Trivial
Any time I start to get all puffed up about readers complimenting me on my blog, I just take a look at the search terms that bring them in.
You know, I would love to think it is our discussions about political and social issues, the books I review, the travel destinations I recommend, the human experiences we share . . . I would love to think that.
It just isn’t the truth. Here is what brings the most people to look at Here There and Everywhere. It is truly, truly humbling.
Deemaland
You know, I always visit my commenters to make sure they are not someone marketing drugs or enlargements or some kind of objectionable filth, and also because I often find a blog I haven’t seen before, and I really like.
I found one like that yesterday – Deemaland. When you go there, the first thing you see is this:
Oh my friends, is that gorgeous, or what?
Then, she tells us about an exhibit:
9-13 Mar. 2008
Event: “Architectural Catwalk”
5th Annual Exhibition of Architecture
Host: Kuwait Architectural Student Association [KASA]
Type: Exhibition of the students work.
Location: Al-Raya Complex, Sharq district, Kuwait City.
(the exhibition is in the Ground floor of the mall side)
Only on HER blog, even the information looks artistic.
This woman has an EYE. She publicizes events that otherwise might go unnoticed. Go visit Deema’s starkly beautiful blog. Also, take a look at her gorgeous Flicker photos.
“So Many Christians!”
My Kuwaiti friend was shaking his head in disbelief. He had been to the old city to pay a condolence call on a Friday, and happened by the Lighthouse compound near the Sheraton circle on a Friday morning, just as some of the services were getting out.
“I had NO idea!” he looked at me in absolute amazement.
I just laughed. When we first got here, we attended church on that compound; our church moved off only months ago, when the road construction work got seriously under way and parking increasingly became a problem. It was the most amazing experience on earth – there were the Indian Men’s Catholic services and the Philipine Evangelical service and the rock-music evangelical service and the staid Anglican services and the family Philipine Catholic services and . . . well, you get the picture. There are an amazing number of expatriate Christians in Kuwait. At any one time on the compound, there are about twelve different services going on, and no sooner does one finish and the participants exit, than the new group is coming in.
Now, churches meet all over Kuwait. They met in villas, they meet in schools, they meet in every neighborhood. Today, in our church, we asked for blessings on Kuwait, on the Emir and his family, and those in leadership positions in Kuwait. We prayed for the leaders of all the countries in our congregation (English, Irish, Scottish, South African, Chinese, Indian, Nigerian, Kenyan, Dutch, Egyptian, Ethiopian, American, Australian {I have forgotten a few, I am sure} . . . lots and lots of blessings!) Most of all, we thank God for the freedom to worship in Kuwait.
(This is not our church in Kuwait. This is the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, in Jerusalem. I was looking for a church that looked more Middle Eastern than Western, and this is what I could find!)
Our pastor also has a blog, q8bridge about which he says “The purpose of this blog is to enable a bridge to be built between Christians and Muslims, especially those living in Kuwait. Through questions and dialogue we hope to promote deep friendships and mutual understanding.”
He examines the beliefs we have in common, and where we differ, and some of the reasons why we differ. I urge you to have a look.
History of Architecture in Old Kuwait City (3)
I am quoting so much from Saleh Abdulghani Al-Mutawa. Architect, that you may think you don’t need to run out and buy the book but I assure you, I am only sharing with you a few of the gems I found within. The author has done so much research with such loving attention that the book is full of treasure, every page offers something worthy.
The Year of Demolish
It is a sad memorial in Kuwait’s history. In Rajab 1289 A.H. (i.e. in the middle of the nineteenth century), heavy rains accompanied by severe winds hit the old Kuwait city, and demolished most of the mud houses. Sea waves went high and hit and wrecked ships. It was a disaster for Kuwaitis.
A second natural disaster took place in Kuwait on 30 November 1954 when heavy rains fell and demolished houses and forced 18,000 Kuwaitis to seek refuge in newly built schools. Houses built of mud and a little cement were severely affected, while houses built of rock were not affected.
My Kuwait friends – tonight, instead of going out in your cars, stay home! Sit with your grandparents and ask them about the house they grew up in. Ask them about the meals they cooked. Ask them about the heavy rains, so heavy that they could destroy houses and force 18,000 Kuwaitis to abandon their homes and go stay in schools. These are amazing stories – learn your stories from your grandparents . . . and then come tell us all the stories in your own blogs. If you don’t have a blog, or if you want to share here, you are welcome.
Some of my Kuwait friends ask why I care more about these things than the Kuwaitis. First – my Kuwaiti friends care. In my country, we call these people “the silent majority.” Every now and then the majority energizes and asserts itself. Kuwaitis care. Change is happening, it happens slowly. Keep the faith.
Second – I live here. I may not be Kuwaiti, but I care about the places where I live. If God has placed me here, I trust that he has his reasons, and it is my obligation to him to learn as much as I can and to serve – wherever he may place me. He placed me in Kuwait.
Tomorrow I will print my very favorite part of this book – where it describes family living. Meanwhile, run out and buy your own copy. There is so much I am not covering. This book is a part of your heritage.
Stealing My Ideas?
Yesterday I was happily working in the project room. The Qatteri Cat, feeling neglected, came yowling back a few times, then went and got his baby and came back to be with me, and went to sleep. He looked so sweet. We don’t know what the baby is all about. Maybe he is lonely? Maybe we all need something small to comfort us when we are feeling neglected? All we know is that wherever we are, the QC will bring his baby back to be with us – and then, often he will leave it, as if we are the baby sitters or something.
So here is the Qatteri Cat and his baby:
You know when your cat – or your child – does something so sweet, you kind of think he’s the only one in the world that has ever done something that cute?
When I checked in with I Can Haz Cheezburger? this morning, I found this:
Enter the ICHC online Poker Cats Contest!
I think they must have plucked the thoughts out of my brain. 
While You Were Sleeping
It’s not that I’m that good, that obsessive, that I would get up every morning to photograph the sunrise. No, AdventureMan has to get to work, I have projects I am working on – AND there is the Qatteri Cat.
His little pea-brain doesn’t know it’s Friday morning. All he knows is that his food dish is empty. He goes around the house, pulling over the trash bins (they are small, they don’t make a lot of noise) and then he scratches at boxes and closets, thinking somewhere there might be food. I am guessing it goes back to some deep instinct, looking for food, from his street days.
I had forgotten to fill his dish last night.
I was so tired, I kept falling asleep over my latest Donna Leon book. Finally, around nine, I turned out my light. When the Qatteri can started sniffing around, pulling over trash cans, opening cupboards (what you hear is thump. thump. thumpthumpthump as he tries to paw it open) and scratching at boxes, I was mostly ready to get up, even though it wasn’t quite six.
Good thing! Cold, clear morning, no sand, not a cloud in the sky and just look at that sunrise:
It is 46°F/8°C this morning. There is a wind, and it feels colder.
Phase Me
AdventureMan and I were having one of those conversations we love so much – why we say what we do. This time, it was on the word phrase “phase”. We have a collection of words you use one way but not the other, and we are adding to it all the time.
Like with “phase” – we never say “Oh, man, I was so totally phased.” We never say “that phased me.”
We MIGHT say “I sort of phased out when he started talking about molecular electronics and phased back in as he summed it up,” but that is a phrase – phased-out / phased-in. I’m not sure they are related.
No.
We say:
That didn’t phase me.
I wasn’t the least bit phased.
We got throught he entire procedure unfazed. (It’s the same word.)
I’ve been searching the internet for any kind of explanation as to why we use this almost exclusively in the negative, and I can’t find much.
I did find a website, Urban Dictionary which asks for audience participation to define what words and phrases mean. Very interesting:
1. phase
(Votes) 132 up, 17 down
(Verb) To disturb, perturb, deter or intimidate. Usually used in the negative.
“They swore at me, but hey, I’m not phased.”
“You can’t phase me by talking while playing chess.”
This entry brought to you by Mrm who used the phrase in a recent comment and it was just too much of a co-incidence, so I had to write about it.
Update:
I just couldn’t let it go. Finally I discovered the problem. Me and Mark Twain have the same problem, thinking phase and faze are related. They are not. From Wiktionary:
English
Pronunciation
fāz, /feɪz/, /feIz/
Homophones: phase
Rhymes: -eɪz
Verb: to faze
third-person singular simple present: fazes,
present participle: fazing,
simple past: fazed,
past participle: fazed
To frighten or cause hesitation; to daunt, put off (usually used in the negative)
Jumping out of an airplane does not faze him, yet he is afraid to ride a roller coaster.
Related terms
unfazed
Translations
to frighten or cause hesitation; to daunt
Usage notes
Citations for faze in the OED start in 1830; usage was established by 1890.
The word phase is sometimes used incorrectly for faze; such notables as the New York Times and Mark Twain have made this error. This sometimes leads to the supposition that faze is an uneducated spelling of phase; they are distinct terms.
The Purg’s Not-Tag
The Purg has non-tagged us to link to The Purgatorian Blog with things that fascinate us.
It fascinates me that thirty year olds are sounding like really really OLD people, criticizing the young people just the way the adults used to criticize them, their choice in music, their ideas of fashion and I wonder how we change from young people who explore new ideas into old people who criticize new ideas?
It fascinates me that although we became “human” so long ago, we find the most amazing reasons to beat up on each other, kill each other, torture each other, and if you just step back a step or two, you begin to see that all the reasons to fight one another are flimsy compared to the great miracle of our creation. I wonder if we are really civilized? I wonder just how thin the veneer of civilization really is? How little it takes to turn us back into beasts?
It fascinates me how the things we own really own us. I have a horror of being forced, in the afterlife, to carry all the THINGS I consider important in this life on my back, like a turtle with it’s shell.
It fascinates me the trivia I give my attention to, the time I WASTE when I have things I really need to do.
I am fascinated by the darkness we all carry within us, and the heroic people I know who strive on a daily basis to overcome that darkness, to give their best in every situation, with earthly good humor and humility.
The Purg sent out this not-challenge to anyone interested to write a post on the sorts of thoughts that fascinate you.
Just Bad English
I am adding a new catagory today called Just Bad English.
No, I am not going to troll your blogs looking for grammar mistakes or misspellings or unusual use of English. I have noticed that I am blogging in English, and that many of the Kuwaiti bloggers are blogging in their second language – that is tough enough without the Language Police lurking in the background, and that’s not my point, nor my interest.
If, however, you are writing for a newspaper, you are held to a higher standard, even if English is not your native tongue.
So tell me, in this article from the Arab Times Kuwait Crime News, how many people were arrested? What were they arrested for?
Meanwhile, a team of securitymen has launched a surprise inspection campaign in Ahmadi resulting in the arrest of two Kuwaitis wanted by law for various criminal charges and 105 jobless expatriates. The arrested individuals were referred to the concerned authorities.
I have another complaint. In the Kuwait Times, we often read of the police “suspecting” a car and pulling it over, or
“suspecting” some individuals and chasing them.
We don’t use “suspecting” that way.
There is suspicious behavior. People are suspected OF something – you can’t just look at a car and “suspect” it, you have to suspect it OF something – erratic driving? What made the police suspicious?
examples of good usage:
Police suspected him of being under the influence of drugs, and pulled him over.
He looked nervous, and police suspected him of being an illegal resident, so they asked to see his papers.
Police received a tip that a brothel was operating in Farwaniya, and based on that suspicion, raided the apartment, breaking down two iron doors in the process which gave the occupants enough time to escape through a hidden hatch in the back of the apartment.
A sharp eyes policeman spotted the car, which appeared to be one stolen a few nights previously. Suspicious that the driver was not the legal owner, they stopped him and interrogated him, and demanded to see his registration and residency papers.
(I made up all the above. Any resemblance to a case you may know is purely coincidental.)
I have also noticed that almost every suspect gives up his drug accomplices, pimp, fellow thieves, smugglers and drug stash after interrogation. I suspect Kuwait police have some extensive experience in encouraging these confessions. Most of these confessions seem to result in other valid arrests. Sometimes, I can believe, these confessions are made by people who are very very afraid. On the other hand, sometimes a confession elicited by fear of a lot of pain might be totally false.
How do you know the difference? What if someone experiences a lot of pain and confesses to a crime they did NOT commit? This means that an innocent man suffers and the one who committed the crime skates. This happens in every country in the world. (That is just a rant, not a language criticism, just a general question in my mind; how do we protect the innocent?)
Kinky
My apologies to all the bloggers / commenters who got sent to SPAM last night, even regular, known commenters. I think WordPress is trying out some new things in the background (just my guess) and I am sure the situation will improve, but meanwhile – my apologies! I have noticed when you get sent to SPAM, it doesn’t even show up for maybe 24 hours – AAARRGGGHH!
Recent Comments
Catherine on Donna Leon Crossing Cultu… intlxpatr on Ignoring the Law thani on Ignoring the Law Anon. on British Soldier Kidnapped, Esc… Reeva Mills on Cahors to Bordeaux, Preparing… Wikipedia Donate Button
Amazina
Early Voting in Florida
Here There and Everywhere 