In 2002, Silvija Seres was visiting Saudi Arabia and spent a few weeks in Jeddah teaching at Dar Al Hikma College (do you remember Karen Hughes’ visit last year?). Silvija took a lot of photos, and some of them are really good. This one is dedicated to a friend who was craving for mu6abaq last week ;-) via as

Lakhdar Brahimi: “Yet all the diplomatic clout of the United States was used to prevent a cease-fire, while more military hardware was rushed to the Israeli Army. It was argued that the war had to continue so that the root causes of the conflict could be addressed, but no one explained how destroying Lebanon would achieve that.”

Here is a brief history of the Saudi currency.

Abu Aardvark has an interesting post on Arab political blogs. He says there isn’t an Arab blogophere; instead, there several Arab blogospheres. Does it really matter? I mean when was the last time when Arabs formed one entity? Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for pan-Arabism, but in a medium like blogging I think individuality is more important.

Meanwhile in Dubai, pink taxis will be deployed at places frequently visited by women, to provide a “women-only” taxi service. The taxis will have pink roofs, pink seats and interiors, and other features to give the vehicles a feminine touch. The taxis would be easily identifiable on roads and would only stop for female passengers. Taxis with female drivers currently only operate at Dubai International Airport to ferry female passengers and families. The service proved very popular that the city decided to expand it.

I have to admit that we, Saudis, are addicted to doing things that nobody has ever done, like, for example, charging single men for entering shopping malls. Yes, you are not mistaken, and you don’t need to read that sentence again: some shopping malls in Jeddah have started to charge money from single men who want to go inside the mall. Pictured above, is the coupon single men must buy in order to enter a shopping mall. Pretty cheap; the move by the owners of these malls that is.

There is a story in today’s NY Times about Muslim schools in the U.S. where young children memorize the Holy Koran:

Making the work even more difficult, the students, for the most part, do not understand what they are reciting. Muslims believe the Koran was spoken to the prophet Muhammad by the angel Gabriel in Arabic. Because it is seen as the literal word of God, the use of translations is frowned upon. Students know how to pronounce the words but mostly do not know what they mean.

I don’t know about you guys, but what I would really frown upon is memorizing Koran without understanding it. We are asked to memorize Koran, but not only for the sake of reciting it. We are asked to memorize Koran in order to practice its teachings and to use the knowledge we learn from it to guide us in our lives. I think these schools should rethink the way they teach Koran; it may take much longer to memorize Koran and in the same time understand it, but it will be much more better for the students and the longer time spent on studying absolutely worth it.