The Prepasted Toothbrush
If you're really too lazy to put toothpaste on your toothbrush, it turns out that for only 5 dollars you can buy a "prepasted toothbrush". No, really. It's not a joke, either. That's an Ebay [...]
August 2012
Made in the USA
Stumbled upon this t-shirt design, obviously written on a computer that can't handle Arabic characters. I love the "Made in the USA" stamp is proudly displayed though. :-P I'd love to see someone wearing [...]
Ramadan TV Review: Everything that’s wrong about Nagy Atallah
It’s not that the film is about theft: from everyone loves a good heist film [the Italian Job! Ocean’s 11, 12, 13!], never more so when the money is being stolen from the bad guy. [...]
NiTON: Nations in Transition Olympic News
On South Sudan’s flag, Egypt’s uniforms, Saudi Arabia’s female athletes, Ramadan, the minute of silence, and Malaysia’s pregnant athlete. All in one friendly article! Their budgets may be a tad tighter and their delegations smaller, [...]
July 2012
Joan Juliet Buck, pen for sale (cheap!)
That looks like a very natural picture, that would totally dupe Ms. Buck. The article that Vogue published about Syrian first lady Asmaa al-Assad and has long been removed from their [...]
Ramadan and Tisha B’Av
I started eating last night [28 July / 9 Ramadan / 9 Av ] right as my Jewish colleagues, here in my summer workshop in the US, started fasting – an amusing reversal of situation [...]
Egypt ‘celebrates’ 60 years of military occupation
Hello again! A second blog post this week, also originally posted at "Foreign Policy - Transitions" -- a brief reminder of why the revolution is not over and that battling military rule is as much [...]
My first lady doesn’t wear a tiara (and that’s a good thing)
Long overdue but worth a post as the topic regularly keeps coming back. First posted at Foreign Policy Transitions. This is what I received by email. Classy, right? Since the presidential elections [...]
#SudanRevolts: Why we’re ignoring the revolution in Sudan
Crossposted at Foreign Policy Transitions. In brief: besides, as Jon Stewart says, "we don't care to know enough about countries we meddle in", Sudan has suffered for so long from such negative coverage that the [...]
June 2012
WWMBD? (What will the Muslim Brotherhood do?)
Crossposted at Foreign Policy Transitions. In short: two elected presidents and one who died then resurrected, a (political) party on the street and possible backroom deals, and we haven't got a clue as to where [...]