This weekend, I signed up for the "Undergraduate Conference for Information Systems."
The main reason? Because today they took us on a desert safari.
I believe the term more widely used around here is "dune-bashing."
There were about two dozen of us in eight Land Rovers, driven by guys who would do this on the weekend anyway. Our drive, Mahmoud, was probably enjoying getting his car full of girls (and Abdalla) to cheer as we bounced around in the sand.
After a little under an hour's drive to the Mesaieed area, all of the drivers got out, deflated their tires, and after that... no roads, just sand.
And, like always, the most thrilling part was coming up to the crest of a dune and only seeing sky in the windshield, until slowly it pivots down until all you can see is sand.
I didn't hurt that as soon as we started the real fun, he put on current pop music with some great pounding bass as a soundtrack.
We spent a good hour trundling around, stopping every so often to take pictures on the top of this or that dune, or overlooking the Saudi Arabia border (that's as close as I'm going to get to a country that's not very easy to enter as a tourist... a female one at that).
After the amazing dune-bashing session, we stopped at a camp alongside the Arabian Sea for our late lunch. They pulled out a volleyball, which we tossed around for quite a while. (It was clear that the drivers were way more practiced than the students). Then there was a bit of wading (my pants are still damp), a bit of posing with a camel (which stepped toward Allan every chance it got) before the call to dinner.
I had smelt the meat being grilled for a while, so it was easy to sit around, dig into the pita (that no one around here calls pita, they just call it bread) and dips and hotdogs and kabobs, and chat with the others around.
The way back had a few little hills and bumps, but the most fascinating part was seeing the amount of people around. As it was getting dark, we went down a dune to a flat area, where there was a Cruiser drifting with another dozen parked toward it, watching; right next to it, a steep hill that a half a dozen Land Cruisers were waiting to race up and coast (slide) down. There were little 4x4s and dune motorcycles and buggies doing their thing too.
Not to mention the vehicle every twenty meters along the beach having a family cook-out. I'm convinced that the half of Qatar that doesn't go picnic on the Corniche on Fridays after prayers goes to Sealine.
Happy International Day, everyone!
I got in the spirit by wearing "traditional" Pittsburgh clothing - a fleece, a hat, a scarf, and gloves... not many people noticed, in the sea of beautiful, multicolored traditional dress. The great part is, people weren't necessarily even wearing their own country's!
KayKay in Singaporean and Urmila in Indian garb (I think).
Varun, his Desi self.
The Student Affairs staff (in random travel wear)
Tessa in something I'm assuming is from Brunei.
My beautiful Sudanese girls!
Boys from the subcontinent (and Shaza still looking gorgeous). (Note Allen's wrap! Knees!)
Arash in eastern Iranian wear (because apparently they differ... and I'm not sure if I got the east versus west thing right; it actually might be western Iran).
Samreen in her pantsuit (and I'm wearing pant I got in India)!
Mathew just wore a dress shirt (boring) but Shahriar (front left) got in the spirit with his Bangladeshi clothes.
Jimmy wore something from a Middle Eastern country... can't remember which one, but he didn't have anything from Kenya to wear.
e the guys were allowed to wear shorter skirts than I am!
Besides just wandering around and taking pictures with people (and eating food), there was the International Day show that Fatima and Maria put together. Being on "Arabic Standard time", it was scheduled to start at 5:30. At 8:00pm, the first act (Mridula doing an awesome traditional Indian dance) was just finishing up.
There were other Indian dances, a Dominican song (sung by Melissa, our study abroad coordinator), an African dance, a Bangladeshi anthem, an English poem, a presentation about Azerbaijan, an im
promptu salsa/latin dance session, more dabkeh, an Iranian dance (that was also performed at Coffeehouse), and I'm sure there are other performance I'm forgetting.
What I won't forget, though, it how people reacted to those performances. For a few of the dances, instead of just sitting and watching, people from the crowd stood up and joined in! The final dance, an encore performance of the "Desi Dancers", turned into a giant jumping mob. It was a bunch of fun.
As if that wasn't enough for a day, Abdalla gave me a ride to Ezadin Towers (yet another fancy hotel!) where Kelsey was throwing Ziad a surprise party! We weren't there for the actual surprising, but we were there for the cake.When the cake was getting lit, the manager was having a hard time lighting them... so another guy with a lighter came up and started helping him. Then another guy. There were eventually half a dozen people gathered around these 20 candles trying to get them lit!
We sang "Happy Birthday" in English and Arabic, then he blew out the candles.Then, the photo shoot started. Ziad was wearing a striped shirt, as were another two or three guys at the party. So after the group picture, all of 
them jumped in together... someone yelled "Arab picture", and all of a sudden the photo shoot got "racist."They didn't leave anyone out... there was the Africans, the East Asians, those from the subcontinent, the Khaleejes, the "white people"... Just goes to show how diverse this place is!
After the final photos, a few of us ended up at the souq, enjoying some karak and sheesha. They kept flipping channels on the TV we could see, but on every channel, Fred knew exactly what was going on. And I think Ziad (the birthday boy) had a good time.
If it looks like I'm blowing away... I am! It was super windy and actually sprinkled a bit. (The waiters broke one of the large umbrellas trying to take it down, and some of the sheesha stands - that weren't being used thankfully - got knocked over.)
"India rubbed off on you." I think that was the most clever comment I heard today, after being very much tan from the bike rides and the fort climbs in the sun in India.
Fair skin is treasured in most of the world, since it shows that the person doesn't have to labor in the sun. The USA is different; we prefer skin cancer.
Though someone around here did tell me I was too white a month or two ago.
Anyways, today's post is dedicated to Valerie, my littler (but not littlest) sister, whose birthday was yesterday.
I got her a bag... just not sure which one she wants yet:
What do you guys think? Left, middle, or right?
It was my half-birthday two days ago... It's halfway through junior year, and I'm halfway to 22. This is a turning point... it's all downhill from here.
As for today's events, I went out to lunch with Allan, Mathew, and Shazia for a good old beef hamburger at Hardee's. Cows aren't so sacred around here.
And I saw the students from Pittsburgh who are here for (their) spring break! Go main campus! I'll get to hang out with them more on Tuesday when we go to Al Jazeera headquarters. (Yay bucket list item!) There was dinner in the majlis with them (or for them... not really sure which). It got me remembering that I'm going to be a CA (a head RA) next year and have to start keeping that in the back of my mind.
We also had our first meeting for Soliya, which is this web-chatting forum with people from around the world on Middle Eastern issues that I signed up for. I probably shouldn't have, given my lack of time as it is, but I'm interested. They fed me too.
So with two free dinners and not enough time in the day, I had to turn down dinner with Abdalla. And it was going to be one of his restaurant rating nights too...
So the last thing I did was start catching up on homework... what joy.
