A house in the Baq3a refugee camp was burnt down on October 28th. The father works on a ka3k trolley and earns 3-4 JD’s a day. Meanwhile, his wife is deaf and has 9 children, 2 of whom are twin toddlers. The Action Committee is trying to collect necessary items for them, such as mattresses, […]

September 19th, 2007: The Towers of Babel outside my house.

October 8th, 2007: One Tower Falls

October 29th, 2007: Return Of The Second Tower

WTF Man?! Apparently, the police and other “officials” have been bought off by Orange and Zain, according to various sources and the fact that one policeman told us bluntly not to mess with these […]

After several weeks of incredibly bad movies coming out, Oscar potential movies are starting to emerge. I thought I’d do a few reviews of movies (available in Jordan now) that are definitely worth watching.
American Gangster | Ridley Scott does a great job of directing this movie based on a true story. Danzel Washington plays a […]

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water, there are more food poisoning cases. After fish, water and shawarmah (several times), humus is suspected by officials, to be the latest culprit.

Health Minister Salah Mawajdeh told The Jordan News Agency, Petra, that final results are expected to be out in […]

Admit something:
Everyone you see, you say to them,
“Love me.”
Of course you do not do this out loud;
Otherwise,
Someone would call the cops.
Still
Though,
Think about this,
This great pull in us to connect.
Why not become the one
Who lives with a full moon in each eye
That is always saying,
With
that
sweet
moon
language,
What every other eye in this world
Is dying
To hear.
- Hafiz

addthis_url […]

So according to the calender, it’s blog-about-your-favorite-blogger-day and I’m forced to break the rules because I don’t have just one. Every blogger in my links section is someone who has a blog that I read consistently (when that term applies to my life) and I do feel they represent the best of the best from […]

Last night the Amman Symphony Orchestra performed its first concert for the 2007-2008 season. Josep Vincent of Spain was the guest conductor with 22 year-old piano virtuoso, Lulu Yang of China on piano. The concert was pretty phenomenal as it was my first time seeing the Amman Symphony Orchestra play. My favorite pieces included the […]

The Black Iris humbly began on a winter’s night in late Feburary of 2005. Mahmoud Abbas had just won his first and last landslide victory in Palestine and The Beatles were all the craze down in Kerak. Fast forward 33 months later and as of a few days ago, The Black Iris has logged just […]

The Jordan Center for Social Research has conducted another poll, about 6 months after its first horrifying one. As before, I’ll run down the results as mentioned in a Jordan Times article, to spare you the excessive reading.
According to the poll:
- 64.8% of Jordanians see the Kingdom as generally being on the right […]

Yesterday, on my way to work, the middle-aged taxi driver initiated an explicit elections conversation with me. Making a passing comment about the suddenly increasing “vote for me” banners around town I was prompted to ask him whether he’d be voting for anyone:
“a3othoo billah!”
“leish?” (why?)
“Because all these guys are sons-of-a-bitches! They take our votes […]

Brought to you by JPA President, Tareq Momani, in a Jordan Times article:
…But Jordan Press Association President Tareq Momani disagreed with the results of RWB’s index. He said Jordan stands at a position of “relative freedom of press”, explaining that on a scale of one to one hundred, the Kingdom would be around the 50s.
Me? […]

Parliamentary elections are officially up and running now. The first two days of candidate registration saw 916 names and as Lina points out, 15.8% of which are women. That’s a pretty decent percentage in my case, considering that the majority of that number are from fairly conservative cities like Irbid and Kerak. Although it’s yet […]

What a skilled man can do with a hammer
The advanced pilgram can do with
Thought.
One builds their own seat in this world
Using God -
The only material
That is
E
v
e
r
y
w
h
e
r
e
.
- Hafiz

addthis_url = ‘http%3A%2F%2Fwww.black-iris.com%2F2007%2F10%2F23%2Fthe-only-material%2F’;
addthis_title = ‘The+Only+Material’;
addthis_pub = ”;

Economics aside, I enjoy a good holiday. Who doesn’t? During my college years in Toronto I had a great deal of holiday-envy. My friends studying in the States seemed to have a ton of holidays. Christmas was nearly a month, while ours was about 10 days. Thanksgiving went almost a week, while ours was only […]

Bab il-7ara was a big hit this year during Ramadan, and in fact people still seem to be talking about it in Jordan. I’ll admit right off the bat that I was too busy to watch more than 4 or 5 whole episodes but I found it astonishing to see the wide spectrum of people […]

I find it difficult clicking with, if not communicating with, people who have not lived outside Jordan for a period of time. People who have not had the experience of living in the Western hemisphere. Actually, any hemisphere will do. I don’t know why that is, but I feel anyone who missed out on such […]