October 2008

We have finally joint the 70,000 Jordanian families that have foreign live-in domestic workers. Irani, is 23, smart and ambitious. She started her studies in economics at the university, and is here to save enough money to be able to go back to school…. I picked her up when she arrived…

And for a split of a second, I imagined myself going into a new place… where I know nothing at all… I don’t speak the language, and where I am supposed to move in with some completely random family … lets say I can understand why she looked bewildered.

October 2009

Rani is still here; we managed to become friends during this last year. By now I know her life story. She still impresses me with her intellect, intelligence and her subtlety. I also know that her mother is here in Amman, she does not live far away from us… she is a cook at some wealthy household.

Today, Rani told me a very strange thing about her mother… she mentioned that even though she is the cook, her employers made her sign a very strict contract that stipulates she is not allowed to taste or eat any food at home. They give her 5 JDs every week to eat!  FIVE JDs  for the whole week!  While  these fat, ugly pathetic excuses of human beings spend extravagantly on their meals… Rani has mentioned several times before the kind of  meals her mothers cooks, the luxury items her employers export from abroad…Salma spends her entire day cooking! Literally!

Does anyone knows how much cooking this is?!

Salma laughed embarrassed as she explained how she  sometimes desires the food she cooks… but since there are 2 other maids there, one of them works as a spy… she actually can’t eat any food… so she has been feeding on Tuna cans, Endomy Noodles and other crap from the supermarket… she obviously does not want to spend her salary…. understandably, she travelled thousands of miles with her daughter  in order to save enough money so that her 3 kids  (including the daughter) can go to university and don’t have to clean people’s toilets for the rest of their lives!

I know it sounds horrible, but I found myself hoping this family will suffer from high cholesterol and high blood pressure, so that they start eating non-tasty food and desire things they can’t eat… maybe then, they can understand what they have been making this human being go through every single day last year.

Apparently Jordan is so known for our creative abuse methods when it comes to domestic help, that someone went ahead and wrote an article about it on Wikipedia….  Human trafficking in Jordan…

Yup this is how we want Jordan to be known on the world’s map! Fabulous, eh?

 First day of Ramadan passed safely. It was extremely hot yesterday, but I did not leave the house all morning.  Therefore, did not get the chance to deal with the heat and the traffic… apparently Amman was jammed yesterday. A friend explained that she stayed from 1:30 till 2:15 standing still in the traffic jam in the new U-turn in Shmeisani. She realized that her petrol tank was almost empty, and therefore had to make a decision to cook slowly in the heat by turning off the car, thus the air conditioning, so that she does not get stuck there in the middle of that traffic if her gas runs out.  By the time I talked to her, she was almost in tears.

My experience was much nicer; I left the house at around 3:30… The roads had cleared by then… as a matter of fact, it was pleasant for me to drive around and see how people go about their Ramadan.

Yesterday Muslim families gathered together around breakfast tables for the first day of Ramdan. The tradition is to cook something green or white. (mloukhiya, waraq dawali, mansaf, shakriya …)… and while some families managed to cook several dishes, others had to do with the bare minimum since prices started increasing slowly two week ago to hit their peak yesterday.

Commodity prices increased by 20%-25% in Jordan this year, while this is mainly due to global surge in the prices of food and other commodities, citizens blame poor market control. As a matter of fact the high prices of fruits, especially dry fruits, and other popular Iftar items in Jordan have left this year’s Ramadan an expensive affair to the chagrin of 90% of Jordanians, whose monthly income does not exceed 200 dinars.

On this note, Ramadan Mubarak for everyone.

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.

“We were sitting in the dark, oblivious to what is happening outside” says my friend Shorouq in Gaza. “My parents closed all the doors and asked us not leave. We could hear wailing, screaming and the constant stream of bombs. We are simply waiting to die.” She continued before the line was cut off. That was the last time I heard from shorouq. I don’t know if she is still alive, I don’t know if they are still waiting to die… but that hopelessness makes me feel sick.

Shorouq said when I asked her what they need, that the only thing they needed is for the aggression to stop, which one of a lot of things we can’t do for them. However, instead of feeling helpless here in Jordan we can do something.

My friends at 7iber are going to launch an emergency clothes and food drive which will be taking place over the next 48 hours.

You can bring canned food items (no meat), clothing, blankets, and jackets – all in good condition –

to

Cosmo Center 7th Circle

from 6:30-8:30PM

on

Tuesday, Dec. 30th.

Click here where you can join our event page to find out all the details you need

We have to help because the Israeli government has been starving Gaza. Since 2006, the humanitarian situation of Gaza has been declining drastically due to the Israeli closure and siege of the area. According to the UN:

·         56 percent of Gazans are classified as ‘food insecure’

·         76 percent of Gazan households are must accept some humanitarian assistance

·         At least 60 percent of Gazans in poverty rate by international standards

·         The Gaza Strip is one of the most densely populated places on earth

·         1.5 million Palestinians  in 139 square miles (360 sq km) and  25 mi long and 4-7.5 mi wide

·         Israeli government (ultimately) controls all borders and seacoast of Gaza

If you want to do something, this is your chance.

After few days, you realize that the hill is not really that steep, as the culture is really impressive, people are so polite and intelligent, and they are so honest, I imagined they will be trying to take more money in taxis because we are not locals, like they do in Amman… but no… they charged us all the same. The city is poor, but it is clean pleasant and is full of culture wherever you look.

And the food… the food is GOOD! Avocado, cilantro, tomatoes, chilies, onions and corn are part of everything! And it is so YUMMI!

Back to my brunch, the object of my attention were three people, the singer, a young man singing for a room full of people enjoying his beautiful voice and Spanish guitar, but not really listening… and was wondering what does he feel about this indifference to his talent?

The second person was a little girl, not more than 3 years, playing alone with her little pinky toys; she was playing around the table where her beautiful mother sits with a bunch of other ladies expensively dressed, hair is impeccable and their manner is of the crème de la crème of the Mexican society…. I could have been in Amman, or in the States, or in France…. These ladies were just global! And maybe the little girl caught my attention because she is the same age as our little Nizar.

The third person came to my attention when the little girl fell, and an older lady jumped to hug her, and I am not sure, but her loving manner is that of a grandmother, she was taking care of her with so much love, patience and calmness… which was really touching….and maybe it reminded me of the relationship of my own mother with Nizar, which is always calm, surely of experience compared to Hania, who panics if he falls, and gets angry if something happened to him… ya3ni just like a typical mother.

I was watching all three characters through out the brunch… wondering about their lives how did they come to be sitting in the same room with me today? Who are the other ladies on the table, what are they talking about? What does the singer do if not here? What is he thinking, how does he feel about this crowd? But really what got me to write today this pointless post, is that among all the 70 people in that room, there was really minimum interaction between all these strangers, except for a split of a second where there was a brief contact between my three characters! Only for a moment when the grandmother took the little girl’s hand to go get some fruit from the buffet and on her way she went to the singer to tell him how much she loved his voice and ask for a special request! What were the odds?!

Beautiful weather, a bit on the cold side. French men are absolutely charming, unlike Germans or Dutch, they do pay for your coffee, even if they don’t know you beyond the seminar. Bread is beyond yummy and their cheeses… don’t let me go there!

I love my breakfast, but I don’t push myself if there was nothing available. But in France, I would dream about their chocolate, Baguette and cheese and marmalade in the morning… and by the time it is lunch, I would be starving for their marvelous Provencal sauces…

Beyond food, well we had the seminar, it was very hectic, we used to wake up at 7:00 am and work till 11:00 PM, there were several workshops and far too many lectures… but I did learn a bit and I got to practice my rusty French. This all was taking place in small town called Arles, which lives off the art of poor Van Gogh, whom they committed to a hospital in his last days but have no shame to use even his room in that hospital to get money.

Nature there is absolutely fascinating! You walk in the streets and you pick up thyme Basel, rosemary and sage as well as beautiful others herbs for your dinner. Back to food again! With this thought, I need to go and have a bite!