Kuwait Police: One Reason to Love Kuwait
Today I was caught up in one of the traffic stops. It figures. Usually they just wave me through, but last night going out for dinner with my husband, I didn’t want to carry a purse so I asked him to carry my Kuwaiti residence card. See what I mean about “it figures?”
So I confidently handed the policeman a copy of my passport page, my medical card and my driver’s license.
“Madam,” he said with concern, “your license has expired!”
“Oh no!” I said. “No! Not really?”
“Yes! It expires 1-1-07 and it 07!”
“Yes! It is still 07! So it is still valid!”
“No, madam, if you have an accident it would be a big problem! You must get a new license!”
“I will tell my husband right away so I can get a new license.”
Actually, the new license is in progress, and I knew I was taking a chance driving on the expired, temporary license. I just hoped I wouldn’t get stopped. Now I just hope the new, permanent license comes through relatively quickly.
But here is what I love. In the US, police aren’t always so flexible. I might have had my papers taken and not have even been able to drive home with my groceries. This guy was polite, spoke English well (even though by all rights, I should be speaking Arabic with him) and he was even sympathetic. He was on my side, even though I didn’t have the right papers.
My husband says “He knows you can’t be held accountable because you are a only a woman, and therefore irresponsible.”
I know my feminist side should be offended, but I just sit here grinning.
Jean Plaidy and Courts of Love
My last day back in Seattle, I allowed myself a trip to the nearest Barnes and Noble. It was a shorter trip, only ten days, and full of family and family gatherings, centered around my father’s recent death. The days sped by, each full and exhausting.
I had already packed most of my bags. I do this so I know how much, if any, room I have. That way, I won’t buy too many books. I know myself. I know my vices. There is a part of me that says “how can there be too many books? How can there be too much of such a good thing?”
And then I am stuck trying to shovel books into an already overpacked suitcase, stuffing more into my stuffed backpack, shoving, re-arranging, tossing out old underwear to make way for yet another book.
I only bought a few books, one of which was Courts of Love by Jean Plaidy. If you follow this link, you will find many reviews of this book that disagree with my opinion, and gave this book almost five full stars.
I have always held Eleanor of Aquitaine in great awe. Born in the Languedoc region of France, she was raised in a court full of literature and poetry, visitors from distant places bringing news. She was educated, and exposed to rule. She was expected to inheirit the rich province of Aquitaine until a younger brother was born, but, as was not uncommon in the times, he succumbed to a childhood illness, and she once again became the inheiritor of a fabulously wealthy and desirable province, the Aquitaine.
And if being the inheiritor of Aquitaine wasn’t enough, she was also thin, and elegantly beautiful, and educated, and she had spirit. She never felt herself limited by being a woman.
She first married Louis, King of France, who was nowhere near her match. She insisted on accompanying Louis on his crusade to free Jerusalem (failed) and upon her return to France met Henry, the heir to the English throne, secured a divorce from Louis of France based on the fact that they were distantly related, and then quickly married Henry, who was even less distantly related. She did as she wished.
Henry was several years younger than Eleanor, and they were both full of fire, and ambition. They had force, and strategic vision; as a couple, they were unbeatable. Eleanor gave birth almost yearly, mostly sons, and was happy until she discovered her husband’s multiple infidelities. His inability to be a faithful husband created a bitterness in her heart, a wall between the two of them. From time to time, Henry had Eleanor imprisoned to keep her out of his way. He believed she had turned his sons against him. But many times, he would need her, and call her out of her captivity to help him. It’s a bitch, being married to a king.
Where am I going with this review, you might ask?
I finished the book, and all I can wonder is how Jean Plaidy took such a fiery woman, a sensual and vibrant woman, and made her so wooden? It must be some problem in me, as the other reviewers give the book a much higher rating than I would, and I wonder if they are confusing their awe with the subject (Eleanor) with the quality of the book?
Or maybe I have become so used to Phillipa Gregory’s treatment that I am spoiled for Jean Plaidy? When you read The Queen’s Fool, The Other Bolyn Girl and The Constant Princess you are there, you are in their world, feeling their thoughts. The dialogue is rich and lively, you are surrounded by sensory clues, smells, feels, tastes – the world is richly created, and when you finish the book, you feel like you have travelled in time, as if you were really there.
Not so with Courts of Love.
I would rate this book far lower, because I DO admire Eleanor of Aquitaine, and I think she deserves an equally lively, richly sensual treatment. I want to know her world, I want to peek inside her mind and experience a little of what she experienced. I want Philippa Gregory to write about Eleanor of Aquitaine! Jean Plaidy, in my opinion, took an extraordinary woman, and make her less vibrant, and just a little drab. A grave injustice, in my book!
Valentine
Talking with a friend the other day, about being married a long time, we were both stunned into momentary silence by the realization that we had lived with our husbands longer than we had lived with our birth families.
We think of all the forces that created who we are as children, but we forget the years of tumbling around in a marriage that helps to wear off all the sharp edges and smooth the jagged surfaces.
It’s not the boxes of candy or the roses, not even the romantic dinners (no! I am not cancelling!) It’s everything . . . the financial struggles, raising children, building a family life, taking care of aging relations, and, God willing, grandchildren . . . good times and bad times. In the long run, it’s all good.
Adventure Man, Happy Valentine’s Day. Through thick and thin, big guy.
Sectarianism
IRISH PROSTITUTE
An Irish daughter had not been home for over 5 years. Upon her return, her father cussed her. “Where have ye been all this time? Why did ye not write to us, not even a line? Why didn’t ye call? Can ye not understand what ye put yer old mum thru?
The girl, crying, replied, “Sniff, sniff….dad….I became a prostitute….”
“Ye what!!? Out of here, ye shameless harlot! Sinner! You’re a disgrace to this family.”
“OK, dad– as ye wish. I just came back to give mum this luxurious fur coat, title deed to a ten bedroom mansion plus a savings certificate for $5 million.
For me little brother, this gold Rolex and for ye daddy, the sparkling new Mercedes limited edition convertible that’s parked outside plus a membership to the country club…. (takes a breath)….and an invitation for ye all to spend New Years Eve on board my new yacht in the Riviera, and….”
“Now what was it ye said ye had become?” says dad.
Girl, crying again,”Sniff, sniff….a prostitute dad! Sniff, sniff.”
“Oh! Be Jesus! Ye scared me half to death, girl! I thought ye said a Protestant’. Come here and give yer old man a hug!”
The Mysteries of Blogging
Every blogger will tell you – you can’t anticipate what your audience will love. There are pieces I labor over – mostly the travel pieces – and I get some comments, and the hits are steady over time, but nothing spectacular.
And then I will just jot off something in a hurry, and it will get hit after hit. When WordPress first came out with it’s snap-to feature, I wrote just a short blurb, and it gets several hits a day, even almost a month later.
But yesterday, all of a sudden, I started getting hits on Unexpected Pleasures a very abbreviated book report I wrote back in January on a book about belly dancing. If it were just one or two or three or four, I would have just thought it were a fluke, but it was 17, then 26, and finally 31 – in one day!
Most of the hits were coming from one referrer, and when I tried to check the referrer, it had some posts that were not public, so if she has mentioned my review, it is not visible to me. I wrote to Little Diamond who had reviewed the book, and she said she, too, had received a huge number of hits yesterday on that one obscure review.
It is a total mystery. No comments, just people peeking in. I don’t know what they are looking for. I don’t know why that one entry interests them. It is a blogging mystery.
Doha Souk Transport
As a young military wife, it was hugely shocking to me when people felt sorry for me that I had to move all the time. Yes, it is painful being far away from family. And yes, it is painful leaving good friends. But in expat world, we all leave sooner or later, this contract ends, this posting leads to another – and some of us are just wired to need the stimulation.
My husband walks into each new posting with credentials – people know what he has done and accomplished, he has “gravitas.” I get to seek out the drycleaner who won’t ruin my clothes, the man who sells the best tomatoes, and to try to get the heating fixed when no one wants to talk to a woman, and to try to find the roads that will get us where we need to go. In short, I am staff.
And, in spite of all my griping, I got the life I was meant to have. I love the variety, I love the shock of finding others think differently, perceive differently, and my own assumptions are challenged. And I love taking photos.
Here is one of my favorites – these wizened old men are always available to carry your excess and heavy packages, and this man was hired to carry the two adorable boys and “nanny” them as mom went from shop to shop. I asked permission before shooting the photo, from a man I assumed to be the father, but the mom came swooping out, asking what I was doing. Fortunately for me, the man calmed her down and all was well.
Better Faster Smarter Solution
My husband jokes that when I have a sore throat, it is the beginning of a common cold, but when he has a sore throat, it is a rare tropical disease and he should be babied and coddled and have tea and soup brought to him, and warm washcloths, and we should speak in sweet soft voices in case he is breathing his last.
Last night I had a tickle. My husband, God bless him, knows that what makes me all better is miso soup, so I had miso soup for dinner last night.
Today, I think I have the rare tropical disease kind of sore throat. It was just a tickle yesterday, but by night I was in the grips of a no-kidding, no sleeping sore throat and stuffed nose, coughing, and feeling rotten. I feel like something the Qatteri Cat dragged in.
I rarely get sick. I don’t have time to get sick now. Please, dear readers, share your top “get rid of a cold” solutions, and do it NOW! I need your help!
Breakfast at Paul’s
It’s a great thing, being a grown-up. A lot of the things that were hard and fast rules as you are raising children get thrown out the window once it is just you and your husband once again.
When I was little, I remember Saturday nights. We would have hamburgers with all the trimmings, and watch a favorite TV show while we ate. It was the only night of the week we could eat in front of the TV.
There was a price to be paid, though. My mother would never allow a bottle on the table. There were special small bowls for the mustard, ketchup, relish, sliced onions, tomatoes, lettuce, etc. Putting condiments IN the bowls was no big deal, but I hated spooning the ketchup back into the narrow necked ketchup jar.
I will never forget my horror visiting my parents home with my son, and seeing a ketchup bottle on the table. I couldn’t believe it! I said “we were never allowed to put a ketchup bottle on the table when we were growing up!” and my Mom just laughed and said “now that we have raised you correctly we can do as we please!”
I totally get it. Now that it is just my husband and me, we also break the rules. We go out to eat more often. Sometimes we stay up late, even on a work night. Sometimes we leave a mess in our project room. I heard my husband tell the cat “Mom is going on a trip and we won’t even have to make the bed!” We’re easier on ourselves and we are easier on one another.
But best of all, when my husband wants a strawberry tart, even for breakfast, he can have a strawberry tart. He loves the ones from Paul’s. We don’t have breakfast there often, but we always enjoy it when we do.
Report: Humans ‘very likely’ cause global warming
This morning, CNN reports that humans are very likely the cause of global warming. No kidding.
This week, an unexpected storm killed 19 in Central Florida. Global warming is said to be creating stronger, more dangerous hurricanes in the Atlantic. This has had a personal impact on us – we bought a house in Florida this year, only to receive word shortly after buying it that hurricane insurance would be almost impossible to get in the future.
We are planning to make the house as hurricane-survivable as we can, but very little can survive the direct impact of a max force hurricane. It is a terrifying event, and makes a believer out of the non-spiritually oriented.
We really have no idea how far along the process of global warming is, or if it will accellerate beyond our ability to undo the damage we may have done. Or . . . is this just another in a long series of cycles of weather change?
Story Highlights
• Scientists release a 21-page report strongly linking humans to climate change
• Report scientist: Evidence of warming on the planet is unequivocal
• Scientists predict global temperature increases of 3.2-7.1 degrees F by 2100
• Sea levels could rise between 7 and 23 inches by the end of the century
(CNN) — Global warming is here and humans are “very likely” the blame, an international group of scientists meeting in Paris, France, announced Friday.
“The evidence for warming having happened on the planet is unequivocal,” said U.S. government scientist Susan Solomon, who also is a member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
“We can see that in rising air temperatures, we can see it in changes in snow cover in the Northern Hemisphere. We can see it in global sea rise. It’s unequivocal,” she said. (Watch scientist Susan Solomon deliver the grim news on global warming )
In a 21-page report for policymakers, the group of climate experts unanimously linked — with “90 percent” certainty — the increase of average global temperatures since the mid-20th century to the increase of manmade greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Fossil fuels like methane and carbon dioxide trap heat near the surface, a process known as the greenhouse effect. The greenhouse effect is a natural phenomenon, but human activities, like the burning of fossil fuels, can pour enormous volumes of these gases into the atmosphere, raising the planet’s temperature and destabilizing the climate. (Watch what happens to our planet when manmade emissions get trapped in the atmosphere )
The report found it was “likely” — “more likely than not” in some cases — that manmade greenhouse gases have contributed to hotter days and nights, and more of them, more killer heat waves than before, heavier rainfall more often, major droughts in more regions, stronger and more frequent cyclones and “increased incidence” of extremely high sea levels.
The report noted that 11 of the last 12 years have ranked among the 12 warmest years on record with the oceans absorbing more than 80 percent of the heat added to the climate system. Add in the melt-off of glaciers and sea ice and sea levels are rising.
The IPCC predicted global temperature increases of 1.8 to 4 degrees Celsius (3.2 to 7.1 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100 and sea levels to rise between 7 and 23 inches (18 and 58 centimeters) by the end of the century. (Watch how rising sea levels could affect San Francisco )
“An additional 3.9-7.8 inches (10-20 centimeters) are possible if recent, surprising melting of polar ice sheets continues,” the report stated.
The group will meet again in April to discuss the socioeconomic impact of climate change.
Defining ‘likely’
The IPCC was established in 1988 to study climate change information. The group doesn’t do independent research but instead reviews scientific literature from around the world.
The United Nations-sanctioned group was formed by the World Meteorological Organization and U.N. Environment Program.
The group’s goal is to produce “a balanced reporting of existing viewpoints” on the causes of global warming, according to its Web site.
The panel’s reports are influential references for policymakers, scientists and other climate change experts.
Friday’s release is the beginning of the panel’s first major report since 2001. The rest of the report is due out later this year.
The 2001 report found that the 1990s were “very likely” the warmest decade on record. It also said that most of the observed warming over the last 50 years was “likely due to increases in greenhouse gas concentrations due to human activities.”
The authors defined “likely” as between 66 percent to 90 percent probable, and “very likely” as a 90 to 99 percent.
Renewed concern in U.S.
Friday’s report comes amid renewed debate in the United States. (Full story)
In his State of the Union address, President Bush called for the use of more environmentally friendly technologies to “confront the serious challenge of global climate change.”
It was the first time he has discussed the issue in a State of the Union address.
The White House has said Bush’s proposals would stop the growth of carbon dioxide emissions from cars, light trucks and sport utility vehicles within 10 years.
Leaders in the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives and Senate held hearings on climate change this week. (Full story)
CNN’s Peggy Mihelich and David E. Williams contributed to this report.
Japanese Breakfast
This is for my husband. I know he reads my blog now and then, and I wonder how long it will be before he sees this?
The other night, we were out for our favorite “fast” food, which is Japanese food. Not just sushi, we love miso soup. When I am sick, miso soup makes my throat feel better. I feel like I am eating good health, with all those little tofu squares and that seaweed, I feel like the miso soup will make me better. I also love salmon teriyaki, and chawan moushi, and a variety of lesser known Japanese foods.
And my husband said “isn’t miso soup what Japanese people have for breakfast?” and I didn’t know. He though miso soup and rice, so today I looked it up on Google, “Japanese breakfast”, and here is what I found:
Japanese breakfast consists of steamed rice, miso (soy bean paste) soup, and side dishes. Common side dishes are grilled fish, rolled omelet, pickles, dried seaweed, natto, salad, and more. Actually, you can make any dishes to go with rice and miso soup in Japanese breakfast. As you see in the photo, it’s an etiquette to place a bowl of rice on your left and to place a bowl of miso soup on your right side at the table.
It was on Japanese Breakfast About.com, along with ads for Japanese condoms (they are different from others?), a sushi making robot, a Samurai hotel and recipes for steamed rice, miso soup, natto (fermented soy beans), Nori (dried seaweed), Tamagoyaki (rolled omelet), grilled fish and pickles.
It seems to me that Japanese food is going through an internationalization process – sushi used to be all about rice and fish, and main dishes were simple, often stir fried, but all in all, very healthy. Now, I am seeing sushis with fried stuff in them, mayonnaise (?????), and we were offered a green tea ice-cream for dessert . . . that just doesn’t strike me as Japanese. Is it?
But this is for my husband – in case you really read all the way down – YOU WERE RIGHT. (I am obligated by family law to say that.)
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