Category News

Thoughts on Jeddah

Three weeks have passed since the Jeddah catastrophe. People now are eagerly waiting for the verdict of the investigation commission. While we are waiting, it might be useful to look back and reflect.

The heavy downpour has exposed some nasty things such as the nonexistent infrastructure and the abundant corruption. But like what happens with many other things in life, sometimes we need to see the ugliness before we see the beauty. There are at least two good things I saw coming out of this disaster: the great spirit of the people, and the power of social media.

In the days and nights following Black Wednesday, we have seen more than 7,000 persons who volunteered to help in any and every way they can. I’m proud of Ibrahim al-Kushi who opened his house to shelter the displaced. I’m proud of Bassem Kurdi who decided to stay at the hospital when everybody else told him to go home. I’m proud of so many young men and women who, despite the harassment of some self-appointed guards of morality, rolled up their sleeves and spent countless hours at al-Harthi Exhibition Center to organize, distribute, and deliver the donations to those who need them in the most damaged areas of the city.

The relief efforts have been largely coordinated using the internet and social media tools. One Facebook group in particular was central to these efforts as it acted like an umbrella and a gathering point for volunteers. The group is called Rescue Jeddah, and it boasts more than 9,000 members. The content there is all in Arabic but you don’t need to read anything to see what they have been up to. Just look at the pictures and the videos and you will get a good idea on what they have done so far.

Beside Facebook, people were using blogs, Twitter, and SMS to circulate the latest news. They were also using Flickr and YouTube to document what was happening in real time. Some of the pictures, like the one of the dead little girl covered with mud, were really disturbing. But I think that in crises you need shocking images to make others understand the gravity of the disaster.

As for videos, estimates say more than 400 videos have been uploaded over the past three weeks. Most of these were taken by citizens using their mobile phones, but I have also seen some well-produced videos like this one by Mohammed al-Rehaili. In the end, I will leave you with this short film by Bader al-Homoud, who captures the tragedy but instead decides to focus on the bright human side of the story:

Read more:

  • One of my favourite blog posts about the disaster is this by McToom in which he offers an illustration on the basics of drainage systems. You know, because our officials are too busy to read long blog posts like mine.
  • Khaled al-Maeena, editor-in-chief of Arab News, wrote a letter to Makkah governor. “At the moment, the people of Jeddah and the surrounding areas are hurt, sad, anguished and in both physical and mental pain,” he said.

Arab Bloggers Meeting: The Unconference

Okay, so in my last post I promised more from there, but the flaky internet connection, the awesomeness of people in Beirut, and my ever changing mood all conspired to make that impossible. I actually hardly opened my laptop during the last two days of the meeting. I’m back to Riyadh but since I promised more, here’s a quick recap of what happened…

On the third day there was two presentations, the first by Mohammed Basheer, and the second by the Drima.

Basheer talked about AljazeeraTalk project, and it was good to learn what they have been up to since the first time I heard of them when I was in Doha back in 2006. However, Basheer had a tough time trying to explain the tangled relationship between the project and Aljazeera news channel. Basheer said the project, despite its name and logo, is not affiliated to Aljazeera, but they receive support from the channel in the form of training to their editors and other means. How does that affect their independence and neutrality? I’m yet to hear a convincing answer to that question. AljazeeraTalk is an interesting project, but they need to answer such tough questions if they want to be taken more seriously.

Later on, Drima talked about SEO and how bloggers, aka “my beebull,” can use its different techniques to increase their influence and extend their reach. Of course there was a debate on how effective such techniques are and if there were simply “tricks to game Google.” Drima admitted that Google is fighting this because they want to keep their search results relevant, but he said it’s a cat and mouse game that we should be playing in order to voice our opinions and make them accessible to more people.

Although most attendees of the meeting were bloggers (it’s the Arab Bloggers Meeting, after all), it was also good to hear from non-bloggers in this event. Gamal Eid, a lawyer and head of the Arabic Network for Human Rights Information, gave a presentation about the legal support for bloggers. He demonstrated some examples of different cases they have worked on, and explained their approach in dealing with cases where bloggers are involved, especially when they get arrested by their governments.

As for the other presentation on the fourth day, it was given by Jacob Applbaum aka Ya3qoub. The talk focused on circumvention tools, which something Jacob knows a great deal about from his work on the Tor Project. It turns out that the Tor Project website is blocked in Saudi Arabia, but hey, you’re not gonna let them win this, are you? You can still use Tor by installing this Firefox extensions. To use the Torbutton extension mentioned here you need to install Tor first. As I said the website is blocked here, but you can still get Tor by sending an email to: gettor@torproject.org.

The fifth day of the meeting also had two presentations. First, Ramsey Tesdell of 7iber.com talked about the new media ecosystem and what they have learned from their experiment in Jordan. It was also good to learn of another promising new media experiment under the same name from Lebanon. Ahmad Gharbiea gave the last the presentation in the event and it focused on Creative Commons and how Arab bloggers should deal with licensing issues.

Keep in mind that these presentations were just part of the five-day event. The bigger part of the event was made up of many, many concurrent workshops on many different things and given by many people. Anyone who has an experience that she would like to share with others was welcome to stand up and say: “hey, my name is X and I would like to talk about this!” The meeting mostly took the barcamp format, which made it really fluid and informal. People were free to choose which workshops to attend, and some of the popular workshops had to be repeated or extended.

At the end of the meeting, the organizers invited those who spoke and gave workshops to stand up and the scene was just so inspiring, refreshing, and amazing: the great majority of people in the room was standing up, which means they didn’t only come here to listen, but also to share their knowledge with others. Usually in conferences, you have a handful of speakers and hundreds of silent attendees. This was not the case here. The Arab Bloggers Meeting was an Uncoference, and a great one at that.

Royal Reaction

While the sky keeps raining dogs on Jeddah, we finally have an official reaction to the disaster. On Monday, King Abdullah ordered the setting up of a high-level committee that will study the extent of the damage due to the calamity. It will also study the causes of the crisis and recommend ways to make ensure that it does not happen again.

The royal decree was particularly interesting because it featured a strong language that is rather unusual for government communications. Many officials in Jeddah, including Makkah Governor Prince Khaled al-Faisal, stressed in their statements that this was a natural disaster and there was not much they could have done about it. However, the royal decree made it clear that the devastation has more to do with the performance of the government than the amount of the rains.

“It is painful that many countries, some with even less potential than the Kingdom, experience similar rainfall almost every day, but there are no devastation of the magnitude we witnessed in Jeddah,” said the decree. “We cannot ignore the fact that there were mistakes and failures on the part of some departments and it is our duty to identify those responsible and take action against them.”

By Saudi standards, this is not normal. Some people even think the whole point of the royal decree and the investigation is to defuse the public anger over the catastrophe. But the firm language of the decree makes me believe that it is going to be different this time.

I certainly hope that this committee will hit hard on the widespread corruption that led to this disaster. Money alone is not enough to compensate the families of those who lost their lives. We must make sure that those responsible for the tragedy are taken to task because this is the only way to make sure that it won’t happen again.

Jeddah Disaster

At least 44 people were killed in Jeddah after a heavy downpour. The rains caused a major infrastructure failure and the results were disastrous. My heart goes out to all Jeddawis.

This would not have happened if the people of Jeddah had a say in how their city is run. This would not have happened if there was transparency and accountability in how our country is governed.

I’m beyond angry and disgusted.

UPDATE 27/11/09 2:40: The death toll reaches 83. Keep in mind this is the official number announced by the Civil Defense. The actual number might be higher. More rains are expected on Jeddah tomorrow.

Riyadh Metro

Driving my car in King Fahad Road the other day, I was listening to MBC-FM’s Rana al-Qassim. The blabbering radio host has come to be associated in my mind with her overuse of the brotherly salutation “akhoi,” an attempt to deter the sexual advances of drooling Saudi callers, I suppose. Although I think her “akhoi” sounds more patronizing than brotherly, but whatever…

The ever-confident Rana has decided to tackle the dilemma of zahma, aka the chronic congestion of Riyadh streets. As calls came in from people telling her their stories of daily horror and misery on the roads, Rana insisted that she wants to hear no whining or complaining. “I want solutions!” she exclaimed in her oh-I’m-so-good-at-this-radio-thing voice. The few calls I had the misfortune to hear offered some pretty innovative suggestions. “Ban all foreigners from driving,” one caller said. “Take old people off the streets,” another one demanded. None of the callers I heard said anything about public transportation.

How can a modern city of 6.5m people survive without a public transportation system would probably be a mystery to urban planners for years to come. But fear not, fellow Riyadhians! Arriyadh Development Authority (ADA) got your back. They will make a metro for us, after all. And No, that’s not because they are jealous of Dubai. I mean, seriously, Dubai who? How can anyone compare our historic city to this tiny emirate? The first reaction from officials in Riyadh upon hearing that the Dubai Metro would launch in 9/9/9 9:9:9 was something like: meh.

So yeah, Dubai launched their metro with much fanfare. Pretty cool, huh? Well, this is not how we do business in the magic kingdom. The plans for Riyadh Light Transit Railway (LTR) were revealed to Arab News by an unnamed source in the ADA. He gave away some supersecret information about the project, but one little, important detail was missing from the story: when can we expect this new metro to start operating?

I suppose ADA don’t have to worry about concealing this tidbit of info, or even falling behind schedule if there is one, because there is no one in charge to make sure that they deliver on their promises on time. What about the municipal council, you may ask. Sorry, they are too busy ensuring that men and women do not mingle during the upcoming Eid celebrations.

Superfluousness

Everything is going great in the awesomest Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Well, almost everything. Today I read three disturbing news stories which shed the light on some serious problems that we should immediately take care of. Otherwise, the whole fabric of society might disintegrate under the pressure of these most horrendous disasters…

First, let’s give it to Dr. Omaima al-Jalahma who has discovered a huge flaw within the healthcare system that has apparently held our hospitals back all these years: no rooms for ruqyah. Al-Jalahma suggests opening ruqyah rooms in all hospitals in the country, and facilitating the work of ruqyah practitioners, who, according to her, have no problem entering any hospital at present but would benefit from having dedicated rooms where they can offer their much-needed services.

Meanwhile, the Grand Mufti has said that wearing graduation gowns is haram because apparently it is part of the infidels’ rituals and customs that no God-fearing Muslim should ever imitate or even consider getting near them. The Grand Mufti, of course, does not use the cars invented and manufactured by the aforementioned infidels. He also does not appear on TV or use a mobile phone, because these, too, are invented and made by those nasty infidels.

Last but not least, a committee in Ministry of Interior has concluded that enough is enough and so they decided it is time to raid the market looking for what they described as “illegal abayas.” The committee, which included members of the Ministry of Islamic Affairs, the Ministry of Commerce, the Commission for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, and the General Intelligence Service said those who sell illegal abayas have two choices: either modify them in a way that makes them Sharia-compliant or destroy them under the supervision of an official body without any compensation.

The committee, however, has not said what they are going to do about women who have already bought some of these abays and are wearing them. Rumor has it that they plan to open kiosks in every corner of every city in the country where these women can exchange their haram abayas with halal abayas at no charge.

Dude, What’s with the Lashing?

Another day, another outrageous lashing sentence.

On Saturday, a court in Jeddah sentenced 22-year-old female journalist Roazanna al-Yamai to 60 lashes for her alleged involvement in the infamous case of Mazen Abdul-Jawad, aka the TV sex braggart. Few minutes ago, AP reported that King Abdullah has waived the sentence and ordered the case be referred to the legal committee at the Ministry of Culture and Information. Well, this should have happened without a royal intervention, but I’m relieved the sentence will not be carried out.

This case aside, I am astonished by the very liberal use of lashing sentences by our right honorable judges. Is this some sort of fetish, as Asmaa once said? Do these sentences say something about struggle to reform the judicial system? Personally, I think that except for the few cases explicitly specified in Quran, lashing should be stopped once and for all. No human being should be given the power to inflect this kind of punishment on another human being, simply.