Not a Parody: Trump, Tillerson and Ross do the Saudi Sword Dance

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Donald Trump's first trip abroad yielded some astonishing pictures and videos today, among them, a video showing Trump and some of his cabinet members participating in (not just observing) a traditional "Ardha" (war) sword dance.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross are seen happily/grimly clutching swords while linking arms with the dancers. As far as one can tell, Trump doesn't link arms but spends a few seconds bouncing and jiving to the music with a goofy expression. You can't see it in the video but at one point he does hold a sword, pointing it downward.

Steve Bannon stands around, looking uncomfortable.

The outdoor pavilion appears to be filled almost exclusively with men, most of them robed. The regal Melania Trump and an unidentified (to me) American woman seem to be the only two females in the crowd. Both have their heads uncovered.

By the way, President George Bush participated in a sword dance in Saudi Arabia. So did Prince Charles. As everyone knows, Middle-Eastern Arabs are notoriously racist. Perhaps this is why President Obama was never invited to participate. Or maybe they just didn't respect him. But that didn't stop Obama from bowing.

An earlier video features Mr. and Mrs. Trump emerging from the plane and greeting the King and his entourage - with Trump not bowing and his wife wearing pants with uncovered hair.

There are three ways to look at all of this. One is of free and civilized people holding their heads high while extending the hand of friendship to (sorry to say it) semi-barbarous exotics (I'm talking about the Trumps not Tillerson and Ross, obviously). 

It sounds silly, but that plane entrance reminded me of the scene in C.S. Lewis's The Horse and His Boy, where the free kings and queens of Narnia, Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy stride confidently up the main thoroughfare of Tashbaan, the capital city of the cruel, quasi-Muslim Calormenes.

Okay, that more than sounds silly. But still.

The second way to look at it is naive and awkward westerners pretending to be best buddies with primitives in order to score political points at home, aid an alliance, negotiate a favorable oil deal or whatever.

In Saudi Arabia, they do not only use swords for dancing.

The third way to look at it is that it's necessary realpolitik. We're all grownups here, right? And the Iranians will get the message.

Here is a short video of the dance, featuring Trump at the beginning and Tillerson/Ross at the end, as well as a video of the Trumps emerging from that plane.

For good measure I've also included a clip from Lawrence of Arabia - "So long as the Arabs fight tribe against tribe, so long will they be a little people, a silly people, greedy, barbarous and cruel..." That's half-right, of course, though I'm not sure the tribe vs. tribe thing was the main problem.

EXCLUSIVE: Shadilay! Pepe the Frog Hacks Women's March

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UPDATE (3:25 PM CST): The hack is no more.

Today, thousands of fema-fascistos from all over the country descended on Washington for the post-inauguration "Women's March."

It's the Frumpsters vs. the Trumpsters.

They're marching against racial profiling, racist cops, abortion restrictions, climate change and Islamophobia. They're marching for Indians, unions, immigrants, transgenders, artists, Chicanas and endangered sea creatures.

I'm not sure why "Women" is in the title. Maybe it's just a marketing thing.   

The Women's March also has over 600 "Sister Marches" in all fifty states and many countries. Indeed, all seven continents are covered, with "eco-visitors" on an expedition ship actually holding two "marches" in the Ross Sea and the Antarctic Peninsula.

There's also a march in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Or so it seems.

This intrigued me when I saw it on the map. You can organize a leftist "Women's March" in Saudi Arabia? You can really do that?

But if one clicks through from the official site of the march, one finds that the Women's Sister March Riyadh is labeled "Shadilay - build the wall" and has a smiling and dancing Pepe the frog as its mascot. The Event was created by "Pepe The Frog" from "Pidgin, Saudi Arabia."

Pepe the Frog and his slogan "Shadilay" are surrealist alt-right pro-Trump memes.

The email contact for the march is a certain aaminah.hakim@aol.com. Hakim was actually interviewed three days ago for Romper:

"My friends and I have want to help the American women on their march against Donald Trump," wrote Aaminah Hakim, organizer of the Riyadh, Saudi Arabia sister march. "Unfortunately, we do not live in America; making us not able to match alongside the American women. But we can still march in solidarity with you! As of now, only a total of four of us (this including me) will march, but we hope to go as high as 1,000." More than 800 people have registered for the Riyadh march thus far.

Either Hakim is a sly Saudi-Arabian pro-Trump provocateur, or her particular page was hacked by Pepe. Either way, seeing Pepe the Frog dance a jig across Women's March Riyadh is very funny.

Of course, Islam is not very funny, especially for women. And people who march for women's rights while also marching for an ideology that is currently denying rights to hundreds of millions of women are also not very funny.

But that doesn't mean we can't laugh at them.

Shadilay.

British Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Converts to Islam

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Darkness at noon

It was announced a few days ago that Simon Collis, 60, the British Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, had converted to Islam and recently completed the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca. Apparently he had converted to Islam in 2011 before marrying a Muslim woman, though it was not publicly announced at the time. I assume his superiors knew of it.

As a quasi-secret Muslim, perhaps the first Muslim convert in modern British diplomatic history, Collis had three of the most important and sensitive assignments in the Middle East - Syria, Iraq and now Saudi Arabia.

As the article below points out, Collis is certainly not the first Brit to "go native," the most famous example, of course, being T. E. Lawrence. But for all of his complexities, Lawrence never converted to Islam and had many critical things to say about the Wahhabi version of it practiced on the Arabian peninsula.

Of course, an ambassador should know as much as possible about the relevant society and culture. And he or she should be empathetic to the people concerned.

That doesn't include pledging one's soul to one of the foulest creeds ever created by mortal men.   

From the Daily Mail:

British ambassador to Saudi Arabia becomes first senior diplomat to convert to Islam and complete the Haj pilgrimage with Syrian Muslim wife

• Simon Collis, 60, pictured with Syrian wife Huda al-Mujarkech in traditional garments
• They made the annual pilgrimage to Mecca - a duty for every Muslim 
• Decided to convert to Islam 'after spending 30 years in Muslim societies'

The British ambassador to Saudi Arabia has become the first senior diplomat to convert to Islam and complete the Haj.

Simon Collis, 60, said he had decided to convert to Islam 'after spending 30 years in Muslim societies'. 

The father of five was pictured in the traditional white Ihram garments worn for the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, which every Muslim must make at least once in their lives. 

Mr Collis is married to Syrian Huda al-Mujarkech. He had previously served as Britain's ambassador to Syria between 2007 until 2012, when diplomatic relations broke down between the UK and President Bashar al-Assad's regime. 

He has served in a string of Middle Eastern countries, including stints as ambassador in Iraq and Qatar and senior diplomatic positions in United Arab Emirates, Yemen, India and Tunisia. 

It is understood Mr Collis discretely converted to Islam in 2011, shortly before he married his current wife Huda. 

Converting to Islam is a religious requirement for a man marrying a Muslim woman. 

He becomes one of the most high profile British figures to convert to Islam. Most converts adopt a Muslim name but according to The Times, Mr Collis will continue using his English name. 

Mr Collis' conversion to Islam emerged after pictures were posted on Twitter earlier this week of him and his wife at the Haj dressed in the traditional Ihram robes at the front of the royal seal at the gate of the British Consulate in Mecca. 

The pictures were posted on Twitter by Fawziah Albakr from the King Saud University, who wrote in Arabic: 'The first British ambassador to the Kingdom leads the pilgrimage after his conversion to Islam: Simon Collis with his wife Mrs. Huda in Mecca. Praise be to Allah.' Mr Collis thanked her on Twitter. 

Mr Collis wrote on Twitter: 'May Allah bless you. Briefly, I converted to Islam after 30 years of living in Muslim societies and just before I married Huda.' 

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office confirmed he had converted to Islam but refused to comment on when he converted, saying his religion was a private matter. 

After leaving Damascus in 2012, Mr Collis served as ambassador to Iraq until 2014, before moving to Riyadh in January 2015. 

His first stint as an ambassador was in Doha, Qatar between 2005 and 2007. He was Consul General in Basra, Iraq from 2004-2005 and Dubai in the United Arab Emirates for four years previously. 

He was deputy head of mission in Amman, Jordan from 1996-1999. 

Mr Collis said he had converted to Islam 'right before getting married to Huda' but few knew of his conversion until the photo appeared. 

Mr Collis was among an estimated 19,000 British pilgrims performing Haj this year as they celebrated Eid al-Adha, which always begins on the 10th day of the Islamic lunar month of Dhul-Hijja, during the annual pilgrimage. 

In Saudi Arabia, more than two million Muslims descended on Mecca to celebrate the festival in one of the final rites of the Haj.

NOT A PARODY: Pokémon Go Gym Found on Top of the Kaaba in Mecca

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Pokémon

I've never been to Mecca, nor have I ever played Pokémon Go.

The closest I've come to the Kaaba is writing a parody about it.

The closest I've come to playing Pokémon Go is handing out little Pokémon trading cards to my kids. (Someone gave me a gigantic box of them about fifteen years ago.)

But apparently Pokémon Go is a thing. People are crashing cars, falling off cliffs and literally venturing into churches in order to find and manipulate cartoon characters whose virtual location is revealed on their smart phones.

"Gyms" are virtual areas where characters can fight each other. They are often located at famous places or landmarks.

Hence a gym on top of the Kaaba.

The Kaaba

Accordingly, Muslim gamers have been spotted playing inside the central Mataf area that surrounds the monument.

This article implies that while the game is controversial in the desert kingdom, some Saudi Arabian authorities have been fairly tolerant of it, which, frankly, is surprising.

Women can't drive but you can goof around with a supremely Western artifact in the holiest place (to Muslims) in the world.

As long as you don't do it with bacon.

Maybe the imams think the Pokémon are djinn.

Or maybe they're still scouring Bukhari for the relevant Hadith.

Meanwhile, their counterparts in the West are crashing cars, falling off cliffs and literally venturing into churches.

I'm immune to all of this silliness.

Today I was doing laundry in my building's basement. Sometimes I bring my kids down to keep me company and to give them an exciting time "helping" me by putting the laundry card in the card slot and pressing the button. Everyone knows I'm the guy with all the kids.

But today I was alone, which gave me the chance to loudly curse the company that maintains the dryers. One of them (of course the best and hottest dryer) had been out of commission for two weeks. Two whole weeks. Damn company. I've lost five bucks in the machine already. (Slight kick to broken dryer.) They don't care about people. It's just the corporate mentality. No one takes pride in their jobs anymore. And so on and so forth.

Sometimes I wish I could run the world.

"Don't worry," said the building manager, walking in. "The repair guys visited yesterday and all the machines are working fine."

"What was the matter?" I asked

He looked at me significantly. "They found a Pokémon card in one of the card slots."
       

Incredible Footage: Panic in the Grand Mosque

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Muslim suicide bombers struck three cities in Saudi Arabia today.

The citizenry of Saudi Arabia is of course 100% Muslim by law. But ISIS, Al Qaeda and other Muslim factions consider the current rulers to be illegitimate.

Casualties were minimal by suicide bomb standards. Two guards were injured outside the US consulate in Jeddah. Two guards were killed and a number of others were injured in a large explosion near the Prophet's Mosque or "Grand Mosque" of Medina. And there may have been no casualties from one or two blasts in the eastern mainly Shiite city of Qatif.

Of course, in each case, the bomber or bombers were blown to bits.

The video below (first highlighted by Vlad Tepes) appears to show panic in the Grand Mosque of Medina. Male worshippers literally run into each other, presumably fearing an additional attack.