Two For One
Oh! I love October! I am so excited to get up in the mornings, go out on the balcony, all cool and fresh! The weather has been amazing, suddenly dry and not-so-hot, not-so-humid, and we can see all the way to the horizon. With the Eid – and fewer factories running, or whatever it is that puts all the junk in the air here – the sky is actually BLUE, not that hazy white we see most of the year.
It’s only 77°F / 25°C at 0800 this morning. I bet some Kuwaitis are shivering! 😉
Here is yesterday’s sunrise, actually taken as the sun broke over the horizon:
And here is today’s sunrise, actually taken a few minutes later (too lazy this morning!)
GOOOOOOOOD Morning, Kuwait! Hope ya’ll have a great day!
Golden Eid Sunrise
At 0600 on this second day of Eid, while all of you are sleeping, I am up with the fishermen. At 0600, the sun has just risen and the sky is all pink and gold. Seconds after I shot the sunrise, the colors totally changed – the sky is totally cloudless, the surf continues flat, except for the twitchy water where small fish are swarming. And the temperature is a mere 79°F / 26°C even at 0800.
It is supposed to be hot today, but the rest of the week will be cooler. Wear your sunscreen if you are celebrating outside today.
Eid Mubarak Sunrise!
When I woke up this morning, it was a little after sunrise and the entire room was flooded with sparkling clear light. Grabbing the camera, I rushed to the window – you can’t see in the photo, but there is an entire flotilla of fishing boats about 2 kilometers off the coastline; I love fishing boats, they evoke something so timeless and serene in my heart. It has to be Eid! Such a beautiful sparkling day, it has to be Eid! And sure enough, it is.
This sparkling, clear, low-humidity, relatively low-temperature day is a blessing to us all! Eid Mubarak Kuwait, and Eid Mubarak (Eid Mubarkhom?) world!
Sulphury Saturday Sunrise
Another sweet, clear morning, a whole blockade of fishing boats between me and the horizon, and a totally different sunrise from yesterday – a very yellow, sulphury sunrise:
It’s a mere 77° F / 25° C, a cool September morning, these last few days of Ramadan. Good morning, Kuwait!
Sweet Friday Sunrise
It’s a temptation to linger outside on my balcony this morning. At 0700, it is a sweet 84°F / 29°C, there is a breeze blowing and look! There are sweet little clouds in the sky! Winter is coming! There is a chop in the surf, the air smells clean, and that band on the horizon is down to a thin wispy layer . . . if only the whole day could be like this.
Yesterday I ended up spending a lot of time outdoors. Early in the day, it wasn’t bad, it was even pleasant, but by mid-day, it was barely bearable.
Ramadan is the season of drawing closer to God / Allah, and thinking on those who are poor, and are not fasting to deprive themselves, but fasting because they have nothing to eat. As I found myself outdoors, unshaded, in the midday heat, I found myself thinking of you who are fasting, and how very difficult this year has been with the heat and humidity. The days of dry heat just leach the moisture right out of you; the days of humidity you drip, losing moisture either way that you can ill afford to lose when you must get through the day without drinking.
It is truly sacrificial, and my prayers are with you, that you find satisfaction in your fast, and draw closer to God.
For myself, at the end of the day, AdventureMan and I found ourselves exhausted and with that little dehydration headache you can get. I am feeling very thankful for the coming of cooler weather, insh’allah.
Sunrise 17 Sep 08
Such a change from yesterday! Still a little hazy, off in the distance, but beautiful silvery-gold shimmer on the water, and the temperature still hasn’t broken 100°F – the weather is shifting, you need only the eyes to see!
Thanks be to God for a beautiful day in Kuwait!
Big Blur Sunrise
By the grace of God, I have been up since 5 this morning. Once I stopped jet-lagging, it was no longer so easy to get up and exercise. I have been hating myself, knowing I really NEED this, but not enough to actually do it.
So I prayed. And there I was this morning, wooo hoooo, wide awake at 5. I got up and went to the pool, which was CHILLY, and I exercised. I had a note from my niece, Little Diamond giving me lots of encouragement yesterday – thanks, Little Diamond, I think it worked!
I was waiting for the sun to come up, to take a photo, but all I have is this big grey-yellow blur. Whatever is in the sky – dust? sand? – the sun cannot break through it. At 0600, however, it is still only 88°F / 31°C, and comfortable.
Whatever is in the air is worse now than it was an hour ago. Yesterday, my left eye felt like it had a piece of sandpaper in it; people tell me they get that all same thing all the time, or headaches. Thank God, I don’t have a headache, and today my left eye feels better but my right eye feels a little gritty. What is this???
I have a million projects lined up today, and time to do them! I love it when I get up early; the day has more hours, I get more done!
Hang in there, my fasting friends. Today is supposed to be a little cooler than it has been – only 105° F / 41°C – not the scorching temperatures of earlier in the week, and apparently not the humidity, either.
Dusty Sun
Here is what the sun looks like on a dusty morning in Kuwait. I can’t call it a sunrise; it is too high in the sky, up for too long, but it just broke through:
Isn’t that a sad little sun?
Good morning, Kuwait! 🙂
Sunrise Meditation
Good morning, Kuwait!
I had to go out on the balcony this morning to take the sunrise photo; my windows are so streaked with dust and humidity that I can’t find a place clean enough to shoot through! I got a delightful surprise – the morning was comfortable! For a brief time, as brief as it may be, there is no humidity, and the temperatures are falling. “Falling” in this case means maybe down in the 80’s F., LOL, but comfortable!
Actually . . . it was lovely!
You can see, we have that suspicious dark layer hanging over the horizon, hmmm. . . . .looks suspiciously like pollution. Anyone having trouble breathing?
The verses for today’s meditation are from the Psalm for today, Psalm 62:
Those of low estate are but a breath,
those of high estate are a delusion;
in the balances they go up;
they are together lighter than a breath.
10Put no confidence in extortion,
and set no vain hopes on robbery;
if riches increase, do not set your heart on them.
11Once God has spoken;
twice have I heard this:
that power belongs to God,
12 and steadfast love belongs to you, O Lord.
For you repay to all
according to their work.
Have a great day, Kuwait.
Streaky Sunrise
Circumstances had me up and about just before the sun was rising this morning, but I was filled with despair – how can I shoot the sunrise through these streaky windows? The men will be coming soon to wash the outside – more than 200 square feet of glass in our living room – the windows make up almost an entire wall.
The humidity of the last week made them damp and sticky, and then the sand storm blew in. The results are a disaster for my windows, now caked with burned on dust and grit, all streaked as the windows shed the day’s humidity.
This is what the windows look like:
This is what the sunrise looked like at 0h-dark-thirty this morning, through my streaky windows:
Here is what is going to happen. The men will come and wash my windows – but not until the day before the next humid day followed upon by another sandstorm. I will have about six hours to enjoy my beautiful diamond-sparkling-clear windows before they streak again. 😦
There is not a cloud in the sky. Weather Underground: Kuwait forecasts that today will reach 111°F / 44° C this afternoon. For my non-Moslem friends, try eating breakfast while it is still dark, early in the day, and then trying to get through a day like today without eating, drinking, smoking or coffee. God willing, there will be no humidity, which just saps the energy right out of everyone. God willing, because it is Saturday, most people will be able to stay at home and off the roads while they are fasting.
I had a man almost drift right into me yesterday in downtown Kuwait; I think he fell asleep as he was driving. Of course when I tapped my horn lightly to let him know he was drifting, he woke up and was all embarrassed and drove off with a roar, maybe to show me he hadn’t been sleeping, I don’t know, LOL. Mostly I try to stay off the roads myself.
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