Come in March

I've had lots of questions from those wondering when to come and visit. I can now say definitively - come in March! By now, many of you are probably sick of putting on snow boots (AGAIN!), looking at black yucky snow piles, and yearning for those first buds of spring.

March is beautiful here. All the flower beds are blooming across the city, we're reaching highs in the mid-90s (mid-30s C), the sun is shining every day. Saturday we were at the pool. Russell had himself hidden under the sun umbrella and I was worried about sunburn after 20 minutes in the sun (even with SPF 70 on).

If you know what's good for you, you'll be booking your space in our guest room for March! I can tell you that when we're living in Milwaukee again, I'll be moaning about missing the fantastic springtime in Dubai.

Thank You, Lyra

I came home last night and Lyra was standing on her stool at the kitchen sink washing the dishes. She's pretty thorough about it (thank you Montessori schools) and then afterward needed to wipe down all the counters, too. As dinner was ready, she wanted to set the table. I was not supposed to help - except for lifting her over the baby gate at the kitchen door (the gate is acting as a dog barrier to keep Clive away from the cats). When dinner was over, she cleared all our plates into the kitchen before we sat down for 10 minutes of the movie "Antz".

This morning, she said to me, "Mama, do your remember ALLLL the things I did for you last night?"

I replied, "Yes, Lyra. Do you remember ALLLL the things I've done for you your whole life?" Yes, I can be petty. And I realized that might be quashing her enthusiasm and pride in a job well done. I quickly added (trying to cover up my petty response), "I DO remember how much you did! Thank you so much for your help! I really appreciate it. You did a great job!"

Quiz Night

I heard this quote on the radio while driving home tonight:

"England is fielding 6 specialty bowlers on a side. They have 4 spinners, but the pitch isn't expected to yield any turns until the 3rd day."

What are they talking about?

amygirl said...
I'm going with cricket.

To be precise, the correct answer is Test Cricket. But, given Yanks are just knowledgable enough to know the name of the game is cricket, I will give you credit for a partial answer

Amygirl was in first at 7:05pm with cricket. Mimi submitted a correct response via email at 7:42pm. And Marnie also submitted a correct answer.

Guess I'll have to make my quiz night questions more difficult.

Huge Fire

These pictures were taken a few moments ago from the window of my office. A huge explosion occurred around 7am in the industrial area of the city called Al Quoz. We're still waiting to hear exactly what has happened. As I sit typing, the sirens sounding from emergency response crews race up Sheikh Zayed Road toward the fire.

We live about 20km from here and I called Russell to look outside - he and Lyra could see the cloud of black smoke over the city. On the news, they reported it was visible from Ajman, an Emirate about 50km from here.

The cloud is stretching over my office - I'm peering up from under it and wondering what short of toxic fall out I'm being exposed to.
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Traffic seems to be moving along the road. Evidently they haven't decided to divert traffic for the safety of the drivers. That doesn't mean it's not toxic, just that the authorities here would rather have traffic run smoothly than to divert traffic for a health concern that may not materialize as cancer for many years down the road. As you can see, further down, it seems like the cloud is spilling over the road. Yuck!
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Updated to add:.
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I found this picture on the Gulf News website. WOW! Reports are that it started in a warehouse that was illegally storing fireworks and quickly spread to 8 other warehouses in the area. There are no clear reports on exactly what was in the warehouses that were burning. I had earlier heard that one was a paint warehouse.

Updated:

That's 80-100 other warehouses that were affected.

A quote from Gulf News, "The toxic emissions - including sulphur dioxide, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide and phosphorus compounds - will be inhaled by people for days." I think we've exceeded our greenhouse gas emmissions for the decade in this one event. I did feel a bit of dryness and a cough for most of yesterday - not sure if that was psychosomatic or not.

Happy Easter - Pat Your Keister

Lyra loves, loves, loves decorating Easter eggs. She enjoys it more than the Egg Hunt. One year, she had to dip every egg into all the colors. We had a lot of brownish Easter eggs that year. I saw a Paas set in the store that included six colors: Blue, Pink, Yellow, Orange, Green, and Grey. Grey? Since when has grey been an easter egg color? I guess when your one and only product is sold for about 3 weeks of the year you have to find some way to try and stimulate sales. At least they got rid of purple. That was always a lame color. Anyone could see that the blue and red weren't mixing together. Instead of purple you had a speckled blue and red egg. The colors seem to be more vibrant than we had as kids. I remember leaving my egg in the cup for 5 minutes only to have it turn slightly more vibrant than dipping it for 10 seconds. Ahhh - the advances of technology.

Dubai Fashion Week

This past week, Dubai hosted a Fashion Week. In addition to having many western fashion designers in the shows, they also featured Islamic fashion designers. Some of the clothing that was on display was gorgeous. Honestly, I've never seen anything close to this dramatic out on the streets here. But I wouldn't be surprised if in a few years you see some of these influences. In some countries, the Abayas and Shaylas are in plain black material. In other countries, the coverings for the body and head come in a variety of colors - not just black. Although I've never seen red. Many of the wedding dresses here are red - so maybe this design is for a wedding.


In Dubai, the abayas and shaylas are black and then decorated with fabric and beads along the edges of the head covering or the sleaves and hems of the abaya. Many of them are quite stunning and beautiful - similar to the picture here (although I don't know about that hat she's got on).

Notice the eye make up, too. Given the women are only allowed to show their faces - and some of them only show their eyes - the eye make up here is always quite dramatic. It's something the rest of us wouldn't get away with - not without looking like we fell asleep while having a make up consultation.

The Biggest Hotel Room

I traveled to Qatar this week for some management team meetings. When I checked in, they told me they had upgraded me to a suite. OK - that has happened several times to me, so no big deal. This is no regular suite! I think it's the biggest hotel room I've ever had.


Here's a view from the living room to the dining room/conference room.
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Here's the living room.
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Here's the bedroom.
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And the control panel for the toilet. Hmmm - I actually had to call the bell boy to show me how to flush the toilet.

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Marnie said...
Hmm. Looks like a real man pad.I think that toilet has more controls than the first Apollo flights!

Yes, it definitely is designed to appeal to the Arab gentleman. The suite is called the Bond Suite. It's designed around the 007 movies. All the movies are available for the DVD. There are posters and movie memorabilia around the room. Definitely doesn't cater to the ladies. Too many gadgets! The toilet is on auto feature and the lid keeps lifting each time I walk into the bathroom. It's a bit off-putting when all I want to do is brush my teeth.

Marnie said...
Ooh. Next it could be speaking to you. That could be really off-putting.

Yes, I'm glad to be back in the land of simplicity. I never did figure out the shower. I called the bell boy who was also stumped had to call the engineer who showed me how to use it. Of course it worked fine when the engineer was there. But by the time I was ready to step into the shower, it had stopped working again. Finally, I just had to take a bath - because I just couldn't be bothered really. I mean a person only has so many minutes in the day to devote to turning on their shower right. After 20 minutes, you just need to move on.

I'm Too Old to Sleep on Rocks

Went camping this past weekend. Ended up in a beautiful secluded valley in the Hajar mountains.

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We loved the rugged beauty of the mountains. It was fun to drive our car through the dry river beds. The dogs loved being able to roam free at will. We were about 15km from a very small town that included maybe 10 buildings - and beyond that it was another 30-40km to the nearest city. We set up camp in a valley where the floor of the valley is mostly comprised of rocks and pebbles that have broked off of the stark rocks of the Hajar mountains.
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We enjoyed the quiet of the evening, the crickets coming out at dusk, a few birds in some scrub, the odd long-legged beetle scurrying by. After dark, we lit a campfire and let ourselves by hypnotized by the flames. Occassionally, we'd look for a constellation. As far out as we were, there was still a lot of light polution. First, the sky was completely clear and the moon was pretty much straight above. So, that cut down on the star gazing. Then after the moon set, there was still some light polution from Fujierah (the nearby city).
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It was a bit eerie being that isolated. I had odd dreams that included an American Indian chief (in full Disney-esque headdress) coming to invite us to the local pow-wow. I was very aware of how far away we were from anything like civilization. I definitely would have problems living on an isolated farm. I like knowing the neighbors are withing screaming distance.

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Here's Basil looking down on our campsite from a quick hike we took. We tried to see if we could get to the top of the mountain overlooking our campsite, but we didn't make it. But you can see that Basil's haircut is growing out - although I still think he looks non-Griffonish. But still cute.

And the Winner Is . . .

India!

For several reasons, including: cost, proximity, and the fact that my sister wants to visit Africa with us around Christmas - we have decided to take our spring break in India.

We'll be traveling to Kerala - a state on the southwest coast of India. We plan to visit tea estates in the hill country, take a houseboat through the backwater areas, and visit wildlife sanctuaries to see elephants and monkeys.

You'll get full details and photos when we return.

Horrific Accident in Dubai

I'm not sure if this has made the international news, but yesterday we had the worst traffic accident in the history of the UAE. Over 200 cars (the actual number is yet to be counted) were involved in a pile up on the road from Abu Dhabi to Dubai. The fog over the past couple of weeks has been unbelievable in the mornings. Visibility is down to 10m at times.

Ironically, I was just planning to write a post about the fog here. It's a bit odd for it to be so foggy in the desert (well maybe it's not I've never lived in a desert before). But to me, desert equals dry. Since Dubai is on the Persian Gulf, we have a lot of moisture that gets into the air. Lately, the weather has been beautiful and warm during the day - probably leading to moisture evaporating from the Gulf - and then cool at night. Perfect conditions for fog.

When I leave the house each morning (around 6am) the fog is thick, but it actually seems to get worse closer to the rush hour and then finally burns off somewhere between 9 to 11. Yesterday, the fog in the center of Dubai was pretty well gone by around 8am. But there were still areas where it was "as thick as pea soup" - so the saying goes. Drivers here have this odd habit of driving with their hazard lights blinking when in the fog. Not just when they've been stopped for traffic, but all the time. So, you can never tell if the blinking hazards are a hazard - or just a warning for other drivers to watch out because I'm coming through at my same crazy speed as any other day.

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Driving with hazards was a direct contribution to yesterday's pile up. Since depth perception is reduced in fog, approaching drivers saw the hazards, but didn't realize the cars were actually stopped until it was too late. That combined with a disregard for safe speeds - it was bound to happen. I'm surprised it hasn't happend on other occasions, actually. One of the witnesses reported that it was so foggy, he actually pulled off the road because he couldn't see. Lucky him - or clever guy, actually. The official reports range from 3 to 5 to 8 deaths, 30 to 60 cars on fire, and 60 to 300+ cars in the pile up. From the reports it sounds like it was 4 separate pile ups. Some cars would come safely to a halt and then the traffic would pile up again behind them.

In the UAE, you are three times more likely to die in a traffic accident than in the US. Last year, the traffic deaths in the UAE were at a rate of 44.65 per 100,000 people (compared to a US national average of 14.24 per 100,000 in 2006). In 92% of the cases, the fatalities were caused by male drivers. There definitely is some sort of male bravado in Arab men when it comes to driving - and the behaviors get picked up by everyone else on the road. We've all had the experience of gasping in shock when a crazy driver overtakes us at break-neck speed and proceeds to weave in and out of traffic ahead of us. But here - this happens every day. Heaven help you if you are going anywhere near the speed limit and are in the left hand lane. For sure someone will come up behind you, tailgate about 2 feet behind you, flash their lights, and honk their horns for you to get out of the way. If you move into the next lane just a second too late, they will swoop into the next lane and speed up to pass you on the right. I can't tell you how many times I've had to swerve back into the left lane to avoid a collision with the guy behind me. Or, even more crazily, they'll pull onto the middle divide between the highways and try to squeeze past you.

Psalm 23

1 Ceiling Cat iz mai sheprd (which is funni if u knowz teh joek about herdin catz LOL.) He givz me evrithin I need.
2 He letz me sleeps in teh sunni spot an haz liek nice waterz r ovar thar.
3 He makez mai soul happi an maeks sure I go teh riet wai for him. Liek thru teh cat flap insted of out teh opin windo LOL.
4 I iz in teh valli of dogz, fearin no pooch, bcz Ceiling Cat iz besied me rubbin' mah ears, an it maek me so kumfy.
5 He letz me sit at teh taebl evn when peepl who duzint liek me iz watchn. He givz me a flea baff an so much gooshy fud it runz out of mai bowl LOL.
6 Niec things an luck wil chase me evrydai an I wil liv in teh Ceiling Cats houz forevr.

http://www.lolcatbible.com/index.php?title=Main_Page
http://lolcat.com/index.html

Grammy Rode a Camel

Hey, that sounds like a great title for a country song.
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When Dad and Susie were here, we went out to the desert for a Desert Drumming evening. This was the second time we've done this - it's a lot of fun. The site is about 20-30 minutes out of town where they've dug an "amphitheater" into the sand. To get from the top down into the bottom is probably about 50 ft. Down in the bottom, they have the perimiter surrounded with Arab-style tents and cushions. In the middle, they've set up theater style seating with cushions and in front of each cushion is an African drum. At the front of the theater are the drum leaders. They take you through learning some simple drum beats and then basically lead the group through some drumming sessions. Yes, that is Russell that you see up at the front helping to lead the crowd.

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To keep the kids entertained they have camel rides and face painting. But mostly the kids entertain themselves by playing on the sand dunes around the amphitheater. Some even bring their snowboards so they can board down the sand. So, we all took advantage of the free camel rides for a bit of a thrill. I'm always relieved when I realize that the camel is standing up and yet again I've managed to not fall onto my face in the sand. They will stand up by straightening their hind legs first. So for a moment, you're at a 45 degree angle facing downward before the front legs finally straighten.

Clive

Last weekend, we went to K9 Friends, a local charity that homes stray dogs. They are always looking for foster families and we decided to give it a try.

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When we got there, Lyra and I took a stroll through the kennels to see if there was a dog that we thought we could take on. Most of the dogs are quite large, or barking (who can blame them), or jumping. Or all of the above. But this little fellow stood quietly at the door to his kennel. He immediately stood out from the crowd.

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He's turned out to be a real gem: gentle, quiet (mostly), clever, and sweet natured. We can tell that he's had previous owners. He loves to jump into the car whenever we go for a ride. He knows he's not supposed to be on the couch - but he gives it a try whenever he can. He loves to have a blanket on the floor or patio to lay on. We're still assessing how house trained he is. He's had one accident in the house (in the same corner where Basil has pee'd). But after one week, he's doing pretty well. Basil is getting used to him although he's still a bit of a bully to him. The cats are taking a bit more time, but are getting more comfortable each day. We haven't yet let him loose in the same room with them - too worried he might get too curious. But he's gentle and quiet enough that it's just a matter of time before they will tolerate him.

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amygirl said...
So do they have a particular source for dogs that need to be adopted? Like do they get left behind by expats when they leave?

I think most are strays but maybe strays that have been abandoned by a previous owner. There are many that are taken in by expats. Or just like at home, people realize that they can't take care of a dog properly and bring him in. When we were there, a family was adopting a small little dog. The dog had been left with a friend for a couple of weeks, but turns out the family never came back. It's not unusual for families to take their dogs to the kennel for summer vacation and then never come back to get them (as a result all kennels require you pre-pay for any lodging.) A large percentage of the expats here are from the UK - and they aren't allowed to bring their dogs home unless they go through 6 months of quarantine. Why they didn't think of this before they got a dog??

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We're only guessing about Clive's previous owners because he was a stray when brought into the kennel. He has the classic behaviors of a dog that was left alone in the yard too much. He's still pretty young (maybe 2 years old) and is a bit rambunctious. I can imagine that he jumped onto something, chewed the wrong thing, scratched a door, barked too much - and someone got tired of it. He responds very quickly to any training and in just a week we've seen a huge improvement. He's got some behaviors that will take some time, though. He barks a bit - especially when he thinks he hears something outside. Once he gets started then Basil joins in and he keeps going - to get in the last word. He jumps when at the door. He's learned he has to sit, but then as soon as you reach for the handle he jumps up again. He likes to pee on the deck - even if he's just been outside. Like I said, he seems more willing to pee and poo on the patio rather than when outside on the leash.

Lyra

Prague = Magical

This past week, I was in Prague for a set of meetings. It had been 10 years since I was there with Russell. I still remember the magical feeling I had when crossing the Charles bridge into the old square. I wondered how much had changed. I worried that Dunkin Donuts had invaded. But most of the city remains as it was when we were there. If anything, more of the buildings are restored to their original beauty.

Prague is one of the few cities in Europe that survived WWII without being completely destroyed by the Allied bombing. When you see this city, and imagine that most of the cities in Germany and Poland were like it, you realize what a great tragedy it was to lose so much history and architecture in the Blitz. But even if they had retained their buildings it would be difficult to rival how stunning Prague is.

Really. Prague is a MUST SEE city. If there is a more beautiful city in the world, please tell me what it is.

Happy Birthday, Julia!

I met my friend Julia 5 years ago. We were both posting in an on-line community of over 10,000 people from across the world. Turns out she lives around the corner from me. Turns out we were at the same point in planning an adoption from China. Turns out our husbands both like to play the guitar. Turns out we become great friends. Turns out our daughters are from the same province in China. Whenever we call each other on the phone we say, "Hi Julie, it's Julie."

I love sitting in Julia's kitchen. She always makes me a cup of tea or offers me a wee dram of whiskey - depending on the day I've had. A couple of the cats come in to keep us company. Willow mellows down and lays on my feet. Lyra and Clara occasionally need to be rescued from one another. But mostly we get to chat.

Lyra loves Julia's kitchen, too. No matter how recently she's eaten, she'll always have a meal at Julie's. She especially likes the animal crackers from the big jar on top of the refrigerator.

This time of year, the frost builds up on the inside of Julie's kitchen windows from the steam coming off a pot of boiling water or a vegetable soup on the stove. A cup of tea with a dollop of honey sits in front of me. The bushes outside have one or two brave birds who are getting fed from the feeders in her yard. And we'd be planning dinner at Kyoto's later in the day - maybe just us girls.

Happy Birthday, Julie.