I know I’ll have the time of my life with him. Life was good, but it just got better with him around. I know I’ll be taking him on awesome road trips and when we’re not playing war with his G.I. Joes I’ll teach him the true meaning of life and how the world works.
I know he’ll love it when I carry him around on my shoulders, when I give him piggy-back rides and when I throw him up and catch him as he laughs his bottom back to earth. I know I’d get tired of carrying him that long (he is getting bigger and heavier you know). So I know I’ll beg him for a short break, but we’ll spend it conspiring and talking about our plan to rule the world! He’d want us both kings, or else he’ll reject the throne, and I’d laugh hysterically … I mean why not!
I know …
We’ll have serious conversations about toys and dinosaurs … and I know I’ll have to come up with a less dramatic explanation why they don’t roam earth anymore. He’ll ask me to read him his favorite bedtime story forever and I know I will, at least until he starts finding them boring. I know we’ll build sandcastles together and then he’ll bury me neck deep under the sand and proceed to do all kind of crazy stuff with my unprotected face, but I know I’ll laugh from the bottom of my heart.
I know …
I’ll take millions of photos of him, arm-wrestle with him and pretend he beat the crap out of me. I know I’ll teach him how to be honest, respectful, how to love people and not to bully anyone and how not to take crap from anyone. I know I’ll teach him what life is all about as we stroll down parks and beaches, his little fingers barely making it around one of mine. I know it will probably come as a shock to him when he learns that daddy is not really a superhero (but I won’t lie about the fact that I do possess Superbabies raising powers). I know I’ll promise to listen and pay attention to him, give him all that time that he needs and always be there for him, and God willing, I know I will.
I know …
I’ll be missing him so damn much when I go to work every day and can’t wait to get back home to lift him up and squeeze him in my arms. I know we’ll both have a high pitched genuine laugh …. until I feel a small hand pulling on my shirt. I look down and there she is: “Daddy, it’s my turn now!!“, she’d say, reminding me how blessed I am with not one, but two little angels.
Update: on the 28th of August, 2011, two months after being detained, Anas is finally free! Thank God!
We always express compassion and sympathy towards people who get put behind bars for speaking their mind. It’s wrong, inhumane, unjustifiable and it could be you or me. We’re even more concerned when those arrested were not even accused of that horrendous crime to begin with, but we are absolutely enraged when those arrested for committing no crime are people we know and whom we interact with.
This is the case of Anas Maarawi, the Syrian blogger and founder of ArDroid, who dedicated most of his time and effort to blog about the Android OS in Arabic, when there were no Arabic resources on the web at all. Anas, who’s always been a supporter of open-source software, now finds himself confined under lock and key.
This is the latest of the Syrian regime’s atrocities committed every day under the pretext of “reform”. According to close sources, Anas was “detained on Friday 1-7-2011 in Kafarsousah, Damascus. No information about him ever since”.
Anas is not a fake virtual identity and he’s certainly not an American man pretending to be a lesbian fighting a fictitious battle, although I now wish he’d get half of the international support the fake Syrian Lesbian received. Anas is real and is in desperate need for any support he can.
Please, tweet about Anas with the #FreeAnas hashtag. It’s a fact, the Syrian regime has people monitoring the internet, and if they get pressure from people the world over are demanding Anas’s freedom, hopefully they will feel obliged to release him. Some good people have already created a Free Anas Facebook page and a Free Anas blog and some banners people can put on their websites and blogs to raise awareness about Anas’s ordeal.
Finally, my thoughts and prayers are with Anas’s family and friends in these hard times and I hope he’s in good health and will soon return to his loved ones to do what he does best: promote open-source code.
I was in the beautiful city of Barcelona* last month for the Mobile World Congress (my second time for the same event). Again this year, I didn’t get to see much of what went on at the show as I was glued to my client’s stand, but then again every night we’d go out, have tapas and paellas – a lot of them! – and enjoy a lot of what the city has to offer.
Anyway, here’s some of the cool stuff I saw there: Continue reading
Now here’s a dining experience I never thought I’d have in my entire life: dinner … while strapped in a leather seat … suspended in the air … by a wire rope … at more than 160 feet!
Really? Yes, and that is winning (to borrow from the great Charlie Sheen).
It was completely unplanned and that’s what’s so cool about it. A couple of days ago I went to the Dinner in the Sky’s location to meet the franchisee and check out the venue and the feasibility of hosting events, or recommending some sort of a loyalty scheme program to clients, and the Dinner in the Sky guys, Dreamdays, invited us for a test drive. I happily obliged.
You get strapped to your chair on a safe platform with a roundtable on it, while a crane slowly pulls it up, reaching heights more than 160 feet . Obviously, the Dinner in the Sky is for those hungry for the adrenaline rush more than the food itself. I must say the platform is completely safe and is very stable. While you’re up in the sky, the platform rotates so everyone on board gets a cool view.
The Dinner in the Sky concept is not new, but this time around they chose the Dubai Marina area as a location, where the view of JBR Towers and the Dubai Marina Yacht Club is (perhaps this is not the best use of words here, but it is) drop-dead gorgeous!
Oh and fyi, there are no toilets up in the sky, so you know, do whatever you have to do before you get up there.
(This post was originally written for The Arab Expats and is a tribute to one of the greatest men in history: the great Salahuddin, who died on this day, 1193 AD).
The other night I watched The Kingdom of Heaven, and then went straight to bed. That night I had a weird dream where I was accompanying a very angry Salahuddin Al-Ayyubi in the city of Dubai. I don’t usually remember dreams, but I vaguely remembered this one after a colleague asked me what I did the day before.
Statue of Salah Al Deen - Al Karak, Jordan by Mark Kirchner
All my efforts to remember the dream went in vain, so I wrote this in attempt to picture what my contemporary conversation with Salaheddin would’ve been like:
صلاح الدين: من أنت وأين أنا؟ .أنا حسين … وانت في دبي يا أيها القائد صلاح الدين صلاح الدين: دبي؟ ما هذه؟ وفي أي عام أنا؟ .دبي هي مدينة من مدن الإمارات العربية المتحدة … وإنت في العام 2007 ميلادي !صلاح الدين: أحمدك وأشكرك يا رب! لقد أتممت رسالتي … واتحد العرب أجمع! شكراً لك يا رب .يا صلاح الدين … الإمارات العربية المتحدة هي دولة وحدة من الدول العربية التلاتة وعشرين Not Really صلاح الدين: إذاً فكيف تقول أن الإمارات العربية قد اتحدت؟ .والله ما أظن إنه هالفكرة ممكن تصير أبداً صلاح الدين: وما ذاك الذي أراه؟ من هن تلك العاريات الكاسيات؟ هدول سكان المدينة يا صلاح الدين. ن !صلاح الدين: مستحيل! قد أكون في بلاد الهند أو في بلاد الإفرنجة، لكنني لن أصدق أبداً أنني في دولة عربية !صلاح الدين: أرني طريق مسقط رأسي يا حسين … العراق !والله العراق يا سيدي حالها مش أفضل من حال أي دولة عربية، استلموها الأمريكان بحجة تحريرها، وأسقطوا حاكمها السابق، اللي على فكرة كان تكريتي زيّك بالزبط !!صلاح الدين: ما الهذيان الذي تتفوه به يا فتى؟ إلهي أعني على ما أثقله على كاهلي هذا الأحمق !صلاح الدين: حسنٌ، حسنٌ … فلنذهب إلى مملكة السماء … القدس … وستعود الأمور إلى مجرياتها بإذن الله والله يا صلاح الدين مش عارف شو بدي أحكيلك عن القدس بالذات … بس كمان القدس بطلت إلنا. صارت لليهود خلص … والعرب اللي ساكنين في فلسطين ماكلين هوا، وعم بقاتلوا بعض. صلاح الدين: اخرس يا رجل!!! إنتبه لما تقول … وإلا والذي نفسي بيده لاجتزيت رأسك على الفور …القدس لنا يا هذا … وقد حررتها بيدي هاتين !!! ن … بقى قبل يا سيدي .. الوضع اختلف الآن .. العرب متفرقين … والوضع زي ما إنت شايف يعني …. بس الحمد لله We’re doing fine … Really صلاح الدين: يو أر دوينج فاين؟! قبّح الله وجهك يا رجل! … تكالبت عليكم الأمم، واستولى الأعداء على القدس وبغداد … وتقول لي: يو آر دوينج فاين؟! واحسرتاه … أغرب عن وجهي أيها البغيض!!ض .طول بالك علينا شوي يا زلمة، يعني زي كإنك محملني ذنب الأمة العربية كلها !صلاح الدين: يا زلما؟ إذاً دلني على أي مكان على هذه الأرض لأحشد جيشاً جباراً لتحرير بلاد العرب والله يا صلاح ما أظن في بكل هالعالم هادا المحل اللي بتحكي عنه صلاح الدين: ما … وأ … جب … جب
This is the part where Saladin gets a severe heart attack while he was struggling to utter the word “cowards”, and where I don’t try to help because he and I know that he doesn’t belong to this time.
