كانت ايام حرب غزة كتير عصيبة السنة الماضية. كان الغضب بيعترم الشوارع الأردنية. كان عندنا شعور بالقهر و الظلم. و عرفنا انه الشعب الفلسطيني كان ضحية للعبه سياسيه قذرة، متعلقة بالإنتخابات الإسرائيلية

نحنا اخترنا نجمع أكل و ملابس لأهل غزة. و يمكن الطريقة اللي اشتغلنا فيها هي دليل على انه مقاومتنا هي مقاومة الضعفاء! (رح أكتب أكتر عن نظرية مقاومة الضعفاء بمقال تاني بس مش مهم. وضعنا اعلان على حبر انه اللي بحب يتبرع، بيقدر يلاقينا عند كوزمو.) و اتفقنا ننقل الأغراض بسيارة نسيم لبيته، و نطلب من مجموعة من اصحابنا يساعدونا، ونسهر طول الليل نرتبهم بأكياس.

و يا ليلي

اللي ما حسبناه، هو قوة الضعفاء اذا اجتمعوا. مئات الناس اذا مش الاف جاؤا يتبرعوا بأكل و ملابس، و عشرات الناس ما بنعرفهم من الشارع و قفوا يحملوا معنا أغراض و يساعدونا بتحميل الأغراض.

استبدلنا سيارة نسيم ب16 شاحنة من ارامكس، و الأكياس بكراتين من نقل. و زدنا على مجموعة اصحابنا مئات من المتطوعين استبدلنا ليلة السهرة للشغل بثلاثة أسابيع من السهرات، و بيت نسيم بمستودع على طريق المطار. كنا كتير ننبسط لما نعرف انه الغرض اللي بنترتبه اليوم، بعد بيومين بصير بغزة. كيف بنعرف؟ كنا نعلّم الأغراض، و الناس يتركوا رسائل دعم في الكراتين ، و بطريقة أو بتانية قدرنا نتصل بالشخص المسؤول عن استلام المساعدات بغزة و بتأكد.

بس بعدين بدأ النهب على الطريق و انحرق المستودع… و عشان هيك انا بسميها مقاومة الضعفاء! بس مرة تانية مش مهم… المهم انه كان في حراك في الشارع الأردني.

و بمناسبة الحديث عن الحراك، هذه مجموعة من الفيديوهات من ايام غزة مأخوذة عن من الأردن

11 كانون الثاني هذه كانت تظاهرة فنية، تضمنت برنامج كتير مؤثر فيه موسيقى بالات مختلفة، و شعر بالعربي و الإنجليزي.

9 كانون الثاني – هذي في الرابية، اقرب مكان قدروا المتظاهرين يقربوا للسفارة الإسرائيلية. قرروا انه بدهم يعملوا

اعتصام مفتوح لحد ما يطلع السفير عن الأرض الأردنية

8 كانون الثاني- اعتصام للقوى الشبابية والطلابية أمام المفوضية الأوروبية احتجاجاً على موقفها من الهجوم على غزة

هذه المظاهرة بدأت عند الدوار الرابع و انتهت عند السفارة المصرية. كان الموضوع غضب على مصر عشان معبر رفح. بس الأهم من هيك هو انة الرئيس المصري كان في اجتماعات مع اسرائيل قبل الهجوم

هذه أنا بسميها مظاهرة الفيس بوك، كانت في الشميساني، بشارع الثقافة و ضمت المظاهرة رسامين و فنانين. هم ساعدوا في تحضير اللافتات اللي حملوها المتظاهرين. كانت المظاهرة كتير خلاقة

… A guy drove by in a fancy car, slowed down and stopped at some 100 meters in front of me…

I was tempted to cross the street, but then decided that I should not let him intimidate me.

So I kept going…

He opened his window, and started shouting numbers… 200? 300? Ok 500… I soon realized that it was JDs he meant!  This guy either thought I was a prostitute and was offering money in hope of service, or he simply was acting like a jackass!  Which probably was the case.

I kept going without even giving him a second glance. I know how cruel it is not to acknowledge the existence of a human being… and this guy, certainly,  did not deserve to be acknowledged.

He kept following me.

I turned left to a side street and he drove back and forth at least ten times in that street, till I reached my destination….he waited a bit, and then realized that I was not going out any time soon, and so he left, probably to bug another girl…

Ohh.. the car had a Qatari number.. It really is upsetting, that some people from abroad come to Jordan, thinking that girls who walk in the streets are  free game… I am not saying that our local guys are better…… but still, when you go as a guest somewhere, the minimum requirement is to practice some self respect….

Our local guys… akh from our local guys…they have succeeded into turning the experience of walking in our lovely Amman into a very unlovely  experience….I can almost swear that any Jordanian girl, regardless of her dress code or background can share horror stories related to her experiences in walking in Amman…. girls get exposed to men’s dirty words, and pathetic sexual frustration at a very early age…and they never share their stories, because they know that their families will only practice more control over them…. so they internalize their bad experiences and move on…. moving on is their silent resistance to things they can’t control

Actually… I am tired of writing about this … so will go watch Dance with me instead!

Why am I saying this?

I got in a car accident couple of weeks ago. I was at a crossroad. I did not see the other car coming. In the middle of the crossing this woman bumped into me… I parked the car and got down to check the damage…

Miracle of miracles… my car was intact…

Hers…well the number fell off… but nothing else was visible to the naked eye.

The lady walked towards me… I have a good inkling about breeds of women, and one glance, told me that this one was the vicious sort, or at least one who will get nasty if she has to. I heard myself saying… oh boy!! 

She did not even wait to make it to my car to start yelling in a way that did not go at all with her perfectly respectable outfit and elaborate coiffure!

“Don’t you have eyes? Are you blind?  She said in a high pitched voice”

I decided to adopt hibbz advice about rising above things, and said calmly:

“Hamdillah 3ala il salameh!”

She was taken aback. Her voice went down one octave.

She asked me if I wanted to call someone, and I suggested calling the police.  But she said that she did not have time, and that I should give her my number. She would call someone to check what the damage was, and then proceed from there… I gave her my number  

BIG MISTAKE…

And while the lady was calling someone… I had done my own checking… I called the police.  They told me that I should not have assumed it was my fault… Even if she had the right of way, she might have been speeding…and actually she might have not had the right of way at all, especially that I was already in the middle of the crossing when she bumped into me. Whoever answered me, told me that when someone leaves the scene, they automatically forfeit their right!

Now I felt strong.

True to my expectations, she called the next day:

“Do you remember me? I am the women you hit… do you remember how you smashed my car? Well I asked my garage, and they want me to pay around 450 JDs to fix the damage you caused, plus 150 for the labourer and 100 for each day the car stays in the garage! Which is another 300…”

I was speechless!

Beside the fact this was a horrendously big amount… I was surprised that the lady felt I was a total idiot! She really expected me to hand her 900 Jds to put the number back!!

I told her coldly that I knew a place at Duwar Al Wa7a. They would put back her number for 1 JD! she did not like that at all and started shouting again (She loves shouting)  She was a total rada7a!

The story ended  son after… I told her her what the police told me, and she yelled some more about me having no roots, no origins, no values and no proper upbringing… she told me that she was testing me and I failed miserably… she then hung up on me, and never took my calls after that…

This incident makes me think that almost every encounter in life depends on our ability to capture other people’s attention.  This lady might have thought she was being assertive, when in reality she was being aggressive and rude.  This surprises me on several levels… especially that she was the one who wanted something from me, and she could have gotten it, had she been a little more agreeable…

The thing is, in general, women in Jordan are cultured to be submissive… however, by going through life’s twists and turns, they make the shift into becoming aggressive bitches.  They live their lives without really ever finding a balance… a lot of people get hurt in the process… but who cares, sah?

One last note, there is a big difference between assertiveness and aggressiveness…

Assertiveness is a skill that helps us to communicate clearly and with confidence, while still acknowledging the needs of others.  Aggressiveness on the other hand is being disagreeable, argumentative, rude and uncompromising… I wonder why in Jordan, a lot of women faile to be assertive, but succeed in being aggressive?

On a different note, I am reading my third Murakami book… this one is called Kafka on the shore… it is quite interesting… this guy likes fantasy, and i like it too…

So…we spent the last three days gathering food for Gaza. 7iber created an event on facebook to tell people about the drive…

I am not sure how things picked up, but I received messages about the drive from fifteen different people!

Now, we told people to bring food to the empty lot of land facing  Cozmo… Aramex generously donated the first truck.  We thought we will fill it out and go home feeling good about ourselves…

Around 1:00 Am, I was hit by a fit of hysterical laughter!… the sheer impact of looking at the mountains and mountains of stuff made me unable to stop laughing.

Hundreds upon hundreds of people showed up throughout the evening and brought stuff… some people donated truck loads…. Tens of young men and women showed up out of nowhere to help!! When we originally started, we hoped to fill one truck load, but we filled at least 16 (Thanks to Aramex that provided  truck after truck)  Tons and tons of cans and food and clothing were gathered.

Jordanians, Syrians, Iraqis, Palestinains, Egyptians, Europeans , Americans were there to help… .I am not sure how to describe the feeling, but seriously… my faith in the human race that was taken away by the Israelis is restored by the Arabs… and those who were there…

Two specific  incidents: a mother showed up with her two kids… they are not more than 5 or 6. They gave me their small money banks ( I don’t know what they are called) they were full of coins… they donated them so that kids in Gaza  can  have food! I wanted to hug them… these kids will grow up to be good human beings

Incident two: around 1 am, when our energy was drained, four Egyptian workers appeared from nowhere to help us load the truck (seeing the amount of work was depressing)….they worked and worked and worked, bringing new energy into the group… we wanted to give them a tip, but they refused… they said we are brothers…

 For videos, please look at Ali’s blog  and of course, 7iber for constant updates

 31/12/2008

We spent the day in the warehouse that was placed by Aramax  at our disposal … I LOVE Aramex! At least  a hundred young people showed up to help yesterday… some of them had their tawjihi exams, they finished their exams and came running to help… others were with us till 2:00 AM the previous night… we were working like an assembly line with so much passion.

We decided to attack food items… as we went on; rules of the game became evident. We had to sort the cans by the following rules:

1-      Expiry date (not less than 6 months)

2-      Every class of cans alone (tuna alone, soup alone, peas alone,  hummos alone, beans alone… and so on)

3-  no meat products are allowed.

4-      Every can had to be examined to check where it came from!! If it was made in one of the countries that are enemies with Israel, the can will not make it there…

5-      Any used clothing will not go through!

Now the last two points are worth contemplating… I am appalled by Israel. I can’t believe that they would put such rules at this time. What difference would used clothing do to Israel? It baffles me… people are being murdered there… 420 people so far… and thousands of injured… if this is not ethnic cleansing… i don’t know what is.

I wonder when they were being killed and the world donated stuff for them, did they care if it was new or not? Did they care if the food came from Germany or France or India?!

What worries me is that the world is not doing anything but watch…. I wonder what would have happened if the roles were reversed?

The world is unfair.

On a local front, around 100 young people decided to sacrifice their new years eve to work with us.  It gets me emotional just to see the dedication these youngsters showed.  Young people are always accused of not  caring… well let the world be a witness to how much we care…  the work was fun, hard and amazing…

These pictures have been taken by our one and only Jad

1/1/2009

We gathered in front of Cozmo at 11. We started with 20 people.. I was depressed, I thought that the number was too little. When we got to the warehouse I found another 30! They came there alone! We were around 50 people. Throughout the day people showed up alone… at around 3:00 Ramsey set off to Cosmo to bring the people who were there…

I was seriously shocked when they came back… an army of women came in, ready and determined to work… it was brilliant!

 From a bird view, we would look like ants!

We started with the clothing… our beloved army of young gorgeous women, got onto the task and within hours they finished the initial sorting

As my dad says, there is still good in this world.

This one was in Shmeisani, on Thaqafa street. The whole demonstration was organized through facebook. It included some artists, who helped prepare the signs carried by the protesters. Some of the signs were quite artistic. The protesters chanted Marcel Khaleefeh’s patriotic songs, the palestinian national anthem, and other emotional slognas, while carrying candles. 

This one is in Rabia.  The closest the protesters could get to the Israeli embassy. It is planned to be an open protest till the Israeli ambassador is out of the country. Even though it was raining, those guys brought their tents and their fire and just sat there. They drew the map of Palestine with their candles.

Some of these videos are taken by my friend Ramzi,  you can see more pictures and updates on 7iber and on his ikbis profile

Don’t forget our food drive