A trickster’s theory of everything
April 15th, 2009Origins of the Financial Mess by Alan Blinder
March 26th, 2009Celebrating Work
March 22nd, 2009PAL and NTSC
March 21st, 2009I donno why I remembered this today… When I was a kid, my mom brought some VHS tapes from Japan. When we wanted to watch them on our VCR, you could hear the audio, but the picture/video was all scrambled.
I remember my dad always wanted me to record on the VCR this TV programme that aired on Jordan TV then, called 60 Minutes, every Friday from 8pm to 9pm, because my father would be working in the supermarket he owned back then. Owning a supermarket pretty much meant that my father did not have weekends.
On one Friday, we ran out of VHS tapes that I record on them the TV programme. So I resorted to the VHS tapes that my brought from Japan. I took one of them, and recorded on it some sample. It worked. You could actually record on a VHS tape in both PAL and NTSC! That was a discovery. Suddenly, those tapes had potential. That’s when I knew that PAL and NTSC are colour encoding systems that were pretty much isolated from the hardware/tape.
A few months later, a Japanese family had relocated from Jordan back to Japan. They offered all their electronics for 250jds. Amongst those electrical appliances was a VCR that supported NTSC! The bulk of the tapes that my mother brought were saved by my recordings of the TV programme, 60 minutes. My mom enjoyed watching those tapes.
After a while, I noticed that the PAL VCR was used much more than the NTSC VCR. We used to rent out from a video shop in Shemeisani called JVTC! In school, we used to circulate amongst a small circle of friends porn videos that played on the PAL VCR. The only problem is that it had to circulate, which meant you could not have the porn videos for long. You would promise and swear by God that it would be returned tomorrow, but then bring it back after 3-4 days. It’s among the few things that never spurred a fight between the lender and the borrower. It was hush hush all the way. Things had to be resolved politically for the lender. Otherwise, it would be a scandale.
So I had this idea of playback the porn video from PAL VCR, and then record it back on NTSC. First of all, this meant I can have a copy, but more importantly, a copy that played on the VCR that supported NTSC, which was used less often, and would make my copy more secure; so that if my parents slide in my copy into the PAL VCR, it would show scrabbled video input!
I remember putting one whole day on that. I needed more wires and adapters to achieve that. I went and asked in one electronics shop in Jabal Hussein, called Al Alamiyeh. But they did not have the pieces I needed. I could never do it.
A few months later, VCR boxes could support all encoding systems in one box; PAL, NTSC and SECAM! I think PAL and SECAM were both supported in the box we had, but not NTSC.
After a few years, Radio Shack opened in Amman in Garden’s street. By then, we were swapping porn videos on the computer using diskettes and CDs! Which brought privacy like no other.
How much is too much!
March 21st, 2009Computer says no
March 4th, 2009The classical “computer says no” scene in Little Britain.
Jordan Internet Connectivity Experience
March 4th, 2009I buy prepaid ADSL cards to connect to the internet. It is probably the best way to hook to the internet in Jordan because of the traffic capping; every month you are capped with a certain number of GBs of traffic; usually 5-10GB/month.
I used to use Cyberia prepaid cards, but they recently starting giving less value; it used to be 16JD ($22) for a 512kbps DSL per month with a 10GB traffic cap, and now it is 5GB traffic cap. So I decide to try another prepaid card; so I found Sama ADSL cards.
Sama ADSL cards are 12JD ($17), and you get 10GB traffic cap. So I bought 2 cards. It worked the first day quite well (last Friday), but now I am getting no more than 15kb on my connection. I thought it might have been that I finished my 10GB traffic cap, but according to my bandwidth monitor, I did not download more than 2GB.
I just scratched the second card I have, just to see what is going wrong. I am still getting 9kb. NYTimes.com takes up to 2 minutes to load. Watching a YouTube video is out of the question.
The whole internet connectivity situation in Jordan is one big problem. It’s what everybody complains about for years now. I don’t know how the government thinks we can build a knowledge economy and create dot coms. It’s going down the drain.
Little Britain Again
March 3rd, 2009Little Britain is a masterpiece. Matt Lucas and David Williams are geniuses. Their ability to capture Britain and its people is phenomenal. Exaggerated at times but to that right bit for us to understand the characters, the humor, and appreciate their Brilliance. The attention to detail in the script, acting, speech, costume and gestures is out of this world.
Obtaining a License to Kill and Injure in Amman!
February 27th, 2009Every Friday the scene is repeated. Near every mosque in Amman (and they are many) the prayers park their car in an illegal and chaotic way; they would do double and triple parking, block narrow roads, and even park on both sides of the street.
Today for instance, I was going back home at prayers time. At the beginning of the airport road, there is a mosque, and on the right lane of the airport road, there were 4-6 cars parking, plus tens of cars almost blocking one of the exits which leads to Wadi El Seir (for instance, if you had a 4×4 car, you wouldn’t be able to exit). Basically, near that mosque, the airport road becomes only one lane.
So I was on the road doing 70km per hour on the right lane. Suddenly my right lane is occupied by those parking cars of the prayers. I had to transfer to the left lane to bypass the parking cars. In doing so, I have to manage with cars doing 100-130km/hr. Nothing bad happened, but I can imagine accidents or near-accidents happening because of these parked cars on the road.
This is happening near many mosques in Amman at prayers’ time. And it is not only Amman. In Dubai, I saw a complete street being blocked by prayers who parked their cars.
But does attending the Friday’s prayer give a license to these people to jeopardizing the safety of the roads, and ultimately the safety of other people? Are they indifferent whether people were killed or injured in a car accident because of the way they park their cars? I can really imagine a sheikh or some of the prayers saying that if I get killed or injured, that I simply deserve it, because I do not pray! I can even imagine them defending their illegal parking; with words like: “There is no wrongdoing if you are going to pray”! Or even worse: “God will protect us all”.
I really don’t understand how these prayers, who park their cars in an illegal way that compromises road safety, can engage in a spiritual connection with God knowing that they have just committed a wrongdoing that can cost the life of someone or cause sufferings for others.
I don’t think that God approves of such actions. You cannot break the law because you want to pray. Praying is not a force majeure. Praying is not an excuse. Praying does not rectify your intentions. Praying is not a license to kill or injure. Praying does not make you above the law.
If you want to park your car near the mosque, just plan it ahead so that you arrive their one hour before the prayers. That way, you would find good parking spaces! Otherwise, I would suggest finding a proper parking even if it is 1km far away. It’s not like Amman has a parking problem.
This license to kill and injure in the name of God is also a repeated scene in Ramadan. People start driving with a lot of nervousness and short-temper. We all saw how many cars drive the wrong way just before sunset, or drive at crazy speeds.
What’s sad is that authorities do not fine those prayers; as if they become first grade citizens for a moment. It seems that the authorities are empowering this license to kill and injure. The department of traffic in the government looks away. It shows you what an uncivilized country we can be. If the government is serious about keeping our roads safe, they should dispatch policemen to fine these prayers. This is how the law is supposed to be enforced. Otherwise, the message from the government is crystal-clear: “There are people above the law with a license to kill and injure”. It makes perfect logic for me to conclude so. Aren’t policemen law-enforcement officers after all!
I care little about my safety, but I care a lot about the safety of my beloved ones who might one day get killed or injured because of these wrongdoings. I would not forgive the wrongdoers then. I will want a true revenge, and a painful one, because it is very difficult to lose beloved ones or see them suffer because someone decided not to walk 200-300 meters. I will kill and bruise in return. I won’t accept destiny.
I will TRY to create this website parked2kill.com sometime end of the year. It will be for everyone to post photos of people parking their cars in ways that can cause accidents. You bet I will take photos from time to time of those cars on Friday, and post them with plate numbers. If traffic authorities give a flying crap one day, those plate numbers might be useful.
I doubt it too!