Let 2012 be the year we do something about it…

We meet up, exchange stories, struggles, brainstorm for some organizing beyond social circles. An organizing that is informal, cautious and secure (yet not paranoid).

Let’s be serious about who we are, lets learn from others, let our network effect grow to protect, enable and grow each other. Creating circles of trust, one large and many smaller ones.

Let’s know that everything is connected, and mostly shared,

  • Struggling to find a space to be with your girlfriend is connected to all girls and women who are bound by culture to live with their parents after 18.
  • Struggling to find someone to date, is connected to the culture of paranoia and not having a trusted foundation to start from.
  • Struggling to fight family-pushed-marriage proposals, is not only shared, but has been fought by many others before you, learn about their experiences and how they did it.

An informal group of Queer women who identify as lesbians, bisexual women and transgenderes.

A support group for us in Jordan. Meet regularly, talk and share. Screen new attendees before they join securely. Educate and get educated about others. Get into the regional conversation and context on queer politics, and in the process define our own Jordanian context and discourse.

Let it be clear, that in the process, some of us won’t like some of us, that we might disagree, but it doesn’t mean we don’t trust each other.

Let’s know that we don’t live in isolation from the culture and people around us, their struggles are ours as well. Let’s be open that many of our heterosexual friends can support us as we support them and be able to grow on that support to help each other.

Who’s in for the first meet up early January, 2012?

(Reply that you are in and i will contact you privately to discuss details, I will personally screen you as others to make the first meet up as secure as possible!)

2011
12/28
CATEGORY
Amman
Community
Queer
Women
5 comments

2011, light bulbs

2011, was full of light bulbs, za following is what comes to my mind tonight:

  • Our regional full-seasons-long-revolutions made me imagine a whole new world, no matter how much conservatives hijack it, they won’t for long.
  • As I grew some distance with old friends; I connected to new like-minded people.  I feel stronger, I feel informed, I feel I won’t take anymore BS.
  • Not only have I entertained the thought of letting my parents know of another side of my queerness they haven’t seen (I use queer in its literal meaning here), I even dreamt about it last night!! Guess what? It went more than fine, actually in the dream, a brother of mine said, oh my, we need to open up more from now on, share more, we can’t be afraid to tell each other anything as a family. Oh yes. I adore him even if he said that only in a dream.
  • For all those years I was secretly thinking how there can’t be one queer culture everywhere, there must be specifics to our culture that is different than the west. Well guess what! Found one local that is different than my local, and found one regional different than my regional. Yes, I feel blessed!
  • Queer. Yes, this is what i came to chose as a label the last quarter of this year, it felt capable of holding the many facets of my existence &  identity and that it can include a larger bubble that is not divided into gay and straight! (How boring that system really is.)
  • I learned how I can discuss politics, queer and otherwise in my native tongue, بالعربي! Ain’t that cool! (yes, I am making fun of me being so pathetic-in-that-context)
  • I learned that sentences like “i don’t want to be hurt” or “i don’t want to hurt you” are exaggerated, that hurt, fear, disappointments are over emphasized, overrated as we with give them too much attention and time better be spent on action and living the moment.
  • I discovered my superpowers, how i need to use them more efficiently  while exerting some control over them so i don’t scare people off! (No, i can’t mention them to just anyone, yes that includes you!)
2011
12/10
CATEGORY
Arabia
Community
Life
Queer
TAGS


2 comments

I choose no casualties.

I don’t really get human ideals, policies, theories or frameworks that decide so bluntly to ignore its large falsifying effect on the other, that group we call a minority.

How arrogant, how insensitive, to how brutal and how unjust it is to decide who will pay the price of your so loved, so idealistic and so heavenly ideal or cause.

Gotta have a better answer than that, gotta force yourself to acknowledge how problematic what you are saying sounds, at least do say what an alternative could be like to account for all. A solution that is all encompassing. Just challenge your self to find one or just come out clean about it.

Minorities are people, flesh and blood. They do count. They must count.

2011
11/24
CATEGORY
Activism
Community
Life
Politics
Uncategorized
TAGS



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Reality, is.

One has to understand what reality is to theirselves and to others.

From one side it’s so good for anyone to be able to create their own reality, but end of the day, we can’t take credit of every aspect of it.

No, we can’t.

Understanding and internalizing that fact is important to navigate socially.

To understand what made people who they appear to us as.

What part of who they are they have actually chosen and what they haven’t.

What is it about, to make the decisions they’ve made, how different it is from our choices.

How easy it was for some of us to stick to certain ideals just because It was, just that, easy.

To comprehend that part of us will always reflect where we came from, the reality of that place and time. Who and what we grew up seeing, how all of those interacted with each other.

I think we have to come to peace with those parts we haven’t chosen and to judge only when we know someone else had actually a choice about what they have ended up having or doing.

Think through, relate and let there be the other.

2011
11/24
CATEGORY
Life
Musings
Random
TAGS


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بحِب

بحب اني أَحب
بحب اني أنحب
بحب نظرات الولع
نظرات الشغف
نظرات البهجة
نظرات التودد
نظرات الاتفاق
نظرات الشوق
اللمسات المسروقة
الهمسات الي دوبها مسموعة
لحظات العشق
لحظات الحنين
لحظات الأمل والتأمل
ليالي الدوب
لما بنطير فوق
ولما بنضل فوق
لما ببتسم زي الهبلة لحالي
وانا بتذكر أني عم بحب و بنحب
كاسك يا حياة كلها حب بحب

2011
10/28
CATEGORY
Love
Random
2 comments

Organizing for LGBTQI in Jordan, yes or no?

As more LGTBQI (Lesbian/Gay/Transgendered/Bisexual/Queer/Inter-sex) communities from around the Arab world are organizing, should we do so in Jordan too?

If yes, how should we go about it?

If no, then why not?

What are the general needs of the community?

If such an organization came about, would you join it?

If we are worried about too much visibility, what should be the proper cover of such an organization?

As women in a conservative-arab-islamic society, do we have more to fear than men? or is it the other way around?

What are your needs? Meeting people? Attending support group meetings? Finding refuge from family abuse?

One thing we know is that being LGBTQ in Jordan is not an illegal issue. Its a societal taboo, nonetheless as Jordan is a mostly conservative society. The authorities use public indecency laws to arrest and harass people, or their most famous claim “satanic behaviour” (3abadet shaya6een). But most of us fear a scandal more than the authorities, for our families to know or our friends and coworkers.

So with the lack of any legal rights to fight for, and If more visibility is not something we seek, will we work on awareness? What kind of awareness? subtle tolerance messages? or will  the sole purpose be a support network?

If we accidentally become more visible, will other conservative groups ask for laws to make who we are illegal? take the whole situation backwards?

I would really like to hear from you on this, so do share your opinion. Those for it and those against it and do state why.

2011
10/12
CATEGORY
Activism
Arabia
Community
LGBTQI
TAGS






3 comments

Monogamy is…well, was.

Monogamy is overly consumed, boring and over simplified.

When you hear that from someone who’s been a serial monogamist, you should pay some attention.

I say that because it’s so heteronormative; that is totally forced into relationships since it’s the acceptable hetrosexual norm.

I don’t want monogamy to be a default that is stamped into any future relationship I may have, if chosen to be practiced then its a personally chosen behavior form both or either party.

Relationships are more complicated but that is what their beauty is all about, not default stamps yet good communication, adapting, learning and listening.

2011
09/25
CATEGORY
Lesbian Life
TAGS



1 comment

A remarkable experience

Time and place is irrelevant.

Space was open and limitless.

People turned souls.

Souls without self imposed restraints.

Souls connected, heart & mind.

A profound stream of beauty.

That was a part of what a special kind of meet-up I attended has left with me.

Overwhelming… I don’t think I’ve felt much love as I felt there. I haven’t been heard as much nor have I ever been given such an open space to be. Or been as social as I was. I had the best group therapy anyone could ever dream of.

All my Identities converged, came out. The personal, the political, the arab, the palestinian, the Jordanian, the woman, the lesbian and more all in 6 days.

I wish you would have experienced this with me, I wish.

2011
09/25
CATEGORY
Arabia
Love
3 comments

ode to my self – II

Settle for more, not less

People might change, but don’t count on it

Don’t tolerate behavior you find unacceptable

Voice your opinion with pride and conviction

Be critical, positively and sincerely

When you don’t like something, say it on the spot

Challenge your comfort zone

Get out and be with the world

Get out and see more of the world

Follow what your gut tells you, if in doubt at least take a big note of it

2011
08/13
CATEGORY
Uncategorized
1 comment

Situational being

I used to say that I live my life mood by mood.

For a libra, that is so not original. I know now.

But really, at any point in time; being this open to change can be a curse or a blessing…

I choose blessing tonight.

Why?

Because this ability to see people, principles, creed or life, situation by situation makes all this grey actually green.

See how truth and life is so grey at the macro level; as much confusing as it might be, yet seem so hopeful, refreshing and ever evolving.

To see that grey, in its imperfection is actually perfect is a bless.

To see people in all their colors, to appreciate the being they were, they are and will be is beyond self projection, beyond right or wrong and beyond your own mirror…it is a gift I so adore even in my moments of self-created-drama or self indulgence.

Today, you rocked!

And that made me happy, hopeful, excited and ever more curious to see all those colors that you haven’t worn yet!

2011
05/27
CATEGORY
Life
Musings
Random
1 comment
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