Middle East/North African Lit discussion

Nile daughter wrote: "Welcome Jummanah , that is so nice , Iam very glad to have you with us ! hope you like staying in Egypt from time to time – sorry can't help it :D

Feel free to join any discussion in the group a..."

shukran :-)

and yes, I LOVE EGYPT!

can't wait to return...

Great and El 3afw :D :D

Hi everyone! I'm Kit, an American (presently in KY). I majored in college in Biblical Archaeology. But met my husband and changed to American Archaeology. The Middle East still has my heart and soul, though I've never visited.

I love anything from the Middle East-food, movies, people, and especially books. So I'm so excited to be in a discussion group with people of the same soul!

I converted several years ago to Eastern Orthodoxy (Antiochian)-my Archdiocses is in Lebanon. The majority of my parishioners are Arabs. I love their stories, the language, and especially the food!!!

Anyone into bellydancing?

I'm frantically trying to catch up on all the reading you have done--and to remember some of the better books I have read. Presently, I'm reading "Morning in Jenin," and a cookbook I found at the library, "Arabian Nights." (Saudi regional food.)

hi Kit! and welcome!
the Arabian Nights cookbook is good! she has another one too. she is amazingly knowledgeable about food history (i've seen her speak) and i think she has a blog...i should go find it. i just ate lunch but i'm hungry again...

Kit wrote: "Hi everyone! I'm Kit, an American (presently in KY). I majored in college in Biblical Archaeology. But met my husband and changed to American Archaeology. The Middle East still has my heart and s..."

Welcome Kit and a warm welcome to all new members to this group!

I have taken a bellydancing class many many years ago, was a lot of fun, though I have not danced in a long time! Middle Eastern cuisine (as well as Indian) is my favorite food. How do you like Mornings in Jenin so far?

oh, and hi Jumanah! i love Egypt, too... :D

Natalie wrote: "Kit wrote: "Hi everyone! I'm Kit, an American (presently in KY). I majored in college in Biblical Archaeology. But met my husband and changed to American Archaeology. The Middle East still has my..."

I loved it!!! The characters were incredible. I could have used a box of kleenex, though. The whole concept of war really tears my soul in two-I hate that this is happening for real.

Kit , welcome again :D
I must check these cooking books to add to the group ! and I hope you will be able to join us in discussing (morning in Jenin)

I never took a course in bellydancing ,I believe ; to us …it is like Salsa in Latin America !

Hello! My name is Amira.. I am a 28-year-old Egyptian female living in the UK..I was raised in Egypt but have moved to the UK with my husband and child about three years ago.
I am happy I have found this group as I have just joined goodreads and I love reading books about the Middle East and the Arab world.

welcome Amira! perhaps we can help you with any homesickness you have... :D

Amira , Salamat men Masr , elbeet betek :D
Hope you like it here with us !

Marieke wrote: "welcome Amira! perhaps we can help you with any homesickness you have... :D"

Thanks Marieke ... I think that might help :)

Nile daughter wrote: "Amira , Salamat men Masr , elbeet betek :D
Hope you like it here with us !"

Nile Daughter , Salamat men England! Salemeely 3ala Masr kteer gedan until I go there inshaaAllah :)
Yeah I love this group..I would recommend that you ask members to read Randa Abdel-Fattah's book "Where the Streets had a name" if you haven't reviewed it before. It is an excellent book that tackles the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Amira, Where the Streets Had a Name sounds great. i'll have to get my hands on it. we already held our poll to choose our books for the "official" group reads for our cruise stop in the Levant, but we have "unofficial" salon reads and we can discuss it in that folder if others are interested. :D

Amira wrote: "Nile daughter wrote: "Amira , Salamat men Masr , elbeet betek :D
Hope you like it here with us !"

Nile Daughter , Salamat men England! Salemeely 3ala Masr kteer gedan until I go there inshaaAllah ..."

Yewsalll :D
I will add your recommendation to the bookshelves , but you can start discussing it if you like as Marieke explained :)

Hello all I am Ghada I am a Palestinian. Currently living in KSA. I love reading but love discussing what I read more. It is always important to know who others perceive what u read as we all have different backgrounds which means different perceptions. I have a full time job married with two kids so I may not be able to join ur lovely discussions all the time, but I promise I will do my best

I fully agree with you Ghada, being able to discuss a book makes SO much difference :)

Welcome Ghada (Officially ) :D , I hope you will like the group here with us , and we have a lot of discussions , so I guess you are in the right place :)

You live in KSA! I thought you live in Palestine, sorry for the misleading message in that discussion thread!

Do not worry Nile daughter. I am new here in KSA I can just 7 months ago, so I still have fresh memory of living in Palestine that I can share :)

Ghada wrote: "Do not worry Nile daughter. I am new here in KSA I can just 7 months ago, so I still have fresh memory of living in Palestine that I can share :)"

and our next stop on the cruise includes Saudi...you are just in time!!

:D

Hi all!

I'm Jennifer. I came to know Palestine through my then boyfriend and now husband who is (half) Palestinian. He asked me what I thought about the conflict and me, not being up on current events (or history) in high school, said I didn't know. He didn't go into much detail, but since then, mainly in college, I looked at it from every angle. It seemed unjust the way Israel treated Palestinians, but I couldn't rule out the fact that I might be biased toward my new friend. I looked at the Bible and the claims of Christian Zionists and premillennialists and also spoke with those I knew to be sound in the faith. I should say that I studied the scriptures on my own as well because that is the verdict I would have to live with- would it tell me Israel is always right or that Palestinians have rights? I can say that it didn't tell me exactly to fight for Palestine, but it also didn't say today's Jews are Israelites and they still have a claim on the land despite being kicked out as promised by God for continual disobedience. I also looked at the news- US and other. I found that US sources tell a different story than say the BBC or other sources. This led me to join groups- yahoogroups, Al-Awda mailing lists, Sam Bahour's list, ICAHD's list, US Campaign to End the Occupation. I've written letters to the Presidents, Sec of State, heads of state in other countries, the UN, my local newspapers. I've been to one protest (about flotilla raid last year), which I took pic of on my blog:
http://www.notanotherpoliticalblog-j.....
I think I put some of those letters and letters to the editor on there, too. I have 2 kids and a job, so there's not as much tome as there used to be, but I still do what I can.

Anyway, that's pretty much my story on that thing everyone wonders when they see me and then hear me talk about Palestinian rights- "why do you care".

:)

Looking forward to adding to my "to read" list!

Jennifer

Hello Jennifer and welcome onboard !:D you joined us just in time , we hope we can share more of your thoughts with us , feel free to join any discussion you like :)

BTW , I could not see your blog :(

oops. I think it included the period at the end of the sentence in the hyperlink. See if this works:


http://www.notanotherpoliticalblog-j....

I am from the United States. While living in Saudi Arabia, 1986-1998, I discovered Middle-Eastern literature.

I couldn't involve myself with reading or studying Arabic as much as I wanted (due to work/family considerations). Now, close to retirement, I wish to resume my reading of Middle-Eastern literature in translation, as well as renew my study of Arabic.

Marahm , I am very happy that you joined us :) anther member talking about learning Arabic , I think Marieke is about to set a section for practicing Arabic language soon ! :D

Saudi Arabia will be in our next stop , I hope you can join it :)

Jennifer wrote: "oops. I think it included the period at the end of the sentence in the hyperlink. See if this works:


http://www.notanotherpoliticalblog-j...."

It opened ...I will explore soon !:)

I'm American, from a suburb of Boston MA, and have lived around here all my life. I saw the link to this group today when Sheila mentioned it in another group here at Goodreads. I've "met" Nile Daughter in that group recently while discussing Mahfouz's Children of the Alley: A Novel. Constant Reader keeps me very busy but I find I want to know more about Middle Eastern literature and life. The books being discussed sound great and the potential to learn and experience seem pretty fantastic. Not sure how close I'll keep up with each book, but I'm going to make an effort to participate at some level.

The middle east has always fascinated me. I have traveled to Israel(30+ years ago) but haven't made it to Petra and Egypt two other places I want to visit. The ancient-ness of the land amazes me. The timelessness of all the problems saddens me. I feel a need to learn more of the literature. I enjoy poetry too. Don't know if that's ever included.

I too am very concerned about the Palestinian situation and would like to experience more Palestinian writing.

Welcome Sue and Mahram! i hope you like it here! we have a lot going on so feel free and welcome to jump into any discussion thread that is interesting to you. and if you are reading a book and we don't have a discussion for it yet, we can set one up in the "Salon" and hopefully others will join in. :D

Welcome Sue :) I am very happy to see you here :D
Feel free to participate at any level , we are trying to make the group flexible as much as we can . and yes we have a thread for poetry , it is not very active but it will if there are multiple members interested in it ...

BTW , you can check our next stop in here
http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/5...

Thanks Nile daughter. I'm looking forward to getting familiar with the group and will look through the offerings. I already saw some things that interest me in the Palestinian section. So many books to read. Better than too few!

Hi Everyone,

I love to reads and only recently discovered goodreads, my name is Sherine, I am Egyptian, I live in Cairo, I love reading and discussing books from all over the world. I always feel like reading increases my family.

So I hope to join some of your great discussions,
A toute a l'heure,
Sherine

Ahlan wa sahlan :D

Very glad to have you with us Sherine and I hope you will like here with us ..
Please check our polls for our the next reading list if you are Interested ...

http://www.goodreads.com/poll/list/41...

Hi Sue, Glad you made it across.
Welcome to all other new additions.

Hello all.

I know some of you from the Great African Reads group, and I was looking to join some more groups so I came over here.

I am very familiar with literature from sub-Saharan Africa, and somewhat less familiar with literature from North Africa. I am hoping to broaden my knowledge some more here in this group. And I know hardly anything about Middle Eastern literature more broadly, once you move off the African continent. Looking forward to learning about new books!

mahriana wrote: "Hello all.

I know some of you from the Great African Reads group, and I was looking to join some more groups so I came over here.

I am very familiar with literature from sub-Saharan Africa, and s..."

Hey, Mahriana!! welcome aboard!

Welcome Mahriana. I'm pretty new here myself and finding this a great group with really good reading ideas and atmosphere.

Hello everyone~
I'm not new around here but it sure feels like it! It's been awhile since I've been able to participate and it's a bit overwhelming to come to back to threads with hundreds of unread posts. You guys have been busy - awesome!
My access to books is quite limited at the moment but I now have loads of books on my to-read list. In fact, my limited access to books finally motivated me to start the "Dahab Community Library" here in South Sinai - and I'm happy to report we've got several MENA books on our shelves already. :-)
Keep up the great reading and discussing! I'll pop in whenever I get my hands on some books.
Bernadette

Welcome mahriana :) hope you will like it here with us !

Bernadette , we missed you here and for the "Dahab Community Library" ...that is a great news ! :D waiting for you ...

yes, Bernadette! that is terrific about the Library. you'll have to let us know how things go. :D

and for those of you who don't know Mahriana yet, she's a great reader and I really hope she likes it here.

thanks for the welcomes. ;-)

Hello Everyone,

My name is Amira Aly and, as you can see, I am a GoodReads author :)

I take pride in my Egyptian (the Middle Eastern and African too :)heritage. But my true passions are Egyptian mythology, women's rights and everything just and true.

This prompted me to write Egypt: The Uprising... a work of fiction inspired by the Jan25 revolution with Egyptian mythology and speculative elements woven in the narrative.

I am looking forward to interacting with this awesome group of people :)

Amira, welcome! I will set up an author thread if you would like. We like for authors to interact with the group as regular members, but we also want authors to have space to discuss their work without fear of "self-promoting" in the threads. I hope you like it here and feel free to revive any "old" threads. We visited Egypt earlier this year...

Thank you Marieke :) An author thread would be great!

You guys have already read a fascinating collection of books-- glad I came across your group :)

Ahlan Amira :) that is very interesting ! I hope you will like it here with us ...

Happy Ramadan to those who celebrate it.

When Jews fast on Yom Kippur, it is customary to say 'Have an easy fast." Do Muslims say something similar?

Hmmmm we say many things actually like "ramadan mobarak" it means ramadan is blessed. Or "ramadan karim" it means ramadan is genirous and usually we respond saying "God is more generious". And in a more official language we say may God accept ur compliance. Hope my translation is clear

Very clear. Many thanks.

Thanks Lauren :)

Welcome Marie! This past year we have been traveling through regions but next year we are planning to do things in a way that will help us learn about all the cultures of the middle east, like Armenian and Greek cultures, for example... Jump in wherever you'd like. We are currently in the Gulf region and have selected books from Iraq and Saudi Arabia. We also have a "salon" where we can share our thoughts about "unofficial" books we read. :D

Marie wrote: "Thanks Marieke- that sounds wonderful!! Looking forward to it all. Once I get the hang of things on this site I will definitely participate :D"

Ask any questions if things are confusing...for goodreads in general or this group. The members here are very nice. :D