Hey everyone! How is everyone doing? Hope all is well!

Alright listen up now! I will be running a contest! Well, two basically. So scroll down for more!




Now as you know I am obsessed with square shots, so I need you to link to me on this journal your nomination for what you consider to be the best square photo! You can nominate your own square photo or someone else's!

Please send your nomination as a NOTE, with the title SQUARE PHOTOS.

The competition ends June 15. Results will be on July 1. I will be updating the submissions on a weekly basis!

SPREAD THE WORD!!!

Grand Prize: 1 year sub + gallery feature
Runner ups: 6 and 3 months sub




It's easy, you are to take a snap of my 25K pageview and you get a 6 month sub! !!!












I just wanted to say THANK YOU for keeping this page alive!!! I hope you all are well and getting ready for your great summer break!

Keep a lookout on the next journal for some cool contests and free subs!!!

Enjoy the thumbs










I've been a very bad deviant

Work work work... God I seriously need a break from everything! Even the holiday season was swarmed with work to do. Sigh.

But what has really been keeping me busy are the legal issues I have been facing regarding my work. Since I switched agencies, the old agency has been giving me trouble and left me with two-months unpaid salary, among other things.

Cutting a long story short, I lost my case against the agency (only because I fall under the ONLY sector unprotected by law) however I did get paid my two months.

Anyway, I made sure the new agency write all my rights explicitly in the contract, which made it 15 pages long but at least I know I won't be taken advantage of.

Nothing artistically major - just enjoying my 30mm 1.4 lens like nothing ever. Unfortunately most of the portrait photos are private (sigh) but good news is I FINALLY managed to pull off an HDR yesterday so I will post it soon.

So how have you all been? How's the new year treating you? Missed you all

Enjoy the thumbs.










Even if I am not a UAE national, it is hard not to feel National Day. Of course, it would have been much different if I were a UAE National...

So what I could DO is, being an Arab expat living here since 2002, is show my gratitude to this country. So THANK YOU Emirates for hosting me all those wonderful years, thank you for making my life comfortable, thank you for making me feel safe, thank you for giving me the liberty of many choices, thank you for your kindness and your services, your charities and beaches and malls and people and culture and everything.

It has been a great journey being here and inshalla (God-willing) there would be many more years to come.

SO HAPPY NATIONAL DAY FOR ALL MY FELLOW UAE DEVIANTS AND ALL FELLOW EXPATS LIVING HERE!!!!













Uuuugh times are tough! But they're great

First off, thank all of you who have dropped me notes, faved, commented and waved hi on my home page it is really appreciated and I will be getting to all those comments, deviations and journals soon.


Just wanted to give a quick update on where I have been:

- Still employed and working for the same company but under a different agency. Things are, thank God, finally appear to get better on the contract-side (at least my rights are explicitly written). Many negative changes though in the work flow is happening but nothing to worry about... at least I am still employed so it's something to cheer up at

- Picked up exercising again... not the gym this time, but cardio. I want to feel my veins and arteries and blood and heart and lungs... so I am training 3-5 days a week, running along the beach. Gained some weight which is always welcome and the exercise happy-hormones take the work stress away

- Picked up on reading too, so thankfully I am starting to feel literate. Instead of leaving work and getting stuck in a two-hour traffic, I go to the beach next to the office and read, then go exercise. By the time I am done the traffic will be over

- I am working on the how-to I promised so expect it by next Saturday

- Miss ya'll and enjoy the thumbs!










I stumbled upon this link yesterday and it truly gave me the inspiration I needed. It is a bit long but you have to watch it all to appreciate it: [link]

As a side note, I used Photoshop to air-brush The Young King, which I am surprised and proud to say now has over 1000 views!




What makes me really proud though is that I had it printed for the first time on 18" x 16", and it really felt awesome. I can't wait for my friend to come on Thursday to give it as a gift!!!

Thank you all guys for your support - I just can't show my appreciation enough!













I soooooooooooo needed this break, and I am happy to report I enjoyed every minute of it! Well almost - there is always an old, dormant family issue ready to pop up and ruin everything - but I had fun regardless.

I spent the morning and nights with granny and the rest of the day with my best buddy and his fiance. I was saddened that they separated a few months back but I am happy to report they went back to each other I am so happy for them... the last time I was in Syria I attended their engagement so it was a good thing they came back together.

I spent a good deal of time outdoors but unfortunately I didn't have the liberty of time to take "well composed" shots. My wide angle lens was my companion, even if I didn't need to take a wide angle shot. I shot a lot of "snapshots" but very very few of them turned out to be dA-good but I am gonna "deviantisize" them. You can scroll down for the rest of the images

I tried HDR photography. Unfortunately they turned out hideous. I didn't really know how HDR worked, and I couldn't take the tripod with me as well. Most of my other shots were taken from a moving car - so yeah good luck with those too.

Anyway, photos isn't the point. The point is that I am back and as refreshed as ever!

I have had a tremendous amount of exposure to humbleness, and I blogged about it if you're interested to read (you can find photos of granny there too).

I will attend to your deviations and journals in the coming days


CLICK ON THE IMAGES FOR A BIGGER VERSION







I will be leaving to Syria on the 10th of October at night, God willing. Best thing about it is that the weather is absolutely wonderful - around a 10-20 degree (Celsius) drop + the latitude adds a lot of atmosphere as well.

On *13s69's recommendation, I would be buying the 10-20mm wide lens for all the wonderful olive-tree landscapes around the village and would be buying the 28mm prime lens to shower my grandma with photos - for all I know this is the best chance to take all the memories I have of her with me

She's making my favorite dishes, god bless her. She raised me when I was a child, not my parents, so there is a special bond between me and granny. She asked that I get her - of all things - a box of Kit Kat. And of course some herbs that would now be out of season in Syria. Tea is going to taste so good!

Anyway, I will be back the following week, although if I find it pointless to come on Tuesday noon so I could go to work for only 2 working days before the weekend, I might as well take the rest of the week off. Best part about getting a one month notice is that you start not giving a shit LoL.

So anyway, enjoy the thumbs, and I will be posting the small mini-guide on photo editing when I return. It will be using Picasa. Although it is ridiculously easy and primitive to use, you can actually pull of some good stunts with it if you use it properly. Anyway all this for later. You guys have a great Eid Mubarak with all your families as well !!










Finally... after two days of going through all the deviations, I adjusted all of them to the new look I am very excited about them! Gone are the really big borders and they are all now replaced by incredibly slim ones with what I think are nice titles.

Four photos though did not undergo the border revamp... this is because I redid them ground-up and will be posting them as separate new deviations. I did not want to over-write the old ones with the new ones because there are favs and comments... and I don't want to cheat the people who faved and commented by changing the deviation. So, I will be submitting soon the new four revamped deviations, and I hope you like them!

As for what they are... well you can head over to my gallery and see which photos still have the bulky look

If you didn't find a photo in my gallery that you like, it is because they're over at the storage. They're gonna stay there for a while. Sorry for that!

Now I have to go cook and pick up my sis from work. See you later




- Got my "one month and a half" notice from the recruiting agency. I mean... they ARE a recruiting agency.. isn't it there job to find me work? Anyhoo
- Going to create a photo-blog with my deviations so that my non-dA friends can have a look










Yup, time to revamp the gallery again. I am making it more, um, "simple" and "summer" like and elegant. This is for the borders of the photos. I will apply similar simplicity to the poetry and prose as well.

I am going, God willing, to Damascus after a two year absence, on Oct 10. It has been such a looooooooooooooong time, I am killing myself and I want to see grandma... she is getting old, God bless her and give her more healthy years ahead. She really misses me and I just can't live with that. Plus, if I am getting fired next month, this means my residency will be cancelled until I find a new job, so I can't leave the country then, and I can't take a holiday off from my new work when I get it as well. Now on Eid (Muslim holiday) it is as good a time as any.

I got a nice collection of photos to show you, so scroll down! I will update you guys with new deviations soon. I am starting to go out and about to take shots, and in Syria I will definitely be taking a lot.

Have a nice day!




- Now I can cook sweet and sour sauce without syrup!
- Didn't lose a lot of weight in Ramadan, which means my weight-control hormones have finally started to work










Yesterday I tried out making Ravioli with Alfredo sauce and chicken. And it was totally awesome! So here is how to make it.




Depending on how many you will be feeding (as well as your appetite), you need as many FRESH chicken breasts. Frozen chicken breasts simply won't do. They'r disgusting. For my sister and myself, we shared 3 chicken breasts. So yeah, you need a lot.

Slice the chicken into small cubes and marinate them with a little bit of olive oil, crushed garlic (as many as you would want to handle) and half a lemon (or as much as you want). Just remember that the taste of the ingredients will dilute with the sauce and pasta, so keep it in mind.

Keep the chicken still to marinate fully for 15 minutes or so.

Next up, bring your frying pan or wok (I prefer a wok). The oil on the marinated chicken should be enough to roast them, so once they are roasted add some ginger powder and put the wok aside.

IF you want, you can roast in some mushrooms and brocolli seperately. Mushrooms take 4 lightyears to roast so keep them seperate from everything else.




It is Ravioli, which is basically pasta stuffed with spinach. Do NOT bring in frozen ravioli. It is the bane of all pastas. It is like unfreezing lasagna. No one likes that.

You can either stuff the ravioli yourself or get freshly stuffed ones. They're not that expensive when you think of it, and they're made fresh and are available in most supermarkets. All you need to do is put them in salted boiled water and sit patiently for a few minutes. Which you can do the sauce in.

If you're going to stuff it yourself, do it like you do samboosak (or samoosak if you're Palestinian). If you're Russian, it is like Pelmeine but with spinach instead of the meat. Put the spinach (you may want to put in goat cheese too) and wrap the pasta on it. Clasp your hands together and savor the moment.



Alfredo is the restaurant name where the sauce was invented. Now you can make it at your home.

The basic ingredient is full cream. Yes, wonderfully thick and deliciously textured cream. You can get them in packs. Don't get the runny cream. You'd want the thick one and then, um, thin it from there.

Empty a pack into a deep cooking utensil and add tiny amounts of water, around 3 table spoons. Stir the cream, if you find it too thick, add a tablespoon of water, until you think it is thick enough. Basically you would like it to be a bit firm to the stir. However, note that if you are going to add cheese, it will make it firmer, so you would want to add another tablespoon of water in this case.

Keep stirring because cream has a bad habit of sticking. Once it comes to a light boil, add the parmesan, romani or cheddar cheese (all grated) to the mixtire. Count to five and then add the chicken and ravioli (after filtering them from the water).

Stir the mixture properly so that the chicken ratios out with the ravioli. Keep it on a very low flame because the cream thickens with every second you keep it on the stove. Taste it to check how all the ingredients mixed and add salt or pepper as necessary.




Put the contents of the food into respective plates of the people who are going to eat (I personally would have eaten half the meal from the pot). Wash some rockets and toss it in every dish. With spinach and rockets, no excuses will be accepted tonight!



You may also want to try out my Fusilli Bolognese recipe.








This is intended for Firefox users. If you still don't use it (shame on you) get it from here.

Have you heard of Greasemonkey? It is a Firefox plugin that runs scripts to do various things on webpages. In English, it simply is a plugin to customize sites in several useful ways.

For instance, in the old version of dA, there used to be skins for the site which run on Greasemonkey. Several other things like devianTIDY as well use Greasemonkey.

So, first off, download the plugin here.

Next, you'd like to see what it can do to dA, right? Go here to check for scripts, most of which are incredibly useful. You'd like to check out Quick Notes, No Thanks, Deviant Toolbox, and DeviantPlus for starters.

But Greasemonkey doesn't stop here!

You can check if it has scripts for sites you frequent. Here are some scripts for Gmail, Google Reader, Yahoo Mail and Hotmail.

Try it out.. you won't believe how useful it is until you install some functions and you'd be amazed at how you were able to live without it!

PS: I got a two month extension at work. If you dunno what I am talking about, read this first.




- It is funny how there seem to be more hours in Ramadan
- Vista or XP? Don't know if it is worth the upgrade!
- I have a 2-gallon box of chocolate ice cream and 2 jars of Nutella. *looks at watch*










Today has been incredibly hectic!


5 AM - woke up
6 AM - left for work
12 PM - left work
1:30 PM - took sis to emergency room (3rd time in two days)
5 PM - left emergency room
5:30 PM - took my best friend to my house
6 PM - started cooking
7:20 PM - ate (breaking the fast is at 6:30-something PM)
8:30 PM - finished the dishes, made tea
9 PM - no energy to go to prayers, went to bed
11 PM - woke up, took my friend home
Now - writing this
Later on - read Quran before dawn.



Hectic! I fasted for over 14 hours straight! *dies*

BUTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

IT IS MY BIRTHDAY! WOOOO HOOOOOOOO!

Happy Birthday to me and RAMADAN KAREEM to everyone!


PS: got the Canon 400D as a gift nagging works!




- incredibly happy Ramadan is here
- still hungry
- going to miss out on all the nice shows in Ramadan. Why do they have to have them in Ramadan!










Before I continue, I have to say something to clear my conscience first. I do not want to be ungrateful for my job. It has done a lot of good to me, in terms of money as well as some personal growth. Although a certain person or two will disagree with the latter, they are entitled to their opinion. Thanks to my job, I have managed to wiggle myself out of an enormous financial burden as well as move out into a bigger house with privacy in it, and this new house alone was worth the year of hard work and bullshit. The house has added so much value and peace of mind to my life and I am eternally grateful for this fact. Although it is 2 km away from the old house, it is 40-minute less traffic. Not to mention it being bigger with a nice view.

I am also grateful for the other parts of the personal growth. It is through my job that I have discovered how INCREDIBLY patient of a person I am (others would call it stupid). I have seen some employees barely surviving the third month. Many have left. Many simply have gone and have never been heard of again. I was whole-heartedly patient, tolerant, and committed. Although I have been told, repeatedly, not to finish a task quickly and to take my time with it, most of the time I finish things before schedule and this has proved I am invaluable. For a while at least.

It is also through the difficult times at the office, which were every day, and when my patience wore thin, that I found my blog to vent in, to entertain my readers (hopefully) through what I see sarcastic, witty and funny (I'm a Chandler Bing type of funny guy). I also have to thank KI and Hamza for the innumerable hours we have chatted through the days.

Now that my conscience is clear, I am ready to say what I am about to say.

My company has recently had no work for me to do, which is exactly where my being efficient backfired. I finished things too quickly that the client and management probably had to have some time to grasp what the have had in hand. For the past month I have had only minimal things to work on. And when I say minimal I say almost nothing. While some days of doing nothing have previously occured, not doing anything for a month has taken a toll on my mental stability. I discovered I am probably a workaholic or simply too committed to my work to imagine myself not working.

But during that period a long list of things at the office occured that I cannot freely talk about yet. The jist of it is that, I either go for another project in Riyadh, Saudi for one year or have my contract terminated. Actually, having my contract terminated is a nice way to put it. The way my company put it is that I will expire.

Feeling like a tuna with only two weeks to go before I rot, I have felt uneasy and it slightly showed. But I have also taken a pledge to myself that I am to be positive and remove negative energy, and this pledge was extensively put to the test.

I have thought about the issue considerably, although, looking in retrospect it shouldn't have required that much thought or fuss. But it was an experience especially that this was, for the first time, the TRUE moment where I had to exclusively make the choice to determine how my life would go, and how it affected everyone around me. Thinking for myself and my own best interest was an ordeal, because myself and my best interest incorporate a lot of people, events, and things, so I had to think on a global factor and not a selfish one (in fact I cannot think selfishly because a lot of people and things are part of the "me").

The company had a lot of cards up its sleeve. Doing a quick cost-benefit analysis instantly reveals that the negative aspect is being jobless and losing the handsome salary, not to mention the company name in the international market. The company held many people with the throat by that.

But I also made another pledge to myself: I am not to become a slave to money. I had been its slave for the past year, and I don't blame except myself for this (but let's face it, Dubai plays a major role to be as such). But here I am taking an active role to remedy the problem. I refuse to subject myself to further bullshit, and I absolutely refuse to have my spirit destroyed for the sake of m... ]]> *nawras http://nawras.deviantart.com/journal/14485161/ http://nawras.deviantart.com/journal/14485161/ Tue, 04 Sep 2007 10:09:59 PDT
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