Jordan's King and Queen. An "inside" view of the couple (she/he does not want to be quoted):
"His wife is more intelligent and better educated, and that is probably why he leaves some of the heavy lifting to her. However, her work experience upon graduating from the American University in Cairo but prior to marrying Prince Trekkie consisted of being a teller for Citibank and an administrative assistant to a man who owned an Apple Computer dealership in Jordan. All told, she has only a couple years' legitimate work experience--and only at a very junior level--and this has now qualified her to claim executive-level financial services and IT experience, serve on the boards of NGOs such as FINCA, mingle with real movers and shakers at Davos and Sun Valley, lecture us all on YouTube, and solicit for various international awards that make her feel like the superstar she wishes she really were. I know a woman who worked with her at Citibank, in a more senior capacity to her. This was back when now Minister of Planning and International Cooperation Suhair al-Ali was the top executive at Citibank in Jordan. The woman I know told me Queen YouTube routinely snubbed their morning greetings to her and that she was a snob even before she married into the royal family. One can only imagine how full of herself she is now. You may have noticed that there are very few photographs of the queen from her days as a single gal. Perhaps it's because she wasn't born looking as she does now. She was average looking, with a large nose, frizzy hair, and a heavier physique. It takes stringent dieting, oodles of plastic surgery and medical procedures, and hours and hours with designers and stylists to create the effect. As you have outed her, she retains western PR firms to keep her image polished and to solicit all those awards, win those online "most beautiful" polls at Hello, and keep real news of what happens under her family's rule in Jordan tamped down. It is even rumored that the Jordanian Royal Family took over this site () several years ago, after it began veering toward the political by some of the more informed members, so that they could use it as a propaganda tool and silence their critics. Rumor has it that the members who go by the screen names Veram98 and Shelley are actually Queen YouTube and Princess Sarvath, respectively. Have a look at it and see what you think. To me, it seems there may be some merit to the rumors. Those two are much too informed, the moderators of the Jordanian section of the forum seem to have the inside track and to clamp down on any hint of criticism of the family (test it if you wish!), while the rest of the forum is more like the usual Internet free for all. Have you heard much about the mental illnesses within the family? This is so rarely written about among the current generation, but it is widely known that the late King Hussein's father had to abdicate after just a year as king due to what was then called schizophrenia but is now believed to have been bipolar disorder. Also, King Talal was married to a first cousin, making for a risky genetic stew. It is widely known that his eldest son, Prince Muhammad, was too mentally ill to become king, and so it fell to the late King Hussein. I've also been told by somewhat credible sources that Queen Noor had her husband and biological children on antidepressants (the latter from a very young age); that Prince Hassan suffers from untreated depression, cries easily and often, and cannot hold his liquor; that Princess Sarvath has both an untreated bipolar disorder (her mother had it) and suffers from a personality disorder that causes her to lash out sometimes physically at others (which partially explains her unpopularity); that King Playstation is a compulsive gambler; and that Queen YouTube battles anorexia, sometimes living for days at a time on apples alone. I know it is taboo to address these things in the Arab world, but I suspect the mental illnesses within the family account for a good deal of what we see that looks so "off." There are just so many inconsistencies, hypocrisies, and excesses in this family. You may blog about some of these things if you wish, but please, please disguise my writing and maintain my confidentiality."