For all of you kabab lovers out there:

The rapper-cum-kabab chef’s website: http://www.mangedukebab.com/

My favorite part is when they say “shish,” then music, then “kabab-u.” Oh, and when the Shawerma master takes off his shirt. Hilarious!

The other night, my sister and I watched The Axis of Evil Comedy Tour on DVD in her place. Since we both had missed the live performance of the hilarious trio in Amman, we were super excited over actually watching them even if on a TV screen.

Dean Obeidallah:
Aside from the fact that all three of them (Aron Kader, Ahmed Ahmed, Maz Jobrani) with Dean Obeidallah, were incredibly hot, they were so funny. Their sketches were very relevant and really touched upon the feelings and lives of Arab-Americans (and Arabs too) in post 9-11 America. As an Arab-Circassian, I could relate to some of the motifs they talked about, and they wrapped it all in “funny.”

I can’t remember a time I laughed so hard. I especially liked Maz Jobrani’s “Persians and Arabs” and “ecstasy” bits. You HAVE to watch The Axis of Evil Comedy Tour, if you watch nothing else in 2008 do watch this one. You can download the torrent for 9.99$ over at bittorrent or rent it for 3.99$.

Maz Jobrani doing the “Persians and Arabs” piece:

I’m Persian. Meow!

I’m rofling. Funny funny funny.

I am so very disappointed after watching the finale of LBC’s World Bellydance Championship. The winner, Estelle, did not deserve to win in this episode as far as I saw. Layla, the Ukrainian dancer, did extremely well and she was outrageously discriminated against by the judges who kept on repeating the same old tired lines: she can’t speak Arabic, she doesn’t have the bellydance gene (supposedly this is born with Arabs, HAH!?), she didn’t sing with the song. Rubbish!!! Layla was stellar tonight, but unfortunately, the judges were too biased to notice.

Rana didn’t win, obviously, and neither did Fadwa although she got a very good result but as I expected she didn’t do well enough. Suffice to say that the jury was blatantly biased. What a shame to waste the value of a show like this in the very final episode! It’s a massive anticlimax; I am angry!

I also have a bone to pick with the producers of this finale. What on earth was Saeed Murad doing there? A DJ and bellydancers? What? I mean, seriously. I let it slip when they had the girls dance to some crazy African beat, but this, in the FINAL episode no less, was stupid. The final episode should have been about classical bellydancing, leave the revolutionary evolutionary humbug to other episodes. Not the finale. Ugh.

Here are two video clips showing the final bellydance duo faceoff:

Estelle vs. Rana:

Fadwa vs. Layla:

Born to live in glory and passion.

Who doesn’t remember Lady Oscar? Jordanian kids of my generation and up to ten years older grew up with this fascinating anime originally called The Rose of Versailles and dubbed in Arabic. In my opinion, Lady Oscar was the ultimate BEST anime ever shown on Jordanian/Arabic TV stations.

I am very nostalgic today. I found myself watching old cartoons on YouTube and repressing my tears. When I found that almost ALL the episodes of Lady Oscar were on there, and in Arabic, I almost cried. To me, Lady Oscar was more than an anime character. Looking at my life, my tastes, my personality now, I understand exactly how she affected me. This was a powerful, intelligent, and no-crap lady who was raised as a man and competed with, and always outshone, her male counterparts. On top of all that, her wardrobe was absolutely gorgeous.

The Rose of Versailles focuses on Oscar François de Jarjayes, a girl raised as a man to become her father’s successor as leader of the Palace Guards. A brilliant combatant with a strong sense of justice, Oscar is proud of the life she leads, but becomes torn between class loyalty and her desire to help the impoverished as revolution brews among the oppressed lower class. Also important to the story are her conflicting desires to live life as both a militiant and a regular woman as well as her relationships with Marie Antoinette, Count Axel von Fersen, and servant and best friend André Grandier.

Lady Oscar was this fabulously strong-willed woman who set, I believe, an excellent example for the thousands of Arab girls who watched her. Now that I think of it, I find it amazing how the anime was ever played on Arab TVs since Lady Oscar’s sexuality was a bit ambiguous. Perhaps the people who censor shows did not get that part, but hey, all the better for us.

There are some shoujo-ai elements embodied in the relationship between Oscar and her protégée Rosalie Lamorlière, the secret daughter of the scheming Madame de Polignac, whose admiration for Oscar may be interpreted as either idol worship or romantic love coming from her possible bisexuality. Many of the court ladies also greatly adore Oscar, openly admiring her at parties and become very jealous when she brings female companions to them.

I remember hating Rosalie too and feeling a very strong attraction to Lady Oscar. I also remember loving André Grandier and hoping they would end up together, him and Oscar, which never happened. There was this imposing sexual and intellectual tension throughout the show, and thinking back, again I wonder how it was broadcasted on Arab TVs in the 20th century. If that was intentional, it was very progressive. If not, well, it didn’t screw me up so the people who censor shows need not feel guilty about letting it slip.

I used to love everything Oscar wore; those military jackets and tight riding pants, the white fitted French-cuff shirts, the fine ruffled collars, the knee-high boots– everything. I still love the look today, and looking at my tastes in fashion, I see Oscar and the period she lived in in most everything I fancy. She was a fine fencer and rider, too. I’ve always wanted to learn fencing and to have a horse, but I learned how to shoot instead. That was more doable.

I used to admire and respect Oscar for being so strong, for being able to always hold her own in front of the men she led, and for being a good person. She was controversial and great. I still remember how heartbroken I was when she died, and although I watched the show tons of times, I cried every time. Oscar was a phenomenon, not just a cartoon show. The anime had a message about gender equality, history, love and loyalty.

I really wish more shows of the type would air on Arab TVs, as Oscar taught me a lot and became a role model of sorts to me. I am still very much in love with the character and the show as a whole, and right now I am looking for a way to purchase the complete episodes on DVD.

This was my humble tribute to Lady Oscar, the rose of Versailles and my role model.

I have come to the conclusion that what Arab men term as “honor” is a polite word for the Arabically-explicit word vagina. I will explain.

When an 18-year-old murders his sister because he believes she has brought shame to the family’s name, he does so because he either knows or suspects that she has engaged in socially unacceptable behavior with a man (who is not her husband, if she is married). That behavior on the woman’s part ranges from talking to this man to fornicating with him.

Since one part of the equation is a man, let us examine that part. When a man talks to, or fornicates with, or takes any other action towards a woman he is more often than not spared any social consequences that result from his actions. This means that the “man” part of the deal does not fall within the scope of this argument.

Now let us look at the other part of the equation for the purpose of this argument. The other part is a woman, an anatomically different human being who is almost always the honor-defaming culprit in any scandal. The woman’s private parts play a vital role in condemning her because they are, in the traditional male chauvinist view, the forbidden yet deeply desired apple.

To illustrate this, think of the worst possible curse words out there in Arabic and in English. About 99% of them involve someone’s mother, someone’s sister, and their genitalia. They might also include explicit references to sexual acts done to these private parts. In Arabic, these curse words are intended to verbally harm the opposite person’s “honor,” a sacred concept referring simply to a woman’s vagina.

Within this context, when someone commits an “honor killing” to wash away the family’s shame, all they are doing is killing the target woman’s vagina who may or may not have engaged in sexual acts deemed socially taboo. By the same token, when a man swears by his “sister’s honor,” he is swearing by her vagina. Fascinating, isn’t it?

The final point I want to make is this: men do not really have honor to swear by or to protect. Anatomically speaking, it is the women that live with these men that do have honor and sometimes pay a dear price for having it. So the next time a man swears by his mother’s honor and thinks he’s macho cursing another man’s sister’s honor, ask him if he likes it shaved, waxed, or a la natural.

Check out the enlightened propaganda I came across today:

Translation: “Boycott the parliamentary elections. Only god can legislate.”

I watched LBC’s World Bellydance Championship last Thursday after calling a number of people to remind them to watch it too. I’m a serious fan of bellydancing and so it was natural that I will be interested in seeing what the show has to offer. After all, with the primitive internet speed I have, YouTube bellydance videos tend to suck the life out of me.

I think Thursday was the first episode of the show, which featured six bellydancers from different countries. There was even a Russian and Ukrainian present and they did exceptionally well. However, I have a few comments on the reception of the show in the media and by the public, and not entirely about the dancers’ performances.

Here’s a theory I have been developing lately in response to the blatant phobia Arab people have of the monster otherwise known as the female body: A great number of Arab people indulge in the almost sadistic illusion of projecting all the centuries-long faults of society, religion, and human error on women.

In our Arab societies, women’s sexuality and in simpler terms their bodies are treated as either treasured possessions of men or perpetrators of corruption and amorality. A unique attitude prevalent in Arab societies is medieval in the sense that it perceives, and treats, them as inferior humans personifying a forbidden desire. The idea is that women must be brought to submission lest they sabotage the otherwise-perfect texture of society through their diabolic allure. The same attitude maintains, without shame or sense of contradiction, that women’s sexuality should be unleashed without restriction according to the whims and fancies of men within the context of unequal relationships. People have this attitude because it is relatively simple, it has a popular support base from men and women alike, and some societies/religions authorize it.

In addition to that, it is obvious that when a certain group is in power (politicians, religious leaders, media people), it is in its best interest to keep other groups at the bottom of the food chain. This comes to play when we realize that the vast majority of people in power in the Arab region, and I am tempted to say all but I will resist it, are men.

Putting all these arguments together, there is no wonder many people object to LBC’s decision to air this show. Obviously, the women will be quasi-naked (although some should not be allowed to expose their figures so), and they will most likely look attractive as they dance to Um Kolthom, and by extension will spread corruption and up the level of STD-infested horniness in the Arab world. I find the naiveté of the position remarkable and only matched by the amount of success these dancers will enjoy because of the show.

I read many articles criticizing the show, and others fiercely resenting it on religious and political grounds; arguing that we should concentrate on serious issues in the region instead of the sexy abdomens of some women. That is a shallow argument of course because there is plenty of seriousness in our media and an alternative must be present as well.

It is not rocket science: people who don’t like seeing pretty women dancing (or enough boobs to last one a lifetime and then some) should change the channel. They should also refrain from dancing in private parties and should abandon a key element in Arabic culture: bellydancing. I know some people who are like that, and they are miserable wretches who get married in lifeless weddings.

Bellydancing is a significant part of our heritage. It was just about the only positive stereotype the world had of us before 9/11; when Arab was synonymous with filthy-rich and clueless middle-aged man in a hatta. Let’s not denounce it merely because it is a feminine art.

From ancient times Arabs have been an integral part of the world culture and knowledge base. Arabs invented the cipher and decimal system, scientific and mathematical breakthroughs in theory and inventions. There are about 3 million Arab Americans. As a community, they have demonstrated loyalty, inventiveness, and courage on behalf of the United States for over 100 years. Kahlil Gibran was an artist, sculptor, poet and philosopher, who was also the original author of the words made famous by President John F. Kennedy: “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country”.

- Source

Some websites you should be checking:

- NITLE Arab World Project - This web site aims to bring a wide variety of resources on Arab culture and civilization to your computer

- The Arab American National Musuem

- Arab & Arab American Culture