The Old Neighborhood

Well, I did not find any blowoff fires, but I did find my old flat in Al-Ain United Arab Emirates. If you are really interested in checking out the neighborhood you can plunk in: 24 °14'42.69" N & 55°43'17.57" E into any satellite imagery service and zoom in. It took me some looking and thinking as it appears if the main roads nearby were tore up and some rerouting was done.

You can see the remains of an old intersection (a perpendicular intersection) replaced with a western job and the north south road tangentially hits a round-about. That intersection was dangerous because many locals would blow through it at 50 mph even though they had a red-light. Anyway that road re-engineering made my job much more difficult.

Anyway have a good one!

Is There a Nurse on Call?

Nurse on Call is the latest add to the Blogger Beer blogroll. The Nurse on Call works in a hospital in Al-Ain and I am guessing the same hospital where the Empress worked at. My guess is she knows some of our friends still working at that hospital.

Anyway visit The Nurse On Call and read her blog. Gives a very interesting insight into what ex-pats (especially low-wasta ex-pats, but it seems The Nurse on Call is able to ably do her job despite her wasta level) have to put up with.

Anyway welcome to the Nurse on Call!

Flash Back

Searching for photos of what was aptly named The Incense Burner souk in Al-Ain (in the UAE where I used to live for a time) I ran across this blog Picture-Dubai-Emirates.com as I was searching for my photo I noticed the watermarks bearing a familiar name.

Visit the site, it has some great photos of the United Arab Emirates especially Dubai.

Oh, by the way WHAT DID HAPPEN TO AL-AIN'S INCENSE BURNER SOUK?

Musical Memories

Right now WCPE (a streaming radio station I have blogged about before) is playing some music by Bella Bartok. I have this piece on CD and obtained it in the early '90s. Can not recall if it was before I went to the UAE or just before.

However when I hear this piece (and other music doing this would be music by Ravel and the Kronos Quartet) I can almost close my eyes and imagine I am in my old apartment in the UAE or driving to Khorfhan with friends. It is amazing how music can bring back such memories.

I find unique smells can do this as well. There is a man's cologne a college buddy of mine wore. I don't know what it is but it is not a common one. Whenever I get a whiff of it I flash back to one of those old fashioned keggers.

Neither my college days or my UAE days seem that long ago.