Born on State Highway 1

“My Lord, make this a peaceful land, and protect me and my children from worshiping idols.” – Qur’an 14:35

It came as no surprise to me, after being in countries before where this practice was commonplace, that in every building in the Kingdom of Jordan, regardless of it’s purpose, was adorned with a picture of King Abdullah II of Jordan in some pose or another (my personal favourite was him looking down the scope of a sniper’s rifle).

But just as it came as no surprise, it also struck me as highly hypocritical. Why? Well given the country’s stubborn adherence (legislatively and judicially) to Sharia Law, and the religion of Islam, it seemed to be an act which flew right in the face of the country’s own belief system and legal structure.

The meaning of this post will now become clear my friend, for the intention is to say that the practice of hanging (with) the King in your living room is little more than idolatry.

First we must break down the term idolatry into the simplest parts possible, and see if this application fits the definition. Idolatry is the worship of false idols, that is to say worship of anything but God itself (or Allah, if you prefer).

So first of all, is King Abdullah II of Jordan God? No source known to man diverges from the obvious response, no he is not.

Is worship of an image of ‘Dullah (I’ve dined in his “presence”, you know) then considered idolatry? Yes, if we take the premise that he is not God to be true. It also has added effect if we consider that the only reason that one would “worship” ‘Dullah is due to his social/political standing as the highest power in both realms in Jordan. So not only are you worshipping someone other than God, but you are worshipping someone for the sheer fact that they hold a unique role as supreme social and political power in Jordan – thus we can consture you are worshipping a higher, or even “supreme”, being.

But the crux of the argument comes down to this final and all-important premise: by having someone’s portrait in every building in a country constiute that country worshipping that person? For this, I will say unequivocally yes, but worship in a more passive sense. For even though you may not be praying to him nor speaking to him (this is discounting what would be a minute minority of nutcases), so not actively engaging in worship as such, the fact that you have him always in your presence and hold that presence to reverence because he is a “higher power” in some sense of the phrase, you are both being complict in his social/political hegemony and passively “worshipping” him.

So it seems that a nation of 7 million Muslims is committing idolatry. Oh dear, not incosistent, hypocritical religious practice. Not idolatry. Not now.

Then again consider this: none of us are innocent when it comes to idolatry. I’m looking at you man-wearing-crucifix. And you indie-kid-wearing-obscure-band-shirt. Hell I’m even looking at me, Mao-Zedong-bag-wearer. But there’s one major difference between the Jordanians and the crucifix-worshippers and the Indie Kid and I, they’re claiming adherence to a belief structure which explicitly prohibits idolatry, we’re not.

Over and out.

Dubai Airport, Terminal Four, Gate 125.

And there it was in all its glory, the Smoker’s Lounge. If you’re like me and you smoke in the realms of a pack per day, sitting for 14 hours from Brisbane to Dubai without so much as a crumb of nicotine gum is sheer hell. After about six hours of flying the delirium sets in; you see white sugar packets as cigarettes and swallow as many as possible in order to get your fix. Little do you realize you’re about half an hour from the eventual… crash.

But free from the shackles of a non-smoking airplane you rock into the airport wishing to smoke some of your newly purchased carton of smokes, enjoy the smooth nicotine rush which will eventually resume your body’s equilibrium.

Which leads us to the top of the story, the Smoker’s Lounge. I guess this room qualified as a lounge due to the three seats that adorned the floor, however tenuous the jump from seats to lounge may be. Picture this: a 15 metre by 15 metre fully-enclosed room with absolutely no ventilation and a constant stream of smokers getting their fix twenty at a time. After one step iside you’ve just smoked a pack.

This is the future of smoking. Corralled into the back alleyways of our towns and cities, forced to feed a habit of which you have little control over after initially taking the plunge as a sixteen year-old.

It made me finally think about quitting. I then realized I still had 399 cigarettes to smoke.

Maybe some other time.

Wired has an interesting story about the growing efficacy of placebos. This at a time while a $330 billion mental-health pharm industry is killing 40,000 people a year and curing no one (or “Making a Killing“). Meanwhile, Oxford University’s suggesting that maybe we’re over-medicating and under-meditating. And if your kid’s got ADHD, why not give him something for it – training bra not included.

Small cast horror tends to be among the best, lending itself to taunt atmospherics. A recent gem was Splinter (2008), which shared the locked in/seige feelings of Night of the Living Dead (1968) and Assault on Precinct 13 (1976). Also of note is the almost-zombie flick Pontypool (2008) (watch out for the OTT performance of the mad doctor – out of place in the film but fun). A movie with not so much smallness on the cast side but definitely on the budget was The Signal (2007), made for only $50,000 and shot over 13 days. Nicely apocalyptic, it feels like a film with at least another couple of zeros on the end.