Arabic or Gibberish

People who know me know how I have never been good at communicating in Arabic (not that I'm any good at it in English, but...). Unfortunately, my first job was in a very strong Arabic environment, where people don’t even just say thank you, their thank you’s are very long and last for minutes. When people ask me how I’m, I just say I’m well, thank you (Alhamdullah I’m fine) but they would say it in so many different ways that half of the time I don’t understand what they were saying.

I often (It actually happened ALL the time!!) embarrassed myself with my lack of knowledge of their arabic. I remember in my first few weeks, I had to do a presentation and the manager I was presenting to kept saying “Bayed Allah Wayhech” and I had no idea what to say because I kept translating it to “May God whiten your face” and just wanted to say “your face!”. I later mentioned this to my brother and turns out you actually do say “Wayhech Abyad” (Your face is white). It sounded ridiculous to me but hopefully one day I will be able to say it without laughing.

What I’m trying to say here, is that if you have kids, then teach them the national Arabic dialogue wherever you live, or just send them to some friends in Al Ain for the summer if you’re local. It will make it easier for them to fit it and understand different people, even in one culture.

Growing up

Spend in pure converse our eternal day;
Think each in each, immediately wise;
Learn all we lacked before; hear, know, and say
What this tumultuous body now denies;
And feel, who have laid our groping hands away;
And see, no longer blinded by our eyes.

-Rupert Brooke

I came to the conclusion that a person never realizes how much he has grown as much as when he read previous writings of his; journals, blogs, personal emails, etc.

There is no better proof of the things I did that I regret and things I said that certainly shouldn’t have been said. Things that seem trivial now meant so much before and I just wonder how silly and self indulgent I was.

I look around me and I see people, especially young women, living very superficial lives and I tried to make more of my life, but after reading my history I realized that I might not have been superficial but I still was not the person I thought I was; I didn’t live up to the image (not physical!) I had of myself.

I guess that is what growing up and learning is all about, you know more today that you did yesterday and hopefully less than what you will tomorrow, or as Lincoln said it "I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday". I know today that I’m not the same person I was six months ago, and that scares me because it makes me wonder who is the person I’m going to be next year?

This was like a wakeup call to remind me that every single decision I make today, is going to shape my future, whichever path I choose to take today, every hour I was I can’t rewind.

"I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I --
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference."

-Robert Frost

Midterms are over ... almost!

Why is it that the last exam is always the hardest to study before? I just get tired from all the exams and the studying, and it all feels like it has been going on forever. While studying for the last exam you can think of a dozen other things that you should be doing, and you get tired faster and an all-nighter seems impossible. On the other hand, when you do well on your last exam all the other grades seems irrelevant and you just want to celebrate.

There are only two courses that any student graduating from UAEU must to take: Islamic Law and Emirates Society. Emirate society is a nightmare to most students in the university and I really didn’t understand why and so in a moment of idiocy I decided that I will take it in Arabic instead of English, I had many reason for doing that one of which is that it is about time for me to improve my Arabic and learn more about my country – in Arabic. Don’t I regret that decision now though, oh yes I do. The teacher seemed like a nice guy, I enjoyed the lecture in general and actually listened to what he was saying, I wrote pages and pages of notes (in Arabic!) and was very confident about doing well, I went to the exam and thought I did great since I wrote all the points needed. Here is what I’m proud of; I wrote two essays in the exam each a page long! The teacher was not as impressed about my answers as I was it seem because he didn’t give me a 100 (I think he really hated my handwriting!), he previously warned us that anyone who questions him about his grading in the essay questions will regret it because then he will open the book and if the student didn’t answer word for word from the book he/she will lost marks. After the exam he said something about the students having bad handwritings, misspelling some words and not underlining key words.

I was so mad, and still am because this course is for all students in the university in all levels and I don’t see why they should make it such a nightmare to the students, why not make it interesting to learn about your culture and history for once?!

I don’t care though because I did great in all my other exams so Egyptian Professor teaching Emirates society and enjoying a power trip is not worth ruining my day. (Can you tell I’m trying to convince myself? I really should have taken that course in English.)

Eid Mubarak

Belated Eid Mubarak to everyone!

I hate saying Eid was not great but it was not, it felt more like a long weekend where you just have to socialize with people and be nice. Since this Eid was not very enjoyable we are trying to plan something more fun for next Eid but I’m not sure it will work out because exams seem to stick with Eid these days, midterm exams after this Eid and final Exams after next Eid.

What makes us Muslims

[This post is basically me stating my view regarding what was posted on: Exposing Muslims against Sharia]

It’s a plain fact in life that things change, ideas evolve and cultural norms adapt to the changing environment, but what do we do when the change start affecting religious beliefs and values, and where do we stop and what should we hold to and what should be changed. It’s a sensitive issue in the society and many people deny and can’t accept that we should try to make the best of everything, of course their actions don’t agree with what they say but that’s another story. If we’re not going to change for ourselves then we should think about doing it for our children because we don’t want them to grow up with conflicting ideas in a multicultural society.

That said, there are things that we can’t afford to lose in Islam and our beliefs, they are plain facts that every Muslim knows and whoever doesn’t believe in that or can’t accept it – maybe they should go and give the religion they are self-tailoring for themselves a name other than Islam.

Islam is simple and direct unlike what people think, to be a Muslim you have to believe in some things and do some things that has been craved in our minds since we were kids, so I don’t see how grown up can’t remember them and hold dearly to them?

Articles of Faith (Arkan AlEman) –

1. Believe in Allah (an only God)
2. His Angels
3. His books of revelation (Quran, Torah, Testaments, Bible and more)
4. All His prophets
5. The day of judgment and the afterlife
6. Faith in divine decree whether it’s good or bad.

Five pillars of Islam (Arkan AlEslam) –

1. Declaration of faith (Alshahada) which goes “I believe that there is only one God and Mohammed is his messenger”
2. Prayer (Five times a day at designated timings)
3. Fasting (Seyam) in the month of Ramadan
4. Zakat – almsgiving in a certain percentage according to a person’s assets.
5. Hajj – Pilgrimage to Makkah at least once in a Muslim’s life to those who are able.

If you don’t believe in those things then you can’t call yourself a Muslim anymore because how can you identify yourself with a group of people when you don’t believe in what holds the group together?

Summer thrill

Last summer I finally convinced my mother not to completely freak out and let me ride the slingshot, or it was more like I ran away from her and went to ride it and when she saw them pulling me up she just held the metal and started praying.

I rode it with my brother and sister and after the guys tied us up they said that I’m the one who will have to pull the trigger when we get up and let us loose, it sounded to me as if he was saying “just go up that building and jump.”, just plain instructions and I told him in plain words that I don’t think I can do that but he ignored me and pulled us up. On the way up I was freaking out and holding my brother’s arm so hard I wonder how I didn’t break it or something. When it was time to pull the trigger, I decided that I need to fix my Hijab, just to buy some time you know, and then I got this idea, I will just pull it only a little bit and tell them it’s not working and I’m trying. What happened though is that I just did that and I didn’t realize what happened until I was halfway down – it actually worked and we were falling!

It was the most exhilarating experience ever, I came down and wanted to go up again but they didn’t let me. After doing that I felt like I can ride anything and would really like to bungee jumping and free falling, I love thrill rides!

"The flight suits are connected to flight cables and on pulling their own rip cord, riders plunge in a 30m free fall at 80 to 90 km/h towards the ground before the swinging upwards in a 180 degree arc and then straight down again."

Pictures from the park's website:

Tied up and ready to go and I would guess the guy is telling them they will have to pull the cord, their expressions are just priceless, at least no one took a picture of me at that point this close.

They are flying!

Free to write again

Since the chance of me being jailed for writing here is null, or at least they say so, I decided I will try my hand at this again.

Now no one mentioned anything about torturing or killing me so I will still have to watch what I write until further notice from higher authorities that I’m to live. For now.

To those people who take life too seriously they don’t get a joke if it slapped them on the face – that was a sarcastic comment.

Ramadan Mubarak to everyone, and good luck in trying to make the most out of the last ten days, don’t forget that this might be your chance to get a free ticket out of hell. J