One of my least favorite things about living in Jordan is that we cannot spend as much time with him as we would like. Although he was quite the workaholic, my childhood is full of the fondest memories of us playing a collection of games he invented for us, of him helping us learn the lines and act out the scenes of historical Arabic movies (“Man minkom moshtaqon ila sayfeee!”), and of him taking us on road trips as often as he could.

Most of my earliest memories involve my father, rather than anyone else. My father, you see, was the first man I ever loved.

I remember him standing on a cliff and throwing us into this little place where the Dead Sea meets sweet water, when we weren’t old enough to swim. I would always climb back up and ask for more. I remember him teasing me when my mother and I would “fight”, something we still laugh about often today, “Roba, aslan Mama ma bet7ebek” is a very popular family joke. I remember him playing this game where we would run through the doors while he tried to get us with little stress balls. That was one of my favorite games ever, if not my favorite.

Dad taught me a lot of things in life, both directly and indirectly. At a very early age, he taught me the importance of defending myself, even if it meant confronting someone much bigger. All it takes, he shows me, was some courage, and if courage doesn’t do it, well, there’s always four of us, and he taught us to stick together. When I became a little older, he taught me how to enjoy the finer things in life; how to enjoy a good meal, how to act like a “gentleperson”, how to always choose quality, and how to be generous, for no one could possibly be as generous as he.

Dad taught me the value of reading; I really started reading the alphabet when we were in the car and he would ask me to read the storefronts and signs as we drove around Riyadh. He taught me the value of information; I was always amused at how my father knew the answer to almost everything, and every time I would read, I would try to remember what I was reading so that I would one day know a lot too.

Dad taught me to love unconditionally, even though some people might not deserve it. He taught me how to value good friends, through different countries and different lives. He taught me to give without expecting anything in return, he taught
me to be easy-going, he taught me that life is a matter of priorities.
He taught me to work hard, to expect the best, and to appreciate the
different types of dates. Dad taught me the importance of being friendly, of treating everyone with respect, of not judging people from where they come. He taught me to be welcoming, and he taught me the importance of saying hi :)

Today is his birthday, and like every year, I find myself helpless as to how to give him an ounce back of all the love he gave, and still gives, to me. Unfortunately, due to distance, I cannot even give him a hug or a card. Perhaps next year.

For this year though, I will have to settle for this; Happy birthday Baba, from myself, Hisham, Omar, and il-Qazam il-Shereer. We love you more than we love the world, and we thank you for everything.

Latest fatwa out of Al-Azhar, “…should a woman
share an office with a male colleague, she must be accompanied with a
chaperon, or she should breast feed that adult male five
times in order for their unchaperoned existence together be Islamically
lawful.“

Via Mahmood’s Den (where you must read the rest of his post, as well as the fatwa in Arabic)

I noticed the heavy campus security as soon as I got to school at 8:00 in the morning yesterday. Although the security is always there, they seemed a little ruffled. I leave campus later on and come back 2 hours later, and the guy who collects money for the parking lot told me I can’t park outside. I hate parking inside because it gets so crowded and becomes really hard to get the car out later on during the day, so I tried to insist on parking outside. He shook his head and pointed to the main gate, where at least 5 big cars of police were parked, and where cops were walking around with their clubs, “They’re not letting anyone park outside today.”

He then told me that a “Abeidat” had stabbed two girls in the university yesterday evening, and that the girls’ tribes are really angry and expected to make an appearance, and that I really should go home. I didn’t go home as I had a class, but my class was in my faculty at the edge of the university, so I didn’t get to go to the main campus area to check out whats happening.

Throughout the rest of the day though, I don’t hear about the fight from anyone else.

Later on at home, I ask the boys whether they heard anything about the fight. One out of 4 confirms and gets all excited recounting the story, “Oh, yeah, hell was loose at school today! Some guy proposed to this girl and her parents said no, so he was so angry that he came to school the next day and “salakha moose” (stabbed her) as well as her friend, and her tribe got so pissed off that a whole bunch of them came in with guns and stuff this morning and security couldn’t do anything about it.”

Mhhmm. Today, I check out the newspapers for any news of a brawl at Jordan University. I check Al-Ghad, Al-Rai, and the Jordan Times, I also check the Jordanian blogosphere for any rumors. Nothing at all.

I wonder what’s up. If anything.

Today marks the 59th anniversary of the Palestinian exodus, the nakbeh, the great catastrophe. It is very difficult to write about something so personal yet so critical, for I am, after all, Palestinian. Both my paternal and maternal families have lived in Palestine for centuries, and save for my paternal grandmother, I cannot trace a single drop of none-Palestinian blood in me. My father was born and bred in Palestine, but the rest of my family, born after 1955, including my mother, were all born elsewhere and bred elsewhere.

Yet, elsewhere or not, Palestinian we remain.

In Arabic, Filasteen (فلسطين) has been the name of the region since the earliest medieval Arab geographers (adopted from the then-current Greek term Palaestina (Παλαιστινη), first used by Herodotus, itself derived ultimately from the name of the Philistines), and Filasteeni (فلسطيني) was always a common adjectival noun adopted by natives of the region, starting as early as the first century after the Hijra (eg `Abdallah b. Muhayriz al-Jumahi al-Filastini,[46] an ascetic who died in the early 700s).

Prior to the 1948 war, Palestinian Christians and Muslims were a two-third majority of the population of Palestine, who owned and operated 93% of Palestine’s lands. Today, in the UN’s area of operation, there are “officially” 4.9 million refugees as a result of the Nakba of 1948, 1 million of them have no form of identification other than an UNWRA identification card.

One of the founders of the State of Israel, Golda Meir’s, had said, “There was no such thing as Palestinians. It was not as though there was a Palestinian people in Palestine considering itself as a Palestinian people and we came and threw them out and took their country from them. They did not exist.”

These 4.9 million refugees exist. I exist. I am Palestinian, my parents are Palestinian, my ancestors for centuries before me were Palestinian, and my children will be Palestinian.

Ultimately, for a Palestinian, memory really matters.

Related: 58

When we first moved to Amman a little less than 4 years ago, Amman was still Amman; everything closed on Fridays, almost everyone around was Arab, and the most decent shopping you could do was with the few brands that had just started opening in Share3 il Markat (AKA “The Brand Street”).

A few months later, Mecca Mall opened, with its plethora of renowned stores, and the world of Ammani life changed. In the years that followed, so many new commercial projects were and are being undertaken that it is hard to keep up anymore. There are cranes in the horizon everywhere you look, new structures everywhere, construction sites getting marked daily.

Whenever I go to a part of town that I haven’t been to in a few weeks, I am always shocked by what I see. They closed off the turn to Jabal Amman from Shmesani, making it impossible to get to Jabal Amman lest one goes through the Fourth Circle. The other day I discovered that my beloved Rainbow Street has been closed off to be turned into a pedestrian road by October. Abdoun looks nothing like the Abdoun I spent my teenage years in. Buildings in the older parts of Amman like Shmesani and Weibdeh are getting knocked off left and right to make way for more modern commercial structures and parking space. Last week I found myself in Khalda and was absolutely shocked to see the towers peaking out of the mountains.

Yet, I haven’t left town for over a week in 4 years.

Here’s a picture of a “new” Ammanite view courtesy of Lina (she has a lot more pictures of construction taking place too):

And last but not least… they’re actually doing something about visual pollution in the form of signage. I was shocked to see Ahmad’s pictures of the Markat Street, because I was just there a few weeks ago, and it hadn’t changed one bit then.

Amman is changing, and it’s changing fast. Nothing is ever closed on Fridays anymore, the crowd at the malls is a cosmopolitan mix of people from all over the world, and you can get really decent shopping done at City Mall. Even more decent than that in Saudi Arabia.

Personally? I love it :) Of course, everything has a negative side to it as well, but for now, I’m enjoying the changes.