DarrenConley.com

The end of our first year in Qatar is winding down, and it seems that I’m busier than ever (although mostly with my own projects – my employment responsibilities are minimal at this stage of the game). Now that Larissa and I have had many months to give our apartment that “lived-in” feel, I thought it might be appropriate to take some video footage of our place and post it on the internet.

This video got me in trouble the first time I showed it to Larissa, since we didn’t actually tidy up anything before I shot it. But after some enthusiastic begging, she’s allowing me to post it, with the disclaimer that I remind our viewers that our apartment is not normally like this. Sometimes our kitchen is much messier.

Anyway, without further self-incrimination, I give you the apartment tour:

So as some of you know, about a year ago I started a little project at cafepress.com which involved me opening a small online shop and uploading designs for t-shirts and other products for sale.  It wasn't really a money-making idea as much as a creative outlet for my underused abilities in the aesthetic and commercial realms.

The shop is called Shirtbug.net, and you'll see that the logo cleverly reflects the name in a way that makes the address stick firmly in the brain of the potential repeat customer.  My idea for the name and logo came in a moment of creative genius which I can only attribute to divine inspiration (proof, I would argue, that God indeed wills that my shop should see success and acclimation).  

However, despite this heavenly affirmation of future commercial prosperity, I continue to be demonized by the Hellish spectre known as "browser incompatibility".

You see, like most tech-savvy individuals in the modern age, I switched my web-browsing software over to Firefox several years ago, using Internet Explorer only during those rare occasions when I am away from my computer and using the hardware of a less technically inclined friend or acquaintance.  However, as most of the web-browsing world still thinks of that blue "e" on their desktop as "the internet", web page designers are constantly forced to create web sites that look good in both Firefox and IE. 

Enter my problem: My cafepress page, which is currently running a slightly modified version of a template which was professionally designed and purchased by me several months ago, does not want to behave itself in both browsers.  Naturally Firefox still offers the best possible browsing experience, yet in this case even "the fox" is slightly letting me down.  I'll give you some links so you can see for yourself.  (PS – you'll need to have both IE and Firefox installed on your computer to participate in this part of the post.  If you don't have Firefox installed, you should do it now and welcome yourself to the 21st century)

Here is the main page for my Cafepress shop:  http://www.cafepress.com/shirtbug

Let's check it out using Firefox first.  If you'll scroll down to the bottom, you should see two little yellow and red bugs flying around near the bottom of the left-side menu.  The one and only issue I have with Firefox is that the menu items overlap slightly with the colour gradient at the bottom of the menu, and the bug graphics slightly cross over into the menu text:

If you look at this same area with Internet Explorer, there is no problem:

However, that's the only good thing that IE is doing for my design.  You may have noticed in Firefox that at the very bottom of my page, there is a graphic of some mushrooms growing out of the grass, like so:

IE decides that it doesn't like the graphic, and thus tries to cover it up:

But my biggest issue with IE is this – when you try to view any of the product pages, it decides to ram my product picture into the menu graphics on the left, and ends up screwing up the menu display completely.  Take this page which shows my Game Over shirt, for example (click on picture to enlarge):

While Firefox has no problem putting each element in its place:

In conclusion, this is driving me crazy.  Honestly.  We have the technology to talk in real-time video to the other side of the planet, but we can't create internet software that can universally interpret html code in a consistent way?!  Can't Microsoft at least raise their browser standards to the same place as the rest of the internet world?

I appeal to my faithful readers, both near and far, who may have any amount of expertise in web development, and humbly ask that you help me to get my design looking nice in both browsers.  If anyone is to take my shop seriously, it has to at least behave itself in an orderly manner.

As for the rest of the web-browsing world, may I request that you give Firefox a try, and at least use it when you feel like browsing through shirtbug.net?  Visiting my site with Firefox is like having you visit my home and hoping that you don't notice that I didn't dust on top of the china cabinet.  Visiting my site with Internet Explorer is like having you visit my home and hoping that you don't notice the flooding on the first floor, and the gaping hole in the living room wall where Microsoft crash-landed their company jet.  It's not that the mess is my fault, but it's still embarassing.

You know, every now and then I am struck anew with just how amazingly blessed Larissa and I are to be in this place, at this time, in our particular situation.  Consider the following:

1. While the rest of the world is in the middle of an economic recession, we're in one of the only countries in the world that has an economy that's still growing, albeit at a slower rate than it did last year. 
2. While many are worried about losing their jobs, or have lost their jobs already, Larissa and I are well established in very secure 3 year contracts at a school that is still bringing in new teachers every semester (with the programs still expanding next year!)
3. We're earning salaries that are three to four times more money than we'd be earning in a comparable position back in Canada, and (for my part) shouldering a workload that is less than my colleagues that I left behind.
4. Everything we earn is tax free, and there is no sales tax on anything in this country.
5. Our accommodations are large, comfortable, and completely paid for by our company, including utilities.
6. We get free travel to and from Canada once each year, with several months of paid vacation time.
7. While we do not own a car, everything we need is within walking distance of our apartment, and anything that isn't is easily accessible by taxis, which regularly drive down our street every 5 to 10 minutes, and which cost, on average, only $5.00 CAD per ride.  Transportation to and from work is provided, and I can read or sleep each way every day.
8. I have access to all of the latest technology for teaching, and have an office that is triple the size of my old workspace back home.  If there is any piece of new technology or software that I might like to use at work, I tell the college and they buy it.
9. The weather outside is always clear and sunny, although it can be very hot in the summer.  But checking the weather is never a high priority, no matter what time of year.
10. Qatar is considered one of the safest countries in the world, with crime rates far below major cities in North America.  At the same time, I can enjoy most of the major indulgences of home: McDonalds and other American restaurant chains, free TV channels that show American programming, and any DVD or video game that can be found in Canada or the USA.

The only major thing that can make life difficult here is censorship.  Censorship can be found in many places in Qatar.  For instance, while any swear word is acceptable, both on TV and in movies, any theatrical run of a film will have all sexual content (including overtly sexual dialogue) and all nudity cut from the film, often leaving out portions of the story which seriously affect your understanding of the plot.  Watchmen has a character (who is completely computer generated) who often displays male genitalia in the film, and any and all scenes where this is visible were butchered in the theatre, often with conversations ending mid-dialogue and jumping to another scene.

Censorship is also found when browsing the internet.  Sexually explicit websites are completely blocked, as well as any website that is critical of the Qatari government, or critical of Islam.  This blocking practice often extends to websites that show streaming video (if the website itself does not censor the video content), which I may want access to in order to see movie trailers or videos to show in the classroom.  Thankfully, you can still watch YouTube in Qatar, although if you were in Turkey or Kuwait, you would not have access to it at all.

On the other side of censorship is the need to self-censor.  If I myself were to put anything on the internet that was critical of Islam, the Qur'an, or the Qatari government, I might not only find my website blocked, but I may find myself deported out of the country.  The same thing goes for portraying my workplace in a bad light, since our college is sponsored by the government.  Beyond that, it's never safe for your job security to be speaking badly about your employer in public.  Not that I would ever do so.  I love CNAQ.  And if any of my superiors from the college are reading this right now, I think you're doing an excellent, excellent job!  

The frustration for me is that I cannot share some of my daily concerns and thoughts with the internet community, and my loyal readers from back home.  For instance, I have a lot of thoughts about my current reading of the Qur'an, but there is no way that I'm going to write about it on my site, because if you look at that list of 10 blessings above, it's not worth the risk of losing all that stuff.  Any thoughts I have can easily be shared in person when I come back to Canada in August, or via more private correspondence.

So while the censorship issues are frustrating at times, it is a small price to pay for the numerous benefits of being in this place, at this time, doing what we're doing.  I'll catch up on the "uncensored" versions of movies when I'm back in Canada, or when they come out here on DVD.  In the meantime, I'm going to continue to follow my policy of doing my job, keeping my criticism to myself, and enjoying the unique benefits that life in Qatar has to offer.

[Update!  I just listened to THIS SERMON by Bruxy at The Meeting House, which falls in line with much of what I've said in the last part of this post!  I promise you that I didn't steal from his sermon!  I wrote this post 10 days earlier!]

I spend a lot of time riding the college shuttle bus to and from work.  I'm on it for at least an hour each day, sometimes an hour and a half.  Sometimes I spend my bus time talking, and sometimes I spend it sleeping, but most often I spend it reading.  And since there are so many classic, influential books which I haven't read, I generally choose to read something that is relevant to society or culture at large.  That, or something that makes me laugh.

The latest notch on my reading belt (reading belt?!) is Charles Darwin's "The Origin of Species".  The back of the book boasted that "next to the Bible, no work has been quite as influential, in virtually every aspect of human thought."  Seemed like this book might be an important one to check out.

Like most semi-educated people in the world, I was familiar with Darwin by name, and I knew that he was the dude who was famous for suggesting that life evolved on Earth, instead of being instantly created.  I also had a fairly decent understanding of how evolution is supposed to operate (random mutation, natural selection, survival of the fittest, etc.)  In fact, I would venture to say that I went into this book with a better understanding of evolution than the average Joe (for example, I understood that evolution does not state that humans evolved from monkeys, but rather that monkeys AND humans evolved from a common ancestor).  What I didn't have was the capacity to say "Yes, I've actually read Darwin's most famous work for myself."

So I started reading The Origin of Species.  I made it through the special introduction by Sir Julian Huxley, I made it through the Historical Sketch section (which was the preface to the original edition), and I made it through the Introduction, so that (27 pages in) I finally made it to the start of Chapter 1.  I turned through each page, anxious to find the section that plainly states something along the lines of "The Common Ancestry of Humans and Apes," or "The Distant Cousinship of Man and Chimpanzee," or even "Proof That Your Grandparents Were Much Much Hairier Than You Are (Possibly)."  And you know what?  I didn't find it.  I couldn't find the controversial section that got the religious world up in arms.  It was rather disappointing.

What did I find?  Allow me to give you a very, very short summary of what each chapter talked about:

Chapter 1: How animals inherit traits from their parents, the difficulty in defining what a "species" is, how animal breeders selectively breed animals to maximize traits that they want.

Chapter 2: More specific info about how species are difficult to classify, and principles about how the size and range of species are related to their variety.

Chapter 3: How ecosystems (a term not used by Darwin) function, and the ways that living things struggle to survive (against their environment and against each other).

Chapter 4: What natural selection is (how it's like breeding done by man, but it's done by nature instead).

Chapter 5: How use and disuse of body parts works with natural selection, how some parts vary more than others, how children often show characteristics of parents (or ancestors).

Chapter 6: Addressing difficulties with natural selection (including the absence of transitional varieties).

Chapter 7: Addressing more objections (purpose of structures in transition, different organs developed from the same source, etc.)

Chapter 8: Instincts, how they're passed on (or not) through natural selection, examples of complex instincts in animals.

Chapter 9: Info about crossing plants and animals in making hybrids and how it affects sterility.

Chapter 10:  Problems with the geological record (mostly about how fossils are only properly preserved under specific conditions)

Chapter 11: How succession of plants and animals best explains the geological record and dispersion of species across the planet.

Chapter 12: How plants and animals came to be distributed across the planet (across oceans, mountains and other barriers, etc).

Chapter 13:  More stuff about geographical distribution (fresh water animals, islands vs. mainland, etc).

Chapter 14: How classification of living things only makes sense when done genealogically, how organs change, development of animal embryos giving clues to previous stages in evolution.

Chapter 15: Summary of objections, how far natural selection can be extended, concluding remarks.

That's it.  In no section of this book does Darwin even discuss human beings, although you could infer points about humans when he talks about "mammals", if you like.  He does spend an awful lot of time talking about breeding pigeons and horses, and discussing (in almost embarrassing detail) the reproductive situations of plants. 

Nowhere does he say "God does not exist" or "God did not create life".  The closest he comes to touching on these issues is in the final chapter, in his concluding remarks.  Here are several quotes which the religious community may find worthy of comment:

"The similar framework of bones in the hand of a man, wing of a bat, fin of the porpoise, and leg of the horse… and innumerable other such facts, at once explain themselves on the theory of descent with slow and slight successive modifications."

This is one of the only examples (and possibly the only example) where man is actually mentioned in the book.  And it is not saying that man evolved from a monkey or a single-celled lifeform.  It is only saying that similarity in structure implies a common source.  Darwin also says:

"I see no good reason why the views given in this volume should shock the religious feelings of any one… A [believer in God] has written to me that 'he has gradually learnt to see that it is just as noble a conception of the Deity to believe that He created a few original forms capable of self-development into other and needful forms, as to believe that He required a fresh act of creation to supply the voids caused by the action of His laws.'"

Darwin ends his book by saying "there is a grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved."

Let me tell you where I stand, having finished reading this book.  It is a belief that has largely been unaffected by Darwin's writing, and if anything has been strengthened by it.  As a child, I believed in the literal Biblical story of creation.  As I started to accumulate facts about the history of the world, I accepted (as a teenager) that a six-day creation, along with a young Earth, was not the only possibility. 

As a Bible college student, I accepted that the Genesis account of creation was quite intentionally written to be understood as poetic allegory, and not as literal fact.  Why?  The biggest reason is the poetic construction of the narrative.  Consider this:

Day 1: God creates light and darkness – Day 4: God creates the sun and moon (for the day and night)

Day 2: God separates the waters above and below (sky and sea) – Day 5: God creates birds in the sky and fish in the sea.

Day 3: God creates plants on the land – Day 6: God creates animals on the land, along with humanity (at the very end).

There are perfect parallels between days 1-3 and days 4-6.  Notice also that animals exist in the sea before they exist on land, and that mankind is the final act of creation.  This is oddly parallel to the order of the evolution of life, according to those who fully subscribe to Darwin's theory.

As a student of linguistics, I spent some time studying human anatomy (especially the anatomy related to language reception and production), and even had the opportunity to explore the anatomy lab at McMaster University and examine actual human bodies.  I learned that humans display many structures in common with animals, and even possess structures which are no longer useful to us, but which are still fully functional in lower animals (Darwin speaks of these "rudimentary organs" in his book).  This led me to accept the possibility that humans were not created exactly as they are today, and may have evolved from lower life forms.

Before I explain my present view, let me ask: Does all of this mean that I do not believe in God or creation?  No.  I absolutely believe in God, for the same reason that I accept much of the tenets of evolution – because there's far too much evidence in favour of this belief.  Do I believe in a literal six-day creation?  Absolutely not, both on the basis of geological evidence, and the evidence of the structure of the Genesis narrative itself.

So how do I reconcile this situation?  Just what do I believe?  I believe that God created the Earth and allowed it to evolve over millions of years to the point where it could sustain life.  Then I believe that God created life, in either one or several forms, and allowed it to evolve into the complex system of inter-connected ecosystems that we see today.  And at some point in the evolution of life, God chose the form (a primate in the past) that was perfectly suited to handle the privilege (and burden) of carrying the human soul, and breathed His spirit into it to grant it consciousness, morality, creativity, and all of the other qualities which separate man from the rest of creation.

Now, allow me to deal with some possible objections to this view.

1. If God is all-powerful and could have made everything in the blink of an eye, or in 6 days, why didn't He?  Why take the long, circuitous route of millions of years of evolution?

There's a lot of things God could have done differently, but He didn't.  Efficiency is largely a human concern, since we're only on this Earth for a limited period of time (less than 100 years, for most of us).  When you're an eternal being, time isn't a concern.  God could have created humans with the ability to be born and mature to adulthood in several months or weeks (like many animals do), but He thought it best that we spend years and years relying on other people, and learning long and difficult lessons.  I believe that it's part of His personality to be patient, and to allow life (in all it's forms) to reach maturity at its own pace, and creating life (and humanity) through evolution is consistent with that personality trait.

2.  Do you really think that life started out as some blob that found a way to survive in a primordial soup and somehow marched onto dry land one day?

Not exactly.  I believe that life MUST have started out with God creating it, because it is a fundamental scientific law that life cannot arise from something that is non-living.  I also believe that the conditions for life on this planet are so specific, and the structure of life so complex, that without God designing the DNA structure or finding the perfect environmental balance (temperature, atmosphere composition, gravity level, energy/food sources, etc.) that life could never have survived on its own without guidance or direction.  The very fact that there ARE universal laws, and the complete and absolute hostility of any environment outside of the Earth for the sustaining of life are both good reasons to believe that God had a huge hand in the creation of life on earth.

3. Why couldn't it be that everything else evolved, but that man was still specially created by God?

I think this question comes from the need to feel that we are specially separated from the rest of creation, and we are, but not because we did not evolve.  There is too much evidence showing that we share (often redundant) anatomical structures with animals.  We are separated from creation in that God chose us to be like Him – with a soul.  Just as God chose Abraham out of the rest of humanity to build a nation out of, and to reveal Himself in a greater way to; just as God chose Mary out of every other young, morally upright woman living in that specific time to be the mother of Jesus; and just as God chose to let humanity evolve to the point where we have the capacity to wipe out all life on the planet, presumably to let us see how we can handle the responsibility.

4. If you really believe that life evolved, why do you need God in the picture at all? 

Because, like I said, there is too much evidence that He exists.  The more that scientific research unravels the complexities of the universe (trying to take a "simple" look at Quantum mechanics, the structure of ecosystems, or the organization of the genetic code will demonstrate its complexity very quickly) reveals ordered structure, the existence of immutable laws, and complex inter-relations of lifeforms and systems that only God could conceive of, let alone create.  Not to mention the uniqueness of the human soul.  I have a friend (a pastor with a biology degree) who once told me "I could prove to you beyond the shadow of a doubt that evolution is true.  What it doesn't explain is the existence of the human soul."  We possess souls because God gifted the human race with something that was only His.  The complexity and diversity of the universe shows His complexity and diversity.  The age of the planet and nature of the development of life shows His patience.  

5. Isn't this just a compromise of your Christian beliefs?  Isn't this a "slippery slope" that leads to believing that the Bible isn't really true?

Absolutely not.  This is accepting the facts as they are offered and growing in an understanding of what is true.  If God, Christianity, or any other idea about the nature of reality is not true, it's not worth believing in.  I believe in God, Christ, and the workings of evolution because I believe there is overwhelming evidence of their truth.  I don't accept them as true and then try to twist the evidence (or lack thereof) to fit my views.  Anyone who asks you to close your eyes to the world, ignore obvious facts, or subject yourself to voluntary ignorance does not have truth (or your best interests) in mind.  The quest for truth is the ultimate goal of science, and should be a goal of any person of integrity.  Christianity (and every other religion or belief) will show itself true (or false) in the face of discovered facts.  What shows itself true should be embraced – what shows itself false must be discarded.  This is completely in line with Christian beliefs and principles (see 1 Thessalonians 5:21-22).

Wow, this is turning into a far longer post than I intended.  I wanted to dispel some misconceptions about Darwin's book, and I ended up trying to establish the truth of the nature of the universe.  Of course, the lines of thought raised in this post could lead to literally years of discussion, but in the interest of length (and reader attention) I'm going to wrap things up here.

In conclusion, check out "The Origin of Species" for yourself.  Just be prepared to find plenty of (arguably) boring scientific explanation and details about plant anatomy, and very VERY little in the way of controversial, sensational conjecture.  Oh, and in case any of you are wondering, my current bus-reading book is an English translation of the Qur'an.  Let's see if that leads to any controversial blog posts!

I am not a tennis player.  It's not that I don't like the sport, or that I don't have the opportunity to play tennis – I just have never gotten around to it.  The closest I've come is the occasional game of ping-pong, or playing it on my Wii when I'm REALLY bored.  

What I have done lately is participate in a boot camp program 3 times per week at the campus where I teach.  It's usually about 25 teachers and other staff members who commit to an hour of hardcore working-out on Sunday, Monday, and Wednesday nights from 4:30 to 5:30pm.  There are three instructors who are well equipped to whip us into shape (one is a certified trainer, one is a phys-ed teacher, and one is a very experienced athlete).  The camp lasted for about 3 months, and recently ended in mid-April.

Sometime in the first week of April, after a particularly strenuous boot camp, I noticed that I had some soreness in my right elbow.  Of course I wrote this off as the normal muscle soreness that one sometimes experiences after pushing their body a little too hard.  But as the days (and weeks) wore on, the soreness persisted, and actually started to grow worse, despite boot camp being finished.

So this past Saturday I decided to pay a visit to a local (and well-reputed) health clinic to have my arm checked out.  It took the doctor about 15 seconds to determine that I had Tennis Elbow.  Somehow I had developed a tennis-related injury without the benefit of having enjoyed the process of learning and playing tennis. 

My first thought was "well, at least it's not something too serious like cancer or arthritis or degenerative flesh-eating disease."  My second thought was "shouldn't I be getting sports-related injuries after having played actual sports?  Does this mean that I won't be able to work out any more?"  And my third thought, later in the day, was "perhaps this is a good opportunity to develop ambidexterity."

I've always wanted to be ambidextrous.  It's not that I think that it would give me any specific advantage in life or employment – it's more for the sake of symmetry, and possibly impressing people at parties.  It irks me a little that I should have one arm or hand (I'm right-handed) that is strong and skilled enough to write and accomplish most of life's tasks, while having a second arm, seemingly equal in shape and health, that is far less skilled.  I've tried to write with my left hand several times – my writing looks like that of a monkey on painkillers scribbling on a pad while playing bumper-cars.

In order to facilitate the healing of my right elbow, I've started to do most of my lifting or carrying with my left arm, but I started thinking – what other things could I do with my left arm or hand in order to increase its strength and dexterity?  I didn't get very far in my thinking before I could foresee some potential problems.

First, there's using a mouse on the computer.  I've always used my right hand for this, and while I've tried to use my left, it often renders the task I'm trying to accomplish impossible.  Suddenly, your index finger is being used for right-clicking and spinning the mouse wheel, while the middle finger is being used for the typical left-click.  Try it yourself – doesn't the mouse suddenly feel like you're wielding a tool of unnatural disutility?  This led me to wonder if they make left-hand mouses, or if left-handed people use their right hands for clicking, or use software to switch the buttons, or what.  Any lefties out there who want to let me know?

Another issue that came up is toilet paper use.  I noticed this morning during my wiping session that I automatically (and quite skillfully, if I do say so myself) use my right hand for dragging the toilet tissue across my butt.  But could I even attempt this with my left hand?  This would mean not only leaning to the other side, which would feel strange, but also taking the risk that my lack of left-handed dexterity could lead to a misjudgment in wiping pressure or vector alignment, and cause my fecal matter to end up where it shouldn't be (like on my hand, or smeared inconveniently on a larger area of my anus) rather than being skillfully removed as it usually is each morning.  I don't know if ambidexterity is worth the risk of a poo-related mishap at the start of my day.

After my morning poo, I typically eat my breakfast consisting of a couple bowls of Frosties, and being a right-handed individual, I hold my spoon in my right hand as I bring each delicious vitamin-and-sugar coated flake of dried corn-mash from the bowl to my mouth.  But what if I tried my left hand?  Would I be able to truly enjoy my breakfast if I attempted to navigate my cereal bowl with a less-skilled hand at the helm?  Would my breakfast table end up a mess of spilled milk and carelessly dropped cereal matter?  And breakfast is the easiest meal to eat, generally speaking.  What about supper?  I already eat most of my meals semi-naked to avoid staining my clothes with Larissa's wonderful cooking.  Eating supper with my left hand could lead to epic disaster.  I would probably make less of a mess if I just tipped my plate onto the floor at the start of the meal.  Is the skillful use of both hands worth both the required cleanup and the disappointment at having watched such delicious meals be wasted in a hand-training exercise?

Thus far, I have not seen fit to take the risks needed to accommodate the development of ambidexterity.  However, I'm not completely giving up.  If I'm using the computer for something that is not very important (and let's be honest here, computers are used 85% of the time for goofing off), or if I have a dump that feels relatively residue-free, or if I'm eating a meal that has been poorly prepared while wearing clothes that I don't really care about, I'll try out the left hand and see what happens.  After all, if life can see fit to give me tennis elbow without having actually played tennis, perhaps it can cut me some slack in learning to be ambidextrous.

After we came back from our overnight desert safari, everyone was feeling lazy and a bit too dusty.  I myself had to go into work that day, so I showered as soon as we got home and changed into my work attire.  Larissa had the day off and stayed at home relaxing with my parents.  

I came home in the mid-afternoon, and we decided to spend the later part of the afternoon at the Museum of Islamic Art.  This museum was just completed in December, and while Larissa and I had visited it once before, we had only seen about half of the exhibits.  This is what you see as you walk up the long walkway to the museum entrance:

Once inside, you are immediately awed by the architecture.  The natural light from the ceiling plays off of the geometric designs in a mesmerizing way:

In fact, I would say that the architecture is one of the main reasons to visit the museum at all:

We spent a good hour and a half walking through the various exhibits, and while I would like to show you a good selection of what we saw, the lighting in the museum is often far too dark for pictures to turn out.  A flash would have solved the problem, but flash photography is prohibited.  Nevertheless, I was able to grab a few (slightly blurry) shots of some of the artifacts.

There was this… uh… jar with legs?:

The style of the design on this jar is actually found on many artifacts in the museum, and we were amazed at the amount of detail that was found on works that were over 1000 years old.  

There was a large selection of rugs and carpets, often in miraculously well-preserved condition:

And of course, there were many copies of (or pages from) various editions of the Qur'an.  Some were gigantic slabs of writing as tall as a person, and some whole books were small enough to fit into your back pocket.  Naturally, we saw normal book-sized editions as well:

The museum closes at about 5:30pm, and by that time we were ready to leave anyway, so we walked 15 minutes back to Souq Waqif (remember it from this post?) and caught a taxi at the Karwa stand which took us to our preferred eatery of the night – Thai Snack.

Thai Snack is a Thai restaurant about a 15 minute walk from our apartment which serves decent food made fast and cheap.  Every item on the menu has a picture, so you at least have some idea of what you're ordering.  I tried to order the "chicken anus" appetizer (after looking at the picture and confirming with the waiter that it really was the "buttocks of chicken"), but they were all out.  I ended up going with my standard pad thai, but I'm going to try the anus one of these days – it was only $1.00 CAD for a whole plate!

When dinner was done, we walked back to our apartment and capped off the evening by watching Slumdog Millionaire on DVD.  Love that movie.

The major plan for the next day (Tuesday) was to visit the camel races.  Larissa and I put in brief appearances at work early in the morning.  Larissa decided to stay home from the races because she wasn't sure if we would be in the sun all day, and due to her not-sweating condition, didn't want to risk losing consciousness suddenly (if you don't know what I'm talking about, feel free to ask me).

The camel races are held at the Shahanniya Race Track, just down the street from the Oryx Sanctuary.  For the last half of April, the GCC Emir Races were going on, with 114 Land Cruisers donated by the Emir as prizes for the winners of the major races.  I had visited the track before, but had never seen an actual race there, so while I had some idea of what we would see, I wasn't sure about where we would sit or how long the races would be.

Eric, one of our favourite and most trustworthy drivers, picked up my parents from my apartment and then came directly to the college campus to grab me from work at about 1pm.  We arrived at the race track just after 1:30, and the first race was already underway.  There were no bleachers or official seating areas – some people were just standing at different places around the track watching, but most of the Qataris would follow the race from their Land Cruisers.  Maybe I should explain how this all works –

The race track itself is 5km long and is just dirt and sand.  It isn't a circle or oval, but it twists and turns throughout its length until you end up at the place that the race started from (almost – the track actually ends around the corner from the starting line).  On either side of the race track, however, is a paved road several car-widths wide.  For the duration of each race, the spectators drive on either side of the track on these paved roads (in their 4×4 vehicles) and follow the camels from start to finish.  Here are some of the Qataris getting ready to follow the next race:

Since we didn't have a 4×4 vehicle, we weren't able to follow the camels on the track, so we stood at the starting gate and watched the beginning of a few races:

As you can see, the camels all line up behind the tarp, and when it's time to begin, the tarp is hoisted up by a motor and the camels are pulled, pushed, and yelled at to start running.  

There used to be jockeys riding the camels, but since this was feeding what was essentially a form of child-slavery (the jockeys were often children as young as 8 who were forced into the sport), they now use robot jockeys, which look like small boxes on the back of each camel.  These robots have what looks like an antenna attached to the side of the box, and when the camel owner (who is driving beside their camel during the race) wants his camel to run faster, he presses a button and the antenna thing swings quickly around and whips the camel's butt.  They can also yell at their camel remotely through a speaker on the robot.

After watching the starts of a couple races, we walked to the other side of the starting gate and noticed some Qatari men watching the race itself on a small TV they had set up.  The Al Jazeera Network was broadcasting the race live, and so we watched the rest of the race we had just seen the beginning of on the TV.  

As the race was ending, an older Qatari gentleman stood up and started speaking to my dad.  He asked my father if he would like to drive in his van to watch the race.  My dad, thinking that this man was trying to sell us his services, asked him "How much would it cost?", to which the Qatari man replied "No cost!  Free!  I have special ticket for inside lane!"  Naturally we took the man up on his offer, and the next thing we know he is calling over his driver and instructing him to let us ride in his van for as many of the races as we like.

We jumped into the van (which could hold about 15 people) and took a separate row each (we had the whole thing to ourselves).  Even Eric (they guy who drove us to the race track) got to come with us.  We ended up driving in the inside lane of the paved road on the left of the track, which was usually only reserved for the vehicles with the TV cameras and the race commentators.  We were so close to the action that I could have spit on the camels, if I had been so inclined (which I wasn't).  Here were a couple of the camels in action:

And in this picture you can see the whipping tool that's attached to the robot jockeys:

We ended up watching three full races in the van, and were amazed to be treated to such a privilege.  Incidentally, if you're wondering how fast the camels run, we were pacing them at about 40 kph.  Also, when they run their lips flap around a lot, and they often have foam coming out the sides of their mouths (it's hard to tell in these photos).

After seeing the three races, we figured that we shouldn't abuse the hospitality of the van owner, so we thanked the driver, and got out.  We looked all over the place for the owner of the van to thank him, but we couldn't find him anywhere.  Hopefully the driver expressed our gratitude to him.  It was also really great that Eric got to experience the races with us, since he's lived in Qatar for many years, and had never had the opportunity to see a race for himself.

After we got home, Larissa and my mom went out to get some henna done.  You may remember that Larissa got henna-ed back in October (see this post), and we thought that my mom might enjoy the experience as well.  They had a great time with the henna artist (a lady who works out of her own home) and the girls came home a few hours later to show us their body-art.  Here is the design on one of Larissa's legs:

The evening ended with a visit with our friend Jane, who lives upstairs, and the watching of our weekly episode of Lost, which Jane gets with her TV package and we do not.  Though my parents haven't been following Lost like we have, I like to think that they enjoyed watching it with us, and if they didn't, they were polite enough not to show it.

The next (and final) day of my parents' visit was not particularly eventful.  Larissa and I each had full days at work, and my parents had to spend some time packing to go home (their flight was leaving at midnight that evening).  The only noteworthy event of the day was when we decided to go to the Applebee's near our apartment for dinner.  There is one waitress there who has served Larissa and I every time we eat there (and who remembers us each time she sees us), so Larissa asked the hostess if this waitress could serve us when we were being seated.

It turns out that our waitress was actually just finishing her shift, but she did come over to our table and talked with us for about 20 MINUTES until she had to go home!  She is incredibly bubbly and friendly, so we didn't feel put out by her – in fact, it made the entire evening much more memorable than it would have been otherwise.  The other waitresses and the hostess kept coming over to our table to try to compete for our attention, and at the end of our meal the waitress who was actually serving us brought us our favourite desert for free (because we had become celebrities, I guess!)  It was a great way to cap off the end of my parents' time with us.

At about 9:30pm, Eric came to our building once again and picked up my mom and dad to drive them to the airport.  We said our goodbyes, gave our hugs and kisses, and waved at them as they drove down the street.  We truly felt like we had had the perfect visit with them – one week was neither too much time nor too little.  And best of all, they had not one, but several once-in-a-lifetime experiences to take home with them and share with their friends, just as I've shared these experiences with you.

Sunday was the day for our overnight desert safari.  We had booked it through a tour group called Black Pearl Tours, and since we weren't going on the weekend (remember, Sunday is the first day of our work week), we got a fairly good price.  Larissa was off work that day, but I had to go in for a few hours to take care of some paperwork and look busy in front of the management.  It was no big deal though, since our safari guide wasn't picking us up until 2pm.

Our guide, Hazem, arrived in a big white Land Cruiser (which are ubiquitous in Qatar) and after helping us with our luggage (for the overnight stay) he drove us out to the area outside the Sealine Resort, where we would leave the paved roads and make our own path over the sand dunes.  Here's Hazem and our car:

While Hazem was letting the air out of the tires in preparation for the desert driving, we checked out the camels that were reclining nearby:

The owners offer rides to the tourists for 20 QR ($6.00 CAD) for a 5 minute guided walk.  My parents decided to take advantage of the opportunity.  Here is my mom getting on her camel:

And here are my parents being led away for their ride:

While they were gone, one of the camel owners showed us his pet falcon.  He shook it a bit so that it would spread its wings for this picture:

It was a beautiful bird:

By the time the camels got back, they were feeling a little restless:

My dad paid a little extra to be able to hold the falcon for himself:

Hazem took us careening up and down the dunes of the desert, on paths that only he knows.  He would stop at certain points to allow us to take some scenic photographs:

The water that you see in some of the pictures pours in from the gulf when the tide is high.  It's this water the forms the inland sea in Qatar, near the border with Saudi Arabia.  Here's Larissa looking out over some amazing scenery:

And another similar shot, at a different stopping place:

Larissa really enjoyed sitting on top of the high sand dunes:

What Larissa didn't enjoy as much was the crazy driving that Hazem did when we were dune-bashing.  Often we'd be driving on top of a large dune with a drop on the left side of the car that looked almost completely vertical.  You'd think to yourself "There's no way we're going to drive over the edge of that," and just as you finished thinking it, the car would swerve to the left, tip over at a ridiculous angle, and start sliding down the dune.  At this point Larissa would start hyperventilating and grab onto my arm for dear life:

There were also huge dunes that looked impossible to drive up the side of, yet Hazem always found a way to accomplish it.  Sometimes there was sand flying everywhere.  They don't call it "dune-bashing" for nothing:

As the sun was setting, we ended up at the top of the largest dune in that area.  It was quiet and romantic, with a perfect cool breeze.  It's hard to tell from this picture, but Larissa is right on the edge of this dune (and actually hanging over it a bit).  You might get a better sense of the scale if you click on the picture and look for the people and vehicle on the far left side:

As it started to grow darker, Hazem drove us to the camp site where we were staying that night.  It was actually too dark to take pictures when we arrived, so I took the following shots early in the morning after I got up.  This was the tent that Larissa and I slept in:

These were some of the other tents on the site, including the dining tent on the far left:

This was where my parents chose to sleep:

And this was the pit where we had a campfire after dinner, and tried some of the shisha pipe (or "hubbly-bubbly" as they like to say in the Middle East):

Dinner was a buffet of Arabic dishes (hummus, rice, BBQ chicken etc.) along with some more American options (fries).  There was actually a lot that one could do at the camp.  They had 4 wheeled ATVs that you could ride, a soccer pitch, a volleyball court in the sand, Foosball, a pool table, even satellite TV, if you wanted to hook it up.  We decided to go more traditional and leave off the electricity.  The camp was lit only by kerosene lamps and torches, and we spent over an hour sitting around the campfire telling stories and trading facts about the differences between Western and Arabic culture.  The night was quiet, and the stars looked so much brighter than they usually did in the city.  It was fun and extremely relaxing.

In the morning, we got up fairly early, since the sun was up before 5am, and as you can see from the pictures above, we slept in tents that were open to the outside.  After a quick breakfast, we got ready to head back home to the city, but not before getting my parents to dress up in some traditional Qatari clothes:

Personally, I think the style suits them.

Friday morning is church time in Doha, and while Larissa and I have been doing our own church at home lately (using the podcasts from The Meeting House), we occasionally used to go to Grace Fellowship, which meets on the other side of the city, close to our workplace.  So we decided to take my parents to Grace and show them how typical North American-style church can easily be done with very little cultural relevance in our part of the world as well.

The service was fine, and the highlight was being able to talk with our friend Michael, who we hadn't seen in many months.  He is the one I mentioned back in this post who invited us to hang out at one of his student's farms.  We also shook hands and spoke to some other nice acquaintances we have there, and introduced my parents.  It was not a bad way to spend a Friday morning.

We spent the afternoon being lazy around the apartment, and in the late afternoon went out to one of the villa compounds for a BBQ that was being put on for those of us who had participated in the Boot Camp fitness group on campus for the past semester.  Even though Larissa and my parents hadn't come out to boot camp before, I got special permission for them to tag along:

We pretty much spent our time hanging out by the pool and chatting with people:

There were some awards given out (none of which I received, since I am more of a general all-around-fitness kind of guy, and do not excel in any one area) and a whole lot of meat was piled on the grill.  John and Mark, two of the instructors, each brought a cut of beef with them which was awe-inspiring to behold – like the take-out that Fred Flintstone gets during the opening credits.  Hence these two pieces of meet came to be known that day as the "Flintstone Steaks".  I believe the actual term is "South African cut".

Our family stuck to our mediocre hamburger patties (it was BYO beef), although I made a mental note to bring steak next time I'm invited to a BBQ.  All in all it was a fun night of socializing with other Canadians.

The next day we had an outing planned with the Qatar Natural History Group (QNHG) to go to the Oryx Sanctuary, which is about a 40 minute drive outside of Doha.  Joanne (a friend of ours who lives in our building and who is involved with QNHG) graciously offered to drive all of us, so we met her at about 7:45am and headed out.

For those of you who have no idea what an oryx is, you can read the Wikipedia article, because I'm too lazy to write about it here.  What I will say is that it is endangered, and is the national animal of Qatar (it appears in the Qatar Airways logo, and in the Olympic symbol that Qatar used in their bid to hold the games).  The Oryx Sanctuary is not usually open to the public, but the QNHG had made arrangements for a large group of us to visit.

One of the main things that we saw at the Sanctuary was (no surprises here) a herd of oryx:

One of their distinctive features is the horns that stick almost straight up.  We also saw some gazelles, which had some special name which I forget:

The animals were generally very shy, so it was good that I had brought my zoom lens in order to get the pictures you see above.

After checking out the animals, were were led down the road to a building that housed a reception area and small theatre:

We filled the theatre to capacity (and then some), and a Qatari gentleman gave us a wonderful presentation about the oryx and the work of the sanctuary in preserving the species (through vaccination, protecting them from poachers, breading programs, etc.)

We were then shown a 45 minute movie about the oryx in Qatar.  I'm told that the movie was great, but I have to take my family's word for it, since I fell asleep about 10 minutes into it.  There's something about a comfy seat and a dark room that just knocks me out.

When the presentation was done, we walked around a bit more and took a few more pictures before deciding to head back.  We capped off the morning by showing my parents around Villagio Mall (the other huge mall in Doha) and having lunch (with Joanne) at a wonderful French restaurant in the mall itself.

Saturday night we decided to take my parents to Souq Waqif, which is the old Arabic market in downtown Doha.  When we told me dad that we were going to the old marketplace, he thought that we were talking about a place where they sell fruits and vegetables, but he figured "Oh well, I'll go along for the experience".  While you can buy many foodstuffs at Souq Waqif, there is actually a whole range of products that you can pick up there, and the major draw is that you can haggle for good prices.  Many of the local Qataris do most of their daily shopping at the souq.

Most of the souq is covered, well-lit, and air conditioned, which is not exactly how a traditional Arabic souq would have been in the past:

However, there are many outdoor shops as well:

And there is one guy who will create custom-made bracelets for you, for only 20 Riyal (about $6.00 CAD).  He heats up this wax-like stuff over the coals of his little fire, then shapes the wax (you can choose your colour) into a bracelet made to your own taste and size specifications.  Just watching him work is entertaining:

Our favourite place to hang out in Souq Waqif is the street with all of the outdoor restaurants and cafes:

After showing my parents around the various shops and stalls (including the fairly large bird and pet market) we parked ourselves outside a Malaysian restaurant and ordered an extremely tasty dinner (which we received a substantial discount on – thank you, Doha Entertainment Book!)

While we were eating, we saw our friend Jinnyn walking past, and introduced her to my parents.  she is one of the most bubbly, energetic, smiley people we've ever met, and since we hadn't seen her in several months, we had a lot to catch up on.  It seems that she's been hanging out at Qatari weddings and get-togethers almost every weekend!  It helps that she regularly interacts with the female students at Qatar University, since she works in student affairs.

Jinnyn gave us the low-down on what it's like to go to the girls' part of Qatari weddings (the men and women are split up for the celebrations).  She explained to us that the women are dressed to the hilt (Jinnyn had worn a ballroom gown to one wedding, and was under dressed!) and spend a lot of time dancing and essentially trying to impress the older women who have single sons, so that they will be chosen for a good future husband.  I won't say much more about Qatari weddings here, since Larissa and I are still hoping to experience one first-hand, but it suffices to say that it was an extremely interesting conversation.

When we were finished dinner, we relaxed outside and soaked in the cool night air and the lively atmosphere.  Hints of shisha smoke wafted over us now and then, and people from 15 different countries walked past us in a continual multicultural procession of expats and locals.  The temperature was in the low 20s, and the evening breeze caressed us as we breathed the contented sighs of those who had finished a delicious outdoor meal.  The perfect end to a wonderful weekend.

Wow, am I ever behind on my blogging.  As I write this, I'm sitting in a hotel room in Amman, Jordan, watching Larissa get ready for bed on our first day of our between-semesters vacation.  However, as you may have guessed from the title of this post, I'm not writing about Jordan… yet.  That comes after I finish writing about my parents' visit to Qatar, which happened LAST week.  I figured that if I didn't get writing about this now, I would have two huge event-filled weeks to post about, and when that is combined with beginning-of-new-semester responsibilities, the weight of the workload would be overwhelming.

So let me tell you about my parents' visit.

My mom and dad arrived in Doha a week ago last Tuesday (April 14th) in the late evening after about 17 hours in transit.  Larissa and I pre-purchased their visas and also booked a service which would meet my parents in the arrivals terminal and fast track them through all of the customs and arrival process.  The service worked out beautifully, and my parents were through customs and hugging us with a minimum amount of hassle or delay.

By the time we were back at the apartment it was just after 11pm, so we showed them around our place and chatted about our plans for the upcoming week for about 45 minutes, and then tried our best to get to sleep.  It was difficult, not just for my jet-lagged parents, but for Larissa and I as well.  All of the excitement left us pretty wound up.The next day Larissa and I had to go into work, so we left my parents to sleep in, and hopped on the shuttle bus for the college.  The semester was pretty much finished, so we just stayed until after lunch, and came home at about 1:30pm.  My parents were awake and mobile, so we talked about what to do with the rest of the day, and ended up heading out to the City Center mall – one of the largest malls in Doha.  

After spending some time walking around the mall and eating at a fairly upscale Arabic restaurant, we came back to the apartment, just in time for Larissa and my mom to do some silk painting with our friend Arale.  Larissa has been taking silk painting classes from Arale for a few weeks, and my mom was happy to try it out.  Here is my mom during the beginning stages of her work of art:

Eventually her painting turned out like this:

Larissa, who has had a bit more practice in refining her technique, produced this painting, which I truly think looks absolutely amazing:

Since the silk painting was a girls-only activity, my dad and I hung out at the apartment.  We watched a movie, and I showed him some of my Wii skills:

The next day (Thursday), we took my mom and dad to work with us and showed them around campus.  Since the semester was pretty much over, there wasn't a lot of activity around the school, but they got a decent tour of the facilities, and got to meet some of our colleagues.  I knew that our college was desperate for Instrumentation instructors, and since my father worked in Instrumentation for about 30 years, I thought that it might be a good idea to introduce him to some of the higher-ups in the Instrumentation program.  

We ended up getting an extremely interesting and informative tour of the facilities of the technical training department, and my dad had an impromptu interview with the Dean of the Trades Programs.  They essentially said that they are indeed anxious to hire Instrumentation teachers, but that my father should apply through the regular online process, if he's interested.  My dad already has a good job back in Canada, but I think he was more interested in seeing what kind of offer they could make him.  It would be cool to have my parents around in Doha, but we'll see if anything comes of it.

In the evening, we had all been invited to visit the family farm of one of my students from the past semester.  This was a real privilege, since most of the staff at the college (even those who have worked in the Middle East for several years) have never had the chance to visit Qataris at their homes, and this was actually the second time that Larissa and I were able to accept such an invitation (although this time was different than our first experience).

My student (I'm not mentioning his name to respect his privacy) picked us up at about 8pm from our apartment and drove us about 10 minutes outside of the main city of Doha to a smaller residential district.  After driving through a neighbourhood of houses, he mounted the curb and continued through the desert for another 10 minutes, until we arrived at a collection of tents and animal pens.  There were sheep, goats, horses, chickens, and 6 or 7 camels:

After meeting my student's brothers, cousins, uncles, and father, we were told that they were going to milk one of the camels.  Camels' milk is considered a delicacy in this part of the world, and being offered fresh milk is a real privilege.  We watched as my student's father milked the camel (in a very similar way that one would milk a cow):

Eventually we had a huge bowl full of milk:

When the milking was done, we all walked over to where the tents were and sat down on a couple of large carpets outside.  Each of us was given a small glass of the camel milk (like a double-sized shot glass), and they also offered us tea and coffee.  I had already tried camels' milk before (though not 5 minutes out of the animal fresh) so I wasn't too worried about having it again, but my parents were a little more hesitant.  However, after the first sip, my dad really enjoyed it.  It tasted like cows' milk that was slightly creamier and a little bit sweeter.  The Qataris drink a ton of camels' milk, and many of them simply gulped it down from the bowl it was gathered in.

The only people with English good enough for conversation were my student and his similarly-aged cousin, but the rest of the older men sitting with us tried their broken English with us, and my student would translate if there were any problems.  Everyone was extremely friendly and welcoming, and my student's father said that we were welcome to come out to the farm any time we wanted.  

Soon it was time to head over to the house for dinner, but not before taking a few more pictures with the camels.  My student's young brothers and cousin really liked the animals:

They were hugging this camel as I took this picture with my family and one of the older cousins:

For dinner, my student drove us back to the residential area and parked at his grandfather's house, which is where the family gathers to spend time together on the weekends.  We didn't go into the home itself (since it is more for family, and not for guests), but rather were led into a large rectangular receiving room with carpet and comfortable furniture around the perimeter:

After some light conversation, it was time to eat.  My student laid a tablecloth on the floor in the centre of the room, then came back again with a huge platter of rice and roast lamb.  The lamb had been taken from the family herd and killed just a few hours earlier, and was the freshest meat I have ever eaten.  The rice had fried onions, spices, cashews, and a few eggs mixed in for flavour, and was extremely delicious.  Here is the tray with the entire meal on it (you can see the head of the sheep on the right side):

We all sat on the floor, and using our right hands, tore off the meat from the bones and scooped up the rice.  It was a little messier than we're used to in Canada, but there were far less dishes and utensils to clean afterward!

The meat was absolutely delicious, and the rice was the best I had ever tasted.  I kept digging through it to snatch up the cashews.  Early in the meal, my student reached into the mouth of the lamb and ripped out the tongue, once he saw that the rest of us weren't interested in eating it.  I was a little worried that my mom might not take to eating on the floor with her hands, but she got right into it:

We were all very proud of her:

After dinner, it was time for tea and coffee.  Tea was served in the same type of glasses that we used for our camel milk earlier:

My student also brought in several plates of sweets.  My favourite were these sticky sweet dough balls, which were a lot like honey-dipped timbits:

After tea, my student informed my mom and Larissa that his mother would like to meet them out in the back garden of the house.  Once again, this was a real privilege, since Larissa had never had the chance to meet with Qatari women (all of her students are male), and my mother would not have the chance again on this trip.  So they were led out to the garden, and actually spent a good 45 minutes there, while the boys hung out in the reception room.

After they came back (I had to call Larissa on her cell phone and tell her I was getting sleepy – it was almost 11pm by this point) we got the low-down on what they talked about.  My mom said that my student's mother was very beautiful and looked quite young (she was actually in her early 40s).  She had been married at 14 and had her first child at 15.  Since then, she had borne 11 children, and her youngest was 4 years old.  Both Larissa and my mom felt honoured to be able to meet with her, and were fascinated by her life and experiences.

It was so wonderful to be able to share such an authentic cultural experience with my parents that night.  These are the types of stories that their friends back home will love to hear about, and which my parents will love to share.  We were only two days into my parents' visit, and already the trip had been more than worth it.

Greetings friends, acquaintances, and lurkers.  It's been a little while since I've posted, mostly because I have a whole pile of photos from Dubai (from over a month ago) that I've been sitting on and waiting to write about, but every time I think about doing so, the task seems too overwhelming.  So if you want to see pictures from our time in Dubai, I advise you to check out Larissa's photo album on Facebook.  I'm giving up on it.

In more recent news, my parents are coming to visit us here in Doha for a week, and they're arriving this evening (in about 3 hours, to be exact).  This is the first time that anyone we know is coming to visit us, so naturally we're both incredibly excited.  For someone like me who has a healthy show-and-tell complex, this is like crack on cinnamon toast.  I'm really looking forward to showing mom and pop around our digs, and dispelling all of their misconceptions about the Middle East.  The other day on the phone, my mom asked me if you're allowed to chew gum here.  No, I'm not making this up.

We hired a cleaner recently, due to Larissa and me (a) being too lazy to regularly clean our apartment, (b) fighting every time we discuss cleaning the apartment, and (c) wanting to support the lower-income segment of this culture a bit more.  So we pay a nice Sri Lanken fellow named "Sathi" about $30 per week to do our dusting, vacuuming, and floor cleaning on Mondays.

After seeing the amount of dust that regularly collects in our place, Sathi recommended that we tape around our windows (which are not insulated anywhere near the standards of windows in Canada) to prevent so much of the desert from sneaking into our living space.  He offered to do it for us in fact (since it would make his job easier), so we paid him a bit extra to take care of that.  We never really open our windows anyway.

In the course of doing the taping, Sathi informed us that there was a lot of dust covering our curtains (something which we were already aware of, but had failed to sufficiently care enough about to let it alter our lifestyle) and he recommended cleaning them in order to maximize our dust-banishing efforts.  So last week we pulled down five sets of heavy curtains and hauled them off to our local cleaners, along with some dress shirts and pants.  The curtains (and other laundry items) were ready to be picked up yesterday, and since I had some time before I had to leave for work (Larissa had already left), I set out to try to retrieve these newly cleaned items on my own.

Our preferred laundering establishment is only about a 5 minute walk from our apartment, but I realized on the way that I didn't have enough cash on hand to cover the bill, so I walked past the laundry place to the bank several doors down.  I arrived at the bank to discover that the ATM was out of service, and the bank itself was not open.  So I ended up walking a couple blocks further to the ATM near Doha Clinic.  At this point I realized that this unplanned distance was going to cut into my "getting ready for work" schedule, so I backtracked a bit more briskly to the laundry place once I had my extra cash in hand.

On the way back to get the laundry, I received a text message from my service provider saying that my prepaid phone balance was due to expire that day, and that I should top up my funds if I didn't want my service to be interrupted.  Naturally, the only place open at 8am that could sell me a phone card was on the other side of my laundry guy.  So I walked past the laundry place for the second time in 15 minutes and ran into the variety store 4 doors down.  Once I had my phone card, I finally arrived to pick up my laundry, and threw my slip down on the table.

Now, when I dropped off the laundry 4 days previous, Larissa had helped me carry half of it, and it had seemed like a daunting trek back then.  When the proprietor of the laundry establishment had lain all of my newly washed items in front of me, I realized that there was no way in Allah's sun-baked desert that I was going to be able to haul my crap back to my apartment alone.  The laundry guy was evidently thinking the exact same thing, because he said to me (in an Indian accent that was full of forlornment and pity) "Oh Mr. Darren, how you are going to take these to your home?"  I could only shake my head and reply "I don't know, man.  I don't know."

The good proprietor (who, incidentally, has remembered my name every time I've gone into his place since the first time I became his customer) spoke some words to his two other employees in a language that was neither English nor Arabic, and then told me, "We will drive you to your accommodation in our bus".  Then the three of us each grabbed some clothes/curtains and loaded them into the small passenger bus that they used to transport laundry around town.  I only needed to travel about 300 meters down the street, but I was immensely grateful for the assistance.  After all, at this point I only had 10 minutes to get my laundry home, carry it up to my 3rd floor apartment, and get changed into my business attire for work.

After pulling up in front of my building, I got the driver to load up my arms with the curtains and clothing, and moved towards the elevator as fast as the laws of physics (given my weight load, muscular development, air resistance, etc.) would allow.  By the time I made it into the front door of our apartment, I knew I was going to drop what I was carrying, whether I had made it inside or not.  Thankfully, my curtains and clothing landed on the couch, and after some frantic dressing (the cuff links are difficult to manage when you're in a hurry) I made it back out the door and onto the school shuttle bus with seconds to spare.

Work this week as been far less frantic than my laundry outings, since final exams were last Sunday (Easter Sunday, to be exact) and I have already finished all of my marking, despite working at a pace that is far too leisurely for the average professional EFL instructor.  And it's a good thing too, because my parents are arriving tonight (which I believe I mentioned above) and Larissa and I would like to spend this week maximizing our visiting time, and minimizing our office-work-time.

The real trick right now is to try to maintain the maximum cleanliness imposed on our apartment by Sathi's visit yesterday so that my parents think it is always this clean.  We're letting my mom and dad use "my" bathroom while they're here, so this morning I got in the habit of not crapping in "my" toilet by defiling Larissa's toilet instead.  All in all, I was happy with the experience, though it took two flushes to teach her toilet how to handle my deposits.

I spent a good hour this evening walking through the apartment and cleaning up some of the residual clutter that may have detracted from the pristine image that we're attempting to convey to my parents later this evening.  You know – putting away the underwear that we had hanging up to dry, making our bed look like we regularly make it up, and hiding the lubricant properly distributing the toiletries among the various bathrooms.  I think we have everything covered, so to speak.

We have a fun schedule of activities lined up for my parents' visit, so I'll try to keep you, my internet readership, well informed.  That is, unless we take too many photos.  Then I may be intimidated into blogging silence once more.