In my last holiday, I have experienced an unimaginable new level of thrill. The timing, the weather, the locations, the activities and the planning were all factors that made this one of the most memorable trips of my life. Geneva (2 days) – Spring Season (18-20 Sep) Our first stop was in Geneva. It was very green and exceptionally colorful. Geneva is known for its great lake and for being a good city for cycling. As you walk in the streets of Geneva, you feel its classy style, its richness, their prude care to discipline. You feel that the city is speaking to you and telling you "you are lucky to be walking my streets". Geneva is a quiet city but not a boring one. The streets are busy with people who are walking, dining, sitting in the parks or by the lake side. As I've said earlier, the best way to explore the city is by cycling as the roads are wide and it is well facilitated for that. Personally, Geneva has a special place in my heart. It is where I learned cycling for the first time. Yea I Know I know. I was lame and I didn't know how to cycle when I was a kid. After half an hour of trying and falling, I learned how to balance myself on the bike in spite of the mockery of a group of bystanders who were waiting for me to get frustrated and return the only bike available for rent to the store. Oh well, I toured the major parks in Geneva for over 3 hours before realizing how stupid I was for dehydrating my body while fasting. Yea, my consciousness was killing me and I felt obliged to fast the remaining days of Ramadan Interlaken (4 days) – Fall Season (21-25) The place may not sound familiar and that is what's great about it. It's a small town in middle of Switzerland. Its residents speak German. The best thing about this place is its location. What more can you ask for from a place that is between two lakes (on the east and the west) and between the Alps Mountains (from the North and South). They have one major central park and the views and the sceneries and the landscape you experience are among the best you might ever enjoy in your life. Four days were barely enough for Interlaken. There was not much to do at night other than dining (such trying the infamous "cheese fondue") and relaxing, which was compensated by the variety of activities that you perform during the day that can range from skydiving, paragliding, hand gliding, canyoning and skiing. I personally did paragliding (a very relaxing and enjoyable activity. You are in the air before you even know it) and canyoning (rappelling and doing impossible jumps is not my thing. I will leave such stunts for Lara Croft. But the water was refreshing despite its temperature being 3 degrees Celsius). Another must see site that I happened to know about when I was there was the "Mystery Park". I caught three shows there: "The Contact", "Maya", and the "Megastones". Each show is 15 minutes in general shown where they use holograms and 360 screens to narrate to you a brief and simple introductory about the history behind each story & site. Jungfraujoch It was a one day trip to the highest railway station in Europe. It is referred to as "top of Europe" with an altitude of 3471 meters. It is in one of the summits in the Alps Mountains. There are 3 basic sites to visit here. The Ice Palace – a small walk through a gallery of sculptures made of ice, The sphinx observatory – a place with a 360 panoramic view of the mountains. You will find a variety of restaurants that you can choose to cater your food appetite. Finally, the open area where you get to hike, play winter sports such as sledging and airlifting. And of course, nothing beats getting an "ice sun tan" (tan that you get from reflections of sunlight on snow..or whatever they call it) Nice (3 days) – Summer Season Away from the luxuries and quality life, the extreme sports, Nice is a city that target tourists with a special appetite to the sea. Like many of its sister cities, Nice's life revolves around its " Promenade des Anglais" coast. Every traveler who comes to Nice for the first time will notice the rough landing of the plane. This is mainly because of the small runaway. After all, the airport is surrounded from three directions by the sea. Another great thing about going to Nice is that it is right in the middle between Cannes (30 minute metro ride to the West) and Monaco (30 minute ride to the East). In Cannes, we spent half a day to tour the city and be educated about the famous celebrities that visit each hotel during the Cannes Festival Ceremony. From there we took a boat cruise to the small island of Ste Honorat. Being on a small island gives you the luxury of solitary, whether it is hiking around the island or swimming by yourself. At night, we explored the city of Monaco and Monte Carlo. I hardly classify Monte Carlo as a city as all I can see there is Casinos. The city has an exceptional road structure as the city has 3 main roads. Those 3 main roads are parallel and run above each other. While walking around, there were areas that we could only reach by using elevators from one road to another. Sometimes if you are unlucky and get lost, you might find yourself taking an escalator to a casino and exiting on the other side to go where you want. Swimming on Nice's beach wasn't a pleasant experience. First of all, the beach is very rocky. It is hard to lie down without experiencing some sore pain in your back. Other than that, my swim didn't pass by without some distractions. For someone, like yours truly, who has been swimming in beaches in the Arab region where women bath in normal bikinis, the sight of women swimming topless was an odd one that you try to avoid. I could not deny the constant internal temptation to keep an eye on the beach in case I catch a woman who does not want to deny her twin assets their share of sun tan. Unfortunately, most of those who did were oldies who are in their 40s or 50s and the sight of their aging wrinkled boobs can be a horrifying sight that you would wish if they remained sealed. Overall, let's say that I started appreciating the value of bras. Our other activities included a visit to Eze village – you walk in small alleys on a mountain where you are surrounded by souvenir shops all around you before reaching the top mountain to enjoy a panoramic view of Nice & Monaco. I couldn't believe my eyes when I read about a 'Cactus garden'. There they were showing you all different shapes and sizes of cactuses. Another thing worth doing is the tour of the Fragrance factory there. For a city populated by the youth, Nice is more of a partying city with a high unemployment rate. A great activity to watch at night other than dining was the sight of roller bladders who were doing stunts around ice cream cones and dancing on musical beats. One exceptional guy was doing the moonwalk with his roller blades while dancing on Michael Jackson's "Scream". He even portrayed him with the hate and the infamous white glove. Some of the guys were really talented. [P.S: this post has been in draft version for the last one month. LOL]
Geneva 
Interlaken
(1 day) – Winter Season (23 Sep)
Jungfraujoch 
Nice 2009
Four Seasons in 10 days
Ramadanian Thoughts II
I know that we are reaching the end of ramadan and this post might appear later but I was inspired after publishing last year's Ramadanian thoughts and this year I had few more
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for the last couple of years, the radio stations in the area no longer plays songs in ramadan. They would play some of the silly 10 to 15 comic shows, and between breaks, they would play "anasheed". The Nasheed genre is a growing genre and at a certain point in time almost all arab artists have done at least a nasheed or two. But really, what's the difference between a nasheed and a song? there are 2 definitions I've heard so far:
nasheed - is a form of songs with limited use of musical instruments. Usually there are no melodies, electronica and tunes and the beats tend to be drum based only - I don't know what's the source of this but I heard of a hadith on the prophet where Aisha was celebrating Eid and there were of girls who were celebrating with only drums and the "arabic daf" - so maybe that's why those forms of instruments are accepted. I don't know if they had piano at that time, would it be allowed or not?
The other characteristic is that the topic is not about love and it should be about islam or religion.
However, over time, I saw that there are many anasheeds that are using more instruments and are covering different topics like kids, marriage and parents. So really, I can't see where do they really draw the line and the difference between a song and a 'nasheed'.
Some of the favourite anasheeds tha I like are for sami yousef "you came to me" and this one.
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Another habit that some people adopt in ramadan and especially the last 10 night is the act of "i3tikaf". It was encouraged by the imam of the mosque in his last jumaa prayer. Unfortunately, when I went to pray the other day in the mosque, I was shocked by the bad smell and how dirty the mosque was. I am not against the i3tikaf but the sight of dirty laundry, smelly blankets and pillows is just not acceptable and unless there is a mechanism to keep the mosque clean, then I'd prefer that i3tikaf is not performed.
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Leilet Al -Qadr is better than the prayers of a 1000 months. If you do the calculations of 1000/12 = then this is equivalent to 83.33 years, which is more than average lifetime of a person. So my idea is if you manage to catch one leilet qadr in a lifetime, then this is more than enough.
So for all the potential travel partners who use the argument of "but if we travel, we will miss Leilet El Qadr which is probably the 27th night", I confront them with my logic. Assuming that you sincerely pray on the odd night numbers of Ramadan, I guess that the chances of scoring one Leilet Al Qadr night is higher than gambling on the Roulette.
P.S: it is ironic that I convinced my travel partner to fly yesterday (i.e. before 27th night) and my inner conscience couldn't help me but to schedule my flight today after I prayed last night. Gosh, I am such a hypocrite. Oh well, he will be enjoying a day more in the Alpes Mountains before I join him. :D
Status Update
2 months of no blogging.
I was just not in the mood
between vacations in jordan and in palestine
yep - palestine for 4 to 5 days where I roamed toul karem, beit la7m, ramallah
too bad I couldn't go to jerusalem
but at least I went to the nativity church
loved it
spent 2 weeks in jordan as well
wanted to go to syria but...
passed CFA Level I
which is bad news
this means I am now obliged to finish level II and level III to continue it.
I am planning preparation for that in November
workwise, I got promoted. :D
I am on twitter as well.
although I don't like it. you have to tweet daily and frequently otherwise, your tweets will be surpassed by other twitters
overall, I am happy with my personal achievements in year 2009
I anticipate updating my "relationship status" soon. :D
TAG: Eight Meme
I was tagged by Asoom around one month ago. At that time, there might not have been many interesting things to talk about. So here it is:
Toronto's Miracle of Runway 24L
It has been over 2 weeks since the incident of the Air France Flight 447 that departed from Rio de Janeiro to Paris. I am sure that many of us are either following the case or at least aware that it happened.
Brain Implosion
My life is about moving from one obsession to another.
Bewildering interruptions on the beach
I have given up. I wish I can find a peaceful place where I can enjoy reading my book. I can't read at home unless I am going to bed. We don't have many bookstores here (actually, we have only one) and if you read there, then you'd most probably be kicked out during prayers time.
