Beat the beat yo

Amazing. 

THANK YOU.

Last week Juan Williams gave the nation a Rorschach test. Williams said he gets scared when people in “Muslim garb” board a plane he’s on, and he promptly got (a) fired by NPR and (b) rewarded by Fox News with a big contract. Suppose Williams had said something hurtful to gay people instead of to Mulsims. 

Suppose he had said gay men give him the creeps because he fears they'll make sexual advances. NPR might well have fired him, but would Fox News have chosen that moment to give him a $2-million pat on the back? 

I don' think so. Playing the homophobia card is costlier than playing the Islamophobia card. 


Click here for the rest of this awesome article: Islamophobia and Homophobia


My response to Williams and all those who fear "Muslim garb" on planes would be the following Maz Jobrani video (Fwd to 1:10): 

Well Said.

"Here on the brink of a future in which human life may find itself as tightly enveloped in digital environments as it is today in the architectural kind...

It asks us to shut our ears momentarily to the techno-utopian ecstasies of West Coast cyberhippies and look without illusion upon the present possibilities for building, in the on-line spaces of this world, societies more decent and free than those mapped onto dirt and concrete and capital. 

It asks us to behold the new bodies awaiting us in virtual space by their phantom powers, and to get to the crucial work of sorting out the socially meaningful undazzled differences between those bodies and our physical ones."

LOTD: Escape the Armada

The sun rises...I feel the morning come alive

Love is blinding, my emotions I can't hide. 

Tides are changing, taking me away for good
...I can't turn back now. 

It's okay, let down your hair. 

Encourage life. 

Live it well. 

Don't get sucked up in the swell of this hell, 

glory days turn and blaze from your ways. 

Feel the vibe, it's alive. 

I'm not ashamed of what's inside. 

Clear thoughts, painless rhymes. 

I swear this is the last time. 

~ Escape the Armada

*If you're unfamiliar with this band, you're missing out. Click on the link and prepare for a new obsession. Thank me later. 

Hilarity

Poor Matthew McConaughey can't stand up on his own.

The Big Apple

This weekend I took a bite out of the big apple...just a small bite.  

This city never fails to blow me away. 

While taking this pic, I stood in Times Square amidst the beautiful chaos of Jay Z's concrete jungle and wondered how many millions had stood in my very place admiring the heights, lights and epitome of all that is cosmopolitan. 

Funny thing is, that on my way home to DC, I stared out of the bus at the beautiful capital and monument standing tall and mesmerizing, and felt the warmth of coming home. Although NYC is one of the most fascinating cities I'll ever go to, there is a sense of sophistication and prestige that Washington carries that I just love. 

NYC is the glamour and spontaneity I need to revitalize, but DC's the cozy couch I want to come home and cuddle on.

Till next time, NYC. 

LOTD: Lyrics of the Day (sponsored by YY)

So a good friend of mine from Egypt, Yumna, shares my love for music and lyrics. Every day she tweets a "lyric of the day" that is so on point that I now look forward to her next tweet (follow her @YumnaYousry). With her permission, she's allowed me to post a few of her picks alongside my own lyrics of choice on my blog. So keep a look out ;)

I'd like to think the best of me is still hiding up my sleeve.

~ John Mayer

RIP

RIP Sony Walkman

1979 - 2010

Ouch.

Burrrrrn.

Los 33.

It's been almost a week without a post and I'm so sad. Seriously sad. Work and school have really been whoopin my ass these days, not to forget my emotional roller-coaster during the whole Chilean miner rescue mission.

Talk about a big ol' mess.

New week starts tomorrow and craziness at work and school will ensue once again but I've definitely been reminded yet again to count my blessings, so in honor of the amazing Chilean rescue mission...

2 months. 2,000 meters underground.

Los 33. 

INCREDIBLE. 

THIS IS SO COOL

This is the "chewing gum high-heel" piece from art and design student
Kobi Levi's artistic footwear collection. 

This isn't fashion, but it's definitely art. Love the concept and execution.

Beat the beat yo

I have yet to introduce you all to the wonder that is Ashibah....my dearest Sarah El Habashy is an Egyptian/Danish singer/songwriter/DJ that has continued to blow me away, and I don't doubt she'll blow you away too.

Check her out latest beats and site:
Urban Undulations - Oct Mix by Ashibah


Click here and fall in love: Ashibah

H St Festival, Washington, D.C.

Ht St Festival

The Social Network, A Must See

"I think if your clients want to sit on my shoulders and call themselves tall, they have the right to try - but there is no requirement that I enjoy sitting here listening to people lie.

You have part of my attention, the rest of my attention is back at the offices of Facebook, where my colleagues and I are doing things that no one in this room, including and especially your clients, are intellectually or creatively capable of doing.

If you guys were the inventors of Facebook...

then you'd have invented Facebook." 

~Mark Zuckerberg

Well Said.

"A celebrity is a person who works hard all his life to become well known, then wears dark glasses to avoid being recognized"

~ Fred Allen

Agreed.

Saw this tweet the today and LOVED it. 

Not only because I'm a Harry Potter geek, but because it is so true and on point.

In the past couple of weeks, there has been a string of gay teen suicides as the result of bullying and Hollywood blogger Perez Hilton has been blowing up twitter and his site on how America should take a stand. Now I agree that no one should be bullied and that Americans should stand by the rights of everyone to be able to go to school without fearing physical or emotional beat downs, but I do have a few arguments on Mr. Hilton's approach.

1. Perez Hilton's been tweeting that gay teens have a much higher suicide rate that straight teens and should be reached out to more - now that grinds my gears. 

First of all, don't be biased - no one deserves more support than the other. Straight, gay, bi, black, white, tall, short, it doesn't matter. Suicide is suicide and it's heartbreaking regardless of who it is. 

2. Whooooo the hell is Perez Hilton to talk about bullying!?! This is the guy who built a blog just to bully celebs! This is the guy that tortures Lindsay Lohan and other celebrities by giving them mean nicknames and then drawing inappropriate drawings on their face, as well as other parts.

What a hypocrite.

I've converted...and it feels good.

So I recently converted to the iPhone4 and holy shizer am I happy I did it! I can't deny that I've been fighting it for awhile, "I don't like touch screens", "I like BBM" - oh, the excuses I used. I used to think I wouldn't like touch screen, I used to think I couldn't live without BBM...but oh wait, I can.

I thought it would take a while to make the transition. It turns out I wasn't alone, my friend Rania was going through the same dilemma with her Blackberry. So I gave myself a deadline by Halloween to finally do it. Then one blessed day, I strolled into the Apple store to just take a look, check out if I am eligible for an upgrade with the horrible drop-call cursed AT&T, drool over Apple's products, you know how it goes. As I began playing with the iPhone4, I felt the pangs of guilt that I was cheating on my Berry...but it didn't matter, I was sold. The FaceTime, the apps, the HD camera, the apps, the apps, the apps. There is an app for everything and I wanted it, BAD.

To be honest though, the affair began a while back. I had seen my friend Zonozi's iPhone and his love for it, he actually did an iPhone4 review using the phone itself that received thousands of hits on Gizmodo, as of 2 seconds ago, 33,005 to be exact (check it out: Zonozi's iPhone4 Review). Z and all my other iPhone loving friends had shown me all the fabulous things that it could do, and of course, just like a child, I wanted to play with the pretty toy too.

Plus, I was starting to get a little sick of BBM and while I can hear my friends in Egypt gasping from disbelief - believe it or not, it is possible. I'm not a big fan of being available ALL the time. Even when you put your status as "unavailable", it means absolutely nothing, people still BBM the bejesus outta you (and most of the time, it's not even your close friends, it's that acquaintance that added you randomly, who then waits until your status is busy and messages to ask what you're up to...DELETE).

Also, the broadcasted mass forwards/jokes/chains, come on now!
I tried to make it stop. I really did. 

I put my BBM status as:

"Please stop sending me broadcast messages"

....when that didn't work, I tried a bit of a more aggressive approach:

"Seriously, stop sending me broadcast messages" 

Before I knew it, I was desperately pleading to my BBM contacts to no avail. 

The "life without BBM" argument is simply answered with the "WhatsApp" application. And yes, it works just the same. Hell, it even looks 10x better on the iPhone than it does on the Blackberry (It's pretty bad on the Blackberry).

Nonetheless, I can't deny that BBM made my life so much easier given that my best friends and family live overseas. To be able to conference chat and instantly send photos back and forth with those I love made a world of difference, especially when I moved away.

It was cute, small, and handy and I will miss it.
(Ok, I can't lie...I get to have my cake and eat it too. I'm unlocking the Blackberry for my Egypt line). 

Guess there's no app for being overdramatic...yet.

THIS IS NOT FASHION.

What the...

So Lady Gaga wears meat dresses and Paris fashion week designer's display their clothes on cardboard now - are clothes not made with fabric anymore? 

I mean I realize I've been a bit out of the couture loop but seriously?! 

The above ridiculousness is from Maison Martin Margiela's Spring/Summer 2011 collection.

A friend of mine just posted a comment on the subjectivity of it all but how it has no relation to the attractiveness of the piece. It's so true. Fashion is art and art is expression and expression is subjective and so forth, but at the end of the day, the fashion industry is about fashion trends that will eventually trickle down from haute couture to the masses - and last time I checked, the masses don't wear cardboard clothes or meat dresses.

What happened to designers with a purpose? All the classic legendary designers began with practicality that revolutionized the industry. Coco Chanel was famous for making her clothes light and easy-to-wear yet nonetheless chic during a time when women wore the most uncomfortable pieces and had to work during the war. Salvatore Ferragamo made comfortable yet elegant shoes. Louis Vuitton made durable yet lightweight and airtight luggage for travel. Burberry focused on durable waterproof outdoor attire.You get the point.

Again...Seriously?

"Give me a place to stand and a lever long enough, 

and I will move the world."

~ Archimedes, 220 BC

Advertising Fail

So...DDB Chile did a campaign for ADT Security Services that shows a bunch of spring-loaded boxes being slipped underneath doors in apartment buildings in Santiago to make a point on how easy it is to break into their homes.

Wait - but they didn't actually break in to put the boxes there, they used spring-boxes and shoved them under the door - aaaand normal sized people physically can't fit under doors like folded spring-boxes to break into a home. 

So in essence...the campaign makes absolutely no sense.

Hey DDB, I suggest that next time you want to make a campaign pointing out the potential easiness of breaking into a home...try breaking into home.

That is, unless you are warning people about being robbed by stuart little. 

The City of Brotherly Love

This weekend, I drove up to Philly with my friend Cait for the weekend to visit her hometown, Morrestown, NJ. It's like the McLean/DC relationship, living in the suburbs but driving into the city for work and weekend debaucheries. It was amazing! Morrestown was one of the most adorable suburbs, it's so peaceful and friendly, and they have a street called Main St, which won me over right then and there. There's also something that I loved about Morrestown - it's a dry town (meaning they don't serve alcohol). It's not prohibited, but they don't actually serve it, meaning if you want a bottle of wine at dinner, they're more than happy to pour it for you if you bring the bottle. "But of course, 7-11 has alcohol right?" I asked, assuming the obvious, but apparently they don't. Not a single 7-11 there serves alcoholic beverages. The city won't prohibit alcohol, they just won't encourage the selling of it. I love it! It limits the possibility for excessive drunkenness on the streets. You want to go to a bar? That's fine, just drive an extra 10 minutes. You want a glass of wine? That's fine, just do it in your own home or bring it to the restaurant. Imagine a city without shady teenage kids standing outside 7-11 praying for the corrupt soul that'll purchase them their first six-pack. It just makes it a little bit harder which in the end, makes a huge difference.

So they call Philly the city of brotherly love and weirdly enough, I felt it; it was kind of like walking into an urban mural filled hug. Mind you, my love for the city may have been based off my love for Will Smith, but come on, who doesn't associate Philly with the Fresh Prince? 

The highlight of my weekend was not Morrestown, Philly, or Geno's greasy delicious cheesesteaks (which still hasn't settled right)....

...it was the Redskins vs. Eagles game that I attended on Sunday. 

It was my first time at an NFL football game and holy craziness was it amazing! I was warned that Eagles' fans are crazy, and I've been to soccer games in the Middle East so of course I wasn't too worried...and then I saw someone arrested in the first quarter, drunk off his behind, being escorted to the in-stadium jail. They have their own in-stadium jail - if that's not a cry for help for a specific fan-base then I don't know what is. As a subtle form of support for my hometown's team, I wore a Georgetown University sweatshirt - which wasn't as subtle as we'd hoped. Either way, we won and it was an amazing experience! I actually like to think that my being there had a little to do with the win. Just sayin.

Beat the beat yo

This song has been stuck in my head ALL day. So good.
If you haven't heard this before, thank me later.

Example - Won't Go Quietly