Category Archives: Travel

TWAT: The War Against Tees Part Deux: Revenge of the Tees!

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From BoingBoing. If you need a refresher about The War Against Tees, click here.

It seems Arab-looking people are not allowed to wear Arabic lettering on their tee-shirts in American airports, or at least not if JetBlue has anything to do with it.

Now, I can tell you from personal experience that white people can.

It’s true the sample size wasn’t large, but it was in this case equal to the other test, so I’m calling it equivalent. And it’s also true that I was wearing it in gold, rather than printed on 100% cotton or even a poly/cotton blend, which would naturally be somewhat suspicious, especially in business class.

But then again, the only item I had that identified me as an Arab sympathizer was a nameplate necklace, the name of which did not correspond to the name on the expired passport I was carrying as my only ID.

And the nice formerly-Iranian lady at US Customs and Immigration who could, as it happened, read Arabic perfectly well, which is a helluva lot more than I can do, laughed when she read my passport and said “So I guess your name is not Cheryl then? That’s what your necklace says.”

And indeed it is not. I said that in that case my sister had my necklace, we shared a chuckle, she handed my passport back, and I got on the plane. End of story.

Then again, not only is my name not Cheryl, but I don’t even look like a Cheryl. 

More to the point, I don’t look like an Almira, either.

I am not a terrorist. I am just a t-shirt wearer

T-shirt: “I am not a terrorist,” in Arabic
Tim Murtaugh tells BoingBoing,

 After reading about blogger Raed Jarrar’s experience at JFK (he was forced to take off a shirt with Arabic writing on it or miss his flight), I finally stopped being depressed about the war on terror and began being proactively pissed off. I made this shirt, which says “I am not a terrorist” in Arabic. I plan to wear it every time I go to the airport from now on.

On the t-shirt site, Tim says: “All the shirts are set to $1.00 more than the Spreadshirt base price — all profits will be sent to the ACLU.”

Lucy Gao’s email

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Andy Hardy meets a debutante, and does not enjoy the experience. When are we blowing candles?

Somehow I knew I could count on Oxford to be on this like pretention on a 21-year-old intern. From the Oxford Gao gossip thread, here’s the original email. Apparently, she’s at Balliol when she’s not at the Ritz or interning in the property department at Citibank. And don’t forget to look through the thread for the comments (as previously discussed…. maybe we need to revisit the intern selection criteria, I think the emphasis on control may be too high!) and the lovely birthday photos.

Dunno what the hell I’m talking about? Check here for the intro to this whole sorry affair, and here for visual evidence that, even if she’s not as well dressed as Mickey Rooney in the above pic, she’s much, much better pleased with herself.

Subject: Details and instructions for Lucy’s Ritz Party

Dear Friends,Thank you for all your replies and I am glad all of you can come this Friday to celebrate my 21st with me.
Please read ALL the following to ensure your entry into the Ritz.Lucy’s 21st Birthday Party
at The Ritz Hotel London Friday, 18th of August
9pm Champagne Reception
10pm Photo Shoots
10:30pm Blowing Candles

“Candles.” Is that what the kids are calling them now?

Mid-night Pangaea, Mayfair

Is that anywhere around midnight? Only with 85% more pretention?

I have arranged the Ritz to host a Champagne Reception with a selection of Ritz Champagne for all my guests, this will be on me so please come and indulge.

And someone please bring the birthday girl a change of punctuation.

A specially made birthday cake has also been ordered and the Ritz waiters will kindly serve you each a generous slice with Ritz cutleries,
etc…also on me.

Those kindly waiters. And they let you use the Ritz cutleries, too? Wow, you must have pull.

INSTRUCTIONS FOR ENTRY:
* When you arrive, take the Hotel entry on the opposite side of the Green Park tube station [Please refer to your arrival time at the
end of this email]

Where are they supposed to take it? Is it heavy?

* When asked “how can I help you Sir/Madame?”, you reply “I am here for Lucy’s Birthday Party at the Rivoli Bar”

Kind of like “the black dog howls at midnight,” only in this case he would be blowing candles at Mid-night.

* You will be escorted to the lounge area next to the Rivoli bar, where you will hopefully see a gorgeous group of ladies.

Okay, I’m not 100% certain about this, but she seems to be indicating that she has laid on hot and cold running hookers; if this is the case, no wonder her email has been forwarded so many times. Bankers can be bitter if they’re not invited.

If you experience any issues getting in or getting to the Ritz, please call my mobile on 07782 205 450 and my PA Ms Gill will kindly deal with your queries between 8:30pm to 10pm.

Is it really that difficult to get into a hotel nowadays? Gee, back when I was 21 we just used to go over the wall like plain folks.

STRICT DRESS CODE:
Gentlemen: Jacket, shirt, and please also bring a tie (no jeans, trainers, flip-flops, polo-shirts)
Ladies: skirt/top, cocktail dress (no denim, min-skirts, flip-flips, bad tastes)

No, we certainly don’t want any bad tastes.

Advice 1: It goes without saying that the more upper-class you dress, the less likely you shall be denied entry.
Advice 2: Photos will be taken between 10pm to 10:30pm, and these will be distributed once processed, therefore you may want to be
well-groomed!

Although certainly not in bad tastes. There is only so much magic Lucy’s PA can work with the Photoshop.

Finally…
I will be accepting cards and small gifts between 9pm to 11pm…<wink
wink> hehehe

I very much look forward to seeing you all at the Ritz this Friday.

Lucy

ARRIVAL TIMES: [Please stick to these as best as you can, thank you]
9:00pm: Lucy, Sophie Sandner, Kajai, Mandeep, Preet, Sanami, Su, Lisa,
Kate.
9:15pm: Phoebe, Sophie Seugnet, Theo, Dmitry, Ed, Nikolay, Paul, Nick,
Harry.
9:30pm: Marco, Andrea, Jess, Ovi, Yuki, Olga, Kim, Marcelo, Ulyana,
Krystal, Dan.
9:45pm: Sunita, Alan, JingJing, Emma.
10:00pm: Anthony, Rachel, Roger, Uli, Yogi, Gharzi Lucy Gao
Citigroup | Real Estate Equity Research
4th Floor, Citigroup Centre (CGC1)
25 Canada Square, London E14 5LB
Direct Line: +44 207 986 4116
Fax: +44 207 986 4341
Mobile: +44 778 220 5450
Email: lucy.gao@citigroup.com mailto:lucy.gao@citigroup.com

You know that each and every one of those people is pretending not to know this woman today.

“No, no, that’s the other Gharzi!”

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Lucy Gao, revealed

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Thanks to Dealbreaker. My apologies; she’s not in the least platinum blonde, although she is smugly self-satisfied.

Dunno what she has to be so smiley about? Click here for part one, here for part two, with bonus put-downs from coworkers. Lucy Gao, thanks to anal-retentive qualities that would shame even Martha Stewart, has entered the elite group of cybernotorati headed up by Dog Shit Girl.

Lucy Gao, revealed!

TWAT roundup

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Just a quickie roundup of TWAT news buzzing around the blogosphere.

Yes, I've used this before, but it just keeps on applying

British schoolchildren are being fingerprinted without parental approval, and on pain of suspension for non-cooperation. So Guido was late to it; I’m later than anyone, but not too proud to post!

Ah yes, and they’re being fingerprinted by the same corporation that trains interrogators for Abu Ghraib and Gitmo. We all love a strong corporate culture, don’t we? Mind you, this isn’t the same company that’s being sued by all those war widows for the wrongful deaths of their husbands. I know, it’s just so hard to keep them straight!

A Florida company is looking for permission to stick RFID chips in all service personnel in the US. Look for legislation making it an offence to remove these chips, if such legislation’s not on the books already. And don’t expect an out when you retire. We’ve already covered in this blog the fact that there IS no meaningful retirement anymore.

VeriChip Corp, based in Delray Beach, Fla., and described by the D.C. Examiner as “one of the most aggressive marketers of radio frequency identification chips,” is hoping to convince the Pentagon to allow them to insert the chips, known as RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) chips under the skin of the right arms of U.S. servicemen and servicewomen to enable them to scan an arm and obtain that person’s identity and medical history. The chips would replace the legendary metal dog tags that have been worn by U.S. military personnel since 1906.

And if they can’t get your children or yourself, they’ll at least get your garbage cans. Fighting TWAT in the back alleys, in the Rubbermaids…Churchill would be so proud.

 Half a million household wheelie bins have been secretly tagged with hidden electronic “bugs”, it has been reported.

The tiny devices identify each bin so that records can be kept on the waste disposal habits of its owners, and up to 500,000 bins in council districts across England are thought to have already been fitted…

A similar controversy also emerged in Ryde, a suburb of Sydney, Australia, earlier this week.

Residents accused the local authority of acting like “Big Brother” after workers suddenly began fitting the devices to the rims of an estimated 90,000 bins.

The devices use Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology which have also been used to identify objects as diverse as animals, vehicles and expensive goods.

Like cannon fodder units.

marketing ploy o’ the day: Lakehead University

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Hmmm, wonder what that says?

Hey, that’s kind of a nifty-looking poster. Wonder what it actually says.

Let’s take a closer look, shall we?

Yale Shmale we say to the male

Graduating from
an Ivy League university
doesn’t necessarily mean you’re smart.

Lakehead University, a teensy-tinsey little school out in the boondocks near my aunt’s place (which actually describes all of the places near all of my aunts, come to think of it, except Dodie) has come up with a killer of a marketing ploy, if a bit late for September registrations.

A little background; it’s not exactly Ivy League, but it was considered appropriate for His Royal Highness Randy Andy when he did his time in the Colonies. It has a vaguely preppy, vaguely party reputation, but the draw for parents is that it’s so isolated you can’t really end up passed out at Younge and Bloor at dawn; that they assume you’ll dedicate your time to studying instead of drinking is a testament not only to their optimism, but also to the scarcity of really good booze up there. When I went to university, Lakehead had about 2500 students, roughly as many as my sister’s high school.

Apparently, they’ve decided to do a bit of outreach and in this their historically quirky, smartassed attitude has done them proud. Check out the Yale Shmale website and, if you’re still looking for something to do in September, keep them in mind.

We wouldn’t want you to end up like that guy in the poster!