Happy B-Day America…

Freedom is indeed a treasure to cherish and celebrate, and here are some of the well said quotes on this occasion:

“Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.” ~Thomas Paine

“Liberty is always dangerous, but it is the safest thing we have.” ~Harry Emerson Fosdick

“We stand for freedom. That is our conviction for ourselves; that is our only commitment to others. ”
~ John F Kennedy

“Where liberty dwells, there is my country.”
~ Benjamin Franklin

“Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves. ”
~Abraham Lincoln

“In the truest sense, freedom cannot be bestowed; it must be achieved.”~ Franklin Roosevelt

“The United States is the only country with a known birthday. ~James G. Blaine….

Now is that a fact? …. anyways, happy birthday America…

Politics & Religions are Technologies?…

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Hmmm, I think I can see his point of view…

The heat in NC

So much heat like I’ve been walking in Riyadh KSA, yet there were some nice things on this road trip, the beautiful highway stretching over the ocean and across the lush green scenery, the company was really good, my friend is a happy young lady who has a lot of stories to keep me happy and entertained, stories of family members, relationships, work settings, recipes, husband and homes and many more… We had a good time on the outer banks beaches and I had a nice collection of shells, and not so in the City of Raleigh, we started from the farmers market, a beautiful display of colorful plants and vegetables but not the best time of day to visit, the History Museum of Raleigh, was the only air conditioned place to save us from walking in excruciating heat downtown, we glimpsed through the city’s history of drug industry, tobacco, furniture and quilt designs, and we couldn’t avoid the war displays, beautiful Iraqi outfits for Iraqi and Kurdish tribal men were given to Captain Macarthur battalion on Iraq displayed along photos of young Iraqi soldiers surrendered to the US troops… Next day was much better; we enjoyed the forest ideal location of Duke University campus, one of the best places in US to study I think, but too late now to reconsider, it was so beautiful and quiet and of course such an inspiration for creativity… The best place ever in the visit was Sarah Duke garden, with its wonderful designs and exquisite plants in Durham, a real beauty that reflect what was engraved in the entrance floor “gardening is the purist of human pleasure” and I can’t agree more… The little hidden city of Chapel Hill is a glimpse in the past, the architecture and the forest along with its little Chapel Hill museum is all like an extra bonus for the visitor despite the heat… The best of all is the outer banks again, with its ancient light houses, pirates stories, historic walks and beaches and little antique shops and food hideaways, we enjoyed our last stroll on the old streets of Manteo city and I bought a little souvenir that would always catch my eyes and mind every morning on my fridge “women who behave rarely make history”, a good wrap up of the hot weekend I’d say…

Claiming women’s rights [I don’t need support]

I’ve heard first about Ms. Wajiha Al-Huwaider through an email that presented her as women rights activist in KSA on a TV show, she wanted to revive the claim for women driving and demonstrated that by showing herself driving a car online… I highly respected her courage and determination, and heard more about her recent campaign to remove women guardianship system in KSA. This is a system that assigns a male guardian to every woman regardless of age to permit her to pursue everything in life, in other words, Saudi women can’t have a legal identity to be held accountable for any matter in their lives, they would need a guardian to approve their marriage, job, education, travel, or legal representation in any governmental office… This is an old system that has been legalized by the government which was meant to protect women when the tradition didn’t allow them to participate in public life by themselves for fear of harm in older societies where the laws were not held properly, but has been since an outdated system, and it turned to be a formality for most women and a nightmare for less fortunate ones… A Mahrem or a guardian has the legal power to stop women from anything and demand her to live as he wishes regardless of her consent, as the case in approving underage girls to marry older men, or children who would remain without ID papers because the father decided to abandon the woman and neglect the family, he can deny the link of any kid to him to avoid the alimony and no DNA testing would be of any use in here, in a male dominant society, a man of 18 years old can be the guardian of his sponsoring mom of 52 years if her husband dies…

Ms. Wajiha raised all these issues in a recent web article and decided to tackle this problem by a simple individual act, she would go every week to try to cross the border to Bahrain from the Saudi Eastern Province without a mahrem, this is meant to tell the authority that if they didn’t allow women to have the full accountability for their own lives and remove the guardianship system, they should then let the women leave the country to live in any other country that would respect them better and recognize them as fully accountable adults… what she needs from other women is to join her to the border to demand for the right to travel or to leave the country… In a reply to my email of support she said [I don't need support, I need women to come with me, do you know any women who would?]… I maybe thick a pit, but I don’t see the problem being solved by the authority allowing or preventing us from crossing the border, and I don’t believe that we need to confront the authority to get what we claim, the success in legalizing the marital age for young girls inspire us to try other meaningful, and less confrontational methods to reach the decision makers, without inciting negativity. Here is a possible list of actions with better long term effects:

• Prepare the public, raising the issue in media and newspapers and focusing on the detrimental effects of the guardianship system
• Forming women rights group “Non-Governmental” to educate women through lectures and pamphlets of the effects in the system and the tradition on their safety and wellbeing
• Inviting influential figures (like royalties) to join the effort to promote the cause
• Forming constituency and alliances with enough representative women to push the efforts and the message

I can see that the lady is asking others to join her in the demand for independence, but I can’t see why she is asking them to join her in her chosen action, how many women feel secure enough to challenge their families, traditions, government authority to join? How many can travel alone to the Eastern province? How risky would that be on their wellbeing? And would that grant them anything at all except focusing on their own individual freedom as what happened before with those women in the 90s who drove their cars? They were prevented from travel, banned from their jobs and never granted their request… My only take on Ms. Wajiha is her individual approach to solutions, this is a public issue and she needs all the support that she can get, to say that she doesn’t need support and that she only need to cross the borders to make the point is a major simplification of the National problem, she appeared driving her own car alone, and she appeared on the border alone also, and I do assume that not enough women would join because the majority are just like me, we want solution and not evacuation from the country or imprisonment for us and our Mahrams in the worst scenario…

The New Democratic party… Genious!!

When life stopped for a while…

This is by far the best I’ve read on Obama’s visit to Egypt:

http://www.nawalsaadawi.net/articles09/obamaspeech.html

The Arabic version of Bridget Jones’s diary!!

“Get a translator

If you find yourslef sitting with a guy who is talking to you in Arabic and you and you don’t understand what he is saying, get an interpreter. And keep your mouth shut until you do. Because if all of a sudden the room breaks out in a big zaghrouta (loud voice to express joy), you might have just accidently agreed to get married.

Let me tell you a little story, My great grand mother, Sitto Nejume, was taken with her family to a  real nice wedding in a nearby village. Oh, she had a great time! a ball!! They danced. They feasted. It was just F-U-N! and the wine was good too! Sitto Nejume was just havin’ the best darn time of her life. Well, when the wedding was over, she hopped into the carriage with everyone else to head back home. They picked her up and put her back out in the street. She hopped back in, again. They put her back on the street, again. She couldn’t figure out why they wouldn’t let her go home; it didn’t make any sense and she was so sleepy, too. Finally, they explained to her that she wasn’t going home because it was her wedding that had just attended.

She was twleve.”

This was a glimpse from the lovely instruction guide for marriage for Arab American girls ” From Veils to Thongs“, for dalel Khalil.

I’d say that this was a much prettier story than that of my Saudi Grandmother, at least she get to attend the wedding, My poosr grandmother got married three times and never attended any of her weddings, now my Egyptian Grandmother actually fell in love and married her handsome young neighbour, not all the stories are the same, they were all twelve years old though, apparantly that was the official age for marriage…

FBI or CIA? I’m a one Confused Saudi!!

In the ADC 2009 Conference, I happened to meet Hesham in The Elevator, an American Arab from an Egyptian origin, I started asking him if he is a member of ADC, I was hunting for comments for my story, He said that he was invited to represent the FBI in the conference exhibition. Once he said the FBI, I started bombarding  him with all sorts of questions –of course, you don’t happen to meet the Arabic version of James Bond everyday- and then he said he’ll grant me an interview afterward. We met the next day, with me equipped with the digital recorder and all –like a proper journalist- which stopped sometime during the interview without me noticing it, and the interview went on for about two full hours… What did he say in the interview? Many interesting things, he came as a young teenager from Alexandria/ Egypt to California and hoped for a traditional successful career like medicine or engineering, but then he enrolled in the military and had a strong interest in the work of FBI, he applied and was worried that maybe his ethnic or religious background would be a barrier, but no, he was assured by the interviewing committee that this is not an issue, that all they look for was his actual fit for the job, so he started working sometime before 9/11 and since then he enjoyed his work tremendously… I asked him of course if that career would jeopardize his social relationships, with people of Arabic origin who maybe hesitant to express their opinions in his presence, he said that some may have reservations but they never stated any in a frank manner. I asked him if he ever had to compromise or choose between his duty and his religious affiliation as a Muslim, he stated that this has never happened during the course of his career, that his governmental work is made of a system of checks and balance to prevent abuses or false accusations without evidence… He said that if the government offices like the FBI had people like him to deal with the American Arabs or Muslims, there will be a better understanding of motives and less misconception of Arab or Muslim people, that he’ll be the best person to understand them and to speak for them than any other person who may not come from the same culture… He said that he is a person who represent the law just like anyone who does the same job (Mabaheth) in the Arabic country, I would say that people of this kind of law in our country are not really perceived very well, they are not trusted as working for the security of the people, but rather for the security of the system, but I got his point… we talked a pit about the conference and whether he believes that democratic reform in the Middle East can be supported by the US? He said that this a bad strategy and no Arab American parties would be engaged in that, and unless reform is made from the people of the Middle East, they’ll always be under the strains of other countries, I agree, but still I believe the first world has an obligation toward the developing and third world to keep the governments checked, to stop abuses of human rights and fights for power, otherwise, everyone and not only the Middle East or the third world will be suffering from the repercussions of the oppressive systems… He said that tolerant Americans exist now, largely because of the new administration, and his role as an Arab American is to do his duty to the best of his ability and thus draw a better picture for his Arabic and Islamic heritage, which can speak more than a thousand words, that he’s not much interested in playing more roles as activist or promoter of reforms in the Middle east, he is now an American citizen and FBI special agent… I asked him if he ever visit Egypt, if he misses his people, he said that he miss the ease of going to pray in the next mosque but his country is where his kids are, the US … I learned that he reads “Al Masri Al-Yawm” the opposition Egyptian newspaper, that says something about his wish for reform, even if he didn’t admit it…I emailed him his statements, and he approved of them, with one exception, He is an FBI agent and not a CIA agent as I erroneously stated, that would’ve been a real nasty mistake!! too many acronyms for my crowded memory!!…

The Arab-Americans and Civil rights

Over the last weekend, I attended the Arab American anti discrimination committee conference; it was a great experience… a group of people who got together to establish a connection for a common goal, to remove discrimination based on ethnicity or religion, one of the great things in such conferences is meeting the people, and this is what I got:

• “It’s not mutually exclusive to be American or Arab and a Muslim”, Reda, a young engineer commenting on how he manage to keep a foot on both cultures.
• “It was inspiring to meet so many distinguished and ambitious Arabs and Arab Americans of diverse backgrounds all coming together for a common cause, people who really want to make a difference in the world.  I believe it is a wonderful time to be an Arab American because we are gaining impetus in having our perspectives heard by the larger society. Though there is much more work to be done, it is great to be a part of that trend and being active with ADC and all the good work they do is an important part of that trend” Sara, a Saudi-American, an art gallery manager, who doesn’t know how to speak Arabic much but have been a member for years in the American-Arabic committee
• “It’s hopeless, that’s how I feel about Palestine, but being here and reviewing the work of activists who invested much of effort and time in moving things a pit, just give me enough hope that we can do something even it was a little thing” Randa, a Palestinian American physician who contemplates on joining a Palestinian medical service group in Gaza but afraid of losing the professional status in USA.
• ” I call it innocent ignorance, when people discriminate based on false information, that’s why I work to demystify the truth about Arabs and Muslims” Nawar Shora, a young Arab American who wrote “The Arab-American Handbook”
• “I wanted my book to speak to the girl from Syria who landed in London or the saudi girl who landed in Paris” Dalel Khalil, the author of “from veils to thongs”
• “There’s a regional fatigue in the Middle east leaders, but I’m optimist, the youth can bring democracy and reforms” Saad eldin Ibrahim, commenting on the future of democracy in the Middle East
• “Well, if you invite US for help, don’t be surprised if it you end with the Bush doctor” Professor John Mearsheimer, answering a question on why US wouldn’t support democratic reforms in the Middle east
• “It’s an Irony that my Jewish voice would find a listening ear more than the voice of the Palestinians themselves” Anna Baltzer, a Jewish activist, who by herself, organized a campaign to call for Palestinian rights
• There was a real interesting FBI agent of an Arabic origin, He graciously allowed me to interview him for a whole 2 hours, I’ll publish that in the next post…

There was a key note address by the previous president Bill Clinton; obviously the Obamamania is true, as the president used quotation from religious texts to support his call for unity between people… The gathering provide a true image of the mixed heritage Arab people of the Middle East, from the Jewish-Bahrini female ambassador, to the Syrian Christians to the Muslims majority, every one who sahred a common interest and love for the region’s culture and heritage worked together for a common interest, quite interesting to say the least!!

 

Bridging the gaps

My points on the speech:

1. Considerate: the speech has referred to Arabic words -although mispronounced-, history of peaceful coexistence and Islmaic diverse and rich cultural contributions to humanity.

2. Inspiring: Quoting the principles of human rights and the struggles of the people of all religions and races, including those of the US , to protect & uphold them…

3. Well-planned: Outlining the main themes of conflicts and struggle within Middle East, violent resistence to attain rights, Palestenian-Israeli conflicts, race for nuclear weapons, democracy -or lack of it-, religious freedom, women’s rights and economic development…

4. Powerful: The conclusion on the importance of peaceful coexistence between nations, the reference to the general perception of the West as the enemy out of centuries of mistrust and fear, the message of importance US partnerships with other nations were right on target…

5. What’s irrelevant or missing: While the president’s understands that women’s rights include freedom to wear Hijab or “Hajib” in the West, we really faces oppression here in our own countries from the simple forcing on a particluar dress-code, to descrimination in civil rights and autonomy, this is true as well for religious intolerance, quoting the King Abdullah inter-faith dialogue doesn’t help in this regard, the dialogue didn’t improve any public religious tolerance in the country nor did it brought real changes in the government policies regarding religious freedom or secularism.

I would applaude the presdient as many did in the region and join them to say “We love you Obama”

Finally, in a strange coincidence today, I drove behind a van for five minutes, the first time I notice the anti-obama on the street, the van had many stickers against Obama. In one of them, an acronym of Obama: O(One), b(Big), a (Ass), m(Mistake), a (America), in another sticker, Obama and Osama only difference is the BS… Quite a coincidence!!