The day I nearly got arrested in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

There are times when things happen, but the mind and body is a mere guest to the scenes played out. And then in the quiet 4 am of an ordinary sleepless night , the mind comes to an utter realization of the profoundness of what had happened months ago.

Well the story is something like this...

We were 5 people. Myself and my husband Ammar, my friend Umaima and her husband Taha, and good old Ali Bhai. It was weekend night and left with only one choice of entertainment (feeding our bellies), we head out to a Peshawari place in the most crowd-infested streets of Thuqba (an old part of Khobar). Usually cringing away from such jammed areas, we are drawn every time by those hot, mouthwatering, sweat-laced chapli kababs and karhai that remind us of Karachi and its dhabbas.

The deal here however is that there is no place for ladies to sit. Or as in Saudia, "No Family Section". With saliva filled mouths awaiting our meals, we ladies sit in the car and try to share our food with the seats we sit on. As it happened that on this fine hot desert evening, I went over to my friend's Camry and hopped in. She was seated in the front passenger seat and convinced me to sit in the driver's seat because it was practical to put the tray on the box in the middle of the seats. At this point I can hear my enlightened reader's go "Aaaaaaah ....". But the Aaaah comes later, after our food was all plunged down our esophagus and the men returned, there came a policeman knocking down my window.

The thing to understand is that its very difficult to make Saudi police or any official for that matter to understand anything at all.

There is the language problem.

Then there is the temperament problem.

Then there is the social problem.

There is the ego problem.

The list goes on.

Anyhow, we made the guy understand with what little Arabic we knew that we were just eating in the car and I had not driven and come out on my own. Oh... did I mention before... women cant drive in KSA??? Yep, this is the world's only country that doesn't allow its women to drive. Its a crime and is severely punished. Jail. Fine. The whole works.

So back to the guy and his insistance that I had driven myself to this place to eat, and to top off the frying pan effect, another greasy substance arrives to add to the fuel; a motawwa.

This word brings with it all levels of negative feelings. Motawwas are the religious police from the Ministry of Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice. No I am NOT making it up! Such a ministry EXISTS in KSA. So now the Motawwa who are always all too eager to jump in and pounce on any wrong doing gets involved.

Our story is told again. It gets revalued. The food tray provides evidence.

They reluctantly agree putting all facts that I could not have driven the car to the place, specially with all the men backing us up.

We are told to go.

We sigh ; relieved.

Ready to almost run ourselves out of our skins, we are stopped once again and told that:

"... and if ever ... I am ever ... seated behind the steering wheel ..."

Money is the Root of All Good

I was reading Atlas Shrugged this past week. It is a long and difficult journey through the book. But every second of reading it was worth it. When I finished, I was exalted.

I am posting an edited excerpt from the book. This was being said by Francisco de Anconia, one of the books' heroes ; addressing a general gathering but directing it towards Hank Rearden.

"So you think that money is the root of all evil? "Have you ever asked what is the root of money?
Money is a tool of exchange, which can't exist unless there are goods produced and men able to produce them. Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for value. Money is made possible only by the men who produce.
When you accept money in payment for your effort, you do so only on the conviction that you will exchange it for the product of the effort of others. Those pieces of paper, which should have been gold, are a token of honor--your claim upon the energy of the men who produce. Your wallet is your statement of hope that somewhere in the world around you there are men who will not default on that moral principle which is the root of money. But you say that money is made by the strong at the expense of the weak? What strength do you mean? It is not the strength of guns or muscles. Wealth is the product of man's capacity to think. Is money made by the intelligent at the expense of the fools? An honest man is one who knows that he can't consume more than he has produced.' To trade by means of money is the code of the men of good will. Money rests on the axiom that every man is the owner of his mind and his effort. Money demands of you the recognition that men must work for their own benefit, not for their own injury, for their gain, not their loss--that the common bond among men is not the exchange of suffering, but the exchange of goods.
Money demands that you sell, not your weakness to men's stupidity, but your talent to their reason; it demands that you buy, not the shoddiest they offer, but the best that your money can find.
But money is only a tool. It will take you wherever you wish, but it will not replace you as the driver. It will give you the means for the satisfaction of your desires, but it will not provide you with desires.
Money will not buy intelligence for the fool, or admiration for the coward, or respect for the incompetent. Only the man who does not need it, is fit to inherit wealth--the man who would make his own fortune no matter where he started. If an heir is equal to his money, it serves him; if not, it destroys him.
If so, then your money will not give you a moment's or a penny's worth of joy. Money will not serve the mind that cannot match it.

Alarm Clock!!

I admit I have been sleeping. I knew I had been sleeping.
Its so easy to sleep than to be awake in this age and time. My country is sleeping. I see it everyday in the news, I hear it from the people. The country I right now live in, which conjures up the fallacy that to be a woman is a sin let alone let"allow" her to vote or drive a car. The pain is too much. And hence, its easier to not think. To not struggle.
To just watch that episode of 'Desperate Housewives' or watch some neurons-killing Indian film. To not just escape but to stay there. To just be still.
But isn't that what means death?To not think is to not exist. To not want, is to not live.
and I choose to live.[Image]
We have lost many of our virtues. The first one ....thought; the other reason and another laziness. Reason without thought is stupidity. It is senseless, baseless _ a fallacy, an acceptance of darkness...saying yes to a void.If we act on something without reason, without thought, it holds no value. Because it was acted without reason...without spirit...without TRUTH.The contradiction to reason is foolishness, laziness, cowardice and all that is vice.
The question here is even when we know the truth and gain the wisdom of reason... we lack to act. The lack of action is an action unto itself_ its an inaction.When we decide that we are going to act upon inaction, we are making a noose for our own self; making a wreath for our own funeral. I will not fashion some frivolous speech or pump you with Red Bull. Just this that :
Think, Reason, Pursue and Triumph!