Jul 02
Today after I had lunch/dinner with the family in the most amazing Persian restaurant*, a cousin called me and tricked me to go to Edgware Road in London (An Arab “colony”, for those never been here). He knew that I’ve never been there and he knew that I would never want to go there so he just told me the directions and I found myself there (being all new to London). Ok, I admit, there’s nothing to be ashamed of but I try to avoid my people here for reasons I’d rather keep for myself. Anyway, that doesn’t even relate to my subject, what I want to say is. He assured me why I should stick with my alias, geek in practice that is.
I know how geeky/nerdy I am, but I never looked eye-to-eye to people who call me a geek or a nerd. Let me explain a bit, when I’m in Saudi there are few people who I can debate with in few occasions. Mostly, it’s just chitchat and sport talk (read football, soccer for Americans). Hence, I usually keep my debatable thoughts for myself most of the time which leads us to my point, that is, how on earth do you know I’m a geek or not? However, when my cousin and I were talking we were exclusively debating about everything from society to finance to politics to engineering (of course to our extends of knowledge). We agreed on many things but I played a devil’s advocate just to enjoy discussion (I think he did as well, sometimes). I felt at the end of our evening that I am, actually, a geek in practice.
While I am pouring my thoughts into my keyboard, let me say something about us Saudis. We like to argue and we think arguing is debating but we lack the basics of any debate. We don’t see that arguing hurts others while a healthy debate enriches thought and diversifies minds. And at the end of the day, most of us believe that “debating” is unhealthy for our bodies, minds and souls and try to avoid it and consider some sort of “taboo”. Wait what? you read it right,we love to argue but try to avoid it most of the time but when we do engage ourselves in arguments we don’t respect our arguers. And that is exactly why sometimes I doubt my potential as a geek!
(*) Alounak, That’s for you Hish
Tagged with: arabia • London • saudi • uk
Jun 30
Dear World,
You have tricked me, seduced me and kicked me in the butt! It doesn’t matter now. I’m planning some kind of revenge, revenge in my twisted sense of humor which only you, me and few others understand. I know revenge shouldn’t be funny nor fun but trust me I’ll make it fun, for me at least! Is that blabbering? no it’s not it’s part of the plan (That’s my story and I’m sticking with it
). You see here, I wanted to start a blog for a long time now and actually I registered some blogs. But this one is different, I can feel it! even if you can’t. What makes it so different you ask? Well, let me tell you something, at this age, one needs an outlet of the stress you give us all the time and it can’t be any better than blogging in a country like Saudi Arabia especially in a University like UPM. Now I don’t intend to blog about those two particular places exclusively but quite often I’m sure I will! I’m just blogging about my own life, everyday experiences and most importantly about photos I take every now and then! Now enough about me, let us talk about you. I love how you mix things up, a sunny day then a rainy day then a just cloudy day. I don’t like it when you be consistent like in Saudi Arabian summer. I wish you mix things up a little there as well! Along with this open letter I’m posting some photo I took today. It’s some lady you sent me today to play with. Shame it’s only a ladybug. Here have a look:

Ladybug at St. James' Park
Shutter: 1/15 sec; Aperture: F13; Focal Length: 135mm
I have played with this ladybug for up to 10 minutes. These moments make me regret not buying a macro lens for my Nikon D80
. mental note: next thing to buy! However, I made an obvious mistake here I should’ve had a larger aperture to gain less depth of field and more shutter speed. A noob mistake I say. In my defense, I was shooting after a small nap in the park and I don’t see that it’s that bad. It’s not that shaky after all with a decent depth of field!
When I blog about photos I took I will mention the circumstances, theorize a bit and criticize myself. I will look forward for your critiques and I I hope I haven’t bored you too much and I appreciate that you’ve read that long! post a comment
.
Sincerely Yours,
Omair Taibah
Ps. Please add me to twitter (@amrush) and visit my DeviantArt gallery (http://amrush.deviantart.com)
Tagged with: arabia • London • photo • saudi • uk