Desert Monsoon

Arab Teenagers - boys with bang-dos

2011-10-23T08:35:00.000-07:00

I was in Ras Al Khaimah over the weekend, visiting my friend, and we went to the mall - while there I noticed several Arab teenagers dressed in the weirdest ways. I have no idea what/who is guiding their "fashion" sense - it looked ridiculous to me.

First of all there's the hair-do - and by the way I am talking about teenage boys - not girls and I am of the opinion that the term hairdo and man/boy should not be used in the same sentence. I swear to God this style they all seem to be sporting looks like a boy's version of the Snooki hairdo. Bangs with this big poof hump of hair behind it. Who the hell told them this looks cool????

Secondly there are the clothes - skinny jeans in awful colors - like purple (and again we're talking about boys here). And they wear matching outfits... which again is a very unmanly thing to do in my opinion.

And then there are the shoes. One black one - one yellow one 0r red or whatever color they happen to be wearing. I guess two friends will share - one gets one black shoe and one gets one of the colored ones and then they wear matching outfits. I don't think this is what American teenage boys are wearing these days but I might be wrong - anyone else seen anything like this?

The Big 40 and burkinis

2011-10-22T09:00:00.000-07:00

I turned 40 last week... yes FORTY... I really can't believe it. I can still clearly recall those days when I thought 20 was grossly old and now I am 40 and I have a teenager. Where the HELL did my life go?

It is kind of scary being 40. The main thing that worries me is security. By now, most people I know who are my age and - let's face it - younger have started to prepare for the future. I haven't been able to do that. I have NO (yes you heard me right no as in zero) savings, nor do I own my own home. In fact, all I do own is my crappy furniture, an even crappier car... and a gender confused cat who attacks my feet at precisely 4:30 am every morning.

I was really dreading my 40th birthday for many reasons. The first being the most obvious - that it was 40 - not a number most people (especially women) look forward to turning. The second being that I am here all alone. Turning 40 is bad enough, turning forty all by yourself is even worse. Luckily I expressed my fear of spending my birthday alone to a friend and he arranged a lovely surprise for me. I ended going to Oman and spending the weekend on the yacht of Omani Sheikh along with a few other people. Our host was very gracious and gave me his room on the yacht - the nicest room with a bathroom with spacious tub. We traveled along the Omani Coastline and went to one of the only places in the world where the giant sea turtles go to lay their eggs. There were baby sea turtles scrambling about all over the beach - the poor things need to safely make it to the water, but get disoriented easily. We had a barbecue in a traditional fisherman's hut where we feasted on freshly caught and grilled Omani rock lobster and hammour. It was delicious - a couple of baby sea turtles, attracted to the light joined us, and were scrambling about on the woven mats on the floor. After that we walked along the beach and found three mothers in the act of laying their eggs. Apparently only one out of 100 of the babies will survive to adulthood. I have a feeling the little lost fellows who joined us will not be among them :(. The sheikh told us that the week before, he and some of his posse had gathered up buckets of the little guys and taken them to the sea. Normally, most of them never even make it to the water as they are eaten by hungry sea gulls who just wait for this time of year to feast on baby turtles.

Some of the guys went fishing and caught a 100 (or was it 200?) kg shark, and we all went swimming and jet skiing. The Omani coastline is quite beautiful and towards muscat you have old castles on the cliffs overlooking the water... built by the Portuguese back in their heyday.

I haven't been swimming/ to a beach in ages. I have some problems with sun - photosensitivity - which doesn't actually mean i burn easily - because I don't - i just react badly to the sun at times. So I have avoided it for several years and consequently am as white as a ghost. One of my big fears before going on this trip was the issue of swimwear... I don't enjoy enjoy wearing bathing suits. I didn't enjoy it back when I was young and had a perfect body, so I certainly don't enjoy it now. It just always has (and still does) felt weird to me to walk about in something that is no bigger than my underwear. I wouldn't wear my underwear in public, so why it suddenly is 'OK' in beach context escapes me. So I actually went in search of a burkini, and I did find a sportswear store that sells them. Unfortunately - they were truly hideous. I am not Muslim, so I don't need the head gear part nor do i need to cover every inch of skin above my ankles and wrists. I just wanted something more modest than a bikini, but also somehow stylish looking - this does not seem to be on offer in burkinis. There were different styles - but they all had ugly prints or weird cuts, so I wandered about in the sportswear section for a bit and what ended up getting was a couple of tennis skirts with built in shorts in bathing suit type material that about 2/3 of the way down my thighs and a couple of t-shirts and tank tops in the same material. I think it did quite nicely, but it got me to thinking about burkini and bathing suit design, and think there is an untapped market out there for more modest BUT sleek/stylish/attractive looking swimwear for women of all kinds - not just Muslim women - who don't feel comfortable prancing about in a nearly-nude state in public.

Unlovable

2011-09-11T07:32:00.000-07:00

That's how I feel.

Especially these days, now that I am all alone, I can't help but notice all the people around me - all the people who have someone who loves them and thinks they're special.

I don't know what that feels like, and sometimes I can't bear the thought that I will never know. Sometimes I feel I just don't want to go on in life anymore. My heart is like this big aching bleeding mass full of stabs wounds and holes left behind by people I loved who betrayed me or used me and didn't love me back.

I don't know what it is, but I am sure there is something inherently wrong with me.

I feel invisible, unlovable, untouchable.

I keep asking God to seal up my heart so I don't feel anything anymore, so I can't love or even like too much, so I don't want or need love. It's got to the point that I dread meeting anyone that I could like, because I know that if I get to know them more, inevitably, I will feel more and more but I will not be loved or even liked in return and it will hurt. I just want to want to be alone and not care, but that's not how God made me - I am some big joke or flawed design - a human being who craves love and affection more than others do, who has a lot of love and affection to give, but who has been made unlovable. I just don't understand why I even exist.

And because this is how I am - all I am is food for emotional vampires.

The miss who turned out to be a mister...

2011-09-01T02:51:00.000-07:00

I spent the first part of my nine day eid holiday up north, sorting out things and packing in my old house.

It so empty and lonely there without the boys. I kept expecting my little one to come round the corner at any minute with his long hair, clad in only his little red underpants and looking for all the world exactly like Mowgli in the Jungle Book.

Or for the older one to suddenly appear at my elbow and tell me some string of new facts he learned from the Discovery Channel or reading.

Luckily, I wasn't completely alone. I had my cat for company. He's a little over a year old now and the most gorgeous cat I have ever seen. I have no idea what breed he is, but he is lovely. Considering his beauty, I have been feeling very guilty for getting him castrated. Cats like him should be allowed to breed.

We actually thought he was a girl for the entire first year. Mainly, because the idiots at the pet store told us he was, but also because of his behavior. He had a collection of small stuffed animals that he played with, and he appeared to be playing house. He would pick them up by the backs of their necks and carry them over to his food dish, where he would place them face down - as if he expected them to eat. Later he would take them over next to the litter box. Presumably so they could relieve themselves. He seemed quite maternal.

So imagine my surprise when my little one carried him over to me and plopped him on my lap and announced "Mom, Misty's got a nut-sack". I scoffed at him, "Can't be" I said, but I checked anyway, and sure enough, under all the gorgeous fur, there was - indeed - a nut-sack. A few days later Misty began "romancing" one of the larger stuffed animals and he started licking himself so I saw not only the nut-sack but his ... noodle as well, so before he reached the stage of spraying all over my house, I took him to the vet.

You might wonder how I managed to miss that he had male equipment - I had raised a stray kitten before and from the time he was tiny I could see his balls. But Misty was so furry and fluffy and I swear he never sexed up a stuffed animal or licked himself openly until after we discovered his nut-sack. It was as if he was hiding it from us until we discovered it.

Anyway, he's fixed now, dashing my sons' hopes of cute Misty babies to care for in the future, but my furniture is safe.

Meanwhile, a few months before I left and took this new job, a stray, that the kids named "loud hungry kitty" because - well - he's a very loud, very hungry kitty, had started coming to the house every day or so begging for food and affection. Unlike most strays, he is quite friendly, and loves people. When I was sitting near the window the other day, he was rubbing himself up against the window right next to me - as if he was trying to rub against me. It was quite heartbreaking. If I didn't already have a cat, I would have adopted him - though he is quite ugly - but I can't handle two cats, much less two males - unlike Misty, Loud Hungry has very prominent "man jewels" and short fur, so I am sure he is a male.

The most I could do for him was put food and water out. Now I worry about him, who will feed him now that I am gone. I didn't see him in my last trip, which worried me since he usually shows up at some point. I hope he didn't get run over by a car or something.

Instead of Loud Hungry, a new stray showed up. Eid morning I woke up to find Misty staring intently out the window at goat that was sprawled across my front door step. Where it came from I have no idea. I don't live in a farming area and I never noticed any goats being kept around my house. The fact that it was eid made me wonder if it was an escapee, on the run from becoming someone's eid feast. I put water out for it too. It was still there when I left later that afternoon.

Shaping up

2011-08-27T01:13:00.000-07:00

I am on this fitness kick lately. Have been trying to go to the gym regularly and not eat junk food. I have lost a lot of weight and now fit back into some of my tinier clothes (yay). I don't want to be skeletal, but my frame is not build to carry any kind of extra weight well. I don't have voluptuous hips and breasts. I look and feel better when I am toned and athletic looking.

Anyway, in celebration of my progress, I went out and bought some new exercise clothes. I need new shoes desperately because I noticed the front of my trainers are starting to split - and since they're about 4 years old, I figured it was about time for a change.

I decided to try the new Reebok "toning" shoes. I don't know if they really work or it is just one big fat gimmick, but they were very comfortable; so I figure, either way, it's all good - if they do help tone my glutes then great, otherwise I just have new and very comfortable pair of shoes.

One thing however that never ceases to amaze me is the absolute lack of awareness of sales staff regarding customer service. The salesman actually brought me dirty sock to wear to try the shoes on with - it had brown smudges on it! Seriously? Why he thought that would be acceptable is beyond me, and are they too cheap to send the socks for washing?

I also bought some self help books. I realize that I have many character flaws, and I would like to try to work on them so that I can lead a happier and more fulfilling life.

Random Ramblings

2011-08-26T07:46:00.000-07:00

Well, another Ramadan has almost finished. It turns out that I have the entire week off next week, which means that - with the weekends - I have nine days to myself - no kids. I actually temporarily considered going to the US for the week to see the kids for the week, until I saw the price. 16,000 dirhams .... (more than $4,000) for an economy ticket. Then I thought, why not visit my good friend in Turkey? But that ticket cost around 6,000 dirhams - which is more than I usually pay to go to the US. Clearly the airlines are exploiting the Eid holiday and making a killing. So all travel plans have been scrapped and I am stuck here - alone - for 9 days. I miss my kids so much.Publish Post

I checked out the Marina Mall the other day - for the first time - and I visited the Calvin Klein underwear shop. A few years back, I had bought a couple Calvin Klein bras. and they had fit me better than any bra. Anyway, to make a long story short, after this visit, I am convinced that just like clothing sizes (anyone else noticed how a size two or four has grown over the years?) bra sizes have also gone through a change. Now there is no way in hell I am actually a D (0r even close to that) but I actually had to buy a 34D bra. I had a similar experience at La Senza, but I just thought it was their sizing, since I had no earlier point of reference to compare to. But I know for a fact that at Calvin Klein - when I was nursing my youngest son - I wore a C cup (8 years ago), and I can assure you that my breasts have NOT grown since then - if anything they have deflated. So are clothing manufacturers trying to mess with our minds and make us think we are thinner than we are with bigger breasts than we actually have? I wouldn't put it past them. The fashion/beauty industry is all one big mind f**k if you ask me - trying to manipulate us and distort our vision of reality.

Well, that's enough random rambling for now, the sun is down and it's time to eat... yay!

Taxi Thieves

2011-08-15T06:06:00.000-07:00

Just want to give a big fat shout out to all the inconsiderate taxi thieves I have encountered in the past few days.

First of all there was Mr. "all dressed up in a nice suit" - sir, even though you may dress like a gentleman - your behavior says otherwise.

Then there was a chubby heavily made up lady - She was perhaps my favorite... she didn't want to stand in the sun so she retreated back from the road side to cower in the shade of building where she could not see taxis approaching nor could they see her, when she saw me hailing a taxi, she quickly dashed out to the road in front of me and grabbed it... nice eh?

Lady with Umbrella - another sun-shy maiden - came to the taxi stand after I did and then planted herself squarely in front of me with her big fat umbrella so I couldn't see anything. Whenever I tried to reposition myself she moved and blocked me.

Here's the real clincher - I am the one who needed the most sun protection yet I stood out in the sun the longest thanks to these gems of humanity. Not only am I light-skinned, but I have photo-sensitivity - and am not supposed to go in the sun. After my little ordeal my skin rash was starting.

So people, next time you steal a taxi, or push in front of someone in a line, don't think that what you're doing is no big deal. You never know how your actions might impact another person's life.

So lonely

2011-08-14T03:56:00.000-07:00

Well I have been in Abu Dhabi now for exactly one month (on Wednesday it will be). The kids left more than two weeks ago to go to the US with my mom, because I haven't yet found a place to live, and I can't rightly keep two little boys holed up in a hotel room all day.

My mom tells me they spent the past weekend down at the beach there. My siblings, their spouses and my cousin all rented a big beach house and took their kids down there, and my kids joined. My (paternal) grandparents used to own a house at the same beach when I was little, and visiting it was part of the normal summer routine. This - along with visiting my maternal grandparents at their place on the Chesapeake Bay, and driving out to Wisconsin to visit my great grandparents' farm -was a very important part of my childhood and I am happy they got the chance to experience it too. This was their first visit to the Atlantic Ocean. The sea is very different there, and the waves much more dangerous than they are here or along the Indian Ocean coastline of East Africa - the only beaches they have ever seen until now.

I wonder how they enjoyed the boardwalk - the endless stalls selling waffle cones, greasy pizza, salt water taffy, ice cream, t-shirts, and the games and rides. I wish I could have been there with them.

I am glad they are having this interaction with extended family, but I miss them so much it hurts. It's so lonely without them - especially here since this is a new place and I don't really know much of anyone.

This past weekend I stayed in my room almost the entire time - I did go to the gym twice, but aside from that, my fun weekend activities included organizing my closet and going shopping for sanitary napkins and hangers.

The only good thing about this weekend was that someone from work took me out to dinner. But I wasn't sure why. It was a guy. I don't know if he was just being nice or it was supposed to be date. For some reason, I assumed it was a just being nice kind of thing but then when I told a friend she said she thinks it was a kind of date and that confused me and of course and made me feel more shy than I would have otherwise.

Plus he asked me to go, he picked the place, and I didn't know if I should pay too or not. I didn't want to offend (since he offered) but then I thought maybe I should - I felt kind of awkward at bill-paying time. Not sure how that is supposed to work. I know with my friends how it works, I know how it worked with my husband when I dated him, but I don't know about this person. He's Australian. I don't know how things work in Australia.

Anyway it was nice whatever it was. He is a nice person, interesting to talk to and for a while at least, it took my mind off my kids and my depression regarding not being able to find a nice place to stay.

Am I wrong for hating my husband sometimes?

2011-08-13T04:57:00.000-07:00

I just spoke to my ex-husband - actually, he's really my husband since he can't be bothered to divorce me, and the courts here clearly don't give a shit about me and my kids, so the divorce case I filed has been languishing there for the past three years...

Anyway, I have been calling him fairly regularly for the past six months - ever since it looked likely that I would get this new job here in Abu Dhabi. I needed him to cooperate with regard to some documentation for the kids. It was really quite simple: I asked for a letter stating that he has no objection me sponsoring them and for him to send our marriage certificate for attestation.

Apparently, even the smallest of requests is too much for him to do for me - for his sons! He still hasn't done the letter. Now, for those of you who don't live here, or don't know, everyone living in the UAE should have a Residence Visa. Without a proper visa, you can't work, rent a house, open a bank account, etc. For kids it means you can't enroll in school.

When Mr. Dead Beat left us almost 6 years ago, he had just renewed the kids' residence visas - so they were OK for another three years. But once their visas ran out, they couldn't go back to school. That's why I moved to the North from Dubai, because the company that hired me claimed they were going to help me sort all that out. Of course they did not - they did jack shit - all they did, in fact, was to introduce me to an Indian lawyer who can't even practice in the local court and who introduced me to an Egyptian, who took me an Arab lawyer friend of his. The Indian was the front man for a while, and then he just kind of disappeared. My case went nowhere. No one ever bothered to contact me with updates. When I call them, they avoid my calls - usually - or lie to me and tell me that next week they will talk to the judge and it will finish... and then the day they specify comes and goes and no one contacts me...

Anyway, the kids have been home-schooled for three years as a result of this. I couldn't really afford to send them to the only decent school there anyway... since their father also sends NO money for the kids (he doesn't even spend the money it takes to call them). But now, my new company will give me money for school fees IF I can sponsor them and get them enrolled.

So anyway, I called him again to nag him once again, and I got a bit upset this time. First of all, for no reason out of the blue he asked me if I had started drinking now. I never did drink and don't drink now. At this point I might have become just a tad bit snippy and said "No, sorry to disappoint you - I know you like women who drink."

To which he replied, "who says what I like?"

To which I said "I know your girlfriend is a heavy drinker".

And then he asked who told me, and I said "who HASN'T mentioned her heavy drinking when she comes up in conversation?"

Apparently that upset him, after all I guess I am supposed to respect his heavy drinking, virtuous "Muslim" girlfriend who slept with my husband so she is also the mother of his illegitimate daughter. Something tells me alcohol was involved in the conception of that child, but that's a whole different story (sort of).

Anyway, I also went on and told him "you haven't don't anything for your sons in years, and I know they don't matter to you as much as your daughter, but can you please make them a priority for once - just long enough to get this letter done, signed, notarized, attested and sent off?

He got mad and hung up on me.

Am I wrong?

Things you learn from Facebook

2011-08-01T22:53:00.000-07:00

I know people have varying views of Facebook. Some of my friends are proud to say they have never opened an account, others seem to be online all the time. For me, as an American expatriate living very far from my family, I found it a useful way to keep generally caught up on everyone back home - my mom and all her sisters have Facebook accounts, as do all of my six siblings - though I think my youngest sister created my middle brother's account so she could use it to send herself gifts for "Roller Coaster Kingdom" and "Cafe World". All of my dad's sibling have accounts as well, as do almost all of my cousins and some of my first cousin's once removed, my neices, my mom's cousins and other second and third cousins, my step-grandmother, my best friend since the 3rd grade, and my ex-husband and his family and friends (more on that later). Aside from them, many close family friends - mostly from church, my much loved grade school teacher's five kids, and other people I went to grade school with - and have fond memories of - are on there.

Finding old high school classmates was a mixed bag of emotions. Most of us are naturally curious about people from our pasts - what do they look like now, what have they accomplished, what do their offspring look like.

I have to admit I didn't really miss anyone from highschool aside from my best friend, but I knew her since grade school anyway, so she didn't count as one of them. But I was curious to know how the so-called "prettiest girl" looks now, and if the twin of the 'cutest' boy actually gay like I suspected (surely he should be out of the closet by now).

I am ashamed to admit that I was pleased - smugly and shallowly pleased to discover that I have aged far better than every other girl (or I guess we should call ourselves women now as we all have or will cross(ed) 40 this year - I still have a couple months to go) in my class. Almost all of them are overweight or wrinkled or grey or all three by now. I don't yet suffer from any of these problems. I know it is mean and God's probably going to teach me a lesson now and have me wake up tomorrow morning with a full head of white hair and an extra 50 pounds of lard on my ass, but I am just being honest and I think there are many of us who have been pleased to find on facebook that the girl who tormented us back in school days, called you ugly and laughed at your clothes - is now 100 lbs overweight and can only fit into oversized t-shirts and stretchy pants. I am not immune to such emotions, and you have to understand - I was decidedly uncool and often made fun of or just plain ignored by the "cool boys and girls". Smart (math nerd), shy and too poor to be nicely dressed, I was what most would call a "geek".

All that being said, I don't really hold that much of a grudge, and am willing to give most people another chance to change my opinion of them. So moving past appearances, I tried to find out more about these people - whom I saw every day for five years, sat side by side in class and yet never knew - and I discovered some of the other girls felt as out of place and lost as I did back then, that the two of my classmates I thought were gay are now"out of the closet" - one even posted a video of himself dancing in a gay pride parade in a satyr costume - which I am sure is a big shock for most of my former classmates who all came from conservative Christian families. A few are atheists now, or disillusioned agnostics, but on the other end of the spectrum, two are preachers, and one is a missionary in Japan. More than a few are teachers. Most are parents.

There is also a broadway producer amongst their ranks. Another one - the only boy who ever showed any interest in me - committed suicide a few years back after his wife screwed him over in a custody battle. Yet another's wife just died from cancer - as did one of the set of girl twins in my class. Both of the girls who got pregnant in our last year are still married to the boys who impregnated them- and quite happily it would seem. Most of the rest are happily married as well - only a few are divorced or never married, and almost all of them as it turns out -even the so called 'bad apples', bullies and mean kids in the class - are very respectable and nice people. Which just goes to show that while time may take away our looks and health it often gives us something much more valuable in return.

Abu Dhabi here I come

2011-06-28T05:57:00.000-07:00

It looks like I might be moving to Abu Dhabi...

I don't know that city at all, but I am looking forward to the change.

Apparently white out has the power to erase our memory too... who knew?!

2011-06-27T04:48:00.001-07:00

We are editing the latest edition of the magazine right now - always a fun time in our tension-fraught office.

First there’s the first round of editing, which is always (not) fun given the writing skills of most of the contributors. BFB – the self titled “Editor in Chief” – is one of the worst offenders here because she persists in attempting to plagiarise.

The cover story she ‘wrote’ for this issue was basically a compilation of pasted bits of plagiarised text from other articles and copied portions from other companies’ press releases. I guess, technically, its not illegal to use the text from the press releases since that’s why they put them out, but to brazenly write ‘… BFB reports’ at the top of the article is another thing. What exactly did she actually write herself ? The answer is. … next to nothing. All she had to do was go online, look up her topic, slap together pieces of text cut from here or there, and voila! In a few minutes she had what she called an article.

Now in the past, I used to take such articles – if I could – and rewrite them, which would involve a lot of work on my part – reading, researching, thinking how to say and organise the information in an different way and what to add to it so that it could be called an original piece of writing. She was more than happy to let me do this and take credit for the end result. But at the same time she would have the nerve to submit largely plagiarised pieces to me and then go complain to DH that I am the one who is behind deadline (because what was supposed to be a short proof-reading/editing job of an hour or two turned into a total rewrite of an entire day or two).

It was simply a great arrangement for her. She got to take credit for a finished piece that was hardly her work, while passing off any blame for anything – such as being behind deadline – on me.also

This time I decided not to do the work for her. So I highlighted every single plagiarised paragraph with a comment and wrote “please write in your own words.” I left the copied bits from press releases alone, simply because I thought it was asking too much of her to tell her to exert her brains cells to even write them in her own words as well.

What she returned to me was hardly better than the first. Her idea of writing in her own words is something like this.

Original bit of text: “The town was overrun by mice, and the residents were distraught.”

Her rewrite: “The town was overrun by mice, and the inhabitants were very upset.”

Which still qualifies as plagiarism… *sigh*. So I still had a lot of work cut out for me.

Now we are doing the final edit – proofreading the draft copy by hand. I noticed she had told the designer to make an incorrect correction to some punctuation – she circled it in green and wrote out the instructions on the side of the copy. So I told him to change it back, and wrote a note to her explaining why. It was no big deal, just a small thing. I wouldn’t have thought a second time about it except that the copy returned with a scrawled note saying “I didn’t tell him to make those changes, if you check the copy, I only asked him to check the spacing.”

Well, lo and behold, BFB had taken her white out and covered up her incorrect instructions! At this point both the designer and I had a good laugh. We had both seen what she had written before, and we could see the blob of white-out as well. I really don’t know what goes through her mind. Does she really underestimate the intelligence of others so much? We just let it drop, it certainly wasn"t worth making a big deal about it, but it just reaffirmed to me that she has some serious issues.

Of course DH is similar. I am only responsible for the English text in the things we produce. Arabic is his responsibility in the end. What he usually does it send out what I write in English to a translator to produce the Arabic copy. Of course, a translator is only a translator, and it is DH’s job to check and make sure that his translation is accurate.

Recently there was an error in some Arabic text in something we printed and had distributed to several people. An email was sent to DH telling him this. He forwarded it to me with just “FYI” written on the message.

I was really quite puzzled as to why he had sent it to me since the Arabic is not my responsibility and there was no error in the English text. Then it dawned on me that he thought he could blame me for this by claiming that what I wrote in English was wrong. So I went to him and asked him why he sent it to me.

He said “because it’s your fault because you wrote the wrong thing in English.”

“No I didn’t.”

“Yes you did.”

“No I didn’t. I would never write that, and I just checked to make sure, and the English text is correct.”

He refused to acknowledge that this error was his responsibility alone until I brought the printed English text and showed him. Afterwards he couldn’t even look at me. His cheeks turned pink, and he stared straight ahead and said “cool” in clipped tone that barely contained his resentment. He sat in his office after that and stewed. After all, for DH who is so careful to cover up any mistakes he might make, the knowledge that he alerted me to a mistake he made was an unbearable shame for him. About fifteen minutes later, he came charging out of his office and straight up to my desk with some little stupid thing to nitpick about – he had this weird triumphant half crazed look on his face as if to say “I’ll show you who is the fuck up around here.”

He continued that behaviour for the rest of the day. Even my coworker noticed it and commented. I complained about this to the local guy over him, and I guess it got back to DH. A few weeks later, he called for another meeting to berate me and tear me down, and he brought it up claiming that he had never attempted to blame me for the mistake and had only forwarded it to me for my information. “See I only wrote FYI on the email,” he said, with this smug look on his face which all too clearly said “You can’t prove what I did to you.”

Grammar is just so passé?

2011-06-26T04:33:00.000-07:00

One of the most annoying things about working with DH and BFB is that they can't accept the fact that they make mistakes and don't know everything. So, every time one of them f***s up, they have to pass blame or try to cover it up.

The flip side of this coin is that they LOVE finding fault with others. They will look and look for the tiniest things to nitpick about. Given that my job is editing - which is not an error free discipline - they can always find some minuscule thing to make a stink about. Never mind that I take articles that are badly written bullshit, full of spelling, grammatical and word-use errors and turn them into something that someone can actually read and understand and - at the very least - won't laugh at and think a 5th grader (or younger) wrote it. Nooooo, there is never any appreciation whatsoever for that; instead they will scan a whole magazine looking for the tiniest thing to pick about - like a set of mismatched quotation marks in some teeny tiny subtext the size of ant poop. But, when BFB's friend edited the text when I was on leave and left it chock full of errors of every kind (style, punctuation, grammar, spelling, blocks of text accidentally repeated, etc), they were so happy with the result and didn't notice a single error.

In fact, shortly after I got back, DH dragged me into a meeting with the new (at that time) Marketing Director (who has already been fired) to discuss how lacking I was compared to this new and supposedly 'professional' editor they used while I was on leave. I anticipated what he was up to, so I got a copy and quickly marked, on the first several pages of my copy of the magazine, all of the errors I could spot at a quick glance - which were many (Lord knows how many I would have found if I had gone through it with a fine-toothed comb like they do when looking for fault with everything I do.) So as soon as DH opened his mouth to discuss how much of an improvement there was in the magazine in the issue I didn't edit, I was ready. And it was amazing how he, suddenly, found all sorts of excuses for and reasons why someone might not notice a tiny error - these weren't even tiny errors, but never mind that. Luckily the Marketing Director was not convinced by DH and took my side. He told him he thought that I am quite a competent writer, and that maybe, if they think this new lady adds so much, they should retain her services (freelance) to help edit the magazine as no professional magazine has only one person writing or rewriting everything and editing it and proofreading it.

So the new arrangement was that this so-called professional was retained to help improve the magazine. Of course, this ended up making more of a headache for me. Miss KIA as I will call her, adds as many errors as she finds - maybe more. She is supposedly British but seemed confused about the spelling of the word 'centred' - and kept changing it to the American spelling 'centered' - to the point where she got me confused, since - after all, I am not British - and I had to look it up just to make sure I wasn't going out of my mind. The fact is that instead of finding real straggling typos and such to fix, she often doesn't notice those and leaves them intact, and only makes unnecessary changes to the text just to say she did something. After all, she doesn't want anyone realizing that her services are unnecessary. Usually, when she makes these changes, she introduces new errors to text that was actually error free before. When I catch these errors and try to fix them, BFB takes a fit and says "well, since she is the professional here, I think we should leave it the way she had it" - she puts a special snotty emphasis on the word professional. Of course anyone who has lived here knows that expert and professional are very loosely used terms in this part of the world. Just about anyone can claim to be an expert here - especially people from certain Western nationalities.

When I persist, BFB emails me the snottiest and bitchiest messages you can imagine. She is a typical passive aggressive, so she doesn't do most of her shit to my face. For example thanks to the wonderful editing skills of KIA, there was a sentence with no subject. By the time I saw it, it was already set in the magazine template, which meant I had to mark it by pen on the first printed draft. After I made my proofreading, BFB got her hands on the manuscript and took here big fat green pen and unmarked most of my changes and wrote "ignore" next to them. Then it came back to our section, and DH told me to look at it and "clear it up". I told him, "well she doesn't know what she is talking about, so there is no need to clear it up with her since editing is my job." But since DH doesn't respect me, he told me I should settle it with her. He told me this at 4:00 PM on a Thursday (end of the work week). So I had to take the manuscript home, and spend my weekend redoing all the work BFB had undone and then writing lengthy emails to BFB explaining the grammatical reason for the corrections.

Well, BFB couldn't understand many of the grammatical terms, I am sure, so she replied to only the one she thought she understood - the one about the sentence with no subject. Her email read something like this:

"Dear Desert

First of all language has moved on to the 21st century, not everything that our teacher taught us in grammar school in high school is considered as Bible. Nowadays, some words or styles are used for certain types of writing and are considered acceptable.

Starting a sentence with the preposition 'With' is not wrong.

Secondly, other writers use different styles in the way they write, that doesn't mean they are wrong. Following the old school of writing that you have to have noun, verb and prepositions arranged just so is passé.

I am not saying that we can be loose with grammar and their uses but sometimes a more modern style can be used. The write up about .... is not a serious piece of literature that every little sentence should follow the A,B,C, D rules of grammar.

Regards,

BFB"

Nowhere in my email to her had I told her that all sentences have to start with a noun. All I had told her is that a sentence must have a subject. I like the way she told me that grammar is passé. I guess that is what she tells herself to explain away the fact that she doesn't understand it.

I am well aware that a more informal writing style prevails these days, but nowhere (in any language that I have ever studied) is having a subject in your sentence considered passé.

My response was:

Dear BFB

I didn't say you have to start the sentence with a noun, and I didn't say that you can't start it with the word with. I said the sentence needs to have A SUBJECT, and this is not passe, and this does not change, no matter what "style" you use. I am not going to argue this further, because I am right. I don't appreciate the mocking tone of your message with the use of words like "passe". Once again, this is very aggressive and unprofessional. I am trying to do my job here. I sent you the explanation for the changes because DH requested that I explain any changes to you that I thought necessary.

I have wasted enough of my weekend re-correcting things you uncorrected. This is an unnecessary waste of my time, and I don't appreciate the tone you are taking with me when I am simply doing my job. I am sorry if you don't understand my corrections, as I gave the best explanation I could using proper grammatical terms. If you still don't get it, then I really don't know what to say.

Here are some examples of how you can CORRECTLY start a sentence with 'with'.

"With a smile, she turned around and walked away.

"With 25 years of experience under his belt, he is certainly the man for the job."

FYI, both of the options I gave (in my previous email) did not start with a noun, so quite frankly I think you are arguing for the sake of arguing. I, however, am simply trying to do my job, which apparently is a waste of time. I am not perfect, and I may not catch every little mistake, but I will correct the ones I do see.

Best regards,

Desert

I copied the local guy who is over DH on my reply - I had already complained to him about DH and BFB earlier - so that he would be aware of the crap I am dealing with.

I also went to her office to discuss this with BFB. Being passive aggressive and all, she couldn't even look me in the eye. She had read my email by that point and knew she had no grammatical leg to stand on, so all she could resort to saying was "Well I don't understand why after you have checked the articles ALL these errors still remain in the first place."

That really pissed me off, so I said: "First of all, these errors weren't there the last time I saw the articles. YOUR friend introduced them with her unnecessary changes. Secondly, why do you expect me to catch every typo error in one go when your 'professional' friend cannot?"

She had nothing to say. I also told her that I do not appreciate her interfering with my job.

That sure felt good.

Work update

2011-06-23T06:21:00.000-07:00

One thing that has been keeping me away from writing is the fact that I have been going through a lot of shit at work. Yes, I said a ‘bad’ word. Deal with it, because that’s the best way to accurately describe what has been going on. It’s a long story, and too many things have taken place to mention them all in detail here, but basically, it can all be credited to two people – my supervisor – whom I will call DH and a colleague in another section whom I will call BFB. Those initials do not stand for their names, but rather what I call them in my mind…

Now DH is a male, about 29 years old, from an Arabic-speaking (not Gulf) country. BFB is an Asian female who is in her early to mid 40s. They are part of a gang of expats – the wolf pack – here who consider themselves better than everyone else. One of their favourite pastimes, as far as I could tell from the few times I have been in the presence of two or more of them is talking shit about everyone else. According to them, everyone else is incompetent and useless. Of course, this couldn’t be further from the truth. The truth is that, for the large part, they are insecure and/or under-qualified and clinging to whatever little shreds of power they have been granted because they know that anywhere else – in a more professional environment – they would not be up to muster.

DH – for example – has been in charge of the section since 2007 – so basically that means he was about 25 when he became section manager. Where else on earth would a 25-year-old non-Emirati informatics engineer be made ‘Creative Section’ manager in a fairly large government organisation in the UAE? He has somehow managed – by hook or by crook (or both) – managed to hit pay dirt and he is scared as hell to lose his cruise down easy street. As neither a trained graphic artist/designer nor a particularly creative person, he basically does not have what is required to manage or guide the work of those placed under him. All of his employees have qualifications and skills he neither possesses nor understands – and this makes him insecure and MEAN.

To combat his insecurity, he has formed a close ‘friendship’ with the so-called senior graphic designer, a 29-year-old male from northern Europe, who is his best friend, roommate and illegal business partner. The fact that this guy is the senior graphic designer is really quite laughable – everything he ‘designs’ is lifted from somewhere else – nothing is original or attractive – his ‘designs’ remind me of a prison or a hospital room. Rigid lines, washed out colours, overuse of the corporate ‘palate’ – for crying out loud just because the logo is blue doesn’t mean every god damned thing we put out has to be drowning in the colour blue!

They have enslaved in their section a very nice, quiet Lebanese guy ‘NG’ who has more qualifications, skills and natural talent than both of them combined and multiplied by 100. Poor guy has been with them more than 3 years now. I hate the way they treat him. Like me, he’s an artistic quiet sort, who would prefer to just do his job and stay out of the petty-politics and crap that this place seems to revolve around. Unfortunately, that’s not always possible when one or more of the wolf pack is out to get you.

I guess they had it in for me from almost the first day I joined the “creative” section, when the Marketing Director scrapped DH’s design for the corporate diaries and told him to come up with a new theme that made sense and wasn’t boring. DH came up with nothing, but I did have an idea – which the Marketing Director liked. So we implemented mine… and I did most of the work. In the end, everyone was happy and impressed with the diaries – said it was the best they’d had yet – of course DH was happy to take the credit. But I guess that whole ordeal put me – and the Marketing Director – on his hit list

At the same time, BFB had it out for me, because as PR & Media officer, she should be able to write well in at least one of the two languages we issue our PR material in – English and Arabic – but she her Arabic skills are zero (0), nil, nada, niente, and her English writing is shabby. Until she came here she’d been getting by with bad grammar and by plagiarizing. Part of my job here as ‘Editor’ is to check and fix everything written by her in English, and this make her feel so terribly insecure.

You might wonder why they would hire a non-native speaker to write and then hire a second person – a native speaker to check what she writes – good question. I remember the CEO complaining about her writing shortly after she started, when I used to work in his office. And I – defending her – said “but she has other abilities, and you knew she wasn’t a native English speaker when you hired her.” To which he replied “yeah but ‘R’ (a Czech national) evaluated her and said her English was quite good.”

“So you had one non-native speaker evaluate another one?”

“Yes, but that doesn’t mean anything – the person with the highest score on TOEFL isn’t a native speaker”

“Native speakers don’t take TOEFL in the first place...”

So basically, since that time both DH and BFB having been working – mostly behind my back to undermine me in every way possible – lying about me, spreading gossip, complaining about me to HR and, generally, making my life a living hell… to the point where I started crying myself to sleep at night – or suffering from insomnia from worry and frustration.

Saying Goodbye

2011-06-21T23:58:00.000-07:00

Back at home this weekend, my family will be attending a screening of a documentary made about a very important environmental law that my grandfather passed while he was governor. I wish I could be with them; I wish even more that he could be with them.

I have been away from my blog for a long time, and a lot has happened in that time. One of the most notable – and definitely the saddest – is that Grandpa finally passed away a few months ago at 94 and ½ years old. I wasn’t able to go home for the funeral or memorial service – so it has been a long grieving process for me. It is easier to pretend someone hasn’t died when you aren’t used to seeing him regularly – but that makes accepting and dealing with his death a more drawn out process. I can forget – most of the time – that he is dead and imagine him back in his home, but then when I think about going home and realize that he won’t be there, it hits me and I cry and cry.

I know I should have been prepared for this; after all, no one lives forever. He was in his mid 90s – several years past the life expectancy for an American Male, but he just kept hanging on and in fairly good health, so I managed to delude myself that he’d be around for a few more years.

He didn’t suffer for months or lie around like a vegetable deteriorating for a long time – and I am happy for him in this. That is not how he would have liked to spend the last months/years of his life. He was pretty lucid up to the end. When I was there this past October, he was fit enough that he even managed to attend a political rally. So his death came about relatively quickly, a week or two before he passed on he suffered a series of small strokes and he weakened quickly.

I guess the one thing that bothers me the most is that I didn’t speak to him before he died. I never cashed the cheque he sent me for Christmas either – I am kind of glad I didn’t – I like to look at his scrawled signature – the last thing he sent me before he died.

After his death, they ran many articles about him the local papers – and even in the New York Times. Some of those articles told stories about him that I hadn’t ever heard before.

He was well respected, and for a good reason. There are not many people who would give up lucrative careers to stand up for what they believe to be right, but that’s what he did. He chose the honourable path, not the most profitable one – and I’m immensely proud to be his grand daughter and feel blessed to have known him… and I miss him so very much.

I love you Grandpa.

Living without internet

2011-06-21T00:28:00.000-07:00

I know I haven't blogged in a really long time - half a year to be exact - and before that I had been largely MIA as well, but that's because I had so much going on - and a lot of it I wasn't sure if I could or should discuss in a public forum.

Now I am hindered by the fact that lovely Etisalat - ever the caring and efficient service provider - came to our house a few weeks back to "upgrade" the line to some kind of Elife thing - don't ask me what that is supposed to be. All I know is that I didn't ask for it; they just did it, and now, thanks to E-life I am E-dead... no internet at all, and I have given up trying to make Etisalat take responsibility and come back to my house and figure out what the hell is wrong - after several angry phone calls and one 2 minute visit by a technician - I have just given up.

The technician told me "your modem is broken". I said "so does that mean the technician you sent out to do the upgrade broke it?"
He said "I don't get you"
I said "The modem it was working up until the very second you guys came and now it's not"
He said "Must be a coincidence madam" (I hate being called Madam by the way).
I said: "So you're telling me that my kids were using the internet when you guys knocked on our door to do this 'upgrade' which is supposed to improve our services - and somehow - it just coincidentally broke down while it was off while your guys were working on the line?"
He said: "Yes Madam"
I said: "and you don't think a more plausible answer is that either one of your guys accidentally dropped it OR whatever you did here isn't actually working?"
At which point he just mumbled something and said "I don't know you call 101 and tell them"
Of course the 101 people are just call center staff and really are not capable of doing anything to help you. They just put them there I guess so people like me have someone to scream at when we get no help or answers.

Of course none of this should surprise me really, when I moved to this house I asked to transfer my land line - that was almost two years ago and I still don't have a land line. So now I am basically about as connected as an Amish person... and can only access the internet from the office, a friend's house or the mall - I haven't tried that option yet, but supposedly the mall has free wireless throughout.

In other news... I am waiting to see if I will be arrested or not. These stories in the papers here - like the one about the British doctor who was accused (he says falsely) of giving the finger to a local who was tailgating him have me freaked out. I am not going argue about whether giving someone the finger is an offence worthy of imprisonment, what bothers me is the lack of solid evidence. How can someone be arrested just because some said he did something?!

I was driving home from the gym last night on the main road going into the town - it is a fast moving road with 2-3 lanes in places. I approached the one signal on the road and it was backed up quite far due to a red light. But as I approached the light turned green and traffic started moving - fast - except for the car in front of me. This big shiny black SUV just sat there in the middle lane not moving. I waited ... it didn't start. So, I honked - guessing that maybe the driver was sending an sms or using his/her Blackberry or iPhone and hadn't realized the signal had changed.

The car still didn't move. So I pulled into another lane and passed it.

Apparently this was some sort of unforgivable offence. Once I passed it the car roared into action and started following me flashing its high-beams. I ignored it and kept going so it shot into the lane next to me and pulled up alongside me. There was a very mean and angry looking local woman behind the wheel shouting something at me - Lord only knows what it was because I had my windows rolled up. I just shook my head at her and drove on... but then I got scared - she seemed quite unreasonable - nothing I did was illegal or even rude - yet she reacted as if I had driven over her or something - so now I am worrying that I will find myself hauled in for questioning in a day or two - once they track me down.

2010-12-28T03:11:00.000-08:00

Well, Christmas has come and gone in the blink of an eye.

I had an ear infection and sore throat right before hand, and I was totally stressed out from work, so I didn't manage to get the presents wrapped and under the tree until after midnight on Christmas Eve - well technically very early Christmas morning.

Thank God for the boxes from my mom and sisters arriving on the 23rd, otherwise things would have looked a little bleak under the tree. Speaking of my boxes arriving, the customs official wanted to charge me like 200 extra dirhams and I asked him "Why? They're gifts?" and he said "Under $200 gift - over charge" But each individual box was under $200 dollars and they didn't come from the same place, I just happened to pick them up on the same day. It makes no sense. The same three boxes, if I had picked them up on separate days, would have been free.
They also included the cost of posting the items with the actual price to calculate the duty - nice :(

Anyway, I decide to just cook a little meal for myself and the boys, but then I ended up inviting another American friend and her family because she wasn't at all prepared for Christmas thanks to her sons having chicken pox. Mine already had it, so I figured there was no harm in inviting them. I also invited my Jordanian coworker.

I cooked turkey, corn pudding and mashed potatoes (with sour cream) and then apple crisp and cheesecake (baked New York Style) for dessert.

My maid announced that she is going home for a vacation. First she said she would be gone for two weeks, then one month now it stands at month and a week, who knows what it will be next. This means I have no one to watch my kids while I am at work. S is almost 13, though, so I guess he can babysit for little D. My main worry is what they will eat for lunch and dinner - that's pretty much all she did for them anyway, cooked. Otherwise, she was in her room watching TV. I am hoping, though, that after she has a break, she will be in a better mood and work better.

Finding a maid is not such an easy task in RAK...

I need a vacation... a real one, not a trip back home where I will end up sitting at a computer doing my work the entire time. They don't respect my right to have a proper leave here. Even when I am on sick leave they bug me and nag me about deadlines.

2010-12-11T01:26:00.000-08:00

I can't believe another Christmas is almost here again... though I am not particularly looking forward to it.

I am so tired of spending holidays alone. But at least I got to have a real Thanksgiving this year - one American friend from work had a gathering at her place - so it was me and my two boys, her and her husband and her two boys and a Latina American and her two boys and then a bunch of non Americans - an Iranian - who said "oh ver deed you find dis biiiig cheeken" when she saw the Turkey - :)) (she's so cute), a Mauritian, a Bulgarian and a German woman and her daughter.

It was quite a nice gathering - all the nice people that I like from work - none of the mean gossipy ones. I also thought it was cool to celebrate what I think is one of the nicest North American cultural holidays with so many non-Americans. Setting one day aside to have a feast with friends and thank God for what he has given you in the past year is something nice that I think anyone can appreciate. I am not saying that you shouldn't be thankful all the time - but making a special occasion to do it is nice too.

I made one hell of a delicious pumpkin pie (if I might say so myself). Of course, like all things - especially desserts - that are extra delicious, it is quite fattening. My secret - substitute cream for some of the evaporated milk.

Anyway, good time was had by all - afterward the host went for a walk and the children were upstairs playing and we ladies had a fine time dancing to Latin, Arabic, Turkish and Indian music.

The next day we were invited to yet another Thanksgiving dinner, which was also nice but quieter.

I love turkey....

speaking of turkey, since when did it become the norm to serve gravy from a jar??? For me that's paramount to sacrilege - throw out all the nice juices and flavour from the turkey and serve some ... goop.. from a can... luckily, my hosts had not yet thrown out the drippings and I was able to make real gravy for them - which I can safely say myself is 1,000,000 x better than canned crap. Is gravy-making, like sewing quilting, bread making becoming a lost skill? I certainly hope not. But just in case, I have already taught my sons to make it - and that importance of making the real thing... so let's hope it will stay alive for at least one more generation beyond me.

All this talk of turkey reminds me I need to skiddadle out to Carrefour and get one for Christmas before they are all gone.

**********

On an entirely different note... I am having some trouble with my maid and I am not sure how to deal with it.

She is a nice lady, but lately she has become incredibly lazy.

For example i noticed this growing dirty gray patch on the kitchen floor. So I asked her to clean it... it felt kind of sticky - it's still there. I tried cleaning it myself - it isn't hard to do, which means she didn't even try.

I went on vacation for almost a month and I came back and my clothes were just jammed in my closet - not put nicely - jammed. (And she got paid for that month by the way).

When I wake up in the morning, she is asleep. When I come home from work, she is asleep... any time I look for her, she is in her room with the door locked. I think she stays up all night watching Ethiopian TV and then sleeps all day. What bothers me more than her laziness is the way she acts so put upon.

My son got ringworm recently from the cat. Although they have their own room, my kids sleep with me (don't like to sleep alone :(... ) So she only has to tidy up one room really. I told her that while he has ringworm, the sheets have to be changed every day. She had a little hissy fit about that - changing sheets of one whole bed every day!! Imagine that! When she first started working for me, they slept in their own bed, and I had another lady staying with me - so she had four beds to make - but for some reason this was an intolerable request from me.

She recently bleach the bajesus out of a pair of my work pants because she was too lazy to separate the clothes for washing and just dumped them all in the wash together. She then complained to my boys about how it was my fault for "hiding" my pants in the sheets. And I didn't even get mad at her or say anything, I just told her "ok, please check better next time."

She moved the racks for drying clothes under some tree where the clothes now get covered with little seeds and crap while they dry. I think she did this because it is right outside her door so she only has to walk a couple feet to get to the them. I had put them under the car park because the sun doesn't hit them directly and they don't fade there.... in her new places they get some sun and all my clothes are looking dull in colour. I told her i would like them dried in the previous place and she told me 'no this is better'... Mind you the car park is only another 15 feet away .... if that.

Just in case anyone is wondering.. I pay her waaaay more than anyone else I know pays their maid, and I don't boss her around - though it seems I may have to start. Also unlike many maids in other houses, she is free to eat whatever she wants... something she takes full advantage of - the other day I found out she's been feeding the boys several day old leftovers of chicken while she ate all the (fresh) steak herself - her reason? Because she doesn't like chicken as much as beef (Never mind that the boys also prefer beef).

The good thing about her is that she is honest, I can trust her to be alone in the house and she is basically a nice person - though she seems to be in some kind of funk lately. I also know she would never hurt my children and she is a pretty good cook - when she wants to be. She watches cooking shows sometimes I think, and then tries out little things she sees on them, which is nice.

I really don't know what to do. I don't know how to be bossy, but I am getting tired of things not being done - it has gotten to the point where I spend my weekends cleaning because I am not happy with the way she does it.

Back in the UAE...

2010-11-13T05:19:00.000-08:00

Well I am back in the UAE again...

Vacation went by so quickly. My dad had is surgery a week after I left, and they thought it was successful so he was at home recovering, but now he's back in the hospital again - his body is refusing food. Anyway... I just hope he will be OK. Before I left he gathered all of his children around - except for my older sister who wasn't able to come - and he was talking like he might die. It kind of scared me.

I have a complicated relationship with my father. On the one hand, I love him and I know he loves me; on the other hand, he is a bit difficult. For one thing he is definitely the source of the OCD that runs in our family - and the older he gets the more Obsessive he seems to get. On top of that, he has diabetes and doesn't feel well - fluctuating blood sugar levels make him quite cranky at times. I just wish that when I do get to see him, it would be easier to have a good time with him.

Anyway... now I am back in the UAE.

Some of you have commented on my long absence from blogging - well part of that has been due to the fact that I am not well.

Back in July, after a very traumatic personal experience, I developed a problem with breathing. It started out as a pain on the left side of my chest when I breathed in. I thought it was perhaps gas under the ribs and ignored it. It got worse, to the point where I was having a big problem breathing and my left arm started to ache as well. I have never had a heart attack before, but when that happened the description of chest pain plus left arm pain came to my mind, so I decided to visit my doctor. At the doctor's clinic, they couldn't come up any reason why I was feeling this pain - they did an ECG, took an x-ray - everything appeared to be normal. I was advised to go to the emergency room, which I did. They kept me there for several hours and ran the whole gamut of tests again - plus some blood tests - only thing they could find at the time was that I was mildly anemic and my ESR was more than 4 times what it should be. ESR = erythrocyte sedimentation rate. ESR is a test that indirectly measures how much inflammation is in the body. However, it rarely leads directly to a specific diagnosis, so that didn't tell them much. I also tested positive for rheumatoid factor (yay :( - lucky me). After giving me some injections - of God knows what (but at least it made the pain go away) - and several days sick leave - they sent me home.

Anyway, since that time I haven't been feeling so well - extremely fatigued, sometimes milder chest pains... I went back to the hospital for several follow up visits - my ESR stayed high though it dropped from over 100 to 50. Since then, it has been hovering at 50, which is still more than 2 times as high as it should be. A CT scan revealed a bit of pleurisy of my lungs (inflammation). My doctor was stumped... until I showed up one day for a follow up.

Now, my whole life, I have been one of those unfortunate individuals who blushes really easily. But lately I been getting a reddish kind of rash across my cheeks - I also have become increasingly photosensitive. When I showed up that day, my rash was in full bloom - so my doctor asked me if I had gotten it before. I told him, "yes".

Since then, they have diagnosed me with SLE - systemic lupus erythematosus - though the test results have not been conclusive. Apparently high ESR, rash across bridge of nose and cheeks (butterfly rash), pleurisy, anemia, and fatigue are all symptoms of SLE. It is a disease of the immune system - an autoimmune disorder - where the immune system, in effect, attacks the body - not just foreign invaders like viruses and bacteria. It can be fatal - but varies greatly from person to person. Stress is a big trigger for it - so I guess the events of my life over the past few years have contributed to this. I think it has a genetic element to it. My grandmother had it, and my cousin has discoid lupus (mainly affects only the skin).

Anyway, that's just one of the things I've been dealing with... so I hope you will all forgive my absences from time to time.

By the way, what happened to Aalia's blog? :( I can't open it anymore... If you read this Aalia.. I hope you're OK and are happily reunited with your son now. I would like to be able to still read your blog, but if not... God bless you. I just want you to know, I think of you often and hope things work out for you.

God bless the rest of you as well....

Home Sweet Home

2010-10-10T15:58:00.001-07:00

Well, I finally made it back home after more than three years away. I do so right after this recent hurricane / tropical storm hit the east coast, so it was much colder than I expected. I spent the first several days bundled up in whatever clothes I could pile one on top of another in front of these little space heaters that looking surprisingly like real wood burning stoves.

I saw Grandpa - he's so old now... makes me sad... don't know if I'll ever see him again after this visit. I wonder what it feels like to have lived a few years shy of a century...

I also found out my Dad will be going in for surgery a few days after I leave... God help him :(

The boys are having a great time. S thank God has not yet reached the age where he sees girls as intimidating alien creatures - he just sees them as other kids and likes playing with them - I am not sure about some of the little girls though. He was sitting squashed into an arm chair with my friends daughter - who is already sprouting little booblets and though I think he was completely unaware of it she was blissfully aware of how close she was to him.

We've been doing a hair experiment - growing his hair out so that it is long - he had a mop of ringlets and he looks quite cool for a 12 year old. I think the small girls have taken note :)

Meanwhile little D has a gang of small kids who think he is super cool. Which is nice for him compared to back in UAE where the only kid they play with is a chunky 9 year old who treats him like crap and tries to exclude him from everything. My friend's son Moses announced loudly last night at my birthday dinner (yes I AM officially 39 :( ... ) that he and D are BFFs - I think he has been hanging out with his sister a little too much.

I went to the mall the other day - though I live in the land of malls - still was nice to go to one here. I love the store Anthropology - too bad I can't afford anything there ..... luckily I got some nice things for my birthday.

I have been having a love affair with bread since I got here, Pepperidge Farm Cinnamon Raisin Swirl to be exact... but all the bread is so much better here. Without even realizing it, I had cut most bread out of my diet back in the UAE - just because it isn't very tempting. But here I am gorging myself and unfortunately my waistline is taking note.

Well that's all for now... actually there is so much more but i don't know how to write it all here

I have a zit

2010-05-26T08:00:00.000-07:00

On my chin... and it hurts...

In other news. The Big Boss's third secretary has left - not sure whether she was fired or quit - guess it doesn't really matter - one or the other is bound to happen eventually and the only difference in either scenario is - the person tells him and chooses to leave at the same time or tells him off and doesn't choose to leave at that time. The key to staying there is to NOT tell him off - but that's virtually impossible - because his behavior is so out of line.

The head of my department has been fired - with no warning and for no real reason - just the usual dirty politics / mutiny based on personal vendettas and orchestrated by unqualified underlings who don't appreciate the structure imposed by someone who actually knows their job and comes from a professional background ... I feel bad for him. This happens a lot here - currently at least two other departments are in an unsupervised mess (as we are about to be) due to similar crap. It's funny how they think it is better to leave a department without supervision or run by a totally under-qualified deputy than keep the director until they find a replacement.

I'm depressed by it all - he was the only person capable of judging my work and who gave me constructive feedback. Can't wait to see which yahoo will be stuck there until we find a new director - (IF we find one).

God help us all....

This made me sad

2010-05-10T04:16:00.000-07:00

A very sad article - this poor Bangladeshi man and others like him pay small fortunes (for them) to come to Dubai and end up living as beggars...

Update

2010-04-25T12:21:00.000-07:00

Well it has been a long time since I have visited my blog. I apologize to everyone who wrote anything to me and I didn't answer - I have had a lot going on.

I am still working at the same place I was when I last wrote. Settled into a routine (rut). My ex boss is now on his 3rd PA since me (it's only been 9 months!) - so, yeah, that's pretty hilarious. I realize now that how long someone lasts depends on how long it takes them to tell him off. Obviously I have a lot more patience or ability to put up with crap than most. I also realize that probably means I put up with more than I should.

My new boss is better, but I have a hard time feeling content here and I always expect the company to try to screw me over again.

The kids have started taking riding lessons and my oldest is doing quite well. He goes for jumping. The stable owner - a talkative local man in his early 50s - says he is a natural and he sees a potential jumping champion in him. I think he thinks he will be as small and as skinny as he is now forever - but I'm not banking on it. My father is 6' 2" and his father was about 5' 10" and his dad was close to 6' so I don't think he'll be perfect jockey size forever. Anyway, he is enjoying it so that makes me happy.

The stables are a really nice place for kids - lots of different kinds of animals there and the owner loves his horses and loves teaching kids to ride and passing on that love of horses.

One of the many things I have been dealing with is that someone I trusted a lot turned out to be a completely horrible person - a con artist really. A long while back I let him drive one of my cars - since I wasn't driving it at the time - but then when I asked for it back, he didn't return it for 6 months! Would have kept it forever I think if I hadn't found out where he lived and was keeping it and showed up there and made a scene and threatened to call the police. What kind of loser takes a single mom's car? My youngest needed an operation so I wanted to sell it to pay for the operation. The look on his face was priceless though. He never expected me to find him or to do anything so drastic. People think I'm all mild mannered - they think they can push me around. This is because I prefer to try to solve problems the most civil way possible, but some people don't understand this and they think I am weak - they never see it coming when I hit back. :)

On the downside, he had a bunch of traffic fines on the car that I had to pay and he had totally destroyed the car so it was next to worthless - as I drove off in it he told me "Inshallah you will not get even 1 dirham for it." what a man! He knew I wanted to sell it to take care of my child and that is what he had to say? And he brought God into it! Some people have no shame.

However, not everyone is a slimy creep. A truly good friend of mine said he would help me sell the car once I got it back, but once he saw the condition it was in, he bought it from me at far more than it was worth - saying he will fix it up and sell it and get his money back. He also paid the fines on the car. Now there's a gentleman for you... what a contrast!

I guess I should sleep now... so that's all from me - for the time being.

Why Men Marry Bitches

2009-12-03T23:05:00.000-08:00

I read two books in one day the other day: "Why Men Marry Bitches" and "Eclipse", which is part of the Twilight saga.

I have to admit that men baffle me. They baffle me because I always see them walking all over nice, giving and loving women, and chasing after and giving the world to more self centered women.

According to the "Bitches" book, men take "nice" women for granted and are bored by them, while they find self-absorbed women ("Bitches") more challenging and therefore worth loving and worshiping. So I guess this means I am doomed to a lifetime alone. It is my instinct to try to put other people's needs before my own and to love someone with all my heart if I love them. One of life's big ironies is that this means I am doomed to never be loved or cared for.

:( I'm not feeling very happy today.

Vindication and other things

2009-11-29T09:00:00.000-08:00

So I have a lot to report

# 1 I have been vindicated... my "oh so much more professional" replacement quit after telling the boss off :)))
she told me before she left to go back to her country "that man thinks he is a god and everyone else is a cockroach" She told me that he threatened her before she left about revealing any of his shittiness or dishonesty and then she walked out on him. I am not sure what precipitated the whole melt down, but she the little local girl helping her said that he got angry because she wasn't taking her computer home and wasn't answering his calls after a certain time, so he told her that even if she is using the toilet she should answer!!

So now his office is back in a mess. He has no one on which to take out his nasty little temper, because the girl sitting there until they find someone new is a local, and he is too scared to treat them as shittily as he treats others. That might be why he sent an edict to my present supervisor saying that I must return there to work "until he finds someone new." Imagine the nerve, thinking he can tell me how useless I am, fire me, cut my pay and then make me return and put up with his shit again for less money?? I went straight to the HR and told them there was no way I was going back there and that they have no right to mess with my life like this. Seriously they are asking for a "postal" situation. For some reason he is hell bent on placing a westerner - preferably an American there.

#2 My dad is out of the hospital - his growth is still in his abdomen, but he is out for now at least. I hope he wont be back for a while.

#3 I went to see New Moon. I bought the Twilight book, way back when, got bored and didn't finish it - and I love to read. So, I never paid the movie much mind. But then it came on TV here - MBC channel (Yeah MBC), and I watched it and I have to say that it was quite good and romantic - I have always had a thing for vampires - they are kind of tragic monsters - human but not human, that destroy what they love. The kids watched it with me and liked it too - which quite frankly surprised me and New Moon was rated PG 13 so I took them.

Well this move was even better, what I saw of it at least, the problem was that no one else in theater was there to actually watch the movie. I really don't understand these people here. They pay 30 dirhams a ticket and then talk on their cell phones the whole time, talk to each other and get out of their seats about 100 times for trips to the snack counter, bathroom and God-knows-where else. The most annoying are the little local couples on dates. They go to the movie because its dark in there, and no one will see them on a date that they aren't supposed to be on. I know they aren't married couples, why would a married couple choose to pay to go to movie so they can sit and talk? They can do that anywhere they want. I got out of my seat to complain about twenty times because the couple in the row behind us and the couple in the row in front of us were talking so loudly I couldn't hear the movie and their cell phones were ringing every 5 minutes. The couple behind refused to move when the Indian attendant told them that they are bothering me. They have no respect whatsoever for the Indian and Filipino movie theater staff. By the end of the movie my blood pressure was surging and I had the worst headache from tension and rage. My six year old son was better behaved than all of the adults in the theater (aside from me of course).

My high blood pressure actually started on the way to mall. While waiting for the traffic light, one guy in the lane next to me decided that he didn't want to wait for a green light anymore and he was just going to go, but the problem was there were two cars in front of him so he started honking wildly at them until they went - even though the light was still red, and cars will still coming across the intersection from the right to left where they still had a green light. I closed my eyes and winced expecting any minute to witness a horrific crash.

Adding to my pressure, at the mall while sitting on a bench waiting for the movie, 3 couples decided to just take over the three seater bench I was sitting on with the kids. They pushed my little one and my purse clear off the bench and Salman was sitting on, literally, one inch of bench. They attempted to shove me off as well until I said - EXCUSE ME I AM SITTING HERE! DON'T YOU HAVE ANY MANNERS? Of course that was a rhetorical question, since they obviously didn't have any. They seem to operate on a "my butt is bigger so that means I get to push you off the bench" rule.

#4 In other news, my lawyer says my divorce should be final by December, but he has been telling me that it will be done by "next month" since May so I will only believe it when I see it.
My "husband's" birthday was on the 21st, so I called him so the kids could talk to him. He told me, "thank you for letting the kids talk to me," I told him, "it could happen more often if you ever bothered to call." He said "ok I will." I said "you always say that and nothing changes" He said "you will see" .... well Eid just passed and he didn't bother to call them. I guess he was expecting me to call and pay the long distance bill. He didn't even sms us... what a cheapo. He added Salman on Facebook, but he deleted the friend request. His sister also added Salman and Salman deleted her friend request too, yet he still chooses to believe that it is my fault he doesn't communicate with his sons, though the only time he does talk to them is when I pay for the call and I force Salman to talk to him.

Salman left his Facebook open the other day and one of his annoying cousins there came on and was trying to talk to him. I told Salman that his cousin said hi, he told me just reply hi back. Then he asked Salman how old he is now, again Salman told me to reply for him, I told him "11" and the kid then wrote that he is 13. Now I know for a fact that he isn't because he was born only a couple of months before Salman and his parents got married AFTER I did and my 13th anniversary is this coming friday. So I told him "how can you be when you were born at the end of 1997?" then he told me (thinking I was Salman) "no wonder your dad is here and not with you, you are so stupid" - what a nice family they are... and not too bright either - his parents clearly aren't so good with the math since he said they told him he is 13 now.

#5 They say chocolate is a substitute for love - that must be why I just polished off a whole bar of Lindt dark mint chocolate.

My Dad's Pancreas

2009-11-12T21:50:00.000-08:00

It has been so long since I last posted, that I don't actually know where to begin.

I have been distracted by a lot of personal issues and feeling kind of down.

The foremost one being that my father is quite sick. When I was a little girl, about 30 years ago, when he was around the age I am now, he developed pancreatitis, and had to make frequent trips to the emergency room, which at the time, was just up the road from us. In fact, I have a memory from back then, it was on a weekend, maybe we had just come home from church, and he was standing outside and holding his stomach and then he came in and told my mother rather calmly, I think I am having another attack, I am just going to walk up to the hospital. I didn't really understand what was happening, but after reading about pancreatitis and how painful it is. I wonder at how he managed to appear to so calm, or even walk himself to the hospital.

According to Wikipedia, the symptoms of pancreatitis:
Severe upper abdominal pain, with radiation through to the back, is the hallmark of pancreatitis. Nausea and vomiting are prominent symptoms. Findings on the physical exam will vary according to the severity of the pancreatitis, and whether or not it is associated with significant internal bleeding. Blood pressure may be high (when pain is prominent) or low (if internal bleeding or dehydration has occurred). Typically, both the heart and respiratory rates are elevated. Abdominal tenderness is usually found, but may be less severe than expected given the patient's degree of abdominal pain.

Now alcoholics can develop pancreatitis, but that is not the only cause for it, and it certainly wasn't so in the case of my father. My father had given up alcohol completely in his twenties. On one trip to the emergency room, while he was doubled over in pain and vomiting, a judgmental ER doctor came and looked at his chart, I guess he had told the nurse his history of pancreatic attacks, and laughed at him and said "I guess you had one to many, eh buddy?" When he got a momentary relief from hurling, my Dad looked up at him and calmly said "no my pancreatitis is of undetermined origin." One thing I will always admire about my dad is his ability to calmly react to offensive people.

Anyway, it was determined that his condition would require surgery and removal of most of his pancreas as it was abscessed. There were two surgeons for him to choose from, one up in Boston and one in New York City. He opted for Boston, because my Mom's sister lived up that way, outside of Boston and he and my Mom had decided that My mom and all of us ( we were 5 kids at that time) would stay with my Aunt and Uncle while he had his surgery and recovered.

That was a long and depressing summer - or that's how I remember it anyway. My Uncle Tony isn't the easiest person to like, and he has always seemed to harbor a special disdain for my Dad, and liked to mock him and poke fun at him about his religious beliefs. He must have talked negatively about my dad in front of his kids too, because I always noticed the way they spoke to him was less than respectful, as if they were dealing with a half wit - and my father is anything but that. To be fair, I don't think Tony likes many people; I don't think he likes, Dave, my other Aunt's husband either - who, incidentally, has been my dad's best friend since they were 3 year olds taking tap dancing lessons together - but he is less easy to poke fun at, what with being a successful doctor and all that not to mention at that time a "rational" atheist (after experiencing something he considers miraculous when treating a patient he later became and still is a Christian - along with my Aunt). Anyway, Tony is just... well mean is a word that comes to mind. You know... the kind of person who teases kids just a little too much and with a kind of malicious gleam in the eye - well, he was that kind of person.

What I remember from that summer was, aside from visits to my dad where we gawked at the tubes going into his abdomen - for a while after the surgery he wasn't allowed to eat or drink so they had to feed him through a tube, was being put to work in Tony's rather large vegetable garden, picking string beans and weeding. The only person who was exempt from this was his daughter Mel, who was his obvious favorite, her older sister - who was obviously not is favorite - had to join us. I remember her protesting and asking "Why doesn't Mel ever have to help" I also remember Mel lying on the sofa watching TV and smugly smiling as we all trooped out to the fields. My brothers have an additional memory of having Tony tell them to chop wood and then mock them for not being strong enough, like his son - All of my brothers are younger than I am and I was only about 8 or 9 at the time , and his son - my cousin - was a teenager.

They removed 3/4 of Daddy's pancreas that summer. The remaining portion, continued to function and produce enough insulin for several years and he had no attacks. It eventually gave up when I was a young adult and he had to start taking insulin shots and digestive enzymes. When he visited us in Zanzibar about a year and a half after I was married, he was still getting used to the routine of taking his enzyme tablets and regulating his sugar, so that it didn't dip too low after a shot. One the one hand my dad has some form of OCD, so anything he has to do routinely, he makes a ritual out it, and he was also obsessive about the way he packed and stored his insulin. I still remember the little cooler he kept in our refrigerator and him nagging my mom about how she packed. But on the other hand he is absent minded - or rather has a "one track mind" as he likes to call it, where if he is concentrating on one thing - like reading a book for example - which he usually is, he tunes out everything else around him and gets lost in what he is doing. This made for a kind of dangerous combination, when it came to his insulin. He would ritualistically take his shot, but then start doing something and forget to eat and several times his blood sugar dipped dangerously low, before he snapped to it and remembered to eat.

While visiting us in Zanzibar, my dad struck up a friendship with one of our neighbors, a taxi driver named Babu Ali (which means Grandfather Ali - I'm not sure why since he was not a grandfather and had a baby named Suleiman who was the same age as Salman was at the time). My dad would pay Ali to drive him out to the jungle - Jozani Forest - so he could go bird watching. Sometimes Ali would go with him on his nature treks, other times he would leave him there and come back to get him later. On one of his solo missions, he suddenly became lightheaded and felt like he was going to faint. All alone, in the middle of the forest, he realized that in his excitement to get out the door and on his way, he had forgotten to eat after taking his insulin. On the verge slipping into a diabetic coma, he frantically searched his pockets and found a pack of gum, and he popped all 5 pieces into his mouth, fortunately, the sugar coating on those 5 pieces was enough to keep him conscious.

He also often forgot to take his enzyme tablets before eating. He was supposed to take them an hour before eating - that was the problem - he would forget until it was time to eat because we didn't have a fixed meal time; especially since my parents were visiting, the time we ate depended on what our daily activities were. Or we would be out and decide to eat out and he didn't have his tablets with him. If he didn't take his tablets he could have some pretty serious diarrhea. So he got this idea in his head that if he popped the tablets in right before eating or after if he didn't have them with him at the time, it was better than not taking them at all, and then, after dinner, as soon as he got the chance, he would go and do head stands with his legs in the air, theorizing that it would mix the tablets and the food in his stomach around better. I'm not sure how effective that was...

About a month ago, my dad started having stomach problems again and the pains became severe enough that my Mom decided to take him to the emergency room a few weeks back and he has been in the hospital since. Some kind of initial test or scanning indicated that his pancreas was "swollen"; further scanning / tests indicated that he had a growth the size of a man's fist on the pancreas and, from what they could tell, it was pushing on the bile duct and somehow this was causing some kind of spillage of bile to somewhere it should not be going and that was damaging his liver and causing jaundice. The growth, from those initial test was determined to be "precancerous" or slow growing, but my mom was told there is always a possibility of such growths becoming cancerous and fast growing. They decided to do surgery, but once inside they saw: the growth was bigger than expected and engulfing the bile duct; it was surrounded by blood vessels and therefore could not be removed; looked like it would eventually grow to block of his stomach. So they did some rerouting of the digestive tract. He was recovering for the past few days, but then he suddenly showed signs of an infection and his oxygen levels dropped and he was moved back to ICU the day before yesterday. They found some kind of blockage in his gall bladder, and did another procedure and now he is recovering from that.

So I have been worrying about him a lot, especially since it has been more than two years since I have seen him. I was supposed to go this summer, but thanks to the @%&@ I work, I was deprived of my vacation and tickets to go home.

I feel sad because it seems that even if he is OK for now, this THING growing in his abdomen is there to stay and eventually it will rear its ugly head again to cause more problems. He is only 67 now, but it doesn't look like he will reach 93 like his dad...

I feel so helpless, all I can do from here is wait, and worry and pray...

Time Flies...

2009-10-04T22:26:00.001-07:00

Everyone knows the common saying, "time flies when you're having fun" but the truth is, it flies when your not having fun too. When you get older it just plain flies... perhaps that is why I have noticed that people just say "time flies" these days and leave off the latter part... most people aren't having fun most of the time.

In fact, during the time of life in which we have the most fun - when we are little children - time doesn't fly at all! Years took forever to pass by when I was small.

Anyway, now I am almost 38. The 7th will mark 38 years since my mother gave birth to her second child, who was supposed to be a boy (because my parents already had a girl) and for whom they already had a boy's name picked out. Luckily for my parents, three boys followed right on my heels, and I think that was more than enough for them so that when little girls 3 and 4 came along they were a relief from the constant mischief making.

The 7th will also mark 20 years to the day since that same girl, who was supposed to be a boy, was climbing Mt. Kenya and met the boy who would, 7 years later, become her husband and 10 years later break her heart and 16 years later disappear.

It will als mark 1 year, since what I thought was the first of many happier birthdays to come, when I received a gift that meant the world to me, and still does, only now it makes me sad to look at it because it embodies all of the hopes and dreams I had at that time, which have come to naught and reminds me of how alone and uncertain I feel again.

So, I'm not looking forward to my birthday. It is a yearly reminder of my failure - my failure to find love in particular, but all of my failures in general as well, since my poor track record in personal relationships has shaped the rest of my life.

Perhaps if I was home, it would be a different thing, I would have my family with me, and I could celebrate with my Grandfather, whose 93rd birthday was on the 3rd of October. Last year, he celebrated his 92nd with a big shin dig. This year they are throwing another big bash for him on the 9th - it will celebrate his birthday and mark the opening of the visitor's center at the urban wildlife refuge named after him. The park was named after him - and a statue of him erected in his honor - for an important environmental law he passed, 38 years ago. For him, his birthday is a yearly reminder of his accomplishments. He can look back with pride on what he has achieved over the years.

I called him for his birthday this year, and even though he is 93, he still is as sharp as ever. I am happy that with age, his mind has not gone, I think for someone like him that would be a great loss and tragedy. I hope I will see him again before his time comes. It makes me sad to realize that, having lived well beyond life expectancy for the average American man or woman, any day could be his last. I wonder how he feels when (if) he thinks of that. I wonder if he thinks about how time has flown and wonders where all the years have gone, since he was a handsome star pupil in his highschool in Portage Wisconsin.

He doesn't believe in God. I always wonder where he thinks he will go after he draws his last breath, and if he is scared. I wonder what God thinks of such a man, who in spite of not believing in Him, has lived a more moral and upright life than most, respecting His creation and fighting to preserve it, refusing to backdown on issues he knew were important and sometimes forgoing the power and wealth that would have accompanied doing what was expected in order to do what he knew was right. I hope God is understanding. I love my Grandfather.

Dishonest Mechanics and other random topics

2009-10-01T08:01:00.000-07:00

Why are people needlessly dishonest? Is it really a good business practice as a mechanic to steal from your customers and do shitty job of fixing their cars so they never come back again? I mean can that really be good for business?

I got my car ( that was rear ended) back from the mechanic, only to discover that the light on the right wasn't fixed - and they had glue the glass / plastic covering for it back together instead of replacing it with a new one and that the back door doesn't open. I just don't get it... why would they do that? I mean, do they think I will EVER take my car back to them after they ripped me off like this? I wonder if I am allowed to put the name of the garage here... just to warn other people... "A" took his car there too, to be fixed for something, and they did a crap job on his as well, it started smoking so badly he had to abandon it in the parking lot of a mall somewhere in Dubai - he ended up having to replace the engine later - which might have been what it needed all along, and if they had just told him that and done a proper job of repairing it, then he would have saved money, but no instead they decided to do jack shit and take his money for it.

Anyway... now my registration is up, but my car still isn't fixed so I can't renew the registration ...not sure what the hell I am going to do... :(

I have a new housemate. Which is good, because every bit helps when it comes to paying the bills. She is American too and works for the same company I do and is being dicked around by the management too. So we have a lot in common. She is really nice. I realize I like having other people around me. For some reason I have been isolating myself ever since my Sudanese friend moved away and my Egyptian friend just stopped talking to me for no reason after she found cooler, younger friends who liked to go out to bars with her - I'm a teetotaler, so I guess I wasn't much fun. I have no clue why she did it. Funnily enough, my Sudanese friend told me the Egyptian one would do this to me, but I didn't believe her. Anyway, now I have someone to talk to again - the only problem is that we end up gabbing so much we forget the time and then I suddenly realize it is way past my bed time. And that is probably why I suddenly get so sleepy at 3 PM on the dot every day. Today, I actually fell asleep at work in the middle of editing a newsletter article - I was literally typing in my sleep. When I jerked out of it, I saw I had typed a few words of complete nonsense. "Akkdrwn dfak"

This used to happen to me back in my University days. I fell asleep in Chemistry class every blessed day, no matter what I did, I couldn't stay awake. I tried everything, eating before class so my blood sugar would be up, still fell asleep. Not eating so I was really hungry, hoping that the hunger pangs would keep me awake, no such luck. I tried dressing warmly, so I didn't feel too cold and I tried dressing lightly so I was a bit too cold for comfort. But no matter what I did, I fell asleep. My notes for that class were absolutely useless. Sometimes as I wobbled in and out of consciousness, I continued writing notes. I am sure if I saw them now they would be pretty hilarious looking, but I remember going to study for my exams and looking in dismay at the notes that after a few words tapered off into complete nonsense and then just a line sliding off the page.

Another reason why I am falling asleep at work these days is that they have moved the whole marketing section, and now I am in an office with two guys who are graphic artists who don't make a noise all day. It is so quiet in there that I feel like I am making a huge ruckus when I move a piece of paper and the sound of my shoes when I get up to get a glass of water or use the rest room is like I am stomping all over the place. Sometimes the wife of one of the guys comes in, (she works in the company too) during her break, but he doesn't talk much to her either, so she has taken to pulling a chair up to my desk and talking to me. It's not that he is rude though, in fact he is quite nice and calm. It's just that he is one of the most mellow people I have ever met. Oh and he makes yummy, homemade, caramel fudge, which he shares with us.

The good thing about my new office though is that it is on the 2nd floor and the elevator is so slow; so being incredibly impatient, I am taking the stairs a lot and that hopefully will have a postive effect on my back side. It is also good because it is far far away from my former boss - if I am lucky, I will never have to see him again. The other day I was walking between buildings and he pulled up into the parking and started honking at me and I pretended I didn't see him and kept walking so he had to drive after me and roll down his window and shout to me :) - he couldn't remember the name of some hotel he had stayed in before in Switzerland and wanted me to tell his new PA. Why can't she just look in the god damned contacts file that I made in outlook. Its not like I had anyone helping me out. Oh yeah, that's right, she is a computer 'tard. Yesterday she sent me invoices from the travel agent asking me to verify if they were accurate - again, if she knew how to use her outlook properly this wouldn't be necessary since I filed all of his old emails regarding his trips in one folder there. He also told her to ask me for some CDs that someone had sent and she came and told me that she was looking for some CDs from Austria and I was like 'what the hell? Austria?" because we had no dealings with Austria while i was there. So she went and told him that I don't know and then he summoned me and when I got there he asked me where the CD's from Prague are - so it seems she needs a little geography lesson along with a basic computer packages class.

My 38th birthday is coming up next week, and I'm kind of depressed about that. My mom said she sent me a package, I am hoping there is some nice outfit or something in there, so I can get a little excited. I haven't bought new clothes in so long, sometimes I suspect people are snickering at my out-of-date style. If it weren't for the Christmas and birthday packages from back home, I think I would be a total fashion disaster. Speaking of new clothes... Fatema's big wedding is finally coming up next weekend, and I don't have a THING to wear! I dug out some old dresses that I bought quite some time back, and by Arab standards, they are just plain dull - they also seem way too low cut, and I don't remember them being like that and I cringe with embarrassment at the thought that I actually wore them - Lord Help me, I am getting really old and turning into quite a fuddy duddy.

RAGE

2009-09-06T07:09:00.000-07:00

I am just so full of rage and fury right now. I imagine that I feel the way postal workers must feel right before they .. well.. go postal.

They pay me so little now at work that I can't afford to send my kids to school. Nor can I afford the tutor who used to teach them at home. That means that I have to go home straight after work to teach them, but for some FUCKING reason the ASSHOLES at work think I should happily stay after for 4-5 hours extra like i used to for half the pay this time. I feel so mad I could literally kill someone. Especially since everyone in the company just got a bonus "for their hardwork and dedication in the past year" except for me. I can't tell you how hurt and angry and thoroughly enraged I feel about the way I have been treated. I try to ignore it, but I can feel it building up inside of me, and I feel like I am going to snap soon.

I don't know how to describe how I feel except that I am clenching my teeth as I write this because I want to so desperately smash and destroy everything within reach including my cell phone and this computer. I am so tired of people walking all over me and taking advantage of me, that I am afraid I will kill the next person who tries it.

What's up with that???

2009-09-01T05:23:00.000-07:00

I spend a lot of time wondering What's up with that? about a lot of things that happen around me here. Things like....

1. The lady who replaced me is from South Africa and is a Muslim - a convert obviously, since she is from an Afrikaaner background. I don't have any problem with that part; acutally, I don't have a problem with her at all. But what I find weird is the way she dresses. I mean, she just wears regular western clothes - including shirts with very short sleeves, sometimes made of kind of sheerish blouse material so you can kind of see her bra through it. Sometimes they are low enough you can even see a peek of cleavage too. She also wears trousers that aren't super tight (she is about 50 after all) but definitely show her shape. Her hair is cut really short too, and she doesn't wear hijab, so you can see her whole neck and ears and all that. Considering that I am always freezing in the arctic climate we have in the office and thus wear long sleeves with sweaters over them most of the time, I usually am dressed more modestly than she is. She is fasting during Ramadhan, but she is still dressing this way. So every time I see her, I wonder what's up with that?
If she was born into a Muslim family, I wouldn't wonder as much, because people don't always buy everything they are taught by their parents. That is why you find a lot of nominal followers of various religions. They say "I am Christian" or "I am Muslim" or whatever for the sake of family or culture but they haven't really taken the time to believe it and love it for themselves. But converts are usually very fervent and very strict. And I guess, especially in the case of a religion like Islam, which doesn't just lay down what you should believe but also seems to have a lot of lifestyle rules for dress, diet, etc. that are religious mandates, I alway assume that people who have chosen that religion would follow everything. Anyway, I just find it odd... and I'm incredibly nosy so I really want to know what her reasoning is there...

Speaking of her. I went up to her the other day to ask her how it's going - I actually meant Ramadhan and all that - but she thought I was talking about the job. She confessed (after only one month in that position) that she is beginning to regret taking it or wonder why the hell she left teaching. I didn't realize she was a teacher before, when she told me, I said "you must be nuts, if I had the teaching certfication, I wouldn't even consider this kind of job." So - again - what's up with that?! I mean who in their right mind would leave working with children and having nice hours and the whole summer off, to working for corporate @#%&@s?

**********************

2. I have road rage, I really shouldn't drive. The traffic isn't even bad here, but I still am impatient and angry when driving. Of course, it is largely due to the inordinate number of idiot drivers on the road. No one here drives normally, it either has to be way too fast or so slow that the driver could literally get there just as fast walking. There was this car going around the round about in front of me and it was literally going around it so slowly that it was jumping around - like it would if you tap the gas and then braked immediately and then did it again repeatedly. Lord help that driver if he /she ever finds himself in Dubai at the Trade Center roundabout .

Of course my favorite two types of driving related idiocy are
1) when someone in the middle lane manages to hog all three lanes at once. He wavers back and forth between them, not allowing anyone to get around him because they can't anticipate which direction he will meander next.
2) when you are in the fast lane and someone in the lane next to you is sooo desperate to get in front of you (though you are driving fast) and get around the slow poke in front of them that they gun it, quickly swerve in front of you but then immediately brake and proceed to drive as slowly as the person they were trying to get in front of, who is now driving exactly beside them in the other lane - thereby trapping you at their turtle speed. Or you are happily speeding down the open highway, no one in front of you, no one behind you, and a car waiting to turn onto the road, hits the gas really hard just so they can get out infront of you but then does not continue to accelerate - forcing you to brake really hard. Really, WHAT is up with THAT?! Why do they absolutely NEED to get infront of you only to slow down? Why if they think it is their god given right to drive at the speed of an inch worm on tranquilizers do they need to be in the fast lane, why couldn't they have let you pass first? Why can't they just pick a lane and stick with it?

***************

3. The Chairman - HH - walked up to my desk on Sunday and asked me "you, what's your name?" and I said "qadfjafkljaslfj" and he said "what?" and i repeated "qadfjafkljaslfj" and he said "not kadfjafkljaslfj?"(alternate pronunciation of my weird name) and I said "well you could say it either way" and then he just walked away. What is up with that? I've been paranoid ever since. Are they plotting something new against me? Not that I know that he he was in on anything that has happened to me, but who knows ... And I have been working here 15 months and he only thought to ask my name now? Today I found out that some staff have been invited to the Palace for Iftar, so another paranoid thought crossed my mind that maybe he had suggested that I be put on the list, but since I wasn't invited someone *cough CEO cough* chucked me off of it. But then I think, Why the hell would he care if I was put on the list or not? He didn't even know my name until this past Sunday.

Spunky and Sleepy - photos

2009-08-30T09:40:00.000-07:00

Well the babies (kittens) are sleeping on my lap (see my previous post below) and here are some pictures of them

The cats here have such big ears - makes them look kind of like gremlins - but cute ones.

Spunky (the one behind) is a very adventurous little fellow. Earlier he was attacking my hair. After that, he started licking my arm and purring and he was kneading it with his feet, then i realized he was trying to nurse on it - it was so cute and sad. I think he thinks I am his mom now. When he wants a nap, he keeps coming to my lap.

I wonder what happened to their mother. I feel so sad about their little sibling who died and the other one who is lost and possibly starving to death out in the heat somewhere.

Sleepy is kind of feeble, but she does appear to be getting stronger, she doesn't roam around as much as her brother does - and yes Spunky is a boy - he has the tiny little minature parts to prove it.

They have been eating tiny bits of cat food and drinking rainbow milk diluted with water. I also gave them some egg yolk mixed with a wee bit of milk. Does anyone know what to feed kittens? There isn't any kitten food in the grocery near my home.

FYI, for those who don't know, canned cat food smells A LOT better than dog food. If I was starving and had no choice but to eat either cat or dog food, I would opt for the cat food any day. The chicken in gravy actually smelled and looked like chicken in gravy.

Max the Cat Killer

2009-08-29T09:31:00.000-07:00

Last night I was sitting in my nice black pleather easy chair, when I heard children's voices outside - it was kind of creepy, but I thought it was my little guy's voice carrying over from the other room or he was running around outside trying to stalk his older brother in one of his elaborate play fantasies. He had dashed by me several times before already with toy guns and swords of all shapes and sizes stashed in his underpants, which doubles as a weapon belt and stuck down the back of his shirt. So, I ignored the voices, until ping! something hit against the window glass behind my chair, and I heard a voice say ..."excuse me"

Anyway, I sent Salman outside to see who it was. There was an Arab woman of some sort and child or two outside our gate. I am not sure what Arab nationality they were, it was dark and I am no good at telling Arabic accents from each other - except sometimes I can tell someone is an Egyptian. Anyway, they said "cat - you have cat?"

I told them "No! I have a dog" then woman looked at me and laughed, "no" she said "you have cat! I put cat inside"

"what?" anyway, somehow she let me know that she put 4 kittens in my yard. I told her "why? i have a big dog, I don't want your kittens!"

After that, I tried to look around, but I couldn't hear or see any kittens - it was too dark in the yard. So I thought maybe they had escaped to another yard - like that of the cat lady behind me. In the morning, there was no sign of the kittens either, so I didn't think more of it. But in the afternoon, they suddenly emerged - and the maid spotted them, but not before Max saw them first. By the time I got out there, there was one dead kitten lying to one side of the yard and one wet, muddy and badly shaken one huddled against the wall. I banished Max to the kitchen (because it has doors on either side that can close him in) while I tried to think what to do with the live kitten. Then I remembered that the lady had said she put 4 kittens in my yard - got to love how selfish some people are... but there was no sign of 3 and 4, and the live one I had didn't seem OK.

I called Salman to come out, and he asked me where the dead kitten was. I pointed to the side of the yard, so he went over there; and that was when he spotted # 3 hiding behind some cement slabs heaped near the wall. We never did find / spot # 4. I hope he / she is OK. Meanwhile, we have two very tiny kittens - one of them very energetic and curious (#3) which we called Spunky and the other one that we have called Sleepy because she just lies there and a cat killing dog. Strangely enough, they are all the same color, Max and Spunky and Sleepy. However, this arrangement obviously can't go on for long or another one of the kittens will end up dead if they unwittingly cross paths with Max again. And I can't expect Max to be reasonable and understand that they are just babies, it is normal instinct for him.

They are adorable, and I am so mad at that woman for just dumping them in my yard without even checking if I could care for them or not - or if there was a dog in our household.

The cat lady behind me gave me a cat carrier box to borrow for a couple days to keep them safe while I try to figure out what to do with the, and as I write this, Spunky is sleeping on top of Sleepy (keeping warm I guess). Max looked very offended when he saw me bringing the carrier in with them inside, and he was sniffing it all over the place - though he didn't seem to be getting aggressive - his tail was still wagging while doing it.

If any one of you living in the UAE is interested in adopting a very tiny kitten or two, let me know. They are so small, they aren't quite sure yet how to chew and basically just lick up their food.

I was supposed to go for a manicure today, because I have an interview tomorrow evening, but I had to deal with this, so I guess I will be going with chipped uneven nails - great! Thanks so much cat dumping lady...

Almost famous

2009-08-14T09:42:00.000-07:00

I just took my boys to see GI Joe "The Rise of Cobra" - Name any super hero, action, kids movie that is rated PG or G and I have seen it. They are pretty much all I get to see as I don't have someone to go to other kinds of movies most of the time. This movie wasn't anything great - it didn't bore me, but I could have lived without seeing it. It was just there.

In the past couple of years, of this sort of movie my favorites have been the Batman Movie with Heath Ledger (because his joker was just awesome - really he totally overshadowed the guy who played Batman. I don't think they should even have the Joker in any other Batman movie because I really don't think anyone else can do it as well as he did) and Iron Man with Robert Downey Jr. He is another great actor - though a mess in real life if what you read in the tabloids is even half true. I guess like other kinds of artists actors are often emotionally unstable and tortured people - hence the messy lives and tragic deaths (like Heath's RIP).

Once they had a contest here in Dubai. There was supposed to be some kind of movie being filmed here starring Downey Jr, and they decided to cast the female lead locally. So a local paper sponsored a contest and called for women living in the UAE between the ages of 25 and 35, with dark hair and dark eyes, fluent English and "athletic" builds to send in their photos - head shot and full length shot. From those, they would pick some women to come in to audition. I remember my co-worker reading the article out loud in the office.

At that time, I was working for the Sheikh, and he was out of town, so things were a little slower in the office than usual - hence more time for gabbing. Anyway, we started joking around about sending in our photos. She told me that she and her friends were all going to send theirs and said "you have dark hair and eyes - you should just try it." I was like "yeah right.... they need someone with an athletic build." I still have no idea what an athletic build is supposed to be - when I hear it I Imagine some chick with really toned and kind of muscular looking arms. Anyway, as a lark, I ended up sending my photos in - the full length photo wasn't even a proper one - I was seated - but I didn't have any other photos, and it wasn't like I took the contest seriously enough to run out and get one taken.

Quite a bit of time passed, and we forgot all about the contest. The Sheikh returned, and we were right in the middle of a big event to which he had invited HH Sheikh Mohammed. I was checking my e-mail, and I got one that I almost overlooked because I thought it was junk mail. It was from the contest organizers telling me that my photos and initial self description had passed the first round of screening, and they would like me to come down and join other selected women for the first round of auditions. I just laughed. I showed my co-worker, and she tried to convince me to go. BUT the audition was on a work day, and the Sheikh - normally a really good natured guy - was more than a little tense; plus we were working way over time those days as it was to get the event off the ground, and as my luck would have it, the auditions were to be held in the same place where the Sheikh was going to be on the same day promoting his event. I couldn't bring myself to ask for the day off, given the time crunch we were in at work, and I am not the type to do something - like play hookie - and get away with it.

So... I didn't go, and I didn't think about it again... until I saw Iron Man, and Salman was asking me what the name of the actor who plays Iron Man is. When I told him, I remembered this - so I told him about it too - he was so mad at me

"Mommy" he almost shouted in frustration in the middle of the theatre, and then told the little guy "Mommy almost got a chance to be in a movie with Iron Man!!" (a bit of a distortion of the actual story) which then got my little one to also yell "Mommy!" in disappointed outrage. I am flattered that my sons think I would have made it all the way, but at the time I was a newly single working mother - my husband having taken off only a month or so before that, and I didn't think it was worth it to risk the job I actually had to go for an audition that I was not certain to pass. For all I know, they called half the women in Dubai for the audition. Plus, I think I made a good decision - I don't think that movie ever got made - or maybe it did and I just missed it - which is very possible since I only get to see kids movies most of the time.

From time to time, my boys remember this story, especially whenever they see that actor or some reference to Iron Man on TV and yell at me again for not going and ask me, "Why?!!". In their minds, I almost met Iron Man and was almost a movie star - and, for that, they are torn between feeling I am slightly cooler than they thought before and being totally frustrated with me for blowing it all.

Further Update

2009-08-10T06:55:00.000-07:00

Well first of all, on the job front: As I mentioned before, my current employer has offered me another position but with crappy pay, and I flipped out about that so they raised it a bit, but it still isn't that great, though for some reason my basic pay is higher than it was before. I asked the HR if this was some kind of trick on the part of the management, because quite frankly, I don't trust them at all anymore, and they were like "no, think of this as a second chance," but that really annoyed because the implication still is that I f**ked up, and I know I didn't. Second (and third, fourth and fifth, sixth, etc,) chance is what they gave the useless chick who used to handle their PR, who couldn't write English or Arabic Press Releases who didn't come to work half the days of the week and showed up a couple hours late on most days she did come. They gave her LOTS of second chances and they didn't demote her - no when they moved her out of PR, they PROmoted her. I on the other hand was never late, came to work even when I was sick, and regularly stayed 3-4 hours overtime. And there were the times I did other people's work, at the last minute too to make sure it was done on time, and not once did anyone say good job or thank you or appreciate it one little stinking bit.

Like once HH had to do a speech, so in the evening, after hours, he asked the PR girl to write one for him (for the next day) and she told him it would be ready by noon. And, well, she is good at a lot of PR things, but writing isn't her strong point. So the next morning at around 11 AM or something, she sent me this speech for HH, and I looked at it and right away saw that part of it wasn't that great and part of it looked like it was copied from somewhere else. So I took a suspicious section, copied and pasted it to google, and found out it was copied word for word from some Dean's (of some University in the US) speech. In other words, it was plagiarized. So, I had to re-write the WHOLE thing; it was about noon when I realized that most of it was plagiarized and that the whole thing would have to be re-written, and HH turned up exactly at 12 asking for it. She just nodded towards me and told him I was "checking it", so of course it looked like somehow I was the hold up, the one who was behind on my work. Anyway, I managed to rewrite it and do a pretty good job, if I might say so myself. My boss ended up finding out about it, but he never gave me any kind of credit for it. I don't think he even realized that it isn't everyone who can write a speech at the last minute - or recognize a bit of plagiarism. In fact, as I recall, he didn't know what the word plagiarism meant. Ahhh, I still get so mad thinking about it all.

Their whole attitude towards me just pisses me off.

Then I got that offer in Abu Dhabi, but honestly, the job sounded like a nightmare - 66 hours a week minimum. I am just totally exhausted - after 6 years of stress and spousal abuse and then 4 years of single parenthood at the mercy of jerk bosses (particularly this last year of hell) - I just don't think I could take that. I honestly need a vacation, but I haven't had one in years and I can't afford one. Also it was for a construction company, and all of the other employees were men, including the HR people and receptionists. So, though I would be spending most of my life there, I would not be likely to have loads of friends.

Then, after that, I got an offer in Dubai, but it was originally as much as the offer here (with my current company) and came with a longer working day, a 1 & 1/2 day weekend (as opposed to a 2 day one), and no health insurance for my kids - like I have here. So I refused that, then they raised it a bit, but not by enough, because one thing I remember is that, back when I didn't have health insurance for the kids, somehow any bit I saved ended up going down the toilet in medical expenses for them - one of them needed an operation, or just the routine kids' sicknesses. They also would not provide the annual ticket for the kids. And if I stay here, I can afford a better living space than I would there for the same amount, so we can keep our dog, Max, for now. Though eventually, I guess I will have to leave this place because my eyes are really having problems here, and I don't have a good feeling about it anymore after being treated this way.

So I accepted the new but crappy offer with my old company - at least I won't be reporting to the same guy, and I said I want to have as little to do with him as possible. I will be on probation again for 6 months, so I guess if something better turns up I will / can take it.

Now this one company has called me today, I interviewed with them before I got the offer from my current employer, but I thought it had gone nowhere. Now there is a possibility of a job with a good package, but it is a short term contract. So I am torn about what to do. Because staying here will mean JUST BARELY scraping by every month (if that) but I will be able to relax my mind for a while, come home at 4 (2:30 during Ramadhan - woo hoo!), while going there will mean being able to (hopefully) save some money, but it also means that in nine months I will have to stress out about finding another job (again).

So that is my work-related dilemma. Any thoughts?

As for other things:

Max likes chocolate chip cookies. (Who knew that about dogs?) I made some (from scratch thank you very much) and my maid kind of overcooked the first tray, but then I showed her how they should be when they are removed and the next tray was awesome. Anyway I was standing in my kitchen scarfing them down and totally destroying the headway I have made in the past week (lost another 2 pounds!), and he was sitting there watching me eat them. So I tossed him one and he ate it. He also likes chocolate milk.

As I also mentioned before, I had a car accident last week, and now the back of my car is all mangled and my own back is hurting as well, though getting better slowly. It seems it will take couple of days more to feel better. Meanwhile my car will take a couple of weeks - just great.

It seems that one of the officers took a fancy to me, which was (is?) kind of awkward. After the police dropped me home after the accident, I slept for a while, and woke up with even more back pain. Then the bell rang, and Salman went to answer it. He came back and told me that there was "some Arab guy in a black car" asking for me. I went out and there was this black car with some guy in a Kandora sitting in it and grinning out the window at me. I stared at him blankly thinking "who the hell is this?" until I realized it was one of the police officers who had dealt with my accident - the one who spoke very little English and had driven me in my car back to my house.

Somehow he managed to communicate to me that my report was ready and they needed me to come to the Police Station to sign it so they could release it and said he had come to take me because my car was too messed up and my back was stiff. So we drove there in awkward silence. He asked me "you OK now?" about two or three times, and I told him "no, my back and neck hurt more now." He stopped and bought water at some little shop and gave me a bottle too. I was thinking ... "okay... its not like the police station is hours away," but I guessed he was thirsty and didn't want to look rude only getting some for himself. Anyway, the trip to the station turned out to be pointless, because once they found out my back was still hurting they said I should wait - not sure why, no one at the station had excellent English skills, but it had something to do with them asking me if I " want anything from him (the other driver)" - maybe in case I have some kind of medical problems related to the accident, so I could claim them against his insurance too. So the police officer took me home again. This time he stopped to buy himself cigarettes and offered me one, I told him "No thanks I don't smoke" then he took some rather indirect and meandering route through a neighborhood and stopped at somebody's house, rang the doorbell, and waited a while and smoked a cigarette, meanwhile I was just sitting in the car wondering if he forgot I was there or something and why I needed to accompany him on the rest of his afternoon errands.When we got close to my house again he asked me (again) "you OK now?" I told him, "no back still hurting." The he reached over and touched the back of my neck - and asked me "hurting here?" and suddenly I felt SUPER uncomfortable. Luckily we pulled up to my house at that point. Then he told me I should put Vicks on my neck, and I said "OK, I will thanks" and was getting out of the car. THEN, he said "put Vicks and massage" and I said "OK thanks I will have my son do" and THEN he said "ana (and pointed to himself - means "I" in Arabic) massage you." For a split second I was dumb struck, a combination of being creeped out and just plain shocked. I didn't know what to do. It never even occurred to me that a police officer would do that, and I got all confused thinking that maybe I did something wrong by going with him to the police station, but I thought he was helping me out in the capacity of a police officer and not in the capacity of some guy who wanted to jump my bones. I don't react very well in situations like that, so the best response I could come up with was to play dumb and pretend I didn't get what he meant, so I told him, again, "yes thanks, I will have my son massage",

At that point, Max heard the car and my voice outside the gate and started barking up a storm. The officer looked a little concerned. "You have big dog?" he asked. "YES!", I told him, "VERY BIG." "I afraid dog" he told me. I don't think I have ever loved Max more than I did at that moment.The next day I went BY MYSELF with a taxi to get the police report. The two officers on duty spoke maybe 10 words of English between them. The one typing up the report asked me "you age?" I told him "37" he stared up at the ceiling in puzzlement. "three" "seven" I told him, and again he stared up tracing imaginary numbers in the air with his finger like he was trying to recall what they should look like. "Thelatha - saba" I told him. I know that isn't the right way to say 37 in Arabic, but it was the best I could do and he seemed to understand what I meant.

The day before yesterday, I took Max out for a walk, and when I got back Salman told me that police officer had come by the house AGAIN. I don't think I have any more business with the police regarding my accident so I am glad I wasn't in. Salman told me that he told him that I was "out" and then the dude was like "but her car is here" and then Salman told him "no outside for exercise, walking the dog" and he was like "oh" and went away (yay Max). I have to say, I feel a lot safer having Max than I did before I had him.

Yet another Awesome day in the life of ..me

2009-08-04T10:13:00.000-07:00

OK, if I didn't believe I am cursed before, I do now.

Guess what happened to me today?

You can't imagine? Well let me tell you...

I was driving along, minding my own business, on the cornice road - which has those pedestrian crossing elevated paths with flashing lights that are supposed to make you slow down . I wasn't in any hurry, just going to buy a map from the gas station to see if I could figure out how the hell to drive to Al Taweelah from here. So I was moseying along in the slow lane (or slower lane since you are supposed to drive slow on the road in general) and just as I am coming to an intersection the light turns yellow, so it was one of those situations where, if I floored it, I could get through the intersection before it turned red or if I braked quickly I could just stop. I opted for the second choice since I was not in my speed demon mood today.

Apparently the guys in the car behind me were also considering the option to floor it and had decided to go for it, assuming that I was in sync with what they were planning... so I stopped and then wham! I heard the back of my car crumbling, my neck and back and jerked forward and I found my car being pushed into the intersection - which, thankfully was a T- intersection and I was on the top part of the T so it was as bad as being in the middle of a normal intersection.

The people in the car behind me were "surprise surprise" young local guys (who else needlessly tails people and guns through almost red lights?).

Now I was having a pretty bad morning to begin with, for one thing I have PMS or, more accurately, CMS (current menstrual syndrome), for another thing, everything else that has been going on doesn't exactly have me in the best of moods, so the realization that now on top of everything else, I don't have a car, just pushed me over the edge, and I started to cry. I just sat there and cried. I vaguely remember one of the guys saying something to me like "you didn't see light" and snapping something back at him like "YES I saw it, that is why I stopped, you didn't see ME?" followed by "DON"T you DARE try to blame this on me" and then I went back to sobbing.

So there I was in my smashed car having a break down in the middle of the intersection. The police showed up after about 10 minutes or something. The first one out of the car greeted the two guys and right away they launched into their side of the story in Arabic, I got the feeling they were trying to pin it on me somehow which pissed me off. Then the second officer got out of the car. He could speak some English so I told him that I would like to know what they are saying and then I just started crying again. I don't think any of them knew what to do with that... so anyway they told the guys they would make the report and they could pick it up from the station, they told me the same thing but I said "how am I supposed to driver safely with a stiff neck and no brake lights?" (they were lying in the road) - not that having brake lights had done me much good - but I could just picture myself being rear-ended by yet another car on my way to police station, which is on a much faster moving road, because I had no brake lights

So then, after I mentioned my neck, it occurred to them that maybe I needed to go the hospital. They had me park my car along the cornice, and then they drove me to the Emergency Room. At the hospital they took x-rays of my neck and back. Nothing is broken but the Dr. said I am having muscle spasms. My favorite part was when the nurse (a niqabi) asked me in front of the Police Officer if I was married - I don't know what to say about that in my current situation - so I told them - well not really, I am almost divorced. Then she asked me if there is any chance I could be pregnant and I was like "no way" (barring immaculate conception that is) and then she asked me when my last period was - because I guess she didn't believe me - and i told her "now" and she made me repeat it about 5 times - louder each time. So by the time it sunk into her that I was as we spoke menstruating, the whole room, including the police officer who brought me there knew it as well. That was GREAT, though I am sure the police officer must have been thinking - ok, well that explains the crying.

Poor guy had been really worried and had called his friend, another police officer who had been to the US many times (after he found out I am American) to reassure me that the accident would not be blamed on me.

Then I got a shot in my butt - and they sent me home.

Anyway, after that they took me back to my car, and one of them drove me home in my car. They told me they would let me know when the police report would be ready and bring it to me.

Old Family Photos - My Parents' wedding

2009-08-02T23:15:00.001-07:00

As a change from usual moaning and groaning and fretting about my life - and to take my mind off of it, even if only momentarily, I am going to do something a little bit different.

My Aunt "E", my father's youngest sister has been going nuts scanning old family photos. I don't really have many (any) of my parents when they were young, so it has been nice to see them, plus my dad has been sporting a Jesus look for most of my life so it is nice to see his face for a change.

The thing I like about old photos, is the way they dressed (old photos BEFORE the 70s that is). Everyone looks so... clean and proper and ... decent. Makes me wish I would live back then when things were simpler and marriages were more likely to succeed.

Anyway, since I enjoy looking at old photos (of my own family and other people's as well), I thought I would share some with you. The first batch I will share is my parents' wedding, since without this happy occasion, I wouldn't be here today. Enjoy!

My mom and her bridesmaids (my aunts) at her wedding rehearsal. In this picture they are all wearing scarves on their head because the wedding was in a Catholic Church and in those days you had to at least have some sort of token head covering.

Both of my parents were raised as Atheists, but Dad has always marched to the beat of a different drummer. When he was young he was drawn to nature, and this love of nature made him realize that there must be a God. After reading all about different religions, he settled on Christianity. At first he was attracted to the Catholic Church, mainly because of St. Francis, who was known for his love of nature. This is why they were married in a Catholic Church. After their wedding he donated all of their wedding silver to the Church, much to my grandparents' dismay. He left the Catholic Church later, after further reading of the bible convinced him that certain practices were not necessary (confession to a priest, etc.)

This is my Mother with her father. He died when I was only 8 years old, from lung cancer. I just remember that I loved him most of all my grandparents. We (his grandchildren) called him Bobby, just like our mothers had called his father Bobby. He and my grandmother (whom we called Mimi) lived across the street from us when we were little. My earliest memory involves him. I was less than two and my older sister - who was only three - caught me licking the sweet pink coating off of my grandmother's iron tablets. She ran and told on me, and my parents were worried that I had eaten some of the tablets. What I remember is my grandfather quickly picking me up by my heels and whacking me on the back to try to get me to spit out what ever I had swallowed. I thought I was being punished at the time.

This is my parents' wedding party. The bridesmaids are all my aunts. The one all the way to the left in the top picture and on the right in this one directly above is the older of my dad's two younger sisters "K". The one with black hair next to her is my Mom's oldest sister, Shannon and the one next to her (red head but you can't tell here) "MK" is the middle sister and the maid of honor. The groomsmen / ushers are my dad's brother "G" (next to my dad), next to him is Dave, MK's husband and my Dad's best friend (the three of them were in the same class in high school); Larry - the son of my Mimi and Bobby's closest friends and like a brother to my mom and her sisters; Shannon's husband Tony; and my Dad's and Dave's friend "C" (RIP). C was a very bright and handsome young man with a lot of potential (went to Harvard), but he married a selfish and manipulative woman who later broke his heart, and eventually, he killed himself.

This is the happy couple with my dad's mother's parents. We called them Old grandmother and Old grandfather on the farm. Old grandfather died when I was a baby but Old Grandmother lived to a ripe old age.

My parents were only 23 and 20 years old when they got married. My Dad first saw my mom when he was invited over by MK one day. He and Dave and MK were best friends and he had asked MK to accompany him has a friend to a school dance. His best friend Dave ended up taking MK home after the dance. He saw my mom again later when after graduation MK threw a surprise birthday party for him at home. He said he remembered seeing my mom sitting at a table studying for her final exams. Looking at these pictures, I can see why they fell for each other, they were both really good looking people! (of course I might be biased :) )

My Dad and his brother "G" . My mom said that she was really upset with G because my Dad was very excited and nervous before the wedding so G kept handing him drinks - Champagne. So he was a little pink in the face and tipsy during the wedding. He stopped drinking alcohol altogether not long after that.

Both sets of my grandparents at the wedding. The taller couple is my Dad's parents Grandpa and Grandma (as we called them.) Of all of them, only Grandpa is still alive today (93 years old). Bobby died first when I was 8. Mimi managed to live for 10 more years and then passed on from cancer as well. Grandma died when I was 23. Grandpa has remarried a "younger woman" who is now 73.

Help! I need to pack

2009-08-02T01:54:00.000-07:00

Well, I need to start packing up the entire contents of my house. I don't know where I am going but I have to pack all the same. I don't know where to begin.

Does anyone know where I can get large boxes and / or those large canvas bags that people sometimes pack things in?

I have to find a new home for Max too. Which is sad, since we just found him again, but I doubt I will be able to live some place where he can stay. Most flats don't allow pets - especially not big ones like Max.

So if anyone knows where to get those boxes or bags - or if anyone knows of someone who would like a really sweet and beautiful dog - please let me know.

Cost of Living in Abu Dhabi?

2009-07-31T03:40:00.000-07:00

By the way, as I mentioned below, I was offered the job in Abu Dhabi. Can anyone familiar with Abu Dhabi tell me how much a person needs to earn to be able to live in a 2 bedroom apartment there, send two kids to an OK school, pay a maid's salary, and hopefully save a little bit each month?

Max is BACK!! and Update # 2

2009-07-30T23:25:00.000-07:00

First of all thanks to all again, and for those of you who were concerned about Max, he finally came home! A lovely British family found him. Thank God it was a British family - Brits tend to be dog lovers - at least that is what I have observed from the ones I have seen / met here. At the very least they aren't dog haters.

At work on Monday I told them that I really don't want to come in anymore since I don't see why I need to be there, and I had nothing to do. I had been helping the PR lady with the newsletter - by proof reading and editing all of the different articles for the columns in it and that was finished so I didn't see the need to be hanging around.

They asked me about the offer they had given me and I told them, excuse me I only got it on Thursday afternoon and I asked for more information and for them to increase it and they haven't got back to me on that, so how can I answer them? I also told them that I can't give them an answer on it right away because I haven't had the time to go out and see if I can find any other accommodation that will fit into my new greatly decreased budget.

Now here is what they are offering me - pretending to be magnanimous - termination - plus the new crappy pay or termination plus one more month pay off. They will also pay me off for my leave days that I have built up and not used. They will not however give me my return tickets for me and my boys that are part of my contract with one year of work (I have worked more than one year) They told me because I am terminated they only need to give me one way tickets but the cheapos are not giving me the actual cost of one way tickets - which cost almost the same as return tickets - they are halving the price of a return ticket which is completely wrong. I told them that I don't see what the hell my annual ticket which is one of the benefits offered in my contract has to do with me being terminted, the reason I hadn't taken my leave yet was that Fatema had been on the verge of quitting since January, and I couldn't leave her alone in the office because I was afraid of what they would to to her. THEY were the ones who refused to find a replacement for her and took advantage of her good nature (she was waiting train her replacement) to force her to stay there 6 months longer than she wanted to stay. So now they are cheating me out of the tickets that I was planning to use to send my kids home and hopefully bring them back again once I got things sorted out (God willing). Furthermore they told me I don't get my gratuity - gratuity is a payment equal to one month's basic salary provided you have worked for a company at least one year - this is mandated in the labor law and yet they told me "you haven't worked here three years yet so you don't get it". I also found out that according to labor law if they terminate me illegally, without any prior warning letter, I am entitled to three months pay off (it is like a fine they have to pay for doing that.) So they aren't being magnanimous in what they are offering they are being cheap and dishonest. And technically, since they are still treating my case as a termination and rehire, if I take the new job with them, I would be entitled to all of those things anyway.

Anyway, back to Max.

I was really worried about him - especially after the Russian lady who owns the hair salon nearby called some of her friends who live in the area and asked if they had seen him. She is married to a local and knows many people who live around there. One of them, who knows what Max looks like said she had seen him on the corniche roaming with two other dogs on the loose. This really worried me since the corniche is across a rather busy road. I know he is smart, but Billy was smart too, and she got hit by a car. So Salman and I dashed over to the corniche and walked the entire length of it and back again calling "Max!" at the top of our lungs. People were looking at us like we were a couple of weirdos. I asked some of the people walking there - ones who look like they might be people who exercise there regularly if they had seen him, both of them said they had seen a dog lying in the grass and one of them said she saw a kid kicking it. This really upset me, because it made me wonder if he was hurt that he would just lay there while some kid kicked him.

Anyway, in spite of walking for almost 2 hours - we still hadn't found him. Salman was really upset and said he was angry at the maid. (I suppose anonymous will accuse him of abusing her too now based on that bit of information.)

Someone I met on my walk suggested I call the municipality in the morning to see if they found him, so that is what I planned to do. I was really hoping they did have him, because I was beginning to lose hope.

The next morning I had to wake up bright and early to leave for my interview in Abu Dhabi. "A" called and said he was on his way from Dubai to pick us up and take us (God love him). I had decided to let the maid go to Dubai for a few days to visit her sister and told her the evening before to be ready by 7 AM or "se-ven morning time" in maid speak (yeah that's right anonymous). She was really happy about that. So of course at 7:05 AM, the kids and I were showered dressed and ready with our things in the hall and the maid was nowhere to be seen, so Salman went and knocked on the door to her room. At 7;15 AM she showed up in kitchen in her pyjama's. I asked her "why aren't you ready?" and when she stared at me blankly, I followed that by "why you no take shower and wear your clothes - you go like this?" her answer "I make breakfast for you" - this she is saying while looking at the cup with eggshells in it from the breakfast that I had already made and that we had just finished eating. Since when does she make my breakfast? I would like to know. Luckily "A" was late - usually he isn't and he doesn't like for people not to be ready when he shows up so she managed to get ready before he arrived. If she hadn't been, I wouldn't be surprised if he had left her or told her to take a bus to Dubai. I KNOW anonymous - the horror of it! I am such a horrible person for wanting to get to my job interview on time!!

Anyway the job interview went really well , they offered me the job right on the spot! The pay wouldn't be bad either if it was in Dubai or here, but for Abu Dhabi it isn't so good because of the cost of housing - really, it is insane there and this job has long hours and only Fridays off. Plus almost all of the staff are men - so its not like I would even be able to make friends on the job. So, I am going to be barely scraping by, I might as well be doing it here in a bigger house and coming home at 4 PM every day instead of 7 PM. But still it felt really good to be offered - and on the spot too! Especially since the Deputy Director at my current place of employment told me "you should just take our new offer, you wont get offered anything anywhere else" Since in money terms this AD offer is substantially higher (though not in real terms in view of the hours and cost of living), I feel like going into the office and waving it in her face. God the way they undervalue people and drag them down is really something!

Missing Dog - Max is gone :(

2009-07-28T02:16:00.001-07:00

Well, as if I didn't have enough to deal with at the moment. My dog Max is missing - either someone stole him or he is dead somewhere.

I got a nasty message from some anonymous freak earlier - who flipped out at me for saying that it bothered me that my maid was chatting on the phone with local boys and I find her a little strange. Apparently the ranting anonymous knows SO much more about my maid and my life than I do.

So, for my anonymous "fan" (ha!), if you read this, you are going to love this one, I wonder what you will write in response. My maid let the dog out of the courtyard and into the street. I have a feeling she did it on purpose, because she is incredibly stubborn and thinks she knows everything better than I do, but she might have done it on accident (when taking out the trash) - whatever the case, either way I am pretty sure she knew what she had done and instead of letting us know, she went and took and nap and then two hours later "innocently" alerted us to the fact that he was missing.

I got home at around 5. Max was in the hallway of the house as he always is during daylight hours because his fur is too thick, and I am afraid he will get overheated. We have a tall wall around the house and big black iron gate, so there is no way for him to get out of the house unless someone opens the door to the house and then opens the gate. as well He can't do either of these things himself as he lacks the necessary appendages. The last time I saw Max, he was lying in the hallway staring at me as helped myself to a mouthful of chocolate whipped cream. Then I went into my bedroom with my boys. They were with me the whole time, so I know they are not responsible for letting him out.

Next thing I knew, I was getting ready to take Max for his evening walk, and he wasn't anywhere to be found. Of course the maid, did the usual - blame the kids routine - she lies a lot and blames the kids for it. Like the time she called Ethiopia from my phone - she said my six year old did it. That was just plain stupid for her to even try to convince me that it was him. As if I can't tell who is responsible - the six year old boy or the ETHIOPIAN adult. I was more mad about her lying than I was about her making the phone call. Best part of it all was that she had a received call from the SAME number on her mobile phone.

Now there are a couple of reasons why I am certain it was the maid who let (threw) Max out. The first one being that kids were with me, so there is no way they could have done it. The second being that she has tried to do it before because she stubbornly insisted that he would come back on his own, and I had told her not to do it several times. The third one being that Max hates going out in the heat and only goes out if someone deliberately makes him go out / or takes him out for a walk. Even if he is not on his leash and the gate is open he doesn't go outside unless someone makes him do it. And the fourth one being that when The kids and I went out to run look for him, she suggested we look in certain direction - one that would have actually been the last place I would assume he would have gone (I was looking behind our street in the neighborhood where we usually walk him.) But lo and behold, after not finding him anywhere behind the house, we went in the direction she said and we asked one of the shop people if they saw him and they said they had seen him walking that way a couple hours before. So I think she let him out - maybe even took him out on his leash and then loosed him, saw which way he went, took her nap, and when she woke up, was surprised to see that he hadn't returned on his own and then tried to cover her ass.

But it's not like I am stupid. because, unless we have a ghost in the house who can open the doors, she did it, there really isn't any other explanation. Plus now she is walking around looking guilty - I don't think she meant to harm him; she just thought she knew that he would come back

We looked everywhere we could thnk of for him and asked people we saw on the road, but aside from the shop attendant, none of the people we spoke to had seen him. I hoped that he would wander back at night, but he never came. I am so worried about him. I hope he didn't get hit by a car. I wonder if he is out there somewhere and is hot and hungry and doesn't have water. I couldn't sleep half the night, and then when I did, I dreamt that I was looking for him and I found him and I was so happy, and then I woke up. He really was the sweetest dog, and I miss him terribly.

Salman is really upset, and he was more upset when the maid tried to accuse him of doing it...

I hope someone found Max and is taking good care of him. One thing that makes me feel better is that I know he is a beautiful dog and that people used to stop and ask me for what amount I would sell him. I hope one of them found him.

If anyone reading this lives in Ras Al Khaimah and has seen him, please let me know... you can see his photograph in my earlier post "Max and me."

Update

2009-07-25T05:26:00.000-07:00

First I want to say thank you to everyone who responded to my last post. I honestly didn't expect anyone to read it, much less really care what is happening in my life over here in this little corner of the world. You all have given me a fresh outlook on humanity.

I was raised in a conservative family, with nice honest, God fearing, and quite frankly, naive parents, who sheltered me from a lot of crap. Growing up and living in the real world has at times been quite tough and shocking. I had just naively expected that things like hard work, honesty, being a real friend, etc. would be appreciated, but I had found that it was often quite the opposite, that many people look for those traits, not because they appreciate them, but so that they can exploit them. So I have had many rude awakenings in my life.

My circumstances since my husband left have not helped. I have realized that being a single mother who is just desperate to care for her children is something that many people will try to exploit - particularly employers. They think "oh she can't lose her job so we can treat her as badly as we want." I don't think it is a coincidence that I have had mostly bad employers since my husband left and mostly nice ones before he left / before I knew he wasn't returning.

Anyway, once again thank you all for letting me see a kinder and better side of humanity again.

As for an overview of my situation and an update:

Well as you all know, I was forced to go into work so I could make sure that everything is smooth sailing for my replacement. Any little question she has, any little thing she is trying to find, she comes running over to my desk to get the answer and 99% of the time I have the answer for her. This is not how it was for me when I joined. Because my boss is habitually monstrous to the person in that position, most people haven't stayed more than 6 months and the longest has been a year - or two years if you count Fatema, but she as not working directly with him the whole time. Because of people leaving, quitting, being sacked abruptly, there was never any proper hand over from person to person, the newcomer was always saddled with piles of crap -with no explanation as to its relevance and sorting through it became secondary to current crap that was being piled on daily, so often it remained untouched, until they like their predecessors were sacked and so the mess remained and grew. Because I managed to last a year, I did manage to sort through quite a bit of it and get the junior office staff to clean up a lot of the mess.

When I joined, the shelf in our office area was literally exploding with junk - old newpapers, magazines, company profiles, random documents, you name it - it was all jammed on that shelf, and I being new wasn't sure of the relevance of many of the things on it. I went through some things, and threw away what I could tell was not necessary, filed some things that looked important and I nagged Fatema until finally, when we got the trainee in to help us with a lot the daily and petty takss, they got the rest done.

There were stacks and stacks of unfiled business cards. There wasn't anyone to give me a frame of reference for the old ones that were collected before my time, but I did manage to make a shared contacts folder in Outlook that he could access with the cards from the past year - or the important looking ones - less important cards were given to the trainee to enter into a more general database. Because he was always bleating about how he is "visually oriented" I even made the online cards look like the original ones so that when he looked at them they would look familiar, when possible we also saved photographs of the person the card corresponded to (to jog his visual memory).

Before I came, they were not using the Outlook to manage calendars, I made it so that I and Fatema and his deputy had direct access to his calendar, and we could makes changes to it as necessary - and since he is constantly cancelling and postponing and double booking himself, this was necessary. It also made it so that everyone who needed to could see what was going on in the office by way of meetings. I also got access to most of the directors' calendars so that, when scheduling meetings that required the presence of many of them, it was easier to schedule a time that was convenient for all.

When this lady came, I gave her a detailed description of projects currently underway and briefed her on their history and what is the expected next step - no one did this for me. Everything I learned on my own. Fatema was as helpful as she could be, but since she hadn't been handling his emails or projects and had only been assisting with a few things, she couldn't really help me with the sea of unfiled e-mails floating in his inbox. But I filed literally thousands upon thousands of unfiled e-mails so that they would be easier for him to find and, now, her. All of these were huge and ongoing processes that were constantly being interrupted by the daily stuff.

But I got credit for none of the above. Instead I was blamed for things like the time he forgot to pick up his own wife and son - which I described in an earlier post; Or for Fatema's sudden quitting; Or for the fact that he would completely forget something about which I had spoken with him in detail - sometimes on more than one occasion; or for the time one of his big shot directors was with him in London and had behind my back gone and cancelled and rearranged his meetings there and then forgotten to tell him or me about it - (for that I got a phone call where he screamed at me about how incompetent I am); or the time the same director called from overseas and said he needed to talk to him about something and he said he would call him as soon as he got in the office and so when I reminded him about it when he got in the office he screamed at me for what I still don't know; or the time HE gave Fatema the wrong address for his grandmother and then his mother told them she would pick it up from the office herself (instead of giving the right address) and then didn't for a couple weeks; and countless other inane things like these.

So now, miss replacement gets to come and sit at the nice clean desk - which I did her the favor of leaving in an orderly condition (unlike my predecessor who left me with drawers, in and out boxes full of miscellaneous crap of unknown importance or significance. If she needs something from the shelves, it is right there where she can find it, because the shelves are labeled nicely. There are also soft copies of many important things stored online on the shared folder that was created while Fatema and I were there. And of course, I made sure I showed her how to access them - while explaining how to use a calendar notification and how to put her phone on silent!

Anyway, the past few days I have been sitting at some desk loaded with crap from God Knows Who back the corner near the PR officer and the Technical and Legal Advisors. He doesn't usually wander back that way and that is fine by me, since the sound of his voice makes me cringe.

I read through my employment contract and noticed the termination clauses, and sure enough, they have fired me illegally since there is supposed to be an investigation and review period followed by a warning period, before termination. I also read that since company provided accommodation is part of my contract, I should have at least one month still after termination in my house. So I called up the Accounts and HR and blasted them about the situation with my landlord and housing. So they sorted that out and I now have housing for a few more weeks at least. Though not much, it is better than nothing. Then I made sure to tell a few key people, who would run to him with everything I said, that I know my termination was in violation of my contract AND labor law because there was no cause for the termination - according to the termination clauses - and because there was no reason for termination mentioned on the termination letter - not mention that it isn't actually my name at the top of the letter, since they mispelled it horrendously.

So on Wednesday, Miss Replacement comes stomping over to my desk and summons me into his office. So I made sure I rolled my eyes visibly - they told me not to SAY anything but no one mentioned facial expressions.

Then I went in there. I was wearing 3 inch heels - so he made me sit down in the boardroom. I realized later he was using his classic intimidation method on me. He always makes you sit down - especially if you are taller - so he can feel big - and then he sits too close and having his ugly face so horrifyingly close is enough to make people like me panic and just want to get the hell out of there. Anyway, he then says to me "where's M" (HR coordinator). And I am like "how should I know?" Then he says to me " So what can we do for you?" and said "I didn't ask to come in here - you called me in" then he went on about how they are thinking of giving me a new position within the organization - editing - and would I take it? And I said "how can I tell you if I would take some offer I haven't seen and a job that hasn't been described to me yet?" then Miss Nosey Pants Replacement butts in and he carried on with his conversation in her presence which I thought was highly inappropriate and she sat their nodding as he started (showing off for her) asking me if really think I can manage the new position and do a good job (the implication being that he highly doubts I am capable of doing anything well) and she sat there nodding and clicking in agreement, and I wanted to smack both of them.

Of course, I know he is covering his ass. Obviously, if I had committed some kind of infraction or done something illegal or wrong that was truly worthy of termination, they wouldn't need to offer me anything else, but he knows that I know that my termination was illegal. So he has come up with a clever way to cover his ass AND humiliate me at the same time - offer me a lower paying job.

Anyway, on Thursday, I was sitting at my desk again. And he came back that way looking for the Legal advisor, and then popped over into the accounts sections and then he came over to my desk - which he didn't even need to do - and asked me how I am doing and I didn't even look up at him - I said fine in a very unfriendly voice and didn't greet him or ask him how he is in return. I hate how pleased and satisfied he is that he has gotten away with being a jerk yet again.

Towards the end of the day, HR called me to come up and they gave me this shit offer of less than I was making before I took this job, with a basic salary lower than I have EVER got before. So, having not slept at all the night before, and being in a pretty crappy mood, I flipped out and told them to they can keep their crappy offer since I can't really provide for my kids on it and that I am SICK of their games and that since they have pretty much messed up my life and I have nothing to lose I am going to make sure I take the company and my boss down with me if I can and I won't give up until I do. Then they got all concerned trying to calm me down and I told them, are you people sick, deceiving someone into giving up their stability in Dubai to come up to this place and then doing this to them? And the the HR manager - it was her last day of work incidentally - said, well you didn't have to take the job and come here, And I said, "well I wouldn't have if you people hadn't lied about the position and the boss." I said, "when a boss has a history of doing this kind of thing to people, you have an obligation to let them know this - and if the person is a mother with children who depend on her, you shouldn't even bother trying to recruit her - you all KNOW what a jerk he is, so everytime you recruit someone you know that he will do this and you KNEW my situation, so you should have realized that something like this might very well destroy my life or cause me severe hardship. Now I am stuck up here in the middle of no where with no where to go!" I was yelling. Then I told them that since he is an employee too, he should be subject to rules and restrictions on his behavior and not be allowed to just abuse his power at will.

So now they are going to ask him if they can at least make it as much as I was earning before I came here, which really won't help since my rent there was very cheap, my kids' school was 1/3 cheapers and the Water and electricity bills and other expenses were much cheaper in Dubai too. But maybe I might be able to squeak by on it until I find something else. But I don't know if he will agree to it or not anyway, probably won't knowing him.

Then in the afternoon, Miss Replacement very condescendingly asks me "did you have time to consider what Mr .. talked to you about yesterday?" and I looked at her and said "I am not allowed to discuss this issue with you" and then I said "or rather, I am not allowed to discuss my true feelings regarding this situation with you" and her eyes got all wide and she said "oh!"

Now I still don't know where I stand or what to do. I don't know if I should take the job just to hang on for now - but I am afraid it will put me in more debt to live here when I can't really afford to. .. I think every month I will use all of what I earn plus a bit of the paltry settlement they give me for my old position.

I have been thinking about how I want to change my life for good. For a long time, I have wanted to become certified to teach English as a second / foreign language, but I never had the time or money for it. I still don't have the money, but I can't shake the idea. Being a teacher would be great - I could sponsor my kids easily - no questions, no leaving it up to the whim of some official or another and If I could get a job at a school, I could get discounted tuition, and hours that are great for a working mom. I have been looking for online courses that I might be able to take gradually, but I haven't found anything for sure yet.

Oh I have a job interview in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday, I have no idea if it will be a good job or not, I certainly hope so, because if they drag me all the way there and then tell me that they are looking to pay 2,000 dirhams, I am going to be pretty upset. I told them what I was making here though, and they still called me back about the interview, so I am hoping that means they are willing to pay close to that at least! So if you all could please pray for me, though I don't want to have another bad job, so please pray for me that if I do get any future job offers they aren't from monsters in disguise like this last one.

And that's the latest with me... In short, I'm still alive and trying to figure this out...

OH and I peeped in my boss' webmail and lo and behold the HR has sent him templates for NEW contracts which make it easier for him to do this to people (meaning they can't accuse him of illegal termination with this new contract). Nice how they are facilitating his behavior.

God Help Me I feel like I am dying

2009-07-19T08:07:00.000-07:00

This might be my last post for a while. Quite frankly, I don't know what is going to happen to me. I have lost everything.

I was fired from my job suddenly and for no reason. After one year of working enough overtime (without compensation) to amount to a whole half year extra of work and being verbally abused and degraded on a regular basis by my employer. I have now been terminated.

In the UAE in July it is next to impossible to find another job - I know because I have been jobless at this time of year before. And this time it is worse because the economy is bad. I gave up everything in Dubai - including my super cheap apartment - and moved to Ras Al Khaimah. My boss was such a hugely nasty man that I actually hung onto the other apartment as long as I could, but the company confirmed me, so I let my guard down and let my apartment there go.

Now I am living in company paid accommodation, so I have nowhere to go after this. Without an employment / residence visa, it will be impossible for me to find another place to live, plus my home computer just broke so I have no way to apply to jobs easily - or find them online (I am writing this from my work computer)... not that there is much on offer - there wont be until after Ramadan. By that time, the shitty little pay out I will get from this job will be long gone. I don't have enough money to get back home. I have two little boys to support. When I think about it, I feel like I am going to have a heart attack. I have a loan I have to pay back, without a job and no money they will throw me in prison because this places operates like it is in the Middle Ages when it comes to things like debt. So I have to send my boys away from me for a very very long time and try to pay off my debt or sit in jail - either way they will lose their mother and I will lose the only things in this world that have kept me going all this time.

I tried to stay here in this country so that they could learn Arabic and that they would be able to take Islam in school. I even have asked Muslims friends to take them to the mosque from time to time. I am not a Muslim, after their no good father deserted us, I didn't have any obligation to teach them Islam - at least not according to my religion. But I wanted them to learn what they could so at least when they grow up, whatever they choose to be, they can't say I kept them away from their father's religion and culture.

I don't know as much about Islam as Muslims do, but I am pretty sure that it tells Muslims to look out for orphans and widows. My bosses' are all Muslim, but they are knowingly causing harm to two little boys. They are turning them into orphans basically - their father is gone and they will now lose thier mother. They knew my whole story and they used it to their advantage this whole year, they abused me, overworked me, knowing that I needed my job for my boys' sake and then they went looking for someone else because My boss is too arrogant to admit to his own shortcomings and mistakes and needs someone to blame for it and he is firing me because I defended myself when blamed for things that were in no way shape or form my fault.

I lost my eyesight as well because of this job - there is something in the air here that severely irritates my eyes and as soon as I moved here I started getting red, swollen and even infected eyes. Whatever is causing it, seems to be worse in the office - and yet they would keep me there 12 hours a day using a computer no less. My right eye got so bad that my retina ended up detaching and I lost the vision in that eye. Surgery was only able to partially restore it. I haven't painted since I lost my vision in that eye.

It is amazing how much I have changed in this past year - in spite of all that my husband had put me through and the hard times, I still looked very young for my age and was what some would call pretty. Now I look haggard and worn and there are permanent dark dark circles under my eyes.

I have no friends and no one to turn to. I wish I had never come to this country - it has taken everything from me. My children were the last thing I had and now in a couple weeks, they will be gone too. I don't know if I can go on anymore. I think of ending it after they leave. I don't want to wake up and not see their faces. I don't think I could bear it, one way or another I am afraid this will kill me.

I keep praying for a miracle but things only get worse. They often say that God only helps those who help themselves, but I have been trying and struggling all this time to help myself and this is what comes of it?

Today the landlord came by the house and told me that we will have to get out if we don't renew. They were supposed to renew my accommodation last month, but because they were plotting against me, they just let it hang. So now I don't even know where I am supposed to be staying right now.

I don't have time to pack up or to look for another job because they still expect me to come in to work by the way, to "train" the idiot they hired to replace me.

I shouldn't call her that, it isn't nice and she doesn't seem like a bad person. But I feel so damn angry and she must have lied in her interview or on her CV because she doesn't know how to use her computer except for the most BASIC things. I resent having to tell someone who is supposedly "so much more qualified" than I am how to send a message from her account instead of the boss', how to send a meeting request, how to turn up the volume on the desk phone, how to put her own PERSONAL CELL PHONE on silent... and hand over all the knowledge about projects and companies that I built up over one year with no help from anyone - because when I joined no one showed me anything or told me anything about what was going on but he pretty much started yelling at me from day two expecting me to somehow miraculously know. With all I have taught her, she gets to pretend she is all switched on, when in reality she doesn't have a clue about anything - just has a loud voice (yeah, apparently another reason I wasn't OK for the job is because I am "nice" and I speak softly) and such a heavy tread when she walks that I can hear her coming from a mile away. She hasn't checked his email for one week since she started - he used to yell at me because sometimes I would be in his office with him and an email would come in while I was in there, and he would ask me about it, and I wouldn't know because I hadn't seen it yet - or he would delete it from his blackberry after reading it there - which deletes it in the whole system - and then accuse me of being incompetent because I couldn't find it. I have no idea why she isn't checking it, for the first few days I forwarded them to her mail directly, but I have stopped doing it, she should check it herself, since she is the one who is so qualified. No one had to tell me to do that, I did it without being told. I am sure, though, that when I go back in to work tomorrow he is going to blame ME for why she isn't checking it. As long as I am there, he will blame me for everything, because he doesn't want to admit that anything is his fault and if he blames the new lady then again it will make him look stupid since he maintains that the only thing wrong was with me.

She told me "he seems very intense, but he is really great isn't he?" I almost choked when she said that. I looked away and mumbled and answer because at the same time they terminated me my boss threatened me that I had to train her and I had better not tell her anything about him. Funny, if he thinks he is so great and not to blame, why would he need to do that? I mean if I was fired for doing something wrong then why would he care about that anyway But of course he knows what I know about him - that he has mistreated every person who has been in my position and that some of them who are now in other positions in the company can vouch for how horrible he is and will once they trust you.

According to company procedure, they are supposed to first give an employee a warning and a chance to improve before firing them. They do this for all the other confirmed employees, even the ones who come in late and leave early every blessed day or don't bother to show up for work half the time. But I received no such warning, so they violated the procedure and the terms of my agreement, but its not like anyone will care if I complain. Anyway, what were they going to warn me for? For working overtime? Any other thing he blamed me for, he would need to actually prove it was my fault and that I had committed some grievous error or mistake or violated my contact - none of which I did. But I am certain that if I took it to the labor court they would manufacture some case against me, with witnesses and all - nobody wants to lose their job right now and so many of their employees are not competent enough to get work anywhere else and know it. They are completely immoral and I have seen how other workers have been destroyed by them to know that there is no limit they wont go to.

I don't know what to do. I have no one to help me. I am willing to move anywhere in the UAE to work, but I just need to keep my children. I am afraid to send them to America without me. I am afraid to have them live there with no health insurance. What if they get sick? My little one is only 6, he needs me. My parents are old and don't have much money; they can't really afford to take care of them for me. I have never been so scared, distraught, or angry in all my life.

Just another day at the movies...

2009-07-18T06:46:00.000-07:00

What is it with the rude people here who go movie theaters only to talk on their phones, talk to to each other, switch seats twenty times, yell, let their kids run up and down the aisles, and throw food all over their seats and the floor?

Yesterday, I went with one of my coworkers and my kids to see the latest Harry Potter movie at the mall here. Unlike Dubai, there is only one mall with one movie theater in it. In Dubai I used to go see movies at the theater in the Mercato mall because it was less busy than other theaters. But here I have no choice.

Harry Potter was showing in the large theater with a balcony. I picked seats down because less people sit down, but since this was such a popular movie, there were plenty of people down too.

There was a bit of shuffling around as people got settled into their seats, but it was about half way into the movie that all hell seemed to break lose. One local guy suddenly decided to switch to the seat in front of us and then get up from there about 5 times. Further down his row, a man and his wife were talking on the respective cells phones loudly. A group of obese children started running up and down the aisles yelling and a whole large row of people got up and moved.

I started to get really annoyed, but there wasn't much I could do because my little one had fallen asleep on my lap and I couldn't really move. My coworker shouted "can you shut your children up" to the aisle of noisy kids next to us, and I tried to kick at the seat of the man blabbing away on his cell phone but he was too far over.

When the movie was over and the lights came on, I looked at the aisle where the family with the obese children had been sitting. It literally looked like some animals had got loose in there; the entire aisle was covered with smashed popcorn and nachos and spilled sodas.

The movie was good - as they always are - but the experience was really ruined by the ignorant crowd with which I watched it.

What does Camel taste like?

2009-07-02T05:36:00.000-07:00

After I wrote the rant below yesterday, H.H. the Chairman showed up with a huge platter of roasted camel and rice for all of the staff. I had heard that camel was a local delicacy - heard and shuddered at the thought to be honest. They also sell camel milk in the grocery store and I almost brought myself to buy a small one, but then thought better of it since my gag reflex started at the thought of it.

Anyway, H.H. ordered a camel (with rice) and all staff were expected to show up and eat (I am not sure what the Vegetarians did). I temporarily thought of pretending I was Jewish to avoid eating it (everyone knows I am not vegetarian). Actually, I might not be pretending if I said that, my German Great Grandfather's last name was Lehr which is common among Jewish people especially in the area of Nebraska where he lived; and he had black hair and eyes and was as dark as a medium complected Arab, so though he kept mum on the subject of his origins, there is a good chance he was either a German Jew or a German Gypsy; whatever he was, he certainly didn't look Teutonic.

For those who are wondering / don't know what eating Camel meat or rather NOT eating it has to do with being Jewish, Camel meat is not kosher, for the same reason pork is not, or rather it does not pass because of the same rule that prevents pork from being acceptable. There are two criteria that an animal had to meet to be acceptable as food for the Children of Israel.

In the book of Leviticus (3rd book of the Old Testament - part of the Torah)
Lev 11:1 And the LORD spake unto Moses and to Aaron, saying unto them,
Lev 11:2 Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, These are the beasts which ye shall eat among all the beasts that are on the earth. Lev 11:3 Whatsoever parteth the hoof, and is clovenfooted, and cheweth the cud, among the beasts, that shall ye eat. Lev 11:4 Nevertheless these shall ye not eat of them that chew the cud, or of them that divide the hoof: as the camel, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you. Lev 11:5 And the coney, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you. Lev 11:6 And the hare, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you. Lev 11:7 And the swine, though he divide the hoof, and be clovenfooted, yet he cheweth not the cud; he is unclean to you. Lev 11:8 Of their flesh shall ye not eat, and their carcass shall ye not touch; they are unclean to you.

Sorry for the "eths" and all that, but the only copy of the Bible I have is in King James English - plus it was what my Dad always read, so I actually prefer the sound of it. Anyway, for those who got lost in all the ethththths, basically, the rule was they were only supposed to eat animals that have cloven hoofs AND chew the cud and not animals that did not fit both categories.
*Coney, a translation of the Hebrew Bible word שָּׁפָן (shaphan), in modern Engilsh "rock hyrax" (a rodent-like member of the order Hyracoidea)

Anyway, walking over to the other building where that camel fest was set up, we were speculating what it tastes like. My guess was that it would taste like beef - everything that doesn't taste like Chicken pretty much tastes like beef - including giraffe and zebra.
Yes, I have eaten giraffe, zebra, wildebeest, cape buffalo, antelope, ostrich, and crocodile too!

There is a restaurant / nightclub in Nairobi called The Carnivore Simba Saloon. It is a big, open air African style structure (with Makuti (grass) roof). During the day it is just Restaurant, and these days I don't know how popluar it is, but back in the day when I was just a wee lass of 20 it was quite the happening spot for night-life that was popular among Nairobi's middle and upper classes - which meant it was frequented by a lot of Kenyans of South Asian origin. They used to play a nice mix of Western, Arabic, African and Indian - especially Punjabi (Bhangra) dance music. My husband was the Bhangra king of Nairobi (as in dancer - he was tone deaf and couldn't sing to save his own life) - which should have been a warning sign but I was too naive to know better. Anyway, one of the specialties in the restaurant was the all you can eat barbecue - the waiters would come around with roasted meat of various game animals on a spit and carve it right onto the plates of anyone who wanted a taste. My husband and I tried pretty much everything except for Wild Boar. It ALL tasted like beef, except for the crocodile which was sort of like chicken and sort of the like fish (white meat).

So, once I rembered that giraffe and zebra taste like beef, I got over my fear of trying camel meat, though the huge carcass looked kind of scary and off-putting and there was a huge thick layer of fat between the skin and the meat that was kind of disturbing looking - or maybe that was the hump? I don't know because by the time I got there is was already split open and half finished. Most of the employees, including the local ones, had never tried camel meat before and were kind of hesitant. Fatema and I got Abdul from accounts to taste it first and tell us how it was, once he said it was OK, we tried it, and sure enough, it tastes just like beef.

For anyone else interested in what the Bible has to say about what critters are permissible for the Children of Israel to eat, see Leviticus Chapter 11.

Basically Kosher is similar to Halal in many ways but has more restrictions. Muslims eat some animals (like camels) that God (through Moses) told the Hebrews not to eat.

Meat Grilling at the
Carnivore Simba Saloon Nairobi (Pictures not my own)

And the descent into hell continues....

2009-06-30T23:13:00.000-07:00

Today I got great news. My coworker - the one who handles the Arabic stuff / protocol / etc. has resigned with no notice. Well actually she sort of did give notice. She told them several months ago that she wanted to be transferred to a different department or she would resign. They didn't take her too seriously. Partly because they were under the incorrect assumption that she needed the job. I warned them that she was not happy and they had the nerve to blame me for that (yeah... I am the one who blames people for things that aren't their fault, has no respect for other people's time and makes unreasonable demands).

Anyway the HR was taking their sweet time finding a replacement, partly because our bosses are demanding that we have someone a) Local b) with very very good Arabic to English / English to Arabic Translation skills c)a personality like a bulldozer (because Fatema and I are "too nice" and that's why the office is such a stressful place to work d) stellar Arabic letter writing skills (which I have come to understand is not so easy to find) e) willing to take a crappy salary and work like a slave. Basically, such a person doesn't exist, especially not in this town.

For one thing, most locals wont work a minute past official working hours, and many don't work even that long - especially not in government organizations. Also, finding a local with stellar English is very difficult. Fatema's abilities are, quite frankly, amazing. But of course they never fully appreciated her.

We found one girl, her English was better than average, as were her translation skills, she was hard-working and prompt but "her personality wasn't strong enough" (like mine and Fatema's) so the deputy squashed that, now another department has taken her.

Funny how they say my personality isn't strong, and yet I am one of the only people working here who has had the nerve to tell the boss that yelling does not contribute to a productive "professional" working environment and that it is demotivating.

Speaking of yelling, he called me this morning and told me that he left his car at work and he needed the driver to come get him. I asked him where the key is, and he said with "H" (the driver usually assigned to him). I called H and his mobile was off. I called the tranportation coordinator, and he told me that H hadn't come into work yet today. I called my boss back to tell him that H was unreachable at the moment and could someone would pick him up in a regular company car. He screamed at me "what's wrong with you! The key is with the security!"

Anyway, with her gone, I will have twice the work and no way to deal with any Arabic Correspondence. Since I already leave around 7:30 - 8 PM, maybe I should just set up my bed here behind my desk and ship my kids off to my mother since they will never see me again.

I hate my life sometimes

2009-06-29T22:43:00.000-07:00

The official working hours of the company for which I am working are 8 AM - 4 PM, which means I usually get to go home at 7 PM or even 8 or 9 PM if I am extra lucky.

Since I am staying late and not getting paid overtime, you would think the company and / or my boss would be just a bit grateful. No such luck of course.

On Sunday, my boss called my mobile at almost 7 PM. I was still in the office, but I was over in another section talking to the unfortunate PR officer. Anyway, I heard my mobile ring once and then go silent, so I figured that whoever was calling me didn't have anything terribly urgent to tell me if they let it hang up after 1 or two rings. Anyway, after finishing my conversation about 2 minutes later, I returned to my desk, saw it was my boss who had called and called him back.

"It takes you this long to answer my CALL?!" he shouted into the phone. I hate people who shout into the phone for no good reason. The shouting makes them harder to understand and it just hurts my ear - especially since I always hold the phone to my left ear and loud noises feel like they are stabbing it ever since my ear drum broke when a certain jerk broke it by slapping me up-side my head.

I told him, "It is after hours. I left my mobile on my desk for a couple minutes, and I called you back as soon as I saw your missed call" I was really pissed off, still am when I think about it. Who the hell is he to scream at me and for that?! It was 3 hours in to MY time and I was still at the office, he should have been thankful for that. Secondly it is fucking rude to ask that, since he has no idea what I was doing. I mean I could have been in the toilet for all he knows. Does he want me to answer him on the spot when I am in the middle of taking a dump or a shower. He had no right to assume that I would be in the office at that time anyway so I could have been doing just that or any other number of things that would have prevented me from answering him right away.

Then again yesterday, I was in the office trying to finish up my work, and he had told me to remind him in the evening to call his Bank in the US as he was having some problem with an account. So, as usual, in the evening he was in the middle of one of his 3 to 6 hour arguments with the Deputy Director and I wanted to go; I just needed to remind him before I went. So I went and told him to remember to call his bank - actually I figured he wouldn't do it, so I planned to also send him an SMS shortly after that reminding him again. Anyway, he just kind of looked at me and then carried on again with his argument in Arabic. So I turned to go out of his office.
"Wait a minute!" he shouted "where do you think you are going?" (HOME! it is fucking 7 o' clock - is what I wanted to say). I told him "I am going back to my desk to finish up, I don't understand Arabic and I don't feel like sitting here for three hours while you two continue your conversation in a language I don't understand"

"What do you have against Arabic?" He asked. (What kind of stupid question is that?, I thought)
Nothing, but it is boring and unproductive to sit and listen to a never ending conversation in a language I don't understand. If you want me to be present for this conversation for some reason, then the two of you should speak in English, otherwise I don't get anything out of it and I am wasting my time."

"It's not for you to decide your time is being wasted!"

(WTF?)

My boss normally comes into the office about an hour or two later than I do and the Deputy comes in after noon. Then my boss goes home again for lunch for a couple of hours and comes in nice and fresh after 4 just when I am hoping I can go home and traps me for several more hours.

I don't even get a lunch break and if he catches me trying to eat something quickly at my desk he makes a snide remark. And then they act like I am lazy when I want to go home in the evening 3 hours after all their other employees have left.

I think it is inconsiderate that just because someone doesn't want to be here during the full normal working hours, they expect other people who have been here the whole time to sit around and wait for them.

The best part of this is I get the worst performance appraisals ever according to grading he gives me I am jut shy of being a completely useless imbecile and because it is so low, it means that I don't qualify for any kind of increment.

There are times I just want to explode and scream back and tell him off for the way he treats / talks to me.

Arabian Ghost Town

2009-06-24T00:39:00.000-07:00

This past Friday we did something a little different than our usual - wake up late, go have lunch at Chilis, do something at the mall, etc. - routine.

"A", who is a photography buff, and a friend of his from billiards also named "A" (and herein to be referred to as "A2") who also likes taking photographs, took us to an old deserted village by the sea here. Al Jazeer Al Hamra, is a ghost town of abandoned old Arabic houses, crumbling mosques and shops. I had told "A" before how I wanted to go see old places around here and take pictures so I can get ideas for paintings (I am not very big on painting modern looking buildings or people wearing modern western style clothing - it is boring - though I don't mind if they are wearing modern versions of traditional kinds of clothes, like kandora, abaya, Jilabeeya, Shalvar Kameez, Sari, etc.

Anyway, in true local fashion, "A" kind of forgot to mention this plan and only informed us when they were ready to go, so the boys were just wearing regular house clothes. I told him that if he had told us longer before just showing up at our gate, I would have made them wear kandora - then we could have taken some nice photos of them too in that setting. So he said "insha' allah next time."

The place was truly amazing and the kids had a great time exploring the crumbling houses and towers.

I thought I would share a few photos with you all here.

I've been tagged - lists of 8

2009-06-22T00:53:00.000-07:00

Well, Puca tagged me so, here are my lists of 8 things...

8 things I am looking forward to:

1. Getting a divorce

2. Losing 9 more pounds

3.The weekend (every weekend)

4. Eating something other than boiled chicken breast

5. Sleeping

6. Getting my old a** back

7. Maybe going home this summer

8. Hugs from my babies

8 things I wish I could do:

1. Own a vacation home in Zanzibar

2. Live and run an orphanage in the Kenyan highlands

3. Learn to play the violin

4. Write a best selling novel - or just a book for starters

5. Have a baby girl (or even another baby boy - at least one more baby)

6. Find true love

7. Stay home with my boys and teach them many things

8. Make my husband pay child support and alimony

8 things I love:

1. My family & friends

2. Chocolate Milk

3. Lemon Pies / tarts / filled donuts

4. Reading

5. Painting

6. Africa!

7. Exercising (but at my old gym - I miss it :( )

8. Dancing

8 things I did yesterday:

1. Went to work - blah

2. Uploaded pictures to Facebook

3. Checked my Farm (on Farmtown - I am such a dork) and Chatted with my mom on Facebook

4. Took Max for a walk.

5. Did 1/2 an hour on my Exercise machine.

6. Had a bucket bath because the water went out just as I was finished exercising.

7. Watched Candy Girls and wondered if any of these reality shows are for real

8. Made Chocolate Milk with chocolate whipped cream on top for my boys :)

8 Shows I watch:

1. CSI - love crime solving shows

2. House - love how mean House is

3. Criminal Minds - same as number 1

4. Keeping up with the Kardashians - because it is so satisfyingly trashy

5. 10 years younger - because I like to imagine that there is hope for me yet

6. Dr 90210 - because it fascinates me

7. Grey's Anatomy - because I wish I had got that medical degree and married a hunky doctor

8. Candy Girls - because cat fights are always good fun!

I don't have 8 people to tag :( but I tag:
Empress Anisa (if she finds time)
Lisa,
Aynur,
Ahavah (if they read this and happen to see that they are tagged)

Loving Narcissus

2009-06-13T07:54:00.000-07:00

I realized recently that I am a magnet for narcissists. I always thought there was something wrong with a lot of the people who seem drawn to me and they have things in common. It was only the other day that I realized there is an actual clinical name for what they have: Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

Although I don't encourage the worship of ancient pagan Gods, nor do I take the myths as literal truth, you can often learn something from them.

For those who aren't aware of the Greek Legend of Narcissus: (Taken from Wikipedia)
Narcissus or Narkissos (Greek: Νάρκισσος) in Greek Mythology was renowned for his beauty. In the various stories he is exceptionally cruel, in that he disdains those who love him. As divine punishment he falls in love with a reflection in a pool, not realizing it is his own, and perishes there, not being able to leave the beauty of his own reflection.

Narcissistic people are so in love with themselves (though this self love actually stems from a deep self hatred that is buried beneath the conscious level - you know what they say, love is akin to hate). The painful thing about loving a Narcissist is that they cannot truly love you back. They have incomplete personalities that do not allow them to empathize with other people or understand their needs. Living with a narcissist is like living with a big and mean child that never grows up and learns to appreciate you for what you give to / do for him / her or love you back.

A brief run down of the traits of Narcissistic Personality Disorder:

http://www.healthyplace.com/personality-disorders/malignant-self-love/narcissistic-personality-disorder-npd-definition/menu-id-1471/

A pattern of traits and behaviors which signify infatuation and obsession with one's self to the exclusion of all others and the egotistic and ruthless pursuit of one's gratification, dominance and ambition.

Most narcissists (75%) are men.

NPD is often diagnosed with other mental health disorders ("co-morbidity") - or with substance abuse, or impulsive and reckless behaviors ("dual diagnosis").

Description of a Narcissist: (Narcissists usually have 5 or more of the following characteristics)

Fees grandiose and self-important (e.g., exaggerates achievements and talents to the point of lying, demands to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements)

Is obsessed with fantasies of unlimited success, fame, fearsome power or omnipotence, unequalled brilliance (the cerebral narcissist), bodily beauty or sexual performance (the somatic narcissist), or ideal, everlasting, all-conquering love or passion

Firmly convinced that he or she is unique and, being special, can only be understood by, should only be treated by, or associate with, other special or unique, or high-status people (or institutions)

Requires excessive admiration, adulation, attention and affirmation - or, failing that, wishes to be feared and to be notorious (narcissistic supply)

Feels entitled. Expects unreasonable or special and favorable priority treatment. Demands automatic and full compliance with his or her expectations

Is "interpersonally exploitative", i.e., uses others to achieve his or her own ends

Devoid of empathy. Is unable or unwilling to identify with or acknowledge the feelings and needs of others

Constantly envious of others or believes that they feel the same about him or her

Arrogant, haughty behaviours or attitudes coupled with rage when frustrated, contradicted, or confronted

Another good article about the disorder, written from the viewpoint of someone who has known several can be found here: http://www.halcyon.com/jmashmun/npd/howto.html

Pretty much all narcissists go undiagnosed because the disorder itself is of the nature that it would make it very hard for them to even admit they need help(and thus go to a doctor and be diagnosed). I actually believe that the Arab world - or maybe the Gulf Arab world and the UAE - Dubai - in particular (since that it where I have been living and have encountered a remarkable number of narcissists) has more of these men because this is a case of a nurture induced personality disorder. I got to wondering why there seemed to be more of such people here than I have encountered elsewhere (though they can be found everywhere and I have not been everywhere on earth so there very well may be other places that have just as many or more of these monsters running around.)

Now I have noticed that many parents here seem to think that parenting means producing children, paying for their needs and wants, and turning them over to tiny little maids for rearing - tiny little Indonesian / Filipino / Indian maids who have no authority over them. On top of that, the boys in particular are treated like little gods and indulged (this holds true with other men who are raised in a similar way - like my husband - oldest son, apple of his mother's eye who could do no wrong, etc.). These boys are basically grow up thinking other people exist for their pleasure - to give them what they want and make them feel good about themselves.

Over-indulgence of a child and distant parenting are both cited as factors that contribute to the development of a narcissist.

If you have a significant amount of children being raised this way in a given population, then you will have a significantly higher number of adult males with narcissistic personality disorder in that population as well, and because of that, a larger number of girls will also have grown up putting up and dealing with narcissistic brothers and fathers, which preps them to think such behavior is normal and to not ask for / expect more in future relationships. Now let me just add in here that I don't think ALL Arab men are like this and that all Arab families raise their children this way or that here is the only place you find children raised this way. I don't think this problem exists here because they are worse than any other group of people. They are normal people, capable of good or bad behavior, like everyone else on earth. BUT I do think certain factors - large families combined with newly acquired wealth (sometimes unearned or easily acquired), heavy reliance on hired help in child rearing, certain traditional attitudes regarding boys (males) vs. girls (females), sense of superiorty (nationals vs. non nationals and particularly Asian non nationals who tend to be the ones caring for the children) - contribute to this problem. I mean let's face it, if a child is never told no, if it is receiving care from people it learns to identify (from the example set by parents) as beneath itself and owing it this care (because they are hired to do it - its their job / duty ) they are more likely to grow up thinking that a) others are beneath them b) they deserve to have whatever they want c) people owe it to them to give them what they want and need.

Narcissists are like vampires, they feed off of the emotions, reactions and insecurities of their chosen victims. Before I knew that such a term "narcissistic personality disorder" existed, I used to call them "emotional vampires." And then, when reading about narcissists this past weekend, I saw another person refer to them by exactly the same term. Whatever the case, to a narcissist their partners, friends, loved ones, anyone who is putting up with their shit is not a person, they are what therapists like to call their "narcissistic supply" - they exist to feed the narcissist's emotional void.

Expressing love for a narcissist, being patient, putting up with his crap, are all seen as weaknesses by him, weaknesses that he will exploit and for which he will hold his victim in contempt. He will not appreciate anything that is done for him, because deep down inside of himself, so deep that he is not aware of it, he hates himself and this is why he is obsessed with himself. Doing things for him will not "help him realize his better nature and become a better person." The only way for him to possibly learn anything and get the help he needs (therapy) is to lose everything. So leaving him, might actually be the only thing one can do that might (might) possibly help him.

If a narcissist appears to have spontaneously changed and be acting nicer for a while or appreciative, it is only so he can string his victim along some more.

If you want revenge, the best revenge is to leave him and ignore him as much as you can. No matter what he does to try to upset you, do not give him any more of your emotions, even anger, that is what he wants and needs from you. Once he gets nothing from you, he will leave you alone and move on and find a new victim. Don't waste your time wondering if he is treating his new victim better, because he is not; and if he is, it isn't because he likes them better than he liked you or appreciates them more, it is either because he has to (some external factor is forcing him to behave better) or because he is still fattening them for the kill so to speak.

In the Roman Version of the Narcissus Myth, a nymph named Echo, falls in love with Narcissus, who was the son of the blue Nymph Liriope and the river god Cephisus.

Because of his great beauty, by the time he had reached "his sixteenth year," (fifteen years of age, by modern reckoning) every youth and girl in the town was in love with him, but he haughtily spurned them all.

One day, when he was out hunting stags, Echo stealthily followed him through the woods, longing to address him but unable to speak first. When Narcissus finally heard footsteps and shouted "Who's there?", Echo answered "Who's there?" And so it went, until finally she showed herself and rushed to embrace the lovely youth. He pulled away from the nymph and told her to leave him alone. Narcissus left Echo heartbroken and she spent the rest of her life in lonely glens, pining away for the love she never knew, until only her voice remained.

I find this version of the myth interesting, because, it illustrates what happens to those who are unfortunate enough to love narcissists and persist in this love. Pouring all of your love into the emotional void that is a Narcissist will drain you until you are obliterated and nothing remains except pain and tears.

Because, they are void of normal human emotions (like love) they feel empty, so they suck all the emotions and feelings from their victims, but it is never enough, so they are discontent and they blame their victim for not being able to satisfy them or fill the emptiness. When their victim has nothing more to give, they will discard them and find another victim. As long as you keep giving to narcissist they will keep taking. The only way to be free is to stop giving - stop feeding their sick hunger otherwise all you become is a faint Echo of what you used to be.

Babies

2009-06-10T03:15:00.000-07:00

They're so cute when they're brand new and tiny....

Salman - newborn (next to my sister in law's ugly doll - for size comparison)

My little Guy when he was 1 1/2 months old

I love the little hands
the tiny feet
the wispy hair
the sweet breath
of babies

the way they turn their head and open their mouths when you stroke their cheeks
the way they grunt and squirm when you hold them to your shoulder...

I miss having a baby

Maid Speak and Weird Local Men

2009-06-09T12:21:00.000-07:00

I took the kids to see UP this past weekend. "A" went with us. It was a very cute movie; "A" even laughed, which means something because "A" is a really moody and often cranky guy - at least when I am around him he is, which isn't that often really. The kids see much much more of him than I do.

"A" was married several years ago to a Dutch lady. She and their baby daughter died, along with her mother in a car crash when she went home on holiday. Three generations wiped out in a single blow. He never remarried and doesn't have any children of his own. I guess that is why he likes my boys so much. Especially the little one. He is a father who lost his child and they are children who lost their father - they kind of fit. I don't know if I do, but ....
.

After the movie "A" dropped us at home, and as we were pulling up to the gate, I saw that Sablah, my new Ethiopian maid was outside walking the dog. This bothered me. I don't like her going out like that when we are not there. She just got a mobile and some local guys have started calling her. I am certain they aren't calling her for her great conversation skills since her English is limited to the point that it often frustrates me and her Arabic is even worse. I can only guess she meets them when she slips out of the house like that. The best part of it all was that, when she took the dog out and closed the gate behind her - it latches automatically when closed - she left the key inside the house so that meant she and we were all locked out. Nice! I had to hoist Salman over the wall so he could jump down on the other side and open it for us. I have no idea what I would have done if that was not possible.

Sablah does a lot of strange and impractical things. For example: I bought a Turkey and kept it in the freezer in the spare fridge in the courtyard. Last weekend, while putting some groceries away in the lower (not freezer) part of the fridge, I noticed a plastic bag wedged in the corner. It had smelly raw decaying turkey bits in it - the neck and other parts of the carcass. I opened the freezer and to my horror saw my turkey was not there anymore. I don't think I need to tell anyone that turkeys are not the cheapest things to buy. So it turns out that Sablah, who had never seen a Turkey before in her life, decided to thaw it out - which in and of itself scares me because the only way to safely thaw out a turkey is in the fridge over several days - and had been carving away at it, using it as she would an ordinary chicken. I asked her "Sablah, you see this thing like big chicken?" "yes" she gasped - Ethiopians have this weird way of saying yes where they simultaneously gulp the word in as they say it and exhale at the same time - it sounds like a gasp of sorts. "You know what it is?" "no"
"Then why you cook it?" (I have to speak broken English and leave out any words that aren't absolutely necessary - the extra words just confuse her - I call it "maid speak" since I have had more than one maid I had to use it on - my kids are masters of maid speak, I have to remind myself to speak it and don't do it so well) There really was no reasonable answer for it. If I was in her shoes, I would not just take the frozen carcass of an animal I have never before encountered and decide to cook it without asking about it.

She did the same thing with the expensive steak I bought to be grilled. There were four big fat juicy pieces and then suddenly there were only two. She had cut them up and used them in macaroni of all things! Again, it just isn't something I would do. Common sense would prevent me from doing it. Which makes me wonder if common sense isn't so common after all. I mean maybe different cultures have different common senses?

She also has blown up two eggs by boiling them until all the water dried up and they exploded - lovely smell that makes.

Anyway, after we got in the house, I decided to take a walk - I have been trying to eat right and exercise these days to curb the rapid a** expansion that I have going on.

We live just across from the big mosque - the one used for Eid prayers. Between us and the mosque is a big field and in the middle of the field is a square courtyard used for the overflow of people during Eid prayers. It is walled in, and the locals have made the path around the outside into a makeshift track. In the evenings you will see a lot of people walking or jogging on it - mostly Emiratis. I decided to walk there. I hadn't been walking long when a car full of young Emiratis (18 - 20 years old) crept up on my left side (I was walking clockwise around the prayer yard.) It was a convertible. They turned up their rap music as they passed me and then slowed down ahead of me so that I would pass them and then they could pass me again. I ignored them. As they passed me again one of them sang out his phone number while the other two smirked at me.

They went around and passed me again, and again the driver sang out his phone number. I was annoyed at this point so I turned to them and said "NOT INTERESTED!" and then went back to walking. The other two laughed at the driver and he sped off. I thought I was free from them and continued walking, but again they came back and again the driver chanted his phone number. I just rolled my eyes and kept walking. I can't imagine why they would think that such behavior would actually get any woman to look on them favorably and call them?
They passed again. This time one of them asked, with almost a bewildered look on his face, as if he couldn't understand why I hadn't got my mobile out and started dialling yet, asked "why aren't you interested" at this point I was thoroughly annoyed so I turned to them and shouted "Listen little boys! I am old enough to have given birth to you. PLEASE LEAVE ME ALONE!"
They drove off after that :)

After that, I went back to the house and got Max the dog and continued my walk in the neighborhood with him. As I was getting back towards home, one car pulled in front of us and the local guy behind the wheel whipped out his camera and asked if he can take a picture of Max. My brain doesn't operate very quickly when I am surprised so I kind of just gaped at him digesting what he was asking and then he just took one. I don't really care if anyone photographs Max, but I wasn't too happy about the fact that I was in the photo too in all my shocked and sweaty glory.

Please call before stopping by....

2009-06-07T11:54:00.001-07:00

I sat through three boring hours of meeting this morning while freezing my butt off. The CEO called a Department Head meeting and as usual he talked, and talked, and talked, and talked...... by the time I got out I was so cold and bored that I was mentally and physically numb.

I'm feeling kind of smug today and amusing myself by top management's reaction to the new lock on the Executive Office door.

The Operations department FINALLY installed the automatic lock on the door leading to the CEO's and DDG's offices, so people can't just waltz straight in without getting permission.

For most of the employees, this is no big deal, and it makes no difference to their lives because they wouldn't dare barge into the CEO's office uninvited anyway, and in fact, they are scared shitless in his presence and therefore would not WANT to do that, even if they could.

But there are a select few who always reveled in the power and importance they thought they had. They used to walk straight in an interrupt him "hey everybody look at me, look at how important I am, I can just pop in and address the CEO by his first name without being fired on the spot." OK, they don't actually say that, but I can tell they are thinking it. Either that or they are the special pets of the DDG and regularly "pop in" to her office.

So, now with this new lock (which I ordered be installed), they have to ask if they can enter first, and if they are allowed, they will be buzzed in. Such people really hate having to ask secretaries for permission because they assume they are higher beings than mere secretaries.

All morning, I have been watching as certain people try to open the door, can't open it, look puzzled try again, then notice the box fixed next to it with numbers on it, try to push random numbers - as if they think that will work, or maybe they would rather act like they knew the code and just forgot it (because they are so important naturally they would be told) than simply admit that they don't know, that they aren't "special" enough to have been told and ask us to let them in. The funny thing is, I have no idea why the numbers are there because the only way I know to open it involves a card, which only Fatema, Security, the DDG and I have - the CEO would lose his so he isn't allowed to have one - or pushing the buttons at our desks, so there is no "special code" that only the select few have.

Once they finally admit defeat, they have different ways of handling it.

The IT Director seemed quite miffed by it all and said that he should have been aware of this. I asked him "why? it's just a lock, what does it have to do with IT?" I mean really, just because it is electric he needs to know about it? Then why isn't he interested in the damn A/C above my desk? Actually the IT Director is quite a nice guy and isn't much of a bother,but he still seemed pissed off by the lock.

Another Department head, one of the worst walk-straight-in-without-permission offenders, poked at the pad for a while, and then, instead of asking to be let in said "just buzz me in will you" - he was in denial. I told him that "just buzzing him in" without asking the CEO first would kind of defeat the purpose of the whole lock in the first place. On a completely unrelated note, this Director is Indian, and I had a dream the recently that I was at work. It was a completely normal working day, except that this guy had dyed his hair blonde. People say dreams have meanings but I can't figure out what the point of that dream was. He wasn't even a main part of it, but at one point he walked past and his hair was blonde.

HH, the Chairman, was the only person, who is used to walking straight in that doesn't seem bothered by it. In fact he looked at it, smiled, then asked Fatema about it. Of course he knows that, unlike everyone else, he actually has the right to walk straight in and no one can tell him no. He seemed impressed by the door though and he told her she is a genius. Hey it was my idea!! :( sniff sniff. She told him that it was my idea (she is too sweet to take credit for something that is not her idea) but he was already walking away. I am convinced he thinks I am an imbecile. Usually he ignores me, but occasionally he will do something strange like wink at me slightly, and the other day he walked in straight towards us and said hey and raised both of his hands in the air. Neither one of us has a clue what that was about. Fatema thinks that greeting was meant for me, but if it was I have no idea why. Its not like we are old buddies or have some long standing joke that involves us greeting each other that way. Or maybe that's just how he greets imbeciles? Another reason why he usually ignores me might be that I don't speak Arabic and he doesn't have a clue what my name is. I am sure he has been told, but most people don't get it and if they see it spelled than they get even more confused. That means the only option they have left is to speak to me only when they can make eye contact with me.

He's not a bad guy, but I think that he thinks I am weird. Don't ask me why I think that, it is just a feeling.

Ok, I guess that is enough rambling on for today....

Adventures in the friendly skies

2009-05-21T03:34:00.000-07:00

I am having a sneeze attack today. When I woke up this morning I was fine. I was OK during my shower too. But when I went to brush my teeth it started, the tingling in my nose, and then I exploded into non stop sneezing fit, spewing tooth paste foam all over the place. I think I have sneezed at least 300 times since morning and I look like Santa's favorite reindeer.

I am in a bad mood too, which is being made worse by our travel agent. We used to have another agency here; the lady doing the bookings was very accommodating and we could reach her any time and bug her for last minute changes - which are always necessary because my boss always changes his flight about 20 times at the last minute before he goes anywhere. But she was slowly going mad from the pressure of her job and started having paranoid persecution fantasies - that people were going to her home and disconnecting her internet, that her phone was bugged. Poor lady, I really wished I could do something for her. Anyway, now she is gone, and I am not happy with this new company or more accurately the agent they have assigned to deal exclusively with us.

I have been waiting for three days for information - forget an actual booking - about flights to the Czech Republic. First, after I explicitly told him that I didn't want any booking on any weird unknown Eastern European budget airlines and only wanted to hear about flights with airlines like Emirates, British Airways, Swiss Air or Lufthansa, and that I want to see a variety of options (carriers and timings) he sends me - after a day and a half - information about one single option on some Russian Airline that I have never heard of in my life. So I called him, and he tells me that, oh, because the final destination is Zlin and there aren't any of those major airlines going to the airport closest to Zlin (they only go to Prague) he took the liberty of making the bookings on some airline called Aerosvit or something like that. Now, no offense to Aero-Whatever or the country it belongs to, It might be a wonderful airline, a little known gem of the friendly skies, but if I haven't heard of it before, I am not that eager to discover what kind of service it has - and this is a sentiment my boss shares.

This is especially true for me, since the time I flew to Kish 10 years ago for my first visa change when I got here.

For those of you who have never lived in the UAE and don't have the pleasure of being acquainted with its ever-changing immigration laws, a visa change is when someone has to go out of the country to come back on a new visa. This was true for people on visit visas who needed to change to residence visas as well as for people on visit visas wanting to get a new visit visa. They have changed the laws a bit since then - and made them even more vague, so I wont bother to bore you with them in this post.

In my case, we had just arrived in the UAE to live. My husband had been transferred by Uncle Scrooge, from his Zanzibar operations to the Dubai side of the business. He had been in the UAE for a few months, setting things up, finding us an apartment that was cheap enough for Uncle to agree to pay the rent, etc. and I had gone home to the US for Christmas and stayed a few months longer than I expected to, partly due to delays caused by the UAE immigration authorities who kept botching my visit visa - misspelling my name, wrong nationality (they put my nationality as United Nations on one of them) etc. Once I arrived in the UAE, my husband applied for my and Salman's residence visas, and then we had to leave the country and come back in on those visas.

In order to cut down on the expense of visa changes, people would fly to the closest possible destinations and come right back on the next flight. So certain travel agencies developed quite a little business, in connection with budget airlines from neighboring countries to cater to this demand. My husband booked us on some little airline that flew to Kish and back.

I had no idea where Kish was. Until I got my ticket, I had never heard of it before. When I demanded that my husband tell me where it is located he shrugged his shoulders and told me he didn't know. I think he did, but he was afraid to tell me because I had told him I would go anywhere except Iran. (Nothing against Iranians, but as an American, I don't like going to places that have cheery popular slogans like "Death to America")

So I got on the plane, having no idea where I was even going. From the moment I entered, I began to suspect that I was risking my life. The plane was a small and quite old craft with dingy worn out seats. After everyone was seated two guys, in drab colored "western" style street clothes styled in a way that no western man would wear then (tan pants pulled up and belted a little too high, olivey brown button up shirt with a too thin gray shiny tie and a grayish-brown football jersey cut jacket on top of it), and not any sort of uniform that would identify that they actually worked for the "airline" (this is a term that I feel must be used quite loosely in connection with this particular company since I strongly suspect it only had one plane to its name) closed the plane's door, propped a metal folding chair under its handle and sat, on either side of the door glaring at me from under their uni-brows.

The chair alarmed me the most, I wondered the whole time what purpose it served. It seemed to be placed as some sort of latch for the door. I started to pray while the men's angry eyes stayed fixed on me. The plane bumped around a lot and roared suspiciously, even for a small plane. I was used to small planes. When we had lived in Zanzibar, we routinely had to take small passenger planes to get to mainland Africa. In comparison to this "airline" Kenya Airways seemed like a Luxury carrier.

When we landed in Kish, all women on board who were not already wearing abayas were handed one to put on over their clothes. This included me. I had my own abaya that I wore to Uncle Scrooge's Mom's funeral and my own scarf, I would have been happy to wear my own had someone let me know that I was going to Iran. But somebody (that somebody being my husband) hadn't told me, so I had to wear this ugly and very short abaya that god knows how many other women had worn before. My head started to itch at the thought of it.

We got off the plane and shuffled into the airport. Some official took an extra long time scrutinizing my American Passport and look from it to me to Salman to my husband.

The whole time I sat in the airport waiting to board the return flight I was thinking "my God, I am in Iran, if my parents only knew where I am now." I also started wondering what all the smug Presbyterian kids from my highschool would think if they knew I was wearing an Abaya and headscarf and sitting in an airport in Iran.... or the fact that I was married to someone whose official first name is Mohamed.

I managed to survive my first and only trip to Iran on an ancient airplane, but others weren't so lucky, some time after that a flight carrying visa change passengers between Kish and Dubai crashed.

The smallest plane I ever went up in was with my husband as pilot. He was building up hours on his pilot license so we went up in a 4 seater (including the seats for the Pilot and Copilot). We took off from Nairobi's Wilson Airport on the outskirts of the city bordering on South B and other newer residential areas. We flew out over the game parks, and landed on a small airstrip of one of the safari lodges (the same one where I found out later he had spent the night only a few weeks before with Nimisha, the first - but not last - Indian girl with whom he cheated on me during our engagement and marriage). We had a coke at the empty open air bar by the river. I can still remember the way the air smelled out there, so fresh, and the way the sun shone in the special way that it only shines out of a big African sky, and I still remember how alive and happy I felt, and how I loved him so much it felt like my heart would burst: I was about to be married; I was in Africa - Kenya - the place I will love most of all to my dying day: I thought all my dreams had come true. On the way back, we swooped down and flew over a herd of elephants. It was glorious. Even though the plane was really small, and it was quite windy, so we bounced all over the place, I never felt scared. My love was the pilot, and I knew he would take care of me and never let us crash, but if we did, I thought "at least I will die happy with my love by my side." Sometimes, in my darker hours, I wish we had died then - or I had - so I never had to see all of my dreams crumble, but then I would never have met my wonderful beautiful little boys, and that would be a much bigger loss than that of my dreams.

By the way, I am home now. I took a Clarinase tablet and my sneezing stopped, so it must have been some kind of allergic reaction, but my nose feels like it has been through a war.

A Great way to end a week and six very good reasons why I should not have bothered to come to work today.

2009-05-17T00:07:00.000-07:00

I had an absolutely splendid weekend.

That was sarcastic, it was actually pretty dull, except for some drama and a bit of blood and gore on Friday evening.

On Friday morning I drove to Oman. That went fine, no holiday this weekend so the border was pretty much empty. Only snag was when the Omani Immigration official somehow didn't notice my UAE visa and tried to charge me 60 dirhams, oh, and when a goat just stood there in the middle of the road in front of my car refusing to let me pass through the checkpoint gate. The goats, who hang out at the border (such a happening place) are used to cars honking at them, which means they are aren't bothered by the sound of honking at all. Coming back, the drive was fine, thankfully, I didn't almost plow down any Pakistanis this time - I was a little later than last time, so I think I missed the after-prayers road-side assembly.

I stopped at McDonalds and got food for the kids and the maid - myself too if you count a salad as food. My maid told me she wanted to go see her sister in Dubai and would come back on Saturday.

In the evening I took my kids to see the Star Trek Movie, which rekindled my childhood crush on Spock, though I have to admit I found the bad guy attractive too - then I remembered that Romulins (don't know if I spelled that right) and Vulcans are supposed to be related to each other. Also, though I didn't realize it at the time - what with the shaved head and the pointing eyebrows - the Bad Guy was played by Eric Bana, so I think that is reason enough to find him attractive. Spock's father also looked familiar but I just couldn't place him... now I realize that he is Ben Cross - (Harold Abrams - Chariots of Fire and the vampire, Barnabas - Dark Shadows).

When I got home, the kids started their usual rough play and were taking fly leaps from my bed straight at my wardrobe. When they do this, as they crash into it, just barely managing to grab the top edge, and then pull themselves and scramble up to the top, where they proceed to take flying leaps off onto my bed. Of course, this elicited yells and threats from me, so they settled for just wrestling on my bed, which ended up with Little Guy hitting his head against the night stand and howling. Salman looking guilty immediately started with the "well, he was on top of me and I was just trying to get him off"

I put my hand on his head and it felt wet so it was bleeding. I showed Salman, and he looked quite alarmed. "I didn't push him THAT hard!" he said. "Then why is his head bleeding?" At this point at the mention of blood Little Guy started to howl even louder. I took him to the bathroom to hose off his head so I could see the cut and if it required a trip to the ER - which I was praying it would not (though I know it sounds like great fun, a trip to the ER at 9:30 PM was not something I was looking forward to). When Little Guy saw the bloody water washing off of his head he wailed "Now you have killed me Salman! Salman is a KILLER!" and the howled in anguish some more. The cut wasn't the smallest one, but it wasn't quite what I thought needed stitches and the bleeding seemed to subside a bit after I washed it. So I put a towel on his head and said we would wait a little bit and see. Salman was crying at this point. I could tell he felt really bad, so I told him that if he wanted to help out he could go get ice from the outside freezer and put it in a plastic bag and hold it on his brother's head. Fortunately, there wasn't too much blood after that, so a trip to the ER for stitches was not required and Salman spent the rest of the evening trying to take care of his little brother.

Then we just sat quietly in my bed and watched Survivor Tocantins until we fell asleep. Finally they voted that weirdo "Coach" out. He didn't see it coming, of course, and referred to Stephen the geeky (but clever) Jewish guy as an "evil wizard" for voting against him.

The next day the only "big thing" we did was give the dog a bath. He didn't want one, so we had to drag him over to the hose, but once we got started he didn't fight too much. Of course he did do the doggy shake a couple of times and spray doggy water all over me - yay! Now he looks extra fluffy and smells nice too.

Now it's back to work, and I can't say it has started on the greatest note. I hope this isn't an indication of how "great' the rest of the week is going to be.

First I have big zit under my lip. It looks horrible and concealer doesn't really conceal anything.

Second, the driver showed up early and started honking wildly. That always makes me nervous; so I was rushing around to get out the door and forgot to pack myself something to eat for a snack or for lunch

Third, I could only find one of the pair of shoes I had planned to wear so I was forced to wear a pair that looks absolutely stupid with what I am wearing because I did not have any time to change into a different outfit. At times like this I can see the appeal of wearing an Abaya.

Fourth, I got in to work only to discover my desk covered in dirty water dripping from the A/C on the wall above my desk. This is the same A/C that drips water EVERY TIME IT IS TURNED ON and has been doing so for the almost one year I have worked here. In spite of the fact that the office has central A/C and this unit is not necessary - unless the central A/C is off - someone keeps turning the d*** thing on so I come and find my papers in my out tray and in tray covered with brown splotchy water stains and the carpet around my desk soaked so I then have to keep my purse and lap top bag on my desk all day and have no room to do anything else.

I have complained about this A/C repeatedly and the facility (maintenance) department always sends someone to "fix" it. Which for them just means sending one guy who stands there for a minute switching it on and off a couple of times and pressing some buttons and then leaving it telling me it will be "OK" now and then sending another guy about 10 minutes later when I call again because it has started spraying dirty water on my head. The second guy will watch it drip scratch his head, push a few more buttons and then switch it off again and tell me that it is dripping because ice built up inside, as if that is some sort of "excuse". I don't think they actually ever fix it, because it does the same thing every time it is switched on, unless they think turning it off = fixing it. In which case, I should be promoted to head technician since I can take those technical skills one step further and propose that we NEVER SWITCH IT ON to begin with. I don't know who keeps using it, but I swear if I ever find out, they are going to find me sitting at their desk when they come in next time.

I am beginning to understand why my boss says I need to stop being nice to people and should raise my voice more. Because, today I lost it, and for the first time, the technician who came said something different than what they usually say: "maybe we should remove this A/C"

Really you think so?!!

Hallelujah, finally! At last we are getting somewhere! Of course, I know that is is only the first baby step in what is sure to be a long and tedious process of me nagging them and reminding them to remove / replace it, which will probably involve:

More than one passive agressive email from me clearly and firmly stating the problem, then sarcastically refering to how "i know how busy they have been for the past year" and hinting at their incompetence, then descending into whining, and finishing off by an apologetic, thanks for your assistance and sorry for nagging so much, which I will throw in after I start to worry that maybe I sound too bitchy, and if I do, the next time the water pump shorts out at my home, the maintenance staff wont be so eager to assist me.

Several phone calls where I berate the helpless operations department receptionist and make her listen to all of my problems, which again will end with me suddenly feeling guilty, apologizing for getting too worked up, and thanking her for helping me.

Finally losing it at least one more time

Fifth, since my day was already going so well, I found out someone had also messed with the power supply so my printer was off and I could not plug in my lap top, so I also had a temper tantrum about that, and FINALLY someone agreed to replace the long white thing with multiple sockets in it (I can't remember the word for it at the moment).

Sixth, the icing on my cake, the IT department came and asked me to give them my "old computer"
"Excuse me, you mean the one I am using right now?"
"no the one you were carrying around"
"you took the one I was carrying around last week"
"no, we have the new one"
"that is the one I was carrying around"
"well we need your old one"
"well then I need the new one back"
"you will get it back"
"when?"
"this evening"
"then you can have this one this evening"
"but we need to do a backup"
"then what am I supposed to use all day?" .... silence

Invasion of the Giant Cockroaches round 2

2009-05-14T11:19:00.000-07:00

Well, I am sitting in my room smothering in toxic fumes. because I just dispensed an entire can of roach spray on a two inch monster that was making a break across my hall from the bathroom for the kitchen.

I was sitting in my room minding my business, when Salman popped his head in the door with a terrified look on his face "Mommy!",
"What?!" I said, frightened by the look on his face.
"Mommy" he just said and start making gestures with his hand which I totally misinterpreted to mean something was terribly wrong with his little brother. I probably thought that because I was in the middle of watching a particulary heart rending episode of Ghost Whisperer - what a corny show - where the ghost was a kid who got run over by a lawn mower and it was his brother's fault because they were fooling around on the riding mower.

I harbor a secret fear that, in one of their many sessions of play that erupt into fist fights and slapping and kicking and punching, one of them is going to accidentally, but seriously, hurt the other one. Of course, when I tell them that when they are still mad and I say something like "don't ever kick your brother in the stomach, you could damage his internal organs and kill him" the offending child will say things like "good, I hope so, I hope he DIES! I wish I didn't have a brother!". The only one that seems to get upset by them saying things like that is me, and I say things like "don't you EVER say that you would feel TERRIBLE if something happened to him and it was your fault". I say such boring and predictable stereotypical mom things. I wish I could come up with something better than that, because that stuff doesn't catch their attention at all.

I vaguely remember saying similar things about hating one of my numerous siblings and having them say the same about me as well, but I never realized at the time how stressful it must have been for my Mom to hear it.

So anyway, I was imagining Little Guy in pool of blood in the hall, so I hauled my big butt off the bed and into the hall as fast as I could carry myself.

By the way .... even as I am writing this they have just fallen off the bed in a tussle and one of them has banged their head on the floor and is now slapping the other one.... and I am yelling and telling them to knock it off, and they are barely taking notice and I feel completely ineffective - at times like this I really wonder what it would be like to have daughters. When I came home from work today, I found Little Guy on top of my cupboard about to jump off....

Ok ...I am back (bet you didn't know I was gone); my shreiking, flailing of arms and threatening them with punisments I am currently too weak and tired to enforce (I am very sick with a bad cold or flu or whatever and worked 12 hours straight today) has made them quiet down for a couple minutes, so let's see... where was I...

Ah yes - the cockroach... so I ran into the hall and there I saw it. Now, on the one hand I was relieved that my youngest one had not lost any blood and was safely perched on top of the sofa in the family room; but, on the other hand I was horrified by the sight of the hefty insect that was hauling ass towards my kitchen ,where it no doubt had plans to deposit its huge egg sac so its little babies couldn't infiltrate and infect all of my food and cupboards. I screamed at the top of my lungs, and I guess it heard me because it stopped and turned towards me.

My poor maid, Sablah, who already thinks I am a psycho, came running wondering what nonsense I was up to. I was happy that this time she could see I had good reason for making a scene. She looked startled at the sight of the giant bug too, which just goes to show how big the damn thing was, because she is from Africa, and I know from personal experience just how big the roaches can get there. But at least she had the presence of mind to actually move (the kids and I were all frozen in our tracks) and run to the kitchen and fetch the can which had handy illustrations of dead roaches on it - she can barely speak English so I am pretty sure she can't read it at all. She was about to spray, but I was afraid she would just annoy it with a small spray that would send it running around in a frenzy that would scare the pants off of me. So I took the can from her and then pointed it at the roach and sprayed with all my might and didn't stop for a full two minutes.

Ok, the boys are at it again, one is being dragged off the bed by his leg by the other one and is hanging on for dear life to the bed spread which is slowing coming unanchored and sliding off with him... why did God give me boys?!!

Back to the roach.... By the time I stopped spraying, I had pretty much emptied the entire can on the creature, which was now lying on its back with its legs weakly waving around in the air. (Why do bugs always turn on their backs to die?) It was still way too alive for me to consider touching it, plus I was having a coughing fit, brought on by the fact that I already am sick and had inhaled about as much of the poison gas as the roach had. Luckily, Sablah is a lot braver than I am, because it was dead enough for her to pick it up with paper towel and dispose of it.

Now my little one (and I) are afraid to use that bathroom. I think they somehow get in through the pipes, because its not like I am breeding giant roaches IN my house, at least I hope I am not... obviously it is time to call the exterminator again. When we first moved in we called him and he sprayed everywhere inside and out and giant roaches were oozing out of the drains outside to die...

Sadly, this is probably the most action I am going to see all weekend, except I have to drive to Oman again tomorrow for the monthly visa change for the kids and you never know what might happen there - I don't know why I am saying that, it is never eventful... the closest our last trip got to excitement was when I was flying down the highway on my way back and I almost hit a bunch of Pakistanis who for some reason thought that the fast lane of the highway - right after a bend in the road - would be a good place to gather for their Friday after prayers meet and greet.
Apparently the side of the road isn't happening enough for them so they have to crowd on the median strip that is only one foot wide and has a cement barrier jutting out of it - which means they are actually standing in the road. I don't know what genius thought up that arrangement but I almost killed a bunch of them. Luckily no one else was in the other lane so I swerved. The best part was when I honked wildly at them and they all looked at me like I was out of my mind.

Sometimes what appears to be the total lack (or use) of common sense just astounds me. Yes perhaps the middle of a raod is normal place to gather when you live in a little village and the fastest thing passing by is a mule cart, but this was a goddamned multi lane highway where car and trucks fly by at 140+

Every time I drive somewhere and get home safely in this country, I feel the smug satisfacton that I have cheated death yet another time. God help me...

Max and Me

2009-05-11T01:08:00.000-07:00

Salman is sick with some kind of bad flu or cold.

Yesterday "A" took him to the doctor for me. He came home with about 7 different kinds of medicine, and we had to make a chart to keep track of when he should take what, because it was too confusing to just remember. It turns out, after charting it all out, that the poor kid will be taking some medicine or another every two hours, which means of course I will be sleep deprived - luckily the antibiotic needs to be taken at times when I should be awake, and that is the most important of his medicines so if I accidentally snooze through some doses of calpol and nasal spray it might be OK.

Now, I think I am getting the flu/cold/whatever too. Lucky me, since I don't feel like I have the option to call in sick. I mean, when I am sick and I want to leave work at 4 PM - which is supposed to be closing time and when everybody else goes home - I feel guilty for leaving and find myself standing in front of my boss' desk red faced rambling on nervously about how ill I feel, and feeling like I am lying even though I am not.

Because Salman was sick, I had to take Max out for a walk all by myself yesterday evening. He was all eager and waiting when I got home from work and yelped in disappointment when I entered the gate and closed it behind me instead of taking him out. He probably had to relieve himself. I noticed he gets extra wild when he has to do those things and he does a weird little dance - the dog version I guess of the pee dance that little kids - and I - sometimes do when they have to go really badly and are kept waiting. Billy never did that, but that's because she had no qualms about pooping / peeing right in the front court yard if we did not manage to anticipate the exact moment in which she had to do her business. She was just starting to learn where such things should and should not be done when she had her accident. Poor Billy :(

Max is really smart; when he sees me holding my sneakers, he knows I am about to go for a walk, and he gets really excited. He is a really sweet dog, but he scares me a little when he gets excited. I am not really a dog person so they spook me easily. But he scares me, because after we got him, I was trying to figure out what kind of mutt he is, so I posted his picture on Facebook to see what my friends and family had to say, and most of them said he looks part Chow... So then I went and read about Chows, and I got freaked out because they are one of those breeds, like Pit Bulls, that are bred for agressiveness and have been known to turn on their masters and try to eat them - nice! I can't really imagine Max doing that, because he seems to make a conscious effort to be a "good boy" most of the time, but when he is hungry or has to "go" he acts a little weird sometimes.

Anyway, yesterday Max and I went for a really long walk - two times around an extremely big block - about an hour. When we first start out on our walks, he is always bursting with energy and has to inspect and then pee on every clump of grass, mound of dirt/sand, bush, tree or garbage heap we pass. That's kind of annoying when I am trying to keep up the pace of the walk so I can tell myself it was a "good enough" work out and not use my machine at home.

I don't know how I got to be so lazy. Just two years ago, I used to spend 2-3 hours at the gym - one hour of that on the stair mill. I used to have an awesome ass, which I didn't realize of course and only realize now after looking at old photos of myself in a bathing suit, which my mother took on the sly because I never was the sort to prance Bay Watch style on the beach in my bikini. Now my lower portions resemble dimpled bread dough, it's really rather frightening and depressing.

I watched Dr. 90210 do a "Brazilian Butt Augmentation" on some woman the other night. They suck fat out of the rest of your body and then pour it into some vat and stir it around - it looks like tomato sauce - and then pass it through a seive and collect the pure fat and inject it back in your butt so you get a popping round behind. I also saw them suck the fat out of some woman's knees and inject it into her hands so they would look younger. It's kind of tempting in concept ... to suck fat out of where you don't want it and inject it where you need it and are losing it... That's really one of the saddest ironies of life - that as you get older you find it easier and easier to store fat in all the wrong places while you keep losing it in all the places you need it - like your checks and lips and boobs. One thing I don't understand is how they can make the injections of liquid fat stay where they want it to... I mean, why doesn't the butt flatten out when you sit on it? I wonder is that a possible complicaton of such a procedure. If it is, I am sure that is what would happen to me... all the fat would be squeezed from behind and migrate to my thighs. God has a way of teaching me a lesson when I make any attempt to be vain at all.

One weird thing about that show, when they are doing a breast augmentation they blur out just the nipple - but since that is where they are working, I don't know why they bother to show the procedure at all. When they do a tummy tuck - by far one of the most disturbing things to watch (the way they cut of the big slab of fat and skin like it is a steak) - the don't blur anything, but when they were doing some nose surgery they blurred that completely - I can't understand why. I mean the nose is by far the least obscene part of the body of all those that they show - boobs, stomach, hips, butts...

That was kind of a tangent.... back to my walk.

Every time we get near a dumpster - which seem to be everywhere here teaming and overflowing with foul smelling garbage - he starts dragging me towards them - that's because they are hangouts for gangs of cats. Sometimes we will be walking peacefully and suddenly my shoulder is almost yanked out of its socket and I find myself hurtling at top speed towards a cat in the middle of a mountain of old decomposing food and soggy paper bits. The cats have quite an attitude and I think they enjoy it. They will stand there just staring at Max as he rockets towards them and then, just before he reaches, they shoot off and disappear into some corner or bush where he can't follow them. Others lay low in patches of weeds like tiny little lions hiding from their prey, watching in amusement as he wimpers and barks because he knows they are somewhere nearby but just can't quite make out where. Sometimes, when he is out on the courtyard, they get up on the wall and calmly parade back and forth in front of him, enjoying his frustration at not being able to reach them.

Max is quite a beautiful dog I guess, because every time we walk several people stop their cars to look at him, and children come out to ask me if they can pet him. Luckily, he is not a racist. My South African former co-worker had a racist dog. She only liked white people. Max doesn't seem to mind any skin color, maybe because my maid is black, my kids are brown and I am white. I've noticed, though, that white people seem to be the least afraid of him. A lot of Indian and African people especially look scared when we walk by and ask me if he is going to bite them. I tell them "no" but I sometimes have the urge to say "yes" just to see what their reaction will be. I guess I find the question kind of dumb, since you can kind of tell the type of dog that doesn't like strangers and will bite anyone it can, because they let you know by growling first, baring their teeth and barking at you. Max pretty much ignores most people and just acknowledges them with an absent minded wag of the tail; when he is out on his walks he is far more concerned with making sure every bush that Nelson (another dog in the neighborhood) has peed on is peed on by him too and chasing cats.

The thing I like about taking walks with Max is that I feel safe. Sometimes I get kind of creeped out if I walk alone. Max is a sweet heart and wouldn't hurt anyone, but he is big enough to look scary - he has fur like a lion's mane - so to strangers he looks quite formidable

I think Max has a cold too because he sneezed several times and his energy was low on our second time around the block. When a cat ran in front of him on our second round, he made a half-hearted lung towards it and then stopped, let out a wimper, and continued walking and towards the end, when a whole gang of the exploded out of a dumpster near us, he didn't even bother to do that. When I reached the front of our gate again, I decided to tease him and pretend I was passing it again for a third round. He stopped dead in his tracks in front of the gate and looked at me. "Come on Max" I said and tugged at the leash. He sat down and wimpered.

Dogs may not be able to "talk" but they can sure get their message across when necessary.

This is Max by the way....

Ye cannot serve both God and Mammon

2009-05-08T13:43:00.001-07:00

I am really struggling with rage these past few days. I just don't know how to forgive my husband and my in laws. I guess part of me doesn't want to forgive them, because I feel like if I do, they will "get away" with everything they have done and not have to pay for it or own up to it some day. So most of the time, I try not to think about any of them so that I can move past it and let it all go, but somehow or another something comes up that brings all the pain to the surface again.

This time it's a wedding.

My sister-in-law got married a week ago. Normally a wedding is not an occasion that brings about feelings of rage; but you see, I found out about the wedding a few days later from my friend in Nairobi, a Hindu woman, whose daughter was invited because she is the step daughter of my cousin-in-law - which apparently is a more important relative to invite than the bride's brother's sons. Not that I have anything against my friend's daughter being invited, I just find it sad that my son's were left off the guest list. Yes, I know that they live here and probably wouldn't have been able to attend, but they still should have been invited the same way I am sure all other relatives living abroad were.

I dislike my in-laws for the way they have treated me, but I despise them for the way they have treated my sons - for the way they have erased them from their family so they could make way for my husband's illegitimate daughter and her useless mother who seems to have accomplished nothing since highschool except get pregnant out of wedlock, not once, but twice. Her first child is a 15 year old boy - I don't know who his father is.

From what I know, she never attended university and never worked for any extended period of time or in any sort of job worth mentioning. What she has done in the 17 years since she graduated highschool is gamble frequently enough to be known for having a gambling habit or problem, sit on her ass, and get pregnant by two different men, neither of whom were / are her husband, one of whom however was my husband at the time she slept first slept with him and unfortunately still is.

My husband likes to exaggerate and brag if there is anything at all that he thinks he can exaggerate or brag about, for example how "fair" his daughter is (whoop dee doo! forgive me for not being duly impressed) Now don't get me wrong, I don't think being white is better than being black, brown or tan. I don't think that possessing the ability to age and sunburn faster than other people is a great accomplishment (in fact I feel quite the opposite, and I prefer darker skin tones than my own), but being mixed race people (African and Indian )who are trying to pretend they are "pure" Punjabis, I realized not long into my marriage that being fair is a big deal for him and his family. Actually, let me correct that, being a fair skinned Indian is something to be proud of, but being a white person of European origin is something to be ashamed of. So, when he was crowing about his daughter's fairness, I knew he was boasting.

Anyway, whatever the case, the point is that he brags if he can, and when I asked him about his girlfriend, the most he could come up with was she has "worked a little bit" in her life time, and the way he audibly gulped and forced that admission out of his mouth told me a lot, namely that there isn't much to brag about as far as her accomplishments are concerned.

I suppose it seems as though I look down on her, and I suppose if I were to be honest I would have to admit that I do, as wrong as that may be, I just can't seem to help it. I am not inclined to like her anyway, all things considered, and I am even less inclined to do so after she casually informed me that my husband is "too busy" to talk to his sons so that is why he never calls them.

But what I am feeling right now, after hearing about this wedding, is partly due to the fact that it is stirring up lots of bad memories. You see, I found out about my sister in law's wedding almost the same exact way I found out about my husband's double life. The same friend's same daughter attended her father's engagement to my cousin-in -law a year ago and and, when telling her mother about it afterward, mentioned that my husband was there with his wife, which caught her mother's attention, since she knew that I am his wife and was fairly certain I was in Dubai at the time. So she asked her daughter "his wife? who do you mean?" to which her daughter replied with a shrug "I don't know, some big fat lady." My friend was then kind enough to tell me what she heard and what his cousin's mother (my children's great aunt) who live's here in Dubai was not kind enough to tell me - exactly how rotten my husband really is.

The news, though shocking and sickening, wasn't as surprising as it would have been if I had not already heard (from another Hindu girl who used to be his neighbor and whose sister is married to the brother in law of another of my husband's cousin) that her boyfriend had seen him out and about holding hands with "very fat muslim woman"(to quote him exactly) and shortly after that another rumor (from her sister's / his cousin's mother-in-law) that he had remarried and his wife had delivered a baby boy. When I first got wind of those stories, I called him and asked him about them, and he had denied them by mournfully stating in his best "poor lonely me" voice that he would never dream of marrying again and that he did not have a son, indignantly asking why I would believe the word of "troublemakers" and "gossips" such as his former neighbor and her sister and wondering out loud why people have nothing better to do than come up with such stories.

As soon as I heard what my friend's daughter reported, I knew it was true and that he had been lying. Aside from the fact that my daughter's friend and his former neighbor who do not know each other at all had both described this other woman as "very fat" (which seemed like more than coincidence), there was also no reason to doubt the word of my friend's 12 year old daughter who has no reason to lie or "make trouble." I then ambushed his Auntie here in Dubai with the news, and she denied up and down that she knew about it; she even swore, but I knew she was lying. How could she not know that her nephew attended her own daughter's engagement party with another woman everyone was calling his wife? I realized at that point that everyone that I had considered family and trusted had been lying to me all along.

Angry and hurt as hell, I confronted his cousin. Caught off guard, she caved, admitting everything, including the bit about the daughter and the added bonus, that he wasn't actually married to the woman in question but that they were just saying they were married so "the community wouldn't look down on them."

By the time I actually spoke to him about it, he had been warned by his family that I already knew everything. He was quite resentful, and his tone was oddly accusing, as if to say "how dare you find out that I am a cheating bastard and ask me to explain myself." He confirmed that they were not married and that he had no plans to marry again - a bit of information that he said in voice that seemed as if I was supposed to feel sorry for him. He told me his daughter was 5 months old and that she looks just like Salman. I told him that I found that highly unlikely considering that not only does she not have the same mother as Salman, but her mother and I are also of completely different races and Salman doesn't look exactly like him, and in fact has a lot of traits from my family. He completely ignored this and went on about how "fair" her mother is as if that was supposed to prove something, as if all fair skinned people are physically identical to each other.

His excuse for lying to me earlier, was that he had not in fact lied since he is not married and his child is not a son. I am sure God is impressed with his truthfulness.

So now here I am one year later, still married to someone who parades around in public with another woman who is not his wife and their daughter, who does not provide for me or his sons. All attempts to get a divorce so far have failed due to one legal technicality or another because we are in two different countries. From his side it would be easy enough, but he told me he doesn't have the money to pay the 2,000 dirhams ( about 600 US dollars) for court fees to process it. Meanwhile he bought a new car, and his girlfriend's facebook shows lovely picturees of them on an extended holiday at a hotel on the coast.

Oh, his sister married a Hindu man. This is the same girl who informed me on more than one occasion how it was such a disgrace that I am Christian and how ashamed the family is that I am Christian... Of course religion is only a consideration when the person is also the wrong race and not wealthy, so it seems that it doesn't actually matter at all. In fact they were also ashamed of his cousin marrying a poor half African Muslim Girl and another Cousin marrying a White revert. But they don't seem to have any problem with her marrying a Hindu or her cousins marrying Sikhs.

But her husband and her cousins husbands are RICH and "pure" Indians.

"No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon (wealth)."

It seems obvious which one they serve.

R.I.P. Billy

2009-04-27T23:01:00.001-07:00

Our dog Billy died a couple of month's ago; she got hit by a car.

It was horrible, I was right there and I couldn't stop it.

Ever since I had surgery on my eye, a driver has been taking me to and from work. On the morning it happened, my driver was late, and I was standing outside the gate waiting for her with my two ton computer bag, purse and lunch. Billy was always hyper in the morning. She was just a baby so she had a lot of energy; as usual she was running around in the courtyard excitedly knowing that Salman would come out to walk her in a few minutes.

The street we live on is usually pretty quiet and empty. It is only a bit busy in the morning, because we live just down from the English Speaking School so there are parents and buses going to and fro dropping kids. Every morning, I was very careful to close the gate behind me if Billy was not on her walk yet, to make sure she didn't get out. But that morning, my lazy maid, who had just woken up and called the grocery to bring her a phone card, opened the ,after I was already outside. She asked me if the grocery had come and told her no and to please be careful because Billy was behind her and I didn't want her to get out. At the same time my driver showed up - 15 minutes late - so I rushed to get in the car. As I was about to close the door, I saw that, instead of doing as I asked, she had stepped through the gate and left it wide open. Billy shot out past her and into the sand lot next to our house. "Ashari!" I said. "I am late for work, please grab her before she goes far and put her back inside." Ashari, who pretty much considered herself too good for most work, laughed and waved her hand lazily and said "oh she will come back." "No!" I told her, "You know she is not supposed to be let out, especially not in the morning; you see this traffic? She will go into the road and she will get hit by a car!" Just as I said that, little Billy shot into the road, and headed towards our car. My driver, seeing this opened her door to try to grab her as she passed. But, this freaked Billy out and she turned and ran into the middle of the road where she was immediately hit by an oncoming car.

I heard the sickening thud as she bounced off the car. My heart started to pound, and I felt like crying. There was silence for a few seconds, and then the howling started. I jumped out of the passenger seat of the car and ran to look in the road. I saw her dragging herself in circles crying and trying to bite her own backside. I was afraid another car would hit her, but luckily, the next driver saw her and stopped so that none of the cars coming behind her could run over Billy. I stepped towards Billy thinking to try (as gently as possible) to move her to the shoulder of the road. But she was wild with pain and bared her teeth and growled at me menacingly, when I approached , so I stepped back. I tried again, and again she growled at me and I knew she would bite me if I touched her.

At this point the driver, a Filipina, tried walking towards Billy, but she got the same response. I told her "don't touch her, if she is threatening to bite me and she knows me, she will bite you for sure." I ran into the house to get Salman. Billy always loved Salman the most, and I wanted to see what her reaction to him would be. She let him get closer, but when his hand was almost close enough to touch her, she suddenly snapped at him and tried to bite him. I told him to go back to the side of the road and ran back into the courtyard to look for something that I could use to pick her up that would shield me from her bites.

When I came back out, the driver was now sitting down on the curb with her pant leg rolled up going on about how she was going to die. She had done exactly what I had instructed her not to do and had approached Billy and had been bitten. She must have gone very close, because Billy appeared to be paralyzed from her middle down and couldn't walk or jump.

Then, driver started insisting that she had to get to a doctor right that moment before she died. I told her "you don't die on the spot from a dog bite, in fact you don't die from them at all unless they have rabies and that only after a long time if you haven't bothered to get the shots."

But she started getting dramatic and saying she could feel herself getting sick and feeling faint, which was kind of annoying, but after a few minutes she got up again and found a long plank and pushed Billy out of the road over to the shoulder. We put a couple big rocks around her so she couldn't squirm back into the road. Then I called "A", since he was the one who bought her in the first place and asked him to come quickly and take her to a vet.

Billy stayed with us about a week after that, but she stopped eating like she did before and she made a terrible mess every time she went to the toilet because she couldn't lift her hind legs. We had to give her a bath every day. Meanwhile Ashari, who was responsible for the whole accident, refused to help clean up after her at all. But I was determined to take care of her. The vet had said her hip was broken and maybe if we took her to Dubai she could get surgery to help her. But I didn't have the money for the surgery, so he said to try to keep her from moving, and once the bones were healed she might be able to walk again, but with a bad limp. To me it seemed like she was paralyzed, but even then I thought that maybe I could do like my uncle did for his dog after it got paralyzed in its hind quarters. He made a little cart for it that he would strap it to so that it could run around using its front legs and the wheels of the cart. I had already started eyeing Salman's skateboard with a design in mind.

Unfortunately, she refused to sit still and seemed to be making her condition worse by insisting on dragging herself all over the place. On her last morning with us, I went out to find her sitting in the little cage we had put her in, in a last ditch attempt to try to make her stay still. Only to discover that she had eaten off one of her own legs. The kids saw it and started to cry.

That morning I made the difficult decision to have her put to sleep. With one leg now missing and no idea why she ate it or if she would try to eat more of her body, I didn't have any hope for her recovery anymore. The vet said it was probably a good decision.

I cried a lot that day. I felt so bad and guilty. She was just a baby, and she should have had so many more years to run, jump and play ahead of her. I don't know what happens to dogs after they die, but I hope she is at peace now and maybe even running free like she always tried to do at every chance she got. Whenever I take a walk in our neighborhood up the hill behind our house. I remember her running as fast her little legs would carry her in front of us up that hill, and I feel sad.

After she died, I took the kids to see Marley and Me. I didn't expect it to move me so much. I was teary eyed by the end of the movie, which almost never happens to me, the only other time I can remember tearing up like that in a movie was at the end of Titanic when they showed the old couple hugging each other in the bed as the waters swallowed them up, and the children being put to bed for the last time in their soon to be flooded room and the dead woman floating in the water with her frozen lifeless infant in her arms.

Salman was silent after the movie, but half way home he started bawling his eyes out. He didn't cry when Billy died. He was quiet and I didn't understand why I appeared to be the only one upset when he had spent the most time with her. But whatever he was feeling from that time that he had bottled up inside came pouring out with the emotions triggered by Marley and Me.

A week or so after that I went back on my "No more dogs rule" and we got Max a fully grown, very well behaved beautiful dog. He seems to be a cross between something like a chow - with very thick golden fur and something with a more "wolf - like face" . Everywhere we take him for a walk people stop and ask about him. I put his picture on my Facebook, and I got more comments for that than any other picture I have ever put there.

Friday Ramblings - A Trip to the Local Mall

2009-04-24T10:38:00.000-07:00

I went to the Mall today with the boys. I am sick of this mall. I don't like Malls in General and going to the same one over and over again is just kind of sickening. But what do you do on a weekend, when it is too hot outside to do anything other than swim and you have no intention of parading around in a bathing suit on a public beach while a bunch of weird men, swimming in their tighty whities (which become nearly transparent when wet), gawk at my ghostly white cellulite and spider vein covered thighs and try to incorporate me into their "day at the beach" home videos.

Once when I first moved here, I went to the beach with my husband and Salman. We were taking a walk along the beach, and an Iranian man suddenly came up and grabbed Salman and was talking about how cute he was. His friend was armed with a video camera. He asked my husband if he could get a picture with Salman. My husband said OK (I don't know why - possibly his need to appear pleasant in front of and to please everyone except for me had kicked in) so the guy picked up Salman and stood near me. When I realized I was going to be in the shot, I ducked out of it, to the side... he then pretended like he had realized the view behind him wasn't nice and moved again so that I would be in the shot... so I ducked out of it again... he kept doing that while my husband stood there grinning like an idiot and chatting with the guy... finally I went and stood behind the guy with the camera and told them "Please take the shot and give me back my son."

Soooo there will be no trips to the beach that involve me wearing a bathing suit.

The good and the bad thing about this town is that there is only one mall. It's good because it means it hasn't yet become a materialistic shopping haven like Dubai. It's bad because it basically has no clothing stores that I recognize aside from Next and G2000, neither of which make for a rocking wardrobe, but at least I can occasionally find something appropriately boring enough looking to wear to work in them. However, I have banned myself from shopping at the Next here after the time I went in, and I was the only customer and wanted to try on 6 things and was told that I could only take 4 in with me. I can understand such "security" measures in a busy store during a sale, but when you have only ONE customer, probably the only one you have had all day, is it really necessary? Is it really so hard for them to remember I have six and not four items in there with me? Do I really look that dishonest? Do they have a lot of problems with middle aged, middle class American moms stealing from them? Anyway, when they insisted, I handed them everything and told them "forget it" and walked out in a huff. In retrospect, I think I might have acted like a bit of a brat, but I had gone shopping merely to blow off steam after having another great day at work of being spoken to sarcastically, blamed for things that weren't my fault, and yelled at for not having ESP and I really didn't need that hassle.

Anyway... today I took the boys to Chiles, where we all ordered Chicken Enchilada soup, and the boys got chocolate milk shakes. After that, we went to check out what was playing in the movie theatre and the only option had another hour before it started so we went for a little shopping.

During my window shopping I had the pleasure of seeing a couple of incredibly hideous window displays. There was one outfit in particular on display that caught my attention. A frilly cheap black lace poofy ultra mini skirt and a red satin corseted bustier top. By the way, it is not a lingerie store. I have no idea to whom that is supposed to appeal or who actually shops there, since the rest of their clothes are gross too - ranging from frighteningly garish to down right sleazy like the one I just described, but they need to fire their window dresser.

It is always amusing to see what people wear to the mall and to see all the different kinds of people. There was this one couple, actually I am not sure if they were a couple or what because the guy was so young and the woman looked quite old, who looked like they were going to a costume party as obnoxious tourists. The guy had a big floppy sun hat on his head, sandals and socks on his feet and was wearing shorts and a t-shirt with an unbuttoned button up shirt a clashing print over it carrying a pink cloth bag over his shoulder. The woman was wearing thin cotton blue and white striped 3/4 length pants, a big t-shirt and orange flip flops.

Most of the people in the mall here are locals, especially men. They crowd the Starbucks. I like Starbucks' hot chocolate with whipped cream, but I never go to this one because it would mean having to weave through tables full of smoking local men who seem to have nothing better to do than stare. So if I want my hot chocolate I have drive all the way out Al Hamra to the deserted mall there where they seem to only have a Spinneys and a Starbucks that are actually open and operating. Which is fine by me, because I much prefer shopping in a nice clean nearly empty Spinneys than in an over-crowded Carrefour full of men holding hands and window shopping in the strangest aisles - like the dog food section, or the diapers and sanitary napkins aisle - and women loading carts pushed by minuscule Indonesian maids, cleaners with massive mops wiping up spills in the canned food aisles, and my favorite - the plastic bag hogs in the produce section who take the entire roll of plastic bags off the dispenser and carry it around in their cart like it is their personal supply and give you shocked looks when you have the audacity to take it out of their cart.

The young local guys, I have noticed, have started getting creative with their Kandoras - I am not sure I like it. I saw a young man in a Burberry print Kandora with matching baseball cap. I have been seeing more and more of the Kandora's with prints on them. I also saw an extremely obese homosexual Local man in a brilliantly shocking blue Kandora. There was another Local walking ahead of me with hips and butt just like a woman's. This is not all that uncommon I have discovered. I saw it a lot in my gym in Dubai. A lot of Arab men look at lot better in a Kandora than they do in gym shorts with socks pulled up to their knees. They would enter the gym looking like dignified businessmen in their crisp clean Kandoras and emerge from the locker rooms looking quite silly at times in what they thought were fashionable exercise outfits. Kandoras hide all kinds of flaws and are flattering to most body types, unless they are too tight and the man happens to be bottom heavy like that one I saw today. Such men look better in the loose fitting Kandoras. I think men should make a habit of checking their posterior view in a mirror like women do before leaving the house.

After watching the movie we came home where I am ending my day by writing this and watching Survivor Tocantins and wondering how "Coach" made it this far with his annoying habit for telling tall tales and the fact that in spite of all of his big talking he is crappy at most of the physical challenges. I am also thinking if I should try sign up for Survivor so I could go on an enforced diet - if I could manage to last long enough - to starve for several weeks. However, the seemingly mandatory costume for women, namely a bikini / tube top and optional pair of microscopic Lycra shorts, doesn't really appeal to me.

My life as a whipping boy

2009-04-13T09:51:00.000-07:00

Apparently it is my fault that my boss forgot to pick up his wife and son from the Airport.

It is my fault in spite of the fact that:

His wife never sent any flight details to me or to the email account of his that I have access to.

On Saturday, when she was supposed to arrive, I called and asked him about her flight details so I could arrange for a driver (just in case he didn't want to pick them up himself, or in case he wanted the driver to drive HIM to get them) and he told me in his big man voice "No-ho, I'm going to pick them up myself"; and even after I said, "well I thought maybe you would like a driver so you don't have to worry about parking and to help with the luggage", he said "nah, I don't need any help, I will get them myself" Well okay then...

After reading his emails Saturday Night and seeing one from his wife that made it clear she would in fact NOT arrive that evening because her flight had been cancelled (thanks to inclement weather) and that she would now arrive Sunday evening 'at around the same time' (still no mention of Airline, flight number, exact arrival time, routing of the flight), I called him to see if he still planned to pick her up himself, and he said he would like to if he could, but he would let me know for sure "tomorrow".

On Sunday, after someone from the Marketing department asked if they could confirm an appointment between him and the Chinese Commercial attache, instead of just putting it on his calendar without asking him, I went and asked him if it would be okay or would he rather keep his day free for his family who would be arriving that evening, and he looked at me like I am an imbecile and told me "boy you don't even know what is going on do you?" To which I replied "why has something changed?" To which he replied "She doesn't even know my wife isn't coming tonight!" (he directed this to the Deputy Director who was seated in front of his desk). To which I responded "why not?" , which he answered by explaining that there had been a problem with their second flight (Mechanical problem) and it had been grounded and they were going to spend the night at the airport Hotel and depart at 10 AM today. He then told me. "NO PROBLEM GO AHEAD AND BOOK THE COMMERCIAL ATTACHE, MY FAMILY WONT BE HERE TOMORROW."

I made a point of asking him to repeat the time (10 AM) and clarify what time zone he was referring to. He told me he meant 10 AM US eastern standard time - which is 7 PM our time. In other words he told me his wife would be departing from the US at 7PM our time today.

But, in spite of all of this, it is still my fault that he missed the chance to pick her up OR have a driver pick her up at 9 AM THIS MORNING!

So how did leaving at 7 PM this evening turn into arriving at 9 AM this morning? Good question. I don't have a God damned clue. But it is STILL ALL MY FAULT.

At about at about 9:30 this morning after calling Fatema and asking her if there were any company drivers currently in Dubai on an errand, he then called me to ask me to call Delta Airlines because "a family was coming in on a flight from Atlanta."

"Your family?" I asked. A response that was met with immediate sarcasm - as if I am the dolt who doesn't know how to say things in a direct fashion. Anyway, once it was established that it wasn't just any family but was in fact his family, he told me to ask Delta what time their flights from Atlanta were landing. I called and found out that they had two today - one that had already landed at 9 AM and one that would be landing around 8 PM. I called him back and told him this and asked him which one his wife was supposed to be on. He said he didn't know and to wait because he would call me back and tell me what to do. He then called Fatema and told her something which resulted in her immediately making another call as soon as she hung up, meanwhile he called me and asked me "so what have you done?"

"About what?"

"My family," he yells.

"Nothing, you told me to wait until you call me back"

He changed the subject

"Did Fatema find a car for them?"

"I don't know, she is on the phone right now with someone"

"Why don't you know?"

"Because she is on the phone and I have to wait for her to get off to find out what she has done."

"This is all your fault"

"What?"

"Shut up, I don't want to hear your voice, you forgot to arrange for them to be picked up and I am really angry.."

Later after he arrived at the office, he called me in to berate me in front of the deputy director where he denied telling me that they were leaving at 10 AM US time and told me that all I do is "sit around on my butt all day doing nothing" that I should have known that he didn't really know what he was talking about and that I should have had the initiative to call Delta Airlines and ask them "what about the plane with the problem?"

Apparently it was also my fault that I didn't realize yesterday, after he vanished from the office and skipped his afternoon appointments that he need a driver to take him to the Hotel that is within 5 minutes walking distance of our office to an event where for some reason only he was not able to get valet parking (hence the monumental need for a driver).

It was also my fault that while Fatema was scrambling around looking for a last minute solution for a car to pick up his wife, she missed a call on her other line. Apparently I am somehow supposed to magically know when her other line is ringing and who is calling on it, even though her lines are in no way connected to mine.

And to conclude all of this, after telling us we had "better find a car" to take his wife to make up for the big mess we had made, he refused to give us her phone number so that we could give it to the driver so he could find her and meet her and never called us back when we asked how we were supposed to arrange for them to meet up.

His wife ended up taking a taxi, which is easy enough to do. I am sure he will tell her that it is ALL MY FAULT.

The SWAT Team pays a visit - was my neighbor an assassin?

2009-04-05T09:57:00.001-07:00

I have been somewhat depressed lately and haven't felt like posting anything, but yesterday's events bear mentioning.

I was awakened by the children at about 9 AM telling me that their teacher called and said he wasn't coming, because the police had blocked off the road in front of our house, and he couldn't get through. I was in half-asleep mode, so that didn't really register completely. I asked Salman to clarify exactly where the police were positioned, not realizing that they were right outside the wall to my villa and barring my driveway, the neighbor's driveway and the small section of road in front of our houses. Once I realized how close they were and that they appeared only interested in blocking our two houses, I was a little alarmed.

I couldn't really see over the wall, so I stood on the sofa in my living room, and from there I could make out about ten unmarked cars of different kinds and several men - mostly locals - in the road outside of my neighbor's place and in their courtyard. I was relieved to know that their interest seemed to be in my neighbor's house and not mine, but still, paranoid thoughts crept through my mind and got me worrying that they might try to search my house and I have absolutely no idea what the rules are here in regard to that - are the police allowed to search homes without a warrant? Not that I am hiding anything, but still being half asleep with a tendency to worry about strange things, I started fretting that any second they would be pounding on my door.

The dog - Max (Billy died, that is another sad story I have to tell) - was getting restless and barking. He is a really really good dog, but hearing strange voices just over the wall and not seeing the people they belong to was getting to him, plus he had had his breakfast and needed to go relieve himself. So, Salman and I took him out for a walk.

As soon as we emerged from our gate, the men in the road stopped talking and stared at us. I felt like a suspect the way they watched our every move. We crossed the road to the field opposite us with the men still watching us. I hate being stared at so I pretended not to notice. And walked a distance from them.

Now opposite my neighbor's house, I could see that not only were their several men in Kandoras and street clothes going in and out, there were what looked like members of a SWAT team deployed inside the courtyard as well, I saw at least four men with all black clothes, including bullet proof vests and helmets and guns. There was a big dark hummer with black out windows with a light on top and a bunch of other cars all with Dubai plates. I didn't see a single RAK police car in the area.

We walked behind in the neighborhood a bit, when we came back, we saw that they were removing our neighbor's cars from the courtyard and putting them on a car carrier. I approached an Indian guy standing by the side of the road. I asked him if he knew what was going on, he shrugged his shoulders. I asked if he knew how much longer they would take, a young local guy with longish hair in jeans and a t-shirt came over when he saw me talking to the Indian guy. He was with the police officers, so I asked him how long they would have the road and my house blocked because I needed to go to the supermarket. He was very gracious and apologized profusely saying "why didn't you tell me, we can move our cars for you right now if you like." I told him "no, it's okay, I will be going later, so as long I am not blocked in then, this is not bothering me."

Then he asked me which car(s) was mine. I told him the red one on the street that they had blocked in and that there was one inside my gate as well.

I asked him what was going on. He just smiled and said "oh nothing, just some problem with the cars and nodded towards the car being moved onto the vehicle carrier." I didn't buy it, maybe I look naive to them, but you don't need to call out special forces to repossess a car. But I didn't say anything; I guess they probably aren't allowed to discuss whatever they are doing with bystanders anyway. The young guy's boss - a Middle Aged Emirati in a Kandora - saw him talking to me and came over. Then they started asking us about our neighbors. I am afraid I was of no use as a witness. I am ashamed to say I have not given the slightest bit of attention to my neighbors to the point where I was not even able to say how many people stayed there, what sex, race or nationality any of the were. I told them, "sorry, I am always at work so I have never seen them, just saw a car parked outside once or twice." I told them to ask Salman, he told them he saw one guy a couple of times who always wears white pants and a white shirt. I was embarrassed by our inability to be useful in this regard; like a typical American, I obviously had no clue what sort of people my next door neighbors were. Judging from how involved my in laws were in their neighbor's lives, I am sure Indian neighbors would have been able to give the police a much more detailed report including their comings and goings, how many they were, and what they looked like as well as a good amount of speculation about their love lives...
Salman actually noticed more details about them than he told the police. Later in the day after they had left, he mentioned to me that the man he saw had blond hair and blue eyes. I laughed considering that information is a lot more useful than the white shirt and pants bit the police got from us.

I apologized to the police officers for not being able to give them more helpful information. The younger one told me to tell them if I need to take my car out and then joked that they were thinking to take my car too. I smiled and told him, "please don't!" then we took Max to finish his business. We took a long walk in the light rain, and when we came back things were starting to wind down at our neighbor's place.

After they had all gone, I noticed some cars in the field opposite the house parked there all day facing us. I don't think that anyone was home when they raided my neighbor's place, so I am not sure that their work here is done yet and the house may still be under surveillance. That evening, as I was standing in my gate looking at the weeds growing in the flowers we planted near the road, I noticed a small white car drive slowly by and then pull in front of my neighbor's gate, stop for a few minutes, and then pull away quickly.

Over all, the whole experience creeped me out because

1. I had been obliviously living next to some sort of dangerous criminal all this time
2. We had obviously been under surveillance for quite some time - at least I know now that I was not paranoid for feeling like some cars used to drive by too slowly too often.
3. They haven't caught them yet.

I made the boys sleep with me last night and I jumped at every noise from outside and every time the dog barked. I keep imagining my criminal neighbor coming home, realizing the police are closing in on him and jumping the wall to my house and holding us hostage.

I told "A" about everything I saw and my conversations with the police and he said once when he took the boys out he saw a guy who looked like a Russian coming out of the house (maybe the blond man Salman saw too) and that he suspects that, judging from what I described, maybe my neighbors were Russian Mafia or drug dealers. But who knows really.... And I thought RAK was such a peaceful little haven..

An update to this... now everyone I am telling this story too is speculating that it all might have something to do with the investigation into the assassination of Sulim Yamadayev, the opponent of Chechnya's Russian backed leader, in Dubai at the end of March.... scary thought, I might have been living next to assassins all this time.....

My Heart is Broken

2009-04-01T01:15:00.000-07:00

... and it hurts

Uncle Scrooge, the evil eye, and more tidbits from my life here and there

2009-03-16T00:21:00.000-07:00

During my life abroad, I have worked for a series of evil midgets.

The first evil midget who employed me was my uncle-in-law-in-law - or "Uncle" as everyone in my husband's whole family called him. Other uncles in the family had names or nicknames like "Cha cha" or "Abou" but he was just Uncle. He was THE uncle - the rich one.

Uncle is about 5' 5"; I am taller than this, so as far as I am concerned, he is a midget. He was my husband's boss too, and what I consider to be a major contributing factor in the destruction of my marriage. I worked in his hotel after I first got married. Luckily he wasn't as directly involved in the day to day management of the hotel so I didn't have to deal with him that often. My husband was not so lucky.

Uncle is the Muslim version of Ebenezer Scrooge. His employees work every day of the week from 8- to as late as he keeps them. On Sundays they get a "half" day that ends at 2 PM - considering they are working 6 hours, I don't see how that is a half day. On Eid they also work "half' days. When his father passed away, his shops remained open.

He never likes to see people enjoying themselves, especially poor people. He resents it because, although he is rich, he doesn't know how to enjoy life, all he knows is work and making money, and it bothered him that people had other priorities and could be happier than he was (is) but have less money. Deep down inside he knows that he should be happy with what he has and should enjoy life more and let his wife and children enjoy, but he can't. So he resents being reminded of what a miserable person he is.

The last time I saw Uncle, which was close to the last time I saw my husband, we were all in the car, and my husband was driving. Uncle never could qualify for a UAE license. We stopped at a traffic light, and he was looking out the window. In a simple car next to us, a Filipino couple was laughing and talking happily. He sighed and asked me "why is it that everyone else seems to be enjoying themselves and they have nothing?" My husband told me later that he had asked him and another person the same question earlier in the day.

Uncle has a very slight build. He runs several miles every morning and swims in the Indian Ocean. The rest of his family is obese. His sisters, when seated - as they almost always are - look like Jabba the Hutt draped in brightly colored cloth. My husband's aunt (mother's sister) - his wife - is not a small woman. She is taller than he is and overweight - but normal looking, and she was lovely and slim as a young girl. She carries her weight well and manages to look dignified. His sisters were never lovely or slim, and they don't carry their weight well. They rarely carry it at all, if they can help it.

One of Uncle's brothers married his cousin "S"; she was pretty and pleasantly round and plump when they got hitched, but she rapidly expanded and now rivals his sisters. One time "S" visited Dubai with his fattest brother Hanif's very fat wife; compared to them Auntie looked slim. My husband got the job of ferrying them all around Dubai while they were there. We had a Mercedes 4WD, which should have had plenty of room. Hanif's wife, who is way too fat for words, sat in the front seat - where I should have been riding as the wife of the man driving - and I had to go sit back with "S "and Auntie. I was the last to climb in. I was pleased to see that S had left me enough room to fit only 1/10 of one thigh in the car (and I was a size zero at the time). Even better, I got to hold Hanif's abnormally large son on my lap while "S" bounced my little light weight Salman on her knee.

"S" was a big liar too. Once she had became very very fat, she didn't like to move around a lot. Which meant that her activities were restricted to mainly sitting, and eating, watching Hindi films and gossiping. It was while gossiping that she often lied as well. Gossip is bad enough, untrue gossip is worse.

But still, I felt kind of sorry for her. Both of her babies were stillborn, and she lived in constant fear that her husband Amir would take another wife. It used to irritate me, though, that from her side she didn't seriously try losing any weight since her weight was a big concern during the pregnancies and made it more difficult for the doctor to check on the health of the babies. Amir eventually did take another wife. "S" had adopted the baby of a relative, hoping it would be enough for him, but it wasn't. He still wanted his "OWN" child. I didn't see her after that, but I felt bad for her. I wouldn't wish that feeling on any woman - aside from maybe the one currently living with my husband that is...>:[

I used to think Uncle's family had some kind of thyroid problem, or some other physical problem that made them so large. But I soon realized that it was the result of sheer laziness combined with gluttony. I never saw any people before who were so reluctant to move a finger and so interested in eating everything in sight. Because they were rich (thanks to Uncle) they had maids. so the women didn't have to do a single thing all day, and they didn't. As I mentioned before, Uncle exercised every day and was a tiny slip of a man.

Uncle's father died during Ramadhan, so that meant that my husband and I were forced to go have Iftar on several occasions at his mother's house. I sat with the women. From what I had seen in my husband's family and the other Muslim families that I had spent time with, after the prayer call announcing the breaking of the fast, people eat something small - like a date or two and drink some juice or water and then go pray. I was sitting on the floor in the big room in Uncle's mother's house where the women were supposed to eat. The floor was covered in straw mats and there were cushions against the wall. The food was arranged in the middle of the floor on a circular straw mat with a woven zigzag design on it.

The women in Uncle's family arranged themselves around the food and didn't take their eyes off of it. At second they heard the prayer call, they all (except for Auntie) pounced and their plates overflowed with mountains of samosas and other fried snacks, chapatis, different kinds of curry, and rice. I watched in fascination and horror as they quickly polished off everything on their plates.... and THEN they got up to pray. I wondered how they could manage with all that food in their stomachs. After praying, Uncle's sister Fatima scurried as fast as her pudgy legs could carry her back to the food. "Now we can eat!" she exclaimed.

Fatima is Uncle's youngest sister. He had to buy her a husband. Her husband was only interested in the money. Once he got it, he left her and took another another wife. Uncle's other sister was widowed with one son, a lazy high school drop out who considered himself a ladies' man. She hated my husband and another guy from India named Zahir who worked for Uncle, because he gave them better positions in the company, so she went to one of the villages and visited a witch doctor. She asked the witch doctor to curse them. When my husband heard about it, he didn't take it seriously and laughed, but I happened to mention it to his mom when we were in Mombasa for his Aunt's funeral (she had visited from England for the first time in many years and had a stroke) and she freaked out. Next thing we knew, an Imam had been summoned from a mosque, and all the "kids" - including big ones like me and my husband - had to sit on the floor in front of him while he chanted something from the Qur'an. Then he gave my husband a bottle of water to take home and do something with it to protect himself from the black magic. I learned recently that her son died unexpectedly from a stroke.

Witch doctors are common in Zanzibar, and black magic is widely used for a variety of purposes. When ever anyone gets sick, it is attributed to witch doctors. After Salman was born, I was constantly badgered by Auntie to protect him with various charms, and bracelets with black beads. Being an American, I am not a real believer in the "evil eye", so I wasn't that careful to follow the instructions Auntie gave me. Once I brought Salman over to her house "unprotected" (minus his charm bracelet). Horrified, she ran upstairs and got a black Dior eyeliner pencil and told me to make a dot on him somewhere with it. She told me to keep the pencil - I was happy to oblige her - it worked really nicely for its intended purpose - lining eyes.

Auntie's youngest daughter was born 6 months after Salman. Whenever I went over to their house, the poor child was decked out to the hilt in anti evil eye charms and remedies - from her monkey bone charm bracelets to the black smudges around her eyes, on her forehead and behind her ear.

They had some strange beliefs about the evil eye. Once while in Nairobi, right after we had left Zanzibar and I was about to come to Dubai for the first time, my husband's cousin "Ziggy" was visiting from the UK. He was married to a British girl. I have no idea what their "love" story was, but she was 18 and already had two kids, and the younger one was Salman's age.

They assumed that Leila - as they called her - and I would have so much in common, based on the fact that we are both white. Unfortunately, that was where the similarities ended. Leila tried really hard to fit in with her in laws. It didn't work so well, and she stuck out like a sore thumb. Painfully thin, blond, and pale, she loved wearing the brightest colored Shalvar Kameezes she could get her hands on. I have a photograph from that visit. I am sitting with Salman ,and she is with her two kids. You can't even see her face in the picture - it is totally obliterated by the glare of her outfit.

Leila spoke broken English - just like her mother in law. I really couldn't understand why, all I could think was that she must have wanted to fit in so badly she even started talking like them. Shahid, the little boy from across the street (whose sister was married to my brother in law) found this baffling and amusing. Whenever she would start to talk, I would see him giggling. Finally he asked her "Why do you speak broken English?" I had a hard time not laughing when I heard him ask that. She didn't answer him.

She reminded me of the blond girlfriend of one of the boys in the Movie East is East. I was told that she had beaten up more than one girl she suspected of making moves on her husband and that when they were visiting my grandmother in law in Mombasa (Nany) and he went out to meet some of his old friends, she ran out to the balcony and started screaming at him about how he'd better not be going off to do "jiggy jiggy."

I was about to visit my family for Christmas at that time and my mother in law gave me some small gold earrings to give to my older sister (long story). I was looking at them up close and saw something that looked like writing in Arabic on it. I asked her what it said. She got out her reading glasses. but she couldn't make it out. Finally, she told me that she was sorry but she couldn't give them to my sister, because she was afraid that maybe they have something from the Qur'an written on them and that maybe my sister would eat pork or go to the toilet while wearing them. I asked "why make earrings that someone has to remove every time they have to pee?"

I don't quite recall how, but this conversation rapidly turned into a discussion of the evil eye, with Leila nodding her head and gravely agreeing with everything my mother in law said - even claiming that her husband's brother's wife had put the evil eye on her son. I told them "I don't believe in the evil eye." My mother in law looked at me with dismay. "No, you must!" she told me and went on about how, unless you protect your children from the evil eye they will get sick and maybe even die. I pointed out to her that in the US most people don't believe in the evil eye and we have a lower infant mortality rate than all the countries that do believe in it. This little bit of information was only minor setback to their reasoning, after a split second of shocked silence, my mother-in-law quickly rebounded with "that's because you all eat pork."

"So pork eating pork is a good thing then?" I asked.

"what? no...."

"I mean, it must be if it magically protects the children of pork eaters from sickness"

They fumbled with that one for a while, and then I pointed out that Jewish Americans don't eat pork and their babies are healthier too.

I am sure that, from this, you can see why I was the favorite Daughter-in-law.

After that, we went to the Maasai market in Nairobi with Ziggy, Leila, their kids.. Leila almost got us beaten up.

The Maasai Market, at that time at least, was on a hill somewhere in the middle of Nairobi. African people sat around with various trinkets, souvenirs and other items they hoped tourists would like. I wanted to go, because I still needed to get Christmas presents for my family. The sun was hot and her kids started to fuss. The African people around us noticed and started telling her - the sun is too hot for the kids, you shouldn't bring them here. They were just trying to be nice, and were concerned for the kids, so I smiled at them and patted Salman (who was not fussing) on the head; but she took it the wrong way and got all steamed up. She blurted out: "No they aren't too hot! They are crying because you people scare them!!" ... not such a wise thing to say to a crowd of Africans in the middle of Nairobi, when you are a white as a ghost Brit accompanied by Indians and small children. The mood of the crowd started to get ugly. In Nairobi, there are always those people who lurk around waiting for any chance to stir up trouble - they especially seem to enjoy spats between tribes or races and they look for any chance to get a riot or mob lynching going. Africans are quick to react to anything they consider an offense. When they realized what was happening, my Mother-in-Law and Ziggy started apologizing profusely in Swahili and whisked us the hell out of there.

I kept my mouth shut the entire time, and thanked God, I wasn't the one to blame for the scene.

The Bathroom Attendant

2009-03-05T02:48:00.000-08:00

I went to the movies recently, I saw Killshot... but that is not the focus of this post.

When I first got to the mall, I used the ladies room. Now here in the mall, there is a bathroom attendant for each bathroom. Her job is to sit in the bathroom, clean it periodically, make sure there is toilet paper in the stalls, flush after the surprisingly large number of adult females who find it too complicated of a task to do themselves (perhaps they should paste detailed instructions complete with charts and pictures to the wall behind the toilet?), and hand paper towels to spoiled women who don't want to walk the extra five feet from the sink to the towel dispenser.

I noticed the attendant, sitting wearily next to the towel dispenser. Nobody looked at her, it was like she was just another inanimate part of the bathroom, like the towel dispenser or the garbage can. Even when she quickly got up to offer towels, she was not acknowledged. The towel would be accepted without a thank you, shukran, or even a nod of the head.

The attendant in the bathroom near the movie theatre this evening, was a very tired and sad looking middle aged Sri Lankan woman. She had huge dark circles under her eyes that gave her the look of someone who had not slept in weeks. As I headed towards the towel dispenser, she got up and got me a towel, "Thank you" I told her, automatically (I was raised to thank people who do small favors for me). Her face lit up, and I realized that it was something she seldom heard.

After checking the movie times and realizing that unless I wanted to see a cartoon, I would have to wait a little more than an hour until the next film capable of entertaining someone over 12 years of age started playing, I went to have a bite to eat and after that I went to the movie.

When the movie finished, having the pea sized bladder that I do, I was pressed again and went to the toilets. The same lady was there, in the same spot. While washing my hands, I watched her in the mirror, her weary expressionless face, and the women with fancy purses gliding by her, taking towels from her, leaving their poo for her to flush, who didn't see her.

As I was drying my hands, I asked her:

"What time does your duty finish"

"eleven thirty" she replied with shrug (11:30 PM)

"and what time does your duty begin?"

"morning nine o clock" she told me and then started to ramble half in her language and half broken English about how she goes home, has to cook, clean her clothes, then sleeps at around 3 am until 8 and in the morning when she gets up does it all over again - every day. So for 14 1/2 hours, every day, she lives in a toilet, leaving it only for a small break, and from what I know of salaries here, I doubt she earns more than 800 Dirhams (a little over 200 dollars) a month. She probably does it so that her family back home, can have a "better" life. As I was thinking this, a woman in a glittering abaya with an expensive handbag that costs way more than that woman makes in year limply threw a paper towel in the general direction of waste basket. It fluttered to the floor far short of its target and the Sri Lankan woman quickly bent to pick it up as the woman swept out the door without even looking at her. I felt weird, a mixture of guilt - for ever having complained about having a crappy life, sadness - because I knew that bleak as it is, there aren't many other options for women like her, and helplessness - because I wish I could do something that could make a lasting difference for people like her, and I don't know what I can do.

I stood there awkwardly for a moment, silent; there was nothing I could say really. So finally I wished her good night.

I have seen her a couple times since then. She always smiles when she sees me (she is usually expressionless), which makes me feel guilty, because I don't think I did something to deserve this recognition from her. But it made me realize that small as it might seem, being acknowledged as human and thanked for whatever assistance they provide, does mean something to the many underprivileged hard working people employed in similar positions here - the people who fade into the background and that we take for granted as we rush about our busy lives: cleaners, drivers, office boys / girls, fast food counter attendants, delivery men, and many, many others.

Local Wedding

2009-02-23T05:43:00.000-08:00

Well I finally got to go to my first local wedding. I have lived here for 10 years, but this is the first time I have actually been invited to attend a local wedding. In Dubai, the only Emiratis who ever tried to talk to me or be "friendly" with me were male and they didn't want to be the kind of friends who they would invite to family weddings. It turns out "friend" has a completely different definition in their dictionary than it does in the one I grew up using. Needless to say, I had no Emiratis I could call friends or could even call anything , aside from the Sheikh I worked for once upon a time. I guess he would qualify as something of a friend or more accurately a considerate / friendly former boss, since now from time to time and he still calls and asks how I am getting along. But still, I am not close enough of a friend or high level enough of a person to get an invite to a Maktoum wedding. Here, however, I have finally met so many nice local girls.

Now, a girl in my department (Fatema) is in the process of getting married so finally I am getting to experience a local wedding.

I say in the process, because it isn't over yet. It began with his sister recommending her as a possible choice. Then the families arranged for him to come and meet her mother and brother and stepmother (her father is dead but he had two wives and they all live together). He got to see her face at that time, but she said she was nervous and looking down at her hands so she didn't get a good look at him, nor did he get a good look at her. In spite of that, he expressed his interest and it was agreed that they would be engaged. She found pictures of him on the company server from when he worked here as a trainee and showed me. He is a nice looking young man and she is a lovely girl, so I think they will make a nice match.

After that they got engaged, he brought a ring and gave it to her family, but he didn't get to see her. Her mother and brother are very strict. She isn't allowed to drive and she wasn't allowed (by them) to see or talk to her future husband until after the next two steps, the court marriage and the small party.

But... he swiped her number from his sister's phone and started sending her text messages. At first she wasn't sure what to do, but finally she caved in and they started communicating unbeknownst to their families. It was very cute the way she would come and tell me the things they talked about. I am happy to say that, by the time the court marriage rolled around, they were as in love as any young couple getting married, and I have begun to see the upside of doing things this way. If they had not communicated and didn't know each other at all, I would have been a little scared for her, since she is such a sweet and innocent girl.

Anyway, I was invited to the small party, and I brought my boys along. They wore their new brown Kandoras and looked like little local boys. I, however, agonized about my outfit. The bride had tried to show me pictures of what local ladies wear to weddings - they looked like super flashy evening gowns that expose a lot of flesh. She said "like this but not so fancy." I really couldn't picture what she meant. In the end, I went to some store that sells modern Arabic Ladies clothing and got a gold gauzy tunic that was mid calf length with some gold and silver embellishments on it and brown silky pants to go underneath.

About an hour before I had to leave for the wedding I put on the pants and realized they had shrunk at the cleaners and that, in order for them to look ok with the shoes I had bought, I would have to wear them way low on my hips, which was uncomfortable because they had an elastic waist and my hips are not the same size as my waist. So I had to snip the elastic in the waist band so that it felt comfortable on my hips (I have this thing about elastic that feels tight - it is kind of pet peeve).

As we were heading out the door, Salman observed that we all matched and my little one asked me:

"Mommy, is that an Arabic dress?"

"Sort of" I answered.

"So we are all dressed like Arabs?" Salman asked.

"I guess you could say that"

"Are we still Americans?" my little one asked sounding a tad bit worried.

"Yes peanut, we are."

I picked up my co-worker Cleo, who had also been invited to the wedding, so she had the job of navigating. The party was in the bride's home in the village right before the Oman border. Luckily I know my way to the general area by heart now, but she had made a map for us to follow once we reached the town. Unfortunately my other coworker's drawing of the bride's map was slightly off.

The map told us to turn after the school. My kindergarten level Arabic skills actually proved useful in spotting the school. We passed a big building after the police station (just about the only building with a sign in English.) It looked like it could maybe be a school, but the sign was in Arabic. Driving two miles an hour, I peered out the window, slowly sounding out the words on the sign - happily, I eventually recognized "madrassa" (school). After that, the map went to pot. So we wandered around slowly in the town until we found what we thought was the mosque she had marked (there were several mosques in the town, but this one was named Sheikh Khalifa mosque, so we looked for the biggest looking one). After finding the biggest mosque the map told us the house should be just next to it, unfortunately, all we saw were a row of little shops. We stopped to look at the map again and caught the attention of some Arab boys. We tried asking them if they knew where a wedding was being held nearby, but they didn't speak English. Suddenly the idea popped into my head to try to remember the Swahili word for wedding. I don't really know why, but I said "harusi?" to the boy. A look of recognition passed across his face and he smiled and said "Ah ok.., Ah-rus!" and pointed the way to the house.

Though we ended up being quite late, the party hadn't even begun to start. We sat a table with other people from work, the Deputy Director - a local lady, the Commercial Consultant, a Czech lady, and her two small blond children, Cleo, who is from the Philippines, a recruitment officer from Mauritius, and the woman in charge of the Administration department, another Local lady. My little one checked out the whole scene. After a while of observing as ladies, all local entered and took their seats, he asked loudly:

"Why are there so many Arabs here?"

"Because it is an Arab wedding."

The party took place in an enclosed courtyard of the house - perhaps it is intended to be the car park, I am not sure. There tables were arranged around a small decorated tent with open sides. Inside the tent was a red sofa sprinkled with rose petals. This was where the bride would sit and the groom would come to join her once he arrived.

Most of the guests wore abayas that they did not remove at all, but a few younger ladies, especially those in the bride's and groom's families were dressed (and made up) to the hilt in figure hugging sparking gowns with their hair piled high on their heads. Some of the teenagers of this group were carrying around a giant fake shell displaying the white gold and diamond jewelry set the groom had sent for the bride that he would present to her when he arrived.

After some time, the buffet table at the corner of the courtyard opened and we ate. The food was a selection of Arabic dishes and a couple of Indian ones.

It was only at about 10:30 that Fatema finally appeared. She looked very different from how I am used to seeing her every day at work, in her Abaya. She wore a pale green dress, which was form fitting through the torso and poofed out at the bottom - like a ball gown. Her arms and back were exposed - and I realized she had a much higher forehead the she seems to have when wearing Hijab. The dress must have been heavy or getting caught on her shoes, because she walked stiffly and had to stop every few steps so that one of the girls attending to her could adjust her skirt at the bottom. As she walked, someone started ululating.
"What the heck?!", said my little one.

Salman wasn't too interested in all the fan fare of the emergence of the bride, but my little guy was staring at her intently over the back of his seat. After the bride came out, my coworkers all wanted to leave, they said they thought it would be long before the groom came and the children were getting sleepy. So I took the boys over to greet her and tell her thank you for inviting us and that we were leaving. My little one stared at her in awe the whole time.

That night, back in my room, he snuggled next to me and asked me:

"Mommy?"

"Yes my little love?"

"Can I get married when I am 20"

"Um, I guess so honey."

He smiled in satisfaction, as if he was hatching some plan and everything was falling into place.

The next day, as we were driving to the supermarket, he asked again:

"Um, Mommy, can I get married at 19?"

I said, "well, yes but it is a better idea to wait until you are a little bit older so you have a good job and can support your wife and kids."

"okay, you know who I am going to marry?"

"who?"

"Fatema"

I didn't have the heart to tell him that wasn't going to happen, he looked so pleased with himself and I remembered how my younger brother, at this same age, had been certain that he would marry Wonder Woman.

Favorites...

2009-01-29T00:35:00.000-08:00

I was tagged by Empress and Desert Veil to list my favorites so here goes...

NOTE: You have to add one additional "favorite" thing to the end of the list when you answer

Favorite color: So hard to choose... I like so many and it depends on the context, for example, I like Purple for clothes, but not so much for hair or walls of a room or cars. I like black for clothes, hair and cars but again not walls, flowers and especially not teeth, same for brown (except I don't like brown cars).... I can't pick a favorite color, but I have a lot of black clothes but maybe that is because I have been pretty poor until lately so had to make everything match with my black shoes.

Favorite perfume (guys): A lot of perfume gives me a headache, I can only take light scents. I smelled one the other day that I liked, but I don't know what it is called.

Favorite perfume (girls): Un Jardin Sur Le Nil by Hermes

Favorite pj brand: I like wearing African mumus to bed.

Favorite clothes brand in general: I like shopping at GAP, Banana Republic, Promod, Zara, Monsoon, and Mango. ( I know that is not one but I don't have any one that prefer over others)

Favorite person(s) in the entire world: My Babies

Favorite country: Kenya (I also like Zanzibar -which is sort of a mini country)

Favorite car: I don't pay much attention to cars, but Porsche Cayenne is nice and I like my Range Rover :)

Favorite sport: Well, to watch: soccer or basketball I guess, but I enjoyed squash when I started to learn that. If knew how, I think I would like Horseback riding.

Favorite sport player: N/A

Favorite spot in America: It was my grandparents' house on the Chesapeake, but Mimi (my Grandmother) sold it after my Grandfather the love of her life died, so now I guess it is my hometown. But as far as cities go, I liked Miami.

Favorite animal: Panther

Favorite movie: East is East

Favorite singer: Freddie Mercury (Queen) was and always will be the greatest vocalist ever.
& (for those who don't know) Freddie Mercury was born Farrokh Bulsara on the island of Zanzibar.

Favorite day in the week: Friday

Favorite time of the day: Evening

Favorite holiday season: Back home it was the time around Thanksgiving and Christmas

Favorite number: 7

Favorite food: I have many, but I am definitely not a Vegetarian - I like Mexican food, Iranian Food and North Indian Food (Non- Veg).

Favorite chocolate: Dark Chocolate

Favorite cartoon: Well, I like a lot of cartoons, right now I kind of enjoy Total Drama Island, but Family Guy and The Simpsons are also great.

Favorite blogger: I don't like to play favorites when it comes to people.

Favorite Flavor Ice Cream: Mint chocolate chip, but Ice cream always regurgitates a few minutes after it goes down and if I eat a whole serving I get terrible acidity. I don't know why.

Favorite Mobile Brand: Don't know and don't care. But I am using a blackberry for work now.

Favorite name: Well, for girls - mine 'cause it's special :p and for boys... I always liked all the "el" names
In the Ancient Hebrew Language in which these name are first recorded the word "El" refers to God (not his name but is the word meaning God) so the meaning of all those names have something to do with God. Samuel / Ishmael (Ismael) = God heard / listens; Emmanuel = God is with us; Daniel (Daanyal/Danial) = God is my Judge; Gabriel (Jabril)= God's able bodied one or God's hero; Michael (Mika'il) = one who resembles God; Nathaniel = God has given. I also love my sons' names... Salman and one of the names (Arabic variations) mentioned above :) When I was looking for a name for my younger son, I really researched the meaning of names, and I found that when looking at Arabic / Muslim variations of names of great prophets they often did not have a meaning specified, For example If i looked up the name Ismail it would say "name of a prophet" as if that were the definition. I soon realized that the best way to find the actual meaning of such old names was to trace them back to the Ancient Hebrew version in which they are first recorded (historically). I think the meanings are beautiful.

Favorite hobby: Painting

Favorite room in my house: My bedroom.
Favorite Fruit: Mangostein - if you haven't had one, you don't know what you are missing.

Favorite flower: Bougainvillea

Favorite Word: Don't really have one If you mean by "most frequently uttered" then it might be 'oh crap' because I say it under my breath every time I get summoned into my boss' office :-S - but that is two words. But if you mean by how it sounds, then obsequious has to be one of my favorites because it sounds just like what it means.

Added: Favorite (non religion associated) historical figure: Abraham Lincoln & Favorite Dessert: Key Lime Pie

I don't tag anyone I know with a blog, because I think they have all been tagged :( so I tag anyone reading this who feels like doing it who hasn't been tagged yet.

Censorship

2009-01-24T20:24:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I find the censorship here really bizarre and haphazard. For example, I was in a bookshop looking at some books in the "health section", and there was one about breast cancer. Now this topic interests - or rather concerns - me because my mother had breast cancer. So it was supposed to be a guide for women, how to check themselves, etc. But the UAE censors had blacked out all the pictures of the breast self exam with magic marker - thereby totally defeating the purpose of the book. But, another time, I bought a book called "family doctor" or something like that and all of the detailed illustrations of female and male genitalia remained untouched. I don't know if that one book slipped by accidentally, or if it is up to the whim of individual censors to determine what is and is not permissible. I have no problem with them censoring porn - I wish it was censored everywhere, but censorship of medical books, because they show body parts, seems a bit crazy to me.

I hate censorship of IDEAS the most and of historical and religious topics and debate. I don't understand why other people's views are so threatening. And it doesn't always work in your favor to remain blissfully ignorant of opposing views and ideas other than those with which you are comfortable . I like to read the opinions and ideas of people from different religions, cultures, etc. It doesn't mean I will agree with them, but it does help to understand where other people are coming from and what is motivating them and why they do and say the things they do. I find it very frustrating trying to look up certain topics online here, and all I can find is the viewpoint supported by the government - and everything else is censored. It seems they spend so much time worrying that someone might let an opposing opinion on religion or history get through, that they let other things that ought to be censored slide right on by...

I was taking my kids to a movie at a mall in Dubai several months ago. It was a children's movie, and upon entering, I noticed I was the only parent in the theatre. The rest of the audience was comprised of children aged 12 and under and a couple of Indonesian nannies, who probably didn't speak much English. We were early, so the neither the movie nor the previews had started, it was silent.Suddenly, as we settled into our seats, music started pumping into the theatre - it was loud and the words were very clear and for the most part, quite forgettable - but I will never forget the chorus... "you know I want to FUCK you," over and over again. By this time my little one, who has ants in his pants, was already dancing in front of his seat to the catchy tune and beat. My older son looked at me in shock - he knew it was a bad word. I shot out of my seat and went to find the theatre attendants, who got an earful from me, though I realized later it probably wasn't their fault, they just play what they are given I.

I am pretty sure that no movie theatre in the US would risk playing such music for fear of being sued by an offended customer - and getting fined.

I have also occasionally heard lewd lyrics on songs being played on public radio stations in the UAE - whereas, back home, a cleaned up version of the song would only be permitted on the air (unless things have drastically changed since the last time I checked, which I don't think they have). I wonder just exactly who these censors are here. Who are these men (or women?) who get to see and hear everything and then decide what is unfit to be seen and heard by the ordinary man/woman. Who has the job of reading women's magazines all day, page by page, and blacking out "obscene" things. Sometimes I wonder if, before they black out certain body parts, any of them secretly take their time to admire the images or watch more of a dirty movie than they really need to...
I think they should spend less time worrying that an opposing religious or political view will slip through, blocking websites that give relationship advice, and blacking out necessary illustrations in medical books, and focus their attention on the things that matter more - like what kind of music little kids are listening to in public places. My son remembered those lyrics for a long time after hearing them only once...