Kitchen Before and After
Wooo Hoooooooo! The ugly kitchen is gone! The new kitchen is finished!
Before:
After:
The Arab Way
My husband and I were very young when we first came to live in the Middle East, back to back embassy assignments, first in Tunisia, and then in Jordan. Before those assignments, we had spent two years learning about the culture, and my husband spoke Arabic and I spoke French. It didn’t matter. We were still woefully ignorant. (And we are still learning!)
People would call us, asking for favors, especially visas and getting their kids into U.S. colleges. We would look at each other in astonishment. How could they think their kids could get into college without passing the tests? How did they think their cousin could get into pilot training when there were other, better qualified candidates? And we learned, that with the right connections, exceptions are made.
We got smarter. We were travelling back in Germany, and wanted to stay in military lodging, but all the rooms were taken. We decided to go get something to eat, and at dinner, I said to my husband “let’s try doing it the Arab way.” He looked at me and said “Whaaaaaattt?”
“Take your orders that say we are with the embassy and on special leave” I told him. “Tell them we just got in, and just need a place for tonight.”
“But they don’t have any rooms!” Adventure Man protested.
“They always hold rooms back for special circumstances, for pilots, for emergencies,” I countered. “Make us special.”
We finished dinner, and felt better with our blood sugars back up. Adventure Man became his charming persona, and we went back to the hotel. He was inside for a bare two minutes, and came back out grinning, and holding a key.
We have learned an important lesson. Yes, there are policies. Yes, there are rules. Yes, there are the way things are done, customs, traditions, inviolable.
But there are also exceptions, and they are based on personal relationships.
Our insurance company told us they would no longer insure our Florida house, too much risk exposure in Florida. We went to a lot of trouble to try to meet a guideline that would allow us to be an exception – to no avail. Yesterday, I spent an hour on the phone with one person who was persistently pleasant in telling me it was not possible. I told her that telling me what a great customer I was, and how they valued our loyalty didn’t ring true when they would abandon us after all our years of being good customers. I didn’t blame her, personally, but neither was I buying all this pleasant stuff, when the bottom line was money, not loyalty.
I hung up the phone with a huge pit in my stomach – this cloud, this worry has hung over my head all summer, and now my worst fears had come true and I would have to seek new, less reliable, insurance. But I decided to put it off until tomorrow, no point trying to do something when you feel really depressed.
Late last night, we were in those early hours of dead-drooling sleep, the phone rang, and it was the insurance representative calling us back. Four hours after our phone call, the phone call which had been “the final answer” she was calling me back to say she had found a way, and our policy was being re-instated.
Thanks be to God! The Arab way worked, even though I wasn’t consciously using the Arab way, probably my thinly veiled anger and frustration and bottom line TERROR had gotten through to her. I thought it was over, but God was working behind the scenes, and a miracle happened.
We are still learning; we still have a lot to learn, and living in this culture helps us continue learning a new tools, additional strategies, for our tool box.
Pensacola Kitchen Renovation
Woooooo Hoooooo! Our son just sent us photos from the continuing renovations on our Pensacola house.
Kitchen before:
Kitchen after (we are still waiting for the tile man to put in the new wall tiles)
You can hear nightmare stories about renovations gone awry – but you won’t hear them from me. We found a truly wonderful contractor, David Murphy of Tacoma Construction. He personally checks the quality of the work, gives accurate estimates, and he has good ideas to implement what you want done.
One day, as I was having the house interior painted, I could hear voices rising, and I felt a little concerned. I listened, and what they were discussing, with great heat, was just what exactly a certain verse from the bible meant. 🙂 We feel so blessed; they did their work well, and the work was completed in a reasonable time frame. And how did I find this gem? On the internet.
Where is Pensacola, FL?
It isn’t only my Kuwaiti friends . . . . many of my American friends don’t know where Pensacola is, either.
Pensacola is almost in Alabama.
You can see it at the far left of the map. It has a big bay, and a barrier island with a gorgeous, white sand beach. It is fairly unspoiled, as Florida goes, with more moderate temperatures, and some slight shift in seasons.
Holy Cow! It’s Hard to Explain.
As I was leaving the Apple Market, I saw this display:
which totally cracked me up.
EnviroGirl told me there are all kinds of displays for all kinds of life events – birthdays, new babies, anniversaries, promotions, graduations – if you can think it up, this company will put it out there. Tombstones for a 40th birthday, storks for babies, and this one – Holy Cow! for a birthday.
I don’t know how I would like to get to work and find one of these displays outside on my birthday – I prefer to celebrate quietly, without a lot of fanfare. But every time I see these, I have to grin, so I guess it isn’t all that bad.
What also gives me a grin, however, is how very American this tradition is. I cannot imagine it at all in Kuwait. I can’t imagine it in Germany. Somehow, I just don’t think it would be so funny in any other country, except maybe South Africa, or Australia . . . countries where people don’t take themselves too seriously, and the loss of dignity would not be too severe. It’s just a joke, something a good friend might do.
What do you think? Do you think it is too undignified? Does it invade privacy? Do you think it is funny?
Cactus Flower in Pensacola
The Cactus Flower in Pensacola is usually the first place we go when we get to Pensacola. They have some of the best Mexican food you can find, freshly prepared, and you better get there early or you’ll have to wait a while for a table – the secret is out!
Located in a small strip mall undergoing some serious renovation, the Cactus Flower serves lunch and dinner. You’ll see all your friends there – we can’t go there without running into someone we know.
This is the chicken quesadilla. It is more than one person can eat! We took the rest home for another meal.
This is the three taco dinner; you can choose chicken, beef or pulled pork, or any combination of the above. It comes with a choice of beans (these are the smashed beans) and rice, too. Usually, I order this a la carte, because I can eat the three tacos, but not all the beans and rice, too, and I hate to waste.
This is the tostada dinner, which also comes with beans and rice. Delicious!
As for gaining weight, so far so good. Haven’t done a scale check, but the clothes still seem to fit and the waists aren’t too tight, so I guess I am keeping it off by lugging my baggage here and there, and keeping moving.
Pensacola Treehouse
The tree house is an old American tradition, but most treehouses are fairly primitive things, more like a raft high in the tree branches with sticks nailed into the tree to climb up. Few have walls, if it has walls, Daddy probably helped. But look at this house, and it’s magnificent tree house! I think it must have been built by a builder! And I wonder if it has air conditioning?
Pensacola Houses
I know you all liked the Kuwaiti mansions I showed being built in the Hilton Hotel area. So for you, I will also turn the tables and show you some houses in Pensacola. There are some real beauties!
I love the stained glass window at the top of this house:
I liked this house’s green seclusion, and near-the-water location:
I have more, but I need to upload them. . .
Stormy Day in Pensacola
You know me. I see beauty just about everywhere I go. Pensacola has a lot of sunshine, but this time of year, also has powerful thunder and lightening storms. No one seems to really mind – Pensacola needs the rainfall, and the storms are powerful, awesomely beautiful. And Pensacola presents herself well in stormy weather.
I love the French Quarter style balconies, the Spanish style architecture – Pensacola has been colonized by the French, Spanish, Brits, and I think even a couple others! The influences on the architecture, both public and private, provide a rich variety of style.
And the natural wetlands, the bay, the bridges – it is at it’s most magical in stormy weather, in my opinion.
Hurricane Risks
I wanted you to see a very scary photo, taken at The Oyster Barn. No, not the sign for the “Buoy’s” room (the other one is, of course, the “Gulls” room) but the marks on the wall from the floods resulting from the various hurricanes.
At the top is Hurricane Ivan, the most recent biggest, baddest hurricane to hit Pensacola. It caused billions of dollars in damage. People are still trying to fix damages to house and property caused by that hurricane, three years ago.
It’s a gamble, living near a sea coast. Hurricanes are an increasing worry in the gulf, and hurricane season lasts from the end of June to the end of November. Insurers, hit hard by both Ivan and Katrina, and by new legislation, are pulling out of Florida, fleeing like rats.
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