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johnslat
Joined: 21 Jan 2003
Posts: 13859
Location: Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
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 Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 4:11 pm Post subject: |
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Actually, I think that, generally speaking, the ladies are superior to us males. Treating them as equals is just a sneaky ploy on my part to try to bring them down to my level.  |
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veiledsentiments
Joined: 20 Feb 2003
Posts: 17644
Location: USA
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| Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 4:16 pm Post subject: |
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I'd bet that your system works much better that fatimah's. 
VS |
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Never Ceased To Be Amazed
Joined: 22 Oct 2004
Posts: 3500
Location: Shhh...don't talk to me...I'm playin' dead...
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| Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 4:40 pm Post subject: |
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| desultude wrote: |
| veiledsentiments wrote: |
I read that as possibly being Middle 'Murica as much as Middle East. 
VS |
And the Bible Belt can feel very similar to the Middle East. Can you imagine how much certain religious types in our country would like to have churches in the malls, and mandatory prayer time? |
See what happens when I go off and take a nap?!?
Dear desultude: Your dreams have been realized! They did it years ago at the defunct South Park Mall in Shreveport, Louisiana, which is not the "buckle" of the "Bible Belt", but the next hole up when they tighten the belt!
"...so, in 2003, after putting the final nail in the coffin of the site�s retail history, an unlikely suitor came to the mall in hopes of purchasing it. Summer Grove Baptist Church, a Shreveport religious institution since 1849, did some investigating and decided the empty mall would be a near-perfect fit for its needs, and in September 2003 closed on a deal to purchase the entire property. They moved in 2005 to occupy the mall, and aside from transforming the JCPenney into a church-looking structure, complete with a steeple, have done relatively little to change the mall�s interior as well as the vacant anchors. Numerous former stores, though, are being utilized, and have been converted to worship facilities, a day care, youth outreach, church offices, and more. There are even a couple stores where church crafts are for sale."
http://www.labelscar.com/louisiana/south-park-mall-shreveport
Hallelujah!!! Praise Be To God!!! America: Love It or Leave It!!! Yaa-Hoo!!!
NCTBA |
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johnslat
Joined: 21 Jan 2003
Posts: 13859
Location: Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
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| Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 5:37 pm Post subject: |
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Dear NCTBA.
OMG - If I ever went there, I'd probably get mauled.
Regards,
John |
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Grendal
Joined: 13 Aug 2009
Posts: 861
Location: Lurking in the depths of the Faisaliah Tower underground parking.
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| Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 5:42 pm Post subject: |
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Does anyone have anything GOOD to say about PMU?
No.
Grendal |
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desultude
Joined: 19 Jan 2003
Posts: 614
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| Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 8:23 pm Post subject: |
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| johnslat wrote: |
Dear fatimah,
"Why...did I touch a nerve my dear johnslat?"
Nope - I have no nerves. But if you ARE a lady, I find it very sad that you buy into such tripe.
Are you in Saudi? If so, you must find it very congenial.
Regards,
John |
Not female, so far as I can tell. Just a misogynist troll. I was kind of hoping that the river under the bridge has risen, but no such luck.
I would imagine trolls would find the Kingdom a bit dry for their taste, though. |
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desultude
Joined: 19 Jan 2003
Posts: 614
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| Posted: Wed Mar 03, 2010 4:54 pm Post subject: Re: It's what you make of it! |
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| Raju wrote: |
Saudi Arabia can be exasperating at times. Many persevere for a contract or two because of the obvious financial benefits and comfortable lifestyle, others get used to the Saudi way of seeing and doing things and stay for many years. Many just cannot adapt and many are clearly incapable of gratitude.
It takes a generation or two for a university to rise from the dunes and function well. PMU is a new, private university and has not yet been in existence long enough to produce any graduates. The university continues to expand and reasonable people will understand that a large number of managers and faculty are working hard to establish practices and procedures and produce a workable curriculum.
At PMU, much of the twaddle has been circulated by the 'I loathe myself, I loathe PMU' group. Feeding each other's misery and resentment, the assorted collection of grizzlers and whimpers are/were inexperienced in the region and incapable of adaptation and largely made up of the lonely, bored and unhappy individuals that should never have come to KSA in the first place. I have worked in several institutions of higher education in the Middle East and assure readers to this forum that PMU is a good place to work for me.
Raju
[/b] |
Wow! This poster seems to have disappeared. Or has he? Watch for the stray positive post about PMU. You may be able to connect the dots.
One might want to ask about the new exodus of faculty. It seems to be becoming an annual event. Like the birds flying south. A mass migration to greener pastures. |
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prufrock101
Joined: 02 Mar 2010
Posts: 7
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| Posted: Wed Mar 03, 2010 7:49 pm Post subject: |
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Grendal:
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| Does anyone have anything GOOD to say about PMU? |
Yes. The coffee shop is nice. No, wait a minute. It charges SR8 for two-day old croissants. In that case, nothing. No, I have one. The bathrooms are checked regularly. |
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johnslat
Joined: 21 Jan 2003
Posts: 13859
Location: Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
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| Posted: Wed Mar 03, 2010 8:13 pm Post subject: |
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Dear prufrock101,
I almost afraid to ask, but my curiosity has gotten the better of me: just what are the bathrooms checked for - insects? rodents? cleanliness?
Regards,
John |
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veiledsentiments
Joined: 20 Feb 2003
Posts: 17644
Location: USA
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| Posted: Thu Mar 04, 2010 12:47 am Post subject: |
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... to see if teachers are hiding in there?
VS |
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Mia Xanthi
Joined: 13 Mar 2008
Posts: 955
Location: why is my heart still in the Middle East while the rest of me isn't?
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| Posted: Thu Mar 04, 2010 1:26 am Post subject: |
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| No, I have one. The bathrooms are checked regularly. |
Really? Two years ago, the bathrooms on the women's side were a huge issue. The male side hoarded toilet paper and would not send it to the women's side. In addition, the toilets failed frequently...one in particular would flush endlessly and often overflowed.
Oh, the memories.
Do I have anything good to say about PMU? No, after watching this perpetual "start-up" fail repeatedly at attempts to implement anything even resembling a coherent curriculum, I have nothing good to say. I had great colleagues, and I loved the students and enjoyed my daily work. However, anything having to do with the administrative side of things was perpetually, hopelessly &^*%# up...and I came to the conclusion that it would never change.
And by the way, I am not a malcontented misfit who loves to complain. I enjoyed my life there and tried as hard as I could to bring positive changes. Nothing ever got better, and I don't think it ever will. |
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desultude
Joined: 19 Jan 2003
Posts: 614
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| Posted: Thu Mar 04, 2010 5:24 am Post subject: |
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Hell, Mia Xanthi, you were a model of positive thinking and good effort. You were a veritable cheer-leader. That is why how they treated you was especially sick.
If they are checking the toilets on the women's side, it is news to me. Just last July they were a continual mess. Things would back up for days, and the offices nearest the toilets would be unusable. The excuse? The men could not come over and fix things on the women's side during the week when there were women there. Then the weekend would come and go, and things still were not fixed. They were too cheap to pay the overtime to get things fixed on the weekends, I guess.
Remember when the excellent nurse on the women's side got called on the carpet very harshly, and quit as a result, because she and the (western) head of the female campus had independently and out of their own pockets supplied sanitary supplies to the young women, as the admin would not supply Kotex vending machines? They sold them at cost to keep the supply going, and they were accused by head of the Saudi admin of profiteeriing- on Kotex! He being a master profiteer himself.
Yes, the memories.  |
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desultude
Joined: 19 Jan 2003
Posts: 614
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| Posted: Thu Mar 04, 2010 5:29 am Post subject: |
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By the way, I am currently working for a "start-up" here in Oman, and none of what happened at PMU would happen here.
We are treated with respect, paid on time, have all of our papers in order and can come and go as we wish. The women are perhaps listened to more than the men are in our department, and things get done. We have a cleaning staff that comes in every day and takes care of things.
It isn't paradise. There are still growing pains. But I have never ever heard a member of the administration use the putrid excuse of "we are a start-up university- just wait, everything will be glorious, someday. . . . . insha'Allah". |
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Sheikh N Bake
Joined: 26 Apr 2007
Posts: 1307
Location: Dis ting of ours
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| Posted: Thu Mar 04, 2010 6:25 am Post subject: |
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| desultude wrote: |
| veiledsentiments wrote: |
I read that as possibly being Middle 'Murica as much as Middle East.
VS |
And the Bible Belt can feel very similar to the Middle East. Can you imagine how much certain religious types in our country would like to have churches in the malls, and mandatory prayer time? |
Equating the Magic Kingdom with the US midwest? Come on.
The conditions Mia describes for PMU remind me in some select ways of conditions described at Japanese WWII prison camps. Much as I dislike bible thumpers, it's bending way over backwards as apologists to equate PMU scenarios in the Magic Kingdom with anywhere in the US--except possibly Bob Jones University and Brigham Young. But even in those two places, I imagine people get paid and the women don't need furtive male gofers to walk their timesheets out of the women's camp.
Last edited by Sheikh N Bake on Thu Mar 04, 2010 6:33 am; edited 1 time in total |
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desultude
Joined: 19 Jan 2003
Posts: 614
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| Posted: Thu Mar 04, 2010 6:32 am Post subject: |
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| Sheikh N Bake wrote: |
| desultude wrote: |
| veiledsentiments wrote: |
I read that as possibly being Middle 'Murica as much as Middle East.
VS |
And the Bible Belt can feel very similar to the Middle East. Can you imagine how much certain religious types in our country would like to have churches in the malls, and mandatory prayer time? |
Equating the Magic Kingdom with the US midwest? Come on.
The conditions for PMU remind me of conditions described at Japanese WWII prison camps. Much as I dislike bible thumpers, it's bending way over backwards as apologists to equate PMU scenarios in the Magic Kingdom with anywhere in the US--except possibly Bob Jones University and Brigham Young. But even in those two places, I imagine people get paid and the women don't need furtive male gophers to secret paperwork out of the women's camp. |
Point taken- there is no real comparison at this point.
But the bible-thumpers' wet dream is to have a church in every shopping mall, and their women all barefoot and pregnant. Of course, I am just talking about the extreme fundamentalists- but that is what you have in Saudia- the extreme fundamentalists.
Some fundamentalist Mormon compounds in the US, by the way, are prison camps for the women.
But I did overstate my case regarding the Bible belt. |
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