Month: October 2009

The Story of a Picture

Photography and People

Murtadha

I love taking photographic picture of children. Children represent the beauty of life in very simplistic way. This week, I went with My brother Mustafa and his wife Amani to take picture of my cute nephew around Portland. I babysit the baby two days a week so I think I have successfully developed a friendship with the baby 🙂 except for changing his diapers. I am still in process of learning. They say that a man who change diapers, change the world! so this is why I am trying to learn how to do the job perfectly lol.

Anyway, I also love night photography. Night represent another life that most of us have never seen. I normally go walking around Portland for one hour or more. I love how the light and darkness are drawing the beauty of the night. I also contemplate those who walk alone and find nobody but their shadows to walk with them. There are also those who don’t have homes so they sleep on the ground. I heard from one of my friends that some of them never wake up again in the winter! They simply die on the street because of the harsh weather! regardless of all that, they keep the smile on their face even when they were asleep. I have also seen my people holding their tears as they walk around  the river. Sometimes, I thought of getting close to them and express my willingness to listen to their stories but I have never tried.

So this is why I am opening new category in my blog called The Story of a Picture. I will carry my canon camera with me whenever I go so I can represent people’s stories through pictures. Below is a collection of picture I took this week and last week.

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Saudi and Climate Change!

Murtadha

Picture 1

Whenever I open a discussion about the climate change with my Saudi friends, their reactions are either one of the two. They are either careless and think that climate change is a joke  or think that climate change and global warning are  just signs of the end of our world and the beginning of God’s punishment for all the sins we committed.

My respond is the following:  If you are careless about this global problem and you don’t want to be part of the solution, that is fine but for god sake don’t be part of the problem. If you are someone who thinks that global warning is a sign of god punishment, please know that you would be punished first by god in that day of judgment for not saving this beautiful gift (The Earth) that has given and created it for you. So now let’s be realistic and more proactive about this problem.

  • Turn it off, please!

It is so simple, so easy. If you aren’t going to be in the room, just simply turn the light off. I don’t understand why people like to leave the lights on when they leave their rooms. Reducing the electricity power can save money and a lot of energy.

  • Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

Don’t throw anything that can be reused again in the trash. Be creative. I feel guilty whenever i throw one blank paper without reusing it twice.

  • Don’t use plastic bag

When you go to shopping, try to use paper bags or buy one these special design bag. Plastic bags are non-biodegradable and they have  harmful affects on the environment.

  • Walk instead of driving.

Here in portland, I don’t drive at all. I always enjoy walking even for the long distance places. The public transportation are amazing too. I know that there is no such a public transportation in Saudi and the sun’s heat make it impossible to walk around, but at least try to reduce your fuel consumption. For example, when you plan for a trip, you don’t need to have 7 cares for only five people! two cars can be more than enough.

  • Stop Smoking:

I can’t express how much anger I feel when someone smoke cigarette or hookah in front of me. I would turn my apartment up down if i knew that someone is smoking in my balcony. If it is up to me, I would get all the smokers in one place and then do them another Holocaust 🙂 but what can I say if even my father is addicted to smoking cigarettes 😦 .

Note: this post is part of my participation on Blog Action Day 09.  Thank you Hning for publicly reminding us to participate in this project.

panaroma

Aug/Sept 09 panorama

Murtadha
  • “On this scale, most of us swing between the spectrums, fidgeting and waddling to find relative comfort between inevitable change and honored traditions. No matter where you find that comfort zone, and this is a proven true cliché, it’s the journey that makes it so memorable.” said Hnign in an interview with American Bedu
  • “It is easier for the people in the moon to fall down to the earth but very difficult to the people in the earth to fly up to the moon” said one of my friend
  • “Well one does not know all the answers of the actions one takes…we can just try to understand it.” Said Noor Murtadha in FaceBook chat.
  • “The word ‘forget’ in Mandarin is a combination of two characters: death and heart. Whoever invented this word, I think he or she must have been through an immense pain. Forgetting, the author was trying to say, involves the death of the heart. The heart dies out of hopelessness. I am trying to forget. I am trying to get out of the hole where I’ve been hiding to cry alone. But no one understands. I wish God would answer me back. But what is my pain, compared to so many others’? Said Sara in her email as part of telling her story!
  • “The message I want to give to both foreign men and women is that 95% of Saudis will not go against their family’s wishes. No matter if s/he loves you or not, Saudis are weak against what their families want. Tribal/familial ties always win over everything else. Some Saudis intentions are true, others are not. I was fortunate to have someone who was always honest with me. It is a shame that Saudis, particularly men, who know they are not strong enough to fight for their foreign girlfriend, put her through hurt, or even start a relationship in the first place. As for us foreigners, even when we may know the outcome, many times we think with our hearts before we do with our brains” a woman shared her story in a blog Future husband and wives of Saudi
  • “Life is beautiful, joyful and wonderful, I love it. And death is more beautiful, joyful, and wonderful. If done right!” Said Abduallah in twitter
  • ” Doesn’t seems that everyone love sex and yet everyone pretend otherwise! I think we need to talk about sex openly and honestly! we need to look at sex not as something disgusting and distasteful but as something very powerful and important in our life “ a speaker talking about Freudism and how people in many culture perceive sex wrongly.