your epidermis is showing.
some guy came up to me and said … ” Hey, your epidermis is showing…” and was about to laugh….
so I said..”Well, your bad sense of humour is evident too…”
he called me a bastard and trotted off.
Corporate Noose takes a tug at My Facebook Profile.
Call on Monday Morning…
R: “Hi Muhammad, It’s Renee’… tell me something, are you on facebook?”
M: “Yeah, I am.”
R: “What exactly is your profile picture”
M (confused as to how this is work-related):”Umm…”
R: “Is it a hand grenade?”
M: “Actually, it’s a mic shaped like a hand grenade and its artwork from a band I like. Why?”
R: “Well we have a complaint from a shareholder, he doesn’t think it’s appropriate.”
R: “We have to issue some type of response to him.”
M: “Well tell him I’ll change the profile picture, But Facebook is banned at Unilever anyway, so I’ll have to do it at home.”
R: “Okay, thanks.”
Why did I give in so easily? Facebook is banned at Unilever anyway right? What does a shareholder have against my profile picture on social networking site that has absolutely nothing to do with work, except maybe the “Unilever” network on Facebook.
Well, I just received a couple of lessons in the workplace. Politics, just like family politics, is an absolute bitch if you want to move anywhere, or get anything done. I also just got my second warning for excessive internet Usage (I think the limit is 3 before you get ‘bumped off’). So between a “shareholder” who could probably fuck over my career and changing a profile picture on facebook doesn’t seem like a choice at the moment.
Then again, I should have stood my ground on principle and told him to fuck off. But this isn’t the movies, I got to put food on the table and Rage Against the Machine artwork just wont’ pay for that. The Dillemma sounds too much like something from “Prison Break” though. Unfortunately, I can’t get writer to write me a nice ending, so I can’t take the chance.
So right now, my dillemma is what should I change my profile picture to that will be more subtle, but same sort of message..
hmph. I think it was Immortal Technique who said that when you try and change the system it ends up changing you. This stuff is hitting so close to home.
On Politics…
If there is more than one person in a situation… there will be politics… the
only place there isn’t any politics with more than one person is between mother
and child.
People like playing games, and if you don’t push yourself
and be a little selfish in certain situations, you’ll be bulldozed by all the assholes who do… so
get there first. Work your ass off. Make an impression. Be the best you can be otherwise someone who can fake it better than you can actually do it will get there first.
Technorati Tags: Politics
Overheard at a Boutique Hotel in Umhlanga…
Endless Horizons Boutique Hotel in Umhlanga, South Africa
“The ad has morcheeba music video overtones…”
referring to Escada Perfume’s advertising for the variant… “Into the Blue”
and that’s by arb happening of the day :)
Technorati Tags: Escada, Into the blue, Advertising, Morcheeba
Working with Seduction!
thinking of ways we can properly communicate “Seduction” and its relation to
beauty in a feminine context.
So I’m gonna be cutting up fashion magazines, making collages, talking about topics like femininity and how seduction contributes to beauty, etc. etc.
socially relevant and philosphical?
Technorati Tags: Soap, Philosophy, Seduction
Al Jazeera Here I Come!
by Muhammad on March 30, 2007
in Uncategorized
Tomorrow I’m leaving for Doha to attend Al-Jazeera’s 3rd Annual Media Forum which will be henld under the banner “Media and the Middle East: Going Beyond the Headlines.” The Front Line will be covering the topics and issues discussed at the conference and I will definitely try to interview as many scholars and media pundits as I can. Maybe even get some Al-Jazeera Executives to comment :)
If any readers of this blog have any questions or issues they’d like raise.. leave a comment, I’ll be sure to get it and try t oaddress as many issues as possible. Many heads are better than one!
I’ll be back next week with a report back, Wish me luck till then!
Peace,
M.
Technorati Tags: Al-Jazeera, Media Forum, Bloggers
Embracing Hunger
Do you recognise that feeling when you’re embraced in your work ethic, trudging through paperwork, tapping the beige pond of the keyboard… and then it tugs at you, that perceptible tug, pulling but not really touching. You feel it inside you… right in your gut. Pure Lust. Hunger. That feeling which makes your mind stop. Suddenly Market Shares in Nigeria and the issues with the Turkish Supply chain don’t even compare to the picture of the Gigantic King Size Cheese Burger and a large Coke.
The temptation just doesn’t cease, and what seemed so easy in Ramadaan suddenly moves your feet for you, , you can hold conversations but your mind really isn’t there until you know that that King Size Cheese Burger is Dwelling in your tummy…
So it was that today, I had felt that familiar tug. Pure Lust. Hunger…
…and resisted… with all my might… and the thoughts in my head?
“This feeling… this is nothing, you’ve done it before, you can do it again.”
Feeling gets even stronger, I can’t concentrate on my meeting… I see these people but the words just aren’t getting through… I get hit with the words “Muhammad, what do you think?” and I’m dumbstruck… “Wha?”
“For fuck sakes, what the hell is this thing… surely I can’t be that hungry for this shit to affect my perception like this…”
“I’m sorry I was distracted, what were you referring to?”
 ”Right… Hunger, Lust, Whatever the fuck (you notice I swear alot when I talk to myself) you are… I’m not giving in to you…so Fuck off.”
Suddenly, the feeling fades… like it usually does in Ramadaan, you get so hungry the feeling just gives up. anyhow, the scene plays out like something from V for Vendetta. I just wonder if other people go through this “Battle with the Self”… I’m sure it happens in other contexts as well… like just After Ramadaan I get back to the office and being faced with two bumper editions of FHM and GQ… dillemma, dillemma… to read or not to read… could it really be called reading? Ogling, maybe?
Either way, Jihad must take place and Jihad-un-Nafs (The Struggle against the Self) is the greatest man will ever face… Resistance doesn’t just occure with stones at Tanks and Molotov Cocktails and Kaleshnikovs… it starts right in your gut, and if you can’t master that… you don’t really have the right to go about resisting anything greater, because you will lose.
The fight goes on…
Peace,
M.
Work & Babies.
by Muhammad on November 5, 2006
in Uncategorized
Came across two newly born kids in the last week, two boys, unbelievably cute :) Making me rethink my stance of having kids later… (no no no, you still got some plans ahead Muhammad, hold that thought)
Here they are…
No, I did not make Little Yusuf Cry… he was hungry (or so i was told) and here’s another little cute kid… hover over the pic for details :)
Right… enough of the babies :)
Work’s got me going too, if anybody can tell me how to get my colleagues in Egypt to answer their phones and reply to message, please let me know… trying to do Marketing across an entire region is as bad as having a 2kg yoghurt enema at a siberian health spa. Aaargh.
Oh and my favourite work quote this week… “The project is a bit complicated due to all the simplification.”
Sounds like something from Dilbert, eh? Oh and I got a new Boss, had a big lunch thing after Jummah on Friday in which I went all aout ordering Sushi (I Love Sushi!) and a Kingclip and Prawns main course. (yUM!) This is making me wonder how I survived during Ramadaan… oi, I miss Ramadaan :( I need to get my ass back into gear, because I feel like I’m so close to being a hypocrite mainly because of the difference I saw in myself in Ramadaan and what I’m slowly becoming now. Insha-Allah this will change, I need to make solid effort!
Make Dua!
Wasalaams :)
Muhammad.
