Homeless Hotspots was a charitable innovation initiative by BBH New York in partnership with Front Steps Shelter during the SXSW Interactive festival in March of 2012. It attempted to help modernize the Street Newspaper model employed to support homeless populations for our more digital age. [Link]
I think it’s quite disrespectful to the homeless but they don’t seem to mind it given the situation they are in. Imagine the ministry of telecommunication in Lebanon hooking up 3G signal boosters and hotspots on street children and beggars. That might actually make people like them for a change and stop running away from them.
According to OTV, the Muslim students who violated Antonine’s university laws by praying inside the campus were warned and they signed the warning willingly. The university administration stayed firm on its decision and warned of future similar actions.
Annahar newspaper has been tweeting lately about its new initiative #MyAnnahar where all Lebanese are invited to become citizen journalists and share pictures, videos and all sorts of news all under one platform.
I was told it will be launched soon and I think it will be quite interesting if it’s done properly.
If you wanna know more about citizen journalism, click [Here].
It’s always good to know that our ex-Prime Minister Saad Hariri understands why the Internet should not be censored or controlled and will work on stopping LIRA or any similar law.
It took only a tweet and an email to fix my friend’s problem. I hope they will fix this bug in their system, but thumbs up for the great customer service.
In details, I tweeted MTC Touch about the problem linking them to the blog post and I emailed the person who helped me set up the 3G pilot testing a few months back. They replied to me within 15 minutes and told me that the problem can be fixed and activated the 1Gb plan on my friend’s number an hour later.
A friend of mine went on the MTC website yesterday to see how he can upgrade his 3G plan from 500Mb to 1Gb as he has been exceeding his consumption by some 300-400Mb every month.
Noting that he had not received his invoice statement yet nor an SMS from MTC, he followed the instructions on the website and de-activated his 500Mb plan and then moved on to activate the 1Gb plan.
It wasn’t working so he called MTC hotline who informed him that he will have to wait until the next cycle (his cycle was on the 15th) to activate the new plan and that he will have to stay a whole month without internet. Best practice is to de-activate the plan one day before the cycle ends and then re-activate it the next day.
What sort of non-sense is that? Why can’t MTC simply upgrade the plan and that’s it?
Added to that, MTC can easily make money from such customers who wish to upgrade their plans even if it meant paying extra and they say no?
I had posted few days ago clarifications regarding Dr Zackaria Ahmed Hankir’s arrest and how he collects weapons as a hobby. While Dr.Hankir stated that he was mistreated and humiliated, the Lebanese Army issued a press release today denying what happened and insisting that Dr.Hankir does not have the right to possess such weapons and that most his weapons are operational.
I am not sure if it’s legal to own such guns, but I must say that’s one heck of a collection this man has!
There’s an Arab proverb that says “مصائب قوم عند قوم فوائد”, which basically means that while some people might be harmed by a certain event or incident, others might actually benefit from it. As it appears, the incident that sparked the issue of food safety was the poisoning of Randa Berri, wife of Speaker Nabih Berri during the Independence Day ceremony.
This led Speaker Nabih Berri to interrupt his dinner and leave Baabda palace.
If that’s how things get done in Lebanon, we can only hope that Gebran Bassil has a claustrophobic relative and that he/she will get stuck in a tiny elevator for an hour or two because there’s no electricity. We can also pray that Sehnaoui’s friends or relatives get lost some time soon for a few hours in the mountains with no 3G or network coverage and finally that our Minister of Public Works’ wife breaks her Ferrari’s suspension in one of Lebanon’s potholes.
Randa Berri may have found the solution to all our problems in Lebanon! Thank you again!
Regarding the hippodrome, the leaked correspondence shows that the culture ministry agreed to “the reintegration of the whole southern section of the ruins into the structure intended to be built by keeping it in situ, and the dismantling and re-installation of the central course and northern sections.”
Layoun vociferously defended his decision when he spoke to Al-Akhbar.
“What we did is an important achievement. It corrects the mistake by Solidere, which deceived property owners by not informing them that there were archaeological finds before buying the property,” he said. [Link]
I am not surprised to read this one single bit. In fact, I am a bit happy that they will actually preserve the site by “integrating” it into an upmarket commercial development, because I don’t expect better from this government or any other one. When you hear about filling up an archaeological site with sewers in Beirut in order to build a monument on top, you should not be shocked to hear this.
The man in question is a highly esteemed doctor who treats a majority of his patients for free and has a hobby of collecting antiques. It is quite shameful that relatively reliable news portals and radios would spread such inaccurate information. Here’s a link to MTV’s report on that matter. [YouTube]
Here are comments from Dr Mohammed Zackaria Hankir and Zahra Hankir, Dr. Zakaria’s children. Thank you for your comments and apologies for any inconvenience caused noting that I did not accuse your father of arms smuggling but commented on the arrest as mentioned in the news.
I am the proud son of Dr Zackaria Ahmed Hankir and would like to take the opportunity to say a few words on this peculiar matter. Whilst my dad might have been quoted for saying that he used the Doshka as a “decoration item” what he meant was that he is in the habit of collecting all sorts of items which he uses to furnish his private home and clinic. That particular item is something he simply acquired over decades of collecting various bits and bobs (believe me, I used to go to the Sunday Markets in the UK with him as far back as 20 years ago when I was 10 years of age). The army confiscated this item among many others which as Sergio rightfully said don’t even shoot. Further, they subjected my further to the ignominy of being detained in jail. Now I may have a relatively liberal sense of what constitutes human rights having lived in the UK for a vast majority of my life, but a man is fully entitled to collect whatever his heart desires so long as it is not to the harm of others. My father is an exceptional physician who as Sam (bless your soul sir) rightly said, doesn’t charge a majority of his patients for his services. I can attest to this because despite the fact my father is a Dr, I (and the rest of my family) have had to work for everything we have just so that the people of Saida and other cities in Lebanon could benefit from his altruistic services. I can’t give you a figure (likely in the hundreds if not the thousands), but it is a matter of fact that there are a plethora of people out there in this world (the UK and Ireland included) who are alive and well thanks to my father’s ingenuity and compassion as a physician. He is an asset to Lebanon in the truest sense of the term and nothing less than a devoted patriot. The man has a British passport and me and my 3 brothers are all based in the UK. He can easily return here if he had the desire but he simply does n’t. Finally my father has dealt with this matter with dignity and transparency and so I hope other more pressing matters can be addressed by the authorities of Lebanon; a nation that I will always be inextricably connected to and also deeply proud of.
Dr Mohammed Zackaria Hankir, Oxford UK.
I am this individual’s daughter and yes that item was part of an antique collection and not used for some sinister purpose, as was originally reported in the press (or as you seem to suggest.) Please get your facts right before contributing to such ridiculous, unfounded and absurd claims, which essentially are defamation. My father is a well-respected doctor with a hobby, not a smuggler. At the very least, his name should not be mentioned in the context of these ridiculous charges, and the army should be focusing its efforts on arresting and raiding the many homes of those who truly harbour and smuggle weapons, not an innocent, law-abiding citizen who owns antiques.
I was checking out on lebmanbojumbo’s blog the “Migrant’s workers rights and obligations booklet in Lebanon”, and I honestly don’t know what to think of the Cultural Practices and Social Manners sections [Manual].
Here are some of the recommendations for all domestic workers coming to Lebanon and my comments:
- In Lebanon, people may sometimes speak with a loud voice but this does not always mean that they are angry with you or don’t like you. They just communicate in a different way from what you may be used to.
How about Lebanese learn to talk quietly and respectfully to others including their domestic workers?
- They often say “NO” by raising their eyebrows, shaking their head from one side to the other or raising it high.
WTF? Seriously?
- You could be asked to wear a veil in a Muslim family.
So much for freedom of religion. How about ask the domestic worker if she minds before being asked to wear a veil or a cross or whatever?
- It is quite common for people in Lebanon to entertain a large number of guests till late hours of the night in their homes.
You are a slave. Deal with it.
- Your employer may ask you to work in the evening or on weekends.
Minister Nicolas Fattoush filed a lawsuit against MTV’s Joyce Akiki over a report she did on the Jeita Grotto and the “Mapas” company that’s supposedly managing the Grotto. Looking at the video, local authorities should be the ones investigating this minister and not him suing journalists.
Added to that, I am wondering now if it was also “Mapas” that got Jeita Grotto in the N7W competition and made us lose hundreds of thousands of dollars over some scam competition.
The Ethiopian woman who was beaten in front of her embassy by a Lebanese called Ali Mahfouz has committed suicide. According to LBC, she was being treated in Deir el Salib when she killed herself. [Source]
Two questions that have to be asked here:
- Why was she moved to Deir el Salib? Who decided that she’s crazy or has some mental problem and needs to be moved there?
- If she truly has a mental issue, how did she get passed the Lebanese authorities? Aren’t there routine medical tests performed?
Thank you Mickel!
Update: Here is a link to the DailyStar article [Link]
