Time flies when you are having fun!

Week Ending February 26, 2016
What?!!! Another week has passed? Incredible how times flies when you are having fun. Sometimes we have to make our own fun and though I'm quite limited in what I can do and where I can go, I make the best of it.  I'm working six days a week with one day off to catch up around "home", which is a cinder block flat in a gated compound about 30 km from the plant near a village called Baysh.  This week, I managed to do some beach combing on my lunch break and I brought home some fishing nets, floats and a boat anchor for some interior decorating.

I have found a quiet beach where I can swim and explore a bit.  There are several abandoned fishing boats there which tempt me... all I need is a roll of fiberglass and some polyester and away I could go!

Thursday night (Grocery Night), I drove to Jizan with three of my Finish co-workers and we had dinner in a nice seafood joint and I bought a snorkel set also.

 Grilled fish, prawns, Arabian Bread (which is absolutely delicious with hummus), fries and salad...

Wild cats (and dogs) are a part of Life in Saudi Arabia, many of which are skin and bones...

Grocery Shopping is great here... The local Panda franchise is well stocked and aside from being shutdown for prayer five times a day, is very convenient.

Tahini is an oily paste made from toasted ground hulled sesame seeds and it is used as a dip like hummus.  Its very popular here.

 Halawa is a sweet dense Tahini based confection... more of a treat.

 Ghee is an Arabic type of butter...

 Cardamom is a popular spice here that they use to flavour their coffee, often eaten with dates. (I'm drinking it that way now too!)

Note the copper bracelet I made for myself...  :)

Here is a sign posted down by my beach... 6 per room... nice....

 A new beach I went with my friends to today.. looking south.

 
 Looking north...

 A dead sea lion.... washed up on our beach... along with thousands of tons of garbage...

 And that's all I have.  As per my visa requirements, I leave for Doha Qatar with my Portuguese friend Ricardo this week.  We have to fly from Abha, a town 2 1/2 hrs to the north east of us on Thursday March 3rd and will return on Saturday March 5th.

I have two weeks off March 18th and I have found a little tropical island in the Caribbean where I can relax, enjoy some rum and have a little RnR with someone special and make a little fun. Time flies!

A Camel in the Desert...

The remains of a camel in the desert

Week Ending Feb 19th

Ding!  And that folks is the end of another week in south western Saudi Arabia.  I wish I could say that anything exciting has happened... that the village I live in was infiltrated with armed Houthi Rebels from Yemen and I am being ransomed off for a handsome price... or that one of the scud missiles shot down overhead landed right beside me... But no... nothing that interesting has happened in the past week.  I sleep, I cook, I clean, I work... rinse and repeat.  I continue to take over as head of the multi-national safety department at work, and that brings with it a certain need for diplomacy and tact; two qualities I not only possess in spades but attribute to being a middle child. 

Thursday was a storm day... with strong winds and visibility affected by sand... 

You can see the drifts of sand, sometimes coming across and even burying sections of the highway. Sand drifts are not like snow.. they feel more like concrete when we hit them.

This happened Thursday at the entrance to the plant... speed is always a factor, never mind vehicle maintenance and idiot drivers.

A real camel in the desert...

Nothing like a dip in the Red Sea...

Time on my Hands so Im playing with some marlinspike artwork...

I'm counting down two more weeks until I fly to the capital of Qatar for a couple nights.

There's a new pizza joint just up the highway so wa-hoooo! Its pizza night tonight!

Week 6

A "Red Beard"... one of many old men with long red beards which frequent the markets...

Week Ending Feb 12, 2016
Well there went another week. I arrived back from two nights in Dubai on Saturday and enjoyed a good week of work.  I'm challenged as I attempt to unite a team of South Africans, Philippinos, Pakistanis, East Indians, Finns and Arabs as we regroup on plant safety and try to align our teams to one corporate strategy.  I've been named as the man to pull it all together...
I've booked my next 30 day visa renewal in Qatar March 3 - 5 which will be a welcome change, though I wonder if it will be much different than gold plated Dubai.  I will drive to Abha just north of here and fly direct so that should be interesting.

Tapping the furnace - Pig Iron

 

This is a beach on the Red Sea Coast that I have frequented several times.  Like most of this area, it is littered with garage.  Abandoned boats wash up all the time and goodness knows what else.

Local Seafood at the supermarket

I do my own cooking... this was this week's beef stew..

Pancakes for breakfast

Omelette a la Kevin

Camels grazing on my way to work...

Our "Best Red Sea Beach.... less garbage, more sand...

Its a shallow beach and I can walk out 500 feet just to get the water chest high... There are sharks out in the deep but so far no fins or theme songs from Jaws have played while I swim...

My local supermarket...

My local fruit and veggy market

I'm growing a beard so I can fit in with my Arabian counterparts... :)