Goodbye London

Now its 21:21 pm in Oxford Street in London, and tomorrow I will conclude my short visit to United Kingdom.
Here, from my hotel room window I could see Marble Arch Monument in Hyde Park at the western end of Oxford Street. This monument refers to the area of west London where the arch was situated. Historically, only the Royal Family and the king's troop were allowed to cross here, but now its open to people. Actually, the arch was moved here in 1851 from its original location in Buckingham palace.
The most important event this night is Valentine day, this street is crowded as it never been since I arrived here, thousands of couples spending their love day right here.
I stayed here for 9 days and I could tell that I did not feel strange in this city. London is very beautiful city and there are many many things to do but you need much time to discover it like.
London Eye, Parliament Square, Pig-pen, Buckingham Palace, Thames River, Regent Park, Tower of London and more are only some of the city landmarks.I would like to come again to have a chance to see more in this city and other cites in England

London

My current visit to United kingdom is not tourist one, the schedule is full of work and appointments which means I cant discover much landmarks here. Today I supposed to spend my short free time to tour the city of London but the heavy rain kept me all day inside apart from walking around and having lunch at Arabic restaurant.
By the way, there are many areas and streets in this beautiful city have Arabic culture, store names, workers, walkers and languages you hear while walking there. Not only this, but the hotel where I am staying is almost occupied by Arabs especially from Gulf States, you feel you are in Kuwait or Dubai or Doha. Many Arabs always say that London is their second home.
I think London is not for Britons today, its city for foreigners and most local people prefer to live in outside city or in countryside, this is my impression and it would be wrong.The best is yet to come about my visit to United Kingdom

United Kingdom

Yesterday I arrived in London for 9 days visit, it is my first staying here in this beautiful city, and I did not experience much so far but will tell about this great opportunity soon

30 Nov. 08

It has been long time since last post in my blog, since last April many things changed; I got married in June, I went to turkey for almost 2 weeks,
Today, I am gonna talk about marriage life after more than 5 months, life is different but far better than before, you look to everything in eye of love, your days of life is full of enjoyment and fun but life becomes with more responsibilities in short time, life full of deadlines, lines and red circles.
Today is the second day of "Tho El Heja" the last month in Lunar year, or Hejri and I am fasting from yesterday to next 8 days, these ten days are very great and valued, they are Hajj or pilgrimage days in Islam and they are advised to be fasting for Muslims not including those who are in Hajj.

Europe

it s being long time since my last post, sometimes I wanted to write and then told myself no, make it next time and next time and so on
Life is getting more and more complicated but thanks to Allah always for being in good health

Last week I been in Europe, went to Belgium, France through Frankfurt
Everything is different there and the worst thing will be if we would make comparison between what we have in Arab world and what they have in Europe where nothing left for Coincidence
Therefore, it is better to listening to the silence until things change in better way

pictures from Brussels & Paris

next Eiffel Tower

Paris Arch of Victory

In train from Brussels to Paris

Grand Palace in Brussels

Bad New Year

Today is the first day in 2008; all hopes should be optimistic and looking for a year full of joy and happiness but they do not look like so.
Here, in Jordan, where I spent the holidays, no optimistic sings , wherever you go, you listen only to taking about goods prices, the prices of everything are doubling three times or more in less than one year
People here are disappointed from the government and the whole situation because the prices and they keep complying, and I think they are right since the salaries of employees are still very low and don’t meet the minimum of living coast

New Year comes but everything is optimism and negativity as it never before.

What Eid is!

Yesterday was Eid El-Fitr, the feast where Muslims celebrate when the holy fasting month of Ramadan ends; actually, I did not feel it as a feast since I live away from my family, living the joy and happiness is much different when you are among family.
Here, away I mean, you miss the Eid meanings, I hope that I will be home in next one.

pictures from mongolia

people in west mongolia are famous in eagle hunting




around 50% of mongolians are children

mongolians still wash clothes at rivers



Yak( kind of cows) exists only in Mongolia and Tibet

Mongolia… what you could tell?

Two days ago, I came back from my long work visit to Mongolia, what could I tell about this unknown country?
The earth: mountains, steppe and desert still as Allah created them millions years ago, still untouched, the people in countryside still live their grandfathers' lives without any changes; There were no toilets and showers in most places out side cities, some people do not know even what shower means, they never tried it and they drop their bowels in nature. We had to do the same during our staying in these places.
Most people depend in their live on animals: riding, eating meat, milking and shearing camels, horses, sheep and goats, they even play with these animals' bones.
The most popular game in Mongolia is anklebones, all people play it and the child who still four or five years old could differentiate between the anklebones of these animals. Old people and children play this traditional game all over the country.
These four animals besides camel are the main animals in the country, in Mongolia there are more than 32 million head of domestic animals. So that the country is suffering now from over grazing as these animals eat everything. This problem is now under discussion from many NGOs.
Going from city to another one in Mongolia may take you two days of driving, there are no paved roads outside cities, driving from Ulaanbaatar to Murun which is around 700 km away took two days on off roads. Going from Ulaanbaatar to Bayan- Olgii in the west takes 3 days of driving through steppe, mountains and forests. Therefore, there are domestic flights between the capital and main cities but not all Mongolians could afford the tickets cost.
The country is 1.56 millions square km which is about half of Europe but with 2.5 million people you may drive hundreds of km without seeing any inhabitant but animals.



There are so many places in Mongolia deserve to talk about and to visit, one of them is Khovsgol Lake in the north west of country. The lake is 380 cubic km of water make it the fourteenth largest lake in the world and second largest in Central Asia by volume, with over 1% of the world's fresh water. At its deepest, the lake dives 262 meters. Ninety-six rivers empty into lake, but only the Egiin River exits the lake. The Egiin flows southeast until it joins the Selenge River, which flows through one of Mongolia's most densely populated areas on its way to Lake Baikal. The lake is 1645 meters above sea level and is generally frozen from January until April or May.
The Tsaatan are a small culture of reindeer herders living in northern Khovsgol. Only 44 Tsaatan families remain, totaling somewhere between 200 and 400 people. They ride, breed, milk, and live off reindeer, though the reindeer population has dropped to approximately 600 since the 1970s, when it was an estimated 2000.
The second place is Gobi desert in the south of country. The Mongolian Gobi, a vast zone of desert and semi-desert occupying almost 30% of country's vast territory, is a well-renowned place. The Gobi is often imagined to be place of unbearable heat and lifeless sand dunes, similar to the inhospitable and uninhabitable Sahara desert whereas, the reality is quite the reverse. The Great Mongolian Gobi (the western part is located inside China, now) has high mountains, springs, forests, sands, steppe lands and rich animal kingdom, and has been inhabited since ancient times.
The third place is Altai Mountains in the extreme western part of country, where the Muslim minority lives; the mountain is 4374 above sea level. It’s the highest point in Mongolia.


Despite that Mongolia has more than 30 million head of animals, its hardly to find a good food in country, they cook meat with fat so we could not eat it unless we drown it with pepper and salt, sometimes we did not eat during two or three days but noodles with hot water. Nevertheless, we always managed it for example; we were buying sheep and cooking them in our way.
Any way this was a great adventure in Mongolia despite it was too difficult and hard.

Again from Mongolia

Today I arrived again to Mongolia for work, after one month I came again to this virgin country, where every thing is harmony between man and nature, I become familiar with the country as well as the people here. In this time, I suppose to visit many places in Mongolia, to experience the nomadic way of life here, and to meet with people who still live as their grandfathers lived thousands of yours ago.
I hope I can tell more details about this untouched country soon once I come back from the countryside where are no inhabitants but nature

Pictures in Beijing & Great Wall in China

Discovering Mongolia!!!

After three days of flying, one of my colleagues and I arrived to Ulaanbaatar, capital of Mongolia.
The country is very poor but its people is very rich in culture and history, as last year was the 800th anniversary of the foundation of the great Mongolian Empire when Chinggis khan united the Mongolian tribes and then he invaded most of the world in 13th century.

Nowadays, you can find chinggis khan pictures everywhere; in airport, streets, buildings, countryside and every souvenir as he becomes the country symbol although the Mongolians were forbidden to mention his name during the socialism period, which lasted until 1990 when the Soviet Union collapsed.
Chinggis khan, nowadays in Mongolian people eyes, is a hero and peace man even he killed millions of people over the world, and his grandsons also killed millions and as its known one of them, Holako, burned Baghdad and killed everyone in the Islamic capital before he dropped the books and every thing in Tigris river in 1258.
Lets back to Mongolia today, after being one week there I can tell that most images we have about its people were wrong, the country is very nice, the people are peaceful and helpful, they are well educated and they have so many universities public and private. Most Mongolians are Buddhist but there is around 7% of 2.5 millions in the country Moslem, their grand fathers came to Mongolia from Kazakhstan 150 years ago, and they live now in the west of country.
The Islamic religion was prohibited during the Socialism as well as all religions but now Moslems have 37 mosques in the country, all of them built after 1990.
Mongolia's nature is very beautiful and there is some people call it the earth heaven. As it is located between Siberia and central Asia, it has three types of nature: in the north, there are the lakes, Ice Mountains, in the middle there are the plains, and in the south, there is Gobi desert.
The nomadic life is very nice in Mongolia; they still live in nature, their houses called Gels….
What I can say that when you go to Mongolia you will find another Mongolia, Mongolia that is different totally, of what you can imagine and I am sure that one week is not enough to discover a country of three times more than France is.
More is coming about this virgin country, the land where the number of horses is more than the people are.

Day in South Korea

I spent all this day in South Korea in my way to Mongolia, I supposed to stop here for around one hour for connection flight to Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia but there was a delay in the previous flight from Beijing to here so I missed the flight.
The next flight to will be after 24 hours but I stay for more than 30 hours as the next flight will be delayed and here I am writing this post from airport hall,
Anyways the delay is over all trip as it began in Doha, May 15, and I hope nothing like this going to happen in my home flights.
I spent the whole day watching and exploring things here but I did not buy anything, as everything is so expensive.
It seems that the people here are kind and helpful but not all of them as well

This is the late king Hussein mosque, located in the highest point in Amman, Jordan. Established in 2006.
This picture has been taken in last June, but it just sent to me by Elizabeth Williams from New York after traveling to Syria before going to N.Y.

Ramadan

Yesterday was the first day in the holy month of Ramadan where I live but today is the first day of the month in my home country. This is not the first time that the beginning of Ramadan differs from Islamic country to another. Although we have the same moon, same month beginning and we are all Moslems but we never started fasting at the same day, and every year there are debate in the Islamic world about this issue and we should have the same beginning of the holy month, but nothing happened.

Any way, this is the second Ramadan away from my family, and sometimes you do not feel the spirit of the month when you live alone. The best days of fasting are those when you are among the family because being alone is just like, as you only do not eat all the day and nothing beyond, but there are some friends try to give you some of what you miss.
In the last Ramadan, I visited the family in the last six days of the month but it seems that I will not be able to do the same this year although I would love to.
same this year although I would love to.

July 2006

july 2006




In this month the sixth war between Israel and the Arab countries has started and this time was against Lebanon. Israel launched hundreds of thousands of attacks from sky, sea and land against this small country. According to the UNICEF more than 30% of the casualties and half of one million people fled their houses are children.
In the second week of the war I had within a team a chance to work with children who are suffering from this war, we participated in broadcasting a TV program reflect their feeling about war especially that most of these children never see or live a peace day in this part of the World as the continuous wars began since more than sixty years in Middle East.



Do you think what children say in the show, children between 8 and 15 years? Most of them said they are afraid of the world, afraid of their future and they will never forget the death sights they watched them in their eyes, some of them saw their families killed in front of them as the great countries in United Nation Security Council do not care about stopping the war and some of them justified the massacres against children.
By this day we have 28 days of the sixth war, and hope it will be the last day.

May 29, 2006

In the last post I promised to write something about my desert trip, the fact is I didn’t write directly after arriving but one of my best friends, Elizabeth Williams, encouraged me to write and here some of what I have seen;

Four days ago, I had a new experience, I traveled by car from Qatar , where I work, to my home Jordan through Saudi Arabia, the road was 2,000 km of desert.
I loved this adventure because it means something to me; it was the first time to cross all this way and being alone in the desert gives something inside yourself.

I started the way from Doha at 1 pm driving one hour to the Saudi border and after crossing the check point the real trip started, in the Saudi desert you do not see any thing except sand, camels crossing the Hiway and trucks do not know stopping.
The road inside Saudi Arabia took more than 20 hours of driving including many stops for gas, taking a nap and praying.
Every 300 hundred km you find a city, most people in these cities are not Saudis, they are from Asian poor countries like Pakistan, India and Philippines. They are working in oil industry.
The paradox is that along this way you do not meet a local person except the border people and the police check points on the hiway every 100 km after the terrorist threat in the kingdom, they stop every one cross the road asking for IDs.

Whenever you meet a person working in Gas stations or using the road you meet a new culture different from you and you learn a new thing from its people.

The best moment in this way was when you are driving alone 160 km per hour at midnight and you decided to stop the car and look around in the desert; nothing but stars in heaven…. This moment you can call it" listening to the silence"


I can say now I am proud of everything in this way except one thing; I broke the speed limits which is 120 km per hour.
I hope this gives all of you specially Elizabeth something about the way.

May 24th 2006

Tomorrow, inshala, I will have a new experience, crossing the desert of three countries in my car more than 1800 km, I love this adventure to explore the life. Being alone in an infinity desert line gives you the chance to think in life and what you have done,
When I come back from this trip I will write something