Urges

Psychologists help me out here, what is it with human beings and this urge to do the exact opposite of things they are told to do? I mean, it’s supposed to be easy “don’t go there” you just don’t. go. there! So why is it that hard? Examples?

1. “Caution! Wet paint, do NOT touch”, the first thing you, I, we, think of is “hey, let’s see if it’s really wet or they’re just fooling us, oh no sir I’m not falling for that lie, I refuse to believe that this paint is wet unless I see for myself”, then you just touch it with your stupid index finger and whaddya know! It is wet!

2. This: 

3. “Ladies dressing room”, “Ladies preparation/recovery room”, “Ladies only”. I saw this in the hospital, we were a couple of pale sick girls/women in hospital gowns waiting for our misery to end in the prep room, pale I tell you, ugly! And this man just kept peeping every time a nurse came in and opened the door, what the hell do you want to see? Plus it’s “ladies only” for a reason, a good reason, you don’t see us peeping through the keyhole of the men’s room door!

4. 

The food is too hot, it burned my tongue

[Hey! Let me see if my tongue can handle hot temperatures more than his, I bet I have a higher threshold for pain]
OUCH! I burned my tongue!

:-S

5. “Listen dude, do NOT open that email I sent you at work, it’s NSFW, be careful okay?”, that would be like the first email you check, because, well, you shouldn’t! Next thing the poor guy knows you’re on the phone telling him off for sending you that email because your boss saw it and now you’re in trouble.

6. This one’s my favorite and you have to admit you do it as well, someone smells something really bad, they go “ewww that is disgusting” you immediately go to inhale as much stink as you can, why? I don’t know, we like to torture ourselves I guess.

7. You cut yourself, it hurts, but you can’t help but mess with the cut! You have a zit, you shouldn’t touch it, you can’t help but to! It hurts like hell but you need to, you even pretend that you accidentally touched it but you know your hand was there on purpose! You have a toothache and you still press on your tooth with your tongue, and that’s not because it helps with the pain (because it usually makes it worse) you know why? Because you SHOULDN’T.

I can think of so many examples other than those, what I can’t figure out is why we tend to do that.

Hey don’t comment on the post and don’t share it, you shouldn’t ;)

How Rumors Start

Let me give you a real-life example of how rumors start, I saw it today.

First of all, let’s define the verb "rape" shall we? According to Merriam-Webster Dictionary:

Rape: to seize and take away by force

And according to Dictionary.com, to rape is:

to force to have sexual intercourse.

to plunder (a place); despoil.

to seize, take, or carry off by force.

Obviously the first one is usually what comes to people’s minds first when they hear the word "اغتصاب" although a person is not the only thing that can be raped yeah? A land can be raped, for example.

Now what happened today is that news sites published an item that said one of the candidates for the upcoming parliamentary elections in Jordan, is running his campaign from jail where he will stay for 15 days after his wife filed complaints accusing him of “raping her signature” to be literal.

From “Al-Ghad” newspaper,

اضطر أحد المرشحين للانتخابات النيابية المقبلة لإدارة حملته الانتخابية من مكان إقامته في مركز إصلاح وتأهيل قفقفا، بعد أن أصدر قاضي محكمة صلح جزاء لواء بني كنانة زيد الذيابات أمرا بتوقيفه لمدة 15 يوماً على خلفية شكوى من زوجته.

ووفق مصادر أمنية فإن زوجة المرشح قامت بتقديم شكويين بحق زوجها الأولى تتهمه فيها بالإيذاء والأخرى باغتصاب توقيع بالقوة، مشيرة إلى أن القاضي وافق على تكفيل المرشح من التهمة الأولى فيما رفض تكفيله من التهمة الأخرى المسندة إليه.

Now, “raping her signature” or the term in Arabic at least, would mean that he forced her to sign papers, can you picture this with me, wife doesn’t want to sign papers, husband forces her to do so, she does.

Raping her (or another woman), on the other hand would be *cough* slightly different wouldn’t it? What with the actual forced intercourse that would be taking place, all the physical and psychological harm that would be done and so on.

So fortunately I had read the news before seeing this status message of some girl that is “angry” with a country in which rapists can run as candidates (and become parliamentarians). Needless to say it was viral and now lots of people actually believe it.

Now I’m not going to explain my stance of the whole election thing, not going to say my opinion about the government and not going to tell anyone why they should (or shouldn’t) boycott the upcoming elections, mostly because it’s not our subject now and also for other reasons that, again, I don’t want to get into here. 

But, to read one word of a whole sentence, to take that one word, get it into another sentence, spread that sentence on some social media platform where others read, share and start cursing a country where criminals are parliamentarians is just… I don’t know. 

I know the girl must have misread the news, misunderstood maybe, and I know that what the candidate did is still wrong, but for the gazillionth time, can we please check before we spread? (That is if we have to spread). And I'm not just blaming her, people still believe everything they hear/read.

Let’s see the following sentence,

I was sitting with Flan Al Folani who is a doctor in [insert your favorite hospital, markez se77i here] and he told this hilarious joke that almost killed me, I was laughing so hard.

A dude who is just so mad at doctors in Jordan comes to this blog, (hi there dude) he leaves the whole post and reads a part of the previous sentence, dude angrily goes and updates his Facebook/Twitter/Linkdin/YouTube/Wordpress/Buzz/MySpace/WhateverSocialSiteYouWantHere status to:

Dr. Flan Al Folani almost kills a girl by giving her a heart-attack.

Then people are outraged, furious, angry, how could he? I mean he’s a doctor! What kind of country is this where doctors are murderers? Where the hell is the Ministry of health? We demand that the Minister resigns. 

Can we please not? I thought we would learn from the “Sarkozy Proposes a French Version of Ramadan” story. Obviously I was wrong.

Bon Appetit!

Skinny as I might be, I’m one of those people who really enjoy good food; I make up new recipes, alter old ones to my taste, I recommend restaurants and know exactly what a certain meal might need to make it better, at least from my point of view. 

 
Now what really annoys me is that type of people who always pretend they’re not enjoying a certain meal or snack, they would be hungry, eating and their taste buds would be having a party there but they go “I’m not really in the mood to eat”. YOU FINISHED THE WHOLE DAMN PLATE and you’re not in the mood?!

Then there’s the type that puts the smallest amounts of food in their plate (when there are people around) their meal would consist of one pea, 3 grains of rice and two cells of the poor chicken that sacrificed her life so that we can get our protein, and they would be eating like they are forced to eat, with that look that I’m sure you know on their face, I mean come on! Those layers of fat did not just appear there on your body while you were sleeping did they?

Ok how about those who try to justify being hungry? Ummm, not so sure here but I think all people get hungry? “I just need to eat because I’ll get dizzy, I don’t normally eat this” or “I’m only feeling hungry because I’m hormonal, I usually stay the whole day without having a meal”. Oh yeah I believe you, you also do not use the bathroom do you?

Now I know there are some days when people really don’t feel like eating, whether they’re sad, sick or any other reason that would make them lose their appetite, but to have that attitude the whole time? That is just sad! And we know it’s not true.

Let’s see who’s left, oh yeah the "أنا بشتري الأكل وبكبه" type (I buy food then throw it away), so you have money to buy food but you *cough* don’t eat, how about you give some to the poor? That is if you really are saying the truth.

If you can afford food, if you have food to buy, if you can eat food, chances are you’re luckier than most people on earth, so be grateful and for the love of God, just say you’re hungry and say that you like it, no one’s going to judge you! You’re making me lose my appetite.

*This post was brought to by the two impossible sandwiches from heaven I had yesterday, the grilled melted cheddar sandwich I had this morning and the piece of chocolate with bits of cherry inside that I was just randomly given. And now I leave you with the awesomeness that is random Foodporndaily.com pictures, enlarging is recommended.

10 Signs You're Spending Too Much Time on #Twitter!

1. #You #start #writing #like #this #all #the #time, #you #even #use #the #hashtag #with #words #like #and, #the #and #or.

2. You see a friend’s Facebook status that you like and start looking for the “retweet” button to share it.

 

3. You’re at the supermarket, you want to buy that big bag of Doritos but don’t know how much it costs, instead of asking someone there, you take out your phone, type “does anyone know how much a #big #bag of #Doritos costs in #Amman #JO?” and tweet!

4. You no longer settle for your real-life friends’ opinions when it comes to something you want to buy, instead, you take a photo of yourself wearing that and twitpic/yfrog/whatever it to show it to your online buddies.

5. Every sentence you write has to be 140 characters or shorter.

 

6. You check your Twitter before you check your email, first thing in the morning, you’ve tweeted something like “Good morning #JO, still can’t get out of bed” at least once or twice.

 

7. Every time you hear a nice song you rush to your Twitter to show everyone else what’s #NowPlaying before the song’s over.

8. You’re out with your friends and can’t watch that football game, instead of checking livescore.com or any other match update site you go “can you guys please keep me updated on the #ManUChelsea game? Kthxbai”

9. Your source for breaking news is @BBCWorld.

10. You know all the latest on Apple products even though you don’t care!

Jordan River

I'm kidding, I just gave the post that title because of the *cough* uncanny resemblance.

So this is Caño Cristales, "The River That Ran Away to Paradise", "The River of Five Colors" or "The Most Beautiful River in the World".

Located in the Sierra de la Macarena, Colombia, South America, this river is only a 100 km long and 20 m wide, it gained the name "River of Five Colors" because the pigments produced by algae living at the bottom of the river give it different colors during a short period of time between the wet and dry seasons in Colombia (late October and early November).

It is however inaccessible by road, and tourists can only reach it either by walking or on horseback with a guide.

Here are some pictures I got from Flickr thanks to the lovely people who allow sharing :)

 

There's so much beauty around the world, but we tend to go for the obvious and easy in all aspects of our lives, I think we should look for the hidden (at least from our point of view) beauty more often.

Sources: Wikipedia [Spanish] and Atlas Obscura.

The Ugly Duckling Goes Shopping

This is why sales people should be guys not girls.

Let me show you the difference as I imagine it,

Duckling walks into a makeup shop (because makeup makes the ugly duckling look ok :P)

- Angry girl in store, we’ll call her za3laneh, to herself: Oh no, here comes another one, I own all this makeup and she’s coming to take some of it without paying me a gersh.

- Duckling: Hello :)

- Za3laneh: … *rolls eyes*

- Duckling: I need to see the DucklingMakeupThingie in pink please?

- Za3laneh: … *Hands it to Duckling, rolls eyes*

- Duckling (with a cheerful tone): No I need the lighter pink please?

- Za3laneh (to herself): great, she wants the lighter shade, she knows that one is mine and I don’t want to give it to her but NO, she has to take it.

- Za3laneh: … *Hands one to Duckling*

- Duckling: That’s darker, I wanted lighter!

- Za3laneh: We don’t have lighter. (rolls eyes, thinks to self: why the hell would you want a lighter shade you look so ugly and you would look even uglier.)

- Duckling: okay thanks.

- Za3laneh: …

Duckling leaves the store, she spent $0 and angry girl in store is still angry.

Now Duckling walks into another store, also makeup to make it easier to compare,

- Happy guy in store, we’ll call him Sa3eed, to himself: New customer! I have to sell her as much products as I can!

- Duckling: hello :)

- Sa3eed: hello, how can I help you?

- Duckling: I need to see the DucklingMakeupThingie in pink please?

- Sa3eed: of course, we have this shade, this shade and this shade.

- Duckling: hmmm… *examines*

- Sa3eed: of course this one would suit you best in my opinion (please God let me be right) you can try it if you want to.

- Duckling: *tries* oh I like it.

- Sa3eed: if you want, you can take this shade too for evenings.

- Duckling: (what the hell does this have to…) oh okay!

- Sa3eed: you see this has protection and it won’t leave your beak chapped and dry.

- Duckling: Oh speaking of that I need beak balm!

- Sa3eed: do you want it transparent, translucent or colored? 

- Duckling: ooh let me see all of those.

- Sa3eed: this one is perfect for you; your skin seems to be… (Please God let her finish the sentence)

- Duckling: Dry! I have dry skin.

- Sa3eed: exactly what I was going to say, that’s why this one is the one for you.

- Duckling: *grabs it happily*

- Sa3eed: do you want me to show you our latest collection of feather trimmers?

- Duckling: ermm.

- Sa3eed: imported from Italy, no other store has it. (Rand: Oh you know you have a thing for Italian products too!)

- Duckling: okay!

… Etc.

Duckling leaves the store with $100 worth of makeup items she only needed one of, but she’s excited to try each and every one. She got robbed but she’s happy.

Happy guy in the store is happier, moves on to another innocent customer. And everyone is happy!

Ok, so why? Why this whole attitude with sales girls? Someone walks in, they say hello, have the decency to respond, or at least smile, this Jordanian kashra thing is getting too much, I mean you work in a store, you’re paid to do this, and customers are PAYING for what they take. Plus you most likely DO NOT own the store or anything in it for that matter.

In China they say “if you can’t smile, don’t open a store”. I think if we apply this 70% of stores in Amman will close!

أخبار الأردن

- صرح مصدر رفيع المستوى في أمانة عمان عن نيّة الأمانة إنشاء جسور للمشاة في جميع شوارع عمان الرئيسية وعلى مسافات متقاربة، وقال المصدر بأن الأمانة ستتعاون مع جميع البلديات في المملكة بحيث يتم تطبيق الحملة والتي أطلق عليها اسم "كل 100 متر، جسر" في جميع المحافظات، وتأتي هذه المبادرة كخطوة لرفع المشقة عن المواطنين الذين باتوا يشتكون من أن إشارات المشاة "بتطوّل تا تظوي أخظر وإحنا ورانا شغل"، وبهدف تعظيم الاستفادة من وقت المواطن لرفع الإنتاجية.

- أعلنت وزارة الأشغال العامة والإسكان الانتهاء مؤخراً من مشروع التخلص من الحفر والمناهل في الشوارع والذي ساهم في خفض واردات المملكة من "صنوبرصات" السيارات بنسبة 70% وأشاد معالي الوزير بجهود المواطنين الذين ساعدوا البلديات عن طريق إبلاغهم السلطات كلما شافوا منهل أو حفرة وقال "لا يمكن لأحد أن يصل إلى الوضع المثالي ولكننا نحاول، نرجوا من كل مواطن الإبلاغ عن أية حفرة عن طريق الاتصال على الرقم المجاني 08007OFRA أو 0800MONHOL لنصل معاً إلى شوارع خالية من الحفر.

- أفاد مصدر مقرب من وزير التربية والتعليم فضل عدم ذكر اسمه أن معالي الوزير تلقى اتصالاً هاتفياً من عمّ الرئيس الأمريكي السابق جورج بوش "يتواسط" فيه عند الوزير لقبول ابنة بوش في كلية التربية في الجامعة الأردنية، وأكد نفس المصدر أن الوزير رفض قائلاً "الله يخليك لا تحرجني البنت مش جايبة 65 والقانون قانون" ولكنه وبهدف الحفاظ على العلاقات بين البلدين سمح لها بالتسجيل في جامعة جرش الأهلية على أن تعامل معاملة أبناء البلد.

- بعد النجاح الكاسح الذي حققته قنوات التلفزيون الأردني الـ15 قررت إدارة التلفزيون إطلاق قناة جديدة متخصصة في شؤون الطبخ أطلق عليها اسم Mansaf TV وذلك لتلبية طلبات المشاهدين في الخارج حول وصفات المنسف وطريقة عمله.

- أكد مدرب المنتخب الأردني لكرة القدم أن فوز المنتخب بكأس آسيا هي "البداية فقط" وأن الخطوة التالية ستكون الفوز بكأس العالم، وأضاف أن الفريق يهدي فوزه إلى الشعب الأردني "اللي بتمشي الرياضة بدمّه".

- صرح مدير عام الجمارك الأردنية أن خفض الرسوم الجمركية على السيارات أتى بسبب تدني الإقبال على اقتناء السيارات من قبل المواطنين والذين باتوا يفضلون استخدام المواصلات العامة خاصة بعد حملة التجديد التي قامت بها هيئة تنظيم قطاع النقل العام، وفي استفتاء أجرته دائرة الإحصاءات العامة، أفاد 85% من المواطنين بأنهم يفضلون ركوب الحافلات للتوجه إلى أماكن عملهم لأنها آمنة (80%) ولأنها تتيح لهم فرصة التمتع بمناظر الشوارع حولهم (75%) وكذلك بسبب دقة المواعيد والتي يمكن الاعتماد عليها (100%) بينما فضل 10% من المواطنين ركوب الدراجات وقالت الـ5% المتبقية بأنهم يفضلون سياراتهم لأن لهم حرية اختيار الأغاني على مسجل السيارة.

- تحتفل المملكة بمرور 15 عاماً على التخلص من آخر مظاهر إطلاق العيارات النارية في المناسبات، وبهذه المناسبة أكد وزير الداخلية أن قرار استبدال هذه الظاهرة بظاهرة رمي الورد والـ"ملبس علوز" في الأفراح كان الخطوة الأولى نحو النجاح.

- يقوم وفد ياباني بزيارة إلى دائرة الأحوال المدنية للاطلاع على خبرات الدائرة في إنجاز معاملات المواطنين بسرعة وبدقة متناهية، وقال رئيس الوفد في مقابلة حصرية مع مدونة صوص البطة البشع "لم نتوقع هذا القدر من التطور، سنقوم بنقل التجربة لدائرة الأحوال المدنية في طوكيو لعلنا نحذو حذوكم".

- قررت وزارة السياحة التعاون مع السفارات الأردنية في الخارج عن طريق وزارة الخارجية لضبط توافد السياح على المملكة، حيث شهد الموسم الحالي ازدحام المرافق السياحية بشكل كبير وخاصة بعد قيام الوزارة بتحديث المرافق وإضافة العديد من الخدمات أدت إلى تدفق السياح من داخل وخارج المملكة، وقال وزير السياحة "سيشهد فصل الشتاء حملة أخرى لتحويل المرتفعات في المملكة إلى المقصد الأول لهواة التزلج، جبال الألب مش أحسن من جبال عمان".

* زيما أكيد عارفين، الأخبار من تأليفي ما حدا يروح يراجع حدا من الوزراء بالمكتوب هون.

This post was inspired by my visit to Turin. I know.