Well, it’s this time of year (lunar year that is) again, where people here call it Ramadan, and I call it the-I-can’t-smoke/eat/drink water (or cheap colored/flavored drink) in a hot summer day-in-public-month, yeah I know it’s a long name.. that’s why I start calling it Ramadan like every body else.

The main idea now behind this month of fasting – and for those who are not familiar with Islamic fasting it’s to abstain from food, drinks, smoke, sex (including French kissing, licking, and other forms of foreplays if I can still remember the rules right) – is to feel empathy for poor people who can’t offered to eat will, and the sex part is probably supposed to clear your mind from you earthy pleasures and put you in a heavenly/closer to God state of minded.. until sunset that is, where you can return to fucking (or making love if you prefer that term) and eating like a starving pig.

OK NOW, that’s the theory (doesn’t every thing look amazing in theory (I do use parentheses a lot don’t I!)), but as every thing else in religion, reality is a totally different issue. The fact is, that in Ramadan, as every person living in Islamic community (even though not religious) knows, people become more tempered, performance decreases at work and schools, more car accidents (especially when it’s near Iftar time – which is sunset), a lot of executives don’t answer phone calls and tend to delay every thing till after Eid, and people spend more time then ever on the idiot box watching stupid Arabic TV drama.

Even not that long time ago, some Islamic countries (such as Saudi Arabia) used to give students and public sector workers the whole month off! a whole month of not doing any thing but sleeping and watching TV until it time to eat more then your body can handle.. plus, I don’t get how you should feel any kind empathy to poor people since you know that the fasting thing is temporary until the sun goes down where you can eat like a king.

The funny thing (not the only funny thing really, just the funniest), is how most (or a lot in worst cases) people don’t have anything to do with religion in their daily non-Ramadan life, they don’t pray (which is by Islam, way much greater to abandon then fasting), some of them even are used to call God’s name in vain on a daily basis; once it’s Ramadan, they suddenly start fasting, and sometimes praying. As expected, once God’s month is over, it’s party time again.. priceless.

These are not isolated cases as religious people always say without having the courage to admit that this is theory in practice. Times is changing (it actually changed long time ago), and community is becoming more diverse.. and it’s time for this Ramadan thing to be canceled.

* I didn’t translate Emad Hajjaj cartoon btw, I found it that way.

What I think should be done is the same what Ralph Nader used to do back in the 70’s and 80’s.. he used to organize a VERY WELL PLANNED boycott campaigns against big corporation, and it worked.. the key word here is organized (specific goals, time table, plane B, … etc), it should be something practical, protests is just an expression of emotions.. tell me how many people in those protest drink Coke or go to Starbucks or use Nokia phones or have a P&G product in his home.. all previous brands are BIG BIG supporters of israel, specially when it was commenting the massacre of Jenin!
So, this is the message we’re sending: If you keep doing massacre, building settlements and ignoring the Palestinian people rights we’re going to do a protest that no real action coming from it, and that we’ll only last for a short time, then every body will return home and life goes on as usual like nothing happened, plus, we’ll keep on funding you by buying the products that keep supporting you.. if I was an israeli, I wouldn’t ask for any thing more, I’m actually surprised why the Israelis don’t occupy the entire Arab world if that’s the response they’ll get!

Other thing we can do, is rise awareness to our side of the story, and before that could happen, we should learn our side of the story our selves! Can’t say how many times I’ve seen Palestinians and Arabs debating cluelessly about the ancient history of Palestine, how many Palestinians know about Canaan and the timeline for Palestine history as much as they know Abu Jahel and Khaled iben al Waled stories! How many of them know the details of modern Palestine and how the Zionist immigrations started in the late 19th century.
Some other effective methods is media PR, i.e. writing letters to the foreign press (western or other wise), See how many calls the BBC World or CNN International comparing to SMS sent to support some spoiled teens on reality TV shows.
One last thing; before we start talking to others, we should set our differences a side (e.g. Hamas vs. Fatah, Lebanese government supporters vs. opposition, Wahhabi vs. Shi’a), not solving every damn thin.. just do what the Jewish do, they can have all the differences in the world between them selves, but when they talk to non-Jews, they stand one front.
I came across a group on Facebook the other day about fake holocaust photos, it’s not made by Arabs (no surprise there) as Arabs would usually make groups like “let’s see how many people love Palestine” (in Arabic usually) along with other 5000 almost exact groups!

P.S. If you didn’t figured out the title yet, see the original song

-Heather Whitestone, Miss Alabama in the 1994 Miss USA contest

“Whenever I watch TV and see those poor starving kids all over the world, I can’t help but cry. I mean I’d love to be skinny like that, but not with all those flies and death and stuff.”

-Mariah Carey

“Smoking kills. If you’re killed, you’ve lost a very important part of your life”

- Brooke Shields, during an interview to become spokesperson for federal anti-smoking campaign

“I’ve never had major knee surgery on any other part of my body”

-Winston Bennett, University of Kentucky basketball forward

“Outside of the killings, Washington has one of the lowest crime rates in the country”

-Mayor Marion Barry, Washington, DC

“That lowdown scoundrel deserves to be kicked to death by a jackass, and I’m just the one to do it”

-A congressional candidate in Texas

“Half this game is ninety percent mental.”

-Philadelphia Phillies manager, Danny Ozark

“It isn’t pollution that’s harming the environment. It’s the impurities in our air and water that are doing it.”

-Al Gore, Vice President

“I love California . I practically grew up in Phoenix ”

- Dan Quayle

“We’ve got to pause and ask ourselves: How much clean air do we need ?”

-Lee Iacocca

“The word “genius” isn’t applicable in football. A genius is a guy like Norman Einstein.”

-Joe Theisman, NFL football quarterback & sports analyst

“We don’t necessarily discriminate. We simply exclude certain types of people.”

- Colonel Gerald Wellman, ROTC Instructor

“Your food stamps will be stopped effective March 1992 because we received notice that you passed away. May God bless you. You may reapply if there is a change in your circumstances.”

-Department of Social Services, Greenville, South Carolina

“Traditionally, most of Australia’s imports come from overseas.”

-Keppel Enderbery

“If somebody has a bad heart, they can plug this jack in at night as they go to bed and it will monitor their heart throughout the night. And the next morning, when they wake up dead, there’ll be a record.”

-Mark S. Fowler, FCC Chairman

Update (May 5, 2008): Since the palylist project only allows 100 track per playlist, and I still have some other great rock songs to add, I started working on another playlist as part 2:2, and this one would be part 1:2.

If you have a comment, song to suggest, report a broking link.. add as a comment

I got Shrek the 3rd (and the worst) the other day hoping it would be as great and funny as the first two, obviously, I was disappointed.. it was so bad that I couldn’t finished it all the way till the end, it was basically a bad sequences of copy-paste ideas from the first two movies and some TV sitcoms, it was so pathetic that I got sick in my stomach just by watching this poor stupid production.

My trilogy theory goes like this: the 1^st one is a lonely movie, people don’t know it’s the 1^st of a trilogy.. if they liked it the producers produce a sequel. The second is the best, motivated by the success of the 1^st movie they work hard to make this one better, and they use the feedback they got from the first one, so it usually turns out to be the best part.

After they get satisfied, they say “hey, why not make another one to complete the trilogy to perfect 3, and make more money on the trilogy brand”, so it comes out shit, with no real creative purpose! I guess “third time is the charm” doesn’t apply to Hollywood!

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this is a funny projection on what the result may be