Live as if you are drawing

I am taking drawing classes, and I am enjoying it so much..

I always believed, that results are not worth the work and effort if you do not enjoy the work process

If you do not enjoy your job, and you work only for the salary, then you are living in hell

Same goes for studying, cooking, sports, everything …

And I believe that there is always a beautiful enjoyable way for doing everything you need... you just need to find it

Back to my classes, It reminds me of the observer’s post , he talks about growing up after a certain age not growing old,he found that in reading and many might find it many other things, what makes you "grow up" is the way you perceive everything you do ..

What I like about the classes is that you can apply the taught techniques to almost everything in life..

One of the things we are learning, is looking at the subject we are drawing as a whole, and drawing its frame first…then looking at the small parts and details.. And after that allowing the details to correct the big picture

It is a skill that some people naturally have, depending on the dominant brain part (read about left /right brain parts –it is interesting)

Sometimes we catch part of the problem and work on it forgetting about the main objective and the big picture, that happens a lot in software development, people immediately start thinking about part of the technical problem forgetting about the other parts connected to it and forgetting about the business goals ending up with a solution that doesn’t serve the user.

Another amazing thing is that drawing is about presenting multi dimensional objects with two dimensions, (very similar to database design but that is another story), It requires erasing all what you have learned about a shape or an object and looking at things simply , sometimes you draw a very long street using short lines because of the angle …

Usually life is simple, but our experiences make us complicate things, for example, falling in love is beautiful and simple, but sometimes the pervious bad experiences make us fear to proceed, or make us over analyze things or assume that the same bad things will happen again… unfortunately I see that happening to people everyday … if you just look at things as if you are drawing them..You’ll realize that it is not another long street it is only two short lines and you are already far away from where you started

Homosexuality and freedom

I have always been gay friendly, well…I am everything friendly , at the end of the day if it is something personal and it doesn’t affect me , I don’t care ..

I didn’t know much about homos , I didn’t really know if it is a choice or a sickness , but I thought something is wrong with these people and definitely they are not normal , but no one is “normal”!! What is normal anyway??

I started to learn about homosexuality only when a close friend of mine told me he is gay, many theories, many possible reasons , and I am not here to convince anyone that they are not sick or that they didn’t choose to be gay … because it doesn’t matter , does it ?

With time I got to know more homosexual people, and I don’t think it is a coincidence that many of them are interesting , creative and special … I think it is a result of what they had to go through. Each one of them reached a point where he realized he is gay, where he finds out that he is not like his parents, and usually most of what we learn about relationships and life -in general- we learn from watching our parents, we usually think that that is what is “normal”.

When one is faced with THE fact, then his background doesn’t matter, culture doesn’t matter, not even religion will matter, nothing will matter anymore, what he feels is the only fact, he will have to believe himself, his mind and his body not anything he was taught.

If one –at that age – breaks the norm then he is forced to become a free man, he naturally stops to be a blind follower, it opens the door for him to explore all possibilities and all solutions, that way of thinking affects all aspects of his life, he doesn’t not fear thinking differently about anything and he starts living his way.

I think that most people are blind followers unless they are slapped in the face or living in an intercultural environment, people who live in closed communities usually think that there is only one way of living, because if you always see the sky blue, and you have never seen pink sky you’ll believe that the sky is blue, but if you see a pink and green and yellow sky, it will be easy to accept that there is many sky colors.

Personally I believe that freedom is not a natural need or instinct for humans (maybe for some animals!), it is something we learn from our experiences , and gays are an example of people who had to grow into free people.

La vida es un carnaval

I have too much happiness in my blood today.. I wore the colors I like this morning and the necklaces that I adore and normal people think they do not match.. oh god, I love wearing things that do not match ..

--I know I sound stupid when I am happy

Today I am in a state of mind that makes me feel that everything I do is dancing …

A while ago a friend asked about my dream, I thought for few minutes , everything passed through my mind … my family , career , people around me , children, art , painting, travelling, making a change … so many small dreams .. and then I remembered an advice from an old friend … be happy and make the people around you happy that is my dream .. Very simple.. Small but veeery big..

--Yes, I sound so stupid when I am happy, and my thoughts are not organized, I don’t care, I am happy:)

Who are the people who I appreciate the most? the people who taught me how to be happy and yes happiness is something to be learned , a state of mind , a habit .. and a beLIEf

I wish you all a wonderful day :)

Life from a BI perspective

Every point in life is multidimensional, you can look at it from deferent dimensions/angles, each time you see/understand a deferent image but never the real one, reality is all the dimensions together which is even hard to imagine for humans.

That is why we have different opinions and that is why no one is ever right.

God bless sciences and technology.

Women’s sexual health- Part I

You know how in every period there is something you’re thinking of, thoughts keep bombarding you, omens are all around you and you’re left with no choice but thinking about it, reading and searching it …

This time it is “women’s sexual health” it all started when a family friend told me an awful story about the “Yemeni Khinjar” -the traditional knife in Yemen- he said that women in Yemen are circumcised and the vaginal opening is narrowed to insure that women will stay virgin till marriage, when a woman gets married her husband uses his “Khinjar” to reopen her vagina !!! Interesting!!!

I couldn’t stop thinking of it , I wished the story was wrong , so I started reading about it ..

Here is what I got from the web :

•“Female genital cutting (FGC) refers to the excision or tissue removal of any part of the female genitalia for cultural, religious or other non-medical reasons. It is also frequently referred to as female genital mutilation (FGM) or female circumcision (FC)”

•Where is it practiced? Africa , Yemen, Oman, Emirates and Egypt – I stayed in Oman for two months and I can tell you they are proud of their “Khinjar”

•There are many types of FGC, it depends on how much of the female genitalia is removed (it can vary from removing a small part to removing it all), and if the opening is narrowed or not, in some cultures they only simulate the operation, by causing some bleeding and celebrating.

•Why do they do it? To make sure women stay virgin till marriage and to improve men’s sexual experience. In some cultures they wouldn’t consider a woman feminine if she is not circumcised.

•Although science says that the removed parts are essential for getting orgasm, 90% of circumcised women interviewed for some survey claim they experienced orgasm.

•Medical consequences are terrible, infections happen because the operation is done without any medical support, problems with menstrual cycle may happen because of narrowing the opening, and the cutting done by the husband for the first intercourse can cause very bad consequences as well.

The worst part is that the operation is done by women, usually mothers or relatives, and that many interviewed women think/say that this is a good practice and that it should continue.

I am the type of woman who thinks that we “Women” are stupid for accepting all silly inventions such as makeup, high heels, waxing…Etc that makes us beautiful tools for men to play with, unfortunately time is showing me that there is no limits for women’s stupidity and women abuse .

I love Jordan …

It is interesting how we like to give “ugly “ labels to people who act in an extra ordinary nice way :)

• Nice to his mom : ابن امه
• Nice to women : رخيص
• Nice to his girlfriend: خز
• Nice to her boyfriend : هبله/ مدعوس عليها
• Nice to his/her boss :هز دنب
• Nice to his sister:*قر
• Nice to his/ her friends : خروف
• Nice to clients: نصاب/ بياع حكي
• Jordanian who loves Jordan OR Palestinian who loves Palestine: عنصري
• Jordanian who loves Palestine OR Palestinian who loves Jordan : قليل اصل
• Smiling in Ramadan: اكيد مش صايم... يعني كافر كلب حقير
• Conservative more than me : متخلف, معقد
• Less conservative than me : فلتان, قلت حيا

KalaKeee33 el shabab

They keep on telling us how silly, moody and inconsistent we are …

Check this out

I got 7/10

Happy Women’s Day

Today is the International women’s day, it is celebrated in Russia, Eastern Europe and some other countries, all I knew about it is that my mom gets a big bouquet of roses and I get a small one :)

This year I read a little about it, and learned that the 8th of March was marked as “the International Women’s Day” because of the March 8, 1917, strike "for bread and peace" led by Russian women.

Thanks to those worker women we have some of our rights today; unfortunately many women are still not aware of their rights..

So on this day I wish:
· That women will gain more awareness of their rights
· We’ll have less violence against women
· We’ll have less social presser on women
· That women will no longer allow themselves to be dependent
· That the successful women of my beautiful country will shine
· We’ll have less prostitutes and stripers and more scientists
· That women will be able to walk in the streets without experiencing any kind harassment

Would you steal what you believe is “your right”?

I believe there is no standards in what is ethical and what is not, what is your right, what is mine, what is your company’s right , what is the manger’s right, what are the employee’s rights , parent’s rights, the girlfriend’s rights, the boyfriend’s rights, brother’s rights …

Of course humanity has agreed on many, but it still defers from a culture to another, a city to another and even on the individuals level …

I am talking about the unwritten rights/rules that manage our behavior and everyday activities …

I remember that when I was younger I was struggling to find out the secret standard rights/rules, I found some, created others and there are still vague ones …

I realized that I simply can’t afford following all the announced rules of our society …

I always had the need to announce my rights/rules although I think that no one has the right to judge me… (Not logical)

Back to the original subject: since everyone plays by his rules, is it ok to steal “your right”? Do you have to announce your rules? Would others be able to play if they don’t know your area? Is what you believe necessarily fair?

Softact T-shirts

Finally we got our Softact T-shirts, Hureeeeh, LoLuLoLUleeeesh,Uraaaaaa

3ogbal el Team T-Shirts wel Prodact T-shirts :)

Softact's Boot Camping

I was talking to my manager about the project’s progress, plan and usual work stuff, I asked him what he thinks..

He answered: what about boot camping?

Natasha: HaH!

Dawsar (my manager): reserve a room at a dead sea hotel, the Movenpick or the Marriott if you want, go with your colleague (Heba) for a night or two, isolate your selves, relax and brainstorm :)

Young Arab Women (not virgins anymore)

Few months ago 3 girls I know got married; all of them are divorced now, which is good! Divorce is much better than a bad marriage.

The three marriages were arranged traditional marriages that happened in no time.

In all three marriages every girl gave up either her studies or her job!

Divorce reasons varied from the couple simply not getting along with each other to mental abuse, sick jealousy and even sexual abuse.

I just don’t get it! How can a girl take the risk of getting married to a stranger? How can she stand the idea of sleeping with a stranger? Why would a girl give up her career or her studies? Why? To become more dependent on someone that cannot be trusted?

Playing with Terabytes :-D

I am working on an ODS project, ETLing millions of records, I just realized that we’ll end up (when going live) ETLing almost 2 Terabytes of data, It feels soo good, for me it is like bungee jumping, no matter how good you are prepared for it, and how safe and calculated it is, it is still an experience that will make you feel raw adrenalin pumping through your veins!

SSIS DataReader Source Task

SSIS ETLers,

If you‘re looking for a way to assign an expression to the SQLCommand property of the DataReader Source task , you can do that from the properties of the Data Flow task that contains the DataReader (Not the DataReader itself)

I wanted to share coz it was painful for me to figure it out!

This makes me laugh soo much:

Natasha: drop table X.
SQL server: Cannot drop the table ‘X’, because it does not exist or you do not have permission.

Natasha : create table X( x int).
SQL server : There is already an object named ‘X’ in the database.

Natasha : ok sweety, drop table X.
SQL server: Command(s) completed successfully.

Natasha: :-) No matter how stupid you can be sometime, I still love you :-)

Two Jordanian developers having a “Technical” conversation:

Ahmad1: Esmaaa3, fata7et 3al Aazmen, laget el XML file maojuud u faye3, bas mish gabel yisamsem!

Ahmad2: HaDDa hu nafso bikun M6oget3

Risk: A small tiny area between success and failure

Softact Team Portal :-D

Young Arab Virgin

We talked for only 5 minutes, but it was enough to break my heart !She is 18 years old, out with a guy who looked like he is her boyfriend, she failed in 4 “Tawjihi” exams, and when I asked her about her plans she said :

After I failed in “Tawjihi” I got engaged to my cousin who lives in Sweden, Sweden is a nice country, isn’t it?

It sounded like “I got a good offer in Sweden“!!!!

Well may be It Is a good deal for all three parties, the guy in Sweden dreams of a young Arab virgin! While the guy with her wants to go out with a girl without any serious obligations and SHE wants to get rid of her school problems by getting married.

Congratulations!

Alcohol

I am using a software called Alcohol to browse folders and files, the old version of it is “Alcohol 52% “ the one I have is “Alcohol 120%”,sometimes I start my work day with Alcohol 120%, it makes me laugh sooo much.

Cheers ;)