Ramadanz

Ramadan is upon us… I have to admit I’ve been a great Muslim and have abstained from all my vices for this month… it’s too bad that I’m just a total hypocrite and will revert to my horrible sense in 30 days. The bright side to all of this: at least I get to self inflict a mandatory detoxification period… my liver is probably thanking me and working to get itself back to functional operating capacity.
Everyone knows about Ramadan, if you don’t then read up about it, I’m not going to delve into the workings and teachings of the month (don’t want to step on anyone’s toes). But this is Ramadan to me: I don’t particularly care if you observe to fast or not, actually I don’t care if you choose to be a Muslim or not, do whatever you want, I’m not going to interfere with what you’ve got going on, just as long as you don’t come barking up my tree.
Anyways the whole country is fasting from sunrise to sunset, and the first week is total hell, people are getting over their nicotine and caffeine addictions in the mornings.. the pounding headaches, the shivers, cause you’re so hungry; it’s not a pretty sight… It’s during the second week that the body stabilizes and you can slowly deal with fasting and everything is pretty cool… the third week is when you remember that it’s the third week and you start counting down the days till it’s over… but counting down the days is horrible because time moves so slowly when you’re looking at it… when you’re at the final week, it’s been so long you forget how what breakfast tastes like, you think eggs in the morning? You mean I’m allowed to eat? Whoa…
I’m not knocking the month down, actually to me Ramadan is the start of our holiday season – I really enjoy getting into the spirit of things… During Ramadan, you break your fast at sunset – around 5ish and then spend the next hour or two at the mercy of your television. This is an advertising executive’s wet dream… So you can imagine the money that’s spent on advertising, tv shows, anything to keep you happy and occupied. All shops are open later… and I mean much later… with different raffles and promotions… Since you can’t drink, hotels and other fine establishments pitch huge tents in their parking lots and give people a place to meet up, giving you that classically Arabic feel while parting you from your money… These Ramadan tents are a sham – but still can be a lot of fun if you’ve got a good group of friends with you…
Ramadan is also a month where your hours are totally readjusted… if you went to bed every night at 11, well now you should sleep at 12 or 1, this is what I like to call Ramadan savings time… Because no one does anything during the daytime, after breaking your fast is when Bahrain and most Muslim nations pick up again… Vendors are open late (midnight is average) you can get a cheeseburger up until 4 am… Apart from the tents and eating, Ramadan is also a month of socializing… Hosts open up their doors to throw parties where people get together, eat, smoke sheesha, play cards, eat some more, and socialize…
Today’s the 11th day of Ramadan over a third of the way through… second week stabilization is coming to an end, and pretty soon, I’ll be counting the days down when I’ll be able to have breakfast again… My liver is recuperating, but I just can’t get over the fact that I can’t have breakfast or lunch…arrgghhh… It’s very strange, but I like eating when it’s light outside… for those Muslims reading this, good luck… and remember, Islam is between you and god, don’t let anyone else dictate how you’re supposed to feel and how you’re supposed to think…

Good day and god bless

Absee...

I was driving to work the other morning and out of nowhere this old beat up Toyota Corolla cuts me off… Now this being Bahrain the first thing you’d normally experience is a sudden rush of road rage where you want reach to the back seat pull out that sawed off shotgun you save for occasions like this and put a huge dent in the guy’s head.. but today something was different.. I noticed a sticker on the back window of the car... It was just a regular sticker of a guy with his hair tied at the top of his head. It took me a couple of seconds to register that the sticker was none other than “Absee” from the greatest cartoon of my childhood: “Adnan Wa Leena”
Here’s my famous bridging the cultural gap trick watch this: “Adnan Wa Leena,” literally translated is Adnan and Leena.. The rest of the world know him as FUTURE BOY CONAN, how cool was that?? This is one of the coolest cartoon series’ to come out of Japan… Wonderfully created from the imagination of Miyazaki (the genius that brought the world Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away naming a few) Anyways the story is based on Earth after the third world war, a new world order has taken over and they want everyone to reform to their ways. There’s only one hitch, there’s a small group of islands that have resisted and the story takes many different turns that I can’t remember. Anyways the main character is the boy Adnan (Conan) his girl Leena and his best friend Absee the hippie (I think).. Absee was definitely the coolest, hair tied in a topknot, smoker, obnoxious, and brave…
Absee represented everything you wanted to be… first of all he had no parents, and when you were 6, that was the coolest thing in the world. You never saw Absee taking a bath, unless he was diving into the sea to go spear fishing or something totally cool like that.. He was tough enough to beat the living daylights out of those bad soldiers, but still not brave enough to lead the front line… I even remember one episode where he was rolling some “tobacco-like” substance and smoking it… can you say non-conformist?
I’m not saying that this was a quality cartoon that instilled good morals and gave off a meaningful message to the kids. But this was a cartoon that defined my childhood and brought a human element to the tv… there were no falling anvils, no ACME rockets, no talking animals, no martians nothing.. Just a bunch of kids living in a community that was trying to resist takeover by a Nuclear - Power Hungry World Order that’s hell bent on domination and its Commander, that’s all…
I don’t really know where I’m going with this, but I think what I’m trying to say is where are the cartoons of yesteryear? We didn’t have any toned down violence… No, we had hardcore skull crushing – jaw breaking action.. And if there wasn’t any action you can be damn sure that there was a lot of bright lights flashing… Cartoons today are just losing their battle to computer animations, over controlling parents, and bad production… I mean every cartoon I can remember as a kid had a fantastic well thought out story.. today’s junk is all about morals and about keeping the environment clean and making cartoons fun and educational.. Bullshit….Bring back the great stories and the excellent animation…. And if anyone knows where I can find an Absee sticker.. please let me know..

an Intro to Bahraini Rants

Well I guess I need to write something about something here right? so this is my first time using a blog, I've been a longtime reader but blogging isn't really my forte, so you’ll have to bear with my first couple of posts..

I just started this new thing cause I really feel we don't really have a good medium to discuss to the random things I think about... The web is saturated with new sites about current events, conspiracy theories, soci-political events, intellectual bru-ha and all that good stuff. This is not one of those blogs.. This is a blog where (pardon the expression) I can put my mental masturbation somewhere on display for the world to laugh, ridicule and relate to...

So what is Bahraini Ranting? To be totally honest I don’t really know.. let me start by giving you a quick intro to where I am on the map..

for those of you that have heard of Bahrain or live here, there's really no need to read the following section.. for the rest of you folk that think Bahrain is the town right next to Boise, allow me to begin.. I don't really want to post anything that you can find from a country factbook so I'll give you an insider's take..

Bahrain: Small island kingdom, pretty arid - but has a glorious history of being the mythical setting of the Garden of Eden. Don't know if you know who Gilgamesh was, well he was the super hero of the Mesopotamians (the first civilization in recorded history)... Anyways Gilgamesh apparently found his way to Bahrain searching for immortality… anyways he finds the flower of life.. yadda yadda yadda.. and he’s immortal.. that was thousands of years ago, let me paint a picture of today’s Bahrain: a major bustling financial center for the middle east.. Restaurants, shopping malls, world’s largest bowl of cereal, hotels, F1 Racing Circuit and so much more… We still haven’t hit the million mark in terms of population, but that makes getting to know everyone so much easier. Life can get a little island feverish, but it’s nothing you can’t handle… ok I’m going to save more details about Bahrain for future blogs..

Anyways I’ll be posting a lot more pretty soon.. just wanted to give you a small intro.. a taste of what’s to come.. So be good, remember You never jump out of a plane without a parachute – know what I’m saying?