Editorial cartoons-2

We have been getting some questions as to whether the Syria situation is affecting us.  I guess the answer is not much at this point.  We have received various bulletins updating us on the situation.  People here chat a little bit about it.  The King of Saudi Arabia has been very clear that he thinks that something should be done.  But I always find the editorial cartoons in the Arab News interesting. I have picked some that you might find interesting.  I am not sure who the targeted audience for the Arab News is.  It is in English, but judging by the articles, it may be targeting many of the South Asians living here.  I am not sure if it is for Westerners, even though it is in English.  Many of cartoons relate to the US decision to intervene or not in the Syrian situation.  I tried to find background on the artists.  Miqdad seems to be a Muslim name, but I do not know where he is from.  Stephff is from Bangkok, Thailand.  And I assume that Nazar Basheer is Indian/Pakistani/Bangladeshi?  We will see how the editorial cartoons change if there is an "intervention".

 

South Indian lunch

I have needed to have my hair trimmed and styled for a few weeks, especially before I go to China for my son and daughter in law's wedding celebration.  I am not quite ready to go to a Saudi salon.  I would like to know that I can communicate clearly what I want done.  :) We have a hair salon on this compound, but no hairdresser.  The other compound has a hairdresser but she had been on vacation in the US since June.  Well, she is back!  My friend, who also needed her hair trimmed, made an appointment for us the 2nd day that the hairdresser was back.  I called my other friend who lives on that compound and asked her if she wanted to meet us for lunch at their restaurant after we got our hair cut.  Instead, she invited us to her villa for lunch!  (You know my stories usually involve food.)  When we arrived, she had made a feast of south Indian dishes.  She also showed us how to make Dosa, similar to a crepe or thin pancake, made from a batter of fermented ground rice and a special type of lentils. 

 

 Normally, it is made in a cast iron pan.  But like most of us here, she does not have her normal equipment.  So she used a pan and olive oil.

She fixed a dish made with cream of wheat and many vegetables.  It sounds a bit strange, but it was great.  There also was a coconut chutney and a cabbage dish and a couple of other dishes.  It was a spicy, wonderful meal!

 

 

 My friend showed us how to eat using the dosa.

 

 

My plate and me:

 

What a great afternoon!!

 

Finding a sport to watch

There are several sports channels on the TV here.  They show golf, soccer, cricket and rugby.  I love watching Houston Rockets basketball and usually have a bit of withdrawal during off-season.  I don't know if I will even be able to watch the regular season when in starts in October.  I know that they did show the NBA semifinals and championship games when I first got here. 

Anyway, when I surf the channels here and see the various sports, I come across golf and think NO!, soccer:  I would rather see that one in person; cricket:  absolutely not, they break for tea!; but rugby looked like a possibility.

Today, as I was surfing, I saw that Australia and New Zealand were playing a round in the southern hemisphere Championship.  It was just coming on, so I thought why not.

Well, before the game starts, the two teams come to center and "face off" against one another.  But the fascinating thing is that the New Zealand team lines up and starts doing a tribal chant and dance.  Their faces get contorted and they end up sticking their tongues out.  It was crazy! 

I looked it up.  It is called a Haka.  According to Wikipedia,

The Haka (plural is the same as singular: haka) is a traditional ancestral war cry, dance or challenge from the Māori people of New Zealand. It is a posture dance performed by a group, with vigorous movements and stamping of the feet with rhythmically shouted accompaniment.^[1] The New Zealand rugby team's practice of performing a haka before their matches has made the dance more widely known around the world.

So...I looked up videos of it.  Here is one that they performed against Japan:

http://search.yahoo.com/search?fr=mcafee&p=new+zealand+all+black+rugby+%26+video

They also have flash mobs performing the Haka in support of the team.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-14798867

Look at these young boys doing it:

http://search.yahoo.com/search?fr=mcafee&p=haka+%26+businessmen


Then, I HAD to watch the game.  At first, it did not look good for the New Zealand team, but then they came on strong.  It seems to be a crazy combination of American style football and soccer.  There were several guys on the sidelines with bloody noses and lips.  They wear cute short shorts.  There are lots of pileups (and it looks like a lot of stuff happening in the pileup), tossing the ball down a line of players, kicking the ball, jumping high in the air to divert a ball.  It is very fast paced, which I like.

OK, now I am hooked!  Now that I have found a sport to watch, it may be too late in the season if they are playing championship games.  But I will be ready for next season.  Go Kiwis!! 

Odds and Ends

Today's blog will be about odds and ends.  :)

One of my past blogs was about harvesting dates and drying them.  I was given some reddish brown dates, which now I believe are Sukkari dates, and Ken and I picked some yellow dates while walking around the compound.  We were told that the Sukkari dates had to dry for two weeks after being harvested, so we hung them up on our patio.  I decided to do the same with the yellow dates.  Well, I had put the 2 week date on my calendar as to when to cut them down.  I do follow directions.  But I think two weeks was too long.  I should have checked after 1 week.  They were dry inside and flaky on the outside.  And the gooey sweet inside is what is so yummy about dates.  Oh well, I will know next time.  But dates are everywhere here, at the grocery store and specialty date stores, plain and filled with nuts or covered in chocolate, etc.  Here is a picture of my sad little, dried date:

The yellow dates did not have to be dried, but they were fine after 2 weeks of drying.  I think that they were the Barhee dates.

 

Another thing that I have written about is my quest to get a top covering for our swing on the upstairs patio so that the birds would stop sitting on one of the poles and pooping on the swing chair.  I couldn't find a fabric store or any type of store that sold outdoor fabric to make a top.  We put an Arabian carpet on top and secured it with tie wraps and although it looked like we were in our own private casbah while in it, it couldn't hold up to the wind.  I am surprised that we didn't have people knocking on our door telling us to take that half on half off carpet.  I ran into a glass door when I suddenly spotted velvet tie downs that I could use for that swing!  Anyway, the solution is almost always the most simple.  Ken went up and took off the metal, rectangular support for top canopy.  Now the only rod that the birds COULD sit on is too fat for their little feet on these pooping doves.  Problem solved!  Now, we can enjoy each evening sunset, swinging to our hearts content and listening to the evening prayer call.  :)  Here is a picture of the de-nuded swing:

Another thing that I think that I wrote about in my Jeddah blog was my quest to get a dress for my son's and daughter in law's wedding celebration in China in Sept.  I had been very frustrated in finding the style that I was looking for and extremely frustrated not to be able to try it on in the store since they don't have ladies' dressing rooms.  Well, I solved the problem by ordering it online, having it shipped to my brother in law, who will bring it to China.  I just hope that it fits and I don't look like a little (or worse, big) American sausage.   But I don't think that I mentioned in that blog that there are ladies' fitting rooms in the mall (just not in the stores).  In our local mall, they are near the public bathrooms down a corridor.  I haven't done it yet, but I guess you buy the outfit, go try it on and if it doesn't fit, bring it back to return and get your money back.  I keep forgetting to ask my friends how it works.  I will have to do it on a day that the shuttle bus brings us to the mall and I don't have to get groceries.  I always feel that I am in a rush to get everything that I NEED at the mall and get back to the bus in time. I have a fear of being left at the mall and the Matawa (the religious police) finding me and yelling at me for not wearing a veil.  (I keep one in my purse, but it would still be freaky to be "attacked" if I were by myself.) 

 

That is it for today, we are having 3 or 4 of Ken's co-workers over for dinner tonight, so I have to get busy!!  :)  My next blog might be from China!!!  Woohoo!!!

 

Flowers on the Compound

We are very lucky to have wonderful gardeners here.  Several weeks ago, I walked around the compound taking pictures of (and smelling) the flowers.  Here they are:

 

Spa Day!!

Everyone is trying to stay on the compound a little more because of the terrorist alert in the Mideast.  So, today we had Spa Day at my house!  We had a full day.  First was Zumba at 9:30 am.  Then, 9 ladies came to my house to make and use homemade facials, have lunch and then watch a romantic comedy, which Tran brought over for us.  To get the spa ambience, I dimmed the lights and everyone brought over candles and we placed them in each room.  I had downloaded an album of Spa Music and played it so that it would be relaxing.

Here are two pictures of some of the ladies getting ready to choose and make the facials:

On the table are all the ingredients for the 5 facials.

 

 

                    Combination Skin Facial

2 TBSP rosewater

1 TBSP  yogurt

1 TBSP  honey warm

Add all together, apply to face.  Leave on face for 10 minutes.  Remove with warm cloth.

                           Dry, Chapped, Wrinkled Facial

½ soft avocado

¼ cup of honey

Mash avocado, stir in honey.  Apply to skin and leave on 10 minutes.  Rinse with cool wash cloth.

                         Moisturizing and Soothing Facial

 

2 egg whites

2 TBSP plain yogurt

Separate the egg withes and place in a bowl.  Add yogurt.  Mix then up and apply to the face.  Leave on face for 15 minutes, then rinse in warm water followed by warm wash cloth.

                           Oily Skin Facial

1 banana

2 TBSP  honey

An orange or lemon

 

Mash up Banana, then mix in honey.  Add a few drops of juice from orange or lemon.  Apply to face for 15 minutes before rinsing with cool wash cloth or steaming warm cloth.

                    Purifying Facial

3 TBSP  green tea

1 TBSP aloe vera gel

1 TBSP  honey

Mix together, put in fridge for 10 minutes.  Apply to face and leave on for 15 minutes.  Remove with warm cloth.

Mixing the ingredients:

Putting on the facials:

My mask was Purifying with green tea.

 Karla's was Dry, Chapped with avocado

 Tran and Youngha chose Combination with rose water.

 

Tammy, Cathy and Elizabeth chose Moisturizing.

 Mother chose green tea and daughter chose Moisturizing.

 

After 15 minutes, we washed off the facials and applied commercial masks.  Some of us did the mud mask.

 Some of us did the peel off mask.

 

After removing the masks, we had lunch.  And I can't believe this but I forgot to take pictures of the yummy food:  Lentil soup, toasted bread with parmesan basil butter, vegetable quiche, Thai glass noodle salad, green sticky padan rice, apples, chocolates.

Also, it was Cathy's birthday!!!  We celebrated with birthday apple pie.

Then, we all watched the movie "Bridesmaids".

It was a fun day with a great group of ladies!