Blue Light Special
Back in the United States, there is a store, K-mart, that from time to time makes an announcement:
Attention, K-mart shoppers. We have a blue light special for the next fifteen minutes on (vacuum cleaners/ school supplies / men’s clothing / holiday wrapping / . . .ad infinitum) on Aisle whatever.
So when I saw this at the local co-op, I just had to grin:
Stormy Weather
This was taken minutes ago, through my dust encrusted window. For my non-Kuwait readers, although we have rain throughout the winter (and winter does get cold here, down to almost freezing at night) the “rainy season” is late March – April. We have had truly spectacular thunder storms, amazing lightning, and rainy days.
Even on the rainiest day, the sun breaks through at some point in the day. We are already beginning to feel hints of the heat to come. The rain, combined with the heat, makes it increasingly muggy. Most of the year, it is dry, not terribly humid, even living at the coast.
But my windows! You would think that the rain would wash them clean, but no! The rain carries dust, and my windows are streaked and caked! You can see it if you look at the darker part of the clouds – but you grab the shot you can when you can, and although this one is flawed by the dust, I love the contrast of lights and darks.
A Male Theory
I read this op-ed piece yesterday in the Kuwait Times, and found it heartbreaking. And yet . . . I read hints of these stories in your blogs, too. I am printing this with the author’s permission. Tell me what you think – and make a copy and send it on to Fouad Al-Obaid, whose e-mail address is at the end of the article.
A Male Theory
By: Fouad Al-Obaid
In recent talks with many friends, I heard rather spine chilling revelations on how my fellow males (Kuwaiti that is) perceive their fellow Kuwaiti girl counterparts! Today I will try to rationally touch upon a matter that is highly irrational in nature. I will discuss the Kuwaiti male theory on women, dating and relating.
The average Abdallah I have noticed is a person filled with great ego, an individual who has a desire to control and manipulate others. In his desire to manipulate, often encourage by both elder relatives and society at large, seemingly has developed a tendency to project power over his friends, enemies, and concubines alike.
The desire of power is inherently something that most men aspire to. However if everyone in society was a leader then it would be hard to govern. Hence men in local custom, and to an extent projected in religion are deemed to be sovereigns of their possessions, which could be understood as leaders of their family and of the people that directly report to them. In this social order, a concubine is yet another person the average Abdallah can project his power upon.
A dilemma however constantly surrounds the average Abdallah for despite his desire to grow his “harem” he is conscious that perhaps other ill-natured people: people at the end of the day similar to him, are likewise on the look for yet another conquest.
Abdallah aware of the situation realizes that people out there could try to make any-given number of his female relatives likewise concubines in their respective “harems”. At this point if one question’s Abdallah’s rational of wanting other female yet at the same time if one transgressed his “sovereign kingdom” he would not hesitate to decapitate the fool who would have dared come close to any of his female relatives. Yet he like a lion in a jungle after a long day preying on Gulf Street and Marina, nevertheless is proud to share details of his hunt with fellow kings at their weekly roundtable or more correctly speaking “diwaniya”.
Moving to the next illogical notion that many have in recent times developed, if a girl accepts to even talk “innocently” on the phone it is seen as a big problem by many, yet most if not all people I have come to known do it on a rather consistent basis. Following the initial contact, a relationship develops usually, and more often than not, it would be an open one, unless off course prince-charming is eloquent in speech and threatening in nature. If the later is the case, then another highly illogical matter arises. Brining back the concept of power and control, guys I have noticed have this inherent nature to have the final word on most of everything. This is applied to “dating” for I have witnessed many irrational actions based on the later notion.
I recall once being with a friend cruising around when he called his “girlfriend” and asked here where she was. Upon knowing that she was out with her mother, he started to literally scream and shout at her, telling her how she disobeyed his command to not go out, and ordered her to return home immediately, he further instructed her to make an excuse in order for her mother not to doubt anything was wrong with her! I for one was shocked by the conversation and so I intriguingly asked the given friend about the rational of his action.
In all calm and serenity he replied that he had to teach her how to respect him. Furthermore he went on how it made him feel good, and that it was her fault not to ask permission from him to go out! What made the situation that much more unusual was the fact that they were “phone-dating”, needless to mention the irony of the situation!
On the one hand you have the guy ordering a girl he physically isn’t close to. On the other hand you have a girl who naively believed that the guy was overprotective and saw it as a gesture of love, or simply plainly put happened to be stupid, foolish enough to abide by the rules of a guy she barely knew; certainly a guy she will not end up having any meaningful relationship with.
For thoughts and comments fouad@kuwaittimes.net
So here is my question – would a man marry a woman who had a phone relationship with him? Is a phone relationship enough to ruin a woman’s reputation?
“Woh ist der bahnhof?” Revisited
Today, in the co-op I was looking for toilet paper, because we were perilously low. In the diaper section I found three women workers (when did women start working in the co-ops? I really like it!) who wanted to help.
“Ana ashuf . . .” I started off (I am looking for) but I don’t know how to say toilet paper, so I said “toilet paper”.
Blank faces. I’m trying to think of a way to say it in Arabic, roundabout, but all I can say, weakly is to repeat “toilet paper”.
Blank faces. But kind, patient, so I say it again.
The light goes on.
“Ah! Toi LET paper!” she says, with the accent on the second syllable.
“Yes!” I say, as she leads me there, continuing to correct me: “Toi LET paper, Toi LET paper.”
30% Chance of Rain
Yesterday, Weather Underground for Kuwait forecasted a 30% chance of rain. I told my husband this morning that what it meant was that it rained about 30% of the day, not that there was less that a 50 – 50 chance of precipitation. It rained just enough to make the roads DEADLY. . . Cars skidding on built up oil all over the place. Kind of like the first snow of the winter in Seattle.
Today, Weather Underground says there is a 60% chance of rain, but so far I don’t see any. Uh oh, as soon as I wrote that, I saw a huge flash of lightening and heard an up close and personal rumble of thunder. Need to send this in and unplug! Is there an electrical souk in Kuwait where you can buy transformers and heavy duty surge protectors?
One of the reasons I love living here, however, is the colors. This is the color of a morning with a projection of 60% rain. Just look at those colors!
Mosquito Magnet
I am a mosquito magnet. Adventure Man and I go to Africa almost yearly, on safari, sometimes walking, and we love it. But oh, the price I pay! Two or three times a day, I have to tend my wounds – putting antihistimine creams on my bites, which swell and throb and itch until it nearly drives me crazy.
In Tanzania last year, I had no sooner put some serious DEET on when a TseTse fly landed on me and bit me – right where I had just sprayed the repellent!
So every step scientists take to develop a repellent which will truly repel, I applaud.
Mosquitoes Target Exhaled Breath
The mechanism mosquitoes use to zero in on their targets has been discovered by scientists in New York. It is already known that the insects are very sensitive to carbon dioxide in exhaled breath.
Now a team led by Rockefeller University has found that they sense the gas using protein receptors in the structure extending from their jaws.
Writing in Nature, they say the discovery could aid the fight against insect-born diseases, such as malaria.
Read the rest of the article at BBC Health News.
I’m not ready to stop breathing! But maybe they could develop a gum I could chew that would mask the carbon dioxide I exhale?
Chocolate: The Newest Truth
I heard this tidbit on today’s Good Morning America – Good news for chocolate lovers!
And Now Some Good News from the AAAS: Chocolate in Medicine, Tractors in Space
By John Tierney From the New York Times blogs.
I just spent five days at the Woodstock of science, the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The theme at this year’s meeting, in San Francisco, was “sustainability” — not the most sprightly topic. But in between the lectures on environmental degradation, there were some cheerier discussions. A couple of my favorites:
The healing power of chocolate. The researchers weren’t quite ready to call chocolate a health food — they cruelly reminded the audience of its fatty content — but they did have good news about the flavanols found in cocoa (particularly some dark chocolates).
Norman Hollenberg of Harvard Medical School has documented that central American Indians who consume large quantities of cocoa have low rates of hypertension and of vascular dementia (caused by restriction of blood flow in the brain). At the AAAS meeting, he reported on a experiment showing people given flavanol-rich cocoa enjoyed a “a significant increase” in cerebral blood flow. “We hope,” he noted, “to explore the potential of flavanol-rich cocoa in preventing or ameliorating the vascular dementias.”
Another researcher, Ian Macdonald of the University of Nottingham, scanned the brains of women who’d been given flavanol-rich cocoa. He found it increased “cerebral blood flow to gray matter.” He and Dr. Hollenberg didn’t urge listeners to go out and gorge on chocolate, but they did raise the possibility of flavanols being used to help aging brains, perhaps being administered in the form of vitamins. Let’s hope these vitamins are the chewable variety.
The Kuwait Church Souk
In Kuwait, as in most of the Middle East, in the shopping areas, shops that sell the same kind of goods are grouped together. “Souks” in the traditional shopping areas are small stalls, or open displays, thus all the vegetable vendors are grouped in one area, the perfume dealers in another, the cloth dealers in another. It is handy – when you go looking for something, if one shop doesn’t have it, another surely will.
I remember once looking for masonry screws in Doha; when the first stall didn’t have it, he left his stall – and all his merchandise, unprotected – and took me to his friend, who did have them. Sometimes a stall owner will send a helper to another store, and return with the item you are seeking.
Even some of the large malls seem to group similar vendors in the same spots. In Saudi Arabia, I remember entire floors devoted to shoes, or to abayas, or to accessories, or cloth and tailors.
So it gives me a big grin to go to churchin Kuwait on Fridays.
Friday mornings are sleepy in Kuwait. It’s a day off for the majority of the population, and Moslems go to the mosque for Friday prayers around noon. In the middle of downtown Kuwait, however, even early on a Friday morning, there is a hive of activity – at what we call the “church souk”.
It’s really a very clever concept, and also one that tickes my heart. In one area are many many churches. They are all Christian, and range from congregations of mainly Indian men, to Phillipino families, Nigerians, Chinese, Western, Baptist, Evangelical, Catholic, Orthodox, at least one congregation which has live musicians playing loud, joyful hymns and then more staid and traditional congregations.
I’ve often wondered how all these different congregations manage to work out a schedule – there must be at least 10 – 12 different meeting locations – for sharing the chapels, for managing the time needed to get people seated, and then to clear up and get people out again. It’s exactly these kinds of little bureaucratic quibblings that can stir up a hornet’s next of problems between “like minded” believers. If there are problems, the church leaders seem to work them out without acrimony. I wonder how they do that?
In my heart, I believe this is how we were meant to worship – and although our worship has different styles, it delights me that we all – hundreds of us, if not thousands – meet in the one area, every Friday, and have the freedom, here in Kuwait, to worship each in our own style. That’s a very powerful freedom.
What is Your Greatest Fear?
Reach down deep. Take your time. Think about this.
A friend sent one of those “getting to know you” e-mails, and this question was on it: What is your greatest fear?
(Photo from Acclaim images)
My first reaction is – whoa! That is a VERY personal question! But I shared my answer with her.
One of the reasons we share when we blog, I think, is to connect with one another, to make this world a less lonely place. When we are going through a hard time – and don’t be fooled, no matter how good, how together, we look on the outside, we ALL go through hard times – it helps to know that we are not the only person in the world who has ever gone through this, whatever this may be.
There are things we don’t talk about. From time to time, you find a friend you can really really trust, and you take a chance. What a relief! You discover, if you are lucky, that maybe he or she has been there, too. At the very worst, you have someone who knows what you have suffered. It can be years down the road that they come back to you and say “I’m there now – can you help me through it?” And two people are less alone, and your suffering has not been for nothing; it has equipped you to walk this path with your friend, and lighten the load a little.
So here is is: my greatest fear is to die a meaningless, stupid death.
I don’t want to die on a Kuwait highway saying “oh sh$t” as I see some doped up, testerone-loaded, out-of-control driver barreling straight into me.
I don’t want to die as a random, unchosen victim of terrorist attack, like 9/11, or Pan Am 103.
I don’t want to trip over my high heels and break my neck falling down the stairs. (My own stupidity!)
I wouldn’t mind dying a heroic death, but my preference is to die quietly, prepared, even eager to meet my Creator. But my terror is to die too soon, for no good reason, as the result of someone’s stupidity.
So. I’ve taken the risk, early on this Thursday morning. Step up to the plate. Take a deep breath. Even if you’ve never commented before, take a risk, here, now. (Regular commenters, welcome!) Share your greatest fear.
What is your greatest fear?
Ultrametabolism and Kuwait Diet
I used to be thin. Really thin. Actually, I have been really thin several times in my life, but, *sigh* no longer.
This morning as I was picking up my e-mail, this review on AOL caught my eye. Dr. Mark Hymon is one of the AOL Wellness Coaches, and he has written two books, one called Ultrametabolism, about using your built in genetic strengths to lose weight and maintain the weight loss naturally, and one called Ultraprevention about foods to eat (and not to eat) to contribute to overall wellness and good health.
If you’ve been reading me for a while, you will know that I can be a little cynical.
What I like about Dr. Hymon’s approach is that it makes sense.
Diets that totally eliminate foods you love just aren’t going to work. Give up pasta for the rest of your life? I don’t think so. But what Dr. Hymon asks us to do is to eat mostly non-processed, or minimally processed foods. He says that the processed foods have components that the body doesn’t even recognize as food, and that’s why after eating things like Twinkies, Mars bars, packaged crackers, etc. we still feel hungry – our bodies don’t recognize what we have eaten as food.
Here is what Dr. Hymon suggests (this is from the AOL Health and Fitness section):
How to use what you eat to tell your DNA how to slim you down and live a healthier life.
Day 1. Clean out your cabinets, refrigerator and freezer. Get rid of packaged items filled with processed fats and sugars. Check the lable – if it says “hydrogenated oil” or “high fructose corn syrum” get rid of it.
Day 2. Go shopping for whole foods. Find a farmer’s market in your area for fresh produce and schedule visits in your calendar weekly or biweekly over the next few months. At the grocery, choose items from the “perishable perimeter” of the store, instead of items in the center aisles where processed foods lurk.
Day 3. Change your oil! Throw out old oils, which can become rancid quickly. Replace vegetable oils like safflower and canola with extra-virgin olive oil and make it your primary oil for cooking and salad dressings.
Day 4. Visit a health food sotre. Leave there with 10 new items you’ve never tried before. Bulk-purchase whole grains, legumes and nuts. Look for new whole grain cereals, breads and snacks without processed additives, fats, sugars or preservatives. And remember: just because it’s in a health food store, doesn’t mean it’s good for you. Read the labels of any packaged foods you buy.
Day 5. Choose Eggs! Choose organic eggs farmed with omega-3 fats. Make yourself a spinach omelet for breakfast. Eggs are a good source of protein. You can enjoy as many as eight a week.
Day 6. Become wild about fish. Find a local fishmonger or educate yourself by talking to your local grocer. Or learn more about which fish are best to eat by visiting www. ultrametabolism.com. Print out a primer to bring with you when you shop.
Day 7. Prepare some healthy snacks for when you’re on-the-go. Pack a small zipper bag with a few servings of almonds or walnuts. One handful equals a serving.
Day 8. Don’t go thirsty. By now, you’ve tossed the sodas. Bring out the blender and learn to make high protein, no sugar smoothies. Experiment with crushed ice and fresh fruits. You can even make frozen nut cubes by soaking nuts overnight, blending them and then freezing them with a bit of water or milk in ice cube trays. Your smoothie will be creamy and full of good fats and proteins.
As I did his online mini-seminar, I found myself thinking “everything this Dr. Hymon is recommending is the way Kuwaitis USED TO eat.” And I also found myself thinking what a wealth of opportunity we are living amidst, here in Kuwait, where we can go to any market and buy FRESH fish, really fresh, right off the boats, in the local fish markets. We can buy fresh meats, and fresh vegetables, lots of them grown right here in Kuwait. We can buy fresh eggs. even fresh chicken when not under threat of Avian Flu. Kuwait is a paradise for exactly this kind of diet.
Not only do we have access to fresh, locally grown foods, but the cost is so much less than processed foods on the shelves. He is talking about lentils and grains commonly available here in those big sacks, down in the Souk Mubarakiyya, as well as in the co-ops and the Sultan Centers.
This isn’t anything new, eating low on the food chain, eating fresh, but it does strike me as a diet that particularly works in Kuwait, and a kind of diet that you can live with for the rest of your life, because it doesn’t make changes in your life that you can’t live with. Like he does tell us to give up soda, one of the main contributors to obesity in the world today. As you get older, carbonated beverages aren’t that hard to give up because they also give you heartburn, so just another reason to steer clear of all those unwanted calories the body can’t identify as food.
He didn’t say anything about chocolate . . . but I have ordered both books from Amazon.com hoping that the dark, semi-sweet, barely processed chocolate that I love will also be “just what the doctor ordered.” Meanwhile . . . I hear a spinach omelet calling my name!
Recent Comments
intlxpatr on Give to Those Who Ask ExpatAlien on What Country am I Living … intlxpatr on Yellowstone: Old Faithful to C… Michelle on Yellowstone: Old Faithful to C… Cathy on No Grown-Ups in Charge Wikipedia Donate Button
Amazina
Early Voting in Florida
Here There and Everywhere 