Quantum Thoughts

Cleaning Out the Closet

2005-10-08T23:44:00.000+03:00

I have some pics that have been laying around in my phone, and since I can't think of anything else to post, I thought hey wouldn't it be a great idea to post them with some smart-ass comments, and make it all look like I really had something to post about? I am a genius!

My new car, a 2006 Toyota Land Cruiser =D

Drove to Bahrain in my new car, and had to go through Al-Ahsa (in Saudi Arabia) on the way. I was in the middle of the city, yet the GPS system was showing that I was in the middle no where. Notice the red circle showing my car's location on the blank screen. Normally the screen would be filled with all kinds of roads/lines.

Omani pomegranate, the best I have EVER tasted. This year and the one before this Omani friend of my father sent the family some of their finest pomegranate. Omani's rule. I hope he reads this and sends even more!

Remember my smoking friend who left ashes all over my table (link), now I cought him on camera sleeping in the computer lab at school. We're far from even, but I'm getting there, one embarrassing picture at a time!

How to destroy 30,000 QR ($8000+) in 5 seconds =(

Where I spent most of my weekend: blasting, painting and inspecting pipes I'm working on for my graduation project. Exciting huh? *sighs* Btw, I appear in none of the pics above.

See you guys in the next real post =p

Ramadan Mubarak

2005-10-04T23:56:00.000+03:00

Whoa, long time eh?

No specific reason why I haven't posted for long. Honestly, I just didn't feel like it. I guess I was a little blogged-off, I even stopped visiting any other blogs.

Now, a new month, new scheduele, new habits (fasting...etc), so I thought it was a good time to re-visit my blog. I honestly have no idea how far away is my next break, but let's hope it's like really really far.

So, what happened on my off time?

After the UAE experience, I just chilled at home. For real, I didn't do much. I didn't even read ANY book of the stack I bought from Dubai, and now that Ramadan is here, that should take that reading break at least til after the Eid. God do I love talking about myself.

Anyway, back to school now, and it should be very busy. If anyone remembers the post about my graduation project advisor Dr. Hussain Rahmat-Allah, he didn't get well enough to come back to work. So the guys and I are left with ourselves and his assistant (who is being very helpful) to complete the project in a record time, may Allah help us. There are also a ton of projects, reports and whatnot in some other classes, not mentioning the preparations for my wedding in January (YAY!!). So I'm a little crammed up during this semester, and hopefully this blog will be like a place to vent all my frustration, anger, stress, and hardships that are coming on the way.

It should be exciting. ;)

So Ramadan is here....

I can't believe the year went so fast! Ramadan is great, but all the school work just ruins it for real. It's not like I'd spend the whole day praying and reciting Quran, but come on, it's like there is no time for anything. Clocks seem like they double the speed, you can barely scratch your head and the day is already about to close. Once iftar is done, time runs even faster, and before you know it it's 11 pm and you can barely have a few hours of sleep before waking up for Suhoor.

Ramadan is a stressful time school-wise during a regular semester, but this time it's even worse with all the extra work.

Things should really get exciting here.

Beard Dilemma

Keeping true to the laid back life I've had during the summer, I let my beard grow. I think it looks cool, but I want to get my nice looking trimmed look. Now, if I trim it now, then by the time Eid comes, it'll grow again. It won't grow to knee length, but you'll get those messy hairs. Instead of the nice clean parallel-looking hairs, you'll get those irregular, uneven looking ones, that are too big not to be noticed, and too small to be calmed. Then I'll have to get another trim right before Eid, and it is much harder to trim those little hair devils than with a long beard. Those messy hairs really test a barber.

I could let my beard grow, and get a nice trim right before Eid. I love having drastic changes and seeing the reaction on people's faces. However, a brother got to look good. I mean, I visit people, and well, I rather look pimpin'.

Life is hard, you know. =p

Moon sighting issue

The same debate EVERY SINGLE YEAR. Gosh people, give it a rest already. I am so tempted to write a very long post detailing my position on the issue, but seriously, what for? just so we have the SAME debate again next year?

I'm done for now.

Oh, wait...

Is it just me, or is my chatbox gone?

Tagged Again

2005-08-24T20:06:00.000+03:00

Finally an excuse for a new post. Thanks Sam. =)

Last book you read: Khaled Hosseini's Kite Runner. Good but "meh" at many parts.

Last phone number you called: Mohammad, our driver.

Last show you watched on TV: I seriously do not remember, but lately I've been trying to catch MBC's reality show Starting Over (Min Jadeed).

Last thing you had to drink: Al-Marai's Laban. The fat-full one.

Last thing you ate: Dates.

Last time you cried: I'm not trying to act tough or anything, but I honestly do not remember.

Last time you smiled: A few minutes ago. I was listening to to Ebert and Roper's review of the movie Wedding Date and I was glad Roper agrees with me that it was horrible.

Last person you hugged: Probably my mother, or father. I hug them occasionally but not often enough to remember the last time it happened.

Last person you talked to on the phone: My brother Abdallah, he was asking me if I wanted to come have lunch with the family.

Last thing you smelled: Myself.

Last CD that you bought: Within Temptation's The Silent Force.

Last song you sang: Megadeth's Rust in Peace...Polaris.

Last thing you laughed at: This guy in the movie Wedding Date, it was his wedding day and right before the beginning of the ceremony, he went to his bride-to-be with his hands covering his eyes to avoid bad luck associated with the known superstition.

What's in your cd player: I stopped using CD players after I got my iPod.

What time did you wake up today: 11 am.

Current favorite article of clothing: This is such a girly quiz. I can tell you my least favorite one: sandals.

Favorite place to be: Bed.

Least favorite place: Out of bed.

Do you believe in an afterlife? Yes.

In Heaven or Hell: Yes.

How tall are you: 5'6"

Current favorite word: I only have a least favorite one: Whatevah!

Favorite Book: 100 Years of Solitude, by Gabriel Garc?a M?rquez.

Random lyric: Don't look now to Israel, it might be in your homelands.

If I could be doing anything right now, i would be: Resuming reading the book that I...erm...stopped reading.

Are you a daredevil? Can't say I am. I kind of used to be, which I think now was stupid. Yes, I'm getting old.

Have you ever told a secret you swore you'd never tell?: LOL everybody has. Right? :/

Do looks matter? Yes.

How do you release your anger? Usually say Astaghfer Allah over and over, then spill my guts out to a friend. Poor poor friends.

My second home is: Those are some weird ass question. I don't think I have one.

One thing i have that i wish i didn't is: Myopia (short sightedness)

All you need is: love. Cliche I know, sue me. :p

Something i want but i don't really need is: Better music on the radio.

Something I need but i don't really want is: University degree, job.

*do you...*

drink?: No.
have a boyfriend/girlfriend?: I'm engaged.
have a dream that keeps coming back? Never.
believe there is life on other planets? Possible.
read the newspaper? Yes, quickly and painfully.
consider yourself tolerant of others? I'm tolerant now to people I would never stand years ago.
consider police a friend or foe? Stupid foes with authority advantage.

Tagging: Cat, CrazyRed, E-Sensation, Z, W, Raed, and NaBHaN.

Movie Review: The Island - 3/5

2005-08-08T21:36:00.000+03:00

The movie is set in what seemed to be a world ruled by Microsoft. Expectantly, it's full of errors.

It is about Lincoln and Jordan (Ewan McGregor and Scarlette Johansson), products in a cloning institute, they escape and travel to confront their owners, the people who paid for them (or themselves) to be cloned. On the way, they get chased by this very sophisticated and heavily armed bunch of people hired by the institute's CEO Morrik (played by the great Sean Bean), and instead of going to the police or some place safe, Lincoln goes back to the institute to single-handedly rescue everyone else there!

The film starts out great. It was interesting to explore the world of the cloning institute, the guards, the rules of proximity, the way we learn how each "subject is totally monitored when Lincoln was interviewed and remarks were made about his eating, sleeping, exercise and working habits. This exploration of a possibility of our future then turns into an action adventure ride when Lincoln and Jordan are chased in around in the city. It seems now that every action movie has a car chase with a car going against traffic, the one in this movie was very well done, although Ronin still hold the title of best car chase scene in my opinion. Then watching those cars flip one after the other after being hit by the huge dumb-bells throw from the truck Lincoln was boarding was also pretty badass.

Everything was pretty much fine and dandy until one plot hole after another started to appear. I understand it is difficult to construct a believable view of the future, specially such an outstretched one, so I usually allow a certain amount of mishaps, but sometimes they are so many that they are really difficult to ignore.

OK, so they planted those little bugs in him to monitor Lincoln's behavior, how come it took them so long to locate him in the vicinity of the institute? If he was so suspicious they could have monitored him 24/7. Second, it is too hard to believe they took that much time to locate him after he escaped. It is also funny how they discovered the guy who helped him, played by Steve Buscemi (Armageddon, Fargo), who was upstairs and giving everyone his back buying that map, and missed Lincoln and Jordan who were standing suspiciously right at the entrance of the station. Then they get to Tom Lincoln's home and we discover that the original Lincoln is Scottish, while the clone was struggling throughout the whole movie with faking an American accent, which was just painful to listen to. So let me get this, they can imprint memories in the clones but not speech patterns? OK, then they go to the car, and Lincoln the clone can drive? Not only that, but he very successfully maneuvers among tons of cars on the highway, DRIVING AGAINST TRAFFIC! Gimme a break. He later hops on what seems to be a flying motor-bike and amazingly just knows how to use it, even better than the specialized task force guys chasing him who shamelessly drop dead one by one behind him. The motor bike thingy then runs through a whole building, falling from its other end while the heroic duo jump and land on a big R sign stuck to the outside wall. The R then falls from a 70 floor-height, WITH our heroic couple ON it, and guess what, they come out with barely a scratch. When they by some undivine intervention from the script writer eventually escape from like everything, instead of going with his plan of going to tell NBC, Lincoln instead at some point not shown in the movie, changes his mind to do the more logical thing to expose the cloning institution for what it is: he'll go back, sneak in again without anyone noticing, blow the whole place up, free everyone, and escape again, all pretty much by himself. And he just does that. Man. And as if all of that wasn't enough, the last shot is of Lincoln the cloned and Jordan on Lincoln's (the original one's) boat! So when a man dies his clone just automatically claims all of his positions? Sounds fair, not!

I should have know when I saw the XBOX sign when Lincoln and Jordan were fighting, and the msn Search logo on the information directory booth that this movie's fate was like any Microsoft product's, full of errors. Too bad no amount of updates could help this movie.

Bottom line: I'm giving it a generous 3/5 for the cool concept and the very entertaining action scenes, also because I think, in spite of little acting envolved, Ewan McGregor and Sean Bean are still great actors. The numerous plot holes and the perpetual stupefying one-man-saves-world concept makes it just another big budget Hollywood summer flick. It is proof that money alone cannot make a good movie.

Post From Dubai

2005-08-03T15:33:00.000+03:00

Let's recap what happened in the past few days:

- Sunday evening I was with my family on a flight to Abu Dhabi for vacation.
- Monday morning I learned the following news:
1- John Garang died in a plain crash.
2- King Fahd died after a long illness.
3- My father's aunt, who was like a grandmother to me, also died the same prior night.

That was a little overwhelming to handle at first. We all just sat in silence, and soon it was getting very depressing, apathetic and just plain uncomfortable. Things would have been a little easier if we learned the last piece of news while we're back home, everyone would be busy either contacting relatives, giving condolences, or helping with the funeral; you're sad but at least you're doing something about. Here, you are so detached from everyone involved with the incident that you are left all alone, just feeling sad, period.

So how did we deal with it? As selfish and inconsiderate as it may seem, we went shopping like we planned before. After my father received the phone call from home with the news, we all sat staring at the floor, and after an eternity had passed my father and I started exchanging glances at each other that told with absolute certainty that neither of us have the slightest clue what to do. We had to kind of break free from all of that tensed environment before we start to get a grip on what's going on. We had to do something familiar, just go on with our plan for today and then try to figure out the next step.

After some debating and contacting relatives, we decided that we are better off staying and trying as much as we can to enjoy our vacation here, while my brother Abdullah, who stayed back home because he has summer school, will do what has to be done, or like we say 'ysawi elwajib'. I'm sure it may seem selfish by many people, I'm also sure they'd be more understanding if I explained the whole situation in more details, but frankly I don't feel the need to.

On a lighter note, I'm taking lots of pictures here, but because of my very stupid decision of leaving my laptop back home, I can't post any of them here yet. My brother Abdullah is coming tomorrow, and hopefully he won't forget to bring my laptop along. Til then, you all take care and sorry for the belated post.

اتقوا الله في دماء المسلمين

2005-07-23T08:30:00.000+03:00

يقول النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم "لو أن أهل السماء وأهل الارض اشتركوا في دم مؤمن لاكبهم الله في النار".

ويقول صلى الله عليه وسلم وهو يطوف بالكعبة "ما أطيبك وما أطيب ريحك ما أعظمك وما أعظم حرمتك والذي نفس محمد بيده لحرمة المؤمن عند الله أعظم حرمة منك ماله ودمه وأن تظن به الا خيرا".

ويقول صلى الله عليه وسلم "لزوال الدنيا أهون على الله من قتل رجل مسلم"ـ

Thank God For Peaches

2005-07-21T02:20:00.000+03:00

Peaches are the best type of fruit in the world. The qualities that make peaches the queens of all eatables go beyond mere shape, color or taste. These are but few of the things that would make peach (not the princess in Mario) miss world-fruit, if there was such a contest:

- Easy to cut: There may not be any other fruit as easy to cut as peach. All it takes is a little push of the knife and you've already reached the core, a run around it and in mere seconds it is cut perfectly into two halves.

- Hasshle-free seed: Lots of fruits are evil, having two kinds, one with seed and another seedless, many times you have to guess, and sometimes you guess wrong. A very painful and sometimes embarassing experience would be to reach for your favorite fruit, and enthusiastically bite into it just to feel your teeth almost shatter as they collide against the evil invisible seed(s), and the criminals are countless: watermelons, oranges, grapes, and the list goes on. Peaches, on the other hand, are honest. They always have a seed, and it is always one (unline cantaloupes which have like infinite!) It is easily visible, and even more easily detachable! Not only that, but when detached the seed takes almost nothing from the fruit itself. Try that with plums, or mango!

Before

After

Look at it, it almost begs to be eaten.

- I'm not allergic to it, otherwise bananas would win the contest, or strawberries maybe.

- Peeled or not, same great taste: For me at least. I eat my peaches unpeeled, but I have eaten peeled ones and they taste as heavenly. The trick is that, unlike oranges or oh God watermelon, the skin is so thin and tender you can barely feel it.

- Juicy but not messy: The secret lies in the texture. For instance, with oranges, you have this thin seethrough skin that although allows the slice to bend against your teeth as you bite in, the teeth don't go through it for a while until suddenly and with no prior warning you feel yourself dashed into the mess, with a string of juice shooting towards your eye burning it. For watermelon it's another issue. In (good) watermelon, there is so much juice that while eating it starts dripping down your chin making you look like a 1 year old. Peaches save you all that hassle, the texture is hard enough to take the shape of a peach, but soft enough to carry lots of juice that when you bite in, your teeth smoothly sink in, and juices run with a perfect amount and pace inside your mouth that not only let's you sip it in comfortably but also allows you to enjoy the taste of the hard part of the fruit, the peach itself at the same rate.

- Perfect size: If it weren't for the size issue, apricots would also be up there with peaches. With peaches, one can be enough, it's size is perfect for a light snack. Grapes (seedless ones) are evil, they come in such a small size that you keep eating, and every time you think you're done, you think, you know, seems there is still room for one more grape, and before you know it, you ate so many grapes that your belly starts turning green (or black.) Peaches are straight with you, you eat one, you're good, but you also can make a pretty good estimate whether your stomach can take another one or not. Peaches are stomach-friendly.

What peach haters may say:

- Skin is hard to peel: It's not as easy as bananas sure, but have you ever peeled or even watched someone peel a peach? It's an experience on its own. The care that must be taken to take the peel off a slice of peach in one take is not only admirable, but enjoyable. It's as if it is your baby and you're peeling...erm, wrong analogy. OK, it's almost like rubbing the dust off a newly discovered relic , you do it with so much care not only to prevent hurting the piece, but also to take your time as you enjoy unveiling the treasure within.

- They go bad quickly: Not half as quick as strawberries. Plus, you suck.

- The seed doesn't come out as easy as you mentioned: Well, that's because you suck at it. I admit it took me years of training to perfect my seed-removing technique, but that's partly because I had to do it all on my own. I can teach it to you in a few minutes, it's as easy as 1-2-3. I'd have shown it now with step-by-step picstures but I already ate the last peach I have (the one in the above pics.) Mainly, you put your forefinger right behind the upper end of the seed and your thumb a little above the lower end. Then as you push inward with your thumb, you pull outward with your forefinger and watch the seed peel nicely off and your peach is ready to be enjoyably eaten.

Bit of Arabic

2005-07-20T23:13:00.000+03:00

ذهب الرجـال المقتدى بفعالهم...والمنكِرون لكل أمر منـكــَرِ
وبقيتُ في خَلـَف يزكّي بعضُهم...بعضا ليدفع مُعورٌ عن مُعورِ
فـطـِنٌ لكــل مصــيبة في مــالـه...وإذا أصيب بعرضه لم يشعرِ

أبو الأسود الدؤلي

Chile's Pics

2005-07-15T23:15:00.000+03:00

I wanted to use Flickr first so that I can have pics automatically resized and with a nice comment below. It turned their free service only always 20MB each month, I was like fudge that. I decided I'll resize 'em myself, host them on imageshack (where I always host my pics) and use thumbnails to save space, and add comments under each thumbnail here on the post itself, basically doing all the work myself. Hope you like the pics.

Approaching Santiago, Chile here. I thought the view was amazing, looked like a painting, subhan Allah.

We arrived at noon, headed to our hotel, got our rooms (but did not unpack), went to lunch then back to the hotel to get our projects and stuff and right away to Estacion Mapocho, where MILSET's science expo was to be held. In the pic, I'm holding the box that has my project, then I walk backwrds and almost hit the guys coming from behind. If you notice my head, I was aiming at a place in front of me, while my friend in green, Jassim, was pointing towards the opposite direction, which caused me to walk backwards and almost hit the Emarati guys walking across behind me. If people would just listen to me.

We had 4 sections for 4 projects, mine would be the one on the right, yes the one with the broken light bulb.

(Me on the left): Pfft, too much work man, I'm gonna look for something easier to do.

Writing names on ID cards, that's more like my thing.

My hand is burned from the hot wax I used to fix the small flags above me, but I am overjoyed, we're all ready!

The whole gang in front of Estacion Mapocho.

Later at night we went to dinner and the language barrier showed its ugly face. Fahad (left) is trying to tell the waitress that he wants what's in the poster (beef) while Abdurrahman (right) just finished walking like a chicken, I kid you not, because he wanted to tell her he wanted...chicken.

My k750i Sony Ericsson phone can take panoramic pics by merging 3 pics into one. My phone so rules. Oh, this is the view from my room. It's not perfect, but the way I see it, it could have been much worse.

So I realize there is wireless internet in the hotel's lobby, and I run there to show off my small Sony laptop, just to find this one, smaller than mine! This guy from Quebec had it, it's so small it doesn't have a CD-ROM!

Estacion Mapocho, during the opening ceremony.

Us with the guys from Bahrain. Awesome and funny people.

With the Kuwaiti and Emarati guys. Cool people too, but the Kuwaities were too many, 43 people in Chile! We were only 7 :/

Next day we went to this park with stores that sell all kinds of traditional stuff. This guy and his wife supposed to be the best sculptor's in their tribe. They make all kinds of sculptures, mainly of famous natives in Chile's history.

The park had beautiful walkways. I think if the mechanical engineering thing didn't work, I may have future in the circus.

Even if my car didn't work, even if they didn't understand a word I said, kids were happy enough to watch the videos of the car moving around I had on my laptop. Kids are the best.

But they had more fun with the working robot Rashid had.

I could tell you exactly, almost word for word, what I was saying during that picture, simply because this is always how my hands look like when I'm explaing how the steering of the car changes the electric potential, also changing the power of the electric signal going to the computer, which the computer translates as a degree of rotation. Yeah, I said something like that :p Oh, and this guy had loads of questions. Alhamdulellah nothing I couldn't answer.

This girl speaks classical (fus7a) Arabic, and she's from Hungary! Amazing.

*looking through my English-Spanish dictionary*: Hmm, so how does one say "no avocado for me, ever, EVER!" in Spanish?

During the cultural night, all gulf countries agreed to make one presentation together. The speech at first were said in 4 languages, Arabic, done by the Kuwaiti guy in the pic, English by the girl in front of the mic, French by the girl in the black hijab, and Spanish by little ol' me! I wish there were better pics but oh well, better than nothing.

This is by far the biggest crab I have attempted to eat, or seen anyway. Santiago has some good sea food restaurants, specially at the central market. Here, the waiter is cutting the crab all up,then he'd slide the meat out of each leg and lay it nicely on our plates. Price was cheap for the good food and service we had. Somehow though, I still prefer home-cooked seafood.

We appeared in Santiago's local newspaper El Mercurio. OK, not all of us, just Saleh and Rashid, still cool though. Don't ask me what Saleh is blowing.

I'm trying to get a good shot of the scene on our way up the mountain and the stupid trees won't let me!

Check out the mountains rising from the fog in the back. Spectacular!

My first time ever touching snow had to be recorded. I am happy, but I don't look like it in the picture for two reasons: 1) The sun is in my face. 2)My hands are freezing as it took forever til my friend snapped the picture.

Me: I'm not smiling, something's wrong...

Rashed:I don't know man, I think we look OK. See, I'm smiling.
Me: Dude! Can you come over here for a sec?

Me: Ah, perfect. Now I can smile.

Where we rented our skiing gear.

For some odd unknown reason, we have to learn to ski on one leg before we put on the other ski.

Yay I'm skiing...

No I'm not. Fahad (guy in blue pants) walked a few feet and I'm still in the same position.

Group pic with the coolest skiing instructor ever, Ahmad Eisa. He's from south of Chile.

Chilling at a restaurant on the mounatin, talking with Ahmed Eisa about how he became a Muslim.

After skiing, we were all spent, and we used the little energy we had to pack all our stuff to start the trip back home the following day.

This is definitely on the top 5 of most exciting and fun trips I've ever made. I'd love to go back if it wasn't for the long flights. Beautiful country, kind people, just if they spoke a little more English. ;)

Tagged Part Dos

2005-07-13T03:07:00.000+03:00

Again by W. =)

1. What does 'love' mean to you?
Someone who can stand your sh**.

2. What does "marriage" mean to you?
The second half of my life, which I think will, insha'Allah, be exciting and loads of fun.

3. Do you believe in 'love at first sight?
No. I don't think you can truely love someone before knowing them. It just doesn't make sense.

4. How many children would you like?
As many as possible. But it takes two to tango, so we'll see what she thinks.

5. If given the opportunity, what is that one song you would sing for me on wedding day?

Arabic: جيت لين البحر الاحمر...جبت من قاعه درر...يعجب النقاد منظر...يا سنا حظي سعيد...طاب ليلك يا عريس
English: Love Stinks :p

6. What is your favorite holiday destination?
After reading the Da Vinci Code, Paris!

7. What are three qualities you would look for in a woman?
Honesty and just being totally natural. I wouldn't mind a pretty face either.

8. What are the three qualities and three bad habits that you have?
I never liked this question, so I'm going to pass. Sorry W.

9. Where do you see yourself in 10 years time?
Living with my wife and (probably) two kids in my own house here in Qatar, probably not too far from where my folks live. Probably not blogging too. :p

Tagging: Kazablanka, Sam, E-Sensation, Nightface, Crazy Red, Z, Cat, Raed.

Back

2005-07-11T02:42:00.000+03:00

Just got back home. The trip back home was good, I don't feel so tired really. I got to finish The Da Vinci Code and at least now I could see why people are so hyped up about it.

Now the bad news is that I can't find my 1 Gig USB drive yet, so I have to figure out another way to transfer all the pictures from the laptop to my PC. It's also better to wait til I could get copies of all the pics that were taken by all my friends on the trip.

So, anyway, wb to me! Now I have to get some sleep.

Kids Shouldn´t Know This Much

2005-07-07T18:12:00.000+03:00

I´m making a nueva entrada

It happened, I met one one of those kids who seem to know everything. His name is Roberto Gonzales and he´s from Columbia. You know what he does in his free time? Study black holes! The guy calculated Chandra´s limit, the Schwartzman radius and all kinds of properties for several black holes. And he´s only 16!! He also claims he doesn´t want to publish his data on the internet because he´s afraid someone might steal them, that´s how far this guy went! I´m so friggin´ jealous. I´m 26 and I only know what he´s talking about but I didn´t do any math work myself.

Gotta start reading and working. Can´t let 16 year-old kids intimidate me.

Me, A Celebrity

2005-07-05T05:21:00.000+03:00

No, that is not the stage for some birthday party. That is, believe it or not, the main stage where the official inauguration ceremony of our international science expo MILSET took place. Except for the part when MILSET's president attempted to welcome everyone in several languages, including Arabic (we barely make up what he said really), the ceremony was pretty boring. Or maybe I should say it would have been boring, if it wasn't for us!

We, the Qatari participants, ROCKED! We all came with our traditional (or should I say everyday) Qatari clothes, and we pretty much stole the show. EVERYONE wanted to take pictures with us from all countries. At one point, we were surrounded by at least 20 people, the front row had at least 5 people with cameras, after a while I could barely see with the flashes that were, um, flashing in front of my eyes. We felt like celebrities, I swear we could barely walk a few steps before someone stops us to get a photo snapped with us.

People kept asking us about our clothes and where we're from and stuff. Several asked why do where so and so piece of clothes, and I'd reply with "why do you wear a shirt?" They then have this dumbfounded look, and somehow I don't feel they took my reply very nicely. They have this "pfft, what a smartass" look, which I admit my answer was a bit smartass-ish, but seriously I couldn't think of any other way I could make them realize that it is just what we wear everyday. Most people don't get up in the morning and ask themselves "damn I wonder why I always wore shoes before I went out." It's just what people wear/do.

So many cool, funny, embarrassing, everything things have happened but I'll spare everyone a long boring post and try to put the whole day in small points, so here we go:

Breakfast: My friend ate pork without know, and he liked it.
Preparing our booths: Took us ages, we had this cool Qatari flag hung sideways.
Lunch: Sucked
Opening ceremony: Mexican guy promised to teach us salsa dancing. I discovered that to befriend a South American, all you need to do is mention the word "dance." These people love/live to party.
On the bus back to the hotel: Singing and making a presentation to my new Argentinean and Columbian friends about different ways of wearing the Qatari headgear, ghutra and ogal.
Dinner: Found a cool restaurant close to the hotel, but had a tough time explaining what we wanted to order considering non of us speak Spanish. One of my friends went with the waitress outside to point at the big poster of the dish he wanted, while the other was imitating a chicken because he wanted, well, not pork this time (he's the one who ate pork in the morning.)
Shopping: I bought the original Spanish copy of Gabriel Garcia's 100 Years of Solitude.

Today was a lot of fun. Tomorrow the expo is going to be open to the public. It'd be hard to top today's fun but hey, you never know.

Finally in Chille

2005-07-04T03:56:00.000+03:00

Alhamdu lellah * infinity

The flight went much better than I expected. First we found that it was not, after all, a direct flight. We had to make a quick stop in (something) Andres city in Argentina before reaching Santiago. I spent all the time either sleeping, eating or reading, which got me to finish half of The Davinci Code so far. I actually thought I'd finish it by the time I arrive in Chile, but I guess I wasn't being realistic.

It isn't as cold as we all expected. I'm sitting here typing this post right outside our hotel, Los Nogales, and although my fingertips are getting a little cold, the rest is alright, and I only have a light jacket on. It's like when your body feels a little cold, but not too much to make you feel uncomfortable. It's the kind of cold you can enjoy.

There are huge green mountains all around the city, which made a really awesome air-view before landing. The people are, so far, nice, although it isn't easy to find someone who speaks English. Lol While I was typing the last senestence a lady with a girl who seemed to be her daughter approached me and started speaking Spanish. The only word I recognized was "Qatar" and they only knew this 'cause they read it off the card hanging from my neck. This is going to be one heck of a trip.

The science expo looks like is going to beawesome. A sort of a let down that most of the partcipants are really young (high school level or younger) but that makes my job easier since I could probably make up stuff about my project without them noticing. I just hope I don't get one of those super nerd kids who'd bombard me with specific technical questions. Hate those type of kids who think they know everything, even the ones that actually do know everything.

Tomorrow is the official opening ceremony of the expo, should be a lot of fun.

French, Oh French

2005-07-02T21:47:00.000+03:00

I'm right now at Paris Charles Digol (sp) qairport, and I'm having a real hard time typing here because of the messed up French keyboard, a few letters are misplaced and it's annoying as hell. It's funny though how the whole blogger menue is all in French now.

The flight from Dubai to Paris went much better than I expected, the time passed so quickly I didn't feel the need to check the time not even once! I hope I can carry the same attitude for the next 17-hour flight *sighs*

Can you guys believe that there isn't a place to pray in the airport? I would have expected from such a huge and important in a country with a huge Muslim minority to have a little ,osque somewhere, or at least a little prayer hall for anyone to pray from any religion like they do in Amesterdam`s airport (I think it's Amsterdam). I was a little worried about what people will think if I started praying in front of people, don't some security idiot to hink I'm doing some mandetory ritual before blowing myself up. It sucks that it has come down to this you knoww. I remember in the pre-9/11 years I used to have no problem what so ever with praying anywhere I liked. The worst thing is you'd some curious people staring at you, and maybe ask you a couple of friendy questions later. Times have changed.

See you guys soon, now I gotta hit the "Publier le message" button and go get something to eat.

See You All Soon

2005-07-02T03:57:00.000+03:00

In a few hours I'll be boarding a flight on my way to...guess now...

No, guess again...

This is your last time...

Wrong! I'm going to *drum roll* CHILE!

That's right, Chile. Yeah, I wouldn't have guessed it after a thousand times either, so don't feel so bad.

Remember the little car project thingy I was working on (link)? Well, I was preparing it 'cause I got to represent Qatar University in a science expo (link) in Santiago, Chile. I'm leaving today, and will, insha'Allah, be back late at night on July 10th.

This is by far the longest trip I have ever taken (and probably will ever take.) We start from Doha to Dubai, then Dubai to Paris, then (get this) board a 17-hour flight directly to Santiago!! That's just insane, dude. I can imagine myself, getting bored of all the acitivities I have in line, books, DVDs, flight movies, music, talking to friends, and all in only a few hours, then the worst thing happens, when all you do is want to sleep, but are NEVER able to. You can't just force yourself to sleep. And even when you try all the tricks to sleep, then one actually works, and you sleep, and then you are terrified to wake up because it happened before, you know that once you glance at your watch you'll discover you only slept for 15 min! You do eventually decide to wake up 'cause you can't stand sleep-pretending anymore, you look at your watch and guess what, it has been only 15 min! Total torture.

I'll try to relax. I'm trying to think I have a WHOLE day ahead of me from Paris to Santiago. I'm trying to imagine it even longer than it will be hoping that somehow I will be surprised when the pilot announces the arrival (OMG I THOUGHT WE WERE STILL IN PARIS LOLZZ!11). Man I just know it ain't going to work, that I'll be sitting there counting the minutes and seconds, and calling the stewardess every minute asking her when will we reach land.

I'd love to blog and post pics from there, but I doubt I'll have enought time or convenience to do so. So, most probably, I'll see you all next week. Will miss you all.

Prayers Needed

2005-06-30T02:29:00.000+03:00

Sadly, my academic advisor and senior/graduation project supervisor, prof. Hussain Rahmatullah, has been recently diagnosed with having a brain tumor. One of the most humble, down to earth and giving teachers I've ever known, is now undergoing radiotherapy and chemotherapy, and the doctors are optomistic that they can contain the disease within the next weeks of treatment. His family and he are in desperate need of everyone's prayers so that we can all see him up and healthy again.

Please don't forget him in your prayers.

By Linda Causey

2005-06-29T03:50:00.000+03:00

Courtesy of aperfectworld.org. Check out the Bad Idea Man cartoons, some of them are quite funny.

Blog Thought

2005-06-28T03:03:00.000+03:00

You know, it's at times when I have so much to blog about that my blog feels alive, pumping with at least one or two posts a day that I get more comments. It's, ironically enought, the same time I forget to check for comments since I guess I'm having so much fun blogging.

That is contrary to the dark times, when my life feels stagnant, and with great effort I try to force out a post before the week comes to an end that my blog feels so lifeless I hardly get any comments. It's, also ironically enough, those times that I keep checking several times a day for new comments, hoping someone other than me did the effort of updating my blog lol.

Blog life is fickle.

PS: I first mistyped the last word, placing a "u" instead of the "i", which brought me a laugh. Note to self: you are no longer a teenager, stop laughing at these types of jokes. "fuckle" *giggles*. STOP!

I Got Tagged!

2005-06-28T01:01:00.000+03:00

...which basically means I need to answer a couple of question another blogger, the great W, has passed on to me.

I used to get these kinds of questionnaires through email, and always ignored them thinking they were just stupid. But this one is made by bloggers, and bloggers rule!

So here we go:

Number of books I own: Count them yourself!

Books I've just finished reading.

My next-to-read book.

This is my desk looking tidy. I'm not kidding. Remains of my bachelor life.

Obviously, I didn't read all of them. Some are text books, some are references, and very few that are waiting to be read.

If you want to get a better approximation of your count, you have to (at least) double the number of books in view in the last image because of the depth of each shlef. I would love to think they are many, but considering my father has a seperate room of our little house, each wall carries shelves to the ceiling housing all types of literature, not counting the mini shleves in the middle of the room, mine is nothing more than child's play.

Last book I read: Stephen Hawking's The Universe in a Nutshell. It's a good book for anyone, not only science buffs such as myself, who's interested in updating himself on the universe as scientists understand it today. However, because it tries to put lots of heavily complex theories in layman terms, let alone trying to encompass all the major theories, past and present, governing our universe all in one book, some topics are oversimplified, others are quickly summarized and the reader is never given enough detail to understand them. For the heavy task it took, however, it is an amazing effort from the famous Hawking, whose light-hearted sense of humor succeeds in keeping the reader interested even in such a boring subject as SCIENCE!

Five books that mean a lot to me:

Separate category: I just didn't think these books fit with 5 fav books category I'm mentioning next. The ones in this paragraph have had and still have direct effects to my fundamental beliefs today:

القرآن الكريم، فقه السنة للشيخ سيد سابق، كتاب التوحيد للإمام محمد بن عبدالوهاب، حصن المسلم من أذكار الكتاب والسنة لسعيد بن علي القحطاني، و صفة صلاة النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم للمحدث الشيخ ناصرالدين الألباني.

Now on to what everyone expects from a 5 fav books list ;) :

- Where Does the Weirdness Go? Why Quantum Mechanics Is Strange but Not As Strange As You Think, by David Lindley. By far the most interesting, entertaining, clear, and absorbing book that have been written on the subject of quantum physics. I've read it at least three or four times, more to come.

- 100 Years of Solitude, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez: I have never found characters so rich, interesting, lovable, close as the ones Gabo (as he is called by fans) created in this novel. One of the most, if not the most, emotional reading experiences I have ever had.

- The Hobbit + The Lord of the Rings trilogy, by J. R. R. Tolkien: If you've read the books, then you already know how I feel, if you haven't, then you are missing on the most beautiful, interesting and joyful fantasy adventure an author has ever written.

- The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho: I have never read a novel where each page is a treasure in itself. Honestly, Coelho has the ability to articulate so much in so few words, there is wisdom in every paragraph, sometimes even every sentence in The Alchemist.

- Soul Mountain, by Nobel laureate Gao Xingjian: Without the slightest bit of overstatement, THE crappiest book I've ever had the pain of reading. Boring as hell, characters that don't make sense, environments that don't make sense, a plot that doesn't make sense, nothing makes any sense about this book. Even the author receiving the Nobel prize of literature does not make sense. Feel free to read my brief review on Amazon.com, under the nick name "Blessed." It should be either on the first or second page. Also don't miss on the negative reviews, some are really hilarious.

The book I am reading since long but could not finish: Gabriel Garcia Marquez's The Autumn of the Patriarch. It's a tough read, the structure is strange, and the sentences go on and on, some for literally half a page that by the time you reach the period at the end, you forgot what was said at the beginning of the sentence. I'm giving the author the benefit of the doubt though and blaming it on the translation.

Stephen Hawking's The Universe in a Nutshell took a long time to finish also. I already mentioned above why it was a difficult read.

I'm Tagging: Enigma (Not Sam), Cat, PT (or Z), Kazablanka, Nightface, and Sree. (Let's hope they even see this)

Double Kudos

2005-06-27T21:28:00.000+03:00

My First kudos is directed, surprisingly, to the biggest most blood sucking leech-like monopoly my dear beloved country has ever produced, Qatar Telecom, as they have yesterday annouced the launch of their eQ-Tel service. Finally we're able to pay for their ridiculously overpriced services rom the comfort of our homes using our internet connection, which is also provided by our dearly beloved Q-Tel. I have all the rest of my life to hate you Q-Tel, but today I shall love you. Thank you Q-Tel.

My Second kudos is for the Ethiopian government. Apparently, a few months ago they applied more strict rules on Ethiopean citizens that want to work aborad. In the old days all they needed was a work Visa issued from the country they want to work in, and the airline ticket of course. Now, a contract has to be signed by both parties, employer and emplyee, spelling out clearly the rights of each party.

I know this because our favorite housemaid of all time, Neima, is leaving us for good because of health problems. My mother loved her so much, we all begged her to stay but she said she felt tired all the time and that she needed to quit now and go back home. My mother then asked her if she could recommend someone else to work instead of her, someone (lol) just like her. Her cousin, who is working with my disabled grandmother, is also leaving, and they're both from Ethiopia. Neima recommended two of her relatives, so we quickly finished the Visa issues, contacted them back in Ethiopia and they made the 8 or so hour trip from their small village to Addis Ababa, it having the only international airport in the country, so that they can board the flight to here, Doha.

They were then stopped by authorities in the airport, and after contacting us we learned that an emloyment contract has to be signed by both parties and approved by the Ehtiopian embassy where they're planning to work, and because there is none in Qatar, the papers have to be mailed to the closest one, the Ethiopian embassy in Kuwait! At best, this is a huge inconvenience for us.

Now here's the good part, these new rules were put after a number of Ethiopians who came to work in some gulf countries were unpleasantly surprised by some of the working conditions and the salaries they were receiving. To protect its people from frawd, the Ethiopian government issued new laws that no Ethiopian citizen can leave the country for work until he/she signs an emplyment contract (shown below), also signed by the employer, and approved by an Ethiopian embassy.

Documented in the emplyment contract the amount of the salary and the interval of payments, the length of the employment, the right to a sick leave and so on. It also spells out the right of the employee to terminate the agreement at any time in any case of physical abuse, inhuman treatment, serious insults, long working hours, or even just not liking the work, although in the last case a thirty-day notice must be given. The rights any working man or woman deserves.

So, kudos to the Ethiopian government for acting appropriately on behalf of their hard working citizens.

"Extreme Makeover" Sucks

2005-06-27T20:42:00.000+03:00

It's a show about people who get thousands of dollars worth of surgery for free just because they can't deal with the way they look. I hate the idea of the show. I hate the idea of plastic surgery all together really, unless it's fixing something drastic like a 5 inch long scar on the face. With the latest editions of Playboy reemphasizing the narrow defintion of beauty in only blond-hair and blue-eyes (no pun intended to the women who fit this category), the ideal look of a woman as an anorexic stick-like figure portrayed in fashion magazines, and Lindsay Lohan, the last thing we really need is a show that tries to prove that looks is what matters!

And they do it in the most deceiving way. It's more apparent when it's a girl: they show her before pictures looking like her mother just died, with the most hideous wardrobe, and no make up at all. The after pictures are exactly the opposite. OF COURSE she's going to look better you morons. If they had any guts (refraining from using the other expression here) they'd show both pictures either with or without make up. Asses! Woops.

It was all summed up when this guy just looked at his new face in the mirror for the first time and said:

"You know what? I don't know this guy, but I like him!"

You know, people judging you positively about your looks may sound better at first, but in essence they're still judging you by your looks.

I know the show has been on for long, it's already in it's third season, and I know that many have talked about it, but when I heard the above comment I just couldn't help but pour my thoughts out here.

Post-Wedding Update

2005-06-26T22:55:00.000+03:00

I just came back from the wedding, and I'm very far from feeling like a million bucks.

It's not because I can hardly get my fingers to type these words, or that my thigh muscles feel sour, my swalloen index finger, the pain in my middle finger, which just stopped bleeding, my tense neck muscles, or the almost paralized right shoulder.

It's not because I hadn't eaten anything since lunch, since I was too busy to even sit down. It's not because the only way to sustain life was to drink whatever I can get my hands on, which included some water, Arabic coffee, apple juice, 7-up, pomegranate juice, and pineapple juice. Trust me, not a very rewarding combination.

It's not because I discovered how out of shape I am, when I felt my heart almost stoppped only after a few minutes of sword-dancing.

All the above usually comes with any wedding of a close friend or relative I go to, and I still manage to get back home feeling like a million bucks. Today's wedding was different. I wasn't a guest, I was in the action, with every step of it.

And you know what sucks, it's not really the amount of work you have to do while everyone else is having fun, it is just that nothing will seem good enough to you. You watch the work, the coffee and tea being circulated, the guests being welcomed, the dinner being prepared, the dishes being put down, the guests invited to the dinner, the guests being escorted to the place where they can wash their hands....Ah, I'm not going to mention anything, but what really sucks is that you notice every single flaw, you see it with your own eyes, every plate being put a few inches away from where it's supposed to be, every guest entering or leaving without being properly escorted, every carpet who has a some folds here or there AARRGGH! It's like reading an essay you just wrote and noting every single sentence or word that could have been replaced or improved.

But you can't replace or remove it. You cannot afford to correct every little thing, because there are a million other things waiting to be taken care of. You cannot afford to fix the tilted plate because everyone's already sitting and it's time to make sure everyone is having dinner. A little later, you see a couple of guests that really should be one of the first to sit down for dinner standing but you don't have the time to pull them by their throats, because you're already busy directing people where they can wash their hands. A few minutes later, you see people going to the opposite sides of where they're supposed to be, but you neither have the time nor the energy to pull them back because you're already overseeing the plates being removed.

Every little flaw is stored in your brain, and you leave each stage with disappointment and frustration which accumilate as the wedding proceeds until you're left beat down and exhausted by the time the groom leaves announcing that it is time for everybody to go home.

You drag yourself home, rewinding the tape in your head, and telling yourself how you could have made it all better. You console yourself with the fact that it is in the past now, that hopefully it didn't look as bad for others, and that it will be a good experience to you for your future wedding.

You gulp down the last bits of chemically manufactured pineapple juice, then you feel a lump in your throat and you start coughing to discover that the last bits of the juice were pieces of mashed pineapple, also chemically manufactured to look authentic. You try to forget the spider that you just saw running under your chair, hoping it will not crawl its way into your mouth while you sleep.

You then look around, and see the book you've been reading lately, waiting to take you into somewhere far from this world. You type the last words to your blog post, and get prepared to click on the "Publish Post" button. You then notice how warm the room is, then you remember you had to turn off the AC before the shower you took right before the wedding. You remember the day's experience again, and feel the heavy load that your book promised to erase come back again with full force. In a quick move, you reach for the AC remote, click on the "Start" button, then move swiftly back to your keyboard to click on "Publish Post" and then run towards your new world.

Wedding Training

2005-06-26T15:39:00.000+03:00

I just had to update, whether I had something worth talking about or not. My blog is starting to look like a dull painting in some skyscraper's corridor that cannot invite the quickist glance from the tens of daily passers-by.

My cousin's, Abdulrahman, wedding is tonight, and I'm so psyched. Whoa it rhymes! The time's right, for me to take flight. OK, I'll stop.

My cousin has only been blessed with a single brother, Shaheen, who is too young to help out with the wedding, so many friends and relatives have been helping out. My brother Abdullah and I have been helping a little since yesterday, checking out the tent (he has a huge tent from Albaddad, checking if the lights, air-conditioning and fans work, making sure they got the chairs, carpets.

We also should be busy tonight with making sure everything goes as planned. The cool thing about guy's wedding parties is that they don't have a lot going on really. You just need to make sure the tea and coffee are circulated evenly, but also pay attention at high profile visitors, who usually do not stay for long, so at least one has to be alert to quickly serve 'em as soon as they sit down. If there are fresh juices and stuff circulating than those are extra. We also have to pay attention to the band, make sure they don't take too long of breaks between songs. Since evening prayer finishes now at 8:30, dinner should be served around 9-9:30ish but no later than that. For wedding dinners, the earlier they are served the better. And that's pretty much it. For the rest of the time, I should be acting as a guest and having fun.

Because there isn't so much going on there, it is the little things that count. Coffee must be hot, and good, and we have to make sure we have enough people serving it as to have an even coffee circulation around the guests. The worst thing would be for someone to enter the wedding ceremony and leave without veing served coffee. Then there must be some people responsible for receiving guests, specially high prfile ones, you know people with certain positions in the government, big business, just important people. And then the dinner has to not too late, and we must make sure that no one's left out.

It kind of sucks since I do prefer to play the role of the guest full-time. Yeah I am happy to help out my cousin, and I know it's a good experience for me since I have a wedding to think about, but still it's much more fun to just stroll around the wedding and watch everyone else get everything ready for you :p.

Anyway, it's 4:03 pm now and the wedding should start around 6:45. I have to go check that everything's ready. Pray that I don't collapse or anything as I am VERY tired right now already.

"It's just another wedding, it's just another wedding..."

State of My Life

2005-06-21T23:38:00.000+03:00

I'm having so much fun right now that it's scary. My life is far from perfect, and I could make a very long list of things in my life that should guarantee nightmarish nights, that is if I would get any sleep at all. My life is so complicated right now, there are a million things that I need to do, each has to do with certain people, and those things are so entangled with each other in a web of circumstances that it is overwhelming to think about.

In the study of probability, when several events, each with a certain probability, are connected together so that they create one total outcome, the probability for that outcome to be a success equals the multiplication of the probabilities of each event. So if we think about the unresolved issues in my life, each with a fifty/fifty chance of success, then multiplying all these probabilities we end up with a very small number, meaning a very small possibility that my life will turn out fine.

In spite of the seemingly dark picture, I seem to have no problem with it what so ever, alhamdu lellah. I'm taking my time in each step, doing whatever I can each day, enjoying every moment of whatever I am doing at a certain time, appreciate myself for each task I finish no matter how small, and then move to the next, no matter how small or big.

It isn't as perfect, ordered, or successful as it sounds. Like I said, my life is far from great. Maybe I just realized life isn't worth being so miserable about. Sometimes I encourage myself with the thought that everyone thinks they're the only ones who have so and so problems, that I should be better than that and realize everyone has problems, that it is only about what attitude one carries with his/her problems.

I didn't plan this post to be the way it turned. At first all I wanted to mention was how much fun I'm having these days reading. I never realized how I missed reading so much until I delved into the two books I'm reading right now (a novel and a science book.) I was just caught up with reports, projects and exams of the last semester that I forgot how awesome it felt to read. People usually describe reading a book as diving into a new world, but I usually felt a book to be more of a companion that has SO much to offer you. A novelist with a strong sense of language and an infinite volume of imagination who's ready to share knowledge and thoughts whenever you call for him, just any time and in any place YOU feel like hearing from him.

In fact, I was planning for this post to be about how much I felt my posts were turning more boring, with little life, and much less passion than they used to have when I started my blog. I then wanted to claim it was because I had other passions going on that nothing was left for my blog.

I have to say though, I'm pretty happy now with the way this post turned out. Maybe not very focused, but much better than what I thought it'd be like. =)

Baby Cats

2005-06-18T23:23:00.000+03:00

I just snapped these pictures moments ago at our house's entrance.

There were three of them at first, but only one was brave enough to stick its head out the whole time, while the others hid behind. They're all cute and nice when they're tiny until they grow up and get all paranoid and frantically running away at the slightest sight of any human. Humans are no better.

Life...

2005-06-18T23:22:00.000+03:00

...is amazing. Thank you God. Thank you mother.

My New Car

2005-06-16T00:55:00.001+03:00

Just wanted to share one thing I am (or should be) busy with throughout the following week. I am trying to assemble this car that old friends of mine worked on as a graduation project 2 years ago (man, I can't believe it has been this long.) The car uses ultra-sonic waves to sense obstacles and automatically avoid them. It also has a camera that can be configured so that the car can follow an object with a specific and unique color.

The car was torn down because, although everyone else liked the car, the examiner (the prof. who is responsible for most of the grade) didn't. He thought it looked ugly (which it did) and was poorly designed (which it was), however it was sad that he didn't take into account the vast amount of work that was done on it. 90% of other graduation project don't involve half of the amount of effort that was put on this one.

Anyway, long story short, so far I was able to get all the parts needed, which wasn't as easy of a task as I thought. I have to get it all ready before the end of this month for a reason that, if everything goes fine, will be revealed later insha'Allah.

Triumph of Classical Arabic

2005-06-16T00:15:00.000+03:00

When a couple are officially engaged it is called here in Qatar and the neighboring region "Melkah". The verb is "Malak" which means "to own". However when it is said that a man got engaged, it is usually said as follows:

فلان ملك على فلانة

as opposed to:

فلان ملك فلانة

The second literally means that the man has "owned" the woman. The first, which is the one that is used, when translated word for word means 'the man has owned over the woman', which doesn't really make sense neither in Arabic or English, not to me at least. However it is just the expression when people want to say that a X guy got engaged to Y girl.

The above is the usage in local dialects. However, in classical Arabic (فصحى) the expression is "aqd qaran" (عقد قران) which translates to "agreement of partnership". Although no one really thinks of "owning" anyone when the former expression is used, the latter is more elegant and clearly spells out "partnership" instead of the sexist implication one may feel from the expression used in local dialects.

That is just another reason why classical Arabic will always remain superior to any of the modern dialects spoken now.

Speaking of engagement, I've just done my Melkah, I mean 3aqd qaran, on Tuesday. I'm officially married now, yay. =)

Things That Shouldn't Bother Me

2005-06-11T21:25:00.000+03:00

It bothers me how:

My father only says hi once I turn my back to him making my way out of whatever room we're in. I know he does it 'cause he just wants to make me spend a little longer time with him, but it sucks when you're sitting there for so long without him noticing you, and just when you feel you got bored and want to go look for other ways of excitement he goes "Hey Mbarak." It shouldn't bother me because it's probably his way of saying "I don't want you to think I didn't acknowledge that you were here", still it sucks when it always happens at the last minute.

My mother starts talking about family problems, because the talks never end, and they're usually more of he-said-she-said stuff that I really rather not be bothered about. It shouldn't bother me because I should acknowledge that although these things may not matter to me, she wouldn't have sat and spend that long of a time talking about them unless they matter to her, and I should be a good enough of a son to at least listen to what bothers her.

My grandmother gives me such a hard time because I missed one day without seeing her. It shouldn't bother me because she lives right next door to us and I don't really have any serious excuse not to take 10 minutes out of my schedule to say hi to her.

Family members keep asking me every single time I meet one of them about my graduation time. It shouldn't bother me because I know if I spent a little more time with them and let them know me better we'll find other things of interest to talk about other than my academic life.

When I decide to open up to some friends and mention some of my problems, how they go on judging mode and start offering the most trivial and simplistic solutions like I never tried all that. It shouldn't bother me because I used to be them.

Google Me!

2005-06-10T11:35:00.000+03:00

Woohoo! I'm on Google. When you google "Mbarak" my blog profile URL is listed on the FIRST PAGE! Now you guys cannot use the excuse of "Oh I didn't visit your blog 'cause I forgot the URL", now you just google my name and you'll find me. Sounds like a some romantic sappy song for the 21st century "Just google my name, and I'll be there baby, oohhhoaaahhhooo."

Picturia

2005-06-09T02:29:00.000+03:00

Since I finished my exams on Sunday I've been enjoying my time, going out with friends and most importantly, snapping some pictures.

We went to this Iranian restaurant, and there was this band, well it was just a guy singing and another dude on keys but I guess you still can call it a band, anyway, playing some Iranian music. The picture is a zoom in at the band. A zoom out gives a better prespective of the atmosphere:

Oh yeah, the party is pumpin'!

This was at Qatar's Postal Service main building. Doesn't "Internet Free" mean "no internet"?

Check out the battery icon on the top right corner, my iPod is running on an empty battery, awesome! Apple makes the impossible happen. I think this should be their new slogan. Would be cool if anyone can spot some "other stuff" in this picture. ;)

Insecure Scientists

2005-06-08T22:37:00.000+03:00

Edward Arthur Milne was a prominent British astrophysicist and mathematician that lived during the first half of the 20^th century. Instead of going the usual way of taking classes and reading text books to complete his undergraduate studies, he arranged with Trinity College at Cambridge so that he submits papers with original work that amazingly earned him a Fellowship at Trinity.

Many, including myself, see this as a sign of his sheer brilliance, however not Milne. The very fact that he missed on the typical academic way of studying made him always insecure about his mathematical ability. He would always fill his papers with rigorous and tedious mathematical formulations just to prove to himself and others that he was good enough. Some of his colleagues, such as Sir Arthur Eddignton, did not miss an opportunity and were happy to point out to any mistakes in his papers, comments which Milne sometimes took very personally.

It just amazes me how some people like Milne can attain such levels of exceptional scientific achievements, can pretty much live on clouds compared to us mere laymen and still become a victim of the same insecurities and self-doubts that any of us can experience.

Another example is Indian astrophysicist and Nobel Laureate Subramanyan Chandrasekhar, who wrote in a letter addressed to his brother:

I wish I could…tell you how I feel at times that my heart will break by the oppression of my ignorance… I cannot repeat too often that nobody can be so dissatisfied with oneself, as I am of myself.

The letter was dated May 12^th 1931. By then Chandra(as many called him) was 20 and doing his graduate studies at Trinity College as a result of a scholarship he won after completing his undergraduate studies in Presidency College Madras the previous year. He joined it when he was 15, and before he even completed his degree he was already publishing his own scientific research papers on stellar structure.

Sometimes I try to imagine the life of such scientific prodigies, how it would feel to be a genius doing research, publishing papers and arguing science with the likes of Eddington, Bohr and Heisenberg. How great it’d feel to attain a fraction of their achievement. However, the above proves that you can have all that and still feel like crap. It means, to me at least, that happiness is not something that you aim for, or a feeling you hope to receive as a result of certain achievements, but rather something that you can decide right now. You decide how you feel about yourself right now regardless of what stage of your life you’re going through, weather it is full of achievements or struggle. Success is not a goal to reach, but rather an attitude you decide on taking on right now. If such prominent scientists are not immune to insecurities then the cure must be something else than what you can achieve in life.

Somehow I am reminded of British poet T. S Eliot’s quote “Success is relative. It is what we can make of the mess we have made of things.”

It brings back a quote I read once by British poet T. S. Eliot that said “Success is relative. It is what we can make of the mess we have made of things”

Info on Milne and Chandra were taken from Arthur I Miller’s book, Empire of the Stars.

GOTCHA!

2005-06-06T09:29:00.000+03:00

To work on our graduation project, Qatar University gave me and my project-partners this room/office place that we also occasionally use to study for other classes, or just as most cases chill, enjoy the superfast free internet connection. ;)

I finished my exams yesterday but a couple of friends still had one more exam they had to do today, so unreluctantly I chose to hand them the key to this room/office so that they can use to study. Their exam is ongoing at the moment, and I chose to come to school now simply to see a professor about a certain matter, and I didn't find him so I chose to come to this room where I'm typing this post now.

Now I don't smoke and I don't like to sit in a smoking environment, I hate the smell of smoke, so believe me if I befriend a smoker then he must a pretty special person, otherwise I won't stand sitting with him. I enter my room here and find freakin' cigarette ashes on a sprite can on my freakin' desk! How dare they! I swear to Allah I have made it very clear several times that I do not under any circumstances like ANYONE lighting a single cigarette in this place. They are free to step aside until they finish their cancer dose then come back, but NEVER in my domain! I am so so pissed.

There is only one cancer-lover in the group so I already know who he is, and I'm just waiting for him to finish his final. There's going to be fists flying, teeth shattering, and bone crunshing here very soon. If I don't make a new post by tomorrow, then that means I will be in jail.

You Love Me, You Really Love Me

2005-06-05T20:11:00.000+03:00

I just ran through some of my old posts, and I was amazed at the amount of typos, misspells, grammar mistakes and other stuff that cannot be categorized, sentences that just don't make sense at all! Now I'm really wondering how you people could stand reading through them, and some of you even made sensible comments!

Problem is, after finishing a long post I obviously feel too lazy to proof-read it, just so many words. I know I know, if I can't take the time to read my own post then how am I supposed to expect other to do the same. But it's like you just wrote it and know exactly what to expect.

I should proof-read my posts before hitting the "Publish" button though, and I promise I'll try harder in the future.

Thank you people for sticking with me through the bad and the ugly. You guys rock!

Pins That Should Not Be

2005-06-05T16:24:00.000+03:00

...in Kids' stores at least:

You notice the toys in the right side of the picture? Yes it is a toy store, Spacetoon's store. If you're not familiar with the name, Spacetoon is a TV channel kids aimed at Arab kids. They always rave about being THE channel that makes sure everything shown conforms with Arabic ideals and principles and so on, also unlike some children channels (*coughDisneycough*) they make sure their cartoons and shows are all broadcasted in (simplified) classical Arabic to strengthen the kids' Arabic language. So I was really surprised to see such "Lick Me" and "who's your DADDY" pins up there along Lego and Fulla dolls. I pointed it to the guy working there in the store, and he was like "yeah these seems like they're for grown ups" I'm like "you think?" He wasn't interested in doing anything at all, and frankly he probably was just told to put them on the shelf. Whoever ordered the stuff is the one responsible, so I'm going to the top; to Spacetoon!

I try to do my research and look for any way I can contact them from their website, and I find out that half of it is under construction, including of course the "Contact Us" part. So I immediately go to my brother Salem's stash of Spacetoon magazines and get the magazine's email, write down a very elegant letter (in Arabic, man I haven't written in Arabic for a long time), telling them how happy me and my parents were (not really) that Salem is watching a channel that cares so much about what they show for kids, and thus how surprised I was to see such things in one of their stores. I ended it by saying that I preferred to email you guys rather than talk to local newspapers because I'm confident it was an honest mistake...etc (I'm so nice aren't I?) I hit send and I immediately get an email telling me the email was not delivered! Most of the times this means BOGUS EMAIL! I just can't believe how can they have the audacity to have this email printed in every issue of their magazine when it does not even exist!

I'm not losing this fight too quickly. I then google the publisher, Young Future Publications, and find an email. Thankfully, I kept a copy of the email, so I just change the old email to this new one, and guess what? ANOTHER BOGUS EMAIL!

At this point I really don't know what to do. I'm thinking of going to the local papers, they just love to expose such things so I'm sure they'll be more than willing to publish the story. I don't like though. It feels wrong, even though Spacetoon also did wrong, but I guess I feel like a narc in school if I go to the newspapers with that. "Look teacher, Khalid has a squirt gun under his desk!" I'm thinking of looking up the owner of the Spacetoon store in Qatar and talking to him. If everything fails I guess I have to be the narc.

I looked up the company that manufactures these pins, Twinklers, and most of their products look innocent with little bunnies and smiley faces. I had a kind of a hard time locating the pins that I found in the store. And man there were even worse ones, stuff like "Beyond Bitch" and "Boy Toy"! But you know, the worst part is that, just like the store did in Doha, they are scattered among things that are for kids. A "Sex-O-Holic" pin was literally shown there between two innocent looking "Let's Party" and "Looking for Love" pins. Those pins were located under the section "Big Kidz" that has an icon of a drawn kid with only his red-underwear on, very cute looking I must say. I don't know about you, but the kid sounding title (Twinklers) and the whole kiddy look of the website provided they have this adult stuff stashed somewhere around the site is very disturbing. It's as if they actually want kids to be exposed to this, even the ones that do not wish to. I think it's unethical, sick and should be stopped. At least a warning should be put up "this is NOT for kids."

I'm done ranting.

The Son of the Mask - Twice the Suck

2005-06-03T02:10:00.000+03:00

"I will kill you!"
"You will not, for I am your brother!"

This is an example of an exchange my 11-year old brother Salem and I had yesterday. Gives you an idea of the quality time I spend with him, no wonder we're so messed up. By the way, he was the one who wanted to kill me.

I promised WAY back that I was going to post pictures of me with Salem and his friends, and because his friend Mohammad unfortunately still did not manage to send me the pictures he took at the time of the linked post. So, I had to take it upon myself to take new pictures with my new Sony Ericsson K750i phone. The one in the front is Faisal, behind him is his brother Eid, to the right is their brother Mohammad and then the little devil Salem:

You know, I KNEW someone was doing something behind my back, taking a picture is not so much funny to have them all HAHAHA-ing as I was snapping it with my phone. Oh well, kids.

The son of the Mask (1/5)

The movie was so BLAH! First of all, I thought it was for kids, but after the amount of very icky kissing I've seen in the movie there is no way it should be aimed for kids. Second of all, even if it was for kids, that is no excuse to make such a shallow, un-funny, forgettable, terribly written, awfully acted movie. I mean for the love of God, couldn't have they spent a little bit more effort at make-up, the hair looked like a piece of plastic attached to the actor's air-filled head who's acting was OH so lame, gosh he wasn't even trying to be funny. He did try to be cool though and failed miserably. The special effects: some were good, but the CGI kid was scary. And you know they'd trick almost as if they mean to scare you. First they show you the real child and he's oh so cute. Then the camera moves to some other angle then back to the kid, and he's a totally different person! Yeah they got the hair and eye colors but everything else was nothing like the original. the CGI'ed kid looked like a 50 year old shrunk into the body of a one foot tall infant, each eye has a different size, the nose was crooked, forehead lines were countless and the skin looked like friggin' clay, ew! Not cute!

Witty exchange of dialog like the first movie? No. Take this, the "evil" mask guy is at a shooting spree with the cops inside a museum, he shoots AT them but none of the cops get actually shot, instead they keep jumping like school girls that walked into a ground covered with thorns (actually that would have been a better scene.) After the evil mask guy stopped shooting he looks at them and says "Thanks for dropping by" to which they reply "dropping?", so he continues while smiling pointing with his finger downwards "by!" The cops look down and see a circle of holes made by the bullets, they utter an over-dramatically AAHHHHH!!! as the fall down to infinite nothingness. Now seriously, would there be ANY reason the cops would be replying with "dropping?" I don't see it, if someone has a logical explanation then please hit me with it. The script writer just forced a pseudo-witty dialogue into the scene that ended up looking very very stupid, and the movie is filled with those.

What a great way to ruin a classic.

And just to let you know the extent of my misery with this sorry excuse of film roll, I took Salem so that we see it on Friday. Man...what a Friday. Anyway, on Monday he tells me he wants to take his friends; Mohammad, Eid and Faisal to see The Son of the Mask, I'm like come on man, can't we just chill at home today, he gave me this sigh like all his world just crumbled, I'm like fine we'll go see it another time but only for THEM. Then in the middle of the very stupid movie, I hear Faisal making some comments about the movie, I ask him hey you didn't see it before did you? He enthusiastically answers "Yeah we did! On Friday just after it came out!" I'm like I can't believe you guys dragged me to see this movie when you ALL saw it before. GOSH! I then felt a little sorry for them, because they would go to another movie if there was actually any movie for kids out in the cinemas. So I did the only mature and reasonable thing at such a situation and slept for the rest of the movie.

I don't know why the cinemas in Qatar bring so many crappy movies. It's either a crappy movie or a good movie that is already available on DVD. And if they happen to grace us all with a good movie, then know for the sure that the next few weeks are going to be ALL bad or old movies. For instance, they showed Star Wars Episode III on the actual international release date, the next week we have Sahara and Coach Carter, the week after The son of the Mask and Hide and Seek, the next is Boogeyman and Birth! I can't say Birth was a bad movie but I just saw it on DVD last week damn it! I seriously should consider opening my own movie theater.

Khamis Al-Rashdi

2005-05-30T22:56:00.000+03:00

He's a political cartoonist in Qatar's newspaper Al-Sharq. I've always loved his cartoons and thought he should be somewhere far beyond the local level he's in now, he's up there with the levels of cartoons seen in international publications such as Newsweek and Times. Even though his name got very brifly mentioned in CNN once, I think it is far from the recognition he deserves.

Yesterday, Al-Sharq published another great cartoon of his:

On the right half it says "The west", and it shows a western looking man confidentally making his "No" vote in the box that has the stars and the word "Constitution." On the left, "Arab World", half we see a guy casting his "Yes" vote afer being beat up and having his "No" vote thrown in the trash. The cartoon happened to be published as France was voting for the referendum to approve EU's constitution (before the results were announced), and right after Egypt announced the approval of a constitutional amendment concerning elections.

The cartoon mentioned on CNN, however, was probably the most controversial and my favorite cartoon of his:

Say Masha'Allah

2005-05-28T03:12:00.000+03:00

Please do when you look at the picture. Doesn't Mariam, masha'Allah, have the prettiest eyes in the world.

And just in case there are any cynics out there that may think I got this pic off of the internet or something, here's a pic of me with Mariam. She's so tiny!

I took these pictures using my brand new Sony Ericsson K750i phone (2 megapixel camera w00t!) that I bought the same day. I'm snapping pictures like there is no tomorrow so expect to see picture-filled posts much more often from now on.

Thanks to echo, Arabian Princess, Sam, Catchy, e-soz, Crazy Red and everyone for your congratulations, may I return that whenyou have your babies soon insha'Allah. =)

It's a Girl!

2005-05-26T12:50:00.000+03:00

My sister had her first baby this morning OMGLOLLERSKATEZROFLICOPTER!!!111

I just came from the hospital and the baby looks beautiful masha'Allah. My mother says she has my sister's mouth and her dad's eyebrows. I really have absolutely no clue how people notice this stuff on something so tiny. All new babies look the same for me (I hope my sister doesn't read this.)

I think this baby is going to give me a hard time. My sister was in the hospital since yesterday morning at 8, and until 1 am there was nothing. My mother was with her all day and she didn't even sleep the night before, so she called me around 1 am telling me that the doctors said the baby will probably be delivered in the morning and that she wanted me to bring her back home so that she gets some rest. So, I change, get the Suberban's car keys and head to the car, start the engine, then my mom calls again saying that my sister is starting to have pains and the baby could be delivered any moment now. I got all excited and went back home after telling my mother that I'll be up and I don't have school tomorrow so if she needs anything she can just call me up right away. I get back home and stay up until 4 am, and nothing, no news, no phone call. By 4:30 I'm done. I only slept for two hours yesterday and was up the night before because I was studying for my first final, in which I did well alhamdu lellah. I was talking to a friend who's in the US during the night, and by 5 am I was nod-sleeping in front of the monitor, you know when you sleep and your head moves gradually lower till your chin hits your chest and you raise you head again; it happens several times that it looks like you're nodding. I knew that that was it, I can't stay up any longer, especially that I was planning to see a professor at school around 10 am. I lie on the bed, and just 15 or 20 minutes later, just when I started enjoying the taste of the first stages of sleep, the phone rings and my dad very tired and very sleepy voice tells me that my sister just had the baby.

Beautiful moment, we're all happy and so on, but notice this; the little brat waited ALL night, until the minute I friggin' decided to get some rest. At that very moment she was like AHA, it's perfect, now I'll come out and Mbarak shall NOT have a peaceful time to sleep. Can't say I hate her, but I can see we may not get along so well in the future. Plus, I already heard my mother call the baby حمارة (literally: donkey, metaphorically: you suck) when I visited my sister at the hospital this morning, so it's not just me who's having a hard time with her.

So from now on, it's Uncle Mbarak, please. ;)

Say Hello To My Little Friend

2005-05-24T20:08:00.000+03:00

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

What do the above pictures have in common? I can't get close to touching either because the damn cockroach just crawled on my toe. A hair raising feeling! I am so disgusted with my toe now I can cut it off and eBay it. Any takers? It is a pretty good looking toe, you have to admit.

Philosophy Schmilosophy

2005-05-24T13:30:00.000+03:00

"To be is to do" - Philosopher A*
"To do is to be" - Philosopher B*
"Do-be-do-be-do" Frank Sinatra

I wish words of wisdom would stimulate action as easy as they stimulate thought. It will narrow the gulf between knowing what's right and doing it. But does that mean it would do the same for other decisions, namely "wrong" ones? If so then both actions will be as easy and we'll end up in the same world. How about if only the right actions were made easier, so that good always wins, and evil is at a constant loss. Would there be evil then? Evil ways have always been the easier road than good ways to get the same results, that is the main (maybe the only) attractive thing about the former. Through that evil gains more fans, otherwise everyone would eventually be good and soon evil will be a legend told in future generations. But can good exist without evil? Is it true that to each thing an anti-thing, an anti-matter to matter, a negative to a positive...etc. Does good need evil in order for good to survive, in order for it to have meaning? Does death define life?

I think I'm going way over my head there. Truth is, I've been lazy to do my assignments and study for my final exams which are drawing near, and I'm trying to find some lame excuse to that laziness. Maybe I should attach the above to my professors along with each late assignment. "This assignment is being handed late because I, as a student of life before being a student of engineering, have been having difficulties in motivating myself to submit my work. Below is a brief explanation of how far I reached in deducting the actual reason behind such difficulties, and whether they will ever be resolved. Thank you for your patience."

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*I have searched in pages after pages on the internet for a reliable source of these quotes, but the only ones who actually mentioned a source said they got it off of public toilet wall! The first two quotes were interchangeably credited to Kant, Sartre, Descarte, Rousseau, Plato and Socrates, and most of sources were other blogs. Who know, maybe there were made up. All the links, however, agreed on the Frank Sinatra one. Plato and Socrates can go to hell before anyone dares misquote the great Sinatra!

It's Weird to be Back

2005-05-20T02:34:00.000+03:00

It's as if you haven't seen a friend for a long time, you have this urge to call him but it feels weird, it doesn't feel as natural and friendly as before. You're always terrified of how awkward will your conversation be, how sad it will feel that only a relatively short time of disconnection has caused all this uneasiness. This is exactly how I feel writing back in this blog.

Yesterday a friend of mine called me a drama queen. Sometimes I really wonder how much people know more about me than my own self.

I saw National Treasure on DVD for the first time today. Yes I preferred to stay at home and watch a relatively old DVD than to go watch Star Wars: Episode III yada yada. I tried hard to like this Star Wars series with absolutely no success, and the fanatics do not help at all. I mean come on, look at this !

Anyway, the movie was fun to watch. Sure it is your typical American/conspiracy theory movie, you know, guys that, with no explanation what so ever, have the navy-like fighting and weaponry skills, athletic to the max, can hack the toughest of securities in a matter of minutes...the best of all worlds, all embedded in the all American patriotic hero. It gets boring after a while. Actually it gets boring pretty quick. But hey, it's an action movie, and i admit, I had fun watching it.

There was this scene when Nicholas Cage's character "Benjamin" is standing across from Abigail (done by Diane Kurger, the girl from the disappointing film Troy), and he's expressing how much he loves looking for the treasure of all treasures and how hard he has been looking for it since the time his grandfather told him about when he was a kid, how sometimes he's so close to it he can taste it. Then she looks at him and says "People don't really talk that way you know", to which he replies "I know, but they think that way."

Seriously, why can't people just say whatever they feel? You know what sucks? People who make you feel awful for just acting natural, in your own silly/vulnerable way. They give you this look like you're some type of alien while they know deep inside that it's more natural to act that way than to abide by certain customs of sitting, standing, talking. Not really that, but, and I believe this is mostly with guys, when people always take on the "duel" mode. Why can't you just, out of the blue, just share what you exactly feel at a certain amount of time. Why do some people feel so reserved in accepting when they know themselves that it happens to them too, we get feelings of happiness, anger, sadness, joy, depression...etc sometimes because, for no logical reason, we remembered something in the past or sometimes we just feel that way! Other people aren't as mean, they give you this "compassionate" look, but they never share anything back, or at least say yeah I know EXACTLY how that feels. Sure some may not know how it feels, but I'm talking about that look, the one that says "I know EXACTLY how you feel, I go through crap like you also, but in no way I'm expressing it because, well, I'll probably look silly." Believe me, you won't. I like people saying whatever the hell they feel, it makes me feel better inside, it makes let's say the game fair, when everything's out on the open so that reactions also will be correct.

See this is what happens when I don't post for a long time, I start making posts that make little to no sense. I hope I've learned my lesson.

I.C. Engines and Starbucks

2005-05-11T07:03:00.000+03:00

I don't know about you, but it is so amazing to me when I can see any similarities between scientific equations and human behavior. It is part of why I love science so much, I believe that those mathematical expressions and equations is a method to describe life, and help us understand it better. They are a part of life, and they (if correct) should be harmonious with other parts of it. Mathematics this way comes to life, it is no longer a collection of numbers and symbols but another language, another sense to experience life in addition to sight, sound, smell and touch.

Sometimes a mathematical or physical relation has absolutely nothing to do with a specific human (individual or social) behavior, but when somehow they happen to have similarly, I get this tingly feeling deep inside. There may be no power of science that can relate the two logically, but just their similarities tap into something deep, in my opinion, that life should be like that. It's all one earth, one universe, one life.

Don't worry though, I'm not turning hippy on you, so let me just give an example I experienced today.

I'm taking this course about Internal Combustion Engines (I.C. Engines), and it mainly talks about car engines. There is this relation between the speed of the car, which we call "load" and the engine's efficiency. The relation goes something like the following figure:

One could expect the efficiency of the car to decrease as it goes to higher speeds (larger load, moving towards the right of the graph), however what was (to me at least) surprising was to discover that also at very low speeds or loads the efficiency of the car does perform worse. Does that mean that it's not good to drive the car slow? Well, that is a very relative question depending on what we mean by good, and I'm not going to get into right now. However, it was very surprising for me to know that a car engine is more efficient, not at low or high speeds, but at somewhere in the middle!

"But how the hell does this have ANYTHING to do with Starbucks dammit!?" You ask?

So I take a break from studying this afternoon and I call up a friend so that we meet up a Starbucks. I get there and I'm starving. It's around 4 something PM and there is hardly anyone there. There were 5 Starbucks guys behind the counter, doing various things. I stand at the counter, and everyone is just moving past me doing everything BUT taking my order! What the heck? Then finally someone acknowledges my existence in this world, the guy comes, I order a COLD turkey sandwich and a medium fresh orange juice with ice. All the guy had to do was pick up the stupid sandwich, and I don't even care if he cut it up or not, just throw it on the damn table, click on that o.j. machine and seconds later everything should be ready! Instead, he tells my order is worth 31QR, and I have the EXACT change (I never have the exact change) and the geezer leaves before I hand him the money? And NO he didn't leave to prepare my stuff, he just disappeared somewhere, and 4 other guys are still running around behind the counter doing I swear I don't know what, just crap! The guy finally comes back "31 QR sir" I'm like dillhole, I heard you the first time and I had the money all along! I hand him the money, he picks up a turkey sandwich and puts somewhere on a table behind him, and disappears again! I move up to wear they serve you the drinks, and thanks to the almighty ALLAH the orange juice is finally ready, but I still can spot my sandwich real far, just freakin' sitting there with 4 Starbucks airheads just running around! I'm like" can somebody get my poor sandwich please", the guy who took my order is no where to be found, this other philipina girl who works there felt sorry for me, and thought it's her advantage to show who's the better employee, she runs to my sandwich, takes the knife, cuts up the plastic pack around quickly and perfectly. I'm like WOW, she knows what she's doing, my dream of having my turkey sandwich is much closer to it being a reality. She picks up the sandwich and moves it away from me, where the hell...I see her hand moving towards the microwave, she's about to murder my sandwich, and I swear to God I uttered the most dramatic "NOOOOOOoooooo." Everyone, and I mean everyone, there turned their heads expecting to witness a child drowning or something, they then look back at the philipina girl and they realize what was about to happen was much more grave than anything that they expected. I yelled desperately "PLEASE, do NOT heat my sandwich, I beg of you woman!" She then withdraws her gripping-gripping hand from the microwave, shuts its door, and I finally feel blood running through my veins again.

See I'm kind of a regular at this Starbucks at Al-Emadi Center, and I saw how they work. I kid you not, they were MUCH more efficient, finishing more orders in less time when many more customers were there.

I do believe each person needs a certain amount of pressure to work better and more efficient. Too much pressure may break him down, but too little will not allow him to reach his full potential, and in fact it may have a negative effect dragging him down. It happens with me in school. Too many hours per semester can hurt my grades, but too few have always hurt my grades even more. I need a certain amount of pressure to work better, otherwise my efficient, just like an I.C. engine, will go down.

Starbucks employees should all take a course in Internal Combustion Engines, taught by me! Hmm, I could make some extra money off of that.

Their Things vs. My Things

2005-05-09T23:17:00.000+03:00

The main purpose of this blog was to document thoughts of mine that I may like to get back to later; thoughts that range from the most serious and personal to the extra silly, with a drop of cheese. I just hate it when I can't recall something I said or wrote somewhere in the past. This blog could be an archive for life, or just another interest that will fade away like previous ones (chat-rooms, online games, message boards.)

Anyway...

In one of the message boards I used to go to, someone posted one of those feel-good life-is-perfect lists called:

15 Things You Probably Don't Know

1. At least 5 people in this world love you so much they would die for you.
2. At least 15 people in this world love you in some way.
3. The only reason anyone would ever hate you is because they want to be just like you.
4. A smile from you can bring happiness to anyone, even if they don't like you.
5. Every night, SOMEONE thinks about you before they go to sleep.
6. You mean the world to someone.
7. If not for you, someone may not be living.
8. You are special and unique.
9. Someone that you don't even know exists loves you.
10. When you make the biggest mistake ever, something good comes from it.
11. When you think the world has turned its back on you, take a look: you most likely turned your back on the world.
12. When you think you have no chance of getting what you want, you probably won't get it, but if you believe in yourself, probably, sooner or later, you will get it.
13. Always remember the compliments you received. Forget about the rude remarks.
14. Always tell someone how you feel about them; you will feel much better when they know.
15. If you have a great friend, take the time to let them know that they are great.

Good list right? But as we all know, the world has both black and white, life and death, yin and yan, good and evil...etc. So I took it upon myself to write the anti of the above list:

15 Things You Probably Don't Want to Know

1. At least 5 people in this world hate you so much they would die to end such agony.
2. At least 15 people in this world hate you in some way.
3. the only reason anyone would ever love you is because now they know what they don't want to be, you!
4. Your smiles are creepy and they bring happiness to no one, not even the people who like you, assuming such people exist.
5. Every night, SOMEONE thinks how life would be better without you.
6. You mean the world to no one.
7. If not for you, someone may be alive.
8. No matter how hard you try, you will never be special nor unique.
9. Someone that you don't even know exists hates you.
10. Whatever you do, bad results are always the case.
11. When you think the world has turned its back on you, think no more. It's true.
12. Believe in yourself all you want, because just when you think you're able to get what you want, you will lose it. ALWAYS.
13. Always remember the insults you received as they will always keep you checked of your true self. Don't even try to remember compliments as you most probably never got any. And even if you did, whoever said them probably didn't meant it.
14. You want to tell people how you really feel? You bear the consequences. Don't say I didn't warn you.
15. If you have any great friends, which I doubt, do them a favor and cut all relations with them. NOW!

Personally, I like my list better =p Which one do you prefer?

What Women Want

2005-05-09T02:48:00.000+03:00

Once upon a time there was a small kingdom, ruled by a fine King, who ruled his people with justice and mercy. One day, while his eldest Son was on his regular hunting trip, he mistakenly crossed over to the territory of the neighboring kingdom. Patrols of the neighboring kingdom caught him and held him prisoner (I guess both kingdoms weren't very cool together.) The father pleaded for them to let his son go, and after much negotiation, it was agreed that he would be let go but only on one condition. The king that held the son captive said he only needs one question answered, and he will give the Son's father 30 days, if by the end of those days he gives an answer to such question then his son will be free. If not, then his Son will be executed.

The question was: What do women want?*

Afraid for his Son's life, the King did everything in his power to get an answer to the question that will free his son. He announced that anyone who things he/she has answer should present the answer to the King's palace. He got hundreds upon hundreds of different answers, and none seemed right to him. The time was running short, it is now only a few days before the deadline, and he's still like the same day his Son got caught, without a clue. His first and most loyal Knight, the King's right hand, then mentioned to him an old witch that lives in a stranded area upon the darkest mountain at the outskirts of the kingdom. She was a wicked Witch but she had the reputation of knowing the answer to any question.

The King then asked for the wicked Witch to be brought to his palace. After being asked, the Witch smiled and said with confidence that she knew the answer that will let the King's Son be free, but she also had her own condition. She said that after the Son is let go, she shall be married to none other than the first Knight. Although the King had so much love for his son, he also held great respect and love for his Knight, who stuck with him through thick and thin, the keeper of his secrets, the only person other than his son that will gladly give his life to the King. Not only that, but he is the most handsome and respectful bachelor in the whole kingdom. Girls want him and guys want to be him. He then smelled a horrible stench, he turns his head to find a crouchy old woman, her clothes haven't been washed for months, huge nose, one eye, discontinuous line of hair, falling skin, and supporting herself on her also crouchy cane. He couldn't believe he was about to condemn his first Knight to live with this horrible horrible woman for the rest of his life. He reluctantly turned to him and the Knight, bravely, smiled and nodded to the King.

The Witch then whispered something to the King, which he immediately wrote down and sealed in an envelope and had it sent with the fastest of horses to the neighboring kingdom. Hours later, the news came that the King's son was free. The whole kingdom celebrated with joy! The King was overwhelmed with happiness, but he could never forget that the same choice that caused the freedom of his son will cause an imprisonment of his loyal Knight. And even as he tried to forget, the Witch came running to him asking him to fulfill his promise. The loyal Knight accepted gladly.

Days later the celebrations were held for the Knight's wedding. the Knight took his bride to his house, bringing her then to the bedroom. He turns to her and instead of the ugly wicked witch he saw the most beautiful woman his eyes has ever seen. She then answered his puzzled look saying that it is her, the wicked witch now transformed to this beautiful woman. She told him she will only look like that half of the day, while the other half she will be back to her horrendous look, and it is up to him to choose which half of the day will she be either one. If he chooses her to be beautiful during the day, then the whole world would know how pretty his wife is, and he could bring her to all the occasions, balls, parties...etc that he has to attend as a first Knight, but he will have to face her ugliness the whole night when they are alone later. If he makes the other choice, then he will have the best time alone with her, but he will live a life of embarrassment when everyone, everyday sees the witch he married during the day time. The Knight had a very tough choice to make. So what was his answer?

The Knight said to the witch: You choose! The beautiful woman then said that she shall beautiful night and day, for he now knows what women want: they want to be given the choice to make their own decisions.

And they lived happily ever after.

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I remember reading this story on a message board years ago. It was posted by a girl from Spain, who claimed this was a traditional Spanish story. Of course I did not copy it word for word, I only remember what happened in the story, so now you know why it's poorly written. I'm no feminist or anything, but I like the story. It's at least original. Anyway the inspiration came from the story Z posted on his blog, so thanks Z, I guess.

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*I just added this part. I just found out that I didn't mention what the question was, the question that was the point of the whole story. God I feel stupid.

Kaza: I'm Sorry

2005-05-09T02:38:00.000+03:00

I gave you a hard time when you once said you couldn't use my shoutbox because you were getting errors. Well, I finally can post something on my shoutbox but only after getting errors all day!

Let the world now know that Kaza then told the truth. This is an official post-apology for calling you a liar then. Don't get too excited though, I'm not saying you never lie, just that you didn't lie at the time. =p

...

2005-05-07T01:52:00.000+03:00

"It's all over but the crying
Fade to black, I'm sick of trying...

...Baby we're done"

And You Thought Your School Principal Was Tough

2005-05-07T01:48:00.000+03:00

Student suspended over call from mom in Iraq

10 days! This principal makes Ghloom, the toughest shchool principal in Qatar and the principal in the high school I went to, look like a harmless puppy.

Kingdom of Heaven (8/10)

2005-05-06T15:12:00.000+03:00

I don't claim to be a serious movie buff, but I think I have watched enough historical based movies to know what to expect, and more importantly what not to expect.

It is unrealistic to expect a movie writer, or a director to be so true to history for several reasons. For once, history is subjective; no 2 history books will tell you the same story, unless they copied from the exact same source. History books are so subjective it's not even funny. To get a realistic idea about what really happened at a certain point in history you'd have to do a great deal of reading different history books that used different sources. My father read three different books about the end of the Ottoman empire and he still doesn't claim he knows what happened completely for real.

Second of all, no matter how true the movie is to history, it should be after all a movie. The writer tries to conveys some ideas, reflect certain feelings and let the viewer have a certain experience, and he uses (in this case) some events in the past to do so. That what puts it apart from a documentary, in which a writer is trying to just tell what happened. So, it is perfectly expectable that in a movie, historical events will be shaped in a way to give that view, or vision the movie writer has in mind for the viewers to experience. That is of course, excluding the other constraints such as keeping the pace of the movie and the time limit that could slash many potentially good or true scenes.

Having this in mind before I enter the movie Kingdom of Heaven, I also knew that the movie was about the crusades. I tried to isolate myself as much as I can from all that I already know and read about the actual crusades. I put in my mind that now I will see a movie about two parties that will go to war, trying as hard as I can not to make any prejudgment about which side is good or bad, or if they were Muslims and Christians or Elves and Goblins. I'm going to take this movie as it is.

The result was, I enjoyed a very good movie. There were so many historical mistakes, but hey if I wanted to see a historical documentary I'd switch to the History channel. The writer and director had things in mind, feelings, ideas and a vision that they wanted to deliver and they brought it all home! It was a very enjoyable experience. The acting was very good. Jeremy Irons (one of my favorite actors) was awesome, even though he did not have a very big role in the storyline. It just shows you that a great actor will shine no matter how small his/her part is. The storyline achieved a good balance between the emotional/romantic and the action sides. The action was great, the fight scenes were bloody, the two armies clashing together, the attack of the catapults against the castle, the camera angles during the battles were all top notch to give a very rewarding experience for action lovers. the cstumes were beautiful, yet not too lavish or eccentric. The Arabic of most actors was horrible, except for Salahudin, who was played by an actual Arabic (Syrian) actor, Ghassan Massoud, whom Arabic was spoken like a pro. I loved when pronounced "Salahudin", each letter clear and spoken very clearly. It is such a relief after horrible Arabic of all the past Hollywood movies that we had to endure. Finally, the music: absolutely amazing! Very beautiful and emotional, but they never take you away from the scene. I am buying this CD as soon as it hits the stores in Doha.

There were, however, some flaws. The biggest was how the movie missed telling us how the main character, Balian, (played by the Lord of the Rings' elf; Orlando Bloom) magically acquired all this knowledge and experience in war tactics from only being a blacksmith in France. Another was that the main battle, where most of the killing took place was not shown. But I can understand it not being a big part in the storyline, and how even if it had great action scenes, it'll mess up the pace of the movie and may also leave the viewers always waiting for this battle to have an impact on the story. That's all of course, not counting the historical slip-outs that we've agreed shouldn't the experience of the movie. But it was funny seeing how we, Muslims, pray all scattered around the land instead of forming lines behind the Imam hehe. No biggie really, it's just a movie.

I know that may seem like a passive approach, but I think one should remember that at the end of the day it's just a friggin' movie. So just enjoy/take it for what it is.

Favorite quote:

Balian: You march to certain death.
Hospitaler: All death is certain.

What Do You Think of Your Dad?

2005-05-03T15:28:00.000+03:00

I took this from a cool message board I visit frequently. I'll call it "Tell me how old are you, and I'll tell you what you think of your dad":

1-10 My dad was the smartest guy on the planet.
11-12 Dad started slipping a little
13-18 Dad was the dumbest, most obnoxious turd on the planet
19-21 Dad was still not with it, but maybe I judged him too harshly
22-25 You mean he KNEW about all that stuff I thought I was getting away with?
25+ OK, I get it now. Thanks, dad - I love ya. Sorry I was such a prick. For any teenagers out there, it isn't your dad who is the idiot.*

So funny, so beautiful and so very true.
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*Originally posted by Nortpoy at the Mike Portnoy message board.

My Little Brother is an Idealist

2005-05-01T22:05:00.000+03:00

I don't have anything happening in my life, so I might as well make another post about my (almost, I think) 11-year old brother Salem. Actually I do have stuff happening in my life but nothing that I can discuss here. ;)

I took him to his school's annual festival thingy. They have a play or two about helping your fellow brothers or being a good Muslim/person, a poem or two recited by students but usually written by teachers, and they end with the most exciting part, the KARATE show (*makes a Bruce Lee badass sound). Actually, I go to this festival every year and they always do the same moves, I have them all memorized by now. Next time I should walk to the karate boys and start doing the moves with them. I would love to see the reaction on everyone's faces when they see this grownup guy with his Arab headgear walk up there and start going (enter Bruce Lee voice) WWHOOOAAAAAHH!.

On the drive back home, we were trying to listen to this awesome Final Fantasy soundtrack music that we both like but my iPod's battery goes out. Sorry Salem, the only alternatives now are either my giving priceless words of wisdom or listening to BBC Arabic on the radio. As any sane person in the world would do, he chose the latter.

This guy on the radio was talking about the future of the British Labor Party, and along the way (for no reason that I can remember now) he mentions the "cold war." I thought it was a good opportunity to explain the concept of a cold war to Salem.

So I start explaining it to him, war, no guns...etc. I brought the example of the US-USSR cold war, and he seemed to actually get it. Then he asks "but why did the cold war between the US and the USSR start?" I'm stomped. Now how can I explain to him capitalism vs. communism, something that is pretty complicated for his age, and for my mind. Anyway...

I say something like "Both countries had so powerful of weapons, that if an actual war started between them they'd destroy each other completely, and nobody would win." Then the moment comes:

Salem: "Then there should be no weapons in the world so that no one goes to war, don't you think that's better Mbarak?"

I could just take this as an innocent comment, but I am keeping it in mind to remind him when he joins Greenpeace in the future.

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

Note: I really salute Salem and every idealist for having such hope in the human race. But truth is, it will just never work. I do believe that humans are (in general) born "good", then they get spoiled by whatever circumstances and environments they grow up in. This is, of course, is not saying that criminals are only victims of bad up-bringing. Ok I'm digressing really badly. My point is that a more realistic, but with good spirit and intentions, approach is better for the world. No matter how much we work on making the world better, there will always be people who want to hurt others, and to deprive the victims from means of self-defense is, in my opinion, a crime on its own.

Nerdy Humor

2005-04-30T12:47:00.000+03:00

Robert Doisneau

2005-04-29T19:07:00.000+03:00

When you're overwhelmed by the troubles of the world, start dealing with the one hurting you the most. In my case it was my pinky toe-nail, which was fractured at the end and kept hurting me every time my right foot bumped into something, so I clipped it off today. My life is perfect now!

Anyway, thanks to my friend Z, I just discovered the work of French photographer Robert Doisneau. I'm not really into photography but even I thought some of his work was just amazing. Here are my favorites:

Hell

Picasso and the loaves

The Cellist (my most favorite one)

Picasso and Francoise Gilot

Geographically Gullible

2005-04-29T18:35:00.000+03:00

There was a report on TV (I can't remember if it was on BBC or CNN) about how the internet is helping bands that don't have record deals to reach a broader audience. One girl they interviewed said made the comment: "Now we can reach the 4 corners of the globe." At first I was amazed, thinking yeah, they can reach all over now! Then I was like, wait...

First of all we live in a semi-spherical planet, so there aren't really any corners. But let's give the girl the benefit of the doubt and say she still lives in the dark ages when they thought the earth was flat (or she could have been thinking about a world map on a paper); and let's examine the most popular world map out there and see the 4 corners ourselves:

Top right corner: mostly water + part of the far north eastern part of Russia that is hardly populated by anything, let alone people.

Bottom right corner: mostly water + small part of eastern Antarctica. Good luck finding anyone there.

Top left corner: Again, mostly water, and a bit of Alaska, and we all know the only good thing that comes out of Alaska is oil, and they don't even use it.

I'll leave the last one for you to guess. I feel sorry for unknown bands if that's their target market.

Always keep a thinking mind, and do not be geographically gullible or intimidated. The next time someone mentions that phrase, get a map and show them what they actually meant and enjoy watching the "huh!?" look on their face.

Phone Cameras Save Lives

2005-04-29T18:27:00.000+03:00

Bitten chef saved his life by snapping lethal spider.

I am seriously considering switching to a camera phone right now.

Long Postponed Post

2005-04-29T16:48:00.000+03:00

Phew, I can't believe the week is over.

I promised some pictures, and I shall keep my promise. I went on a field trip to Qatargas twice, the first was two Saturdays ago and the second was last Tuesday. The former sucked decomposed camel dung, it was very short, we barely got to see anything, people there were really busy and looked like they wanted to get rid of us, half of the people that planned to come didn't (including some professors), and the food sucked. The second was THE total opposite; the people there had a whole planned program for us, we got very cool presentations with lots of info, we got a real nice site tour and I even got to do some measurements using their instruments myself!, finally we had a smashin' full buffet for lunch in the senior staff lounge!

We had to wear coveralls and safety shoes in both trips, which explains what I'm wearing in the pic. I wore a yellow colored one in the first trip and an orange one in the second. If I seem happy in some of the pics of the first trip then know for sure it was way at the beginning when we arrived.

Also, excuse the not very professional quality of the pictures. They were taken by a Nokia 6600 phone camera, a less than 1 Megapixel camera.

At last, my magical smile is revealed for the world to observe. I know, it's not as magical as you expected, but trust me, when you look at my pre-perfect-smile pictures you'll appreciate the progress I've made. The guy in blue is my cool friend and graduation project partner Jassim.

I didn't know which one to post, this picture or the previous one. I thought this one made me look all small next to Jassim, but I still like it, so I'm like what the heck I'll post both.

Mbarak: What the heck are you pointing at, Hasan?
Hasan: I was hoping you'd tell me.
That was taken during an experiment at school.

We did an experiment in school on a single cylinder diesel engine. It was LOUD, hence the hideous ear-piece. That's my handwriting on the back by the way ;)

This sign was before the main gate of Qatargas. One dot over the second "ta" in the Arabic line was missing, so rather than saying "Qif letafteesh" it read "Qif letafneesh", which translates to "Stop to be fired!"

You can tell that was taken at the end of trip.

You know, I feel much better now knowing that a camel holding a wrench has my back.

Teaser Post

2005-04-28T01:50:00.000+03:00

Lots of stuff happened during the past few days but I still cannot manage to have enough time to post about anything. My sleeping habits are messed up, I have a ton of reports to submit, several exams to take and some that I've already taken, and to top it all off; my car wouldn't move.

But I am planning a decent post soon, with pictures. Here's a preview:

Stay tuned. =)

Quotes I've Recently Read

2005-04-25T01:31:00.000+03:00

"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former" - Albert Einstein

"Human personalities are not measurable by symbols any more than you can extract the square root of a sonnet" - Arthur Stanley Eddington

"I'll take you to the candy shop. I'll let you lick the lollypop" - 50 Cent

You know, I heard this line and I immediately searched for the lyrics online, read through them and AHA he never mentions he actually is going to BUY the lollypop! THIEF! I mean, seriously, how low can you get? When the shop-owner comes asking for money he's only going to look at who's holding the lollypop, which is the girl. Half a dollar is probably going to be running away by that time, look at what he says a couple of lines later:

"In the hotel or in the back of the rental. On the beach or in the park...homie I aint stoppin"

"u know,,,sometimes, u end up in buying and selling dogs, and birds" - Someone on my MSN Messenger list.

No comment.

Chronological vs. Categorical Brain

2005-04-25T00:01:00.000+03:00

When you a learn a new piece of information, does it matter if you know how or when you're going to apply it? Does knowing the purpose and method of application of such information make a difference when the time comes to need such information?

I'm wondering about this because just now (in my last year in college) I'm starting to actually get a grip on the importance of mechanical engineering, its application, how I can apply the knowledge of different courses in to actual cases and problem I will (insha'Allah) face in my future engineering career. What if I knew about this way before, right when I chose my major during the first year of college, how much difference would it have made?

I know for sure it would have made me at least like a couple of classes more than I do now, but how would it make a difference later? What if I went through my college years, getting good grades and understanding theory, but having absolutely no clue about how it's going to affect my career in the future? Will it be harder for me later to recall such information, more precisely, will it be easier to locate such information in my head if I already knew back then how I am going to apply it in the now/future?

I think it goes back, again, to how the brain stores infomrmation, and in general; memories. Now let's imagine that the human brain stores new information chronologically, with no relation to its subject matter. If that was true then whether you do or do not know how important this piece of information in the future should not matter. One should would have the same amount of difficulty remembering two pieces of information that were learned in , let's say, the same day, regardless of how important he/she thought that piece of information was AT THE TIME it was learned. Keep in mind that both pieces of information were learned in an equal manner. If we set up a scale of understanding a subject from 0 to 10, 0 being totally clueless about a subject, then at the time both pieces of information were learned they should have the same grade. An example of academia/theory vs. practical applications should clarify this a bit more. So if one learnes 2 theories: A and B, but only on B he/she is provided with information of certain applications where such theory can applied in a future career, then how well will he be able to recall the 2 theories later. Our "chronoligical brain" hypothesis says that both theories should be as easy or hard to recall, because the brain has memories stored by date. This way one does not have to bother about, what I do know, learning about at least one application of any theory I get in school.

On the other hand, what if the brain stores information catagory-based? So, following the above mentioned example of the 2 theories, B will be put in a folder that has the name of its application, or a folder linked to the folder that has the name of B's application, let's called it "BApplication". A, however, will be stored along with the folder with the labaeled "Other", which probably will be crammed up with all types of seemingly useless information: disconneced old telephone numbers, the guy you saw yesterday on the street sniffing his armpit, the font type used in a price tag of the shirt you were about to buy 2 years ago...etc. This way, once the time comes, and you face "BApplication" you immediately recall the theory and start crunching numbers (or words, or flowers, or guns...whatever), also accordingly you will have a very difficult time locating A in a time when you need it. This gives huge importance to having a clear idea about your career, what you want to do with it, and consequently get as much details as you can about how every single equation (in case of engineering) learned in scool can be applied in the real world. I know that most if not all books and teachers always mention the purpose of each equation explained, but seriously, how many students actually pay attenion or can have a clear view of that, specially with the future so unknowin and open in front of them.

The Chronoligical Brain theory is , for me at least, more comforting and less worrying. If knowing the purpose of what you learn has no effect on the actual process of learning the materical then one doesn't have to worry so much what is or is not applicable. There is somehow less control, which means less things you can change, which means less things you should worry about. One could just concentrate on learning whatever he/she comes across without comtemplating so much about what's waiting for them in the future.

The Categorical Brain theory however highlights the importance of one knowing what he/she wants to do in life, because that will be directly reflected on how efficient that person's brain will be in recalling information at times of need. It puts more pressure on the person in sucha way that one should always have a clear idea why is he learning or doing a certain thing. The brain says to you "if you don't tell me where to put this, then I'm going to throw it away", more or less.

I know that there are so many factors affecting the learning process and how well the learned information will be recalled. Even when applying the theory vs. application case, other factors can play a role. For instance, if one knows the application and importance of what he/she studies he most probably will be more willing to learn more about it reulting in a better understanding than a plain theory with no mention of practical use what so ever. There are also exceptions, for example, some students actually prefer theory, it represents a seperate world they love to discover and live in, while the real worls (for them at least) is limited, predictable and boring. When you have so many factors playing a part in something so complex as the human being, then the only clear-cut thing you can say is that there is no clear-cut answer.

However, I believe a better understanding of how the brain works in storing and locating information can greatly improve the learning process in schools. Hopefully, one day I will get a chance to teach and will be at the other end of this discussion. Who knows how I'll see it by then. It'd be interesting to look back at this after some years and realize how smart or stupid all this is. =p

Funny Picture

2005-04-23T04:32:00.000+03:00

I just love this picture lol. I have it as my MSN screen display.

1 Weekend, 3 Movies (Spoilers)

2005-04-23T03:04:00.000+03:00

If you don't want want to read the spoilers just look at my rating next to each movie title.

Thursday: The Ring 2 (2/5)

The movie was a huge disappointment. I know sequels are always difficult especially if the first movie was really good, but I know they could have tried a little harder. I mean come on, I don't care how mean you make them look, deers are not scary! The way the deers rolled down the road would have been cool if it wasn't computer generated, badly even. The CGI was pretty sorry for the most part throughout the whole movie. It's sad that they couldn't do something better, I know after all the doe they made with the first movie they can't say it was a money problem.

It seemed that seriously the movie, as a horror flick, was pretty done in the first part and there wasn't much to add. The best thing about The Ring was the suspense; the way they wouldn't show the whole video of the "damned" tape, how they keep mentioning how horrible the faces of the victims are but never show them, the way the tape always had some way of going to another person, until it all comes at the end, you finally watch the whole horrible tape, you see the ugly deformed scared faces of the victims, not only that but the girl comes to life and comes out of the TV to haunt YOU!

Now to The Ring 2: first there are no phone calls. Second, you've already know how the ugly face of a victim looks like, so showing it more is not going to scare anybody. And btw, how many people died in the second part? like 2? That's pathetic for a movie that's supposed to be so badass. Now somebody tell me please what the hell does those pictures found in the notebook have ANYTHING to do with the storyline!

It was pretty obvious that they ran out of ideas. They should have just stopped at the first movie and called it quits. The best line was when Rachel said (talking about Samara) something like "She's never coming back." She better not, 'cause I've had enough of this movie.

Friday: Robots (3.9/5)

Good movie; good story, good animation, the jokes were funny, the action was interesting. The only down point is that it was slow at some parts, so I think they could have edited or deleted some of the scenes. It's a kid's movie for sure, but one you can watch with your children or little brother, but not by yourself. I don't know, it's just too kid-like, although there were some very suggestive jokes. For instance, they had a sticker of a plug on the men's bathroom door and a sticker of a socket on the women's. I know, only an adult, a perverted one (like myself) would understand it in an "adult" way, but come on I'm sure, I know they meant it.

All in all, a great family movie.

Friday: Hostage (4.5/5)

Wow. I didn't think the movie would be that good! Acting, action, story and the surprise element. I highly recommend it. I can't spoil any of it to you, you have to see it for yourself. Plus I have to get some sleep.

Operation: Reading - Update

2005-04-22T20:23:00.000+03:00

I've got some good news and some bad news. The good news is that Salem BOUGHT HIS FIRST BOOK OMGLOL!!!!1111222121

I couldn't believe it. We went out yesterday, so I first asked him about the comic story he bought a few weeks ago and how'sit going so far, and he tells me he finished it. I'm like AWESOME, time to take it to the next level. So we drive to Jareer's bookstore, and I was thinking it may be still too early to buy him a real book (no pictures you know), so I was thinking of something with some text and lots of pictures to get him into reading paragraphs rather than dialogue of a comic story. Thetask proved harder than I expected. Most of the children Arabic books there were either too childish for him or too old. They have these books with pictures of animals, and the name of each animal under it, it's like for 4 year olds (Salem will turn 11 very soon insha'Allah). On the other hand they have books for older kids that are like full novels, classic ones you know, some by original Arabic authors and others are translated. I was almost giving up when Salem screamed HARRY POTTER!

It was the perfect book. Salem, although did not watch any of the Harry Potter movies, he is familiar with the some of characters because he played some of the video games and hears about him among his friends. He even has a few Potter T-shirts and sweaters. I pick up the book, and it's a translated to Arabic version of the 4th book in the series, called Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. I really was working at containing my excitement but then I thought, wait, what if he really didn't want it. I know Salem, he can scream about everything in a store but ends up buying nothing, and even ridiculing the stuff he was just so excited about. It could be just one of those episodes. What if he thought I wanted to read the book, and he was excited just 'cause he found it for me? You know how kids are. I know how much Salem hates reading. I can recall how my mother tried over and over to get him into reading something, anything, so that he can get away a little from TV and Playstation with no luck. But I can't just ask him. I know Salem, if I ask him directly "Do you want this for yourself" or "Are you sure you're going to read this" he's going to feel a little scared and intimidated and may turn it down even if he was so excited at first. After all I am his big brother and my opinion (sometimes) counts, so I couldn't take the risk. I had to put it in some kind of direct way. I go "Cool, I wonder if they have an English version so that we can both read it and talk about it and stuff, or maybe I'll take this copy and read some then return it." Salem's reply was firmly "NO! get your own copy!" First "aw" moment. =)

I had then to go ask the bookstore guy about the earlier books in the 'cause I didn't want him to start with the 4th book, and the guy says they're bringing them in early May. That wasn't good enough for me. I'm at least 80% sure that if I wait till May all this excitement Salem's feeling about the book will die out. I have a step to take this "operation" to a higher level than I expected and I'm not letting this chance go. I start calling other bookstores, asking if they have them, and I find it in some bookstore in the middle of the Souq. The traffic there is horrendous, but by God Salem IS getting this book tonight and I'm not letting some stupid traffic stand in the way.

We go to the Souq, the bookstore was in some obscure, tiny corridor in the Souq that we had to walk a long way to it. But we found it! I run and talk to the guy inside, follow him eagerly, we walk through the main corridor, take a right turn, up a step, we enter what seems to be a small chamber filled with novels of various kinds, shelves to the floor all around, we turn to the left corner of the room, I watch the guy attentively as he browses through the stack of books on a shelf somewhere near the middle, a moment of hesitation takes over, I start to worry that all this trip was in vain and maybe this great chance of advancement in Operation: Reading is being jeopardized by the bookstore owner who has no idea how essential this step is. For him, I'm just another customer. Maybe he didn't think I was serious on the phone. Maybe he gets lots of people who call asking about books and never come to pick them up, and he though I was one them. A bookstore owner disappointed by a time when people are eager to get the latest DVD or video game while a book is something they see as a burden, something can be bought any time, and it is better postponed. It won't be surprising if he just told ‘em he had the book, but in fact he wasn't really sure. He probably thought, even in the unlikely case of the customer coming to ask about the book in person, he'll look for it at that moment, and if he doesn't find it, he can recommend some other book, given that the customer isn't already happily out the door to buy a DVD instead.

And in the mist of all these thoughts I hear the voice of an Egyptian accent "etfadal ya baih" which can be translated to "Here you go sir." The world stopped. The clocks stopped ticking, the noise of the traffic died out, the noise of all the people in the souq buying and selling suddenly went away, the room got darker and a beam of light shined on a tilted small colored book held by the Egyptian guy in front of me. I gently carry the book and being the doubtful person I am, I had to turn to the side, and there was the most beautiful number I've seen yesterday: 1. It is the first book in the series. We found it; a symbol of triumph, a cornerstone to a long planned project, a small step in Salem's journy into the literature world. I turned to Salem, and noticed his cheerful glowing eyes, he had the same look he has when getting a new toy he has been eager to get. He grabbed the book from my hand and held it close to his heart. Second "aw" moment.

Just as I was enjoying my moment of victory, a new fear creped in. What if he never reads it. Maybe he just got it just 'cause he wanted to own the thing, not necessarily to read it. I have to make sure he reads it and enjoys it. We already had our plan to the go to the City Center, sit at Starbucks so that I can catch up on my reading, while he gets his hot chocolate (and maybe gets some reading done.) We reach Starbucks, get our orders, and sit down. I did not want to put any kind of pressure on him, just create a perfect environment for him to want to read. I open my book and start reading keeping a close look with the corner of my on Salem, and then he did it. He opened the book and started reading. What a beautiful sight.

After a few pages he looks at his book, then looks at mine, then says "Mbarak, see now I'm reading big books like you." Third "aw" moment.

It is a big step for him. I really hoped the book had at least some illustrations here and there to help with visualizing some characters and sceneries, but the book is all text. It's a turn off for most children. But I have faith in Salem. We went to watch a movie today, and just before it starts we had like 10 minutes we both used to read in our books. Also, in the car he started explaining to me how he is visualizing the characters, I almost had a tear in my eye. Fourth "aw" moment.

Salem...

You rule!

Oh and about the bad news, there is none ;)

1, 2, 3,...,10

2005-04-20T00:04:00.000+03:00

We were in the System Dynamics and Control lab today doing some experiment, and we were changing values that are called P, I and D on the computer that controls a twin rotor machine simulating the behavior of a helicopter. My Design I professor (who pretty much has nothing to do with this experiment) enters the lab 'cause I guess he was looking for someone. Now the helicopter simulator has been moving up and down and all around and we were struggling all day to know how to tune the values of P, I and D to get a stable operation of the stupid helicopter thingie. When that professor entered the lab, we were at the last stages, changing the value of I to get it all stable. Now again, we were struggling all day with this, but he takes only one glance at the experiment and says: "change I" Then the following conversation follows:

Mbarak: Well yeah, P, I or D that's pretty much what Control's (short for System Dynamics and Control) about.

Prof.:*with a sneaky smirk on his face* You really think that's all what Control's about? What about transfer functions, don't they affect your P, I and D values?

Mbarak: Well, yeah but...

Prof.: Mwahaha, you fell for it. I got you, the transfer function actually has no effect on P, I or D.

Mbarak: Well, then see my first point is correct, it's only about P, I and D not the transfer function.

Prof.: Didn't you study transfer functions in your Control's class?

Mbarak: Um, yeah?

Prof.: *continuing the same smirk, even bigger now* So you think all that study was just for fun that it had no purpose what so ever?

Mbarak: Well, you need to know about it to model a system first, then you apply P, I and D to minimize the error. But once you have the transfer function then all the work is on P, I and D. So in a Control problem we always take the transfer function as is, and then apply P, I and D on it, and that's Control.

Prof.:*smirk* And you think this transfer function will fall down from the sky in your lap? You have to develop it yourself when designing a system...

*class laughs*

Mbarak:*irritated and interrupting* Well, that's how we studied Control, we got just an idea about how to develop a transfer function, but the main part was how to minimize its errors using PID.

Prof.: I'm trying to teach you that you need everything you learned in your Control class to develop a control system.

Mbarak: Not really, you're just trying to prove me wrong, and prove that no matter what, you're the professor and I'm the student; that you're knowledgeable and that no matter what I do or say, I understand nothing.

Now that wasn't cool.

The prof.'s face changed. The smirk disappeared. His glowing eyes became dim and his cheerful face started looking a little saggy. His tone changed from cheerful to compassionate, almost hurtful! He said: Now why would I want to do something like that, Mbarak? You really think I came here 'cause I felt the need to "be the professor"?

Of course, as in every embarrassing moment, I tried to get away with it by turning the whole thing into a joke. I started laughing, and telling him I wasn't really serious when I said that last part "come on prof. come on! hahahaha" :/

After the experiment was done, I was standing in the corridor next to the lab room talking with some guys, and the same professor passes by, then approaches me and asks, with the same sad face "Come on Mbarak, I can't believe you honestly thought I was just trying to embarrass you there, I can't believe you guys think this is how we feel when we try to teach you something":/

So, now I'm officially an ass.

The conversation extensively described previously may have sounded very confrontational, but it was in a kind of light atmosphere, the prof. and I were smiling during the whole time. It was a little confrontational, but there wasn't much to indicate any of us were taking it too seriously.

I don't know why I blurted that last part about the prof. vs. student thing. Actually, I may have an idea. It felt like I was being cornered. The smirk, the laugh and the laughs may not have been humiliating, but you know how you feel cornered in an argument, and when it's by someone 100 times (at least) more knowledgeable than you in the subject being discussed, it puts the intimidation factor in the equation too.

But I still was wrong. I ran the whole thing into my head again, and the guy actually WAS trying to teach me something. Plus, I have taken a class with him before and I should have known that he does play tricks on students when explaining a subject, not so much to humiliate them but to make them think. I should have thought of this first before I yell "damn you, evil being!" The guy seriously looked hurt, it was obvious that he was sincerely trying to teach me something, bare in mind it wasn't even his class so he had no obligation to do so, and in return he gets rudeness.

Now I know why my father always said count to 10 before you say anything. I need some time out.

Baby Thoughts

2005-04-18T00:03:00.000+03:00

Kleenex can never replace Q-tips.

It's good to plan for the future, as long as one enjoys that future when it becomes "now."

A 50-year old can also be a computer geek if it was the only thing he/she worried about. When people grow up they end up doing lots of things without having the time to be really good in any.

In quantum mechanics, Niels Bohr says a measurement of a system only describes the system at the time it was measured and that we are not allowed to use such measurement to conclude anything about the system's past. I say a person's action can only describe his state at the time the action took place, and we are not allowed to use that "measurement" to draw a conclusion about the general "state" of that person. If you observe someone lying at a certain occasion, that doesn't necessarily mean he's a liar. And that doesn't only work for negative actions.

Sometimes it's difficult to be both understanding and just.

Being intimidated can be the death of progress.

I'm hungry, and sleepy. Which one do you think I'll choose to deal with first? Which one will you choose?

Simplifying, Stupifying

2005-04-17T20:29:00.000+03:00

You know how when someone tries to explain something to you, and they try to simplify it by saying "it's so simple" and every time they repeat it, it makes you feel even more horrible and more stupid, as if he's saying "you dumbhead how can you not get it, it's so simple!"

I'm guilty of it, I usually say that at the beginning before I'm about to start explaining something. But after a mentally painful experience today, I finally realize that it doesn't works. If something is indeed simple then all I have to do is show it is simple, not say it. Repeating "it's so simple" will only make things worse.

I'm A Grownup Therefore I Lecture

2005-04-15T19:34:00.000+03:00

When my car was getting fixed at the dealership a few months ago (which took like a whole month) I ended up going to Friday prayers with my little brother, let's call him S. It turned out to be fun, we'd talk on the way there and back, so even after my car was fixed, I still go with him.

Today was no different, but on the way back as I was with him while he was driving on a two-way street, a bunch of guys were walking in the right lane of the street blocking our way. So, S had two choices, either run the guys over or move over to the left lane, even though it is for the cars that are going the opposite way. My brother did both, well, almost. He went over to the guys, and just centimeters before he hit them he pulls the steering wheel quickly to the left moving to the left lane (which had no cars on sight whatsoever) almost grazing the walking guys.

Time for a big brother lecture, and before I utter a single word, I know exactly who the conversation is going to develop. I'm going to ask him why he did this; he'll say the guys were blocking my way, and they're not supposed to walk on the street, I'll say but you didn't have to do that move to them; he'll say that they're the bad guys here, they blocked the street and it's not like he hit 'em. And that's almost exactly how it went. And there's a simple reason why I know this conversation by heart: I used to be him.

I absolutely and utterly hate with all my heart giving lectures to my little brothers. I avoid them like a plague, because I know how awful it feels to be lectured, how I used to feel grown ups always saw that everything I do was wrong, how it's always my fault even if others initiated the wrong deed, and I also remember how I thought grown ups were hypocrites because they often scorn others for things they used to do when they were my age. My brother has every right to feel this way.

So what do I do now? I become the "cool" brother by leaving my brother be, never question anything they do or say, be their friend rather than their brother? Heck no.

First of all, no one's perfect, and the fact that I used to do this very wrong thing in teh past (and now I don't) makes me more eligible to give advice, since not only do I know about it, but I also know how to get rid of it. Second of all, I think lecturing, no matter how much we hate it, is an essential part of being a grown up. It's what we do, we hate it but we know we have to do it. It's just like a janitor who hates cleaning, or a government clerk who hates paper-work; they both know they have to do their jobs. The difference is that they can quit and cannot. Grown ups have a responsibility towards youngsters, the former (in general) seen, heard, read and had more experience than the latter, an advantage that is coupled with a duty to share those experiences so that even if the younger person does not accept then at least you did what you could. That is especially the case if the grown up is a parent of an older brother/sister. If someone sees you doing something wrong or stupid in public, most probably he instead of giving you advice he'll either laugh at you, make what you did some kind of joke told in a friends gathering or at the very least just think bad of you. People don't usually give advice to strangers, partly because people also don't usually take advice from strangers very nicely. But the point here is that, it is the parent or older sibling who does that, others won't. If a parent refrains from his duties as his son's lecturer then he becomes just like all the others in the world, watching. His son may never meets someone to let him know of his mistake, and even if he does it may be too late. I remember several years ago my parents made a comment about my walk, that it looked a little funny. They weren't making fun of it, the werre letting me know how it looks from the view of other people's eyes. Naturally, I became defensive, told 'em it's just the way I walk, and I don't think it's bad, or at least not as bad as they make it sound. I later discovered that a couple of friends were actually making inside jokes among them about my walk. I then realized my parents only meant well. They probably knew that I wouldn't take their advice well, but they also knew they had a responsibility as parents, that others will only make fun. Lecturing, in fact, is a huge part of what makes a parent.

I'm not saying all lectures are created equal. I know that some parents or in general grown ups take advantage of their "status" and keep lecturing left and right whether for a good reason or not. What I'm saying is that, if you're a grown-up then never shy away from lectures. We all hate it, but we are, unfortunately, grown-ups. We didn't choose to be ones, just like we didn't choose to be born, but it is what we are and we have to take respnsibility for the extra years of experience we have compared to younger people. We can't expect them to change overnight, in fact it's better not to expect anything, we just do our jobs well as grownups and let them choose. If we can't avoid lecturing, then we have to make an extra-effort in perfecting the lecture, avoiding mistakes that other grownups made when they lectured us, and who knows maybe your lecture will stick and will be the one that will make the difference in the lecturee's life.

Another Reason to Deal with Your Snoring Problem

2005-04-13T01:34:00.000+03:00

Man Living in Closet Charged With Murder (Link updated)

Somehow, Michael Jackson's song "In the Closet" has a whole other meaning for me now.

Want to Smile? Deal with the Devil

2005-04-12T16:52:00.000+03:00

You really can never know what can make you smile. Lately, there is this song that always manages to put a smile on my face; the song is called Deal with the Devil, and it is by the classic metal band: Judas Priest!

Now you're probably thinking how can a song with a title Deal with the Devil translate to anything positive, let alone make someone smile. Before anyone scream SATANISTS, let me just say that metal is a term that describes a very broad and very diverse array of music styles. I mean, you have your power metal, thrash, progressive, death, black, nu-metal...and the list never ends. The subject matter of the lyrics can vary from anti-christian to pro-love and almost hippiesh. So it's not always just loud guitar, screeching vocals with songs talking about whips and chains and kicking ass.

However, in the case of Judas Priest, it is just that: whips and chains and kicking ass!

Most people identify Judas Priest with their classic hit song: You've Got Another Thing Comin' (click here to listen to a sample), and although is doesn't really do justice in representing their style, but most of their songs are high in energy, loud, and just about kicking ass! (This is the third paragraph I finish with "kicking ass" let's see how long I can keep this up.)

Deal with the Devil is no different; high energy, loud, screaming vocals that are enough to give you the impression that this song is...you guessed it: kicking ass!

The song has no introduction, it blasts in your face from the first moment with it's main riffs and all the other instruments playing a long, just a few seconds later vocals kick in, you have no idea what the guy's singing, still you know it's kicking ass!

I don't know if you've ever heard the term "overplay", but it's mainly when an artist plays one or more instruments in a manner that is more than needed for the song, so much that it doesn't fit. (sloppy definition I know, but lemme just finish this please). Now, if you ever wonder about what the term "over-drumming" means, then all you need to do is listen to this song (click here for a sample.)

This is seriously one of the most severe cases of over-drumming that I've ever heard. It's like the drummer, Scott Travis, has just discovered double bass drumming, he's doing it like he'll never get a chance to drum again ever! Whether it is a suitable or non-suitable part he's making those double kicks. Why for the love of the music why? For instance, in the part before the chorus going "Nothing held us back or dared to try" all is needed is a simple double kick, double the speed of the regular pace the drumming was in. Instead, we get like 12 double kicks with an extra-rich drum-fill. The next time during a similar part the same thing happens, instead of a simple double kick you hear a fast 2 double kicks, 4 snare, two double kicks then 1 snare and CRASH into the next part. Usually this kind of stuff would piss me off 'cause it'd be ruining a song that could have sounded much better without this stupid stuff, but you know it actually makes me laugh.

It's jus so funny, it really sounds like this kid who just learned double kicks and going all over the drum kit no matter what the song sounded like. It's really funny, ever time you expect a simple a simple double kick in the next second and you get a train of double kicks and toms in the same second instead.

It's really hard to explain how or why that makes me smile, it just does. In fact, if you've managed to read until here then you are a very patient person, or I threatened to kill you and all of your family if you didn't read my blog. But yeah, I can't figure out why it plants a smile on my face. Today, I felt like total crap in the morning, so I just browsed my iPod into Deal with the Devil, and a couple of seconds later I have this wide smile on my face.

Thank you Scott Travis for doing a horrible job drumming for this song.

Kicking ass!

PC is Back

Yes ladies and gentlemen, it is back with all it's glory. It was just like I guessed, a problem with my video card, got it replaced, end of story. Thank you all for your prayers.

Good News and Bad News

2005-04-10T22:47:00.000+03:00

Good News: A new shoutbox is up. I tried the same one Kaza uses for her blog and it seems to not give me that unnecessary space problem I used to get with the old shoutbox. To be honest, I like the old one better, this one blends too much with the background. It's funny, when I choose the scrollbar mode for this shoutbox (meaning I make it look like the old one, you know having it's own window kind of thing not blending with the background) then I get the space problem and my whole blog looks messed up when using IE.

Speaking of IE, I sometimes cannot access my blog using IE. A window pops up asking me to save some stupid file or sometimes I get a page full of weird characters. If you get this problem, please refresh or access the blog a few moments later and hopefully the problem will disappear. I hate not being able to know what's wrong with this thing.

Bad News: Remember the noise my PC made, which I mentioned in a previous post? The noise is now gone, and so is my PC. Well, let's hope it's not totally gone but I just don't seem to get anything on my monitor when I start my PC. I took it to a guy so that he fixes it and he hasn't called me back yet.

I usually write my posts at home, and since I still didn't figure out how to connect this laptop to my DSL connection at home, there won't be many posts in the coming few days. Let's hope my PC is fixed soon. :/

"Shoutbox Down. I Repeat, Shoutbox Down"

2005-04-08T13:03:00.000+03:00

Thanks to C-Red, I just found out that my Shoutbox was messing up my blog when viewing it with IE. I use Firefox, but I usually check with both Firefix and IE before I make new modifications to the template. I guess I missed it this time. I'll check if I can put it back without screwing my blog, but until then Shoutbox shall rest in peace. Please include it in your prayers.

NaBHaN: This is the only template I found with a cool flash. All the other wide templates were inferior compared to the greatness of this one. But trust me on this, once I find a cool wide template WITH a cool flash, I'm changing in an instant. :)

Impossible Friendship and Cool Kids

2005-04-07T17:35:00.000+03:00

Put shortly: Close Friends of different sexes are just that because circumstances don't allow for more.

I could make an attempt to understand a regular friendship between a guy and a girl. But when I say close, I mean they have to see or at least talk to each other on the phone everyday, share secrets, share the most personal stuff and not hide anything. Seriously, if you can get that close to a girl then you're both destined to be for each other, and I guarantee you that one of them at least will think about taking it to the next level. So why pretend?

Mohammad, Eid and Faisal: You Guys RULE!

My little brother has the coolest friends. Today, I took my 11-year-old brother Salem and his friends, Mohammad, Eid and Faisal to watch Yu-Gi Oh! the movie. I'm not here to talk about the movie I slept half way through, or how I still cannot understand the whole fuss about card-games and card trading. I'm here to talk about my brother's friends, they are the nicest kids. Ok, so they were fighting a little in the car, but, even though we are hardly related, they call me uncle Mbarak! How cute is that! And I don't even have any real nephews (yet)!

When I have kids, I'm going to teach them to be so respectful of other people so that they boost the confidence of other insecure adults, like me.

Smile Update

Salem's friend, Mohammad, took a pic using his Nokia phone camera of me with Salem and Eid. I tried my new smile, and it worked! I'm so in love with myself. Unfortunately Mohammad doesn't know how to transfer the picture to a PC, and even if he did he doesn't know how to send it by email, or else I'd show it here so that you can all see the smile mastah! Ok, I'll calm down now.

Oh, I also discovered that I need braces.

Computer Noise

My computer has been making the weirdest noise lately, and I'm still too busy (i.e. lazy) to open it up and chek out the problem. At first it made this sound continuously, and now it is in a repeated manner, almost like a vacuum cleaner vrrrrrmm vrrrrrrrm. Yeah vrrrrm is exactly how a vacuum cleaner sounds, at least to me. Go away!

I really hope nothing drastic happens like my hard drive gets fried or something.

My Smile and Becoming a Superhero

2005-04-05T21:37:00.000+03:00

I finally found my smile!

I've always had a bad experience smiling in pictures. Usually I don't smile 'cause I know it'll look fake, so I always ended up with a stoned look. Lately though I've been trying to change this and have been smiling non-stop in pictures, and now I'm getting to the other extreme, the cheesiest smiles, my cheeks swell up, my nose spreads, I get hundreds of wrinkle lines from stretching my face muscles too much, and my eyes totally disappear. I have samples of the previously described horrific image, but I ain't posting them here, sorry. Alas, I was still determined to find my smile.

And I just found it today.

Just like that, it happened in an instant, and I wasn't even thinking of it. It was such a "eureka" moment, analogous to the discovery of Plank's constant or Bell's inventing the light bulb.

I was at one of my school's restrooms washing my QP mug, and just as I was wiping it with some napkin and about to leave I look at myself in the mirror, and I smile. *moment of silence* During that moment I knew without a single doubt that my life has changed. My days of stoned faces or cheesy smiles were over, I have finally found my smile! It was perfect, not too cheesy but still not too "oh I'm so cool", my eyes were there, I could see them! And my teeth were showing, very few wrinkles, cheeks are perfectly round, mouth looks like a perfect upside down triangle. I was charming! It was such a great feeling.

So, to all the people that still have a hard time with pictures, I feel your pain. Well not now, but I know how it feels. Keep trying, you can never be as hopeless as I was, so just keep trying. If I can find my perfect smile, then so can you! "Now go get 'em tiger!"

Final Thought

" I never look back, darling. It distgxacts from za now. " - Edna, from the movie The Incredibles

You set yourself a goal, let's say something like "by the end of this year/month/day/hour...etc, I will become a superhero" You then set specific steps with a timeline towards becoming a superhero. Now think about this, every single minute until the deadline you've set to your goal is part of your goal. You being a superhero by the end of this month, depends solely on perfecting each step on the way. That means that every step you take is part of that project. That means that doing each step IS your goal. And since you can only control this very moment we are in, being a superhero is a decision you make right now at this very moment. Once this moment passes, then the next one is your superhero moment. If you make a mistake it's in the past. See, you don't realize you made a mistake until you've already have made it. That means it's in the past, in an area you cannot control, and since we are "working" towards being superheroes, we are only concerned now about things we can control and change towards that goal. Never look back, only glance back so that you don't repeat the mistake again. And even if you repeat it, again it's in the past. Focus on what you can do now. This moment is what counts, it is your superhero moment. It makes every second of your life count. You ARE a superhero because at this moment you choose to act towards that goal. At this moment you ARE a superhero. It makes every moment of your life "superheroic."

This very moment IS your future. This very moment IS your life.

Stupid Pic and April Fools

2005-04-03T23:18:00.000+03:00

You know, for instance in movies when they try to show some hacker trying to crack in the CIA network, and you look close at the screen and he's typing on Microsoft Word? or Like when they show in newspapers kids on computers that are supposed to look like they are conquering the computer age, just so that you find out they are all playing Solitaire, and they're bad at it?

What is about to come is much worse.

I finish the meeting with my graduation project advisor today, and the Materials' Lab technician , who we shall call MS for now, tells me and my partner in crime, err I mean project that he needs to snap us a few pictures in the lab so that they can be put up on the university's journal. I'm like finally the hard work will be paid off, I'm getting famous!

We then go to this computerized tensile testing machine, and MS asks my friend to be on the actual machine while I work on my magic fingers on the computer, I'm like awesome I got the cool part! So I sit all proud and all on the chair, feel the smooth touch of the mouse sliding against my right palm, and set my left fingers elegantly on the keyboard's arrows...MS starts snapping pictures and here is a sample:

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the PC is OFF! This is not a hacker using MS Word, or kids playing Solitair, it doesn't take, not only half a brain, but half an EYE to notice that I'm working on a non-working PC!

People should stop taking stupid pictures like that and thinking people won't notice.

Final Thought:

April fools are stupid. You want to do a cool prank then never let your prey know of any information about its time. There is nothing more fun than doing a prank to someone when they don't expect it, at all! And don't give me that "well, if he knows it's going to be within a month, then it's more challenging to think of something he will miss even thought he knows it's April." Still, once he realizes the prank, he'll have this candid camera laugh (you know after they tell someone they've been on candid camera and they turn from pissed off to laughing mode.) There is nothing better than doing the most unexpected prank and leaving someone to ponder for the rest of his life "why did my friend do this to me?" Now that is what I call quality prank!

Poor People Aren't As Unfortunate As You Think

2005-04-02T21:04:00.000+03:00

So I'm in the shower today, and I feel the water is a little cold, I turn the hot water knob a notch, it's hotter but getting a little too hot, turn it back half a notch and I start enjoying my shower at exactly the temperature I feel like having. I thought wow!

Let's not think way back, there are places in the world as of right now that do not enjoy this luxury, that either spend a long time each morning warming water just to have a decent shower, or if they are lazy asses like myself they'd just go through the uncomfortness of a old shower.

This may not seem very important to many, but seriously it is one of many things that we take advantage of. Instead of spending an hour heating some water, I just turn the knob for a few seconds. We are so blessed, or are we?

Since poor people have it tougher they are automatically considered better, and there is no amount of work or goodness that (relatively) rich people can do that will get them even. No matter what a rich guy does, people will always think "well, he had it all easy." It's almost like this vertical line (let's call it Righteousness Line, or RL), where top is the best and most goodness one can do. The more distance you cross on that line the better you are as a person. Rich people (who were born rich) are already somewhere far up that line. It's not their fault, they were just born this way. They can only do so much to reach the top of the RL. Poor people on the other hand are on the other hand have a long line in front them to the top, and hince they have a better chance to be better persons than rich people. Poor people suck!

Not only that, but let's imagine that the bottom of the RL extends down to create another line, let's call it Badness Line or BL. Now, you'd think it'd be worse for poor people since they are closer to BL than rich people, but no! See, what happens is, because they are closer to the BL, they are more excused if they drop a little towards. It's always like "Oh, he stole because he couldn't feed his family, or because he needed a new gift" Maybe good excuses but he always has an excuse. People would rave out on the smallest bad thing that a rich person would do because, "hey this guy got everything he needs, WHY DID HE THROW THE EMPTY CAN IN THE STREET HE IS SO EVIL!"

Here's a small sketch of the idea:

Poor people aren't so unfortunate after all!

I know there are serious flaws in the above argument. I know goodness isn't necessarily measured in how much money you can give charity, but you have to agree that no matter what a rich guy does, he will never be considered better than a struggling poor person, even if they both seemed like they did the same effort. We do sometimes hold different standards depending on people's situations. You may say they should have different standards because they are in different situations. Hm..what should I say to that?

I guess what I'm actually saying is that, that sketch there is false. The top part should extend to infinity, so that both are only judged on how much distance they pass on the line, not on how close they got to the end. I hope you followed me so far.

I only wrote this much to debunk my own theorem, I do have too much time to think. Well, ok I I didn't just debunk it, the sketch shows what most people view the above situation while the above paragraph describes what should be.

One day, just one day I will write shorter posts.

Looks Matter, A Puzzle and My Brain

2005-03-30T20:48:00.000+03:00

...And Update I Shall; BEHOLD My New Laptop!

After months of research on the internet, going back and forth to the store, asking about it, looking at it, touching it...I finally have it! Check out my new Sony Vaio T16:

I know it looks a little plain, but trust me on this, it looks so much cooler in real life. I mean, look at how tiny the thing is! 272 × 25~34 × 205mm! It's the tiniest (decent) laptop I found here in Doha. You may say small doesn't mean necessarily good. Well in my case, size was a big factor. I mean, I can't really understand how people spend money on buying these laptops with super-specs which means they usually turn out to be huge, then have this gigantic and utterly ugly bag to hold it, it is almost as uncomfortable as carrying a PC case with you! I mean what's the point of buying a laptop if you're going to have such a hard time carrying. It's a laptop, it's supposed to be mobile and ready on the go!

But yeah, you cannot get everything. If you're going for a smaller size you have compromise some specs, which is fine by me. I have this laptop adjacent to my PC. My main work will still be on my PC. This means I don't need much memory nor much power. My main thing was that it has to be tiny, and pretty! Who said looks don't matter.

Here are some up close and personal pictures taken with my webcam, which explains the very crappy quality (check out the cool case in the first picture, so tiny!):

And here's a picture of my favorite gadgets; my 17" LCD, 20GB iPod and my new (in a Japanese accent) VAIO!:

You can guess what my next gadget should be: a digi cam!

Solve This

You have 12 balls, and there is only one ball with a different weight. You only have a maximum of three chances to weight any combination of the balls, and within these three attempts you have to find out which ball is with the different weight. Notice I said the ball's weight is DIFFERENT, so it could be lighter or heavier than the rest.

Show me what you got. :)

Final Thought

Do our brains grow, i.e. they build new information and experiences over old ones so that yourself now is better and more than your old self? Or is the brain of a fixed volume such that it can only encompass so much. So new information push some of the old information out. In this case, we're different than our old selves but not necessarily better nore more.

I really am not sure. Most of the time I think it's the first case, but then sometimes you find yourself forgetting old information and bad at certain skills you were very good at in the past, which means that, although you gained some new experiences, you also lost others. Or is it somewhere in between, such that we still have a fixed volume, but it's confined so that old information isn't lost but squeezed against the inner walls of the brain by the new information created in the middle?

Is there even a chance we'll ever understand how our brains work? I mean, we're hoping to discover our brains using nothing but our beains themselves? Sounds a little spooky.

Road Rage and Life

2005-03-27T16:03:00.000+03:00

Let's say you're trying to enter a highway from an exit. The traffic is really bad, and there is a long line of cars in front of you till the exit. Then you are finally there...well, almost; there is only one car between you and the highway. You know how it always seems like this guy is taking too much time, missing opportunity after the other to get on the highway, and even when he moves it always looks like it's taking him forever till his car is on the highway. You shake your fist out the window screaming "DAMN YOU!". Once you're there it also always seems like you don't take a fraction of the time he took to get on the highway.

Well guess what, the guy behind you is thinking exactly the same as you did.

I was in my car at an intersection yesterday and I was thinking just like the above. Then, I was like OMG! I AM the guy in front of me.

What if it was like that with every thing else in life? What if every single thing we complain about we end up doing unintentionally to other people? That is a scary thought. I'm not talking about murder or rape (although we can try to apply such examples); I'm talking about certain things people do in certain situations. A friend that forgot to call when he promised. A relative who's words always seem cruel to you. A boss that you felt treats you unfairly. Just think of any situation where people seem to do you wrong, and imagine what if, just what if given the same circumstances you actually end up acting the same?

I think it's a good exercise. It makes us more understanding, but not only that. It makes us more strong and dynamic towards the injustice we may feel about others, to always think that there must have been a good reason why they did such things, to look really hard for the best reason and consider it. Sounds too idealistic? Maybe. But it's just like Thermodynamics, you first start studying the ideal solution, which is impossible to achieve. However, you know your goal, and you start working towards it. Just like everything else in life, it is good to define your goal, even if it's impossible to get, you grade your sucess according to how close you got to your goal.

We are all the guy in front of us in traffic.

Final Thought: Recently I found out I'm really good at acting strong. Let's hope I can keep up the act till the curtains are down.

Late Rant

2005-03-26T04:46:00.000+03:00

It's almost 4:50 am. I came from school half an hour ago after spending 5 hours in front of the computer typing a stupid lab report. Why is it stupid? 'cause I spent the first hour trying to actually write it on my own, then I was sick of it and thought I'll just copy some stuff from the internet. That took the rest of the 4 hours! Such a boring task of filling page after page, and just editing images and equations with no effort in actually understanding the material.

Oh and guess what, I have a similar report to finish tomorrow, err, today...and some other assignment, oh and another, and one more. So I'll probably be here tomorrow, the same time making a similar post.

Yes, I admit, it is kind of my fault for postponing these reports. Not only that, but yesterday I wanted to start working on them around 5 pm. At 6 an old friend calls and says that lots of cool old friends that I haven't seen for at least months are gathering tonight at some guy's place. Needless to say, I went there, and it was alright.

Do I wish I could have finished this report sooner so that I don't have to mess up my schedule like that? Absolutely. Do I regret going to see my friends? Heck no. If I hadn't gone there I'd have probably got a chance to see 'em for the next month or so. The semester is not getting any easier.

Can't type any further. Must sleep. ZZzzzz...

Bribing Family, Sponge Bob and Funny Doctors

2005-03-24T22:42:00.000+03:00

Operation: Reading!

I'm trying to make a habit of taking my little 11 year-old brother Salem out each weekend. Now Salem has, like most other kids of his age, a TV addiction problem. Other than going to school, doing his homework or sleeping, he does nothing but watch TV all day. Now I can't put all the blame on him. He is the last child, and all of his brothers including myself are much older than him so he doesn't really have people to play with in the house. He also isn't the most social kid. He has few friends, and these few don't even live close by. So, he's left with either TV or video games, ALL DAY! The poor guy would actually beg us to play with him sometimes but I swear most of the times I really do not have the time not the energy to do that. It kind of sucks because it feels like I turned into the dull adult that I hated when I was a kid, but I guess that's life. Anyway...

I'm trying to get him interested in reading. Now for a kid like Salem, that's almost asking for the impossible, the only way is to trick him into it. For instance, now I'm trying to take him to a movie each weekend, more lazy, visual, majorly pointless entertainment right? That's how I get his attention first. Then I convince him that we should go get the ticket way before the movie starts to get good seats. We usually go to early shows anyway, in which you almost always get good seats even if you come in at the end of the movie, but a brother gotta do what he's gotta do. So we get the tickets and we're left with around 30 min to show time, so I suggest going to Starbucks (he loves Starbucks) and getting him some hot chocolate (he loves hot chocolate). On the way I suggest we pass by the bookstore to buy some magazines. I can't start suggesting books for him now, not yet, so I try to suggest magazines that have less pictures, because he usually ends buying some gaming magazine, which is in English, so he ends up just looking at the pictures (more pointless visual drunkeness.) We get to Starbucks, order, sit at out tables. Nowit isn't easy to convince Salem of anything, he actually is aware of why I'm doing all this but thinks who cares if my evil older bro is trying to manipulate me as long as I'm getting some free stuff on the way. So we sit, and...well that's it. He doesn't open any of the magazines. What do I do? I have my own book, and stick my nose into and pay NO attention what so ever to Salem until he's so bored of sitting like this that he opens up a magazine and starts reading.

I'm so evil!

Who Thought Sponge Bob Would be so Funny?

I took Salem to see Sponge Bob Square Pants Movie today. I didn't have time to execute Operation: Reading, so we went right into the theater this time. I was expecting a very boring time, considering the last experience with the oh so crappy Piglet's Big Movie. Even Salem thought it was crappy.

Sponge Bob rules! It was hilarious! I was laughing my butt off there, I almost scared all the kids in the theater away. I've never watched any episodes of Sponge Bob but I think I'll try to catch some if I get the chance. The plot was more for children, but it was interesting. Plus (without giving too much away) it does speak to the inner child in every adult. The voice acting was great. King Neptone's overly commanding voice was spot on and the exaggeration in it made it funny. The way they made those fish at the gas station have a southern accent, it just fit. Hilarious jokes. The movie actually may be boring for people who are more used to adult humor, but if you're the kind of person who still laughs at cartoons, you're going to love this movie.

A 4 out of 5.

Final Thought

Doctor 1: Do you think that a woman sitting on a bed for 15 years with no senses except for sight wants to live?

Doctor 2: Yes, maybe she is afraid to die.

That was on Aljazeera, on a show where they were debating euthanasia. At the end of the program the presenter asks Doctor 2: "Do you think that what happens is like the scene in every Egyptian movie where the doctor holds shoulder's of the patient's relative and tells him 'we did what we can to save him but...'?"

Doctor 2: I think Egyptian movies are capable of ending human life on their own.

That made me laugh. Who would have though old fart doctors can have such a sense of humor. :)

Be Yourself?

2005-03-23T21:29:00.000+03:00

I haven't always been a very open person with people. I'm not saying I lie to them, I just don't get close to people quickly. It usually takes a very long time for me to actually get to know someone and trust 'em. So now I'm thinking maybe I should change that. I may be missing on some good people right? Well, I still don't know.

Lemme explain. So I'm in my senior year in college, and I started on my senior project (with 3 other guys) which should take 2 full semesters. Now once you start your senior project, you're given your own office on campus. That is right, your own office, with a key, a T1 connection and a phone line (perfect TFU moment *tsk* *tsk*). So being the cool (not mentioning humble) guy that I am I invitemy friends to chill in my "office" between classes, I got myself an electric kettle so I'm making my own tea here, serving it to people, and if this sounds like I'm turning it into a chillin' place, well then who cares it's MINE! :p

Let's cut to the chase here, people come over that I really don't know very well, but you know just other students that I "met" before. Usually I'd be kinda formal "hey, what's up blah blah" I'd say "come in" but it'd be my formal voice you know, please tell me I'm making sense. Like, if a real cool friends comes in I'd go "DUDE..come the f&^% in!" Get my point? No? Doesn't matter.

I had this friend, let's call him Z. Z is the kind of guy that can get to know a person that he met for the first time in an instant. He has this gift where somehow he can be free and open with anyone. Not only that, the other person feels so comfortable that they both start acting like they knew each other for years.

So I'm like, I can be like him. I start being nice to people, and now I'm thinking can I really do it? What if I over do it? Some close friends started telling me like "hey, this guy's a jerk don't give him any attention" or "that guy is a cheap asshole, he'll just come here to use your printer" OK, so it's not really MY printer, one of my project partner's brought it but you get the point. But you know, this is the same stuff I heard long time ago about some people that I'm good friends with right now.

So what now? Be yourself? Well, what self? old self, or the new and improved Mubarak? People always say be yourself (I say it too) but then does this mean that you don't allow yourself to change? 'cause that would suck.

I think I should go on with my little experiment of my new self. Could end ugly, but again...who knows, right?

Thought of the day: Scientists describe what is. Engineers describe what matters.

Selfish Demonstrators

2005-03-23T01:14:00.000+03:00

This is concerning the demonstrators against (OMG!) terror that took place in reaction to Sunday's bombing in Doha: Link

After a previous experience, I decided that I probably (never say never) never participate in a demonstration again. Why? Several reasons but mainly, 'cause I consider it a selfish act.

So the bombing takes place on Sunday, and I'm a regular Qatari boy. I get pissed because not only do we not know who really did it where did it happen, but innocent people have died. I have this built up energy of sadness, anger and frustration, and all I think about is how to release such energy, so what to do? Sharpen yer pitchforks and let's DEMONSTRATE!

Very few people stop and think about the real problem, and how to take realistic practical steps towards making a difference. I bet at least most of these demonstrators haven't spend even a few minutes pondering why could such thing happen in a place like Doha and how can we actually help prevent something similar in the future. All they want is to DEMONSTRATE! Let the whole world hear that we say NO to terrorism! I think that is becoming the lamest cliché in the 21st century. Everyone knows terrorism (in it's most typical modern definition) is bad, we do not need a couple of more hundreds or thousands of people to carry banners.

I mean seriously, does anyone really think that some terrorist in Mansoorah or Khratyat (random areas in Qatar) is going to be watching those demonstrators in Aljazeera and then immediately dial some numbers and go: Yo! Brotha O (Osama's code name, don't ask me how I got it), we gots to pull the plug on this bad boy here, people are DEMONSTRATING!

These people do not think like that. They'll start feeling sorry for how many misguided people are on the street, and probably will think of preparing something even worse for the future.

So what should we do? Talk to Osama? I'm not sure that's possible and even if it is it may be too late for a talk. What we can do is talk to people who are around us. Ladies and gentlemen, my fellow Qatari's, the shit happened here, and someone sitting next to you may be the next suicide bomber. It is possible and I am not exaggerating. Lots of these bombers have started as regular people like you and me, who are frustrated with the amount of injustice in this world and were unsure of how to act, they however found certain people who guided (or misguided) them to this way of, let's call it protest.

Many had, and still have doubts. So, educate yourself about this. Learn the Islamic rulings concerning suicide bombing, read the different debates around it with an open mind and put your feelings aside. Teach people. Talk to your friends, they'll talk to their friends, and who knows one day maybe you'll be the cause of saving lives.

Demonstrators are selfish because all they think about is how to satisfy their own anger and frustrations. It's at its best a waste of time and at its worse a false feeling that a demonstrator actually did something.

Please, think before you demonstrate.

Editing Almost Finished

2005-03-22T01:45:00.000+03:00

Almost, because I'd like to always leave room for improvements. Hell, who am I kidding, I spent the past hour or so reading through HTML codes, trying to figure where I can edit stuff to make this blog look a little different. I'm happy with what I did so far. Come on, for someone creating a blog for the first time ever it isn't a bad job. Keep in mind it's moving close to 2 am here!

I know the layout looks plain, and I hate bright layouts, but insha'Allah I'll work on this soon. I chose this template 'cause it was the one with the largest width. The narrow look is so not going to work for me. A couple of lines in this template will be like a 100 lines in a narrow looking blog, that would just be a turn off, not only to readers, but for me too. I'm so lazy.

Can't wait to make my real first post! Stay tuned, or....just please check again, pretty please.

Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to my brain.

2005-03-21T16:23:00.000+03:00

Please do not be afraid, I know it's huge, but most of all that is in there is a careful balance of egotism and self-depracation. It is so carefully balanced between the two, that sometimes I consider my brain itself a miracle for mankind. Humankind. You and you, both. And you, and you, and you, and you -- all of you, then should perhaps appreciate its existence. (yes, and before my dyslexia kicks in -- these big words i'm looking up in the dictionary are causing havoc in the receptors of my nerve thingies...you know those signal thingies...like the stuff we learned about in high school biology...like yeah, I know you totally get me, like okay, moving on -- before it kicks in, maybe I should cut to the chase, and what the hell does cutting to the chase really mean...someone enlighten the lightening in me)....