Through The RDF

Everyone seems to be living in a Realty Distortion Field, A certain environment that shrouds realty, and makes lies believable. Philosophers like Nietzsche said that the mind 'philosophizes'.

People think about things, then try to adapt them to their own convention of truth. I'm certain many of us do this, for example, have you ever tried to translate a Traditional Saudi idea to a non-saudi ? you will find yourself spinning the explanation around to adapt it to a convention acceptable to both of you, whereas when explaining the same point to a saudi (who share many conventions with you) It is not necessary to 'spin'.

The real point is the RDF (apologies to all sj fans for burrowing the RDF) or the 'Bubble' everyone lives in, you know you are in the bubble when you allow yourself to temporary believe in something you don't, for the benefit of ingratiation.

This happens many times in the context of our lives, but its by no means acceptable - we tend to look at it as a necessity, but we realize inside that it is no more than a lie.

When the prophet (pbuh) was asked: Does a believer commits adultery ? "yes", Does a believer steal ? "yes", Does a believer lie ? "No". 

The Reason Fouad is Jailed

From the BBC, an excellent report on the subject of jailed reformists.

"Saudi blogger Fouad al-Farhan has been detained since December for speaking out on behalf of the jailed reformists"

An Explanation of Money

This is just a stranded thought, many people do not realize what money is. money as we have it now is based on the labour theory of value (LTV), a principle coined by Smith, Ricardo & Marx.

Simply Put, your money is worth as much as an hour of Labour is worth, for example:

In Britain the minimum wages is £5 an hour.

The average meal at a restaurant is £2.5.

so the meal is worth half an hour of labour.

A more realistic example is that when King Abdullah came to power, he raised salaries by 15%

this caused the recent rise in prices, but how ?

Right, so lets say someone gets 2000 r.s. a month, working 180 hours a month, that means he earns 11 r.s an hour

lets say he buys a book with 22 r.s. so its worth 2 hours of labour

after the futile generosity by the king, you get 12 r.s. an hour, making your salary 2160, how good is that ? after the increase in prices, the book is worth 24 r.s. (i.e the same amount as before, which is 2 hours of labour )

So your salary increase did not improve your life. well, you say, at least no harm is done....

Ha, your wrong! salary increases - official ones that is - contribute to inflation; making your currency of less value than it was.

I could go more on this, but I'll just leave it hear for now, after all, this is not school.

And on..

So sorry for cutting short last night, the fact is, talking about nationalism in Saudi Arabia is very unusual, Saudis are very nationalistic, but decline to admit it, we generally despise nationalism - yeah, that Gamal Abdulnasser bollocks - and we claim to be more religion oriented than nationality oriented: "We muslims are all brothers" sort of thing.

Truth is very different, we are one of the most racist nations to tread the surface of this planet we call earth, for not only we despise people for not being Saudi, but also for being from the wrong tribe

Three orders of despicableness:

1. You, Sir, Are not an Arab

2. You, Sir, Are not A Saudi

3. You, Sir, Are from a different tribe.

Those who suffer most from racial profiling in the KSA are foreign workers, esp. from India, Pakistan & Indonesia. note that we don't really care weather they are muslims or not, Heck, we don't even know, for they are beneath are observance.

Dr. Murad Hofmann took note of this when he came to Saudi Arabia, he then reflected:

"I guess one can feel above all, when fortune at its greatest strikes him twice, once when Islam is born on his land, and once when the Oil was discovered" however, Hofmann knows that it is not an excuse.

Hofmann was german diplomat who converted to islam after a car accident.

For Hofmann's more than excellent book, visit amazon, a link.

The Beat Goes On...

Jon Arbuckle, the creator of Garfield, Hated February. I wonder if I should have started blogging 5 days earlier ?

I hate february too, february is cold where i live - all the year is cold where i live now i come to think of it - not the case in saudi arabia, and especially not the case in Jeddah, a hot, crowded and humid city, but for me, it was where it all began.

Everything was good, or so i have been told. Everything was foretold. years ago at school, we were taught to obey - not to question everything - we were told we lived in a perfect place ruled by the perfect monarch in the perfect country. repeatedly.

I will not argue to which degree that is true, for i can not judge people or events that i am not very familiar with. none of the saudi citizens are. we shun politics as an evil secular west-oriented type of thing, and not realize how islamic its roots are.

We take pride in being saudis, yet we know nothing of what goes on and about, of matters that concern us most.

"that nonsense that is nationalism" - Albert Einstein.

The First Post

Right, here goes the first post...

To be quit honest, the idea of a blog just jumped to my head today after a browsing a fellow-saudi's blog, I thought I would try blogging after all, how hard can it be ?

Lets start from the basics:

-I'm a Saudi

-Obviously I'm not overjoyed with the KSA position right now, and i realize its a difficult time from the country, and mostly its people - hence the name of the blog

-When i say that, by no means do I "Predict a riot" - I like to think that Kaiser Chiefs will find KSA rather different from the UK.

-This Blog will be limited to commentary on news, and thoughts that i feel a must share as a saudi

-Please do not let the mostly pessimistic style with bitter Irony get you away from here.

-This is my first shot at blogging, so please send some feedback, especially if you are a fellow blogger/saudi

Thank you for taking the time.