Dirt World

Tuesday was a LONG day. First we had the Embassy visit, which we met for in the hotel lobby at 7:45. Bus did not show until around 9:00, we were finally seated in the embassy around 10:00 for our briefing. It is a little disconcerting when the windows have plaques next to them saying things like: Glass Kills. In case of an emergency stay away from all windows. Nice.

Though we had a nice little meeting, most of the staff had been sucked over to Jeddah to attend to Karen Hughes, Bush’s new appointee as Under-secretary of State for Public Diplomacy. See, she is supposed to do things overseas like improve the image of the United States. Kind of like what all us college reps are doing, by getting students to come over and check it out. Wonder if she knows we are here at the same time? Fulfilling her mission for her? Perhaps she’d like to come to the college fair and show her support? No? Instead she’ll disrupt all our well-laid plans with the embassy by making impromptu PR visits to posts. I guess she took her cue from Bush himself, who rerouted rescue resources from Katrina so that they could show up in the background of his PR appearances. Style over substance…

So ANYWAY, after the embassy we set up our booths for the fair at Al Yamamah College. This was the opening day of a three-day fair. We even had the new king’s brother come and speak. Yes, I did say in an earlier post that it was supposed to be the King, but he too was pulled away by the visit from Karen Hughes (I’m not bitter). Student-wise, it was all guys (girls cannot visit at the same time – day three is reserved for them). And all these guys were interested in was stuff my school does not offer. One even told me my school’s offerings were “bool-sheet.” I’m trying really hard to like the Saudis, but when I get home I think I’ll sell my car and walk everywhere just to deprive them of a few bucks.

After the fair I packed up, said goodbye to Mike, Joseph, and the other tour members, the cabbed to the airport for my flight to Mumbai. It did not leave until 2:30am. I was packed in to a very old jet with a gaggle of foreign workers. It sucked, big time. But I got there, checked into the hotel, napped, went to the organizational meeting, then pigged out with everyone at a local restaurant, Khyber. Dish after dish after dish – it was an incredible feast. Made the past 48 hours fade out (or maybe that was the Kingfisher). Back to work in the morning…

Those pictures I promised...

...can be found below. I managed to get them off my camera and onto the laptop, but still the batteries are dead, so no new ones. I'll figure this out as soon as there's time. The new tour has started, so we are very busy.

Gatehouse to the Emirates Palace

Emirates Palace

"No, I insist, you drive the Rolls."

Joseph chatting up some students in Bahrain

The group enjoying the smoking room

worm's view of the central atrium

Joseph, a young Telly

Yours truly, enjoying a shot of Wild Turkey (yes, it was on the menu).

Mike, of the Rat Pack

A debate...

Hani, Mike and I

OK, camera still has no juice, so no new pics of my own (above is from Mike). Was going to show you the amazing Emirates Palace in Abu Dhabi (and still will, en Shallah). If my camera was going to poop somewhere, Riyadh ain't a bad place for it. There is not much to distinguish this place from Amarillo, Texas - a hell-hole I've actually been to. But at least in Amarillo you can drink beer and flirt with pretty ladies. Not in Riyadh. Oh no.

So another digression: over the course of this trip, Mike and I have been debating over what allows you to claim having "been to" a country. I take the simple view that you must at least spend the night, and hopefully eat some distinctive food, try the local beer. Even this is sometimes cutting it close. Best if you can spend a few nights, see some sights, meet some locals. Mike, being an old man with little time left on this Earth (I keed, I keed), argues that simply setting foot in an airport gives one right to claim a country. How lame.

So who is more right? Or do you have your own benchmark? One other rep said you have to brush your teeth there. I thought that was interesting. Please comment... and visit Mike's site to heckle him.

Limbo

Okay, first off, this is not the post I want to make right now. I have some really, really cool photos to show off, but unfortunately my camera is SO out of juice, I cannot even download to my laptop. This would not be an obstacle, except that the battery charger I bought at CIRCUIT CITY (refund requested, if any corporate bastards are reading this) has decided not to work. Therefore, I give you the following anecdote:

Tomorrow our group flies to Saudi Arabia (one of two countries named after a family. What's the other? Discuss). Reps are taking bets over whether or not I will be detained and jailed at the airport due to some of the "artistic" photos in my school's catalog. We shall see. What IS certain is that no alcohol is allowed within The Kingdom (except at the US Embassy, which I hear throws a kick-ass party). Mark (from Toledo) and I decided that due to this we needed a couple or dozen pints of Guiness the night before the journey. Lucky for us, we found out where the only place in town has The Black Stuff on tap. Quite a cosmopolitan establishment it was: our waitress is the first Uzbek I have ever met, and we ended up befriending a gaggle of Australian platform workers. By "platform" I mean OIL platform. These guys travel around the region by barge, maintenancing platforms. They make quite a bit of money, and try to claim as little as possible, so I will not mention any names. What I will say is that I will never again complain about sub-standard accomodations. Anyone in Southville, or Panama City, has seen a container ship pass by, called so for their cargo containers. Guess where these guys are forced to sleep during their stay? If you said on the ship, that is bad, but not bad enough. They are sleeping on cots INSIDE A CONTAINER. That was their excuse for drinking, and drink they did...

Bahraini Confessional

The H4: Oil sheiks have so much money, they use it as a planter.


Today was a good day, and a bad day.

The Good:
Three great visits, to schools catering to natives Bahrainis and other Gulf residents (not-expats). We were all way busier at every school than we thought we would be. At the first I went through materials like crazy, at the second I tried to be stingy, at the third I was just out and told kids I'd send them stuff later. I really felt like I did a great job today, not just representing my university, but representing the USA in general. If I get some apps out of it, even better.

Back at the hotel I took a much needed nap, then logged on and started doing yet more catch-up work. I went through my interest cards and made spreadsheets of students and their e-mails by country and event. Then I started sending them follow-up e-mails. At 8pm I met some other reps at a nearby Indian restaurant for dinner (as if I won't get enough Indian food in the next few weeks). Then I came back to my room, opened my bottle of Lebanese wine, and did more e-mail.


Baggage fiasco: that ain't fitt'n in the back of that truck. We ended up hiring two extra cabs, for luggage.

The Bad:
As I finished my mail and wine (it was a half-bottle), Hani knocked on the door. We had agreed to hit the town together, as tomorrow is the first day we have nothing to wake up for. Let me say this now: hanging out with Hani is not bad. That is not what I mean. Hani is a good guy to sit and talk with, just check out his blog.
What I mean is that I did not enjoy the going out - at all. I must be getting old, or mature, or something. But, at the same time I think that, I realize that I have hated the whole "going out" scene for a long, long time. This is coming from someone who has been a patron, bouncer, barback, bartender, and manager of a bar. Familiarity breeds contempt? And if I hate it, why do I feel compelled to still do it? I don't know. I do know that I feel more comfortable working at a bar than frequenting it. I prefer being an observer. Now that I have my "real" job, I'm stuck on the wrong side. I'm thinking it's time to throw in the towel. I gave up TV, why not going out? Another thing I know is that I enjoyed cataloging my student contacts more than I did exploring the local social scene. Ugh. Here are some more pics:


Early AM: Leaving Oman


Construction of the Bahrain World Trade Center. Deja vu anyone?

BAM! : Beirut, Amman, Muscat

Ah, my club sandwich from room service showed up just as I sat down to write. Now I shall much on French fries and type with greasy fingers. Notes:
1) Internet in the Middle East is spotty, and where available often very expensive. Therefore my posts may be sporadic.
2) Yes, there was a bombing in Beirut while I was there. I was in my hotel when it happened, and wouldn’t have known until the morning, except I had CNN on while I was packing. I still love that city.
3) The pics I promised last post will be spread throughout this entry, often where not related, just to break them up. They are of Baalbek, an amazing Roman site in the Bekaa Valley of the interior of Lebanon. The first of these:

Last time I visited Beirut I went on and on about how much I liked it, so I will try not to repeat myself too much. I will try to be creative and/or specific with my praise.



For instance, I am infatuated with city-states. I always have been. I can remember in middle school, high school, and college being fascinated by ancient Greece and all of its distinct, unique little units; by Renaissance Italy and its scheming, warring neighbors; and by the bewildering mess of pre-unification German principalities and whatnot (Prussia kicked ass!). Even today, I admire the modern-day anachronistic holdouts of Europe like Andorra, Luxembourg, San Marino, and the Vatican.



In the Middle East however, the city-state is alive and well: Lebanon, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, and the Emirates (all seven). One could even argue that Israel and Jordan are city-states of a sort. There are bite-sized countries, perfect for getting to know in a short period of time. They are intimate and have cohesive personalities, rather than wide varieties in character due to regionalisms. This is not to say they are not complex – just look at Lebanon and Israel. Careers and lifetimes have been spent on studying and trying to figure out these tiny nations. Enough rambling on this tangent…


Notice the people, bottom right, for scale

An illustration of why I am infatuated with Lebanese women, namely, a prospective grad student taking my card at the fair in Beirut:

“This is your name? J----? Mine is Mira.”

“Mira? That sounds Spanish.”

“Yes, I know. It means look. I am nice to look at, yes?”


Those pillars, one more time

The embassy guys offered to take us out on the town after the fair, but we had to decline. Our flight is early (woke at 5am to catch it) and there is much packing to do. Like I said earlier, it was during this packing that I heard about the bombing. Still, no problems leaving in the morning.



Next stop was Amman, Jordan. Jordan has some very cool sites, primarily Petra (you know, the Indiana Jones grail-temple in the final movie), and Jerash (Roman site in the north). I saw both of these on a foreign study trip in college. No time for that this go-round. Our schedule of events started just a couple of hours after we checked in. I thought the fair would be as sleepy as Amman is. No way. It was a tidal wave of students. I think I’ll get some good apps from here.

After the fair a few of us went down the street to a sandwich shop that was open late. Chicken schwarma to die for, cheap. To bed.

The next morning we had to check out before making our school visits, because we would not be going back to the hotel. Had to leave one tour member behind because she was sick (she met us later at the airport). School visits were good. Had a traditional buffet lunch before hitting the airport again: lots of lamb, olives, and hummus.

Erectile Dysfunction (heh, heh)

A bird grazed me with poop as we entered the airport. Another guy got hit hard. It was ugly. Airport pigeons suck.

Inside the Temple of Bacchus

We arrived at Amman airport at 4pm. We did not finish checking into our hotel in Muscat, Oman until 2am. This is why I awoke at 9:20am this morning. We were supposed to get on the bus for a school visit at 9:30. You have never seen a man dress and pack promotional materials so fast.

On the way to Baalbek

The school visit was great (glad I made the bus). I raved about this place on the blog last time around. Sharp, sharp ex-pat kids. I really want to get a couple to my university. Mike, who was set-up next to me, got a good picture of me talking to a very animated Irish/Venezuelan girl. I'll have to get it from him.

Back at the hotel, we had a couple hours to kill before the fair. I went for a 3 mile run on the beach. It felt good to almost kill myself again. The heat was absurd. The only thing that spared me was a good stiff breeze off the Indian Ocean. Back, I jumped in the pool for a bit, then went back to my room for room service lunch and a little computer work.

The fair: steady but nowhere near as hectic as the last two. Now I'm going to try to take care of some email and hit the sack.



That is a cross-section of a fallen pillar that I am stretching my 6'3'' body across. Romans = Bad Ass Ancient Engineers

Baking in Beirut

Well, Mike did call at 6am, but I did not make it to run with him. I slept another hour, then took my jump rope out to the jetty to get some exercise. I won’t say jet-lag is defeated yet. I’ve had it sneak up on me a day or two late before…


The brutal setting

We held a mini-fair for two schools today. It was outside. What the HELL? Today in Beirut, it felt like Southville about a month ago – hot and humid as a bulldog’s breath. Of course we are all dressed up. Guys always get it worst with the long sleeves and ties. Ugh. It was miserable. I could feel the heat coming off my table, the sweat dripping down my back beneath my undershirt. We couldn’t get out of there quick enough.


Mike, before his laptop melted, and he started crying

Back at the hotel now, catching up on answering student email that has been piling up this week. We will probably go down to the café district for dinner tonight. I should have some great pics tomorrow after our morning excursion…just wait.

Battling Jet-Lag with Recreation

Flights: Savannah-Atlanta-Philadelphia-Paris-Beirut
Start: 12 noon, September 12
End: 5 pm, September 13
Time difference: 7 hours
Total travel time: 22 hours

Whew! Have seats gotten smaller, or have I gotten larger? I think my ass spread out over the course of the trip, you know, kinda like how you get shorter over the course of the day as your spine compresses? You didn’t know that?

So the flights were the usual. Some reading, some sleeping, some wanting to punch the passenger in front of or beside me. I lucked out on the Philly-Paris flight and got an interesting seat-mate, a young lady named Andrea going to Athens for a semester abroad. She laughed at my blow-up chiropractic neck pillow. It didn’t make sleeping any easier or more comfortable, but it did save the neck-crick afterwards. Paris: as soon as the plane door opened my eyes started watering from the cigarette smoke. Thank Allah it was only a 90 minute layover.

As soon as I checked into the hotel I changed and went to the pool. It is very lively, as it has club members as well as hotel guests. Swam some laps and did some reading. I also watched the sun go down. Hopefully, this will imprint onto the reptilian core of my brain: it is NOT NOON, even though it thinks it is. I am determined to beat jet-lag quickly on this trip. I have read that getting sun and exercising really help. So do pills. I took some OTC stuff and slept 12 hours.

In order to get the sun and exercise, I met up the next day with a tour buddy, Mike Wigal, to go scuba-diving. Now, the last time I went was two years ago, on the Honduran island of Utila, and that was when I had my open-water course, and never sent in my info for the card. No problem. The swarthy fellows here took my word for it and only rolled their eyes slightly when I tried to put my regulator on my tank backwards. They also said, “En Shallah.”

The dives were great. One in the morning as a refresher, during which we did go through a short cave, then one in the afternoon on a wreck just offshore from our hotel. Mike and I were hoping it was sunk during the civil war:

Mike: So how did the ship sink?

Dive Master: Like this… (imagine the dive master twinkling his fingers downwards and making bubbling noises)

We all got a good laugh out of that.

In between dives we cabbed to the center of town and walked around a bit. Most of this stuff I saw the last trip, but it was new to Mike. I love central Beirut. What a great café, shopping, and sight-seeing area. We need to come back here at night sometime. This evening however, we met up with other tour pals (Stephanie, Joy, and Katherine) at ate across the street at “Snack M.Barbar.” I had a Tawood pita sandwich and a platter of hummus for about $3. Can’t beat that. Now it’s to bed. Mike’s going to attempt to wake me at 6am for a jog along the corniche. Our tour organizer, Joseph, said to just be careful to stop running south when we begin seeing black banners. That’s Hezbollah.

(ps – pics to come. for now, check Mike’s site)

Bush-hating Republican

I have resisted being political on this site until now, but it has just gotten so unbelievably bad, I can't stand it. If I were a citizen of another country observing this one, I'd probably laugh. Since I'm an American, I'm just sad and ashamed. I truly believe that the Bush administration will go down in American History as the worst and most corrupt, ever. It's absurd, truly absurd what is happening on a regular basis in this country. Forget the war in Iraq, forget the ongoing disaster in New Orleans. Take a look at just another straw on the pile of mid-level outrages going on daily in this kleptocracy:

The Pentagon's inspector general will be leaving his post Sept. 9 to take a top job at the parent company for Blackwater USA, one of the largest private security firms in Iraq, the Defense Department said yesterday.

Joseph E. Schmitz has been the IG since March 2002, heading an office of 1,250 military and civilian officers and employees, with a mandate to prevent waste, fraud and abuse in the Pentagon. Its work included an extensive review of a controversial plan for leasing Boeing Co. jets as Air Force tankers. A top Pentagon procurement officer and a Boeing official went to prison in that case.

Danielle Brian, executive director of the Project on Government Oversight, said, "The inspector general is a standard-bearer for ethics and integrity for the Pentagon. To see a person who has been holding that position cash in on his public service and go work for one of their contractors is tremendously disappointing," she said. Schmitz will be based in McLean for Prince.

This is a symptom of a much larger disease - one that starts right at the top. As they say, the fish rots from the head down. If you are a Republican who supports anything Bush does, please wise up. Blind support is not being a patriotic American, or even a good Republican. Read some of the stuff at Huffingtonpost.com. Just because it comes from the left, doesn't mean it's wrong. Who else will criticize him and his administration? Most of our Republican representatives are party-line cowards.

God bless John McCain, for President 2008, please...