Al Shabiba & Al Watan

There will be a small article about my latest book in Al Shabiba in next week's Wednesday issue which can be found in the Cultural Supplementary.

There will be another similar one in Al Watan, however, it is unknown whether it will be printed tomorrow (Wednesday) or some other day of the next week. I will provide more information as it comes my way..

Hope you all enjoy the excitement as much as I do.

in(theweek)twice

Yes, people.

The day of reckoning has come! lol ;oP

theweek has published two articles about me. One written by me and another about my book Wonderous World penned by Patricia Groves.

You can find these both in the downloadable version of the gazette in the below link:

(NB: The section you are looking to download is Section 2. You will find the articles in pages 14 and 17, respectively).

theweek


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I will place, for your convinience, a permanent link to theweek in the sidebar on the right.

Tomorrow

Tomorrow, in theweek, you will find not three. Not one. But two - yes, two articles about me.

Well, in a matter of speaking anyhow..

The first article will involve a critique (as I have mentioned before) about my latest book Wonderous World by someone who has recently joined the vast list of article writers.

And the second, will be my article which is about a crucial topic that is arising in Oman. And for once, it not been edited once. Not even the title.

I hope you all enjoy this week's issue.

Happy New Arab Year

Tomorrow has been announced as the dawn of the new Hijri (Arab) year..

May we all be blessed with a year that we grow closer to God and farther from the sins that call to us..

Happy New Arab Year to all the Muslims around the world..

Offers..Offers..Offers..

I had a slight interview with a reporter last night (29/1/2006) about my latest book Wonderous World, who will issue a small news article in either one of the Omani newspaper's cultural supplement (i.e.: Oman; Al Shabiba; or Al Watan).

I was also approached at the same time to work as a full-time translater/article editor. Yet, I turned down the offer.

I realize that you would have to start at the bottom of the staircase, but that isn't the staircase I am exactly looking for.

There will be other opportunities...

Horizon Newsletter

If any of you are studying or working at the Sultan Qaboos University then here's some good news for you.

An offer has been made to me to include one of my short stories in the English Language's Department newsletter Horizon which is due some time by the end of this week or the next week.

If you find this of interest, then look me up there.

I do hope that you will all like the piece that I will choose for printing, inshallah..

Painful Dismissal of the Heart..

I write to you
After night and day
After I have given up hope on my heart
And set my trail

I write to you
In this season of Winter
In a cold, cold, breeze
Where the warmth whimpers

I write to you
After much dismay
Where hope was once hope
And agony prevails

I write this down
I write to you with my pen about to fall to the ground
And only my sense of survival will be my save

I write to you
With a tear in my eye
Where I have lost friends
And the world just goes by and smiles

I write to you
After giving up hope
On whether I'll get married, stay single, or become some street dope

I write to you
With no fear
Of what the future
Has to conceal

I write to you
From fear of pain
Of suffering the worst
Instead of the happiness that I should gain

I write to you
In this dark corner
Where the shadows of the trees
Have been altered
Where pride used to live
Where agony moves on with bliss
And the attention we both seek is faltered

I write to you
From the darkness of my room
Where the horizon is met by a large un-glowing moon
The visit to fantasy
Is an escape from reality
I hear nothing
Because there is nothing
And at the end of this
I find the one thing that I truly miss
The one thing that has always mattered the most to me
Where life is life is the hope in my dreams
And the flower, the petal will fall into it's pleads

In the end, I write this for you
All for you
Only for you
And I await your reply
Will it come; is it near?

Imperfect Life

I just don't get it. Do bad incidents wait for me to be around so they can roll into action?

Man..

It's like you have your whole day planned out and then suddenly nothing is going right like it should. I wish for one day, you know, I could just have something go my way. Nothing to upset it. Nothing to make it look bad. And certainly nothing to have it go bad.

What would it take?

First I wake up and my printer's being funny; printing when it wants to and when it doesn't want it goes haywire. Then I couldn't find my stuff until like more than 45 minutes of a search. Oh, I found them, but it was like - "you were there?" Couldn't have a proper breakfast when I am supposed to when I take my medication over it. Plus you get out of the house with a really bad mood when you were hoping to have a nice shiny day without that single intangible raindrop.

After all this, I go to Starbucks (yes, like it or not, I still hang out there) to relax and work on a few stuff and at the same time waiting for my friend to come by who has a copy of my CV with him. So, enter the friend. Tired, though. 'What goes friend?' "I feel really bad and I need to go the hosptial". Not a moment to lose. Left my tea there without drinking it towards his house to get his card and off to the clinic he attends. There we find out that his pulse was racing, his blood pressure is high plus his sugar level was a sky rocketing 20! Stayed with him enough to talk to him to get him to relax, after giving him two shots of insolin and stablizing his mood. And then off to his house to drop him off.

Come back to Starbucks.

And what else do I find out?

One of the guys' Grandfather's had just passed away.

It just doesn't pay to get out of bed at all sometimes. But like someone said to me; we're all merely human beings and the imperfect life that we lead is just the fact to state that piece of evidence.

Stay well all.

Not My Day

This isn't my day
It isn't my day at all

Feel like crying
Feel like dying
The pain just won't go away

My friend was at the hospital
Another had his Grandfather die
Or as we would more appropriately say, pass away

Sometimes it just doesn't pay to get out of bed at all

Registrada

I'm sorry everyone..

I've had to take up the last resort option due to circumstances beyond me since an anonymous individual is testing my patience by leaving very rude comments on this blog.

Therefore; I hereby announce that only registered users of blogger.com will be able to post their comments.

I hear your cries, really. And as much I feel its unjustified because of one's childish behavior I've threatened again and again and it's high time to take a stance on this annoying situation.

I hope you all do understand and continue to blog your comments as if nothing has happened..

Thanks again..

Plain Wreckless

Yesterday I almost had an accident because someone thought he owned the roads his 4x4 was rolling over on whilst he cut me without an indicator and with such wrecklessness that not an even a plea to stop by on the highway and reason with him over his behavior.

Knowingly so, he waved off the incident as if it wasn't his fault and sped off over 140 kmph where the speed limit was 120 and this was just after leaving a turning at a large roundabout at Seeb International Airport onwards to the City Centre.

Obviously, my blood was boiling the whole day from that moment on because I wanted to do something about but didn't know what to do. Family said to leave it at that and to thank God that nothing had happened. But my question is this: what if something HAD happened to me and I wasn't able to make it to the centre to see my family for a nice gathering and lunch? What if something had happened to me and no one knew about it? Whose fault is it by then?

I met my friend later on at my hang out spot and told him about the incident asking him what was the number to call about such disturbances on the road and highways. It was the same you called for emergencies. 9999.

So I called it in. And made sure they knew the license plate number and what the 'gentleman' did and how his was behavior was that of idolistic nature.

The police officer behind the phone on the other end said they would send an APB (All Points Bulletin) to all the police cars for that number plate and have him pulled over to be given a few tickets for wreckless driving & overspeeding.

Next time someone like that pisses you off on the highway, don't get mad - get even. Call 9999.

I did..

UNICEF

Someone I know very well is going to launch a CD single in Oman that the money raised behind it will go towards the UNICEF Programme Against Child Abuse.

This person has approached me to write a few lyrics that will go on the front of the CD single that would be launched later this February.

I'll let you know more details about this as I get more information..

3rd invitation

I have been invited for administrating - along with running two other blogs and participating in another and writing in another website's corner - to help run the newly established UAE Community Blog (Arabic).

If you would like to become a member of the blog in order to participate in it, send me an email on: pennedthoughts@gmail.com.

Or you can get in touch with Abdu Yahya of A Secret Arabian Journal.

The Truth Will Set Her Free..

She looks in through the window
Think of what the world would bring in
Telling herself that everything would be better
Once she is in the 'in'

She turns around to look at her doorknob
She returns to her past
She could never ever
Get past that

A tear
A cry
A deep breath
A little sigh

How the world has come by
And taunted her in the night
Fishing her out from one pond
Into a waterfall, for her alone, to fight

She gathers her belongings
She walks to the door
She reaches out to grab the knob
And pulls it inwards to go to another world

This time
She's going to make her own opportunties
No tidal waves, no hidden agenda, no unwritten phase

She is the opportunity waiting to be taken
She is the light of Heaven
She is the first stair in the staircase of success

No more crying
No more lying
No more dying inside
No more lonely nights

Just her and her passion
The future is hers to grasp
The love in ignition
Is just out there, for someone to understand

Good things happen to those who wait..

So, I'm back..

Some good stuff has happened while I was away.

There's been news that a crtitique in theweek about my latest book Wonderous World the coming week's issue along with my new article..


I suppose good things do happen to those who wait..

Life at a stand-still

I found out today, in a hospital visit, that:
- A very good friend of who was diagnosed with Cancer and was being treated with chemotherapy had died a week ago.
- My HgB level has dropped to 11.5 from 12.
- My blood pressure was at a high 134/86.
- And that I had an alarmingly high pulse rate at 133.

I hereby declare mourning for 3 whole days..

Things you just don't see everyday..

1. A woman in full cover veil and probably the most colorfull color ever, hiding away from the public eye to have a smoke of a cigarette.

2. Eight cars crashing on one lane into each other on a public highway.

3. Two cars only fifty metres away from that sight crashing into each other on the other side of the road.

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"..And that concludes our daily broadcast..!"

Eid Al Ghadeer

Ok.

Don't laugh.

I know I am a shi3a and all. But like I explained before, I don't know much about my 'group' of people. Hence this question - if anyone can answer it for me; What is Eid Al Ghadeer all about?

Circumstances Vs. Me: 2 - 0

So I just got back from the hospital only to have found out that my appointment was not today but rather tomorrow. I tried to implore the staff to get them to do a quick blood sample and give me the meds I needed but to no avail. Not because they didn't want to, though. But more because there were no doctors around - everyone was busy for some reason; rounds; conference, stuff like that.

So I told them I would come back the next day - Sunday.

This means I lose on two days of the week I could have worked on sending out my new job applications to those 29 companies I have listed.

What can I say?

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"To light a candle in the dark is better than to curse the dark a thousand times" - Chinese proverb

The Definition of Cheepskates

How idiotic do you have to be in order to realize that there is an unfair advantage between rivals in the same indistry? My personal opinion: you'd have to be really dumb.

Oman Mobile is a subsiadary of OmanTel no matter how many people try to explain to me that the first is a private-owned company while the latter isn't. How is it that Oman Mobile was formed? It was the mobile devision of OmanTel for all those dimwits that don't understand. No matter how much you may have invested into the company during the IPO, it still doesn't mean that it's a company that the government has a bigger say in, because that's just how it is.

Oman Mobile's unfair advantage in the telecom industry is as such because it has the backing of the government and in most cases the TRA against Nawras. While Nawras is a joint international venture between private investors, Oman Mobile has the backing of it's investors and the government.

Oman Mobile's homepage boasts "Being a dynamic and agile market player we deepen and personalize relationship with our 1 million customers by delivering maximum network coverage, more value-for-money, and a wide range of cutting-edge wireless voice and data services with immersive and interactive promotional offers.".
Yeah, right.

Most Oman Mobile users complain more often than less about how their unable to get through the network because of that one reason. In addition to the lousy service they get through their service hotline.

Even though the fact still states that Nawras has only about 300,000 subscibers in it's network, its still far more advanced than Oman Mobile's in terms that it introduced prepaid cards use internationaly two weeks before Oman Mobile did. Nawras also introduced sending prepaid credit through SMS' a feature that Oman Mobile only got close to by presenting its newest feature SMS Parking - half their customers hardly know the number it should be sent to so they can get their ticket. Nawras introduced EDGE technology which enables you to use your data line upto ADSL speed to go through the internet whilst using your mobile as the modem. Another first to come into phase is the 3G network although there may be speculations of how successful it would be in Oman let alone in the GCC region.

Those are just facts.

I just wonder how much time is it until people realize that Oman Mobile clearly imitates every single campaign Nawras gets into? From advertisements, special offers and now: Muscat Festival sprees.

Oman Mobile wasn't going to enter into sponsoring the Festival because it thought to itself that 100,00 was just too much until it changed its mind for two reasons. First; Nawras took the chance first. Secondly, the government gave them the 'red eye'.

If you're still an Oman Mobile subscriber by the time you read this article - you're a sucker.