#blameAhmedZainal

Blaming Ahmed Zainal is in! Get with it!

Murdering intelligence is a crime.

In my job, I interview private sector employees and analyze their jobs in order to set a training plan to improve their performance or ready them for a new position. The employees fill out an assessment form before I start and I just seen one of the worst, although a common sight, unfortunately.
A young man, born on 1987, has a hard time writing properly. Simply writing! He left school at junior high, never finishing it.
The number of Bahrainis that leave school is shocking me. I don't have numbers but I constantly see young, very young Bahraini's who are illiterate or are very weak in basic reading and writing. The fact that our kingdom has systems that allow illiterate people to exist frankly sickens me.
As far as I know, primary education is mandatory. However, if I was, say, to not allow my son to study, are there any penalties to be imposed on me? Would anyone notice in the first place?
I saw many illiterate working men my age or younger who dropped out of primary school. How on earth is it possible that we cannot track and stop such occurrences? 


I suggest demand that education up to high school be mandatory. Parents who fail to allow their children to study up to high school should be punished by law. Repeat offenders may face numerous penalties aiming to benefit the child. Extreme cases need the child to be removed from the custody of his/her parents and allowed to study should his/her parents deny him/her education or lead destructive lives that prevents the kids from studying.


And to all the Maatams and Mosques, shame on you. You should step up your game! These places of worship are blessed with strong social relationships and has a social responsibility to society. They should address parents who allow their kids to not study or prevent them from doing so. These social measures would often be more useful than regular legal measures.


The ongoing problem is that the illiterate do not try to improve themselves at all. The government does provide alternatives for adults who wish to finish their studies up to high school, but I have yet to meet one who did despite spending 3 years on this project. I was really ecstatic to hear about A9eel which is a unique programme to promote good work ethics and in turn push for individuals to improve themselves. I hope that the data of my work helped Tamkeen see the extent of the problem and made them come up with this.


If you know someone who stopped studying, please, talk to them. If you know of a parent who allows their kids to not study, talk to them, to their kids or report them if so needed. 
You can make a change. Real change. 

In case of Black Hole, Break Glass.

My Physics Professor at NYIT-Bahrain shared this picture with me. She used to work at CERN and one of her physicist friends sent her this:

I asked her if this button is real, appearance it is. it shuts down the whole experiment should things get out of hands.
I know the picture is of a wall (or a table, I dunno) and the skeptics will not believe its CERN, well, she gave me one more picture to look at. That's one GIANT machine!







This better be on Digg soon or I'm switching to Reddit.

Not as funny as you think

A Bahraini View Point

Bahrain is filled with Negative Energy. Its giving off bad vibes or something and it's very contagous. I often adopt a "we-can-do-it" attitude sprinkled with some chllenge in a despeate attempt to infuse those around me with what is now so lacking in my heart.
Lands being stolen, riots for frivoulus reasons, traffic jams,  profiteering traffic cops, endless pllution and no hope for individuals of rising in economical class. Everyone has a serious complaint. That amount of negative energy has generated its own mass and gravity that one would need a massive amount of energy to escape from its grasp.
Hence, it is refreshing and inspiring to see tidbits of hope. Shining examples roaming our decayed earth. Mahmood Alyousef (The famous reborn blogger) is channeling his energy to serve the forces of good. His quick video interviews, named Bahraini Views, shows other people who still have that zest, that glimmer in their eyes and that rock hard determination.
Thank you. This is just what I need. Just what, many of us need.

Please point your browser to their You Tube page and subscribe to get their latest entries.
http://www.youtube.com/bahrainiviews

Me no understand!

I was working on a Beta version of Microsoft Office 2010. Powerpoint gave me a unique remark. Click on the picture to enlarge and read:

"Whats this? Its all gibberish to me! Naaaahh. Throw it out. Throw all  that shit out!"
Funnier if you read it in a Chris Rock voice, BTW.

The end of Blogging

In 1996 I had a geocities website which I coded entirely in HTML using notepad. Old school. I also used HTML based chat rooms. That was big then. But times changed. 
10 years later I started blogging here on my desktop. And blogging as a concept came to be. 
A huge leap to be sure. But, as is the case with print media, blogging as we know it is dying. 
It was cute to see people describe thier blogs as ramblings, thoughts, opinions, and the like. It gave humans insight never previously available. Access to restricted news and innermost thoughts to humans. But, is this even valid right now?

I concider my self a good measure of when things are gaining popularity and when they begin to die. It is my opinion that blogging in that sense is dead. I really do not care what bloggers think anymore. 
Example: if you overheard someone talk about anything on a supermarket line or on a train or a bank, does it really matter to you? Probably not. It's just something someone anonymous to you said. So what? Why on earth would the same thing matter to me if it was printed on a blog?
Gaining an insight on peoples thoughts was once what blogs enabled you to do. Twitter has since took over that responsability. And still, twitter reflect only the tweeting community, not general public, it is then still a limited tool but it has two advantages. For one, I would think that hot topics and breaking news are better represented by an average of a group rather than the one sided argument of one or two bloggers. Trends in Twitter does that. I also think that the common blogger does not resemble the common man much, twitterers however, while still different, are a closer match. 
Twitter is not complete. It will either evolve or something better will come along. But blogs ceased to provide me with solid opinions representative of the masses or unbiased credible news.  
So are blogs dead? No. They are simple different. 
Specialized blogs are a valuble source of information and expression. While the musings of a random girl or the rants of some man start losing interest, specialized blogs by informed people gain importance. They resemble newspaper columnists. A finance website by someone with a solid background in finance or investment can provide valuable insight. Car blogs by racers and die hard car guys, fitness blogs by trainers or amature players and movie blogs by film aficinados are all good examples. 
It is from this understanding that I started two other blogs, arablish.net is one that focuses on the lack of respect and attention we show to the Arabic language, being an ex newspaper columnist and the son of a renouned poet I saw my self able to add value there. My other blog, ithnain.com is a video cast presented by my self and fellow blogger Eyad Ebrahim in Arabic as we both have around 20+ years of gaming experience. 
This blog (theredbelt.com), being unfocused has been losing both readership and my interest. Infact, most Bahraini bloggers feel a slump is taking place. Blogs, as they were, are ineffective in this age and have little, if any, impact at all. Posts are dwindeling and bloggers are stopping. In fact, if you are Reading this, chances are that you are, or were, a blogger yourself. It is a small closed inactive community. 
It is a shame but it has to be realized sooner or later. Blogs and bloggers need to evolve and provide significant value added. The times are achanging.

I used to blog from my desktop. But not anymore. I now wrote this on an email on a very different device. 
Times changed  We must change. 


Sent from my iPhone