Memories of 32 years ago

I didn't visit Iraq since my engagement party in 1980, which went really well by the way, and since then the country went through two wars and changed governments and was under American occupation for few years. Basically there is no evident change except decayed buildings, people with rotten minds, corruption, dirt everywhere and check points every 5 kilometers (due to the many suicide bombers who think that they will go to heaven and have dinner with the prophet if they kill some Shea people). The country had suffered a lot, and the new government is trying hard to make it a better place for people to live in, but the fear of the return of the old regime and most importantly fear of losing the freedom of speech that is now open to everyone to say what they think is very obvious.
My problem though is not with the new government, my problem is how to make the people believe that they can effect change? The country has lots of potential, and everyone is talking about this potential; however they damage is so huge to the extent that there is no one place to start. I was talking to some friends, and suggested that they should make a miniature of the current Iraq and look at it as if through satellite, and then decide what needs to be done, and how to do it. For example, they need electricity, internet, fiber optics, better food processing, more industries, quality control, better hotels, better restaurants, better petrol pumps, better roads, better housing, and more over better finishing to the new houses, better supermarkets, garments industry, confectionery industry, schools, colleges, language schools, health system, newspapers, magazines, technology, you name it and they need it.
The country was so deprived during the old regime, but at the same time have a lot of natural resources, in actual fact Iraq can be self sufficient as they have it all. Oil, minerals, plantations, rice, fruits, vegetables, textile, wool, animal and animal husbandry, historical sites, religious tourism, art, music, and many other interesting resources are plentiful, also the brain drain need to be reversed. Their problem though is that the previous regime’s mistakes have put them into huge debts, and having to refund money to the neighboring gulf countries for the damage that happened to them is a burden the country cannot bear. To my simple mind, the mistakes of the previous regime should not be borne by the people or the present government, as the two wars were in actual fact instigated by USA, and this is proven by many CIA people who left their jobs, so to make the people of Iraq and the new government of Iraq liable is something synonym to stealing money from a poor man.
I think the neighboring countries should also stop sending suicide bombers, and let the different sects live together in harmony and rebuild Iraq so it become the real Iraq that is rich and prospering. I would love to come back and do a proper touristic visit, but having to stay in a -500star hotel is not my cup of tea, and having to eat breakfast in the dirty alleys, is not something of high hygiene standards and should actually be stopped by WHO. The government needs to have proper checks and balances in place, to help build not to hinder it, and all the religious parties around here should stand together and do a united Iraq. I would hate to see Iraq turn into a battle field again, it is high time that the Iraqi people get what they aspire for, and are able to live well in their own country rather than be humiliated for visas and what not in other countries. Also I would suggest that we send a team of psychiatrist to repair the minds, as every Iraqi is scared of something. The kids that I talked to are scared of not seeing bananas again!! What a life!!
Some photos to show you the various troubles.

some silly questions and answers!

A friend sent me the below and I don't just read stuff and discard it. This is serious stuff and those that wrote them are to be stopped and senteneced to years of imprisonment until they forget how to read and write:
‫فتاوى نساء السعودية
س: أنا أعمل في رقابة المطبوعات، وأحيانا أقرأ رواية فيها حديث عن امرأة سافرت دون محرم، فهل أنا آثم وينبغي عليَّ ترك العمل؟
 ج: الشيخ سلمان العودة: عليك أن تتصل بكاتب الرواية، وتطلب منه تغيير الجملة إلى امرأة سافرت ومعها محرم، أو يضيف كلمة آثمة وتلعنها الملائكة، وإذا لم يستجب الكاتب فعليك أن تستقيل لأن أجرك حرام من هذا العمل المخالف للشرع‬!---------------------------------------------

-‫س: لي زميل في الجامعة غير مسلم، وقد استعرت منه كراسة المحاضرات وسقطت فوق سجادة الصلاة، فماذا أفعل لكي لا يغضب الله علىًّ ويدخلني نار جهنم؟
 ج: الشيخ الغامدي: لا إثم عليك إن شاء الله إذا سقطت كراسة محاضرات زميلك الكافر فوق الطرف الأيسر للسجادة، أما إذا سقطت في وسطها أو أيمنها فينبغي أن تغسلها سبع مرات، وإذا كانت صينية الصُنع فغسلها عشر مرات واجب، أما السجاد المصنوع بأيدي فتيات لا يرتدين القفاز فينبغي احراقه‬.---------------------------------------------

-‫س: أنا فتاة ملتزمة وقد رأيت في منامي أن شابا وسيما احتضنني بقوة وابتسمت له، فكيف أقوم بالكفّارة عن ذنبي؟
 ج: الشيخ ابن عثيمين: الذي احتضنك في المنام هو الشيطان نفسه، أما ابتسامتك فتعني رضاك عما حدث، لذا يجب التوقف تماما عن النوم لئلا يظهر الشيطان مرة أخرى، وتتطور الأحضان والقبلات إلى ما لا تحمد عقباه، وقد سمعت أحد مشايخنا الأفاضل يقول بأن الزنا في المنام قد يؤدي إلى حمل المرأة سفاحاً خاصة إذا كان نومها عميقاً‬!--------------------------------------------

--‫س: الموسيقى هي مزامير الشيطان، وأنا كنت أطل من نافذة بيتنا فرأيت عرسا أمام المنزل تنبعث منه الأغاني والموسيقى والمعزوفات، فهل يجب أن أتوضأ مرة أخرى؟

 ج: الشيخ آل الشيخ: إذا كانت مزامير الشيطان كماناً وعوداً وجيتاراً فمن الأفضل إعادة الوضوء، أما لو كانت الطبلة تشبه الدف، والعرس على مسافة خمسين مترا فلا حرج في الصلاة بنفس الوضوء السابق‬!----------------------------------------------

 س: هل هناك جان يجيدون التعامل على الكمبيوتر، ولهم مواقع على الانترنيت، ويدخلون المنتديات باسماء خفية؟‬

 ج: الشيخ الأحمد: الجان يعرفون كل ما يعرفه الإنس، وهناك عفاريت أكثر مهارة من بني البشر في التعامل مع الإنترنيت، وقد سمعت أن عفريتا قام ببرمجة الخطة الخمسية للحكومة، وبعض العفاريت يفضلون أجهزة الماكنتوش، لذا فعليك التأكد من بريدك الالكتروني لمعرفة إن كان المرسل جنا أم إنساً‬!---------------------------------------------

-‫س: هل يستطيع زعيم طاغية أن يعتقل الشياطين ويضعهم في سجونه ومعتقلاته؟ وهل يكون سجانوهم من نار أم من طين

؟‬‫ج: الشيخ عايض القرني: بنو البشر فقط هم المسحوقون تحت أحذية الطاغية، أما الشياطين فتعيش في القصر وتأكل مع القائد المهيب‬..---------------------------------------------

-‫س: شقيقي الأصغر التحق بكلية العلوم، وبدأ يتعلم أشياء غريبة عن الانفجار العظيم والمجرات وملايين النجوم، وفجأة قال لنا بأن الأرض التي نعيش عليها صغيرة جدا وأنها ذرة متناهية تحلق في الكون وتدور حول نفسها وحول الشمس، فماذا نفعل معه؟
 
ج: ابن باز: يجب اخراج شقيقك فورا من الكلية والحاقه بكلية الشريعة قبل أن يتورط في مزيد من الخرافات، فالأرض هي مركز الكون، وهي أكبر من كل الكواكب والنجوم، وتقف على قرني ثور، وتهتز عندما تعطس الشياطين، أما الشمس فتنزل في المساء إلى قاع البحر فتبتل، وعندما تشرق من الناحية الأخرى تبدأ ضعيفة حتى يجف البلل عنها‬.---------------------------------------------

-‫س: أعرف شخصا يعيش في النرويج ويتحدث عن بلاد شمس منتصف الليل، ويقول بأنها لا تختفي في الصيف، ولا تظهر في الشتاء، فما حكم الشرع في هذا المجنون؟

 ج: الشيخ البراك: على المسلم أن يكون حذرا من هؤلاء الجهلة، فكيف تصدق أن الشمس تظهر في منتصف الليل، ثم أين تختفي في فصل الشتاء إلا إذا انتقلت إلى كواكب أخرى تنير لأهلها، ثم تعود بعد انتهاء مهمتها‬!-------------------------------------------

--‫س: أعرف شيخا يقول بأن المرأة التي تجلس قبالة التلفاز آثمة لأن المذيع يستطيع أن يراها وهي بملابس البيت، فهل هناك طريقة لتجنب الحرام في هذه الخلوة غير الشرعية؟

 ج: الشيخ فالح الحربي: عليها أن تتدثر جيدا، وأن تجلس بزاوية 45 درجة حتى لا يلمحها المذيع أو أي ذكر عبر التلفاز، ومن الأفضل شراء جهاز تلفاز بغير صورة تجنبا للوقوع في شرك الكفر البواح‬.--------------------------------------------

--‫س: أنا امرأة صالحة، أقرأ كثيرا لكل الشيوخ، ولا تبتعد عيناي عن شيوخ الفضائيات، لكن لم يجب أحد عن سؤالي الذي أرقني كثيرا: هل يستطيع عفريت ذكر أن يجامعني في حضور زوجي دون أن يلفت انتباهه؟‬‫ثم إنني واقعة في مشكلة محرجة وهي أن ابني الصغير يشبه العفاريت، ويجري مثلهم، ويختفي من غرفة إلى أخرى، ويصرخ كأنه منهم، فهل تظن، سيدنا الشيخ، أن عفريتا انزلق في فراشي، وحملت منه هذا الولد الشقي، خاصة أن جارة عجوزا تقول لي دائما: ابنك عفريت؟

 ج: الشيخ المنجد: إذا كان زوجك يغط في النوم ويصدر شخيرا ولا يشعر بأي حركة حوله فأغلب الظن أن ابنك من الجن وهو يحتاج إلى معاملة خاصة، ويجب أن لا تغضبيه حتى لا يستعين بأقرانه، ويسببون لك المتاعب‬.‫أما إذا كان والده صالحا وطيبا فلا شك بأن ابنك العفريتب وليس من صلبه


So as you can see! This is not something to be ignored!

‬‪

MI

Well, if you are a movie goer you will recognise the name for sure,  and if you see it in MOE then you will see a coke zero monument that has the two alphabets in it.  The hype was high especially as I had never seen the inside of Burj Khalifa yet,  and thought that the scenery would be fantastic especially that Tom will be Cruising on the walls of the Burj, but hah? Was there a view? Noo and the only thing you can see is a photographic picture of some of Dubai high rises,  camels, sand dunes and the Sahara sand storm??? We never had a similar sand storm, and that shot was Borrowed from The Mummy, I wish Brendan Fraser was also there, I miss him as he didn't act for such a long time. Digressing again.

Now, of course the movie is fantastic, don't take me wrong, full of the usual surprises and the cute face of Tom (I admire him since Rain Man, Jerry Maguire and the other MIs).  The only thing that got me is that after paying that hefty sum of money to have the Burj in the movie, and thinking that it would bring some publicity to Dubai so we get rid of this looming financial crisis, to my simple mind, it didn't bring any publicity.  Why? Ok listen up.

1. They used an Indian actor, but we didn't see an Emirati actor, we do have cute faces too, so where is Maryam Alserkal and Nayla Alkhajah from all of this? Where are the group of amateur actors that you two girls have got in store? Or are we only labeled as terrorists-good-for-nothing-loaded-with-money people?

2. From all the lovely bridges of Dubai, and the lovely houses and buildings they show a Morrocan village??? Are they repeating the flop of a movie of SJP the one called SITC2??? And they show a tatty bridge that doesn't even resemble the ugliest bridge in this lovely place? You will have to guess which one, I am not saying. 

3. When they showed Deira creekside, they made us hear some Egyption words??? Are we Egyptians in Dubai? Well they could have at least made us be at home and let us hear some Urdu, Hindi or mallianim words. 

4. When the cars were bashing each other and hitting passing cars and taxis, the number plates were not even Dubai number plates, nor Dubai Taxis, as we only have the bright yellow taxis; now, I wonder where that shot was taken. And I wonder if RTA missed another chance of being publicised as usual! Why wasn't there a shot in the Metro? Did any one notice that the rails of the metro were not even there?


I think the producer was in a hurry, as he or she must have wanted to quickly earn more money by hitting the box offices sooner; not sure if you had noticed but when Tom was coming down the ladder of that lavish jet, and the car of his partners arrived they again showed him coming down the same steps.  It was a subtle mistake as my kids didn't notice it, I told them to rewind the scene in their brain and they confirmed it.  Well, poor Tom, I think his Scientology must have damaged his acting sense! he must have not checked the Movie prior to the premier.  

We always prefer the west to the east, and that is because we are programmed to believe that we build the highest building in the world but have a desert with camels and goat-men living inside these high tech buildings.  

It is high time that we put our foot down and tell these silly producers off.  I think it's high time that our fantastically naive government give me the job of selling our sites to Producers of famous movies. 

How to work with the government!!!

These days large companies have the facility to follow government tenders and have many staff that look after these tender submissions, we (the SMEs) on the other hand, do not possess that many number of staff that can find the tenders and process them, or has the financial ability to follow through with the requirement of the tender for the simple reason that the governments do not pay on time, and that too if they pay at all (have worked before with them and they never paid me to the notion of half a million dirhams). So I have been wondering how to tackle this issue?

It is known around the gulf and the rest of the middle East that corruption in govermental departments is mind boggling; in actual fact none of the middle eastern countries have been visible in this so called international anti corruption code.  Most of the Europeans, and Australasia are evident on the top of the non corruption list, but we don't even know the diffence.  So, my theory is, we need to plant the seed in the minds of our students from little hood that corruption is not only bad for the person as in religionwise, but also bad for the country as a whole.  The trust that foreigners may have in us is not that high, and we will lose out on international recognition.  If the kids learn this like they learn that brushing their teeth, eating well and dressing well are facts of life, we will have a healthy society that is respected and trusted. 

Reaching this goal is simple, we need to test the teachers, advisors, principles and everybody that comes in contact with the children first, to see that they themselves hold anti-corruption attitude in their mind.  The testing is very simple, and doesn't cost much, any type of psychometric tests can do the trick.  Then we have to have mechanisms to report corruption without being scared of imprisonment or fear of deportation. This mechanism has to be sacred, no one can manipulate it or is able to whitewash the names of those reported.  

Then, we have the role of the masjid and the imams in the masjids, they should use the Jumaa platform to continuously remind the people about corruption behaviours and warn them of the consequences.  Corruption is not to be taken lightly, it ruins nations, and can kill us all.  We have to remember that the age of the child is the X factor in learning this habit, so mums and dads are very important to instil the anti cheating, anti lying, anti stealing into the child.  The love for money and the happiness it brings is the basic entry criterium in the realm of corruption, so we need to have the philanthropy element as the background shield for every field of life that we teach that sponge of a brain.   

Unfortunately I will not be here to witness the advancement of this field, if there are young readers that follow my blog, please when you are 60, check the anti corruption lists and see if any of the middle eastern countries are on it.   I will be happy in my grave. 

I will leave you with an arabic poem:
انما الامم الأخلاق ما بقيت.  فان هم ذهبت أخلاقهم ذهبوا 

The scam of sacm

I wonder at times about government providing scholarships and never following through with the administration and the well being of the students. Many of our governments still insist on sending the students to USA. I am not saying that the US education is bad or anything, but what am saying is that we do not really say anything if a student goes to low raked or no ranked university in US for the simple reason of being a US university, but when it comes to other countries all the government become hawks and wonder at ranking, quality assurance and what not.  Also the schools in US? These are a different kettle of fish , students having I20 and reaching there to see no one writing for them in the airport or taking them to their Homestay, nor to the students have anyone wires ring for them at the airport, while in other countries there is a code of practice for international students, and there is ratings for those that send the students, and rating for the universities that accept the students Nd international students can complain if they do not receive all the rights that are mentioned in the code.

We have a student that reached the school and they told him that there is no space for him, and the school moved him to another school.  Of course our helpless student can only accept that or return, and what about his fees, and all the money he incurred until reaching there.  Of course this student is part of king ABDULLA scholarship programme, and he is supposed to away for the first three months from his money, then gets accepted by SACM. Now this SACM is a story by itself,  they told the universities and the schools that they should not pay the consultants their fee, so who is taking the fee of our hard works. We find the students, we counsel the student, we help in visa, and we get the student there, we spend our money for that, pay staff and pay office recent and expenses, and what happens next the scam oaf SACM takes it all. I am not saying that all the staff of SACM are crocks!! That could be large statement to put forward without proof. I don't have proof, but I have hearsay from the people the work at the institutions.  Thus both us the consultants and the students both fall into this deep hole.  The student goes to a bad place (noting the calibre of the student he or she will not be accepted to a top ranked university and not even a second tier one) gets humiliated and then may find himself back to his home country or in a different school and loses his money; and us the consultants lose majorly.

The conspiracy theory is that, those that work for SACM (I am picking on them now, but I can generalise this statement to all the countries that send students abroad and has Cultural attaches that look after the students in station) hate their jobs as its badly paid, to solve the dilemma they get their money out of the universities, and find that the consultants are successful in sending to good places so they have to kill the consultants by making them close down.  What a scam?? Beware guys, even if I have to sell my cloths, jewelry and car, I for one will not stop my valuable work.  The trouble is, who is there in Saudi to listen to me? Or do the QA on their SACM offices?

Sorry my regular readers. This blog is to relieve my brain, as it's going to explode. The time we waste in talking to the schools about this problem outweighs the time we spend on the students.  I have hired a new person just to write to the schools and solve this.  I for one, is going to close down my USA division for Saudi students, as to me they are in deep S.H.I.T.

Turkey- Ankara

You know what, it seems that the governments when they start to work find a piece of huge land, subdevide it, decide where the government offices are going to be and then every thing else is planned accordingly.  Take Bonn for example, from all the nice places in Germany, why did the German goverment decided on Bonn? Thank good that the cold war ended and they were able to return to Berlin! At least it had a character.  Okay, I agree the city will be more beautiful when it is planned rather than growing organically, to me though I would rather have a capital city that was there from time memorial and had all the stuff in them; it is really like having a place where only engineers live? Or only teachers, I can go on forever but you will only be able to follow what I am saying when you actually visit Ankara.  The buildings and the trees are planted, in rows and columns, he must be an architect that plays chess very well.  So this place is not for the usual type of tourists, it's for business and work.  But nothing wrong with being in an organised place with roads and avenues like New York and Abu Dhabi, provided you have a central park, maybe man made but it should resemble a natural habitat with lakes and birds and what have you. 

You will think then why would I go to study in Ankara? Well, you must think twice, it has some of the best universities in the world, Metu for example occupies 46000 donums (cannot convert them for you in hectare, as I am not good with that, but to make you visualise it, the bus tour took a good half hour, and it has it's own high school, it's own museum and its own aeronautics museum too. It has 18 halls of residences, and over 300 exchange agreements with top universities in the world, it's own cafes and supermarkets and the ratio of students to teacher is 1:10, And the cost? I will leave it to you to figure out, but your mum and dad will be more than happy, as the formula fits with their aspirations. And as the iraqi people say, it's hot, crispy and cheap. 

Shops and malls are in abundance, Bazzars are also there and some pretty mosques. So the mums will be happy to visit you.  A last word, two students who joined Metu and were really poor and lived in hardship, had discovered how to cut diamond with marble, so they donated enough money to build three halls of residences and called them in their mum, dad and auntie's names. 

It is growing on me and will visit again, as I didn't have enough time to hit the shops and do some serious shopping, but we went to some really great restaurants, and ate good food. We also visited some more universities which were on the top 200 in the world.

Turkey - Izmir

As I explained in my earlier blog about the fantastic transformation that had taken over Istanbul, this trend had continued in the same direction in Izmir! A very nice town of 4.5 million on the Aegean see, the bay stretches down for miles, and the hotels, cafes and shops are on the bay. You can see the walking track and the bicycle track and the bird track (my name for it as these birds only stand there when not flying) I went out at 6:30 morning to take some shots of the sunrise, but had forgotten that if the son set there then it will to rise from there (silly orientation skills, considering the amount of overseas trips I take every year; 2011 saw 187 days of overseas trips for me only and still have few more trips to do before it ends). the people are so nice, and the food is nicer.  I went to the shopping mall which was a fish sale area, built by the same architect that had built the Eiffle tower, and was converted to this magnificent price of art.  The friendliness of the Turks is remarkable, which is something I had not witnessed 19 years ago.  It see,s that whatever the goverment is doing is working, you see thriftiness, you see education and you see people loving to everything including the carbon footprint. 

In terms of education, this city has 9 universities, some of them are owned by the large conglomerates as a CSR project.  Yasar University is Owned by Mr Yasar the owner of large industries including the well known dairy products company Pinar, so it's a not for profit foundation university that links between the industries that own it and education. It also builds on the successes of the city itself, like the art, design and fashion;  this city is known fornOlives, and wedding dresses, so the courses offered also tag into this realm as well as media (which is linked to the Izmir Opera house)

I would come here again, and that will not be very far in the future.  Leave you with some photos of the bay. 

Let's hypothesise on the #marriege world

This is a Blog about women who are lonely and the analogy that a man is like a paper weight holding the woman from flying

The marriage realm is so engrossed in the orianatal brain to the extent that if a boy or a girl reach the age of 30 and they haven't entered into the world of marriage people will start wondering about the reasons? Is he or she gay? Is he or she impotant, is she or he ugly, do they have a hand or a leg missing, are they stupid? Plus the poor unmarried people will be shy to answer the question so they will avoid seeing adults and would only be amongst those that are not married, still they will talk about it.  In the west, people left the concept behind them as the tax and other laws actually penalise them if they are married. So the question of : are you marrieds? Is not raised, plus we all know that they have another type called Defacto marriage, which is two people committed to living with each other only.  

Why am I talking about Marriage? Well, I believe in Marriage, and this belief is not related to my religion, it's a personal belief that I got since childhood, to me Marriage prevents the person from being selfish, and will always be ready to help anyone to get into a marriage situation.  Anyway, but I never thought of marriage in the same way that the discussion I had with a friend went the other day.  She said that women are lonely without a man, and the analogy that a man is like a paper weight holding the woman from flying was a startling realisation to me. She said that women in the west do all sort of stuff,  which are unheard of in the east, for the simple reason that marriage provides to the family unit.  In the west the sense of family is distorted, some don't want to have a family, even if they get married (which is true, I have few of my western friends saying this all the time) and western women and men are not lonely, as they are open to the idea of meeting men and socialising with them, or other stuff. But for us the eastern girls, this is a no no situation.  For this reason we may grew older without meeting that perfect paper-weight to protect us from flying.  

Well, not sure about my ability in talking further about this subject. I need ideas, I think it is something that needs exploring.  My hypothesis is that unmarried women in the east are unmarried because they haven't been able to meet their soulmates? Please hypothesise with me.

Turkey

I came to Turkey in 1995 when my little girl was only like three years old, we were with a group of friends, and I still remember that we had paid 1500 dirhams per person for ten days tour including everything, somebody miscalculated, or it was true, not sure about that.  The hotels were not bad, and the tours were good, we didn't have major hickups of course, but there were minor fights between my husband (of course) and the tour operators, as he doesn't tolerate  lies, and they were a real  bunch of liars . I remember that we were housed in a NO-Star hotel, and the flier said four star, so he told them off, and we were moved to the four star hotel.  I loved it and loved the bazaars and the mosques. 

Anyway, It was lovely, but the roads were dirty, and the people were not very polished, so when friends ask me, I would say, it's ok.  I still have all the stuff that I bought then, even the accessories, great value for money.

However we arrived yesterday, and the whole scene is different, the country is clean, a lot of bins for rubbish and recycling, very few lies so far, and very clear skies.  From my hotel room I can see as far as Topkapi palace even though we are in Takseem. The people are busy with themselves, and no one looks at us in a weird way.  The food is still as great as it was, and the quality of the stuff in shops is much more superior to what it was then, of course this time, I have my same three year old, but she is looking after me.  Mum, how do you travel on your own? She says, you have no sense of direction, she says, where are you going mum? She says, this is not the way to our hotel? Why are you talking to every body, why did you bring us to this stupid restaurant, tomorrow we choose.  Let's go for a walk you lazy old woman.  Oh, I forgot to add that that same three year old that we went with in 1995, is now telling the air hostess to move me to business class because I am old hehe, times have changed really.

Anyway, I will keep you posted with the new things that we will see in Turkey; I am seeing few universities that will be a new destination to my students, but to those students I am saying that they shouldn't worry, they will love it here. 

Women and their pursuit of life-love balance

Love, a word that is used, misused and abused by all, whether it is love to your soul mate, love to your children, country, parents, grandparents, money, and everything in between.  I don't want to provide a definition as I am not trying to have a masters degree on Love, nor do I qualify to be the authority on the subject, I think if we really look in history, and take only one type of love, which is btween two human beings loving each other, there are only few examples that are worth mentioning; Romeo and Juliet (fiction), Qais and Layla (arabic poetry), Abla and Antar (again arabic Poetry).  Of course your are going to start to question me on why the male is before the female in these examples except the last one, just because I didn't want you to say that I am sexiet, or not politically correct; you know what happens these days, a reporter gets hold of a piece of paper, flash it around and makes up funny stories about one, even though he or she may have said something or wrote something without attaching too much attention on the question of who should come first in the sentence, the man or the woman.

Anyway, to me, I feel as women love more than men, I feel that once in love we never get out of it, and we will not set still until we find the love of our lives. Sometimes there is a mirage of love, we mistake it to be real love, we love that mirage and then get hurt and end it or divorce or just be there without our souls. Correct me if you may.

I have noticed that we never stop loving, we will love even if the other side is not noticing, we will love even if the other side is not interested, we will love even if the other side hates us, we will love even if the other side became ill and forgot that he loved us prior to that.  We will love with no conditions, we will love even if it is not necessary to love. But, we expect to have reciprocation! Our life will not be the same, our agonies will awake us at night, at the mean time our life continues, we will nurture the kids, jobs, friends, and our social lives, we will give without boundaries and try to cover up our losses.  To us the women, love is not sex, love is that feeling when you wake up in the morning and the thought that you are loving someone makes you smile? Rather than give you a condition that I do not want to mention here (my blog is also read by teenagers). Love is the air that one breaths, the water that one drinks, the heart palpitations that one witnesses when we see our love.  Love is being happy that at least there is something going right in your life. Love is finding your love asleep next to you when you wake up in the morning, or when you have your hot flushes in the middle of the night. 

The Pursuit of love and good life is an eternal journey for women,  It is the subject that we all talk about when we socialise, it is not football or golf, it is not politics and money, it is love and harmony, and how to be best at it, is what most of us women talk about.  All those new age-type books that are sold around the world are bought by women, as they are the only ones who need help when their love stop loving them.  Love fills our vacuum, and makes us live in company even if we are alone. 

I think that men should wake up to the fact and remember that even Quraan says that when God created us God also created Love and mercy between us (وجعلنا بينهم موده ورحمه)

Local brands and the brand Jumeirah

 

What is a brand? A very strange question especially that it is coming from a person that is a scholar and teaches this subject? 

No really, what is a brand? You would say Luise Voiton, Channel, Apple,  Porsche, Mercedes, Ritz Carlton! Heinz baked beans etc.  now why did these names come to your mind? Because they signify a certain image, quality, superiority, length of time in the market and always providing great products in the same expected quality.  Of course one would argue that Toyota is also a brand, so is Nissan, and many others that have been in the market for a long time and have similar criteria to the ones mentioned above?  Absolutely true, however many would say that high price is the most significant of all the criterion. 

So let's sum up, a brand is a product or a service that has been there for a long time, always in excellent quality, always brings new models that are even more superior, known in the whole world and has a high price? Agreed? 

Now this is a generalised statement about brands,  what I would like to indulge in now is brands in our country. What would you say is the brands in the UAE? Burj Alarab? Burj Khalifa? Ajmal Purfumes? My fair lady Abayas? Mall of the Emirates? What else? Come on think? Well, there are not really many that would fit my definition above.

Firstly the length of time, UAE is only fourty years old, and frankly, most of the entrepreneurial activities have only started then, so we do not have anything that is a 100 years old! Secondly Quality, ok all the ones mentioned here actually satisfy this criterion, but still you may find the odd incident that can damage a decade of high quality (the main reason here is that the people that work in the UAE are not always here so new people coming in to work will need time to learn, and in between can make a hell of a mistake, this fact is actually a research question by itself). Thirdly, price, one would argue that everything is expensive in the UAE? So at least this criterion is fulfilled. Fourthly, new models every year, that too can be argued that it is there. But are we known in the world? Well Dubai is a brand that is known in the world, but once e tourists come here they are stunned by the problems that they may face in hotels, restaurants, faulty products, not seeing the real face of an Arab country, so we did sell Dubai, but we didn't insist on what we should do to make the client a loyal client, who is always going to visit.

So we only have less than half the qualities to be a brand known in the world.

Enough negativity Suad, go to the positives.  Ok, this whole thing is brought about when The Shelter hosted few entrepreneurs from Dubai who started something and were upset that no one respects local brands including the authorities themselves, for example these brands will not be allowed to have a space in a large shopping mall like Mall of the Emirates, Dubai Mall or city centre.  One of the brands that were on the panel was Jumeirah, yes Jumeirah the hotels, the restaurants, the outlets, the group that is owned by Sheikh Mo. arguably Jumeirah is a brand, it has been there for a length of time, is high quality, is priced to kill, is known in the whole world and is consistant in having new models and additions. So Jumeirah was the devils advocate, every time the other young brands complain, Jumeirah contradicts and says that it didn't face that.

So, I paused the classic question, why doesn't a brand like Jumeirah house these young local brands, for encouragement sake? A question that only sheikh Mo can answer, as certainly the big guy who came to brag about Jumeirah was stunned when he was asked to answer this particular question.

I must talk about a seminar that I had attended with Dubai Women councel, chaired by the Charismatic Raja Algurg; in that seminar the speakers were for
Om a Swiss bank discussing an idea for investments, and we're trying to convince us the Women to go for it and invest in it.  The idea was to have a portfolio of stocks of famous brands in the world, like the ones I mentioned earlier and to let us invest in the stocks of the likes of Cartier, Christian dior etc, to gain a minimum of 12% a year.  Of course I didn't invest, as I don't have money set aside waiting to hear about a certain opportunity and grabbing it.  But the other women were certainly interested.  Again being me, I said to the women (the bank hated me for this comment of course, like the guy from Jumeirah) why don't you invest in the local small businesses, as they will provide you more than 35% profits??? I started to explain how micro financing is so vital to the country and that Smal businesses are the backbone of every society, the largest employer, the least time waster, the fighter for its existence, the future of a brand to be born.  If incubated and looked after it should sustain itself, provide self esteem to those that started it, and huge gains to those that invested in it.  Not sure if any of you had watched the BBC Programme called "dragon's den" if not please do it will explain what I mean.  


As the arabic saying goes, there is no life to that that you are calling  "لا حياه لمن تنادي"
 
Anyway, if I was rich, and I am sure I will be one day, once discovered by whoever that discovers people and put them in the forefront, I will start an Arab dragon's den.  Watch this space.

The analogy between Imam Hussain revolution and the Arab spring,

 

Last week commemorates the vicious killing of Imam Hussain, the son of Sayeda Fatema and Imam Ali. Those that participated in the killing were a group of tribes who didn't believe that Islam was a real thing, but thought that Profit Mohammed had only promoted it to get maximum gains from the people around Mecca and Madina and other Arab countries who slowly started to adopt the religion.  In actual fact there was a poem that they had  recited which portrays exactly what they felt, it goes like this " bani Hashim played with the wealth, there is no god and no Quraan", you must excuse me as I am not that great in translation, but the gist of what had happened is conveyed by this simple translation.  Anyway, in the battle of Karbala, over 30,000 troops gathered to Kill imams Hussain and his friends, only 75 men, their wives, children were there; the water supply was cut, and the tents that housed the prophet's family and their loyal friends was surrounded, at mid day on the tenth  of Muharram (a month that prevents any killing) all the men died, and even the little children (male) were also killed, barring the elder son of Imam Hussain as he was too ill to go to war.  Even the few months old baby Abdullah was killed in a brutal way.  Then they burnt the tents, the girls and mothers were trying to escape, the gang stole all the belongings and raised fear in the hearts of the children 

So one would say that the battle was a complete disaster, and thereafter Islam would die? 

But as we all know, Islam is still a practiced religion and is followed by millions of people around the world? What is the secret? 

The Secret is Sayeda Zainab, she is the bomb that Sayeda Fatima, Imam Ali and Imam Hussain had prepared very well to take over the preaching of Islam. In actual fact if it wasn't' for Zainab, her tremendous strength and agility Islam will not have been here today. She stood in front of Yazeed (coh), threatened him and gave speeches in all the places that they dragged them to including the heads of all those that were viciously slain. 

Let's bring the camera back to our day, it all started with this Tunisian boy who burnt himself in public as had all the qualification and no job. The Arab spring started, fired with the strength of social media, one country after the other declared a date to apprise, and of course, the research had proved that women were the majority in flaring up the public opinion and pushing everybody to ask for basic rights.  I f you gather all the writeups, videos, tweets, Facebook walls,  etc you will see that women were prominent in the Arab spring history of 2011. Some though were not a great examples I must add.  

What happened next was just history, most of the leaders had left, and some fought till they hid in a hole, and some are still steadfast hoping that the young will be bored and forget all about it.  

My point here is, Imam Hussain wanted change, and Arab spring wanted change;  Imam Hussain had a strategy for continuity, however, did the Arab spring had this strategy? Or they just went out and gathered in one of the largest roundabouts in each country, and when they won (those who had won I mean) they paused to think of what to do next? they were basically hoping that the strategy will be built in a similar way that all other revolutions that happened prior to the industrial revolution like the French revolution and others that those interested in history know about.  Of course I am not saying that one should always have an agenda and should know what one would do if one wins, but if you were taking of grabbing basic rights, you should know what these are, how to get them, which convention and recommendation madagascar them, what is the shape of the government that is needed, what are the stands that we need the new leaders to have, are we going to hire crocks to run the government or will we elect the best, as I am certain that this is the aspiration of the youth. We all want to have a country that is number on one in non-corruption, it's college of education has a waiting list, and every person in its community has all the necessities, and socially secured. 

It is not a coincidence that youth join a political party, we all had that mind when we were young, we all believed that change is good, and we all should strive to change to the best.  To do this, every political party should prepare its members to be ministers, in all the fields of a cabinets, we do not really need to reinvent the wheel, we can see what the west had done, learn from their mistakes and then do better.  But to have a no-strategy revolution is not something that we all want to see.  I for one, wouldn't like to live in chaos, I for one, want my electricity, my bed, my Internet, wifi, you name it of modern way of life which we feel it's necessary to have and I want it. So to me I will never (now and before) follow a party unless I know for sure that it has an agenda and a clear governance for when and if it wins.  Every country that has political parties they work in parallel, they have a cabinet and a shadow cabinet. But to have no idea of what their education strategy, for example, would be and no person to run the education ministry, is not something that I and anyone in my generation will approve of.  I do not want to go to the dark ages again, and live a pre-history life.  I want life to continue as if nothing happened, in actual fact I want it to start being better as soon as the revolution takes over.  No worries, no one in the streets, no dead bodies, no queues in supermarkets and petrol pumps, no kids sitting at home without learning, no phones tapped, no censored books (whether paper or ebook)  nothing major that makes life intolerable. 

I am sure that some kids  will be upset with me for saying this, as they feel that lets first uprise, and then worry about the circumstances of whats next? No! I will not agree to help. Of course I will not be anti, I will not attach an unwanted description on them, I will not say that they are communist, chauvinists , imperialists, sheaests, sunniest, Islamists, wahhabists, Machiavelleists, liberalist and the rest of the lists that there are on this world. I will not also say that they have been brain washed by a certain governments to push their existing leaders out, I will not say bad words on their prophets and imams (I saw a tweet from a person who was wanted by the Bahraini goverment and the inter-pole and who was raping prisoners and torturing them, and who is now looked at as "The Lord of the Ring- The return of the king" by some people in Bahrain, weird really).  I will respect those that uprise and are asking for basic human rights.  But I will respect them even more if they knew the next step. 

So here is the final word, if Imam Hussain had a strategy, and ingrained the philosophy of Islam in the head of a weak woman taken as a prisoner of war, and that too was over 1400 years ago, it is high time that those that participated in the Arab spring and their leaders wake up to this fact, learn from it before too late, and before we all start to curse them similar to what the Iranians are doing to their government. 

Okay, sorry but this info falls in the "must share" category

And after you finish reading it you must tell me which of the bad habits that i have that is going to damage my brain ( :) )


BRAIN DAMAGING HABITS
الأسباب الرئيسية المسببة لتلف العقل هي




1. No Breakfast عدم تناول وجبة الإفطار الصباحية
People who do not take breakfast are going to have a lower blood sugar level. This leads to an insufficient supply of nutrients to the brain causing brain degeneration.


2. Overeating تناول الأطعمة لحد التخمة
It causes hardening of the brain arteries, leading to a decrease in mental power.


3. Smoking التدخين
It causes multiple brain shrinkage and may lead to Alzheimer disease.


4. High Sugar consumption التناول المفرط للسكر
Too much sugar will interrupt the absorption of proteins and nutrients causing malnutrition and may interfere with brain development.


5. Air Pollution تلوث الهواء
The brain is the largest oxygen consumer in our 20 body. Inhaling polluted air decreases the supply of oxygen to the brain, bringing about a decrease in brain efficiency.


6 . Sleep Deprivation الحرمان من النوم
Sleep allows our brain to rest... Long term deprivation from sleep will accelerate the death of brain cells..


7. Head covered while sleeping تغطية الرأس خلال النوم
Sleeping with the head covered increases the concentration of carbon dioxide and decrease concentration of oxygen that may lead to brain damaging effects.


8. Working your brain during illness إجهاد المخ خلال فترة المرض
Working hard or studying with sickness may lead to a decrease in effectiveness of the brain as well as damage the brain.


9. Lacking in stimulating thoughts عدم تحفيز التفكير
Thinking is the best way to train our brain, lacking in brain stimulation thoughts may cause brain shrinkage.


10. Talking Rarely ندرة التحدث أو إجراء الحوار
Intellectual conversations will promote the efficiency of the brain







الأسباب الرئيسية المسببة في إتلاف الكبد
The main causes of liver damage are:



1. Sleeping too late and waking up too late are main cause.
النوم المتأخر


2. Not urinating in the morning.
عدم التبول في الصباح


3 . Too much eating.
تناول الأطعمة بشراهة


4. Skipping breakfast.
عدم تناول إفطار الصباح


5. Consuming too much medication.
المبالغة في تناول الأدوية الطبية


6. Consuming too much preservatives, additives, food coloring, and artificial sweetener.
استهلاك المواد الحافظة والملونة والمحليات الاصطناعية


7. Consuming unhealthy cooking oil.
استهلاك الزيوت غير الصحية
As much as possible reduce cooking oil use when frying, which includes even the best cooking oils like olive oil. Do not consume fried foods when you are tired, except if the body is very fit.


8. Consuming raw (overly done) foods also add to the burden of liver.
استهلاك الأطعمة غير الطازجة أو الأطعمة المقلية المخزنة
Veggies should be eaten raw or cooked 3-5 parts. Fried veggies should be finished in one sitting, do not store.
We should prevent this without necessarily spending more. We just have to adopt a good daily lifestyle and eating habits. Maintaining good eating habits and time condition are very important for our bodies to absorb and get rid of unnecessary chemicals according to 'schedule.'


الأطعمة الخمسة الرئيسية المسببة للسرطان هي
The top five cancer-causing foods are:


1.. Hot Dogs النقانق

Because they are high in nitrates, the Cancer Prevention Coalition advises that children eat no more than 12 hot dogs a month. If you can't live without hot dogs, buy those made without sodium nitrate.


2. Processed meats and Bacon اللحوم المعالَجة

Also high in the same sodium nitrates found in hot dogs, bacon, and other processed meats raise the risk of heart disease. The saturated fat in bacon also contributes to cancer.


3. Doughnuts الكعك المقلي


Doughnuts are cancer-causing double trouble. First, they are made with white flour, sugar, and hydrogenated oils, then fried at high temperatures. Doughnuts, says Adams , may be the worst food you can possibly eat to raise your risk of cancer.

4. French fries البطاطس المقلي

Like doughnuts, French fries are made with hydrogenated oils and then fried at high temperatures. They also contain cancer- causing acryl amides which occur during the frying process. They should be called cancer fries, not French fries, said Adams .

5. Chips, crackers, and cookies شرائح البطاطس والكعك المحلى المقرمش

All are usually made with white flour and sugar. Even the ones whose labels claim to be free of trans-fats generally contain small amounts of trans-fats.





أخبر أفراد أسرتك وزملاءك وأصدقاءك
PASS THIS TO ALL WHOM YOU LOVE & CARE FOR

Tug of War

Interesting discussions between two educators in an imaginary country made up of many states, no one would be harmed by listening to these discussions. This country is focused on improving education and introducing the best there is in this field. However, every state does it by itself, and compete with the other state by bringing lots of those white skinned, blue eyed consultants who go there for a temporary period with the main objective of clearing their mortgages, and saving money for their rainy days, thus they introduce products that do not match with the culture, tradition and the way of thinking of this country.

Those in important positions are busy with dreaming new dreams on a minute by minute basis (and call the dreams innovations) and forget to link performance to outcomes from those consultants, then after years of pumping funds into their pockets realize that what have been introduced is not what they mandated, so they kick the consultants out and bring new ones who would do the same thing but camouflaged with new vocabularies. Also each state has an education committee, and each education committee does the same thing, hire/fire for bad results; the education committees in each of the states do not talk to each other, instead they are competing to be better. At the end of the day the kids of this country suffer, the teachers also suffer, and more money is spent on teaching the kids at higher education level.

Two years is lost from the kids' lives, in terms of language preparation and tertiary preparation skills; the money spent on these two years is also a waste and the parents have no idea, as they are trusting the authorities. When people like the two educators who are discussing this subject suggest real, passionate and workable solutions, no one listens to them, because as I said the officials are busy dreaming up new policies, and to make it worst, the two educators just hears that one of the states had hired a top notch (in reputation and in charging) consultancy to produce "the country's public policy in Education".

Basically, this unhealthy competition is similar to tug of war, or the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing; no body is winning, every body is losing. Thus, the educators have decided that they are better off keeping quite, or moving to a neighboring country that is run by a queen who is over looking the strategy of education in a cohesive way.


As mentioned earlier, no person is harmed by this blog, the characters are imaginary, and the countries mentioned are also imaginary.

The reasons for working with an educational consultant rather than applying on your own.

When we opened our wee consultancy back in 2003, it was merely a place to avoid the mishaps that we encountered during our studying lives from acceptance to universities, to finding homes to live in, who is going to do our visas, what do we need to do when we get there. They call me the eternal student, universities benefit from me similar to a boutique benefiting from a shopaholics, can I call me studyholic? Maybe. Also I have changed fields of study so many times, so I am like those that are called Jack of all trades, master of none (in actual fact, till date when I counsel a student I want to do what he or she are going to do!! Hillarious? Of course). 

Anyway, my husband and I thought that many people must have had similar issues, hence the office.  But when we went for the licensing, we found out that there is actually a name for this service, and it requires some sort of validation from the authorities, and some regulations to protect the students to the extent that we almost gave up. However, our encountered difficulties while applying for studies abroad was stronger than the licensing difficulties. Voila, we are here, and we did it.  Now what? Let's find the students? So we went to embassies, schools, and told them about us, published a magazine, visited ministries, and the rest is history. 

What we have started as a litle project went on to be a good source of income; this income didn't come from close friends and relatives of course, but it came as a result of our strong promotion, parents worried about their kids, and last but not least the increase in money in the gulf countries which made the governments introduce lots and lots of scholarships. The friends didn't use our high quality services, as maybe they have a rule of not mixing business with friendship, but to me, having their kids go overseas through our consultancy may save them a lot of agony, money, and time. Notice that time is of the essence here, no one should lose time, as time is money.

I will only provide one example (I have many of course, but don't want to bore you).  One of my friends sent her so son USA, and her son was in continuos contact with her; for a while she was worried to death as she didn't hear from him, when she finally got hold of the university, they told her that he had had an accident and they didn't know how to contact her, as they did not have her email, phone etc. This is something that we insist upon, but the children do not want to provide their parents' information to the university to avoid any communication with the university and to prevent them from receiving their academic records.  Having next-of-kin information with the school, college or university is of utmost importance, as anything can happen to our kids, and we want to hear about these incidents ASAP. We didn't have these kids from thin air, we spent our life to bring them up, and want to be certain that they are well looked after. 

Believe me, I had silly situations and was mucked around with during my long years of study, please ensure that your kids are in good hands, bringing them to me or to other experienced consultants may save you a lot of worry.