isaacc7

New blog

Mon, 16 Apr 2007 19:39:03 GMT

OK, the new blog is up at my new site. Well, at least the location is new, with the exception of the new blog and some videos(!) it's pretty much the same for right now. It's at:

www.isaharr.com

Click here to go there directly. It's been fun on livejournal, but I like my digs:-) I'll still be checking back in on you guys over here, ttyl!

Isaac

Almost up...

Sun, 08 Apr 2007 15:00:43 GMT

The new site www.isaharr.com is almost up, should be up by later tonight. Some of you might have some problems for a couple of days until the DNS propagates through the systems. I'll be blogging there from now on, barring any sort of problem:-) Make sure you update your bookmarks as the old site will be coming down soon.

Isaac

OK, I lied...

Sat, 07 Apr 2007 18:59:14 GMT

I think I've been caught in the Easter holiday morass. My new domain still hasn't been activated. I was hoping to finish this this holiday. Oh well, I'll let you know when everything is set up.

Isaac

Blogging on hold..

Fri, 06 Apr 2007 20:13:34 GMT

But just for a few days. I'm trying to set up my new site, just waiting for my domain to be activated. I will be hosting my blog on my site, so I'll stop using Livejournal. Don't worry, I'll still check in on you guys that use it:-) Anyway, everything should go live within the next couple of days... I hope. I'll let everyone know when I'm up and running.

Isaac

I love technology...

Thu, 05 Apr 2007 17:38:22 GMT

I'm sitting here in Yemen watching a play by play of a baseball game (go Cubs!) over the internet... It's like a constantly updated scoreboard. They show where the runners are, updated stats, pitch location, etc. It's quite nice, and the only way I'll be able to experience baseball over here. Thank God the Cubs play a lot of day games...

Isaac

Women, veils, bluetooth and Yemen

Wed, 04 Apr 2007 18:56:48 GMT

I've been meaning to write a bit about how women dress here for a while. A common thought in the west is that men force women to wear what they wear here. I'm sure that there's a lot of that going on, but I get the distinct feeling that most women here prefer wearing the balto/hijab/veil. Forcing them to not wear them would be like making a woman in the west take off her pants. Walking around in your underwear isn't exactly scandalous, but it sure would be embarrassing to go to the supermarket like that. Wearing the whole getup is considered modest here, going without one of the items of clothing would be horrifying to most women here.

Having said that, if a (local) woman doesn't want to wear some of those things, she's in for a very hard time. Her family (male and female) will give her a very hard time and the men on the street will def. give her a hard time. Many women simply can't choose what to wear because of their husband and/or family. As you might imagine, this upsets me considerably...

Then there is today's Yemen Times. I'll put the first couple of paragraphs up here...

"Fatima, 30, of Sana’a, who asked that her whole name not be revealed, was married and has three kids. Until recently, she was living happily with her family. Then, she was invited to a wedding party in her area. She prepared by putting on makeup and dressing up in a fancy dress to attend the party.

At the wedding party, she spent a lovely time with the other women there. A short time later, her husband was at work, when a friend said to him, “if you want to see hot pictures, turn on your Bluetooth.” Bluetooth technology allows users to send information wirelessly from one device to another, say from phone to phone or computer to computer. Fatima’s husband was excited when he received the pictures, but when he saw them, he was surprised and angered in the same time, because he saw his wife in these pictures.

He immediately went back to his home and asked his wife how her photographs got out. She did not know that some girls took pictures of her at the wedding party, and then sent them by Bluetooth to every mobile nearby. The husband did not believe her, however, and so he divorced her and the lovely family collapsed. Fatima is just one of the victim’s of the downside of new technology. While Bluetooth can be an excellent tool for working and communicating, it can also create serious problems when used irresponsibly."

See the rest of the article here.

OK, there are so many problems with this I don't even know where to begin. How about the husband's hypocrisy? What if someone had spied on her while she was dressing/undressing? If the pictures he saw were of her in some sort of state of undress, he probably would have killed her. No exaggeration, I would expect it, and I'm sure that most locals would too.

At some point, someone has to say that it isn't a crime to want to see a woman's face, that it isn't unnatural to want to see her hair. In addition, it isn't any sort of moral failing, and it does not reflect badly on a woman if she wants to show her face. There are rumblings along those lines here, but that's in the big city. In the villages, especially further north towards Saudi, this type of talk is not tolerated.

Just when I am about to give this culture the benefit of the doubt, something stupid like this comes up. I don't bother discussing it with the locals, it would only piss me off. Today is one of those days that I wonder why this society isn't even worse off than it is. It is shocking to see how low an opinion the men have of women here, it's also shocking that they lay all of the supposed faults with sex drive at the woman's feet. I have read two introductions to Islam for westerners and both have explained the balto/hijab/veil in terms of rape avoidance. According to Islamic thought (and I don't think that this is supported by the Koran but an interpretation from bedouin circles) women are raped because of their beauty. There it is, it is their fault. Make no mistake, if a guy is caught raping a woman, he is going to die. But frequently, the woman is killed to "preserve their honor." So called honor crimes are on the decline, but they are still prevalent.

Abdul Summit told me that Yemen is like America in the 70's. Maybe the 1870's, but then again, I don't think we were ever as backwards as they are with women right now...

Well, it happened..

Wed, 04 Apr 2007 11:20:06 GMT

It was just a matter of time really. I went to one of the hotels that is close by for lunch. I sat down and waited for 5 minutes or so. Some guys at another table were eating and greeted me as I came in. Eventually, one of them asked me if I wanted to eat lunch. When I told him yes, I did (was I sitting at one of his tables for the hell of it?) he told me to wait until they were finished with their lunch.

Needless to say I didn't wait around. It was one O'Clock, in the middle of lunchtime. On my way out I told them that there was probably another place that actually wanted my money, so I would go there. I understand that there are some (rather large) cultural differences, but really, come on.... Serving a customer when they come in doesn't seem like a huge stretch if you're going to be in the business of serving people. SIGH...

Isaac

Thoughts about moving....

Mon, 02 Apr 2007 17:16:36 GMT

The current guys that have moved in are really unhappy with the accommodations. They are going to move to a hotel near Tahreer at the end of this month. For about the same money, they could have a place with two beds and their own bathroom. I've also heard about apartments that are up to half of what I pay now in the old city, although they are unfurnished. I'll have to do some number crunching and see if it's a financial necessity for me to move. There is a lot of appeal to having a nicer place, but I'm afraid that I'd be really isolated. I've met some really cool people living where I live. Luca, Nollaig, Christoph, and Michael have all made my trip much more enjoyable. Of course I've had some housemates that sucked too, but they never seem to stick around that long thank goodness. I think I'll stay in my current place and see who moves in and how long they're staying. That'll help me make up my mind...

Isaac

New web site hosting?

Mon, 02 Apr 2007 17:12:06 GMT

My .mac account is about to expire. When it was free it was OK, but I don't think I'm going to spend the dough on it. The mail service is slow and buggy and it's really expensive. I'll probably switch over to Yahoo mail and find a new service for hosting my site. Does anyone have any suggestions for a good company for that?

Isaac

Odd day...

Mon, 02 Apr 2007 16:27:31 GMT

Went to the supermarket and while I was there I heard Barber's "Adagio for Strings" over the music system... Not exactly great shopping music. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the piece, think of the climatic death scene at the end of "Platoon:. Beautiful music, but not what I expect in a supermarket. On the way home, I swear I saw Rosana Dan Danna from SNL. In Yemen of all places...

Yemen does have some wonderful grapes. I saw a bunch and I had to have them, they're beautiful and they are perhaps the best tasting grapes I've ever had. I'll post pictures later on, they really are that amazing...

Isaac

Arabic continues to blow my mind..

Sun, 01 Apr 2007 14:25:23 GMT

So as I learn new words, I try to keep the part of speech in mind. Is it noun, and adjective, adverb, etc. My teachers have been very good at explaining these sorts of things to me, but Abdul Summit (my new teacher) just blew my mind. I noticed that he had a noun where I thought an adjective should be in a sentence. He said, "Oh, but nouns can modify nouns, so can prepositions..." That blew my mind, but sadly, it also made some things make sense as well. Sentence structure is both very loose and very precise at the same time. I'm floundering along and absorbing things bit by bit....

Isaac

Rain! And new teacher

Sat, 31 Mar 2007 14:16:05 GMT

It has actually been rainy here this last week. Cloudy days and rain for a short time 3 or 4 of those days. It's a nice change. We haven't had any real heavy rains yet, but it's enough to disrupt my laundry...

Had my first class with my new teacher. It went well, if this is any indication I should do well with the new guy. I'm going to have a mini "Easter Break", it'll be good to take some time off. Maybe I should go somewhere....

Isaac

Pictures are up!

Fri, 30 Mar 2007 10:56:26 GMT

OK, finally got the rest of them up, there's even some wooden boats for you boat people!

Isaac

Correction...

Thu, 29 Mar 2007 13:05:47 GMT

There's another problem with the network so all of the pictures are NOT uploaded, again. I'm giving up for today, I'll try again tomorrow.

Isaac

Pictures!

Thu, 29 Mar 2007 12:47:07 GMT

OK, the rest of my pictures should be up shortly. I've noticed the fact that all of the pictures I have taken have been snapshots as opposed to "serious" shots. Part of that is due to equipment limitations. The little digicam I have Simply cannot cope with the really wide dynamic range that I routinely see. That together with high noise at high ISOs makes some shots impossible. The bigger reason is that it just isn't a priority for me. I'm actually having fun recording where I've been instead of trying to "accomplish" something. Part of me is really glad I left the huge photo system back home...

Isaac

Not a good day for appreciating Yemen..

Thu, 29 Mar 2007 10:37:49 GMT

Woke up yesterday morning and we had no water. As I left, they were filling a reserve tank. I came back several hours later and there was water! Brown water, but water... What the hell good is it to have water that you can't use? later that night, the internet across the entire city went down....grrr. The water today is only slightly brown. It never smelled, I assume that it was due to oxidation in the tank outside, but still, ewww!

Isaac

Got back today...

Tue, 27 Mar 2007 14:34:56 GMT

It was an interesting trip, but things worked out rather oddly. The plan was to drive to Zabeed, look around, spend the night and then go to Houdada early next morning to see the fish souk.

Michael was really interested in the fish souk, but we needed a closer base sine Houdada is about 5 hours away and you need to be there early to see all the action. I got almost no sleep the night before we left so I was a wee bit groggy on the way out. So we piled into a Land cruiser and headed out. About an hour into the trip we were informed that the road connecting Sana'a to Houdada (which we needed to use to get to Zabeed)was closed due to a landslide. The driver found an alternate route, but it added 2 and a half hours to the time... So the main focus was to get to Zabeed before it got dark. Houdada and Zabeed are on a coastal plain (on the Red Sea) to the west of the capital. As you come out of the mountains and down onto the plain, the tempature shoots up and it gets really humid. The scenery reminds me of pictures that I have seen of Kenya, short, sunburned grass and trees dotting the plain. The locals use grass huts just like they do in Africa. Unfortunetly, because of our time crunch and a minor dust storm, we didn't stop to take pictures. I did manage to take some at a gas station, but I don't think that they'll turn out so good.

We did manage to get to Zabeed before the sun set and had just enough time to hurry around and snap some pictures. It's a lovely village. It used to be a transit point for the coffee trade between Houdada and mocha (yes, that is one of the reasons coffee is called mocha) so it used to be pretty wealthy. The houses are big, but they only have one or two rooms (excluding the bathroom) as opposed to the usual big house=lots of rooms. The houses tend to be highly decorated as well, both inside and out.

There are several very old mosques there, one dates back to the time of Mohammed. Like most mosques in Yemen, it was rather plain, unlike any others in Yemen, I could go into this one! That was nice. Interestingly, both inside this mosque and on many houses, there were many "stars of David." Our guide was guessing they were for honoring the prophet David. All of the Jewish big figures and prophets are also prophets in Islam. There is another mosque that is known for revering important muslim women, and there is also a mosque that is being restored by UNESCO. It is known as the most ornate and elaborate of the mosques in Yemen. Unfortunately, we ran out of time and couldn't see it, but I will next time!

The highlight of the trip was stumbling across a "woman's handcraft" center. They did lots of needlework, sewing, and basket weaving (not very good baskets though). For me, the best was the weaving. They have 8 or so looms in the back and they make various things. I bought three items. I wouldn't call them masters of the craft, but it is really nice finding things that are actually made here as souvenirs (more about the economics of why there isn't much here later). Everything is part time for the women, they all have the regular duties to perform (kids, cooking, carrying water, etc.) so each item take a couple of weeks to make. I'll see if I can post some pictures of my things... I did take some pictures in the weaving room, and I was even given permission to take a picture of a woman at a loom!

We went back to the hotel and I was a little surprised. It had 5 rooms, but there were 18-20 "beds" out in the open with just a woven roof over them. Michael explained that most people sleep outside since it is cooler. It had been around 90 degrees but close to 100% humidity, so we were all sweating quite a bit. A cooler bed sounded good to me, but after some thought, I decided on the hotter room. Looking around, I realized that if I slept outside I would be with 5 or 6 guys including the guy who runs the place. That always means extra noise... I had noticed more than a few feral cats roaming around and I thought that it was a pretty safe bet that they spent part of the day in those beds, along with their fleas. Plus, I was getting really tired and the owner was watching TV... So I figured I would try the room. It was indeed hot and I was sleeping with all of my clothes on. The window was allowing my only air input (and the fan was going like mad) but it also allowed anyone to look in. With that sort of heat, I don't really care who sees me in my underwear, but in a conservative muslim country you don't want to offend anyone... I did at least take my shirt off for most of the night. I figure that I got about 3 hours of sleep, but that's better than the guys outside! Michael told me that it was difficult getting comfortable out there, but just as he was about to fall asleep, the owner turned the TV back on, at 3AM! He thinks he got about an hour of sleep...

Well the next morning we left before the sun came up in order to get to the fish while it was still hopping. I had ben dreaming of drinking cool water all night and I was parched when we started out. It turns out I had to wait about an hour because nothing was open! This is despite the fact that the morning prayers had already taken place and most people try to get out into the fields before the sun comes up while it's cool. Not a damn thing was open. I was afraid that i might suffer heatstroke if I had to stand in the heat like the day before without any water! Luckily we found a place right outside of the fish souk.

The fish souk was the entire reason for the trip and none of us had gotten any appreciable amount of sleep so we were all really grumpy. It turns out that because of high winds, most boats couldn't go out or could only go out for a limited time, so there were very few fish. We all agreed to pack it in and go back home. Houdada is a port city and there really isn't much to see there...

So I've had about 5 hours of sleep over the past two days and I'm a little weird right now. I do plan on going back to Zabeed to see the things I missed this last time. I also plan on taking more pictures on the way out. With any luck, the women will keep weaving and I'll have something else to buy too! I'll try to post the few pictures I did take over the next few days, think I'll get some sleep tonight...

Isaac

I might be travelling tomorrow

Sun, 25 Mar 2007 13:54:36 GMT

Michael (my remaining housemate) out of the blue asked me if I wanted to go to Houdada tomorrow. It's a smallish fishing village on the Red Sea. Sounds good to me, we might also go to another village nearby and make it a two day trip. We'll have to see if he can arrange a car and driver on such short notice, but I'm optimistic, he's been here many times before and knows a lot of people in these sorts of jobs. With any luck I'll be swimming in the Red Sea this time tomorrow!

Isaac

Chinese food...

Sat, 24 Mar 2007 16:18:14 GMT

Mmmmm, Michael took me over to a Chinese place today. Next to Mexican food, this is what I have been craving the most. I ordered spring rolls, chicken fried rice, chicken with cashews and some white rice. I expected to take home the extra but I ate all of it instead. I even ate a fair amount of his food! Man was it good, a really nice change from my usual stuff. What else is going on... not much really. I better hit the books, class today was a disaster...

Isaac

Volitile much?

Fri, 23 Mar 2007 15:33:57 GMT

My retirement account's value has swung more than 6 percentage points in the last two weeks. I'm on the positive side now (by almost 4%) but wow. One of my housemates swore that he was going into all bonds because of the volatility... I'm sticking to this for the long term, I view this latest up and down as akin to a roller coaster ride...

Isaac

A children's story

Thu, 22 Mar 2007 13:25:23 GMT

I read a children's story in class the other day, and I'm thinking that I understand the screwed up world view many here have. It's a lovely story of a guy that wants a nice big house made of wood. He decides that he'll go into the forrest and cut down some trees. He finds the blade to his axe, but he doesn't have a handle. He goes to the forrest and talks to the trees. Now this is an important part of the story, the trees are sentient. The man explains that he needs a small piece of wood in order to make a handle for his axe. The trees agree to give him the wood as long as he goes away and doesn't come back. He makes his axe handle and heads right back to the forrest. The trees are surprised and they ask him why he came back, he had agreed to go somewhere else. He explains that he really wants the house and where else was he going to get the wood? He proceeds to cut down all of the trees and the trees express regret that they helped him at all. The man builds his house and enjoys it...

What the hell kind of story is that to tell to kids? It's OK to lie and to kill in order to get what you want as long as you have the weapon... Actually, this explains a lot, I wonder how many other stories are like this? I understand that many fairy tales have horrific and gruesome story lines, but there is a difference. In the fairy tales, the monster is always seen as evil and as such we expect them to be bad and to do bad things. In many stories, there is some sort of downside to being evil. This particular story involves a "normal" guy and there are no negative consequences to breaking his word or even of murder. Pretty scary...

Isaac

Yemen censor

Thu, 22 Mar 2007 13:14:56 GMT

Turns out that if any books are sent to Yemen through the regular mail, the official censor must look at it to see if it will be allowed in the country. From what I can tell, there is only one censor for English, so it could take quite a while until it gets through. Interestingly enough, if the books come via FedEx or DHL, they bypass this step. I wonder who they had to pay to get this kind of treatment? Anyway, quite a difference from the US...

Isaac

Internet blues

Mon, 19 Mar 2007 18:11:36 GMT

Well, the internet at the school is not working as well as I had hoped. Right now I'm the only person on it and it's working pretty well. I'm currently making some headway with my Battlestar Galactica episode. The problem is that if I (or anyone else) tries to download a file, the whole thing slows to a crawl. I estimate that this connection is equivalent to a fifth or 6th of the cable modem at home, but this costs the equivalent of $200 a month! Yikes, glad I'm not the one paying for that! I might try to get over to Luchiano's house again. It's nice to hang out, plus I won't slow anyone down with my downloads....

Isaac

My top 25 on iTunes and other music thoughts

Mon, 19 Mar 2007 17:59:36 GMT

For no particular reason, my top 25 most played songs on my computer...

Lori Meyers by NOFX
Gloria by U2
Begin the Begin by REM
Mama, You Benn On My Mind by Bob Dylan
Around the World by Daft Punk
I don't care about you by Black Velvet Flag
Do Ya by ELO(!)
The Brews by NOFX
Spread Your Wings by Queen
Grey Cell Green by Ned's Atomic Dustbin
Jackie Chan by the Dollyrots
Helpless by Sugar
I Can't Get Started by Ella Fitzgerald
Fade into You by Mazzy Star
Only a Pawn in Their Game by Bob Dylan
El Quinto-De Beethoven by The Cesta All Stars
Red-eyed and Blue by Wilco
How to Fight Loneliness by Wilco
The Milkman of Human Kindness by Billy Bragg
Rave on by Buddy Holly
Panic (Smiths cover) by Peter Yorn
Black Math by the White Stripes
5:15 by Chris Isaak
Don't Go Back to Rockville by REM
Hong Kong Mambo by Tito Puente

Not a bad list if I say so myself... The ELO thing surprised me. I know that I listen to it a fair amount, but I had no idea it was that high in my list. Give me a break, its a catchy song! There is a huge spread on the number of times songs have been played. "Lori Meyers" has been played 27 times (!) while "Hong Kong Mambo" has been played 10 times.I estimate that I have close to 400 songs out of 10519 that have not been played at all. Most of the time I leave my play list on random but I do usually start to surf around my collection at night playing a type of free association game. It's safe to say that all of the songs on my top 25 have been mostly picked by me as opposed to them coming up at random. The most highly played random song is "Tulsa County" by Son Volt. I can't even remember what that song sounds like off the top of my head... I've found myself listening to some groups more than I have before recently. Wilco is getting much more playing time. I've always "liked" them, but I never could get through an entire album. Nowadays I'm really digging their first album (Being there?) and Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. I'm also listening to more Pavement and Stereolab. Maybe Arabic is changing how I listen to music? Feel free to post your frequently played lists, I'd be interested to see what you guys are listening to!

Isaac

An NGO head shaker...

Sun, 18 Mar 2007 16:25:26 GMT

I was eating at the Arabia Felix today and there were a couple of women next to me having a high power NGO talk. It was all about implementation of transnational directives of donor's wishes, etc... One of the many feral cats came by her table and started to meow loudly. So she started to feed it. I never do this, feral animals are unpredictable and the last thing I want to do is to attract them. Anyway, the other cats catch onto this and come over to get some handouts. A fight breaks out amongst the cats (3 or 4 of them at this point) and the woman is rather distressed. She keeps telling them to "Stop it! Stop it!" Of course the biggest cat beats up the others and gets to eat. Her response? "He shouldn't have done that..here kitty kitty kitty.." She didn't seem to appreciate the irony, she went right back to discussing how to present the latest ideas to the donor...

Isaac