Hareega

The Story of the Masannats

2008-07-21T08:32:00.006+11:00

If you happen to be one of those 500-or-so people whose last name is Masannat, you probably already know the story of one of our great grandfathers.

Although the Masannats are historically from Kerak or Madaba, the story of where they very originally came from remained unkown for some reason. The history of the family in Jordan dates back to about 100 years ago and doesn't go back any further even when you read those large books written by Rox Al-Ozaizi.

The man in the picture above is one of the famous grandfathers of the family. His named was Jules Massenet, he was one of the Masannats living in little village by Saint-Étienne, France. He became a very very popular Opera singer and wrote an opera comique (play) called Manon that is still popular to our day and is being played in different theaters in Europe. He was born and raised and eventually died in France. He had three brothers (Michel, François, Armand) and one sister (Josette) who got married to a Turkish military man, Fekret Emre, who was a very prominent member in the Ottoman's army. Because of their different religion she had to leave France and immigrate to Turkey. Three of her brothers immigrated with her but the 4th one (Jules-the Opera singer) refused to leave because he didn't want his career in France to be ruined. When Jules died in 1912 he left half of his fortune to his Josette but the French government confiscated that money because it was given to a woman who married a Muslim.

Fekret was very wealthy and was able to take care of the whole Massenet family even when he was relocated to Damascus to control the demonstrations there. However he was later executed after a prominent Turkish leader falsely accused him of treason.

Widowed Josette lost her mind and committed suicide (or so they say). The three brothers had to move far away from Damascus and Turkey. They were already fluent in Arabic and they mastered the Bedouin accent so when two of them moved to Madaba in the early 20th century they were accepted in the Ozazait tribe. The third (Francois-nicknamed Atallah!) moved to Kerak instead after a dispute with his brothers about the family's finances. He was not very welcomed by the Kerak ribes but when he joined Sharif Hussein Bin Ali in the revolution against the Ottomans he was regarded with respect. He got married and had 11 kids.

At this time the Masannats identify themselves as Jordanians and nothing else. There is no connection between our family here and those of Jule's descent (if he had any) who might have been living now in Saint-Étienne or elsewhere, and his name is not even mentioned among our family in Jordan. Most of the Masannats have the light-colored skin and colored eyes but they only identify themselves as Jordanians- they even changed the English spelling of their last name.

It's really exciting to learn more about the origins of your family and its history even though there may be some dark periods of it. It's part of the heritage and there shouldn't be anything to be ashamed of.

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(for everyone who read this and believed it, I'm sorry but I was bullshitting you. Except for who Jules Massenet was, everything and everyone mentioned above is fake. The Masannats have originated from the Arabian Penninsula since the creation of humanity, and we're all bedouins. Having colored eyes automatically excludes you as a member of our family. However, this sotry is somewhat believable and I have used it more than once in the US since it can open a good conversation. Although I've never been to an Opera before but I think that any Masannat can have get good seats with such story)

Why Did He Shoot Himself?

2008-07-20T05:14:00.007+11:00

The shooting in Amman where six people were injured in a musical was a crime of despair. The shooter was an 18-year old, resident of Al Baq'a refugee camp. There are not a lot of details about this guy yet, but apparently he comes from a poor family and I would be really surprised if he ever left Jordan. In that case he wouldn't have received training in some Al-Qaeda camp or had connections with any terrorist organization. And he's 18. A boy, not that people this age can't be criminals but this was probably a crime he planned for himself.

To me it sounded like this guy wanted to commit suicide, but killing yourself is generally a shameful act in our country, and it's really bad to die in shame. How many proverbs and poems are out there in our culture with emphasis that death is not awful and is even encouraged if you die in dignity. People want to be looked upon as a heroes when they die. This teenager is not looked upon now as a hero, but he wouldn't have realized that. He's 18! Dying with dignity is too complex of a concept for him to understand. But there are factors for it: there's the Jordan Festival that some people made it look like an Israeli festival attended by zionists, they're playing music which is considered evil where the audience engage themselves in sin, add to that poverty and ignorance and guns and you've got an 18-year old shooting at people. What's interesting is that islamically the way he killed himself which is pure suicide-just shooting yourself with a gun, grants him an automatic one-way ticket to hell (correct me if I'm wrong).

Well, maybe he realzied that too but just didn't care.

The Best Crime in History

2008-07-16T14:35:00.009+11:00

I really feel guilty for saying this, but this crime was awesome, and I hope the criminal is still alive!

Anyway, if you haven't heard of D.B. Cooper, read this and you'll understand.

The story of this crime goes back to 1971. A man stepped in at the ticket counter in the Portland airport and paid 20 dollars to buy a airline ticket from Portland to Seattle. Passengers then didn't have to show an ID, so he went with the name Dan Cooper. After takeoff, he handled a note to a flight attendant saying that he was hijacking the plane. He demanded 200,000 dollars and..... four parachutes, or else he was going to blow out the plane.

The FBI worked quickly and were able to collect the 200,000 dollars in cash, and labelled the $20-dollar bills with serial numbers. They also bought the 4 parachutes from a local store in Seattle. As Cooper ordered, the plane landed in Seattle and the money and the 4 parachutes were delivered to him. He was also kind enough to request food for the crew. When he got what he needed he released all passengers and kept the crew on the plane.

Up to this point, nobody knew why he needed the 4 parachutes.

The plane refueled then took off again from Seattle toward Reno, Nevada. Right after takeoff, he asked the entire crew to gather around the cockpit, closed the first-class curtains, then went to the back of the plane. An attendant noticed that he was tying something like a rope around his waist.

The crew then noticed a sudden change in air pressure, they looked back and noticed that Cooper had lowered the stairs at the end of the plane and jumped with the briefcase and money, leaving the remaining parachutes on the plane. Left behind was his tie. He was never seen again since then.

The plane later landed safely in Nevada. An extensive search lasting months and involving hundreds of US Army troops took place looking for Cooper in the place where he could have landed. Nobody and nothing was found. It was thought that he might have died during the jump, but neither his body or his bag or parachutes were found.

In 1980 a boy found about 5000 dollars in a river close to where Cooper was thought to have landed. They were in 20-dollar bills and they all matched the serial numbers of the money handled to Cooper 9 years earlier. The rest of the money was never found to date.

About 1000 men have claimed to be Cooper, and the FBI almost believed some of them. After the discovery of DNA testing, the FBI was able to get Cooper's DNA from the tie he left on the plane before jumping and compared it with all these men's DNA. None matched.

This case remains a cold case after 37 years, and will probably stay this way. Six months ago the FBI released never-before-seen sketches and fact sheets of the crime to trigger memories of people who might have known Cooper.

This man hijacked the plane only to get money and not to harm people. Although I do not encourage hijacking planes (never ever ever ever) but I can't help it but feel impressed by the events surrounding this crime.

I feel that everything in the past was done with style, and crime is no exception.

And D.B. Cooper, wherever you might be, don't fly Southwest ... you can never survive their flights even with the four parachutes.

Some of the money recovered in 1980

Here's a clip of a news bulletin following the hijacking:

Best Most Sincere Original Jordanian and Efranji News Around the Clock from Hareega

2008-07-13T12:31:00.017+11:00

- A large fight broke in Tafilah Tech University, resulting in mild injuries to its president and several other students.
Jordanians are in a state of shock. They never knew there was a tech university in Tafileh.

- By the way, the president of the Tafileh University is from Salt. The university is well-known to be the only place on earth where nobody is allowed to say even one joke.

- A doctor in the Islamic Hospital in Amman was attacked by a visitor. The CIA released a statement today stating the visitor was acting in self-defence.

- A prostitute in Kentucky was arrested after she was trading sex for free gas. She appeared to be very frustrated explaining how she had to trade sex for oil because the Russian prostitutes were stealing all the good Dubai jobs from the American prostitutes.

To the majority of the good people living in Kentucky, this woman is considered to be the filthiest thing associated with Kentucky since KFC.

- Barack Obama will meet with HM King Abdullah later this month in Amman. Jordanian officials have read a script of the speech Obama will have on this occasion and asked his staff to delete the statement that said, "If it wasn't for his father, George Bush would have never become the president of the United States" from the speech.

- Many mosquitoes carrying the West Nile virus were detected in the US. As a result of this President Bush have ordered his troops in Iraq to better control all mosquitos flying around the Nile River.

- Syria and Lebanon decided to open embassies in each others' countries for the first time in history. There is still no word on the date when they will open or the method by which they will be bombed.

- Jordanian PM Nader Al-Dhahabi left to Paris to represent Jordan in the Mediterranean Union summit.
Meanwhile, The Parliament has demanded an immediate release of all Al-Dhahabi's geography scores in high school.

- Ammon News mentioned today that a man in Karak has lost 21 million dollars in business deals. It doesn't mention details of how this Karaki man lost his money but it is feared it had something to do with Al-Salt Document released earlier this year that limits the number of "manasef" served in any occasion to only ten.

- Despite the political unrest in Iran, the Jordanian Football Association is still planning to send the football team to participate in the Western Asian Games in Tehran next month.
In fact, most Jordanians are hoping for Iran to be bombed while the team is still there.

Jordanians and Condoms

2008-07-09T05:52:00.015+11:00

Our government is taking the first step in distributing one and half million free condoms to Jordanians. Although I understand most people would have preferred a free tank of gas, I still think this is a great idea. (For detials click here. English here).

To start with, the government has been taking serious steps in birth control for many years. This was a 2-way process, first the government wanted less people because they figured out that's better for the country, and people started realizing they cannot have six or seven kids anymore. They can barely raise one kid a decent life.

Not too long ago a Jordanian woman had to bring 10 kids to life for just 2 or 3 of them to survive. My father had at least 5 siblings who died in their infancy from pneumonia or plague. As health care in Jordan improved and vaccinations became available the life expectancy of Jordanians had significantly improved (in your face vaccines-are-dangerous freakish mothers). Jordan now has the best life expectancy in the entire Arab world, also ahead of countries like Denmark, Ireland and the United States, according to the CIA's 2008 World Factbook.

So, when a Jordanian is born, he's likely to live too long, way too long. If you think there are too many people in Jordan now just imagine how it will look like in a few decades. There will be quite a lot of old people, much more than now. Meanwhile the prices are super-high and regardless of who's responsible for that, it doesn't look like it will get better anytime soon. Even if it did, it won't be like the good old days when middle-class families were able to raise a few kids and put them in college and even go on vacations in neighboring countries. That's over and sadly I think it's over for good. We have to be realistic. There's no coming back from this. We'll reach a stage when having 3 siblings means you have a big family. Unfortunately I think this is necessary, and with more wars going on in the region and Palestinians then Iraqis then God knows who else will flee to Jordan the country cannot take it anymore.

Some like to live in denial so they hate any move by the government to control the number of kids they want to have. Someone has to wake these people up. Men have to realize that their ego of being served and loved (although not always) by many kids when they get old doesn't serve his family's or his country's best interests. It also exhausts his wife(-ves). He has to put on that piece of latex or at least stop beating his wife if she refused to experience another 9-month journey with another miserably-poor child to be.

Look at the misfortunes that Jordan and other Arabs went through in history and you'll realize that having not having too many people was never the reason behind any of them. We never lost a war with Israel because there weren't enough Arabs. Having more people wouldn't have prevented corruption or poverty or thefts or wars between neighboring countries. In fact it would have intensified such problems. For those who believe Jews are controlling the world, the number of Jews is estimated to be only 15 million worldwide. There are more Egyptians living in Cairo.

Jordan has changed and we have to understand this and make others understand it before we get overwhelmed with the number of humans we have came up with. Having very large numbers of people who look like us doesn't mean anything if these large numbers can be dominated by others who were raised in more luxurious societies and received all what a child needs for a decent life. Maybe we had an Einstein living among us but he didn't have a chance to excel or even ask a question in class packed with 50 other students, or his father pulled him out of school to beg on the streets so each of his 7 brothers can get to have one meal a day.

I think it's time every Jordanian should consider birth control for his own sake and for the sake of others.

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We Should Get To Know This Man A Little More

2008-07-07T14:56:00.009+11:00

Today marks the 36th anniversary of the death of King Talal, who ruled the country for approximately one year. In a country where only 4 kings ruled for more than 60 years, I think we should get to learn more about him.

A very good reason he's not mentioned too often is the fact that he didn't rule Jordan for more than eleven months, until he was removed the Parliament. Yes, believe it or not we had a Jordanian Parliament in 1952 that was able to end the reign of the king, although to be realistic it wasn't solely their own decision.

But what makes his rule very remarkable is that he came up with the most important foundation of any country: the constitution. Another shocker: in 1952 the Jordanian constitution was more progressive and used to guarantee more civil rights than it does today.

Why was King Talal removed? According to Time Magazine on its August 16, 1952 edition, it was schizophrenia. Although I tend to believe in some conspiracy theories and sometimes make some of my own, I tend to doubt that he was removed because he was just "too nice" or "too friendly". He was probably mentally ill. He was sent to Switzerland for treatment and died there 20 years after he was deposed. Some people claimed that he imprisoned against his will.

I'm still surprised how can a mentally unstable person come up with a constitution? Does it say in other words that you have to be mentally unstable to write a progressive constitution for a Middle Eastern or Arab country?

Ten Facts I Find Very Interesting

2008-07-07T07:12:00.008+11:00

1- Yasser Arafat did an interview with Playboy magazine in 1988.

2- Ralph Nader, who ran for US president several times and running this time as well, is originally Lebanese and is fluent in Arabic.

3- The Gipsy Kings is a French band.

4- Paula Abdul is a Syrian Jew. Bob Dylan is a Turkish Jew in origin. Singer Layla Murad is an Egyptian Jew. David Letterman is not Jewish!

5- Jordan ranks 5th in the world among countries exporting phosphorus rocks.

6- A football game between El Salvador and Honduras in 1969 triggered a 5-day war between both countries. It was called the football war (although there were other factors predisposing to this war).

7- What's common between a Pakstani president (Zia al-Haqq), A UN Secretary-General (Hammerskjold), the Philippines president (Magsaysay) ? They all died in plane crashes.

8- There were 4 plane crashes invovling Royal Jordanian. In 1965 in Damascus, 1973 in Nigeria, 1975 Morocco, 1979 in Qatar. Nothing since 1979 and hopefully it will stay this way!

9- Remember the SARS virus infection 4 years ago? The Italian scientist who first discovered the virus died from a SARS infection.

10 - The grandson of former Egyptian president Gamal Abdul Nassir (from his daughter) is the founder of Melody music channel.

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If you need a reference for any of the above, I'll be happy to provide it.
Hareega

Summary of the Survey Results

2008-07-05T18:34:00.005+11:00

Some of you may wonder why am I doing a questionnaire every year with almost the same questions.
Over the past 3 years I have always made changes in this blog based on the answers and comments I get. I wouldn't ask a question if your answers wouldn't be taken seriously. For example I have cut down on sport material (unless a big competition is going on) and watched my language a bit more because of your advice. However this year I haven't asked you to comment on the design of the blog because honestly I can't do any better at least for a while.

Thanks a lot for all 60 people who took it,

You can still take the survey if you haven't, click here.

Quick Results:

- 64% of members are females.

- 36% were between age groups 23-27. About 10% are older than 34.

- About 50% live in Jordan. 22% in the US/Canada, 10% in the gulf or other Arab countries, and the remaining in other parts of the world.

- The topics readers enjoy the most are personal stories (90%) and social issues (77%), and less political opinions (60%)

And what they hate the most is again, sports 60%

About 96% think that posting news with personal comments is at least a good idea.

And 90% say the same about my lists of favorite things.

85% placed the blog among the best 20% of Jordanian blogs.

- 60% think this blog got better the last year, 34% think it's about the same, and 6% say it's got worse.

- 36% think the blog is great, and 55% think it's very good. 8% think it's OK.

- 88% think I treat the readers respectfully. 7% think I'm either rude, biased or a hypocrite.

- 85% said I should blog in both Arabic and English. 13% said I should only blog in English.

Here are some comments left by some readers,

- Happy Anniversary Hareega! One thing I liked more about your blog earlier is its previous name, Reega Reega Hareega was funnier:)

- Some posts ideas that I would like to know your experience about or your perspective: ايام زمان في عمّان Your favorite Arabic songs/singers/actors... more about life in Arizona: the heat, cost of living, types of people to expect, Arab presence.. Overall, your blogging is very enjoyable. good luck.

- first reeGa reeGa hareeGa ya hreeGa .. lol .. you have a very Good blog .. and it is one of my favourite blogs of all times .. talent and dry sense of humor makes this blog worth-reading .. keep up the good work

- Nice blog, better than many useless blogs around. I always think if you wanna blog, make it useful! (a good laugh is useful also!)

- ما زلت لا أعرف كيف يمكنك أن تجد الوقت لكتابة موضوع أو أكثر في نفس اليوم أو على مدى يومين مع أنك طبيب ما هو السر؟ كتاباتك مسلية و مضحكة.... لكن كما قلت لك من قبل، ليتك تقلل من الأشياء التي يمكن أن تعتبر... غير مؤدبة :) آسف لكنك طلبت آراءنا... على العموم أنا أعشق مدونتك...

- You're not in touch with your feminine part. your blog lacks emotion. OK I admit the first sentence was a joke. But to be honest, your views are some what grey, and even though you're very respectful, I can't see you taking a firm stand.

- Biggest complaint: I fall into your oldest age category. Please pretend you have some over 50 and over 60 readers just to make me feel better. Even when I don't agree, I love reading your opinion, and it does influence mine and makes me think :) Please go get married! With the added synergy, hyper-joy, and encouragement you will find, it will make your blog #1.

-would u quit the swearing!

- I remember doing this 1 year ago or so.. Keep posts coming.

- Please blog only in English! I love your blog but it takes me forever to read the Arabic ones so I often miss out on them!

- You blog is a nice breeze of air among all the other blogs. Other blogs are generally a waste of time or a big load of talk and meaningless and useless arguments while yours always vary. you go from entertainment to informative posts to funny posts to nostalgic posts. sometimes you talk about things that are happening in Jordan or get happy when something happens in Jordan or is related to Jordanian sports. I wish you the best and it's obvious that you're getting better by the day in blogging.

- Awlan, Meet Wardeh Thanian, I'm so much impressed that you have the time to do it. God bless you, we need a story of how to tie the knot !!

-Your blog is addicting! Wondering if you add Heroin or Cocaine to it :-) Keep it up! I will keep on reading your blog for another 20 years -If God wills-

And some other comments
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thank you again for your time, I really appreciate you visiting this blog
Faris

United We Fly

2008-06-30T13:46:00.003+11:00

I just got back from an interview in South Dakota. I flew 4 times (with United) to get to and back from there.
A few observations from the flights:

** I don't know if you've heard of the movie United 93. Many people didn't like watching it for different reasons. One thing for sure: do not watch it one day before flying with United.

** The day of my first flight, I was the last to get on the plane, and my seat was 1-A. It was the very first seat right behind the cockpit (no first class). When I entered the plane everybody was looking at me, and I'm sure there were a few people scared to death by seeing this unshaven fat Arab sitting one meter away from the cockpit, carrying 2 large carry-ons and trying hard to squeeze them into whatever space was left above. I start having suspicions in myself.

** Airline companies are doing whatever they can to collect money from people. Now they're charging 15 dollars if you want to check a bag. Not only that, but on some flight they can charge you 15 dollars if you choose to sit beside an empty seat during the flight! WOW!

I remember in 2001, right before 9/11, I flew from Minneapolis to Pittsburgh with Northwest. There were 2 people sitting in the first class, and 3 people me included sitting in economy flying a very large jet. The flying attendants served us meals served only on first class. It was also routine to serve meals on flight longer than 2 hours.
Now they stopped even serving peanuts on flights to save money. We only get soft drinks even on 4-hour flights.

Ok, security? 75% of test-bombs passed through security in a test done last year. 75%! That's even worse than the pre-9/11 era.

** Why on earth does the 2 fattest guys on any flight ALWAYS end up sitting beside each other. Not only that, but that always happens with the smallest planes and the longest flights. I swear to God the big guy next to me and I were almost sitting on each other. It was not a nice scene. The only way we could have fit on those 2 seats was to actually hug each other very tight. I didn't feel comfortable with half my ass hanging from the seat and hitting the tray table and whoever was going to the bathroom.

And what about those very tiny bathrooms in the back of the plane? They are so small that if someone farts in the bathroom a major turbulence will hit the plane.

** All flights are bumpy or very bumpy, I got used to that. But when the bumps are so bad that everyone inside the plane is screaming you know that's too much.

** The pilot on the last flight was a woman. I never had a woman be a pilot of any of my previous flight. I have to admit that for a second I didn't feel comfortable and I didn't like myself for that. I used to think I wasn't prejudiced against woman but it looks like I was wrong. Anyway the pilot was great and the landing was the smoothest I've ever had in my life, the passenger next to me continued to sleep even after the landing (maybe because he was hugging me). I don't know why am I still prejudiced.

** On one of the fights, the couple sitting next to me were deaf. I decided to communicate with them by writing everything the pilot said on a piece of paper. They were very appreciative, and asked me where I was from. I told them "from Jordan". I realized that whenever I do something positive and people ask me where I'm from I respond by saying "Jordan". But if the question followed something negative I respond by "from Arizona".

Finally

2008-06-30T11:50:00.005+11:00

For those sport-haters, this will be my last sport post for some time to come.

These are my 2 pesos on Euro 2008:

1- More people supported Spain in the final than Germany. Now that we are all excited for their victory, time to take off the red shirts and go back support whatever crappy team you were supporting before. Of the 500 people I know, only one is a real Spain fan (keefak Nakhleh?), so stop being all Viva-Espana-ishy for now.

2- Italy's fans should stop complaining about losing in penalty kicks. Italy ALWAYS plays for penalty kicks, that's what they seek throughout the entire game. You deserve every loss you suffered with penalty kicks, lucky you got away with a world cup victory out of it (Damn you Trezeguet)

3- Whenever a team exits early in a big championship it's usually said, "we lost a championship but we didn't lose a team". This isn't true this time for Italy. They lost the all-defence team and it's time now to come up with a more interesting Italy, such team was last seen playing in the 1938 Mundial.

4- I have to admit that there was a strange sense of anti-Italism in the air. Let me explain it: people were afraid Italy would win this Euro, which would give the Italian supporters a chance to brag for ages that they were the most powerful. Such feelings were also observed against Brazil in 2006. Hopefully we'll see them against Argentina after 2010.

5- I'm glad Russia qualified instead of England. It's awful that France and Italy qualified instead of the Scotland. I think Scotland had a great team in the qualifications but they blew it against Georgia.

6- This is the championship of overconfidence. See, every team that was over-confident ended up losing big time. Italy were over-confident in the beginning so Holland killed them. Holland became so over-confident after the first round so they were crushed by the Russian. Meanwhile, the least confident of winning, the Spaniards, who were very suspicious of themselves winning a championship, ended up playing great and winning it.

7- This is an interesting trivia: in 1968, Italy played the USSR in the semi-finals.

They drew 0-0. Italy won the game with a toss of coin to make to the final, then win the championship. Again, toss of coin. All of sudden penalty kicks sound very fair.

8- Michel Paltini, who handled the Spaniards the Cup today, is the one who took the Cup away from them in 1984 with his marvelous performance, with France defeating Spain 2-0 in the final.

9- The UEFA should stop letting crappy teams host this Championship. Next one in 2012 will be hosted by Ukraine and Poland. They will automatically qualify to the finals and automatically be heads of their groups in the final. Shit!

10- The winner of this Euro is considered by the international community (or at least by me) as the third strongest team in the world, after Argentina and Brazil.

Who Will Win?

2008-06-28T09:14:00.001+11:00

Three Years of Hareega .... Answer This!

2008-06-25T17:59:00.003+11:00

Three years ago, I started a blog and called it Reega Reega Hareega. Today I sincerely appreciate every single person who visits my blog, even those who left ads for Viagra before I added word verification. When I started this blog with a post about a Sudanese lady I thought I would run out of idea and never come back to write again, but I was wrong nealry 600 times and it's all because of people who read my scribbles.

I need your opinion because it's what keeps this thing going, please click HERE or just type in the link: http://www.createsurvey.com/c/69996-1DKlpy/ . Be very honest.

Thank You!
Faris

BESTest AWESOMest STRANGest Most CNNish News on Hareega

2008-06-23T20:18:00.013+11:00

- Royal Jordanian made a party to honor some of its employees. There were 300 people invited although only 200 seats were available in the room.

- A group of Jordanian actors were attacked while shooting scenes for a new Jordanian series in Damascus. The policemen interfered and were able to stop the two horrible crimes: first the attack and secondly Jordanians still attempting to shoot another Jordanian series.

- This is the Russian goalkeeper Akinfeev. Many observers admired his great performance against Holland although he is very very young, and he got his first international offer today: to be adopted by Angelina Jolie.

- Germany will play Turkey in the semi-finals of Euro 2008. I believe the last time the Germans and the Turks gathered on the same field was in World War One.

- The movie "Love Guru" opened last week. In the movie Mike Myers is an Indian. Many Indians found this movie very offensive to them. There is still no word yet on whether or not Dubai will do anything about it.

- Jordanian police yesterday arrested a group of people who were issuing fake credit cards. Police became suspicious when some cards had "ma3aksh fratet 3ashar leraat" printed on some of them.

- Jordan defeated Turkmenistan today in their last game in World Cup qualifications. The number of Jordanian fans in the stadium in Amman exceeded all expectations: they were almost the same numbers of people watching the Italy-Spain game in the nearby cafe.

- A Jordanian man died at the age of 118. His age was verified when he mentioned just before his death that he used to live at a time when people used to shawerma and falafel without fear of food poisoning.

George Carlin... Seven Words

2008-06-23T20:02:00.004+11:00

Great Job, Georgy. I already miss you

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Check this... for why I think such comedians come once in a lifetime.

Sorry For Football

2008-06-23T18:48:00.004+11:00

Football is a game that was created by the poor, to make the poor happy, and without poor people it would have never existed and reached the level of popularity it did. That's the very main reason football has been the most popular sport on earth for centuries. The biggest giants of football (Maradona and Pele) were born and raised in extremely poor neighborhoods. Whenever a kid living in an underprivileged area any where in the world kicks a ball with his friends he's pretending to be one of those giants who were in his shoes (sometimes literally) and hoping he'd become like them one day. That's why it's more ,much more, than a sport. For many people it's one of their dream, if not the only one. You can answer with this whenever some idiots keep wondering why the world is crazy about football.

These people live in the filthiest places on earth, but that doesn't prevent from playing the game they love.
In the Arab world it's all the same. Kids play football anywhere and with anything. If a football ball is not available they would round anything to the shape of a ball and start kicking it in different directions. Egyptians use socks (el-koora sharaab)! In Jordan football is often the only thing kids do for fun , especially when they can't use electronics for entertainment, can't travel, can't swim, can't go to camps, and really can't afford to do anything else... but football.

Because it's the poor who made this game, it's the poor who deserve to watch it. You can make any show you want a luxury that only rich people can watch, but when it comes to football you're messing up with the wrong people. It's very sad to see how the poor neighborhoods that produced the greats of football in any Arab country being deprived of watching these games unless they put in some big amount of cash. Looks like gathering at the local barber's shop doesn't work these days!

إلى الهولنديين

2008-06-22T20:11:00.008+11:00

" سلامة " روسكو

Flatus Ingnition

2008-06-21T07:37:00.015+11:00

I had this dream for a long time, and as I grew up this dream kept growing inside of me. I just can't get it out of my head.

Lighting a fart is not that simple.
I had to make sure it's possible, so I asked 2 gastroenterologists about it and they assured me (after swearing on their mothers' lives they won't tell anyone) that it's something doable. The gut produces methane and hydrogen sulfide which are flammable gases.

I still haven't done it, and I'm thinking of the best mechanisms to design this experiment. I know that energy cannot be created or destroyed, but may may change forms. It takes a lot to produce a fart. You need to swallow air, eat, digest the food, and have bacteria act on it and allow your very long intestine to move it towards the very end of your colon. Therefore, I would imagine that a single fart carries with it a massive amount of energy. It can transform all of the previous wasted energy into one single burst that can be beneficial for the human kind. Lighting a fart would be the first step to prove that.

I don't mean to be arrogant, but I'm telling you that I can single-handedly light up streets and provide electricity to thousands of homes, make waters run up high from rivers and reach the thirsty, turn on all the A/Cs in this hot town, and even send space ships to the moon.
An average human farts 14 times a day, and all this gas is wasted. In this time of global warming and high gas prices we cannot afford this anymore. Light farting has become essential for existence and prosperity of mankind.

So come on Jordan, eat your hummus and follow me. Don't leave a leaf of cauliflower uneaten, hold your energy in your stomach until it aches. Don't let anyone steal it from you. Protect it with your lives, and let's gather our energies together to benefit our country. United we stand, divided we fall.

May also check this.

The Only Movie Review I'll Ever Make

2008-06-20T11:34:00.007+11:00

This is not for movie buffs, it's for the majority of people: people who like seeing a good movie every once in a while and don't care much about the "expert movie reviews" on rotten tomatoes or elsewhere. They also don't mind seeing movies 10 or 20-years old as long as they're really good movies, and they surely have not seen some movies that everyone else in the world has seen before.

Also: I hate movie buffs, they are elitists!

Here are the some 10-12 movies I watched in the past few months:

1- Erin Brockovich: I used to hate lawyers until I watched this movie. It's based on a very true story. The "true" Erin Brockovich appears in the movie, try to find her! Julia Roberts won an Oscar for her role here.

2- Iron Man: A fantastic movie for 9-year olds. If you didn't like this movie that means you'll never ever like sci-fi movies. Join the club.

3- Ghosts of Abu Ghraib: how can any documentary ever be better than this? Through the words and expressions of the accused and the victims, this movie makes you feel you're sitting in a cell in there hearing the screams and feeling the pain. The beginning of the documentary couldn't have been better.

4- The Godfather: regardless of how good you think this movie is, you have to watch so you won't look a real idiot in any conversation. Voted best movie ever made by IMDb.

5- One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest: That's my favorite movie of all times. It's based on a novel that was banned in so many countries at that time. I think Arabs can relate to this movie a lot better than others. What a marvelous piece of work.

6- Annie Hall: the best Woddy Allen movie. Never seen something more ironic than this. The comedian seems at times to be the most miserable person on earth, and he often breaks the 4th wall to tell you so.

7- My Left Foot: I don't think anyone deserved an Oscar for best actor more than Daniel Day-Lewis deserved his for his role in this 1989 movie. It's difficult to believe this man with the left foot (Christy Brown) truly existed.

8- Le Moustache: A french movie. If you don't like movies that make you think don't watch this.

9- Marty (1955) and To Kill a Mocking Bird (1962): these 2 movies are considered among the best in history, but I honestly didn't enjoy watching them that much. Marty (winner of 5 Oscars) felt like an old Egyptian movie directed by Henry Barakat and To kill a mocking bird was "interesting" for me but couldn't relate much to it. But I heard the novel is wonderful!

10- Knocked Up and Borat (5th time): Very Very Very hilarious, but should be rated PG-30. Superbad is also hilarious but not as good.

As you know, people have different tastes. A movie that I can think EVERYONE will find amazing is the 6th sense. I've seen its end more than 10 times and every time I get surprised lol.

OK that's enough for now, back to cooking fried beans with Mexican eggs.

Van Der Fart

2008-06-19T16:35:00.002+11:00

This is a hilarious video of a group of Netherlands' players sitting on the bunch. All but one smell something horrendous and they look towards the last player on the right, who was probably guilty of producing that smell. Strangely enough, that player's name is Van Der Vaart, with a V.

All of sudden the memories of working with Dr. Fuss came back to me.

Apology to Readers

2008-06-19T11:35:00.004+11:00

A car exploded in Baghdad yesterday.
About 50 people died a bloody ugly Baghdad death. A very outrageous, yet very quiet, death.

My apology for the boring news, it's another slow news day.

Hareega in a Southwest Wheel

2008-06-18T19:43:00.006+11:00

I previously had a bad experience with Southwest airlines. Not a lost luggage or reservation cancelling, but a malfunction of a land gear about 15 minutes after takeoff.

I also previously heard of some flights landing in Arizonan airports especially Phoenix being cancelled because of the heat, due to concerns of too much friction occuring between the plane wheels and the very very hot ground.

I was still surprised and very anxious when a Southwest plane caught fire upon landing at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport yesterday. I had expected Southwest to fix their problems and whoever is running the airport in Phoenix to watch out for such possibility. I mean even if they thought it would be very safe for any plane to land they should have thought to themselves , "Yeeeah it should be safe but this is a Southwest plane that's landing. Watch out!"

P.S. Tomorrow I'm buying 3 tickets for me and my parents on southwest to go to Vegas in August. Mean temperature in Vegas in August: 39 Celsius.

Ten Extraordinary Moments that Made People Scream

2008-06-17T17:55:00.017+11:00

I had 3 previous entries from 2007 (twice: 1, 2) and 2006 about ten magical, extroridnary moments in Sports that even the not-so-big fans of sports will enjoy watching.

Here is another list of ten of these moments that made people stick to their screens and scream in awe, excitement, joy or anger.
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1- The Moroccan Lady Wins Gold

It was the 1984 Olympic Games. Event: the 400-meter hurdles (mawane3). Nobody expected the 22-year old Moroccan woman, Nawal Moutawakel, to win the race. But she did, becoming the first Arab and the first African female to ever win a gold medal in any Olympic game. The King of Morocco declared that all girls born the day of her victory were to be named in her honor.
Here is the race that she won:

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2- Man Versus Machine.

Garry Kasparov was the chess world champion and the smartest man on earth. IBM spent millions eventually coming up with Deep Blue, a computer that challenged and defeated Kasparov in 1997.
Kasparov accused the computer of cheating. Ironically Kasparov retired and later ran for presidency of Russia last year but withdrew , accusing his opponents of cheating.

Here's the story of this challenge (in the form of a movie trailer):

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3- The Very Late Guest Shocks Europe

Yugoslavia qualified to the finals of the European Football Games in 1992 (Euro 92). However war broke there and the European Association asked Denmark to replace Yugoslavia just days before the tournament. Poorly prepared, Denmark arrived to the finals but then started scoring one victory after another, eventually defeating World Champions Germany 2-0 and returning home with the Cup. Here are their goals in the final game:

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4- The Black Guy Humiliates Hitler.

Nazi Germany hosted the 1936 Olympics. It was a chance for Hitler to spread the propaganda that white men with blue eyes are the strongest and fastest. A black guy from the US named Jesse Owens proved him wrong by winning 4 gold medals within 45 minutes while Hitler was watching at the stadium. That enraged Hitler who left the stadium. Unfortunately Owens was not honored at his country until 20 years later.

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5- It's true: AC Milan 5 - Real Madrid 0

It was the semi-finals of the 1989 Champions League, and AC Milan crushed Madrid. That was a very magical team they had. The scorers of the 5 goals were respectively: Ancelotti (current Milan's coach), Rijkaard (Barcelona's coach), Gullit, Van Basten (Netherland's coach in Euro'08) and Donadoni (currently Italy's coach).

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6- Jump Jump, Fosbury's way.

There isn't an athlete whose name is associated with a sport like Dick Fosbury's is associated with high jump. Up until 1968, high jump athletes used to jump in a totally different way (watch the end of the video) until Fosbury introduced his new jump. Experts laughed at him but they stopped laughing when he clinched the gold medal with his new invention that was named after him.

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7- The Titanic of Sports.

Without any exaggeration, this was the worst day in Brazil's history as a nation. They hosted the 1950 World Cup and in the final game, all what they needed was a draw against Uruguay to win the World Cup. 200,000 Brazilians gathered in the stadium, a record number for an audience to our day. They were very confident of the victory, they even printed their players' names on the gold medals. They lead 0-1 but lost at the end of the game 2-1. Three Brazilians fans committed suicide right after the game in the stadium. They had a name for the tragedy: Maracanzo (after the stadium)

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8- Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf Refuses to Stand for the National Anthem.

Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf was on of the top NBA players. But in 1996 he refused to stand for the US NAtional Anthem because of his religious belief. There was a mixed response to this behavior. He was banned temporarily but then was allowed to come back. Here is a response from some people at that time.

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9- Korea Humiliates Italy.

Nope, I'm not talking about 2002. In the World Cup, only one team used to represent the continents of Africa and Asia, and such teams never had any significant impact on the Mundial. In 1966 that team was North Korea. This time they made history by defeating 2-time World Champs Italy 1-0 and knocking them out of the World Cup. History repeated itself in 2002, but this time with the South Koreans.
All of sudden having Jordan lose to North Korea doesn't seem that bad after all.

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10- How Politics Mixed Blood and Water

In 1956, the Soviet Union invaded Hungary to end an anti-communist revolution there. It turned bloody and many Hungarians were killed. The same year both teams faced each other in a Water polo game at the Olympic games in Melbourne. With all the tension going on, a very ugly fight started between the players in water, with a lot of punching in the face going on. Fights on the stadiums never stopped from the beginning of the game to the very end of it.
They made a movies about this game. Here's a short trailer from one of them with some real footage in it:

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Hope you enjoyed this collection ,
Hareega

Beware of Nothing

2008-06-17T05:28:00.005+11:00

So the not-so-Great Britain is warning its citizens of terrorist attacks against the UAE.
Why didn't anyone warn us of the Amman attacks in 2005?
How about the Sharm el-Sheikh attacks?
The several attacks in Saudi Arabia?
Madrid?
London? Yes London! How come they know more about what's going to happen in Dubai while they didn't have a clue the London attacks were going to take place.
Bali?
The US Embassies in Africa?
And how about 9/11 ?

Do they just warn us from the attacks that will not happen?

Last Minute Deals

2008-06-16T20:27:00.003+11:00

This is what's so beautiful about football.
Turkey came back from a 0-2 deficit and scored 3 goals, 2 in the last 3 minutes of the game, to defeat the Czech Republic 3-2 and advance to the quarter-finals.

Here are the 3 Turkish goals:

In their previous game, the Turks were also able to score their winning goal over host Switzerland in the very last seconds of the game, here's their goal:

these last-minute events makes people stick to their screens for the very last second of any football game.

Jordan Out Again, See You in Brazil 2014

2008-06-15T20:05:00.006+11:00

Jordan started participating in World Cup qualifications for the 1986 Mundial.

We started with a great victory over Qatar , 1-0: a goal coming from Issam al-Talli from a corner kick. All what I remember from that is my uncle being really excited about it and seeing that goal a zillion times on Al-Majallah al-Riyadiyyeh every Friday afternoon.

This victory sent a sense of optimism, but we lost the next 3 games and since then we've never been even close to qualifying.

In 1990, we were easily crushed by Iraq and Qatar, and the only team we were able to defeat was Oman, during a time when Oman was defeatable.

In 1994 we were extremely optimistic after scoring big in friendlies (5-1-4), to only be crushed by Iraq and China this time. We came 4th in a group of 5. Yemen, yes Yemen, came ahead of us.

In 1998, we were again relegated from the first round after we weren't able to top UAE or Bahrain.

In 2002, we lost twice to Turkimenstan including one loss at home. Enough said.

In 2006, we started huge with a victory over Iran in Tehran, only to succumb later to the Iranians in Amman and Qataris in Doha.

In 2010, we brought the great coach, prepared well, only to qualify past Kyrgyzstan with penalty kicks and a prayer. Then we lost home to North and South Korea, and today we lost again to North Korea 2-0 and were officially out of the qualifications.

I wonder what else do we have to do for 2014. It's not like we were close and lost in the final decisive game. No, we were never close. In the past 24 years, We were ALWAYS eliminated in the preliminary round, the one preceding the final qualifications round.

I'm just hoping that for 2014 we will get close to the final celebration, that when those million or more of Jordanians start watching the games on TV, and see some Asian team playing there (and probably being smashed), we would say to ourselves , "We were too close to being that team in the Mundial".