tortures our enemies, mows down entire civilian populations to assure we get the resistors disguised as civilians, stands up un-democratic dictators to do our bidding in the third world, suppress the ability of our citizens to undermine our military strategy, allows no dissent from citizens who dont have the best interests of our nation as a whole having a say in policy, and militarize our borders, shooting everyone we catch trying to cross them.......Basically it appears that I want to live in China, Russia, or maybe even North Korea. Apparently I am a Commie at heart and just didn't know it." (Redneck Texan)

If you were coming in the fall
I'd brush the summer by
With half a smile and half a spurn
As housewives do a fly.

If I could see you in a year
I'd wind the months in balls
And put them into separate drawers
Until their time befalls.

If only centuries delayed
I'd count them on my hand
Subtracting 'till my fingers dropped
Into Van Diemen's land

If certain when this life was out
That yours and mine should be
I'd toss life yonder like a rind
And taste eternity.

But now all ignorant of length,
Of times uncertain wing,
It goads me like the goblin bee
That will not state its sting!

(Emily Dickinson)

Call me paranoid or that I need to go out more :), but we just have a North Korean Nuclear Test this morning.

“Any ethnic or religious group that is new to American politics is going to go through trouble,” he said, reaching next to his office desk to open a book called “Jews in American Politics.”

He read aloud a passage about how Jews were vilified and blocked from political office until their expertise in various fields proved crucial to the New Deal.

“It’s going to be the same way for Muslims,” he said. “It is just going to take a while.” "(NY Times)

What's unique about the US is that in every decade, there's different ethnic group or religion that get vilified or looked down upon, the poor Irish, the dirty Italians, Japanese, Chinese, the Lebanese, Jews, etc, etc but in the end, those people always manage to rise above and secure themselves in the mainstream strata of US society.

This reminds me of a joke, when a reporter asked whether a certain President whether a Christian can be a President of Egypt; and he answered "not even a Muslim".

Criticism is good but it is not helpful (even a constructive one) in the beginning of an idea development.

It is not easy to grow ideas and make it a reality. There are things that you have to worry about and most people know about them. Help your creative process by concentrating on what is possible and less about what is not perfect.

Repeat, refine, retry.

But spare the criticism, even the good intentioned one.

Wait until it is time.

Otherwise, the idea will have no chance whatsoever to become a reality.

A child will never able to walk if he/she was aware of the situation and being critical about it.

A child has no shame of failure - so she developed this amazing creation and development process that stopped somehow at the age of 13, when boys discover girls and girls realize their power over boys.

Find reasons why an idea would work and execute it ruthlessly. Ideas, like talk, are cheap. Execution is the secret of everything.

What would happen if tomorrow we all wake up to the news that Mecca was hit by a nuclear bomb?

Will there be riots on the street? Will there be bloodshed?

Will Israel or the USA be accussed as the culprit behind it?

(the destruction of Al-Aksari Mosque)

Let's assume that Al-Qaeda is found later as the culprit behind it (after two months or so)

How would that change the world?

Let me introduce you to Black Swan Event.

"Taleb now focuses on being a researcher in the philosophy of randomness and the role of uncertainty in science and society ^[6] , with particular emphasis on the philosophy of history and the role of high-impact random events in determining the course of history, which he calls "black swans".

It is important to note that "black swans" may also be fortunate rare events and not just negative or catastrophic events.

Taleb believes that most people ignore "black swans" because we are more comfortable seeing the world as something structured, ordinary, and comprehensible. Taleb calls this blindness the Platonic fallacy, and argues that it leads to three distortions:

1. Narrative fallacy. Creating a story post-hoc so that an event will seem to have a cause.
2. Ludic fallacy. Believing that the structured randomness found in games resembles the unstructured randomness found in life. Taleb faults random walk models and other inspirations of modern probability theory for this inadequacy.
3. Statistical regress fallacy. Believing that the probability of future events is predictable by examining occurrences of past events. " (Wikipedia)

Here’s what happens when this irresponsible Congress railroads a profoundly important bill to serve the mindless politics of a midterm election: The Bush administration uses Republicans’ fear of losing their majority to push through ghastly ideas about antiterrorism that will make American troops less safe and do lasting damage to our 217-year-old nation of laws — while actually doing nothing to protect the nation from terrorists. Democrats betray their principles to avoid last-minute attack ads. Our democracy is the big loser.

Republicans say Congress must act right now to create procedures for charging and trying terrorists — because the men accused of plotting the 9/11 attacks are available for trial. That’s pure propaganda. Those men could have been tried and convicted long ago, but President Bush chose not to. He held them in illegal detention, had them questioned in ways that will make real trials very hard, and invented a transparently illegal system of kangaroo courts to convict them.

It was only after the Supreme Court issued the inevitable ruling striking down Mr. Bush’s shadow penal system that he adopted his tone of urgency. It serves a cynical goal: Republican strategists think they can win this fall, not by passing a good law but by forcing Democrats to vote against a bad one so they could be made to look soft on terrorism.

Last week, the White House and three Republican senators announced a terrible deal on this legislation that gave Mr. Bush most of what he wanted, including a blanket waiver for crimes Americans may have committed in the service of his antiterrorism policies. Then Vice President Dick Cheney and his willing lawmakers rewrote the rest of the measure so that it would give Mr. Bush the power to jail pretty much anyone he wants for as long as he wants without charging them, to unilaterally reinterpret the Geneva Conventions, to authorize what normal people consider torture, and to deny justice to hundreds of men captured in error.

These are some of the bill’s biggest flaws:

Enemy Combatants: A dangerously broad definition of “illegal enemy combatant” in the bill could subject legal residents of the United States, as well as foreign citizens living in their own countries, to summary arrest and indefinite detention with no hope of appeal. The president could give the power to apply this label to anyone he wanted.

The Geneva Conventions: The bill would repudiate a half-century of international precedent by allowing Mr. Bush to decide on his own what abusive interrogation methods he considered permissible. And his decision could stay secret — there’s no requirement that this list be published.

Habeas Corpus: Detainees in U.S. military prisons would lose the basic right to challenge their imprisonment. These cases do not clog the courts, nor coddle terrorists. They simply give wrongly imprisoned people a chance to prove their innocence.

Judicial Review: The courts would have no power to review any aspect of this new system, except verdicts by military tribunals. The bill would limit appeals and bar legal actions based on the Geneva Conventions, directly or indirectly. All Mr. Bush would have to do to lock anyone up forever is to declare him an illegal combatant and not have a trial.

Coerced Evidence: Coerced evidence would be permissible if a judge considered it reliable — already a contradiction in terms — and relevant. Coercion is defined in a way that exempts anything done before the passage of the 2005 Detainee Treatment Act, and anything else Mr. Bush chooses.

Secret Evidence: American standards of justice prohibit evidence and testimony that is kept secret from the defendant, whether the accused is a corporate executive or a mass murderer. But the bill as redrafted by Mr. Cheney seems to weaken protections against such evidence.

Offenses: The definition of torture is unacceptably narrow, a virtual reprise of the deeply cynical memos the administration produced after 9/11. Rape and sexual assault are defined in a retrograde way that covers only forced or coerced activity, and not other forms of nonconsensual sex. The bill would effectively eliminate the idea of rape as torture.

•There is not enough time to fix these bills, especially since the few Republicans who call themselves moderates have been whipped into line, and the Democratic leadership in the Senate seems to have misplaced its spine. If there was ever a moment for a filibuster, this was it.

We don’t blame the Democrats for being frightened. The Republicans have made it clear that they’ll use any opportunity to brand anyone who votes against this bill as a terrorist enabler. But Americans of the future won’t remember the pragmatic arguments for caving in to the administration.

I'm publicly calling out Michelle Malkin, someone whom I often disagree with but usually respect. I hope she will think about it and respond thoughtfully and not angrily or flippantly.

The following emblem is carved into the headstone of many brave Americans who died for their country, including some who are buried at Arlington National Cemetary, a place I have visited and been humbled by:

(More here.)"

"I think the cancellation was a mistake. I think self-censorship does not help us against people who want to practise violence in the name of Islam," she told reporters. "It makes no sense to retreat."

Merkel's comments, which echoed those of other senior German politicians, fueled a row over the cancellation of Mozart's "Idomeneo" that overshadowed a government-sponsored conference to promote dialogue with the country's 3.2 million Muslims.

Berlin's Deutsche Oper said on Monday it had pulled performances of the opera, which features a scene depicting the severed heads of the Prophet Mohammad, Buddha and Jesus, after police warned it could pose an "incalculable" security risk.

"Al-Farouq and three other al-Qaida suspects escaped from Bagram, in central Afghanistan, in July 2005 but the Pentagon waited until November to confirm his escape. The delay upset Indonesia, who had arrested al-Farouq in 2002 and then turned him over to the United States -- who then shipped him to a secure facility in Afghanistan." (NY Times)

The dude got shot dead in Iraq.

Christianity more than matched that lurid history with the Crusades, an ecumenical blood bath that began with the slaughter of Jews in the Rhineland, a kind of preseason warm-up to the featured massacres to come against the Muslims, with the sacking of the capital of Byzantium (the Fourth Crusade) thrown in for good measure.

And Islam, of course, spread with great speed from Arabia across the Mediterranean and into Europe. It was not all benign persuasion. After all, what were Islamic armies doing at Poitiers in 732 and the gates of Vienna in 1683? Tourism?"

College education. 59% of US Muslims have a Bachelor’s degree or higher (compared to 27% of the population). In the UK, only 12% do (compared to 17% of the population).

Income. 52% of US Muslims make $50K and above (compared with 45% of the population). Although there aren’t equivalent numbers for the UK, the chart indicates that UK Muslims earn 68% of non-Muslims and have the highest unemployment rate in the country.

But the Indonesian Survey Circle (LSI) also recorded increasing fears among respondents that fundamentalist groups are systematically working to establish an Islamic state through the implementation of sharia-based bylaws.

A total of 69.6 percent of the 700 respondents (88 percent Muslims) from the 33 provinces said the inclusive Pancasila ideology was the most ideal political system. Only 11.3 percent believed that Indonesia should adopt an Islamic political system similar to that in the Middle East.

"We're rather surprised with this finding," LSI executive director Denny J.A. told a press conference here Thursday. "This corroborates the old belief that Muslims here are mostly moderate.""

We, the Indonesian people, hereby declare the independence of Indonesia.

Matters concerning the transfer of power, etc., will be carried out in a conscientious manner and as speedily as possible.

Jakarta, 17th day of August, 45 (note: Japanese calendar year)

In the name of the Indonesian people

<<Soekarno/Hatta's signatures>> Soekarno - Hatta"'

It's probably the most compact declaration of independence ever but the ramification was huge. Soonafter had to handle and deal with the Dutch/Allied Powers invasion. The revolutionary war lasted until 1949. We won. Yay.

“lei deve pretendere di vivere un mondo migliore,  non sia contente di sopravivere” (“you must demand living in a better world, don't be content to merely survive”)

The result, he and others argue, is that Mr. Olmert has responded with a ferocity in Lebanon that Mr. Sharon would not have chosen. At the same time, Mr. Sharon’s neglect of Hezbollah’s arsenal left Mr. Olmert far more vulnerable.

Leaders of Hezbollah and its sponsors said they did not expect Israel’s harsh counteroffensive. However ferociously he had fought Yasir Arafat and Hamas in the West Bank and Gaza, Mr. Sharon never reacted that way in Lebanon while prime minister. In 2004, he exchanged 430 prisoners and the bodies of 59 Lebanese for an Israeli citizen taken by Hezbollah and the bodies of three Israeli soldiers held by the militia. Hezbollah calculated that his more moderate successor, Mr. Olmert, would be open to similar negotiations."

It will take continued dialog and discussion between cultures, and societies, and religions, as well as scholars, and educators. And we must allow for the proper environment for them to be able to do so.

Every culture in the region, almost without exception, operates on the premise of positive feedback cycles with regard to the use of force. An eye is repaid with two eyes, a tooth with two teeth, an insult to a family with an "honor" killing, two kidnapped soldiers with an invasion, and an invasion with hundreds of rocket raining down upon civilians.

We often think of the phrase "an eye for an eye" as a rationalization for barbarity, but the fact is that the Jewish prophets who advocated that position were attempting to DE-escalate from the prevailing culture of "two eyes for an eye." Jesus attempted to take it one step further by advocating an overtly *negative* (limiting) feedback cycle, with his exhortation to "turn the other cheek." I am hardly literate in Islam but it seems evident that the Prophet himself attempted to do likewise, for example (if memory serves me correctly) by advocating moderation in the conduct of warfare. So we see a constant thread throughout the history of the major Western monotheisms in the region, to do anything possible to counteract the positive feedback of force.

Yet to this day, the cultures of the region still suffer from "two eyes for an eye" and the escalating positive feedback cycle of force. And now they have nuclear weapons, with more on the way."

• First, the goal of coercion must be within the capabilities of the target state (it's not in this case).
• Second, coercion like this is only useful if the objective is to get a state to give up a policy (the more ancillary it is to the state's existence the better) than to get them to act proactively -- particularly since large scale systems disruption rips down states. Lebanon is getting weaker by the day and Hezbollah is now existential to the state.
• Third, if the state doesn't officially relent and the state fails, global guerrillas can still achieve a de facto victory. This doesn't work for Israel. The failure of Lebanon only makes things worse."

Now I can't do it for you. I'm too old. I look around, I see these young faces, and I think... I mean I've made every wrong choice a middle-aged man can make. I pissed away all my money, believe it or not. I chased off anyone who's ever loved me, and lately, I can't even stand the face I see in the mirror. You know when you get old in life, things get taken from you. That's part of life. But you only learn that when you start losing stuff. You find out life's this game of inches. And so is football. Because in either game, life or football, the margin for error is so small. I mean... one half a step too late or too early and you don't quite make it. One half second too slow too fast, you don't quite catch it. The inches we need are everywhere around us. They are in every break of the game, every minute, every second. On this team, we fight for that inch. On this team, we tear ourselves and everyone else around us to pieces for that inch. We claw with our fingernails for that inch. Because we know when we add up all those inches, that's gonna make the fucking difference between winning and losing! Between living and dying! I'll tell you this - in any fight, its the guy whose willing to die who's gonna win that inch. And I know if I'm going to have any life anymore, it's because I'm still willing to fight and die for that inch. Because that's what living is! The 6 inches in front of your face...

Now I can't make you do it. You've got to look at the guy next to you, look into his eyes. Now I think you're gonna see a guy who will go that inch with you. You're gonna see a guy who will sacrifice himself for this team, because he knows when it comes down to it, you're gonna do the same for him.

That's a team, gentlemen. And either we heal, now, as a team, or we will die, as individuals. That's football, guys. That's all it is. Now, what are you going to do?"

Everything is going to be OK so you can forget about the ending up in Tenesse in five years with two kids without their daddy :)

Example: If a person was born on October 23, 1972 (10-23-1972*), add the month 10 (which is reduced to 1) to the day 23 (which is reduced to 5) plus the the year 1972 (which reduces to 19, then to 10 and finally to 1**). Thus, the total of the month, day, and year is 1+5+1. This date is a 7 Life Path. The "master numbers, " 11, 22, and 33, have been incorporated within the corresponding single digit number readings. See addition comments about master numbers."

There is a theory in Numerology that a few numbers bring qualities along with them that suggest karmic, or unfinished, business. It may be that we choose to create lessons in these areas to round out our natures. Another possibility is that we want to develop qualities that were somewhat void in the past. Either way, Karmic Numbers can feel a bit more challenging than others. If you have a Karmic Number as one of your Core Elements, you may experience the number as over-balanced or under-balanced before experiencing a fully balanced and accessible energy.

Look for these Karmic Numbers in your Core Elements. Reflect on the area of your life that the Core Element represents and note where you may find confusion from the Karmic Number that is present there. For accuracy, remember that the numbers 11 and 22 are Master Numbers and stand on their own. Always add an 11 as an 11 rather than a 2 and a 22 as 22 rather than a 4. This makes a difference in determining if you have a Karmic Number or not."

"Karmic Number 13/4

When reducing the numbers to a final digit, if you find a 13 before a 4 you have a Karmic Number. A 13/4 is still a 4 but with a focus on learning and accepting the qualities the 4 represents. Often there is a feeling of restriction and limitation. As discussed in Lesson One, the 4 represents concentration, management, application, conservation, dedication, efficiency, and organization. You can imagine how productive one's life could be when applying skills in these areas. However, when a person comes in with a 13/4, they will be learning how to bring these energies into harmony, therefore manifesting the qualities they represent to a greater height. By doing so, restrictive beliefs can be transformed."
(Karmic Numbers)

"Karmic Debt Number 13/4
If you have the number 13/4 anywhere in your chart, you need to make up for a past life — or numerous past lives — in which you paid no heed to responsibility and refused to do any hard work. You lived a superficial life/lives and now you have a debt to pay. In this life you will be called on to learn discipline, vision, dedication and focus. If you decide not to erase this debt, it will carry on with you into your next life."

"(13/4)  Karma comes about by frittering away your talents and opportunities in a previous life and not getting the important things accomplished, or by placing un-necessary burdens on others, such as pain and suffering. Also, shifting your responsibilities of work or activity onto another's shoulders and sidestepping work."

:)

• Cut up 2 kg of chicken breast fillet for the Soup (sliced) and Butter Chicken (cubed).
• Crack open three whole chicken for tandoori grill.
• Prepare the marinate for the tandoori chicken.
• Cut up various vegetables for the soup.
• Soak the basmati rice overnight.

• A boatload of Artichoke's dip
• Salads
• Chicken Dumpling Soup
  
• 12 pieces of Grilled Tandoori Chicken
• Butter Chicken
• Coconut Rice
• Watermellon !!

It was a fuckin' wedding menu :)

when can I book you for some career counseling ?

you are the last person in the world who needs someone to tell them about future careers

what I need is someone to tell me i'm full of shit

I dunno, I used your bigger dreams theory last night.

so clearly I'm buying what your selling

"

Arathi my brain is mush whaaaaaaaaaaaaaat kind of vegetable do not want to think am ready to go home .

 Butter chicken

4 chicken breasts boneless

2large onions finely chopped

4 pods of garlic chopped, 4 cloves , 4 green cardomoms  4 black cardomoms , I stick of cinnamon, I tspn of black jeera.

Cube chicken breasts. Fry all above spices in oil till soft and carmelised  add cubed chicken 1 & ½ tspn  salt  i/2 tspn red chill powder 1 &1/2 tspn garam masala  2 tsps of tomato paste stir 7 simmer till all ingredients are well mixed add 2 scoops of sourcream  some water enough to make a thick curry boil taste cook till chicken is done.

Give dody your eggplant recipe if he wants to barcue chicken

For about 20 drumsticks

15-20 green chillies I bunch of fresh coriander 2-3 pods of garlic I inch of fresh ginger grated. Blend in blender with enough soy sauce to make a smooth past Marinade chicken overnight either barbecue or cook in 350 oven till done. Tell dody I am going to pass through Egypt one day 7 I might need a friend . Just kidding would bre nice to visit the Pyramids.

Love Mom   "

Rice, three types of curry. That's the main meal. What's for appetizer ?

"Mommy! Ok more info he is thinking 2 dishes of chicken + 1 vegetable (he has coriander and would like to make butter chicken for 1 recipe) work your magic hehe"

I'm begging recipes from Arathi for wednesday's dinner party.

The document, written in six sections, sheds little new light on those links but corrects some initial speculation about the attack — that the bombs were assembled in the Philippines, for instance, and that the attack was aimed at the Indonesian government, or the Balinese economy.

7:34 — "ALLAH-U AKBAR!!!"

"We tried to minimize the impact on Muslims," the author explains in the final section, which was written after the attack. "Nevertheless, there were still Muslim victims killed and wounded."

The death toll was a relatively low number compared with the first Bali attack. Five of the 20 killed were foreigners: 4 Australians and a Japanese. Fifteen were Indonesians."

The author of above document was shot death in a raid in Indonesia a couple of months ago. Good riddance.

What I love about girls that grow beautiful late is that they managed to develop interesting personality during their 'ugly duckling' period and become an interesting person. Many teen beauty queens and popular girls never managed to do that and they became a bore really quickly in their adult life.

The same principle applies in general to people that have been through multiple phase in their life. All of us have been through our 'down' or 'up' period where things were really bad or really good and we tasted the bitterness of defeat and estacy of victory. The most interesting people I've met are these kind of people. They have scars of their personal battles which makes them slow to judge the flaws of others. They have become real; less facade, more truth. You might like them or hate them but you cannot help but respect who they are.

"The sea is flecked with bars of gray,
The dull dead wind is out of tune,
And like a withered leaf the moon
Is blown across the bay.

Etched clear upon the pallid sand
Lies the black boat: a sailor boy
Clambers aboard in careless joy
With laughing face and gleaming hand.

And overhead the curlews cry,
Where through the dusky upland grass
The young brown-throated reapers pass,
Like silhouettes against the sky."

While several bystanders were injured, and nearby windows shattered and walls collapsed, the only death appeared to be that of the driver of the car, identified later as Hamza Abu Mukharreb, 21, a member of Hamas's military wing."

It's been 2 months since I started riding horses. My original motivation was shame. I was riding lamely in Pyramid of Giza when a girl galloped past us in all her glory. I cursed under my breath and determined not to let that happen again.

That was then.

After several weekends of walking like pregnant women after each horse ride, I think I've passed that ultimate goal of getting no ill effect after each ride.

I've become a hard ass, so to speak.

But not as hard core as yet another girl that I met today, Dhalia. Her father owned the stable and I talked to her about horse competition and such. She told me about "endurance race" where you race the horse for 120 km in a day. She competed in one two years ago and that race required one year preparation. Now that is horse riding. She told me that if you ride long enough, you will fall. Falling off a horse is the gravity of horse riding. It's the law and it will happen. You just have to learn how to fall properly.

Well, I almost fell today. I rode a new horse, Carama. She's new and very sensitive and loved to gallopped. I lost control of her in one fast gallopp and we almost made a jump over a 3 feet fence before she turned sharply to the right at the corner just in time. I almost flew and became Superman.

Next week, I will tackle the underwater world in Alexandria. It's time to scare the fishes.

Ali did not come lightly to his decision to stay home. For years, he said, he has had no more important appointment than Fridays at Baghdad's Baratha mosque, a revered Shiite shrine said to have been visited in the 7th century by Imam Ali, a cousin and son-in-law of the prophet Muhammad.

‘Who will take care of us’?
But after suicide bombers struck at Baratha in April, killing at least 70 people at Friday prayers, Ali's wife confronted him. "I told her I would go, but she said: 'Who will take care of us if you get blown up? You don't have a salary or a pension,' " recalled Ali, 46, who runs a small shop that sells cigarettes and candy out of his home in the al-Salaam neighborhood of northwest Baghdad."

Love is a lottery. You must pay first and maybe you get something in return. They also call lottery a tax for stupid people.

Time is limited. More so, attention is even more limited. We have 24 hours fixed but you can only spend less than that amount of time to pay attention to anything

You have work, sleep, learning, exercise, meditate, etc..

Then you have some spare time to get to know people. A very limited amount of time.

So you choose and pick the people you want to get to know more. You do it for various reason, for romance, for the pursuit of common interest, for circumstances, etc.

On the other hand, you can have a perfectly fine and genial friendships, acquitances, etc relationship without knowing them well. We do it all the time.

You don't have to know somebody well in order to work with them, play  or even sleep with them. Some people are together for a long time without knowing each other.

So if you are in  a situation where people are spending their time and effort to get to know you, online or offline, realize that you are the few chosen one. You are the winner of his/her internal attention matrix, for variety of reasons.

There is always a reason.

On the other hand, just because you are part of this 'winning team', it doesn't mean that anyone close to you will be qualified too. The attention space is not the universe, it doesn't expand with time. If somebody new is in, your slice is cut and in some cases sent to the "winning team alumni club", the has been of "people I would care to know".

Yeah, you must care to know. 

The membership in this exclusive club is temporary and rarely you get the "card for life". But hey that's life and enjoy the benefits while it lasts.

Wow.

Incredible.

Mind boggling.

There's a music festival this weekend on the Citadel (it's free, even for furiner) and I went to see the Sufi Dancers. The festival itselfs contains many style of music (including fusion jazz) but the main event for me is the dance.

It's consisted of a bunch of old guys playing various ensembles of musical instruments and the dancer dude with his colorful and layered "skirt". He would spin and spin and continue spinning throughout the dance making circles with his "skirt". It was funny, inspiring and full of energy. It cannot be missed.

Swimming in the afternoon, sufi dances, muatam, and late night dinner at Didos. It's a perfect day. And I'm glad I spend it ...

June is ending and so far the feared high temperature and humidity of Cairo hasn't hit yet. Today is actually beautiful day, the sun was out early and warmed up the city pleasantly. Maybe my perception of the whether has been altered by the Luxor heat experience (48 celcius at 3 pm). Maybe beating a sickness symptom in just one day with a cheapo over the counter medicine at the office neighbourhood pharmacy also play a role in giving me a good mood this morning.

Maybe spring just arrived late.

The primary purpose of this conversation is not to convey any specific information. Its primary purpose is to say, "I am here and I know that you are here." (Slate - Herbert Stein)

The “child-martyrs” belonged to the so-called “Basij” movement created by the Ayatollah Khomeini. The Basij Mostazafan – the “mobilization of the oppressed” – were volunteers of all ages that embraced death with religious enthusiasm. They provided the model for the first Hezbollah suicide bombers in Lebanon. To this day, they remain a kind of SA of the Islamic revolution. Sometimes they serve as a “vice squad”, monitoring public morals; sometimes they rage against the opposition – as in 1999, when they were used to break the student movement. At all times, they celebrate the cult of self sacrifice."

Militant cleric Abu Bakar Bashir also called on Bush and Prime Minister John Howard to convert to Islam, saying it was "the only way to save their souls."" (msnbc)

• The hospitality
  
• Siwa
• Dahab
• Mint Shisha
• The Nile
• Seafood in Alexandria
• The girls (ha..ha..just kidding; I don't see any)
  

• Koshari
• The Egyptian Jokes
• Horses
• Diving
• The Pharonic Legacies.
• Mt. Sinai (St. Catherine)
• Home Cooked Meal
  

• Cairo Fucking Traffic (CFT) and Cairo Pollution (CP)
  
• The state of food in general
• Ubiquitous Lebanese pop stars singing 'song' on TV channels.
• The visible class within the society.
• East Delta buses.
• The stupid and random rules (oh, you are not allowed to get out from the side door)
• Bokra, Inshallah (yeah right)
• The high price for the institution of marriage
  

• Cook Door.
• There's one stupid movie trailer that has been playing constantly in every single movie I've seen and in the TVs on the buses (I have no idea of  the title).
• The vendors and guides in Pyramids of Giza.
• The traffic jam on top of 6th of October bridge.
  

My scientific experiment of curing a cold with a healthy dose of Vodka went well until my phone rang just past midnight. It woke me up and now I can't sleep.

Now that the test result has been contaminated, I have to restart the experiment again, this time with whisky.

Ah, things that I do for science.

1) An aggressive program with clear ideological and political goals;
2) immense funding from oil-rich Wahhabi sponsors;
3) the ability to distribute funds in impoverished areas to buy loyalty and power;
4) a claim to and aura of religious authenticity and Arab prestige;
5) an appeal to Islamic identity, pride and history;
6) an ability to blend into the much larger traditionalist masses and blur the distinction between moderate Islam and their brand of religious extremism;
7) full-time commitment by its agents/leadership;
8) networks of Islamic schools that propagate extremism;
9) the absence of organized opposition in the Islamic world;
10) a global network of fundamentalist imams who guide their flocks to extremism;
11) a well-oiled "machine" established to translate, publish and distribute Wahhabi/Salafi propaganda and disseminate its ideology throughout the world;
12) scholarships for locals to study in Saudi Arabia and return with degrees and indoctrination, to serve as future leaders;
13) the ability to cross national and cultural borders in the name of religion;
14) Internet communication; and
15) the reluctance of many national governments to supervise or control this entire process.

We must employ effective strategies to counter each of these fundamentalist strengths. This can be accomplished only by bringing the combined weight of the vast majority of peace-loving Muslims, and the non-Muslim world, to bear in a coordinated global campaign whose goal is to resolve the crisis of misunderstanding that threatens to engulf our entire world."

And I know that when she said, she's gonna try
Well, it might not work because of other ties and
I know she usually has some other ties
And I wouldn't wanna break 'em, nah, I wouldn't wanna break 'em (flake)

and she's from Argentina and absolutely gorgeous. She's my horse riding instructor.

So Mostafa, suck it up ! :)

Now I can go to Mars.

I'm back tomorrow for Up and Down Trot and Gallop around the palace.

not yet :)

I'm looking forward to learn on how to handle horse properly. Yay.

Not bad, ain't it?

Good morning. Cairo feels different at 7.00 am in the morning. It's a nicer and gentler city. Wait for another hour and the ugly side of Cairo traffic will rear its ugly side.

Jesus supposedly had spent his childhood in Egypt and yesterday I checked out his supposedly family pad.

(St. George church)

Welcome to Old Cairo, the oldest part of Cairo, a location dear to Coptic Christian (Coptic means Egypt is Coptic language - speak of recursion).

You could reach this cluster of churches easily by taking the city train down to Helwan and stopped at Mars Girgis. It was a pleasant albeit smelly and hot ride for me. Cairo was getting hot.

There were 4 or 5 different churches within ten minutes walk here and I went to all of them.

(St. George)

I lit a candle in St. George church (yeah, that dragon slayer); it was an old habit that I didnt' carry anymore . When I was inside the chruch I felt the urge to do it. Funny how things happen. The candles made crackling noises as they burn, creating rhythm  that I found comfortable.

I made a wish as I lit the candle; I was essentially a beggar.

I noticed a few Egyptian women prayed by touching some ornaments and the gold covered 'picture' of St. George.

I like to check out people's place of worship because this was one of a few place where people tended to be honest about themselves; less facade, more soul. There was always a serene atmosphere about these place that calm my usually turbulent mind.

In situ, there was also the old Synagogue, which was now became more of a tourist of attraction than a place of worship. That was unfortunate.

Romans were here and you could still walk on their pebblestones narrow streets under the St. George complex. It was amazing to me to find a huge tourist store (I mean mall size, although only one floor) under here. My inner capitalist smiled while my inner religious police frowned.

The Greek cemetary nearby was interesting. You could differentiate the rich Greek and the poor Greek by their tombstones. Class difference was still evident even after we die.

(Greek cemetary)

My favourite church was still "Abu something", where the crypt of the holy family was located. I loved the high wooden ceiling and the chirping birds nearby. I sat down and closed my eyes and absorbed the serenity of the place. I needed it because Cairo could really fucked up your inner balance. I couldn't enter the crypt because it was blocked. So the only sight I had of this crypt was some generic stone pillars.

Old Cairo was worth a visit although the area you could enjoy was actually pretty limited. A couple walk here and there and khalas. Don't visit the faux soux nearby.

Until next weekend.

(Hanging Church of Old Cairo)

“No,” she said. “They wanted to learn Hebrew so they can talk to us when we go down and visit.”

“When you go down there and visit?” I did not know what she was talking about.

“Last year 200,000 Israelis visited the Bedouin during Passover," she said.

“Two hundred thousand,” I said. “On just one day?”

“You didn’t know about this?” she said.

“No,” I said. Before I went to the Middle East I had no idea Israeli Jews had any kind of genuinely friendly relations with Arabs in any country except right-wing Lebanese Maronites. And a significant number of Maronites say they aren't even Arabs at all.

“The Bedouin roll our joints for us,” she said. “They sell us hashish. Israeli women like to go topless.”"

We stopped at a massive sand structure with a long and steep slope, ready to 'snowboard' our way down.

I sucked at snowboarding.

Naturally I spent my way down falling over, twice, fast. Ziyad went down well, too well actually, when at the bottom he flipped twice in the air and fell like hurried leaves in autumns, hard on the ground. He got minor concussion and lost a total two minutes of the memory he had when he was on the ground, laying down, trying to get up. We thought he was pulling our legs at first. It took us thirty ticks on the clock to realize the boy was fucked (not in a nice way). We ran down the slopes and reached him.

He survived although he had headaches for the next couple of days. Wuss.

So we continued our merry way to our location for the night camp. And we met with another jeep full of American brats studying at AUC. Great. But never mind. This was Siwa and I was in my nirvana level of chill and peace.

The guide prepared our camp and we chilled and letting ourselves be awed by the sunset.  I witnessed the sun reluctantly disappear under the horizon line marked by the flowing waves of dunes, like lovers slowly parted for a long period of time. Darkness slowly embraced us and the glitters of the stars above started to dance in our eyes.

If you let your shoes go and dip your feet on the desert sand beneath, you would feel the sands crumble crunchly, sending an estatic and sweet noise to your ear. If you climbed to the top of the dunes, you could  lay down and hug the dunes; it will hug you back. Just close your eyes and feel the breeze slowly caressing your body. Daydream.

Then we went to sleep, on a rug, with the night sky as our roof, clutching to our blankets, trying to steal a couple of hours before dinner time, our bodies nagging after being objected to the harsh bike ride earlier today. Our nap was serenaded by the chattery of the other group, high pitched girly laughters combined with alcohol infused guys making jokes.  No matter.

The twin dry woods made crackling noises as yellow flames consumed it, sharing their heat with us a stone throw away. The flame danced enticingly and I couldn't resist. I moved away from our sleep cluster and laid down next to the fire and started writing on my notebook.

Just my torch, my thoughts and the flames. And the stream of conciousness just flew to the papers. I confessed and she listened. Some pieces of those are on this blog, the rests were kept between me and the desert.

Our nap was interrupted by the main event of the night, warm meal in the desert. Grilled lamb, chicken (bird flu be damn), fresh soup, salad, bread; the works.  And BEER !

A feast, worthy of a king's dinner. It filled us up, made us happy and kept me awake.  The rest had been sleeping on for a good two hours before I tore myself away from the fire and doused it off. A haunting howl of a desert fox dominated the night. It was completely dark. The starsth twinkled freely without a ray of moonlight.

Desert at night was cold. The sand got in your face and pretty much everywhere else. But my body didn't matter because my mind was at peace.

I wanted nothing that night and I received bliss in return.

I slept at the feet of everbody else because there wasn't enough room and I noticed strange things happening in the middle of the night (smile); lucky bastard. It was good to be sick and taken care of.

I woke up the same way like the day before, all hurting from the hard sand but with a big stupid smile. One night in the desert of Siwa made you do that.

I left Siwa grateful and enlightened. This was another world and I had a taste of it. Next time I will return with my loved one. Scratch that last part. I'm going back either way.

Last weekend I went to two places, Mars Matruah and Siwa. The former provided beautiful white sands with warm Mediterranean water and General Rommel office-in-a-cave site.

I will write about Siwa for the rest of this post.

After two hours and change ride on a microbus that flew at 160 km/hour through the barren landscape of Western Egypt, I arrived in Siwa 'downtown', a simple square with scattered restaurants and donkey kart. Kids would politely offer their donkey taxi service to you. The day was ending; the sun was resting.

The time had been gentle to this place. Only minimal amount of progress intruded the sweet atmosphere of Siwa.

We were too late to go camp in the Great Sea of Sands. The office that issue the permits for foreigners to camp in the desert had closed. We needed the next day, 10 US dollars each and 10 LE  and our passports to get the permit. Ziyad didn't get the permit because they charge $500 dollars for Arab citizens (for hunting deers) and our guide wisely recommended that he pretended we only had four people camping instead of five.

So for the night, we stayed in a Siwian camp four kilos away from the town. Incidently this camp had a natural hot spring. There were only two hot spring in Siwa. We would go to the other one 36 hours later in the morning; but for tonight, it was jacuzzi time.

The pond was warm and full of green algae that rub softly on your skin. The smell of sulfur was strong and there were bubble constantly surfacing from the source of the spring. Mix this with a lazy desert night wind and you had a blissful combination of warmth and breeze.

Dinner was cold but nice. We ate under the main tent which would become our shelter for the night. The desert floor was covered by old carpets and the tent was made of zigsaw of quilts. There were a group of Siwian man playing their songs in their cheerful beats on the other tent. The noisy groups of night visitors slowly peeled away from our tent and went their own way home. Before midnight, there were only 8 tourists in the camp; we stayed in the main tent and the rest had their own smaller tent.

I woke up in the morning hurt. The sand maybe soft on your hand but they made lousy bed. After a spartan breakfast, we hitched a ride back to town. It's time to see what it had to offer.

After depositing our packs to a hotel, our bike ride adventure began.

We went to the nearby hills full of abandoned villages of mud and stones houses, the Shali. Jumping among ruins was fun. By now the full might of the sun had shown its effect. I was proud to say I didn't have any sunburn on this trip. Just 3 shades darker.

Our next route is to reach the Amun temple, the site where Alexander the Great went to see the Oracle of Siwa thousands years ago.  The oracle declared him as a son of God Amun.

For this previlege, I had to part with my twenty pounds. I could confirm that unlike Alexander, I was not the Son of Amun. No oracle showed up to greet me. Selfish bastard.

Our pleasant bike ride continued on sleepy dusty roads of Siwa. The thick brushes of palm trees decorated the sides of the road. There were very few cars passed these roads. Me, happy. We passed Cleopatra bath, a spring with green clear water where you can see the rock formation underground.

Cleopatra was there, with her dark skin and flowing long black curly hair. She's either a guide or taking her parents to Siwa. I didn't know where she was from.

Our next destination was to reach the lake nearby (or what it seemed at the time) and my stubborness (or can I call it persistence) forced the rest to painfully ride twenty minutes on under the midday sun of Siwa. The water was running out until just around the corner appeared this beatiful lake with rough hills on the far horizone. One single road split the lake into two. There was no car on this road and we spent time being tourists; snapping pictures and pose.

Needless to say that our ride back to the hotel would be torturous; except that a discovery of a cafe on a hill saved us. It was in the middle of nowhere and packed with buzzing flies. Good enough. Our fourty minutes break only left us one hour to got back and prepared for our ride to the desert at 3.30.

Finally we were on our way.

Our Land Rover jumped, slided, and skidded on the mountains of sands, dropping to 60 degrees slopes in places and climbing on 30 degrees peak in others.

Welcome to the Great Sand of Sea of Siwa.

And I found my love for the desert, as if we were old loves reunited for the first time after years of separation, a tragic poetry.

to be continued.

Falling is what I do :)

• Live a celibate lifestyle for an extended period of time.
• Eat bad food.
• Did a 100 hour week.
• Live in Africa (sort of).
• Learn a new language.
• Fulfill my dream of eating Koshari.
• See the Pyramids, Dahab and Mt. Sinai.
• Get a Teddy bear.
• Spend 77 minutes with Jen.
• Acquire master level certfication for jay walking.
• Completed a marathon.
• Ate Hardees.
• Went Scuba Diving.
• Eat once a day.
• Got  a new passport.
• Hangout with Superluli and Nisrin.
• Met Zeead and Taher for the first time.
  
• Sober on St. Patrick's day.
• Moved out of my old apartment.
• Return to Photograpy once again.
• Shaved my head.
• Not get trapped in an LDR.
  
• Not get married.