Jimmy rolls up his sleeve, Mobi won't back down

Hold on to your seats everyone, it's about to get interesting!

The Ahram Newspaper is Egypt's leading newspaper, even though it's full of absolute Bullshit! It reports growth, when no body else does, it omits news that everyone should hear, and if you were on a deserted island and didn't know the state of the world today and only got Al Ahram Newspaper dropped from the sky every day, you'd think Egypt was in the G8.

Despite all of that you can get a lot of insight into what's happening in Egypt, even if you admittedly only read the headlines, & look at the pictures like yours truly.

Being mentioned in the Ahram newspaper is good - but where you're mentioned is what says a lot! You can be mentioned in the front page (Mubarak related news), page 3 (other worthy news), the middle pages (Egypt related news) or in the last page (a.k.a the seen and heard page)

Gamal Mubarak (aka Jimmy) was mentioned in the Ahram a lot over the past few years. Early on it was in the seen and heard page, then he jumped up to the middle section pages - news about his Party, the decisions he makes etc.

This week he has consistently been on Page 3! A nice upgrade for little Jim! He's made headlines on plenty of other places too - and has therefore become the latest topic by the watercooler! Jimmy is rolling up his sleeves and getting ready to take in the limelight.

Everyone thinks it's with the support of his loving father (aka Moby) but a look at the Ahram newspaper would show that Mr. Moby is none too happy about Jimmy's rise up the Ahram-page ladder. Every time there's an article about Gamal Mubarak's vision for the future, right next to him and even bigger one is showing Moby in full swing 'running' the country. Moby, whose news generally fill the first page, now fill the first and 3rd page as well.

Now, if you were trying to support your offspring's rise to the throne, wouldn't you take a step backward and let you boy take in some of the limelight?

If Moby truly wanted to pass down his throne to Jimmy, shouldn't he be sorting him out while he's still in power? Why leave it up in the air when Moby's number could be up any minute now? So he tested fate and tried for 5 more years - a risk i would call stupid when you're eighty something - you'd think he'd get wise and start easing Jimmy in before it's too late!

Based on the news coverage, this is not happening - and it looks like Jimmy's patience with his father has ran out and he's taken matters into his own hands.

It seems as though things are in fact going to get interesting...Moby vs. Jimmy is not what everyone expects, but it might just happen!

P.S. I found this on Masrawy just as i published this post - if you read Arabic check it out.

Summer hibernation - over!

Summer is finally O-V-E-R! I know it's still like 30-something degrees out there and the electricity bill is still triple its usual amount but it's Autumn now - move over summer!

It's also the end of Ramadan...

Now, let me take a moment and do a little happy dance...

Ok, i'm back!

Over the weekend I made some purchases: Pink Reebok's, Membership at club next to the office, cheap-but-funky-looking squash racket

Sunday I finished work and headed over to the Gym then hit the Squash courts. Monday morning I realized I have muscles in places i never knew. Tuesday morning did not feel any different. Today I was able to laugh without wincing with pain - and like the diligent person i pretend to be i'm heading over the gym & squash court again today.

TV has started again so my couch potato blog should be showing signs of life as soon as I finish my Lost marathon (man, Season 5 is good!)

Game on!

Scrabble nights have been happening for a while, even though they're not as frequent as they once were.

Lately Nis and I have had our asses handed to us by Adrian - who, much to Nisrin's dismay, happens to be Canadian!

So Adrian decided to help us and sent us this to help us beat him - it's funny:

Captain Jack is back!!

* happy dance

Great news from EW.com! Pirates of the Caribbean 4: On stranger tides

Now we have to wait till Summer 2011 - :(

AIESEC influence reaches the Oscars!

Apparently the Academy Awards have decided to rely on AIESECers to help them vote for the Best Motion Picture.

If you've ever been in a PAI election or a National election in AIESEC you'd instantly understand the system they've derived - in fact you'll think it makes complete sense. For others, it seems a little complex.

And given the fact that PWC is a big AIESEC Partner, and also the company that counts the ballots for the Academy Awards, i'm thinking my theory is not too far fetched.

Here's the new procedure according to ew.com:

"In the past, once the nominees were announced, Academy members voted only for the one film they thought should win the award, and the film with the most votes won. But with so many nominees next year, it’s feasible that a movie could have won Best Picture with only 11 percent of the vote, which seems crazy. So now, once the 10 nominees are named, voters will rank the films from 1 to 10. All the No. 1 votes will be counted, and if no film has more than 50 percent of the vote (which will certainly be the case), the last-place film will be eliminated and the voters who voted for that film will have their No. 2 votes counted instead. That process will continue until one film has a majority of the votes. As Pond points out, there is a chance that the film that ends up winning won’t actually have the most No. 1 votes, but will instead emerge the victor in the second, third, or fourth rounds. "

Now tell me that it's not an AIESECer who came up with this!

CNN likes juice!

No body likes to twist the facts a little to get some juice like CNN does! Especially when it comes to Muslims and Arabs. It's like a big lucrative punching bag right there in your face, and of course they'll want to take a swing.

So the article was discussing some Nigerian player in Italy who was fasting because it's ramadan, and didn't perform well in the match. The Coach was not happy. This is of course a valid discussion - I understand the Coach's concerns. Personally I think the player should fast on his days off to make up for his Ramadan, he needs to eat to be able to earn his living. This, however, is not what ticked me off.

At the end of the Article CNN says:

"Meanwhile, the Egyptian team preparing for the under-20 World Cup in their home country have turned down the chance to break their fast. The country's religious authorities gave the squad members permission to avoid fasting during Ramadan, but the team ignored the instruction.

The competition starts just a few days after the end of Ramadan, but the team is in strict training in a bid to claim the prestigious title."

Religious authorities don't have a say in whether you're allowed to break your fast or not. This, much like daily prayers, is up to each person. So the team does not need "permission" to not fast.

Why throw something like that in there that would just send the message that this mean evil religion is starving its people and they need permission from religious authorities to let them eat? The truth is that religious authorities give their opinion - not an instruction or permission!

But hey, this sells more doesn't it?

blame it on the

HEAT!

Life's been quiet, and a little boring if you ask me. I blame it fully on heat...

I'd like to start walking and maybe potentially move to Racewalking coz it's got this cool hip shaking action. However I hate sports, and I hate heat. So it's hard to start something you hate in conditions you hate. I'm claiming that if it were fall/winter I'd have happily hopped off my ass and gone Racewalking...

So far I've bought a stop watch and i'm looking for new running shoes and sports clothes - all in preparation for when the weather is a bit more bearable.

Another thing I'm blaming on the weather is how i've ignored the Piano sitting in my living room for the past month. My un-air-conditioned living room is just too hot. Adding a new A/C is not an option, and the Piano won't fit in my room. Yesterday I tried playing and turns out I've forgotten the little piece i'd busted my ass in learning earlier in the summer.

I blame it on the heat