JOCR8 spoke to Rajai Qawas of www.3alarasi.com about the characters he helped develop for these short animations on life in Amman, which started out being broadcast on an MMS channel through Zain and later on spread to the internet through 3alarasi's web portal. The portal, as of the closing of 2008, has nearly 45,000 subscribers, mainly Jordanians, Palestinians, users in the Gulf states and Arabs in North America.

JOCR8: Tell me the story of 3alarasi.com

RQ: 3alarasi.com I wasn't there at the moment of inception of the idea of 3alarasi, I came around one and half months later. The idea was to start an MMS channel…in those days - the beginning of 2007 - MMS was not a popular business. In those days maybe the quality of MMS was not that high, or non-existent, even, and we came out with a quality that was comparatively high for Jordan. I should say, Omar Abdallat (the creator/cartoonist) came out with it, because at that time I was not involved.

JOCR8: Omar used to work at Abu Mahjoob (www.abumahjoob.com) during that time, correct?

RQ: Yes. I met Omar Abdallat there at Abu Mahjoob. He was a cartoonist there, and I was doing stand-up comedy in Jafra coffee shop downtown, which Imad Hajjaj (founder of Abu Mahjoob) used to come and see. He (Imad) said to me: "Come visit me at my office, let's work together," etc…I did, and I wrote for a series for him, and I actually met Omar on my last day of work there. I checked out the website he had started out with, it was something really basic, but I liked it and I told him I'd start writing with him. So I started writing in February 2007…in those days I started with Hawwa, and launched it through Zain network in July 2007. Hawwa and 3alarasi are two of the top channels on Zain.

JOCR8: What encouraged you to go ahead with this venture?

RQ: You mean what prompted me to do something crazy and leave a steady job to write for 3alarasi full-time? What led me to believe in the idea was that, one, I believe in myself, I know what I write, and I've written for Abu Mahjoob, the first national character in Jordan. I believed very much in my idea, which is that there was nothing typically Ammani in the media that expresses what the youth, in their everyday dialect, want to express.

JOCR8: How did you start writing, before 3alarasi, before standup. Were you the class clown?

RQ: I was mischievous in class, but at home I'm quieter and more bitter. I wrote poetry when I was younger. I used to feel like what I wrote was good, but I had this idea that poetry wouldn't reach people. So I kept writing anything that came to mind, articles, sarcastic essays and love stories, even. Anything in my head, I wrote it. Everything I had in mind, no matter how strange.

JOCR8: So eventually it comes down to writing the everyday things that no-one expresses through public media. What about your view on comedy?

RQ: My personal view is that I have no view. One is asked a question. He answers…but there's always an answer that he wants to express but doesn't. My problem is that I don't filter, for example, I sat for two years without working because I used to say what's on my mind without filtering. Like when they asked me "What do you want to add to our company?" I would answer, "A table, a chair and maybe a computer…what do you expect? I'm not here to add anything. I want the paycheck." He started laughing. Of course, he didn't hire me, but I made him laugh. Anything that comes from the heart, reaches the heart.

JOCR8: Who are your influences?

RQ: I follow the school of black comedy. My biggest influence is Mohammad Al-Nabout, who is Syrian. He wrote "Exile", "Kasak ya Watan", and almost all of Duried Lahham's work.