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Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in Abu Nagi's LiveJournal:

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    Saturday, November 14th, 2009
    2:54 pm
    Dream on...

    It's been a long time I guess.

    In the last year and a couple months I have:

    1) Gotten married
    2) Migrated to France (I was already here since May 2007; with the exception of a couple returns
        to Saudi Arabia).
    3) Struggled to find work.
    4) Became a street musician (Which in fact worked out fairly well.)
    5) Became a father (again.)
    6) Found work (finally.)

    All in all, not the quiestest 15 months I have known.

    What I would really like now is about a year without responsibilities during which I could de-stress.

    Haha, dream on....


    Monday, June 15th, 2009
    4:21 pm


    Sara Marie Boudica Mac Millan
    Born 5 June, 2009, 3.2 kilos

    Beautiful as only a child can be to his or her parents.
    Thursday, November 27th, 2008
    7:54 pm
    En fin, en France
     What mad marriage time and the stuff that fills it!

    After a very long wait, I am en route to legal status in France.

    This is the culmination of an effort which required more than a year and not inconsiderable expense (read: the tiny bit of money that I had remaining.)

    There were a good many surprises. Nearly every time I believed I had the required papers in order (for various reasons I had to actually replace _all_ of my papers relating to identity etc) I learned there was another additional requirement. This meant repeated trips to the Mairie or other agencies to put everything in order.

    Finally having gained the right to claim legal status here, I was informed by the Prefecture (a combination of sort of Police, Sheriff and city hall for those unfamiliar with the in-and-outs of the French administrative system) that it was better to make the request from outside the country.

    Again, I had to provide additional papers, well above and beyond what I was told was needed. These required genuine French people to go and sign various other papers in various offices and then send them to me via DHL. In the end it still took much longer than anticipated.

    The final surprise was that I am _still_ not permitted to work until sometime after January. Superb.

    I am taking advantage of the time to work on a novel - this is the first time I get to to the 40,000+ word mark where I have not been utterly bored with what I write, nor finding it totally irrelevant.

    That's all the news.

    Current Mood: neutral
    Current Music: Patty Smith
    Monday, April 7th, 2008
    11:45 pm
    About that mole the back of your neck...

     It's been going on for years.

     I see a barber, they of course get rather intimate with my neck. Sometimes they say:

     I don't really like the looks of that mole.

    These are not hairstylists, these are good, old-fashioned, blood-letting, circumcising
    barbers from Turkey and Pakistan. They know a thing or two about things on your
    skin.

    I go to the doctor or dermatologist, who depending on how seriously they take the
    fact that everyone in one side of my family develops skin cancer, usually says:

    Oh. Well. That. Well. We could... well, BIOPSY.

    This sends me into a panic every time, I ask them to just remove it. Every time they say
    "No, no, no need to remove it unless it's cancerous." and I argue with them, and lose
    the argument.

    So, today being my last night in Saudi Arabia for at least six months (I live near Paris
    now) I passed by the last barber who told me, "I don't like that mole."

    With chicken sandwiches in hand, I bravely stepped over that threshhold and said

            Sheel-ha (Which is my baby talk way of saying, "take the bitch.")

    It wasn't especially painful. Ok, that's a load of crap. I won't tell you how they did it
    except it took two people. As the younger barber who wanted to remove it was just
    getting started, the older barber said (in turkish-accented  Arabic): 

        Oh, this one is really dug in there well, you will have to burn it out from
        the center.

    A short while later, though it seemed like about four lifetimes of searing agony, he
    showed me the mole which was a nasty, neoplastic looking thing that didn't belong
    on my neck at all.

    This evening, I realized the mole lasted on my neck, about as long as my marriage
    lasted. Somehow, I think that's significant.




    Friday, September 8th, 2006
    3:27 pm
    The problem of human memory
     The way human memory works has some problems (I am not suggesting that someone needs to fix these items, but I was curious as if this is just me, or a universal issue.)

    Let us say you are writing fiction. You refer to the lead character as ???????, thinking "That's not a bad name for a guy who does blah blah blah blah." Forty pages later you realize the name means "Stay where you are!" in one of the languages you know. Suddenly, the name seems less fitting for the protagonist of your story. You try out the name "?????." At first, it seems to work.. but then on hunch, you get out your much dog-eared copy of "Blankety Blank over Blank" from the "Blankland Series" by Blah B. Blah.... Ok, it's not exactly the same name but damn. It has the same letters. This can go on endlessly - you can even use, or write a random name generator, but the fact is... whatever it spits out, your memory can find something to which it seems to refer.

    Same problem with music. Imagine for a moment you are into bizarre music from Central Asia (humor me, please): You are writing a folk tune (Don't ask yourself why you write Central Asian folk tunes, that's a dangerous place to go). You are writing it because the main theme came out in one of your improvisations on the kebak kemanja (A kind of folk violin used in Azerbaijan, Iran, and parts of Turkey.)

    It's a beautiful piece of music - even though everyone is used to hearing you play this stuff incessantly, it still caught their attention. Your four year old son even stopped running around to listen to you.

    You think, "Wow."

    All full of pleasure at having been the vehicle for the delivery of a new piece Uzbek Maqqam, you suddenly think to yourself.... "Hmm... what was that piece from Estonia or Latvia again?" You get out your CD of archaic music from Estonia. No, it's not there. Wait.. what about the ancient music of Norway CD? Ah... there's half of the same melody, played slowly on a reed flute. The key is more or less the same, and really what you wrote sounds like it could be a variation on the same piece.


    Your confidence shaken, you actually ask someone: "Is this the same piece of music?" and make them sit through the Norse music, and then play your "own" composition. They claim they don't even hear the similarity. You play your composition again, and now you can hardly tell it from the Norse piece.

    I am fairly sure we shouldn't ever expect to do anything original, considering the scope of human history. But sometimes it seems a less encyclopedic memory is more useful.

    Current Mood: None
    Current Music: Jack and Charlie Coen: The Branch Line
    Saturday, August 5th, 2006
    4:00 pm
    Everything is yet the same
     I dissapeared for a bit, because to be honest.. the world two years ago was making me sick and I didn't want to talk about it.

    Now, nearly two years after, it is still making me sick and I don't want to talk about it.

    In truth I wound up back here through cruising the web site of a former friend from the US. Since most nearly everyone who knew my prior to 1991 is dead, I am in the habit of trying to seek out all the persons I knew roughly between 1989 (after returning to Chicago) and 1997 (leaving Chicago.) I have some admittedly strange notions about not seeing or talking to anyone who has known me more than the last couple of years.

    Back to the former friend - someone I treated with respect (not mere human to human respect, I mean, I gave them equal time with anyone else in my life) through most of the time I lived in Chicago. When my business was active, there were several times when I didn't even pay myself in which I helped this person economically (the individual is nearly always jobless and often without fixed abode). For any such help I gave them, I consider myself already rewarded as it were. But I have an occassional habit of looking at their web site and getting outrageously angry at them for ignoring me for two years.

    Considering all the people I have ignored, and failed to communicate with in my 4.5 years of expatriation I have no room to talk. Go figure.

    Oh, I no longer work for the government of this country, I am now employed by a private company. In some ways this is a good thing: I can speak my mind without concern over how it will affect myself or others close to me. But in truth, I find I have nothing to say about the place that I could not say in front of some high ranking dignitary. Is that because...


    • I no longer fear the consequences of speaking my mind?

    • I have bought into the system to such a degree that I think it's normal?

    • The place is so crappy outside of government employment that I have learned that crappiness is a local condition, and unrelated to the government?
    • The place has changed so much in the last couple of years that I have nothing to complain about?

    • I have become rather idiotic in my slightly advanced age?



    I am not sure any of the above really captures the truth.

    (Please disregard my spelling - I am not even re-reading because I will never post if I do.)

    Current Mood: thirsty
    Current Music: Air Conditioning [broken]
    Sunday, September 12th, 2004
    6:42 pm
    Life without possibility of parole, in a stinking monkey jail
     My first personal political activism was mostly in the animal rights arena. Although I am not vegetarian (even) any longer, I still think our maltreatment of other living beings is one of the foundations of our maltreatment of other humans.

    Here, I is perhaps evidence that the two maltreatments exacerbate each other.

    After all, Abu Ghraib probably makes some prisons seem like ClubMed.

    Current Mood: litosht
    Current Music: The sounds of children playing
    Monday, September 6th, 2004
    4:41 pm
    To spoon the ocean into a thimble
     Lately, I wonder if I am too quixotic for my own good, and the good of those around me.

    At times I can't sit still - I feel driven to complete various projects that I involve myself with that are ultimately supposed to contribute to social justice; to find time to write about the things that I consider important.

    Consequently, I have no difficulty overlooking my own well-being, and health.

    Yet it's apparent that I will not see the benefit, if any, of my own actions.

    So, what really motivates me? Is it to set an example for my children? We know pretty well that things generally, do not work out in such a manner. Children, at least those of Westerners, are more likely to develop ideals contrary to those of their parents than in sympathy. And I will admit, that the militancy with which I cling to some of my ideals (food quality, boycotting certain multinationals or companies which do business with certain governments) bugs the crap out of some of those around me.

    As I age, I find that I am not "mellowing out" as so many people assured me I would. On the contrary; with age, there are fewer things that seem important to me, and thus have more energy to hurl at a more limited set of goals.

    Oh well, back to work.
    Saturday, September 4th, 2004
    7:21 am
    Ossetia
     The beginning of a long list of things about these events which disturb me, in the sense that I cannot reconcile them with "official" versions of things.


    • Shamil Basayev, one of the major Chechnyan leaders has both denied responsibility, and condemned the operation (so we hear.)
    • Russian special forces can be seen moving toward the walls of the compound, in film, before the "explosion" which preceded the assault (so we saw).
    • Why (if it was Chechnyans) carry out the operation at all? At best, it has ensured that everyone will forget about the travesty that was the last general elections (so we wonder).
    • Is, or is not the region a Muslim region. Some media suggested the population is 70% Muslim. Putin made a point of stating no one should use the crisis as an excuse for ethnic violence, but that makes no sense if the school is primarily Muslim and the hostage takers, supposed Muslims, does it? (so, we ask.)


    I am careful to never call my fellow Muslims "kafir", because there is a hadith which warns us, "The one who calls the Muslim kafir, is a kafir." However, if the responsibility of Muslims, these people have gone far outside the religion - and done nothing to help Islam whatsoever.

    Which is why, in large part, I am suspicious of the affair - like most things in the Russian sphere of influence.
    7:20 am
    Lucked out, I guess
    |.!....
    |.!u+..
    +.).)..
    If I were a NetHack monster, I would be a unicorn. Most people are only after one thing - I try to maintain a quiet and respectful distance until I feel sure that I can trust someone.
    Which NetHack Monster Are You?
    Wednesday, August 18th, 2004
    1:52 pm
    How I Lost the War [I should know better.]
     I should know better.
    Let's face it, my feelings relating to the war on Iraq are well known. I cannot claim to be dispassionate, and when I talk about the war I probably have an agenda, nine times out of ten.
    ( Read more... )

    Current Mood: numb
    Current Music: Lots of whirring fans
    Saturday, June 12th, 2004
    8:22 pm
    Nameless Iraqis
     I was reading an AP article aloud when I realized that it
    contained the phrase "bodies of the men" and I had
    no idea who where "the men", only that a Lebanese had been
    kidnapped and murdered.

    I re-read the previous paragraph and saw the other "bodies"
    belonged to "two Iraqi colleagues" who were also
    kidnapped and murdered. Here I mean to call attention to the fact
    that Iraqi civilian casualties (whoever kills them) are largely
    remaining nameless, however foreign civilians and occupation
    forces warrant having names, as long as they are not from too far
    to the East.

    In the hopes of making my point obvious... would it be acceptable
    to mention the names of a wanted terrorist killed in America, and
    just say: "A number of FBI agents and bystanders died in the
    shootout." My example may seem contrived, but it's hard to
    imagine the (nameless, and faceless) public not being disturbed by
    this kind of reporting.

    Current Mood: other
    Sunday, June 6th, 2004
    11:25 pm
    Conversation with my Dentist
     I sometimes get the benefit of light political chit-chat with my Dentist; who is like myself foreign here (from another Arabian country, though he is rather "Europeanized.").

    My dentist was asking: Are you in communication with your Embassy? Are you thinking of leaving, etc... When he brought up the issue of voting. He explained how he made a point of voting by proxy in both his home country and the European country where he studied dentistry.

    I remembered some of the last years news and reminded him:

    "But Doctor! France is a democracy. And for that matter, so is Lebanon. You have every reason to vote in your elections. Why would I bother?" In truth, his homeland had her first "free" elections in quite a while, during the last year.

    He was mollified by my comment, apparently accepting my implied statement that America is not a democracy.

    Current Mood: alhamdulillah
    Current Music: Air Conditioning
    Monday, March 8th, 2004
    7:01 am
    Life/Articles from Haaretz(Israeli) English Edition
     No time to write lately, preparing for a move to the new apartment (not the one previously
    mentioned!) in two days time.

    Teaching a class on Open Systems at work. There is something special about finding out on a Wed. that you have to teach a class on Saturday (ie. think, given assignment on Friday, due on Monday)
    and succeeding well to bolster ones confidence in ones abilities as an educator. Not that I mean to be a professional educator.

    A couple interesting articles at Haaretz.

    Talking about democracy, Zvi Bar'ei

    The task of the ethicist, Sefi Rachlevsky

    Thursday, February 26th, 2004
    4:52 pm
    Lately....
     I have been away from my journal lately because I suffer from a combination of:


    • writer's block
    • family responsibility (alhamdulillah)
    • workload (both official and unofficial)
    • impending move to new apartment (less than a 1/4 k away from the present)
    • enthusiastic pursuit of hobbies (mostly, coding a mudlib.)


    The first two items are uninteresting. The third leaves me a bit flustered - I am having to charge someone for work done for their business, and it's difficult as in principle my relationship to the client is that of a friend.It seems different if one has the business relationship first - and then later on develops friendship (something which has occurred often in my career.)

    The new apartment would seem to be more comfortable. My current dwellings, huge by American standards are tiny according to the locals. The larger salon (there are two) of the new apartment is 2/3 the size of where I now live.

    I will be happy enough if I can just have some occassional peace and quiet.

    Current Music: Sebestyen, Marta & Ensemble, Okros TRANSYLVANIAN PORTRAITS
    4:44 pm
    animal, human
     The other day, as my son caused chaos about the home in his inimitable 1.725 year old fashion, I thought it fitting to explain to him the difference between humans and animals, with an emphasis on their behavior.

    I realized I had no really good definition of the difference, and so improvised the following:

    1) Animals sleep or run amok until they desire food.

    2) Animals chase other animals, and kill them when they want food.

    Humans add an additional step:

    3) Humans take the carcass of the dead animal and burn it over a fire, while exaggerating their exploits during steps one and two.

    (apologies to any vegetarians.)
    Saturday, January 17th, 2004
    6:49 pm
    Israeli Ambassador Vandalizes Museum Art
     I realize I just keep posting articles from Yahoo and other places with minimal content; but the study of history teaches us that events can say much more than the blabbering observer.

    Here, an Israeli Ambassador desides to engage in his own little "...Taliban-like destruction of art."

    PS. I didn't lift that phrase from an Israeli, it's actually the Turkish Ambassador to Saudi Arabia who uttered the phrase, after the Kingdom tore down (and rebuilt elsewhere) a fort dating from the Turkish occupation of the Penninsula. Still, it's nice to remember what we chose to protest about, and when.

    Current Mood: amused
    Current Music: raindrops and drips
    Wednesday, January 14th, 2004
    2:09 pm
    Saudi Newspaper: "Attack the Roots of Our Problems"
     I am not making this article available for the sake of its criticism of Saudi society, but rather because I think the author's assumptions say something about the difference between the rank and file and the so-called "extremist".

    I think the position of the writer is close to that of the average Muslim in the kingdom. The vast majority of Muslims here, reject the idea that any Muslim who doesn't belong to their sect are "kafir", and thus lawful to be killed.

    No doubt, most Muslims here don't think anyone should be killed. :)

    Allah knows best.
    6:54 am
    US Accused of war crimes in Iraq
     In this article the US is accused of "War Crimes." Not that such accusations have done anything to stop other states accused of them from continuing along their merry way.

    As the article points out, the US has increasingly adopted similar tactics to those used by Israel in its occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

    I guess credibility for the US was already in short supply, but the idea of arresting and holding family members hostage looks really bad. It looks bad when Israel does it, and it doesn't look any better when it is America.

    Let's see, secret trials, secret evidence, indefinite detentions without charges, collective punishment, blacklisting, abductions, torture (ie. making someone kneel in the dirt until they kak themselves, keeping them without food or water, etc... for 24 hours at a time) - perhaps a better comparison is the Soviet Union under Stalin, circa 1936.
    Monday, January 5th, 2004
    7:06 am
    Maybe it really is bin Laden
     Until this morning, I admit I mostly didn't believe bin Laden was alive.

    Most of the tapes I have seen thus far really did look like montage-work performed in a bad public-access cable-tv studio.

    What makes me unsure this time, is bin Laden's warning regarding the precedent of allowing America to topple a Muslim government - "especially after they saw the capture of their former comrade in treachery and collaboration with America" (lifted from the Yahoo news article found here.)

    This is "classic" bin Laden, who would never cooperate with a secular leader such as Hussein, who was regarded as a tool of America until Gulf War II (ie, the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.)

    It's a case however of the "pot calling the kettle black" however; would the real Osama bin Laden forget that he himself was financed and assisted by America in the struggle against the Soviet presence in Afghanistan?
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