Proud to be an Arab

I was watching the coverage of James Brown's funeral on the news and the thousands of mourners who came to pay their respects to the Godfather of Soul. It was very moving, one lady who was interviewed said that as she grew up in a time when it was difficult for her being black, obviously before the Civil rights movement. She added that for her James Brown helped her become proud of who she is and made her say that she's proud to be Black.

I'm wondering who would that person be for me as an Arab? A person so influential that he/she would reshape the world's perception of Arabs... a person that will make believe it when I say:
Proud to be an Arab

Archeology Sucks

So yesterday I was watching a Discovery Channel documentary about a new tomb discovered in the valley of the Kings in Egypt. The tomb was named KV63 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KV63) and hailed as THE most important discovery in the Valley of the Kings in over 80 years!

So here's the part I don't understand, all this exponential technological advances and mankind hasn't yet created a device that would shoot x-rays or any other kind of rays thru the ground to be able to spot HUGE EMPTY ROOMS that are hidden under a few meters of rock?This just blows my mind!

We do have an International Space Station in Orbit around the Earth!? And yet it takes us 80 years to find an extremely important tomb, in the valley of the Kings and oh by the way did I mention it it was found only 15 meters away from, arguably, the most famous tomb in the world: King Tut's Tomb?!

The FeshFactor

So, I've just spent my first Christmas in Poland! Woho! Well to my surprise it was Sunny on the 25th?! Actually it didn't and so far hadn't snowed! I was actually happy it didn't, I know a lot of snow is coming my way and I'm not in a hurry at all.

The funny thing is that I was talking with a few of my friends from work today and they told me that this is very strange. Actually one of them told me that as far as he can remember there was always snow on 24th/25th! So before you jump to blaming Global Warming, check this out. Meanwhile, 1,613.34 miles away (that's not a random number, I'm so bored that I measured that on Google Earth), Cairo is suffering from some surprisingly low temperatures, that is relative tot he average temperature in Cairo around that time!

Seeing that this is obviously a new phenomenon, I'm proposing calling it: The FeshFactor, you know like: The Big Bang or The General Theory of Relativity. The idea is very simple, it's been proven experimentally that I raise the temperature of the city I'm in by an average of 3-5 degrees Celsius. The explanation of how this phenomenon works is lengthy and at times technical, but I'll give you the summary:

My magnetic field, generated by my huge ego, interferes with the Earth's own magnetic field thus causing the slow down of the rotation of the Earth's hot molten core. This usually results in higher temperatures, if you don't believe me check movies like: Day After Tomorrow or The Core (for a lack of a better name).

P.S: I'm happy with my current shrink, so pls spare me the referrals to good shrinks who "helped a very good friend of yours".

Moving DRAFTS to Production.. (2of 3)

As promised, more incomplete drafts fresh out of the oven....This is draft 2 of 3 :

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Just yesterday I saw this article about the Hi-Res pics a spacecraft orbiting Mars has snapped (yes I'm boring and I read boring shit, we've established that) during it's multiple flyovers of the Red Planet.

The funky thing is that it took a picture of another spacecraft (it's the white disk in the middle of the picture) that NASA sent back in 1976.... think about it... a spacecraft that has sad there motionless for 30 years in the middle of the Martian Desert.

It's been sitting there,motionless, for basically all your life. Think about it, you were born, went to school, studied, went thru exams, vacations, university, work.. you even got married and got two kids. It was there sitting still in an alien world...isn't that freaky?

Itdependence

I was recently in a training intended for Expats to help them settle more into the Polish culture and although it wasn't really part of the training when the instructor asked if anyone has any questions, I asked the following:

Based on my little experience with the Polish Culture I can confidently say that if I go out now and ask 10 random ppl, 10 different questions, 8 of them will start their reply with "it depends". Do you agree?

There was an awkward 5 seconds of silence, only then that I realized that my question -although VERY valid and positioned as more of a funny comment- might be taken as offensive! I was finally relieved when the instructor -she's Polish- started her answer by an agreeing laugh! Only then did I realize that not only was not misunderstood but also I was onto SOMETHING!

Here's why I find this behavior, which I call Itdependence (pronounce it like Independence, then replace the 'n' with 't'), very strange for me. In Egypt if you ask ANYONE about ANYTHING they'd have an opinion. Although this is not necessarily a good thing because sometimes ppl just have an opinion based on little or no data at all, But what I like about non-Itdependence is that it usually results in shorter conversations and I like that.

Let me give you a hypothetical example. You ask someone if renting cars here is expensive, if the person suffers from Itdependence, you're probably going to get a lecture on how smaller cars are less expensive than bigger ones.... oh and local car rental companies will be less expensive...and if you .....bla bla bla.

Ask the same question to someone who doesn't suffer from Itdependence and you're gonna get a straight answer: Yeah, but try this company or that .. they usually have good deals. Problem solved!

Moving DRAFTS to Production.. (1of 3)

Occasionally I come across stuff that are just pure Gold. I know there's a lot of potential to pick on them in yet another angry post on my blog, but I don't know how. Someone of them make it (I am guessing 1 out every 4 of my 'new' posts have been sitting my draft for sometime) while others don't.

So, since it's a long vacation and I have nothing better to do, I decided to do some serious housekeeping on Blog and I decided to move the 3 drafts that are sitting them out and unleash them upon the world without any further work from my side.

So here's the first of 3:

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I read CNET's news regularly to nurture the geek inside of me, so back in August I come across an article that is titled: Intel readies 'Tulsa' Xeon debut CNET News.com (it's still there, it's a boring read, you can check it if you want). So the article talks about this new processor that has some HUGE cache memory on it. Here's the part that amused me:

.......The major use for all that new circuitry is a large amount of cache memory that stores data for faster access than main memory can provide. Tulsa has 16MB of level-three cache, more than any other chip except the top-end "Montecito" Itanium with 24MB.

"A large cache hides a multitude of sins," Gilbert said.......

Okay, maybe it's just me BUT having high paid technology Guru compare MORE onboard processor cache to a "multitude of sins" just tickles my phunny bone.

FIFOing My Fridge

Today is a sad day. All these years I've tried to run from who I actually am. I tried to hide. But this is no longer possible. Today I found myself FIFOing my fridge subconsciously! Yes I am a nerd ... it's official now.


Okay for you non-nerds out there, before you jump to conclusions on what a sick and twisted bastard I'm because I was "FIFOing" my fridge, let me explain to you what's FIFO and what's my history with it. Okay so FIFO is First In First Out.. I've come across this in many places in life in study you use it in algorithms in Computer Science, in Accounting you use it to estimate the value of your goods ...etc.

So basically, I discovered that without thinking of it, I am ordering the stuff in my fridge in a FIFO manner ...i.e. if I have 2 Oranges from yesterday I move them to a lower shelf and put the fresh ones from today on the top shelf. This way stuff goes in to the top shelf and goes out from the bottom shelf. See, this is not a bad approach if I have a humongous fridge, or if I stock food .. the funny thing (or sad) is that I have a small fridge and usually I have like 5 Oranges there, that will be consumed over the course of 2 days. What I'm trying to say is, I was just doing this for the sake of doing it .. not because it was helping or something :S and that's why I think it's sad.

Any who reminded me of this very interesting Finance guy I used to work with back in Cairo. He used to say: Consistency over Accuracy... and that's basically what I was doing.

Don FeshFeshzioni

So I'm a big fan of The Godfather (all hail Mario Puzo), so all the killing, extortion, gambling, drugs and prostitution aside (Wow that's a lot to put on one side) you have to admit, it's be kool to be the Don right? Okay imagine you're playing "Scenes From A Hat" from Whose Line is it Anyway .. and your scene is: Dorky Corporate Slave Who Treats his coworkers as if he's a Mafia Godfather.

Now GO!

Well, I guess the first thing I'd imagien myself doing is that if I feel anyone in the office didn't "show respect" to me, I'll get 5 of my men to beat the crap out of him and then I'll go to him, while he'll lying on the floor barely alive, pat his cheek and say: "It's purely business, it's not personal"... while he nods and struggles to say: "I understand".

First Trans-Siberia, THEN THE WOOORLD!

Is it really time?! Ever since I was young I dreamt of my ULTIMATE trip, thee trip if you will. This trip is characterized by 2 things:
1. I have to take the Trans-Siberian train, which starts in Moscow and ends in Beijing .. a week later I believe.
2. I have to go AROUND THE WORLD! It's just the feeling, that I want to leave one place, head East and ONLY East, till I come back to the same place.

Now seeing I'm in Warsaw, I am seriously considering this option for Summer of 2007. How best to Celebrate 07.07.07 (my birthday btw) than by crossing the international Date Line over the pacific?!

So here's what I'm thinking:
1. Leave Warsaw to Moscow, Board the train, head all the way to Beijing.
2. Hop on a flight from Beijing to San Francisco.
3. Pick-up a car, drive till Chicago.
4. Fly to Warsaw.

In 2 weeks if I may add :S

Doable?

The 5-point rough guide

I don’t like having dinners here in the US, I believe there's a personality clash between me and your typical USofA waiter. If you are a waiter, pls go thru this 5-point rough guide to serving me:

1. I can barely remember the names of my friends, so pls dont waste my precious brain space with your name.
2. If I don't like my food I'll bitch about it, If I'm not bitching then I am enjoying.
3. Don’t interrupting me while I'm enjoying my meal, to ask "Is everything alright".
4. IF you absolutely have to interrupt then understand that the number of interruptions is inversely proportional to the % of tip I'm gonna leave you.
5. When I say "Thank you", I expect "you’re welcome" and not "you’re verry welcome". I just gave you my empty plate, let's be honest here.