Rainy Sunrise
Woooo HOOOOO, Kuwait! We have rain! We have rain! Not a heavy, Pacific Northwest kind of rain that will last the whole day – as you can see, the sun is even breaking through from time to time – but rain! Beautiful rain!
The roads will be slick today, my Kuwait friends. Be careful out there.
Wooo HOOO, ShoSho! The Great Kuwait Market Magic Challenge
Watch out! Ya’ll have some serious competition! ShoSho sent these in, and she blew me out of the water. Wow. Wow. Wow. Wait till you see:
How does she do it? Look at those colors, look how saturated they are!
My friends, I remind you, the deadline in January 31st. You still have this one week to get your entries in.
I am heartened by the number of cameras I see down in the market – whether you enter or not, you are down there, taking photos and enjoying the sights and sounds and smells and tastes of a Kuwait national treasure.
Even the way the vegetables and fish are arranged shows artistry and an eye for beauty and composition. Look how ShoSho captures the colors and textures of the Sadu woven goods and carpets. Wow. Wow. Wow.
Send your photos to Intlxpatr@aol.com. If you send them, I will print them. 🙂
(ShoSho, you set a very high standard to beat!)
Warming Sunrise
I can always tell when the temperatures are going back up. The Qatteri cat is no longer sleeping all curled up in a tight little ball as close to me as he can sleep; he is stretched out, or sometimes even just at the bottom of the bed, not creeping between me and AdventureMan for every ounce of heat he can absorb.
Temperatures are warming, but still no significant rain.
The sunrise this morning is purely glorious, and I love the way it spills over into a little beach pool, as if it were a rainbow with a pot of gold at the end. Here, we have a pool of gold, well, golden in color, anyway.
There is no surf to speak of today, none, and there are patches of utterly flat, glassy water. Not a fishing boat in sight.
Have a great day, Kuwait!
Dancing in Qurtuba
Last night, leaving a dinner with special friends, as we exited, we stopped in our tracks. It was raining! It was a gentle rain; we hadn’t heard a thing.
It was a little wet; that wasn’t a clue, sometimes people wash down their garden areas. It was the smell – there is nothing, nothing like the smell of rain, especially in a dusty, dry country, rain has a magical effect on the dust, and a wonderful, clean smell. Rain on the trees, rain on the garden, rain on everything – we danced all the way to the car.
We’re up a little late, this Friday morning, getting ready for church, still smiling from all the fun we had last night, but I haven’t forgotten you. The sun is a little higher in the sky, but with the clouds – still a photo worth taking.
Have a great day, Kuwait!
Intlxpatr Has an NBK Account?
Also in my Intlxpatr mail this morning, LLLOOOLLL!
When I clicked on the “Update Now” type so that I could print their web address and encourage YOU to submit false data, their website did not even work.
Losers.
Beware. These scammers are out there. Some aren’t as stupid as these guys. Some can fool ya.
Dear valued Watani Online Bank member:
Due to concerns, for the safety and integrity of your Watani Online Bank
account we have issued this warning message.
It has come to our attention that your Watani account information needs to be
updated as part of our continuing
commitment to protect your account and to
reduce the instance of fraud on our website.
If you could please take 5-10 minutes
out of your online experience and update your personal records you will not run into
any future problems with the online service.
Once you have updated your account records your Watani account
service will not be interrupted
and will continue as normal.
To update your Online Banking records click on the following link:
Update Info
Thank You.
© Member FDIC Copyright 2008 Watani Financial Corporation1-800-Watani .
Kuwaiti Girl Raped and Abandoned in Desert
From the Arab Times
If YOU know anything about this, please tell someone. The young men who committed this crime must be stopped. What they did is unthinkable. They robbed a young woman of her privacy, and they robbed her of a future where she had never been raped.
Who could so such a thing? Who is not paying attention to what their sons are up to? Abducting women off the streets, even in front of their own homes – who brings up young men who would do this? Why so many at this time of the year?
Young Kuwaiti girl left in desert after gang rape, 10 men queried
KUWAIT CITY : In a shocking incident, a Kuwaiti girl in her 20s was raped and left unconscious in a desert area in Al-Jedaliyat near Doha.
Sources say a Kuwaiti man noticed the girl and called Operations Room which promptly dispatched securitymen and paramedics to the scene. She was then rushed to Intensive Care Unit of Sabah Hospital where doctors confirmed that she was raped.
Investigations revealed that the girl was a resident of Sabah Al-Salem area and a missing persons report was filed on her.
Securitymen combed the camping area where she was found and arrested tens of youths for investigation.
Sources suspect that the culprits are still out there. “Since no mobile phone was found near the girl and she is still unconscious, police don’t have any clue about the culprits,” they add.
Securitymen are keeping a watch in the area where she was found.
African Heads and Art
From this morning’s e-mails – I think this is a sincere one. If anyone wants to contact this artist, his e-mail is:
africanhead_art@yahoo.com
Good day sir\ma
it is a great pleasure of getting across to your wed site. Am Mr KOLA OWOLAWI JUNAID am muslim an artist am the founded of african heads art and cultural gallery african heads art gallery was base in lagos and osogbo osun state in nigeria
i participated in my first art exhibition at GENEVE COMITE INTERNATION committee of the red cross ICRC am one of the winner in the art competition i also exhibit at US Embassy in lagos ,IITA ibaban German cultural Center , British High Commission ,american international school,Britsih high school, National art council in Accra Ghana i received an award for up coming artist an many more
i will like to make an inquiry on if i could join the Qurain cultural festival or organizering a cultural art exhibition on Qurain words, painting adire ,batick ,tye and dye and other local fabric art work for up coming this year.i will ilke to know if it could be organizes and what was the general registration or inquiry is needed for the exhibition thanks you.
please if you ilke to see the samples of the art works i will be glad to show it
A New Dawn (and Glimpses from the Inauguration)
“Are you able to watch the inauguration from work?” I type an IM to my son.
“Nah, I’ll have to catch some of it later,” he types back. He has victims to interview and briefs to prepare – it’s a normal day, not a holiday in his state.
I am glued to the screen. AdventureMan comes home and joins me, just in time for the swearing in and Inaugural address. WOW. Our new President is inspirational. He doesn’t tell us it is going to be easy. He says we are all going to have to work hard to turn things around. He reminds us that together, united – we can do it. Wow.
AdventureMan said what was most exciting to him was that we are celebrating 200 years of peaceful transition of power. The pendulum has swung right and left and center, administrations have changed, and by the Grace of God, it has happened peacefully.
Taking the oath of office:
Crowds watching in Kenya:
Inaugural speech:
An estimated 1.4 million Americans stood hours to watch Obama become President in temperatures below freezing:
Singing the national anthem:
Signing his first documents as the US President:
What? You thought I forgot? Here is the new dawn in Kuwait – a pearly morning, another great day in Kuwait. Thanks for your patience. 🙂
Big Blob Sunrise
Good morning, Kuwait!
We almost missed the sunrise this morning; the sky is full of cloudy haze and when the sun came up, there was just this big bright mass, you could hardly tell where the sun was. A few seconds later, the diffusion ended slightly and I grabbed a photo, but my camera had a hard time figuring out where to focus.
I am not complaining. We need rain. We need rain desperately. We had such a terrible time, last year, when so little rain fell and every small wind picked up soil and whirled it around. When I came to Kuwait, over three years ago, I remember thinking how GREEN it was here, compared to Qatar. So many trees! Even in the desert! Now, I fear for the greenery, I fear for the water table. Kuwait needs rain. Maybe it’s time to organize another big prayer for rain, like they did just before the rains last year?
Mubarakiyya Food Court
Several people have asked where the Fatayer Man is in Mubarakiyya.
Here is what the area looks like:
Here is a GoogleMap of the area (isn’t this amazing? Isn’t GoogleEarth amazing? I can’t believe such great technology is give to us for free. I wish I were smarter, I wish I could put arrows on the map, and stars, but I can’t figure out how to do that . . . yet!
You will see three lines of white running parallel – those are covers over the walkways in the main part of the souks. There are others, but this is the heart, where they sell vegetables, meat and fish. You walk straight down one of them until you get to the open court – you will see a mosque. In the GoogleEarth photo, you will see a round gold circle – that is the dome.
Just below the mosque, in the photo, you will see restaurant seating areas. The one closest to the entrance to the “food court” is the Malik al Saj, or King of (a particular type of) Bread; it is written on a great big blue Pepsi sign, and there are lots of waiters there eager to seat you. The food is fresh, and very good.
Now look at the map again. You will see more seating lower in the photo, over to the left. It is just around the corner from the other restaurant areas. This second area is where the fatayer man is. Just go down around that corner, peek into the restaurant areas until you see him hard at work, and then sit in the area just in front of where he is working. If you order tea, in this cold weather, they will bring you a pot with a charcoal heater, to savor while your fatayer is baking.
You can find these tea-heaters in the souks, too, but don’t use them inside, because they need charcoal, and using charcoal inside is a really bad (as in fatal) idea.
Words you need to know if you are not an Arabic speaker:
Chai – tea
fatayer – a breakfast bread filled with “jibn” (cheese), Halloumi (salty cheese) zatar (thyme-sumak spice mix) or jibn/halloumi wa zatar (cheese/salty cheese with thyme-sumak mix)
shish taouk – marinated, grilled chicken on a skewer
semak – fish (some of the fish served is amazing)
mixed grill – mixed grill 🙂
Happy eating! Go while the weather is cool and wonderful!
Recent Comments
intlxpatr on Shampoo Ginger tigerbutterya0c5ff1d… on Shampoo Ginger intlxpatr on British Soldier Kidnapped, Esc… John on British Soldier Kidnapped, Esc… intlxpatr on British Soldier Kidnapped, Esc… Wikipedia Donate Button
Amazina
Early Voting in Florida
