Great Mosque, Abu Dhabi

I visited the Great Mosque in Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab Emirates. It was amazing. The most striking thing about it was the combination of simplicity and intricate detail. In that regard, the building itself reminded me of LDS temples.

Here are the pictures.

In this view from the highway you can see the ongoing landscaping construction.

From the courtyard looking toward the side wall.
Domes above main hall.

Inlay detail of one of the smaller domes along the courtyard.

Chandelier and dome inlay in the atrium to the main hall.

More ceiling detail.
Stained glass window between the main hall and the atrium.
Vinework in the atrium to the main hall.
Pillars surronding secondary domes in main hall.
Handy prayer clock that flashed the name of each prayer and the time it will begin that day.Reflecting pools on the exterior.

Me standing in the courtyard. Proof that I was really there.

Me, too.

My Daughter is a Heartless Carnivore

(...just the way we like 'em!)(Oh, I kid. It's our vegetarians we like good and cruel.)

This is another of Megan's homework assignments. I think maybe I should start a separate blog devoted entirely to the hilarity that is her education.

For this assignment, there is a wordless cartoon strip with pilgrim-like people getting ready for Thanksgiving. First there is the piping hot pie. Mmm...pie... Then Mother Pilgrim sends the menfolk out to get a turkey, said menfolk chase said turkey, and then poor Mr. Lurkey, perhaps sensing he is not long for this world, pleads for his life. At this point, the children are supposed to draw in the last frame what they think happened.
As you can see, the turkey's pleas fell on deaf ears. Mmm...turkey...

P.S. No, I don't know why one of the pilgrims at Megan's table looks like a skeleton. Perhaps karma for killing off the turkey? You be the judge.
P.P.S. To prove that I'm really not kidding about needing another blog for these, I have another of Meg's school papers to post tomorrow.

Qatar (the place, not the musical instrument)

So after a couple days in Qatar, I have some pictures to show. I went to a large outdoor market where you can buy everything from palm trees to dried fish (oh, the smell) to cheap Pakistani trinkets. The apricots were imported from...wait for it...California.

I wonder how easy it would be to tip over the whole stack of melons. I mean, what if I wanted that one near the bottom?

When I saw this guy I knew I had to get his picture, which he posed for willingly. The beard coloring is a traditional henna dye. You can't see it in the picture, but he was pushing a flat-bed cart around the market, and when I took his picture, another vendor came over to me and told me over and over that the cart belonged to him. I guess he was proud his cart was in the picture.

If this guy were shorter, I might have followed him to get the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

At another market (by the stinky fish) I saw this collection of vases and thought it would make an interesting picture. You be the judge.

After the fruit and vase markets, I went to the animal market. The 2nd most important feast in Islam (Eid Al-Adha) is approaching, and millions of sheep are transported to Saudi Arabia alone, from all over Africa and the Middle East. The on-hand quantity of sheep all over the Middle East is growing, and I saw buyers haul away sheep by the truck load.

So why no pictures of the sheep, you ask? Because the sheep didn't smile. But this goat did. See the toothy grin? When I put up the camera, the goat smiled. No joke.

I realized why the goats were happy after I spent a few minutes with these Sudani goat herders. They were very nice, and insisted on taking a picture with me and the goats. As is often the case, they were intrigued by the fact that I spoke Arabic to them and the standard questions to the white-guy-who-speaks-Arabic went something like this [author's translation]:

Them: Where are you from?
Me: I am American, but right now I live in Cairo.
Them: Oh. But your parents are Arabs, right?
Me: No. They're American.
Them: Both? Your Mom and your Dad?
Me: Yes, both are American.
Them: So where did you learn Arabic?
Me: I studied in the U.S. and I have been studying in the Middle East.
Them: Ohhhh (grinning like they finally understand), you speak Arabic because you're Muslim, huh?.
Me: Nope. I am Christian.
Them: Then why would you bother to learn Arabic?
Me: (smile)
Them: So, do you speak Arabic in the U.S.?
Me: No, I came to live in the Middle East so I could learn and practice speaking Arabic.
Them: Oh. Is speaking Arabic prohibited in the U.S.?
Me: (laughing) No. It's just that there are no Arabic speakers where I live so there's nobody to practice with, so I have to come here, to where the Arabic speakers are.
Them: Oh. (turning to each other and grinning with disbelief) He's American. And he's here...speaking Arabic (more laughing).

As you can see, it can be pretty interesting talking to Arabs who have likely never heard a non-Arab/non-Muslim speak Arabic to them. Later on, I will give you the transcript of the standard Obama line of questioning. It's also pretty good.

I got excited when I saw the basket hut, because Sara loves baskets, and I thought I would be able to find a nice gift. Unfortunately, there wasn't anything in a decent color of useful enough to take home, so I didn't get anything. But at least I took a picture for you, Sara.

At the end of the evening I got a couple pictures of the skyline at the ends of the bay in Doha. The building on the left--with the spotlight shining on it--is the brand new Museum of Islamic Art that opened two days ago. Pretty fancy.


On the other side of the bay is the skyscraper garden. About half of these buildings are currently being built. They literally work through the night on these things.

And there you have it. Come back in a few days for more travel pics. I might even be able to find a camel or two, though I doubt I can get one to smile.

Our Retirement Plan

For the last 6 weeks or so, Jessie has been playing on a basketball team at school, and last week we trooped on over to the school to watch what ended up being their only home game.

Here she is, #55:
She was fouled twice and got to shoot 4 free throws. Sorry it's blurry; a sports photographer I am not.
And here she is in action. Yes, she is related to me, ergo, she is all leg. The dream of her life has been to get taller than Aunt Katie, Kevan's little sister (I am showing great restraint making no commentary whatsoever about that adjective I just used), who is 5'2". When we went to Utah in March during Spring Break (and the first time in over a year that we had seen Katie), Jess was anxious to measure herself against Kate to see if her wishes had come true. Alas (and alack), she was half an inch shy of her goal. At the end of May, she had her annual physical, where the nurse measured her and pronounced her to be 5'3". I think there was squealing involved (from Jess, not the nurse). I said to her, "So I take it that all you've been doing for last two months is squeezing your eyes shut and saying, 'Grow grow grow!'" Then in August, she had to be measured for her health class, and she was 5'4". Just now I put her up to the tape measure and it said 5'4 3/4". Needless to say, I think she's living her dream. Sorry, Kate. Heck, she's closing in on Aunt Kristen now. That was a really long lead-in to a picture. It's a good picture though. Worth the wait. Those long legs are very useful for getting down the court quickly.
I thought for sure that Sam would looove the game, since besides numbers, his main love is throwing and/or kicking balls. I was wrong. He spent most of the game like this:
Want to know why he was so unhappy? Because HE didn't get to play. The hollering you can imagine that was coming out of his very loud mouth was along the lines of, "THAM!"--he has a lisp, remember--"TURN! HOOOOOOOOOOOP! THAM! HOOOOOOOOOP!" That translates roughly to, "GIVE ME THE BALL!" Roughly. He calls a basketball a "hoop," fyi. A soccer ball is a "bid! shawtaw! bame!" ("big soccer game")(he speaks as if every word is its own sentence)(yes, all the time), a football is a "foopaw," a baseball is a "bayth-baw," and a tennis ball is a "pep-uth baw." Now you know. He loves them all. Loves. So you can imagine his severe disappointment at not being able to suit up and join the team. Because of this, after the half we spent the rest of the game like this:
I guess if things don't work out with Jessie's basketball career and therefore our chances of resting on her financial laurels, we can always hope that Sam will turn out to be the Bo Jackson he seems to be gearing up to become.

Traffickers Beware!

Traditional desert life on the Arabian peninsula is typically described by contradictory descriptions:

On the one hand there is the harsh and cruel aspect of excruciatingly high temperatures, a dearth of water and vegetation, and the dry, shifting desert sands that blow with the howling wind for miles and miles.

On the other hand, there is the generosity and hospitality of the desert people who offer three days food and shelter to any approaching traveler with no questions asked, or the hours of socializing and drinking tea and enjoying entertaining dances in the tents of friends and family.

Today's example is quite modern, and every traveler to Saudi will be subject to both the harsh and cruel and the generous and hospitable:



So I say again: Traffickers Beware!

The things I do for my baby sister...

My sweet little sister Emily tagged me a few weeks. I don't have anything against being tagged, per se, and I totally meant to do it, it's just that I'm, how do I put this? Oh yeah--lazy. But we've covered that already. So I wasn't even a little bit surprised when Emily's question for me was, to paraphrase, "Why in the name of tarnation haven't you done that tag?"

So, for Em, or as I like to call her, Moe (when she was three, she said to our dad, "I know how to spell my name--M-O-E"), here are my answers. I'm hoping this also serves to answer a few of the other questions asked? You know, about our loooooove (say that like you are a 9-year old boy) story? (Please say yes.)

What is your husband's name? Kevan Duane
How long have you been married? 14 years, 5 months, and 17 days
How long did you date? 2 months, then engaged for 3. It helps that we went to high school together, so we already knew all the bad stuff about each other. And what the other one looked like with 80's hair. If that's not a test of love, I don't know what is.
How old is he? Old. Oh, I mean 36.
Who eats sweets? Uh, that would be me.
Who said "I Love You" first? Geez, I don't know. That was a long time and a lot of sleep deprivation ago.
Who is taller? He is--3 inches more if he stands up straight.
Who can sing best? Oh, easy--him.
Who is smarter? I think we're about equal, though he has this uncanny ability to remember stuff he learned in high school. Like, he'll reference some obscure biology fact, and I'll ask how the heck he knows that, and he'll say, "Mrs. White's 10th grade biology class." Then I'll tell him he's a nerd.
Who does the laundry? I do. It is long-standing knowledge that if Kevan's doing laundry it's because Sara's pregnant and too sick to care about what happens to the clothes.
Who pays the bills? Me. He's the income, I'm the outgo.
Who sleeps on the right side of the bed? Depends on whether or not said "right side" is closest to the door or not--the rule is that I get to sleep as far away from the door as possible, therefore making him the first person with whom any child that should venture in comes in contact. This supports my rule of never making eye contact with a child after dark.
Who mows the lawn? If we had a lawn, that would so be Kev's job. Lawn and yard care falls under the category of "Boy Jobs," which is defined as, "Any and all jobs that, while I may be perfectly capable of doing them, I see no need to except in the case of deployment." Other jobs in this category include but are not limited to car upkeep, garbage taking-out, and child nail-clipping.
Who cooks dinner? I do most of the time.
Who drives? Here? Boy howdy you better believe it's Kevan. I only drive here if I have to. And by "have to" I mean "we will starve if I don't." That's the litmus test.
Who is the first to admit they are wrong? Well, if I were ever wrong, I'm sure it would be me.
Who kissed who first? Don't remember for sure, but the most likely scenario is that it was him kissing me.
Who asked who out first? You know, I actually think it was me. Oh wait, no, I asked him out for the first date we actually went on, but that was because I felt guilty for shooting him down when he asked me out and I already had a date with another guy. So I guess he asked first, but I asked first successfully.
Who wears the pants? We both like pants. He doesn't like skirts though. Except on me.
How did you meet? Technically we met in elementary school, but neither of us remembers the other one. Then we ended up at the same high school, but I don't remember ever actually meeting him--he was just this kid a grade higher than me who never tied his shoes. When he was a sophomore and I was a freshman, he had math with my sister (a senior) and English with my brother (a junior), and he asked Nathan once, "So, I know you and Teri are brother and sister, but how are you related to Sara?" And Nathan answered, "She's our cousin." We started hanging out in the same group of friends my junior year, during which time he was dating my best friend. Then he went away to college and then went on a mission, during which time I dated his best friend and moved to Texas (do you really need a link to tell you what Texas is?)(ok, fine). About 4 months after he got home from his mission, I moved back from Texas, and we met up again. He had apparently been spreading it around to our mutual friends that he was going to "chase me" (I still don't know what that means), but I was dating another guy I really liked, so I was not interested in being chased by anyone else. I went out with both of them a few times, and it didn't take long to realize that, wow, I actually liked Kevan more. We got married 5 months later. (And you may have noticed from the links that aforementioned best friends are now married to each other. Yes, we all still like each other, and no, it' s not weird. Mostly it just makes for a really funny story, which comes in handy when people find out we went to high school together and say, "Awww, you're high school sweethearts.")
Who's funnier? I dunno, we're both pretty darn funny. Especially the later at night it gets.
What was your first big fight? We'd been married a few months when I had a dream that we'd gotten into a big fight about whether or not our girls would get their ears pierced (Kevan's mom and sisters don't have pierced ears). After I woke up, I told Kevan about the dream, and he laughed and said, "That's silly. Of course they won't." And then we got into a big fight about whether or not our girls would get their ears pierced. Now he claims no recollection of this conversation ever occurring, and the terms of any piercing that may or may not happen have been negotiated to everyone's satisfaction. Except maybe Grandpa Lewis's. (Sorry, Ted.)
What makes your hubby cranky? Things that are irritating.

I don't have a bunch of cute pictures to show you a chronology of our life together, like Emily, because we were married in the olden days before these new-fangled digital cameras were invented. We did have indoor plumbing though, so it's all good. I can show you a recent favorite though, taken last month just before he left for Saudi. It's a series, really. Crying out to be framed together and preserved for posterity.

Do my work for me

Hey folks,

So I can't think of anything to write about. Sure I could tell you about Halloween, or maybe Kev could put up some more cool pics from Saudi, but that takes effort, and I think it's a long-established fact that me no likey effort. Plus I'm having a hard time choosing which of the pictures from Halloween to put up, and Kevan's off on the range everyday, so at this rate you might not see another post until February.

My dad likes to say that he doesn't think that necessity is the mother of invention, rather that laziness is. Sometimes I agree with him (Look, Dad! It's in writing!), as evidenced by the following: I had a great idea! How about any or all of you that read here ask me questions you'd like to know the answer to? Holly, does your dad read this? In that case, what I totally meant was how about any or all of you that read here ask me questions to which you would like to know the answer? (I also know the proper usage of older vs. oldest, Holly's Dad. I swear.)

See? Great idea! It can be about anything you can think of, and I'll just ignore the ones I think are stupid. And smart-alecky (Nathan, I'm looking at you). It occurred to me that we might not be presenting you, our friends and families (and any creepy lurkers that may be hanging about, welcome!), with a very complete picture of what our life in Egypt is like. We have some friends who write thoughtful, insightful things about their experiences here, and me, well, I put up random pictures with smart-aleck remarks (I blame growing up with Nathan).

So if there's something you've been wanting to know, or anything you'd like to know more about, ask away. For instance, why do I still care whether or not Holly's dad corrects my grammar? Was Nathan really that bad growing up? Oh, yeah, and maybe anything you might be interested in about, you know, Egypt.

Friends, family, and creepy stalkers alike, we want to hear from you! Though, if you're truly creepy, we may also want to block you. But first we want to hear from you! If you're not creepy but have been chillaxin' out there in the woodwork, even better.

Whatcha got for us? Help us to help you. (And what I mean by that is of course, don't make me spend any more time trying to think of something interesting to write about while simultaneously feeling guilty that I'm not writing about anything at all, interesting or otherwise!) (I am so not kidding about being lazy.)

The Only Political Post You Will Ever See On This Blog

So remember those Scholastic Readers you had as a kid? Little pamphlets chock full of useful information about varying subjects such as firefighters, pumpkins, and whatever seasonally appropriate topic was current at the time? Well, Megan comes home with those about once a week, and, unsurprisingly, this week's topic was voting. They talked in their class about how America was choosing a new president, how that means that voters are choosing between two different candidates and voting for the one they think will do the best job, how to vote, and other things related to the process of the election. I guess then the teacher told them that they should take their booklet home and vote themselves--but that they should keep their vote a secret and that they didn't have to tell anyone who they voted for.

Megan took this task very seriously. First she looked all over the house for a pencil and was rather dismayed when she couldn't find one that was sharpened. When I asked her why she needed one so badly, she said, "Because, Mom, I have to vote!" Happily for all of us, I convinced her that it was ok if she used a pen. Then she sat at the desk for close to 10 minutes, looking at the booklet, tapping the pen against her pursed lips and talking to herself: "I wonder who I should vote for. I just can't decide. Hmm...maybe him...or maybe him...I just don't know." During this process I never said one word to her beyond agreeing that voting can sometimes be a difficult decision, and, yes, it is very interesting. Finally she was struck by the muse, announced that she had decided, wrote it in her booklet, and ran off to play. I didn't ask her who her choice was, of course, because she was very serious that--like a birthday wish--you cannot tell anyone.

Yesterday, though, I found her "ballot." And I am not ashamed to say that I looked inside it. And now I am going to further my betrayal of the sacred trust that is a vote and share it with you, because I just cannot keep this to myself.

She went above and beyond her civic duty, I tell you, and decorated the front of her paper:
I will translate for you (I am helpful). Up by the "Let's Find Out," it says, "I VOTE BUT SHE DID NOT WANT TO." And coming out of the mouth of this apparently un-American woman who does not choose to exercise her rights as a free citizen it says, "BUT THAT IS OK." You will also notice that out of the other side of her mouth, musical notes are escaping. I asked Megan tonight what that meant, and she said, "She's singing it, Mom." Like, duh.

So what I take from this is that Megan is advocating a position of acceptance of those who abstain from participating in the electoral process, especially if they do so in song.

And if you're wondering who Meg voted for, here's the inside of her booklet:
Girlfriend's got her finger on the heartbeat of America, it seems.

The best part of all of this (though it's hard to top the musical-theater aspect of it) is that from what I can glean from talking to her, I think that Megan truly believes that her vote was the swing vote that tipped the scales in his favor.

I think her teacher did a really good job of explaining it all (aside from perhaps leaving out the fact that, cute as they may be, Kindergarteners' decorated Scholastic Readers aren't included in the official tally), because tonight while I was reading an article online that had a big picture of Obama in it, Megan came up behind me and her eyes got really big. I said, "That's a picture of our new president," and she said, "I know." And I said, "I hope he'll be a good one," and she said, "Well, you know, Mom, he has to promise that he will do his best."

Desert Rain (start humming now)

So maybe it's because I haven't seen rain since June in New Mexico, or maybe it's just the expectation of being in the Arabian desert, but when it rained the other day, I had to go out and watch. For a guy who grew up in a high desert climate, there is something funny about how fascinating the desert rain was.

The funny part about it was that during the morning and afternoon, it smelled and looked like it was going to rain. One of my local counterparts, in response to the question "Is it going to rain today?" responded "Only God knows." Within a few minutes, he got a cell phone call from an astonished friend telling him that it was raining in the capital. He laughed and said "It's raining in Riyadh."

More interesting than the quantity of rainfall was how dark it was in the late afternoon.

So here is the ominous cloud cover,


And here is the early evening downpour.

Not exactly magazine covers, but you get the idea. More to come...

Clean Air.....Clean Water.....am I in heaven?

Today I give you: Jake's First Post. I thought he would be the best qualified to tell you about the trip he took with the 6th Grade. If I were the one writing it, it would read something like, "And here's a picture of some stuff, and here's a picture of some things, and here's a picture of some stuff with some things. Discuss."

And yes, my mother-of-children-primarily-schooled-in-California brain is still reeling that a) they even had a 6th Grade trip, b) that there was a chartered plane and a hotel stay involved, and c) um, Luxor!?!

So anyway, here's Jake:

Last month I went on a school trip to Luxor, Egypt. I have a few (hundred) pictures to show for it, but I'll only show a few of my favorites.

Here's the airport terminal in all it's blue-lightish glory.

This is the most astonishing picture from my trip, taken from behind the hotel dining area. Clean Nile...wow!! I had to get someone to pinch me to confirm I wasn't dead.

This is another Luxor Nile picture.

This is actually an accidental picture, but it turned out to be a guy on a donkey.

These are the two colossus statues of Ramses II. Behind them, there used to be the temple of Ramses II. It was knocked down by an earthquake in Roman times.

This is the temple of the Pharoah Queen Hatshepsut.

And here it is again zoomed out, showing its position in the desert.

The paintings inside Hatshepsut's temple still had paint on them. This scene depicts workers carrying supplies for Hatshepsut's expedition to Ethiopia.

This is the "City of the workers". It's where the people who worked on the tombs lived, away from everyone else, so they wouldn't give away the location of the tombs.

This is the roof of the temple of Ramses III. It depicts holy vultures with sun discs on their heads.

Another time someone had to pinch me. A stoplight? In Egypt? What next?

This is the roof of the temple of Ramses III. It depicts holy vultures with sun discs on their heads.

This is Hatshepsut's obelisk, inside Karnak temple, with a minaret too.(I don't think that ancient Egyptians built that, too.) The Karnak temple was the ancient Egyptians holiest temple, the temple of the sun god, Amun-Re.

Here's a little guy I found at the hotel dining area.

So, yes, I had good time and all that (not like you were wondering or anything). It was really fun and I hope that everyone can go down there to see it themselves. It was a truly remarkable experience.