Highs and Lows

Highs and lows

This place is exceedingly isolating! A colleague summed it up for me by saying that the difference between home with your family, and being here alone, is that here, when you go home, there is no one to go home to – it is empty. After 25 years of living with someone, this part of being here really ‘bites!’

I was planning and started the process for our two children to come for a visit. They were to fly to Dubai where I would meet them, we would visit old friends there for a week and then travel on to KAUST. Upon attempting to find affordable flights from Edmonton Alberta, we realized that a two week holiday with a price tag of over CDN $5000.00 was unacceptable, so those plans have been shelved. Onto more positive news, our plans for Garnet to live with me next academic year are still in the works.

Speed-taxi

A week ago I traveled into Jeddah, again using a KAUST taxi, and on the way I noticed that where there used to be bare sand, open space and dirt fields, a velvet patchwork of green from the recent rains now covers the area. It is nice to see the thorn bushes that sprinkle these open expanses have leaves now too.

The taxi trip was a panic… in a negative sense! The driver was one of those people who are really placid while away from the wheel, but look out when they start to drive! I suspect his easy-going nature is how he got the job… nice guy in an interview, just don’t put him behind the wheel. This guy was really impatient and reached speeds of over 180 km/h (where the speedometer stopped). We tried to tell him that we were not in a rush a number of times and he would slow down a bit and then forget and away we would go again. The guy knew no English which was frustrating although he knew how to get around -- we received many angry looks from other drivers as this guy cut them off and burnt a strip through Jeddah traffic. I could have got whiplash from the accelerator/breaking he was doing as he whipped in and out to pass people! Whew! We made it home anyway and that was our main goal after we realized how the trip was going to play out. From now on I am going to ensure I ask for an English speaking driver so that we can express ourselves better.

Arindam and I now have tennis rackets, purchased on the Jeddah-speed-trip. We got out for a bit of ‘chase-the-ball’ the other night and I realize that there is a lot of room for improvement. It is good to know one’s limitations. I can honestly tell you I do not know: the size of my racquet, how TO hit the ball, how HARD to hit the ball and the rules, but do know that I am out of shape. 8-)

Domestic Planning: aka, what to eat because I am hungry

Monitoring my behavior is helping me to plan my meals. Don't know if this is a ‘guy’ thing or just me, but I find that I can plan my meals more effectively if I leave all the cupboards open so that I can see what is in them. When I see the ingredients I automatically scan my thoughts for what I want to eat even if I am not hungry. I can then plan what I need to purchase ahead of time. A number of times now, I have been able to plan ahead because I unconsciously scanned the cupboards in the morning and that seemed to plant a seed of an idea so that on the way home on my bike I dropped in at the store and picked up some fresh fish to have with the rice that was sitting in the sack in the cupboard. 8-) I am wondering if it might even be a better idea to remove the doors completely! I wonder if I have stumbled upon the ultimate 'man-kitchen;' a gender specific ‘open-concept’ man-kitchen.

Bike License again

This past week I went out again in the ongoing process of acquiring a motorcycle license. Each time I go, I travel with a few other people and the Government Affairs people from KAUST who are the ‘facilitators’ and translators to help us expats with the fluid laws and rules. This time I was with two other people, one getting their motorcycle license from the beginning of the process and another their car licenses so I have to go through the WHOLE thing all over again – this time just sitting and waiting at the different offices we visit. We visited the medical clinic for blood and vision, the administration police station for another eye exam, the driving school for license translation and payment of fees and a few other rooms for stamps and finally to the local police station prison where we were fingerprinted. Somehow motorcyclists are given extra attention and have to get fingerprinted like the other common criminals that were being cycled in and out of the station's prison holding cells. We walked into the building and there was a handcuffed person standing in the middle of an empty room which we had to pass through. Along the walls were armored doors with small grated windows. Inside I glimpsed people standing or sleeping against the walls. We got to the final stop for the day and the call for prayer happened which left us sitting in an empty room while everyone left for a half hour. One has to maintain their patience when working though government processes; it all happens eventually. We started the day at 9 am. and we got back to the university at 3:30. I believe I still have to wait for a few weeks – but no one actually knows! I will visit the Government Affairs office in a few days and make sure that they remember me. 8-)

Turn of Another Year

Christmas and New Years in KSA

What can I say?.... nothing!  When I signed up for the job I had looked at the University calendar and others have commented the same, that we asked if indeed we get Christmas holidays.  The answer was yes, there was a Christmas break.  Well, I guess you can take this answer a number of ways.  Since I have lived in the Middle East before, I was a bit shocked with the answer.  In the UAE, we did not get a Christmas holiday but we did get a New Years day, day off.  When I got here, I noticed that the official calendar did not have any breaks between Eid (end of November 2009) and September 11^th of 2010!  I then looked at the academic calendar and realized that what I was told was ‘half true,’ yes, there was a break over Christmas and New Years but only for students (teachers can choose to take some of their yearly leave at this time and I guess I could as well if I wanted to), but there is no ‘stat holiday’ as they say in Canada.

So, again, how was my Christmas and New Year? 

For Christmas I planned on having Arindam and family over for a BBQ with my new grill but it turned out that I ended up over at their place for a BBQ on their new one.  It was a good day; I got up late and went to bed early.  In the middle of the day, I was feeling creative, and baked three dozen peanut butter cookies to take over for dinner.  I have learned that Donna has taught me well – always bring a gift when going out for a special evening.  8-)

Monday the 28^th was no special day, but it was the first time I have bowled in years.  KAUST has an eight-lane 10-pin bowling alley with some fancy electronics.  You have to type in your name on the control panel at each seating area to start the game, and then the large plasma displays, above these areas, animate each of the turn’s results, measuring the speed of the ball, the direction and suggesting how the next throw should be aimed.  Arindam and I were well matched although I did use the gutter-rails a few times as bumpers (they were pulled up for Arindam’s 5 year old son who was our Third).  New career?  Maybe not!

December 31^st was a pleasant day – my birthday.  I received so many birthday wishes on Face Book.  I wonder how many were auto-prompted.  But then again, I am sure they were all genuine! 

The same day, I carried on a tradition of sorts that lasted for 5 years when I was in high school in Kenya – just a mere 31 years ago.  Yikes!  Our family would go down to the coast and go deep sea fishing on my birthday.  I like to brag that I once caught a 236 lb. Black Marlin.  This time around, I brought my fishing gear as well, but never even had a bite.  I guess good snorkeling locations do not make for good fishing spots.  And the snorkeling WAS good!  On the way out to our anchor location I received a phone call from Donna wishing me a happy birthday. Later in the evening I found myself over at a friend's home with about 20 other people to greet the new year's arrival.

The post works here. 

My first bit of mail I have received here in Saudi Arabia was a Christmas card from my Aunt Jessie and Uncle John in BC.   I had to smile because if this letter could get to me anything will be able to.  The envelope was embossed with a large ‘Merry Christmas’ in gold lettering running vertically with my name in nice green font and address in black, below a short line with gold star.  Three days later I checked my mail box again and what did I find, but my Christmas gift from Donna and the kids.  Marlene, your Christmas cake is as fresh as the day you baked it and has traveled to the further reaches of the globe, sitting in my fridge, partly eaten.  What a wonderful piece of Canada.  Thank you so much, all involved.

Packed in the gift box was a beautiful hand made card from Donna which is sitting on my table beside Jessie and John’s and on my fridge door is a foolscap piece of school-binder paper from Aven with a whole lot of GOOD MORNING and BE HAPPY messages on it – with instructions to put it on my fridge door so that I can see it each morning.  8-)  And there it is, even now.

Vis Lab

Every Sunday between 1 and 2 in the after noon the Visualization Lab on campus has an open-house where anyone interested in seeing demonstrations of how measurements can be turned into visual representations can drop in.  I have described this facility in a few of my previous blog postings.  This time, I wanted to see it all (but found out that the best part, the Cave was not working that day so will go back again another time).  I did get to see a number of large display screens used where images can be spun, rotated and enlarged.  On one, millions of measurements of a human brain were taken with cat-scan technology and water movement pathways in the human brain (not blood movement but water movement) plotted.  These measurements were then turned into a sort of colored wire diagram in 3D so that each pathway is a special color.  This made up a bird-nest kind of visual object.  But when zoomed in, each of the bird nest twigs were color coded and bunched in groups and you could see where water movement came and went from each of the lobes of the brain.  This diagram could be spun around and enlarged so large that the visual aspect of it was like we were right inside the center of the brain looking out. 

Another visualization tool is to use glasses to enhance the 3D experience.  We were shown a set of plasma screens in the shape of a half cut-away ball.  We stood around the outside of the cut-away side and looked at the inside of the ball which were TV screens pointing inward.  This semi-circle effect enhanced the 3D.  This unit was not as good as the ‘Cave’ is said to be.  I am placing a You Tube video of someone demonstrating their archeological research in the Cave here.  The best part of the video is towards the end of it.  Keep in mind that this whole demonstration has been built from measurements at the archeological dig-sites.

Trying to get out and around

 I am slowly getting connected to the community as I have discovered a few websites being run by community members attempting to build community here on campus.  These sites will help me to start promoting the idea of a dragon boat club.  I need 15 founding people interested enough to sign a paper expressing their interest in being involved.  From there, I gather a few dedicated folks who would be willing to have organizational meetings and then put forward the proposal of the group.  Once that is done, we wait to see if KAUST will support the group and get boats, equipment and a trainer.  Then it is onward and upwards. 

I have been going out for walks in the evening but I'm finding that I feel safer walking on the roads than I do on the sidewalks.   The housing blocks are built too large for their plots causing them to flow out onto the sidewalks, which pushes the walker off into the gravel verge.  Hydrants sit smack-dab in the middle of the pathway, streetlights are right where the paths should exit at street corners, holes have been left open without signs, and sprinkled here and there is the odd metal or plastic pipe erupting out of the concrete path. Oh, and the single-car driveways often have two cars parked end to end or (on) parking pads that are too short for vehicles which forces the walker out onto the street anyway. So you can now officially call me a street-walker and I will not bat an eye.