Job Discussion Forums

johnslat · Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 4:31 pm Post subject:

Dear Cleopatra,

If you have "screwed up," I'd say your students are very lucky indeed. How I'd love to sit in on one of your classes.

Why - well, I imagine they're likely as fun as mine.

I mean, can you believe they actually PAY us for having for having this much FUN? And I KNOW you're having fun because you've loved sharing what you've learned. Isn't teaching the best way to learn?

It's certainly been that for me. And, just to keep me humble (well, more or less) I must admit that I've learned a heck of a lot about the English language by teaching it.

Regards,
John

007 · Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 4:45 pm Post subject:

Well, the big loser is the one whose girl friend was forced to leave him and left him with a broken heart in the Magic Kingdom! Laughing

The losers are the ones who return to their home country and find themselves queuing in the Job Centre for social and incapacity benefit! Laughing

Over to you Uncle Scott, the weather here in Scotland is very very cold (-20 C), and the snow is painting our life with white poetry! Laughing

Cleopatra · Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 5:05 pm Post subject:

cmp45 · Joined: 17 Aug 2004 Posts: 1475 Location: KSA

Cleopatra · Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 6:09 pm Post subject:

johnslat · Posted: Sun Dec 05, 2010 6:28 pm Post subject:

Dear Cleopatra,

Well, OK - maybe I'm thinking more of my students now - the ESLers who come to class because they really WANT to learn.

Maybe I've gotten spoiled - but unless my memory is playing tricks on me, I had some pretty darn good students back at the IPA, too.

I really enjoyed (I know saying "loved" would be a bit too much) going to work every day, and quite honestly, I wouldn't have stayed as long as I did without having the feeling that what I and my students had done in class that day was meaningful.

Well , it was to me, anyway - and, if the number of ex-students who have
found me on facebook is any indication, maybe they thought so, too.

Regards,
John

PattyFlipper · Joined: 14 Nov 2007 Posts: 572

veiledsentiments · Joined: 20 Feb 2003 Posts: 17644 Location: USA

I've always wondered if the conditions are really getting worse or merely our tolerance of them... Laughing

VS

sheikher · Joined: 13 Jul 2009 Posts: 291

In reference to Mr Slat's post of 3 December and concomitant others, and re-entering Hijack Mode, of the 20+ lawyers I have spoken with over two years, one case stands out.

Wait for it! First, breaking news hot off today's press:

Saudi prince fined for speeding
By Staff
Published Tuesday, December 07, 2010

A Saudi prince has become the latest catch for the advanced speed cameras planted across the Gulf Kingdom over the past year, a local daily reported Tuesday. Prince Abdul Aziz bin Majid, Emir of the central town of Madina, was caught speeding in the city two weeks ago and made pay a fine, Shams said. �The Prince paid the fine two weeks ago after his car was caught speeding by Saher,� the paper quoted Talaat Qari, police traffic cameras director.

Saher is an Arabic name given by Saudi traffic police to a sophisticated speed camera system installed through the Gulf Kingdom over the past year as part of a drive to reverse a surge in road accidents.

http://www.emirates247.com/news/region/saudi-prince-fined-for-speeding-2010-12-07-1.326103

There is a certain Sheikh Meklef Al-Shammari, an internationally noted human rights advocate resident in Eastern Province. Al-Shammari often writes about poverty and unemployment, accusing the government of ignoring these problems because it is obsessed with public morality and keeping men and women apart. He has also highlighted the government�s failure to promote tourism and its discrimination against the Shiite minority.

Al-Shammari has been, yanni, ensconced for six months in detention in Dammam due to, ostensibly, his blogs related to the seeming unwillingness of a certain Prince to, for the sake of local tourism, expediently fulfill his promises of infrastructure development within Dammam and environs. Charged with, quite simply, "annoying others". Another case of arbitrary arrest.

'Tis a long and sordid tale. Three years ago Mr Al-Shammari was incarcerated for three months for not dissimilar blogged remarks related to horrid human rights violations perpetrated against migrant workers.

This is his avocation. Honourable. To be brief, his business enterprise went bankrupt; 30+ migrant workers sent home.

It took three years to win the arbitrary arrest case against a certain Prince -- a sum of some ten million riyals awarded. When Mr Al-Shammari approached City Hall six months ago to receive a copy of the judgment and demand enforcment, he was denied entry by security enforcing a sign posted by Someone at the entrance. A few days later he was arrested at an human rights associate's residence in Jubail.

This latest arrest has been challenged in courts. Final judgment last month stipulates that he should be released immediately. Despite a formal summons, Al-Shammari was denied release to appear for that judgment hearing.

His arbitrary arrest and incarceration have received local and international coverage in Human Rights Watch, Wall Street Journal, Frontline Defenders, New York Times, Reporters Without Borders, United Nations High Commission for Human Rights, whatnot, and is ongoing. You can look it up.

Be assured, dear KSA EFL teacher, that Al-Shammari's intelligence coupled with his not inconsiderable compassion guide his motivation to advise most any appeal for assistance requested by a wronged migrant worker.

For free.

On 23 September 2010, Saudi Arabia's National Day, Al-Shammari released this item to the international press. For what it's worth, here is Google's translation. Be seated and parse at will.

From a prison in Dammam year I dream of a national day more humane!

I woke to dawn darkness and light to replace the undisputed place in the sky Bmsanh as usual, and that reflects Bzenzanti shared by the ten prisoners, mostly convicted on charges of drug trafficking, and some of them murderers.

In this desolate place prisoners packed like sardines in a family lying on top of each other, so that room nine largest possible number of them. Dammam prison very crowded year, as the number of reviews in which more than the default capacity, including more than doubled.

I can almost hear the same each and every one of my colleagues in the cell, while each of them trying in vain to be defying the day and steal some time for himself to remain lying on his bed, and so far his body and his mind for a moment on the daily prison routine, boring.

But today is not like other days, it is Saudi Arabia's national day on which it is by more than seventy-year-old declaration of the Kingdom and unify them under one banner, "the kingdom of humanity," as some like to be called these days.

Contemplates the prison population today to get a special meal and luxury over this occasion, Eating cooked in ovens that prison has become dull times, bad taste and taste.

I am lying on my bed I felt the movement of the prisoner, nicknamed "Abu Antar" over me as he lay in bed top. Antar, a Syrian father, accused of fraud and sentenced to imprisonment for a period of seven months and then deportation to his country. His sentence had been completed many years, and no one cares about ending the legal procedures, so it is still languished in jail and does not know when they will be with him. There are a lot of non-Saudi prisoners who like the case of "father of Antar," languishing in prison, despite the end of the extended detention, because there is no one outside the walls follow their cases.

Rose, "Majid" from his bed as usual and become advocates of each one in his name in order to wake up for Fajr prayers. "Majid" has become him in prison for more than 25 years for a murder he committed as a young man. Not carried out the death sentence because the judge is expected to control the daughter of the deceased. Ironic that the daughter of slain girl mentally disturbed and they understand something of life. "Majid" in the forties and it is expected that this daughter of her mind either to recover or cause her to die to God, and therefore known as "Majid" fate, this is what the judge in his case for a quarter of a century!

Wake up everyone in the ward and became actively scurrying off to the toilets in dilapidated buildings almost fall out of the length. All maintenance of these cells and the facilities comes from the pockets of reviews, no one knows where the disposal of the prison budget for the maintenance paid by the state, they are like all the money stolen by the public in broad daylight and without that there is accountability.

Cannot bear to go to the bathroom it reminds me of the day I arrived in this detention and degrading treatment by their actions taken against me. They forced me to take off all my clothes and feel my body disgusting manner, in order to make sure of the absence of any drug to me. They know very well I am a man without precedent and the prisoner without charge. And placebo is their homeland and its people. We must be different procedures for those who are gay prisoners, because we are peaceful people who do not hold us any tool or material that may cause harm to one, Fmkani not here will never be here.

I went with the prisoners to the mosque to perform the dawn prayers, the mosque inside the walls and oversees the clean Asian workers are the masters of this prison, all requests for reviews are the ones who implement them in cooperation with the jailers. They're like "mafia" organization extorting money from prisoners in order to meet the demands of simple Calcjir and food services, as well as the smuggling of mobile phones, what is worth ten riyals outside the walls of the prison becomes a hundred within SAR.

Today the congregation lacked one prisoner has Toviy yesterday of heart failure as it was said. Was a guest in the ward (1), the amber which high mortality rate due to the presence of a listening device which transmitted radiation affect the brain or cause an imbalance in heart rate depending on the rumor circulating among the prison wards. Here there is no general state of health services provided to any prisoner of whatever had been suffering from chronic diseases, so it gets sick remains at the mercy of God abuse "Panadol", because the exit procedures for the treatment takes a long time, and again the prisoner dies before reaching the hospital.

I finished the prayer, I went back to the cell, and I walk down the aisle I barely felt the prison walls crumbling as she tells me all men have spent their lives here unfairly, or Zjawa for many years in these cells despite the expiration of their sentences.

I'm from, he was tempted to get all the oppressed of his incarceration, I find myself now in prison, because of the issue of malicious and premeditated, where Olpsoni no crime committed, and fabricated my charge the same judge refused to rule where, where from Incefni and restore to me my right and given me my dignity ...?

In this national day .. I still dream of that day will come again, and where there is rule of law and there is accountability for those who use its authority to the liquidation of his opponents.

I dream of a national day more humane, and we can all homeland with all our clothes and Atiava.

I dream .. I will continue my dream to see a decent life for all citizens be treated equal.

I dream and I will keep my dream .. because life is a dream such as this prison death attendant death, disappointment and frustration-drawn.

http://www.aafaq.org/news.aspx?id_news=8597

In conclusion, two items of note. A close an associate of Al-Shammari states to the Wall Street Journal: "Using the anti-terror campaign has been the conspicuous Saudi policy to arrest and harass political reformists and human-rights activists," says Mohammed al-Qahtani, co-founder of the Saudi Civil and Political Rights Association, which has become the most public face of a maturing national civil-rights movement. "It is a serious threat to those dedicated to nonviolent change in the nation."

http://www.zawya.com/story.cfm/sidZW20100829000063

Seven months ago, the same member of the Fourth Estate reported Saudi Arabia: Land Of Conditional Opportunity

Of significance to the EFL community:

...But the opportunity to earn a living often has to be weighed against the difficulties of living in a strictly conservative Islamic society. Foreign workers face a number of challenges in Saudi Arabia, including problems with their local sponsors, an opaque legal system, gender and religious discrimination, and trouble adapting to the country's Islamic culture...

...The sponsorship system is often criticized by human rights advocates. In April, the UN rights chief Navi Pillay called for changes to the system while giving a speech in Saudi Arabia. She said confiscating passports, withholding wages, and abusing domestic help and other illegal acts can only be mitigated if "governments maintain a human rights approach to migration at the front and centre of their action."...

...The tough environment doesn't affect everyone the same way. And as the kingdom continues to plow its reserves into development projects, it will undoubtedly lure the workers it needs. For many Muslims, there could be no greater privilege than to live in Saudi Arabia.

http://www.zawya.com/story.cfm/sidZW20100517000018/?relcontent=ZAWYA20101027030040

Incidentally, Mr Slat, to confirm Mr Carpenter's remark posted the following day, five minutes ago a prominent Al Khobar lawyer informed me that hundreds of princes own establishments across the Kingdom. Many of them are engaged in court cases. I have Sheikh Dr Bader Busaies's authority to quote him. I'm sure his phone number would be edited. PM to me if you care for it.

007 · Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2010 2:45 pm Post subject:

johnslat · Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2010 3:02 pm Post subject:

Whoa - stop the presses (so to speak.) I'm actually in agreement with one of 007's posts.
A prince getting a speeding fine? Bukra fil mish-mish.

Regards,
John

sheikher · Joined: 13 Jul 2009 Posts: 291

Beer money for a wee public relations. Brilliant!

007's next theory: Mosaad was involved.

veiledsentiments · Joined: 20 Feb 2003 Posts: 17644 Location: USA

I'd suggest that Sheikher just post links rather than keep posting all these reams of ... often off-topic stuff... that is likely of interest to few readers.

VS

sheikher · Joined: 13 Jul 2009 Posts: 291

Is that an off-topic suggestion I see? Tu quoque.

I am not motivated to post best-sellers. I wish, however, to provide convenience. For whom?

Many seasoned eslcafers fail to realize that the bulk of readership is newbees -- including some farting backpackers -- who require detailed information to assist in their deliberations. Instant gratification leads to skimming, and an overlooked link without commentary or content could impact careers.

Happiness is in the details, though for the life of me I can't cite that right now.

johnslat · Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2010 6:16 pm Post subject:

Dear sheikher,

"Happiness is in the details . . ."

Well, there is this:

"Happiness lies in the details, in the small, particular things.
Gloom and depression are general but happiness is always specific." �Garrison Keillor

But this is likely a more familiar quote:

"The Devil is in the details." source unknown

which, it turn sprang from another saying:

"God is in the details."

But the Devil seems to be winning:

"By (1999) major U.S. newspapers and broadcast-news sources were invoking the devil in this phrase anywhere from about twice as often as God to some twenty-five times as often."

http://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/issues/2000/01/001wordcourt.htm

Regards,
John