YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!!!!!!

It's not itsy-bitsy, it's not teeny-weeny - it's the burkini

Say hello to the burkini - a swimming costume designed for Muslim women. Costing £65, it is a semi-fitting two-piece swimsuit that connects to an "ahiida hijood" and it will be worn by Muslim Australian lifesavers from January.
Sydney designer Aheda Zanetti came up with the design after Surf Life Saving Australia began a drive to recruit more Islamic lifeguards, particularly women, following riots last year between Lebanese Muslim teenagers and white Australians on Sydney's Cronulla beach. The style is not exactly Baywatch - that's the whole point of it - but no one will be able to miss the women running up and down Bondi Beach in these yellow and red outfits.

However, the burkini is by no means the first Muslim swimming cossie. In 2000, the "sharia swimsuit" was all the rage in Cairo, with Egyptian women flocking to buy the high-necked costume with sleeves and a small skirt, which was worn over long trousers. Then came the "swimming hijab", also known as the "legal swimsuit" and again championed in Egypt, which was "manufactured from industrial fibres which prevent it from sticking to the skin when wet". Last year saw the launch of a Turkish swimwear collection called Hasema, consisting of a neck-to-ankle body-suit with hood. More than 40,000 units were sold. Hayrunnisa Gul, the wife of the foreign minister, was among the buyers.

So will the burkini take Australia by storm? Zanetti, 38, said it had taken her a year to persuade Muslim women in Sydney that swimming "is not a sin" and sales had soared. Her company, Ahiida sportswear, has had great feedback, which she has posted on her website: "Sister, you have a fantastic product ... I can't come up with any downsides to the swimsuits," said Arzo.

Heba was equally delighted: "I was finally able to go to my aquarobics class, and I love the swimsuit! It's so lightweight, dries so quickly and it looks great. I received compliments from non-Muslims. I don't look like a fool in the water any more, and I'm not weighed down by all the heavy wet clothes I used to wear."

"In the water, I look like a real swimmer wearing a full body suit or scuba suit - but modest," added Diana.

These ladies have a point: wearing a burkini means saying goodbye to silly swimming caps and cellulite problems. Who knows - Islamic swimwear could catch on in swimming pools from Barnsley to Brighton.

SO UNFAIR

I am hungover...and the only chocolate in the office is SNICKERS....NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO...I hate SNIKCERS!!!!!!

Never Again

Today I have experencied what my friends used to complain about. Going to work-8am-while one is still drunk.

I remember when I was unemployed and waking up at around 10ish and talking to friends who were already at work, and them telling me that they arrived at work with not a hangover but still drunk. And I never understood that...but today I finally did!

I was FORCED awake by my ride who had been waiting for me outside for 15 minutes already-I put my ipod as my alarm yet forgot to put the speakers on!!! Arrived at work, without taking a shower, still smelling of the last drink I had at Nai-vodka/orange juice-and having to write a report!!!! Not only that, bas I also am just starting to go into hangover mode...the headaches, craving for greasy food...wanting just to put my head on a pillow and not to talk/look/listen to anyone!!!

I am NEVER EVER EVER doing this again...drinking yeah ok I won't be giving that up any time soon-enjoy it to much-but not on a week day...khalas...I am unable to sleep till 10/11/12/ and so I have to stop!

The really annoying thing, is that I had decided not to go to Nai, yet I ended up going...why OH WHY...do I not listen to the voice within????

Catch-22

I have read, and am rereading Catch-22, by Joseph Heller. Anyway there is a line that I am trying to understand...will be walking around with a little paper with it written on it till i get it or am explained it..fa lets see if the blogging world can help:

Anything can be done to you that you can not prevent.

Good Luck

Like I needed a reason...

Chocolate addiction lead to sweet discovery

(Reuters) - They were so addicted, they just could not give up their favorite daily snack -- not even in the interest of science.
But chocolate lovers who flunked out of a Johns Hopkins University study on aspirin and heart disease helped researchers stumble on an explanation of why a little chocolate a day can cut the risk of heart attack.
It turns out chocolate, like aspirin, affects the platelets that cause blood to clot, Diane Becker of the Johns Hopkins University's School of Medicine and her colleagues discovered. "What these chocolate offenders taught us is that the chemical in cocoa beans has a biochemical effect similar to aspirin in reducing platelet clumping, which can be fatal if a clot forms and blocks a blood vessel, causing a heart attack," Becker said in a telephone interview.
The 139 so-called chocolate offenders took part in a larger study of 1,200 people with a family history of heart disease. The study looked at the effects of aspirin on blood platelets.
Before they got the aspirin, the volunteers were asked to stay on a strict regimen of exercise, refrain from smoking and avoid caffeinated drinks, wine, grapefruit juice and chocolate.
Chocolate and the other foods are known to affect platelets. "We knew they would offend," Becker said. "Some people said to us, 'I can do anything but I can't stay off my chocolate.'"
"If people said, 'I will try my very best,' we said, 'OK do your very best, but it is crucial that you don't eat chocolate for 24 to 48 hours before you come in for testing.'" Yet some people failed even this test of self-control.

GOING ALL THE WAY

"Nobody ate like a chocolate chip. If they were going to eat it, they ate some chocolate," Becker said. "It went all the way from a chocolate chip cookie to someone who ate a gallon of chocolate ice cream with chocolate chunks and two chocolate-chip cookies at one sitting." Becker cut them out of the aspirin study, but looked at their blood anyway. Researchers ran platelet samples from both groups through a mechanical blood vessel system designed to time how long it takes for the platelets to clump together in a hair-thin plastic tube. The blood of the chocolate eaters was slower to clot than the blood of the volunteers who resisted chocolate, Becker told a meeting of heart experts in Chicago.
In a urine test, the chocolate lovers had lower levels of a platelet waste product called thromboxane. "Does it help a little bit? Yes," Becker said. "But it does not have anywhere near the magnitude of the effects of a single baby aspirin a day."
Nonetheless, Becker's team wants to study the effects of eating chocolate on a "free-living" population of volunteers. They will measure how much chocolate people eat and then watch them for several years to see if chocolate-eaters have a different rate of heart attacks, stroke and heart operations. Other studies have suggested that dark chocolate contains more of the beneficial compounds linked with heart health, and experts note that the high sugar and fat content of most chocolate candy might cancel out some of the benefits.

Last Night

Last night we had to take care of a friend of a friend and she wasn't there. First we had to wait for ages for this dude to find the place where we were-Dubliners...when he finally did show up, the place had called final orders and we had ordered him a beer inno its the safest bet for what people drink. Anyhow what was strange was how awkward the conversation was. I guess i am not used to meeting new people anymore, inno I spend so much time with people that I know so well that we don't' have the usual superficial talk...where you from? Where did you study? What did you study? Do you like Amman? BLAH BLAH YADA YADA...then I asked the feux pas question, why you in Amman for the holidays?!?!?!? Haram, inno I made it sound like it was the worst decision he had ever made. The dude is an Arab bas has lived most of his life in London...then of course comes the question, so where does one go out in Amman? What do you tell someone who lives in London? He was nice enough to take the pressure off a bit by saying that he is not here to party or stuff like that, inno he can do that in London...so the pressure cooker was opened and we breathed a bit easier!!

Then of course being all people who have just celebrated our one year anniversary in this great city, and us planning to leave for New Years, we started to talk about Amman, don't worry we were good ambassadors for this city, bas inno ya3ni...guess we could have been better, since one of the places we listed for him to go to is HangOver!!!!!!

Bas really the strange thing, I think for him and us, was that the person of contact was not there, fa the buffer was off, and we had to chit chat about stuff that just were not very comfortable...really felt bad for him...my feelings were further compiled when he told us that he had to dive all the way back to ZARQA that very night...inno NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

Bas we helped a friend out, and I guess that is what matters...bas it was really awkward...yet kind of fun in the fact that it was awkward...lol!!!!

AlJazeera

Today is the launch of Aljazeera English...I am at work but am keeping my eyes on the web page, aljazeera.net/english, for at 12 GMT the website will also be launched and one can watch the broadcast. I am so excited...it is a historical event-and we have quite a few in our lifetimes-bas finally a venue for Arabs to broadcast how they view the world and hopefully this will help to bridge the gap between us and the West!!!! I mean i remember when the Arab channel was launched and watching the first news broadcast...to say that I also saw the English one would be quite cool...inno to my kids.

Anyway, do check out the new channel, we get it on NileSat and ArabSat.

BRILLIANT!!!

A Spanish town council has vowed to banish sexism from street signage by demanding half of all road signs and traffic lights show female figures with skirts and ponytails.
Fuenlabrada, which lies south of the capital Madrid, will replace old and damaged road signs and traffic lights with new stock within a year. "In this way the sexism which until now has seen only masculine figures appear in traffic signals will be brought to an end," the town council said in a statement.

The council, which said it would ask manufacturers to incorporate female figures in their signs, would not cost taxpayers a penny.

The Anniversary

We need to take the time today to stop and think and reflect. A year ago a tragedy occurred in Amman, and we not only lost lives but our sense of security was shaken. As I look around our region on this sad day, I see how we are not only on the brink of chaos, but that we are not doing anything about it.

1. Palestine-the massacre that happened there.


2. Iraq-the daily massacres there.


3. Lebanon-the out of proportion aggression that it suffered through last month.


4. Syria-the threat of a war its facing.

We need to do something, Qatar is asking for the Security Council to approve a resolution not only for a cease fire but also for an investigation into what happened in Beit Hanoun...we need more such action.

I send my condolences to anyone who lost a family or friend in the bombings last year. I also send my condolences to us as a region as a people. When will we realise that our lives are valuable, that our blood is worth more then just to be spilt on the ground of our land.

We need to wake up, we need to start thinking about what where we want our lives to go, where we want our children to grow up. I for one don't want to have children who will be ashamed of being an Arab, or who will be living in a place where death is a daily occurrence, and where their sense of safety is always in jeopardy.

My Condolences to our nation, to our region.

First Day

Since July 1, 381 Palestinians have died versus five Israelis.

Today is the first day of mourning for Beit Hanoun.

My blog is going into mourning also, I can't believe that things are going on in the Arab world-to my people-and I am just sitting down doing nothing!!!!!!

Am disgusted with myself, the people around me and our governments!

At a meeting today...

I had to take the minutes of my first meeting today-never done that before-anyway not the point...it was a meeting between a Jordanian and Turkish delegation, to discuss something...again not the point-promise it's coming up! I looked around at the Jordanian side, to find only me sitting between a group of elderly men...then I glanced at the Turkish side and found 4 women, the question started to form in my mind, why is it that this country has four women on their delegation, all with presentations and proposals to make, yet on the Jordanian side I was the only one, and I was there pretty much to take notes-still too new to be of much help!
I then came online and found an article in the Guardian, No room at the top - fewer women reaching boards of Britain's top firms, where it is discussing how the number of women as head of boards has come down since last year, "The number of directorships held by women fell in 2006 after rising steadily in previous years. Now 23 companies in the blue chip index - one more than last year - have entirely male boards." It goes on to discuss the implication for this situation on women and also on how companies are going to grow, they also said that the UK has refrained from making a quota for women on boards.
I have never been able to decide on where I stand when it comes to quotes, be it in parliaments or in this case board rooms, sometimes I am for them, for we need to force society to start seeing women in these roles, and then we can take the quota away. Yet in the case of Jordan it proves that just because you have women in parliament does not mean that they will be voting or acting for the benefit of the women of their society, we saw how they voted in the last parliament against laws that would have made the legal and social life of Jordanian women a lot better.
I think the main thing, is that it is not so much about quotas only it is also about educated the women and men who will fill them-for in some cases their are quotes that include men (racial and religious minorities.) These people that we vote for, or who are assigned to represent us, should be shown and explained to that when they are in such a position it is not only to fill a seat, or show that the country is equal, but it is to actually work so that at some point we no longer need quotes we just vote for people because they are good.
Looking through the Guardian, I found a opinion talking about Palestine and what is happening now, and it had a really amazing quote, that showed how effective women are when they decide to do something about their lives. In A brutal taste of the future, Sami Abdel-Shafi, stated that, "On Friday morning, scores of women marched through Beit Hanoun in a spontaneous rush to aid friends and loved ones after hearing their pleas. Unarmed, they were shot at by Israeli soldiers from their tanks; two women were left dead and others severely injured. These women were said to have been heading to a mosque to free armed men who took refuge there. Television footage and interviews with witnesses show these women posed no military threat, but they were treated as such by the Israeli army without warning." Again Palestinians and more importantly Palestinian woman show us the way to go...how we have to just go out there and break through all the boundaries, and obstacles put in front of us.
So again, I was disappointed in our delegation today, I really had expected there to be more women, we make up more then half this society, and it is about time that we start pushing through all the glass ceiling and whatnot and make a place for ourselves.

A Working Woman

Now that I go to work everyday so early in the morning...and still not having a car fa am in cab, I have found a new way to entertain myself. Watching people on their way to work! You see the most interesting things, people really think that the car is an extension of their homes, no realising that we can all see what they are doing-to be fair I do that also-fa you see people flossing (I SWEAR HE WAS), the picking their nose for sure...bas also what I noticed is that no one is smiling. Today i actually saw someone with his face between his hands, like his world was coming apart while we waiting for the Rabia traffic lights. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that people are listening to the news on teh radio...wallah I hve no idea...bas it is my new form of entertainment...watching people being miserable on their way to work...lol...

How things change...

Life in Amman has truely changed for me, I have gone from being a PhD student, who is unemployed to having handed in my PhD and am currently writing this on my office computer. This Eid was the best, it really is the beginning of the new year for me. I went to Beirut, to see my parents, and with the rest of Amman to celebrate. Friends came from here, and we celebrated in style. We went to all the hang out, got drunk and my friends opened a bottle of Champagne for me to celebrate having handed in and them no longer having to deal with me bitching and moaning about it!!!!!!
I got my Phd bound and I sent it to my friend in Edinburgh who officially sent me a text a week ago informing me that she has submitted it for me. I received a phone call from my new job at King Abdullah Design and Development Bureau (KADDB)and got a job as Research Executive. I have also recieved an email from UNIFEM asking me to come in for a second interview. I was on quite bad terms with some friends of mine prior to Eid, and now we are all hunky-dory. wallah I have no idea why the first post that I write after such a long time is so short, or so uninteresting for all of you out there. We as a generation yesterday lived another big event in the history of not only this region but the world-the sentencing of Saddam-and yet all I can think about is that life is going well. Well that my life is going well-obviously life is not going to well for Saddam-how selfish we humans are, when things are going well for us the world is a oyster that we are just opening, and when it is going badly its an oyster that we opened to find a sand grain not a pearl.

Inshallah I will be sorting out the car situation soon, I shall become and independent woman, who only takes rides because she wants to mish inno she can't get around without calling cabs or asking favours of friends.

Wallah it is true that life can change in a blink of an eye.