Open a newspaper in the Middle East and expect to be whacked with some bad news. Still, I wasn’t prepared to read that – according to the World Misery Index (the name was a tip-off to what was coming) – Jordan (where I live) is the fourth most miserable country in the Arab world. Regionally, only […]
What’s vegewarian, anyway? Answer: it’s selecting sustainable dishes based on non-meat foods at least once weekly. Halloumi is said to have originated long ago in Cyprus. Cheesemakers spread the Halloumi technique abroad of compacting milk fresh curds and curing them in brine, and now many Middle Eastern countries produce the cheese. It may be made […]
Drop-A-Brick is a clever PR campaign to cut water waste in severely parched California, a state with dwindling aquifers that is experiencing its worst drought in 500 years. It’s a project that can be implemented everywhere there is indoor plumbing, and the concept is sound – displace some tank water and over time, save buckets of the […]
Social media websites are awash with pictures of flooded underpasses and traffic snarls caused by exceptionally heavy rainfall in West Amman, Jordan. The skies ripped open late yesterday morning, quickly dropping several inches of rain across the capital city, overwhelming storm sewers and turning roads into raging rivers. I was there – it was a […]
Jerusalem’s been boiling over with violent and deadly conflicts over the last half a year. But faith leaders intent on ecological ideals as a peace bridge have met again at the the Faith and Ecology conference in Jerusalem last week. Green Prophet has attended meetings in the past (see our coverage from 2011) and a […]
Although the tropical cyclone Nilofar has been veering away from Oman’s coast downwind towards Pakistan and India, it had inundated the infrastructure of several areas in the country, including Muzra, Dabab, Al Khabourah, Al Seeb, Al Khoud, Rusayl, Jalan, Sur and Al Ashkara. Nilofar is a Persian baby name and it means lotus or water lilly. Flooded […]
Christian fires burned on hilltops where pagan fires had burned for 1000 years. The Irish made lanterns out of turnips to guide 'Stingy Jack' and other wandering souls caught in the netherworld while warding away the evil spirits with frightening masks and Jack O' lanterns made from carved turnips.
Halloween landed on a Friday this year, meaning your “I have to work tomorrow” excuse for not dressing up becomes as flimsy as a ghost. So, with a few hours to prep before tonight’s parties begin, how do you devise a spooktacular costume without buying more polyester (most likely shipped over from China) to crap […]
All round the globe and most importantly the business world, the use of barcodes has been emphasized in areas other than the traditional stock identification. Barcodes are more than just codes anymore. They can help us trace materials, sources of production and pollution, and even help sustainable businesses manage stock. But the way we use […]
Mostly we hear stories of pain and tragedy from Syrian refugee camps. But the Za’atari Syrian refugee camp in Jordan, a place where Green Prophet’s Laurie Balbo is knitting together and flying hope, there are new sprigs of hope. The non-profit organization Save the Children is teaching some of the camp’s 800,000 refugees how to garden. […]
Nanoflowcell technology’s Quant e-Sportlimousine is fast. Its 920 horsepower engine can accelerate this sleekly luxurious car from 0 to 100mph in 2.8 seconds. Its maximum speed is 217.5 mph. Nanoflowcell, maker of a new kind of battery, claims this electric car has a range of 373 miles with a full tank. And when it does […]
Many ecologists identify with it, but there is something sad about Shel Silverstein’s The Giving Tree, about a tree that gives to a young boy until its bitter end. A parable about how us humans treat nature? Could there be a better kind of giving tree in store? An Israeli solar power integration company called […]
Dubai Municipality teamed up with spice giant Eastern Masala and Jaleel Holdings to launch a new project that aims to pass on a message of healthy living, encouraging residents to create home gardens to grow vegetables, herbs and fruit.
Almost exactly one year ago Green Prophet revealed that King Tut’s jewelry contains ancient comet dust. Now the ancient Egyptians will leave their mark on a passing comet as a spacecraft named after an Egyptian obelisk takes a selfie before attempting a soft landing on a comet.
The quinoa craze turned what was once a cheap, nourishing staple diet for Bolivians and Peruvians into an unaffordable grain for many of the poor locally. Read here about the dirty secret of quinoa. The appetite of western culture, and fanatic vegetarianism has increased demand for quinoa stratospherically: in 2013 the price of quinoa tripled […]