Year: 2004

Happy New Year 2005

As the year finally draws to it’s end, I wanted to wish everyone a Happy New Year 2005 🙂

May it be a great year, full of happiness, success and prosperity for everyone, especially the loyal readers of my blog 🙂

I hope this new year brings more peace and less war.
I hope it brings more prosperity and less poverty.
I hope it brings more well-being and less misery.
I hope it brings more success and less failure.
I hope it brings more understanding and less differences.
I hope we hear less about how bad the world is becoming and more about what a great place it can be.

Have fun and take care 🙂
See you all next year 😉

LBC Star Academy 2

The second season of the Arab version of Star Academy starts today on LBC at 18:30 GMT.

16 contestants have been selected from all over the Arab world, including one Tunisian girl, Amani Souissi.

I didn’t watch LBC’s Star Academy last year, and only saw a “Best Of” episode after it all ended. But I heard a lot about it, too much in fact.

Everyone was mad about it, and it was a big success for LBC.
People from all around the Arab world, from all ages were pinned to their TV sets watching the contestants’ every move, choosing their favourite, talking endlessly about them, and wasting their money voting for them.
And the people who weren’t interested in the show were interested in the Lebanese presenter Hilda Khalifa 😛

In short, the Arab world was hit by Star Academy Mania and they loved every bit of it.
Now, it’s about to happen all over again.

But would it be appropriate for people to spend so much money now to vote for some talentless nobodies when that money could help so many people in countries that were hit by the disastrous tsunami, providing clean water, food, shelter and so much more?!

Best Arab Blogs Awards 2004

Haitham Sabbah and Mahmood Al Yousif have launched the Best Arab Blogs Awards, a.k.a BABA’s 😉

Nominations go on till January 15th, and then the voting begins and stays open till the end of the month.

My blog is nominated in a number of categories, so when voting opens, you know which blog to vote for 😉

If you have a blog you would like to nominate for these awards, just pass by the BABA 2004 site.

Fly Eating Robot

Scientists at the University of the West of England (UWE) have designed a robot that does not require batteries or electricity to power itself.
Instead, it generates energy by catching and eating houseflies.

Dr Chris Melhuish and his Bristol-based team hope the robot, called EcoBot II, will one day be sent into zones too dangerous for humans, potentially proving invaluable in military, security and industrial areas.

The EcoBot II powers itself in much the same way as animals feed themselves to get their energy, he said.

The EcoBot II uses human sewage as bait to catch the insects. It then digests the flies, before their exoskeletons are turned into electricity, which enables the robot to function.

Bacteria in the sewage eats the flies’ soft tissues, which releases enzymes that break down the hardened shell.

Sugar molecules released from the broken-down shell are then absorbed and used as energy by the bacteria.

Wow. That’s so cool.
Not the digestion part of course. I mean the whole idea and concept of a self powered robot.

Flash-forward: Terminator will be back!

[Source: CNN]

Israeli Racism

“The Arabs are worms. You find them everywhere like worms, underground as well as above.”

— Yehiel Hazan, parliamentary leader of the biggest lobby group for Jewish colonists illegally settling in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.

and…

“What is it about Islam as a whole and the Palestinians in particular? Is it some form of cultural deprivation? Is it some genetic defect?”

— Ze’ev Boim, Deputy Defense Minister

This is extremely sickening and dangerous racism!
Only an animal would think and talk like that in the first place. But with animals like that in the Israeli government, it totally explains their racist and sickening approach to the Palestinian people and how they’re totally against a real peace process.

[Via: Yenayer]

New Year Resolutions 2005

So, just a couple of days before we’re out of 2004 (phew!!) and into 2005. That means it’s about that time of year when we weird humans put together lists of unreachable goals that we call our new year’s resolutions.

Of course, I didn’t accomplish most of my goals from last year, so I’ll be carrying some of them with me to the new year.

And so my list of new year resolutions for 2005 goes as follows, in no particular order:

  • Join a gym and get back in shape.
  • Organize my time better and allocate more time for fun and leisure.
  • Try to cut down on the number of movies I watch.
  • Get started on some of the projects lying around in my head.
  • Advance my career and take steps to be happier with my job.
  • Get more into photography.
  • Start praying and stick to it.

The theme of the year 2005 for me is “Life Decisions & Change”.
I want to work on setting a great path for my whole life, take the right decisions even if they’re hard and change a lot of things I’m not satisfied with.
I want to do more of the stuff I love and waste less of my time on the stuff I hate.

I hope I get to realize these goals. Even though I need to put some effort into it, I think I’ve been pretty realistic with my list for this year.

Oh well, only time will tell…

New Tsunami Alert

Indian authorities have warned people in coastal areas to head for higher ground, four days after giant waves triggered by the massive earthquake killed at least 10,000 Indians.

India’s central alert said there was evidence from foreign experts that a powerful earthquake could occur Thursday afternoon near Australia, triggering another tsunami in the Indian Ocean, according to a report from state-run Press Trust of India.

The U.S. Geological Survey, which monitors earthquake activity around the world, said it had not recorded any major activity that would spawn a tsunami.

There have been more than 70 aftershocks recorded on the Web site from Sunday’s quake. The strongest measured 7.1, but most have been between 5 and 6 in magnitude.
None have produced any more tsunamis.

[More: CNN]

Asian Tsunami Help

The latest death toll from the Asian tsunami has risen dramatically to more than 56,000 [Update 29/12/04: Now it’s over 80,000] [Update 31/12/04: Now it’s over 120,000].

More countries are reporting casualties from the killer waves, spawned by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake that struck off the western-most portion of the northern Indonesian island of Sumatra early on Sunday.

The devastation stretches from Thailand to East Africa, where the United Nations reports that entire villages have been washed away.

Islamic Relief has launched an appeal to raise

25 Rules That Guys Wish Women Knew

1. Crying is blackmail.
2. Ask for what you want. Subtle hints don’t work.
3. Don’t cut your hair. Ever.
4. Sometimes, we’re not thinking about you. Live with it.
5. Get rid of your cat.
6. Anything we said six or eight months ago is inadmissible in an argument.
7. Anything you wear is fine. Really.
8. Christopher Columbus didn’t need directions, and neither do we.
9. You have too manyshoes.
10. If you think you’re fat, you probably are. Don’t ask us.

Continue reading 25 Rules That Guys Wish Women Knew

ONE TV: Ongoing Entertainment

This past weekend while zapping through satellite channels, we found an ad on Dubai TV about a new TV channel called One TV. The ad was really cool that it got me doing a channel search right away.

So, it turns out, starting from December 24th, Dubai’s once boring CH33 was shut down and replaced by this new channel bearing a new name, a new look and a new line-up of the best in American and British programming.

Branded “One TV”, the station is aimed at modern Arabs who enjoy western-style programming, as well as English speaking expatriates.

Blockbuster movies dominate prime time with television’s most popular series, sitcoms, reality shows and kid’s programs rounding up the rest of the grid to offer a unique variety of choices for all tastes and ages.

We’re already hooked on this channel and it’s great programming. I’m truly enjoying the movies and the sitcoms. They’ve already pushed back my bedtime an hour or so already.

Something else worth mentioning is that the movies are censored, so no nudity or sex on the screen. I think even french kisses are cut out. And even though it’s a bit annoying, especially when you’ve already seen the movie before, I think they totally have the right to do this so that it can be a true Arabic family entertainment channel.

For more information on the channel and it’s programming, visit their really cool website: One TV.