Today was my nephew’s Birthday; he turned 5!

He called my mother two days ago and asked her to deliver a message to me and my sister; the message was that we should buy him gifts from a certain store and he should be there to choose the gift, brilliant ha?

So yesterday, we went to a kids store in Jebal Amman called Ali Baba; they have all costumes you can think of; Spiderman, Superman, Batman, etc. and a whole lot of toys and games.

He asked to get him a Spiderman scooter and that is exactly what I did. My sister got him an educational toy laptop according to his own request; and he told me that he wanted this specific gift because he likes my laptop!!

We threw him a nice party tonight and as usual; I would love to share the joy with the entire blogosphere; so there you go!

Homemade Trifill

Custard

Happy Birthday Sign

Part of the decorations

Homemade Fruit Salad

Nice Black Forest

Birthday Boy (3ahed) holding a gift

I asked him about his age and that was his answer

He is happy with the scooter

Enjoying another gift

And another

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There is a big difference between acts of kindness and complete ignorance, and when we are blinded by our emotions, logic and common sense usually take a back seat and as a result; sad and tragic consequences are in order.

As I was browsing through the famous Arabic magazine; Zahrat Al Khaleej, I came across an article reporting two tragedies that took place in Jordan; specifically in Al Koorah.

The two separate incidents are about two families that were shattered by someone finally speaking and telling the truth.

After 24 years of marriage that resulted in 9 sons and daughters; Mohammed discovered that his wife is banned to him because he was breast fed by his grandfather’s wife, and in a complicated chain of relations, he discovered that he married the granddaughter of his brother, and when the case was tried by the court, the ruling came horrifying to the whole family and they got a divorce right away.

In less than 60 days and in the same area; another case emerges and Ibrahim discovered that the breast feeding syndrome turned him into his wife’s uncle, and again the court ruled that this marriage cannot continue.

Is it ignorance or stupidity? What is the fate of the sons and daughters who discovered after all these years that they were living a lie? How can this happen? And the more important question; is this still happening? If a new mother is sick and cannot breastfeed her child, are people still seeking other nursing mothers to compensate for the lack of breast milk?

I understand that in ancient times, when there was no powder milk or liquid milk on the shelves of any pharmacy or supermarket, that the need might arise for a substitute mother to step in and save the newborn, but when we have all the facilities and products to compensate and provide the child with a healthy beginning; why do we still go to extreme measures and risk future incidents like these to take place and wreck calm lives?

Let me go with the idea, and assume that this already happened; shouldn’t there be witnesses to declare that this marriage is not allowed before it takes place?

I can’t believe that we still have such tragedies. Whose responsibility is this? I suggest that with each blood test people take to check if they are compatible for marriage, they should check their histories as well to double check that the guy is not marrying his sister, aunt, niece, etc.

It sounds like an Indian movie, but it is tragically true and some people are suffering from the consequences!!

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When and where does this charade stop?

What does it take to make us think before we act? Why do we always tend to drag ourselves into the most stupid situations? And then we start whining how the west is marking us for stupid and primitive.

Despite all the effort that we do to build our personalities, despite all the education that we get, despite all the reading and knowledge, despite all the travel and exposure to the world, we still let ourselves slip and go with the flow of the masses.

Every time something or anything happens, make sure that we are going to boycott something because that’s what we are perfect at, boycotting.

I am telling you, we are so good at it; no we even mastered the art. Let me tell you, we start campaigns, we bombard people with emails, we announce the brands that will be included in the boycott, and we keep insisting and persisting till we get what we want and you better be careful mister as we are boycotting these days!!!

When does this stop for God’s sake? When do we stop acting like a clan of anger and pure grudges? When do we start thinking and proving to the whole world that we are indeed civilized?

Instead; we continue to mark ourselves as the 3^rd world people who will never ever reach global standards.

For God’s sake; stop all this nonsense about boycotting whatever brand, as this is not the way to make your voice heard, and please stop spamming us over and over with the brands that we should stop consuming. Did I say should? Well, says who? And what is the benefit? How are we affecting anyone by boycotting? Think again or better yet start thinking.

Boycotting shmoycotting; well enough already with the dark ages techniques!!!!!!

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A couple of weeks ago I was doing some searches over the net and I came across a blog of a Kuwaiti fellow blogger. As I was browsing through the posts on that blog, I came across one that left me very disturbed and preoccupied with its content that as a patriot Jordanian, I had to comment and seek permission to link to his post and get my fellow Jordanian bloggers to participate, so here I am seeking your kind assistance.

To cut a long story short; the Kuwaiti newspaper Al Watan has announced on the 8^th of December 2005 that Kuwaiti students in Jordan are under attack, and that this is a series of incidents that have been taking place for some time; please read the piece of news here.

The Kuwaiti blogger UzF was moved and disturbed by the news that he understandably blogged about it.

I do not know whether this piece of news is true or not as this is not the reason I am blogging about this; my main concern is the amount of hostility I got towards Jordan and Jordanians by reading the comments on that specific post, which you can get here.

I am seeking your kind assistance to show our Kuwaiti brothers and sisters that there is no hidden agenda against Kuwait or Kuwaitis and that we as Jordanians share their annoyance and anger from these incidents if they ever took place and that we condemn such acts, and as I commented to him that we think highly of Kuwait and Kuwaitis and this is by no means a reflection of our country, or our people.

I will be informing our fellow Kuwaiti blogger about this post and I hope that our responses will urge him to reflect this in a new post on his blog so that his readers can learn the truth.

Last but not least; thank you in advance for participating in this initiative; I look forward to getting your responses and feedback.

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