The Third Grade Field Trip

This last month I had the wonderful opportunity to help chaperone the third grade field trip to the Al Thani Museum at Sheikh Faisal's Farm.  It was definitely an interesting experience.  Not many third graders can say they have gone to a museum like this. 

Abbey, Rebecca, and Tameem were my responsibility for the trip.  Mrs. Errico apologized ahead of time, so that tells you what I was in for.  Rebecca and Abbey were easy to manage.  They were thoroughly involved in the assignment and noticing the interesting displays.  Tameem was a different story.  He is a very nice young man, but since his dad is the emir's brother who also runs the museum, he felt very comfortable handling artifacts, venturing into off-limit exhibits, and getting "lost" every three minutes.  He got very tired of the excursion quickly, but I held his attention for awhile by asking him about his family.  He showed me numerous pictures of his dad with the emir, pictures of himself with his father, and the one below with his father (on the left), his brother, and another Qatar dignitary.

Tameem told me that his dad has two wives, and his mother, who is from Saudi Arabia, is the second wife.  He has 19 brothers and sisters between the two wives.  One of the most interesting things he said was that his family has a nice arrangement:  all the females in the family live in one villa, and all the males live in another.  Tameem told me that his father takes turns living in the two villas.  Interesting, huh?

So when I wasn't tracking down Tameem, we got to see the amazing collection at the museum.  There is a fossil room, a document room, a jewelry room, a furniture/weapon wing, and an art/car building.  There are other rooms and wings, but we weren't invited into all of them.  The museum is open at random times, so if you are interested in visiting it, you have to make an appointment, and since they never answer the phone, you either have to know someone who can get you an appointment or just show up and hope the doors are open.  Tameem's mother kindly set up the appointment for all seven third grade classes to attend. 

  

I wish I could have rubbed a few of these lamps.

This looks like some type of transport for a few of the harem wives maybe.

This weaponry and armour reminded me of Genghis Khan.

Ali Babba and the 40 Thieves checked their weapons at the door!

These trucks were some of the most hilarious items in the museum. 

I really don't know if there are words to describe this kind of artistic talent or this kind of taste in vehicles. 

I wonder what kind of music they play so the kids will come running for the ice cream. 

Tameem tried to tell us that his dad painted one of the trucks and his dad's friend did the other. 

We didn't believe him.

It wouldn't be a Qatari museum without a dhow or two.

Check out this moustache!

Studious Abigail

Here is a traditional bedouin tent with all the comforts of home, especially stuffed falcons.

What else would a hanging rug be for except a spontaneous limbo game for the moms?

Two men pulled a bucket of water from this indoor well.  The kids clapped when it reached the surface, but then when the grate got locked back into place, the well returned to its former use - a despositry for gum wrappers.  Naughty, huh!

This is the door leading into the car/art building.

This photo does not do the intricate carvings justice.  It is beautiful.  So is Abbey!

This female mannequin was an interesting choice for the men's section of the clothing display.

I've never seen an Arabic man with long eyelashes like those.

Another crack-up was the bubble wrap that covered many of the pieces of art on display. 

I guess that sand and dust are pretty insidious.  Either that or they were still unpacking!

After spending most of the morning worrying about Tameem and keeping track of him, I realized that he probably knew the place like the back of his hand, and if any of the kids could get away with breaking something there, it was him.  So I relaxed and tried to enjoy the rest of the sights.  Then I noticed this sign right before we left.  I'm pretty sure none of the kids were guilty of getting too much excess that morning.  Maybe I had an excess of chasing and wrangling, but that goes with the territory of field trips I guess. 

Photo of the Week

This street signs reads:  Take Care - Your repsect of traffic signs reflects your awareness.

Don't you think that is brilliant?!

Two New Family Members

I don't think I have introduced you to our newest family members: Buddy and Bluebelle. We have quite the zoo in our home these days. I have always loved birds, so when our neighbor got a tiny purple parakeet and was holding it on her finger outside one day, Abbey and I had the same idea - we need a bird. So we went down to the old souq and picked out a sweet yellow guy and Abbey named him Buddy. He adjusted well to his new home and let us hold him and stroke his feathers, but he seemed pretty lonely. A few days later Brett brought home Bluebelle and a bigger cage. Now there are two little love birds who are so sweet together and perfectly content. They sing, they argue, they preen, but mostly they kiss and cuddle. When we take one of them out of the cage, they call to each other in a reassuring way. Or maybe they are just cursing the rotten humans who keep holding them and disturbing their romantic bliss. Maybe they are asking the other one to create a diversion for an escape attempt. Sometimes Heavah (our neighbor and Abbey's friend with the purple parakeet) brings Skylight over and the three birds have a sleepover. For the sake of the flock we have made an exception to our family rule about no sleepovers.

Bluebelle (or Belle for short) isn't quite the charmer Buddy is. She is temperamental and she bites. We are having to work with her a little more each day, and I have to say she is getting more tame, but I don't think she will ever be as easy going as her cage mate. I have read that female birds are pretty testy most of the time. I guess even parakeets can have hormone issues.

Buddy is so relaxed that one day we were able to put him on Ci Ci's back for a few seconds before the cat got scared and ran away. Between the new birds and the fish Abbey brought home as a party favor, Ci Ci keeps pretty busy plotting and planning her instinctual obligatory investigations. Tonight we perched Buddy on a bowl of water and he gave himself a little shower of sorts. I think he might get some satisfaction from teasing the cat with his feathery habits.

When I was a little girl my dad gave me the nickname Dee Dee Bird. The Dee Dee part came from my little brother who couldn't pronounce Dianna. I'm not sure where the Bird part came from, but I don't mind. I too like teasing the cat at every opportunity.

A Flat Stanley Adventure

A few weeks ago, my friend Mesha asked me if I would accept a Flat Stanley and take him on an adventure for one of her nieces. If you haven't heard of Flat Stanley, he is a character from a series of children's books who goes on adventures all over the world with families and individuals who then send their photos of Flat Stanley to school children for a school project or the Flat Stanley website. And of course, Flat Stanley is . . . a . . . flat, so he is easily transported via email or snail mail and hardly incurs any travel expenses whatsoever. It would be nice, right?

So I told Mesha we would help her niece with her school project and try to schedule some Doha expeditions, remembering to take Stanley along. There is a camel souq not far from our house that we often smell but have never been to, so we thought this would be a great opportunity for us and Mr. Stanley too. For one of our Thursday date nights we were scrambling for something to do (because there are so many things to do in Doha - NOT), and we decided to go check out the camel souq to see how difficult it would be to take Abbey and the flat guy to see the camels. How many women can say their husband went all out and took them on a camel souq date?

There wasn't much of a moon that night, so as we were driving around, what turned out to be, the ANIMAL souq in the thick of the darkness, we found the sheep, but that was it. The souq was of course closed, but we thought we could at least catch a glimpse of a camel and make a plan for where we could go on Saturday morning. To say the least, we began to attract a little attention from the off-duty workers, and they were staring at the two white people wandering around the grounds in a white Xterra.

A group of men flagged us down, and we thought, "Oh no, now we are in trouble. We have broken some unwritten law of the Middle East culture and we're going to get kick out of the animal souq." Brett stopped the car and slowly rolled down the window. The men couldn't speak any English, but we figured out that instead of reprimanding us for invading the animals, they were curious about what we were looking for. We tried to explain that we wanted to see some camels and wondered where they were. They looked at us quizzically, and even if they could have understood English, they probably would have thought we were crazy. A comparable situation would be some Middle Easterners wandering around a farming community looking for cows. One of the men smiled and said, "America?" and we confirmed the obvious that yes, we were Americans. They were from Sudan.

The men finally understood, or so we thought, that we wanted to see camels, and they motioned for us to pull over so they could show us. Brett was hesitant to follow them. They weren't the most well-groomed gentlemen after all, but I reassured him we would be all right. They took us to some large buildings, and in Arabic gave us the grand tour of the bunny stalls, the chicken cages, and the peacock house. We thanked them, and didn't want to sound ungrateful, but we again tried to tell them we wanted to see camels. There were some Indian men standing around watching the procession that was gathering men along the way, so they stepped up to offer help. So when we told one of the Indian gentlemen that we wanted to see some camels, he translated our request to our Sudanese guides. A light quickly went on in their eyes, and they all exclaimed, "Ahhhh, jamal!" I guess the word "camel" is sooooo much different than the word "jamal" that they had no idea what we were saying. :)

The Sudanese men quickly volunteered to get into our car with us and take us over to the other side of the animal souq to see the camels. At least that is what we think they said. Brett wasn't so keen on the idea, so we thanked them and told them we would be back on Saturday to see the camels in the light of day. They all looked at us, obviously not understanding, as we got back into our car and drove away. At that moment I got this feeling that we had just missed out on a unique adventure, so I talked Brett into turning around and asking two of the men to jump in with us. He kept saying, "You're sure you want to do this, right?"



Mahmoud and Salim had big smiles on their faces as they climbed into the back seats. With their expert pointing and Arabic directions we wound our way through the sheep stalls and over very bumpy, muddy paths. When Brett made a wrong turn, we didn't need to understand their language to realize his mistake. We finally pulled into the camel area, stopped and followed our guides into a fenced area with about five camels. They insisted we take pictures and Salim cuddled right up to me, surprising even his friend at how forward he was. He didn't do anything inappropriate, but for a Muslim man, it was unusual for him to be so casual and demonstrative with a western woman. He grabbed my arm and made me put my arm around his shoulders and he put his arm around my waist. It looked comical because I was about six inches taller than he was. As we posed for Brett to take our picture, Salim's fingers lingered just a little too long on my bare arm, but I tried not to freak out.

After our photo op they took us over to see a baby camel who wasn't real happy about being photographed in the dark night. The baby's mother was even more unhappy about our intrusion. We thanked our new friends and asked them if we could take them back to where we had picked them up. After they got back into our car we quickly realized they had other plans. They kept pointing to the busy souq area across the traffic-filled road. As we drove, Salim asked to see the camera and then proceeded to scan through all the shots. They both asked about a picture they saw of Abbey. When we got over to the souq I pulled some bills from my wallet and realized I had pulled out dollars instead of riyals. I quickly exchanged them for riyals and gave our persistent camel finders a tip for all their help. Salim said, "Dollar!" so I pulled out two dollar bills and added that to their tip. They were thrilled. Then they tried to persuade us to eat with them at the souq, but we had had enough adventure for one night and thanked them again for their expert help. Salim kept talking about the picture and seemed to be insisting that we get a copy of it to him. When Brett agreed to do just that, they waved a good bye and smiled as we drove away.

The next Saturday we did make it back to the camel souq and had Flat Stanley pose with some of the more friendly ones. At one point a group of camels decided Stanley looked like a nice snack and almost ate him, but we saved him from that nasty demise. There were some really cute baby camels with fluffy fur on the tops of their backs who were friendly with us until their moms intervened.

Flat Stanley also got to go Dune Bashing that day with Brett, our friend Ephraim and his son Eph. I don't know if any other Flat Stanley has had a more unique day on this planet, but he did get up close and personal with the desert, the sand, and the camels of Qatar. Along with that, Brett and I got up close and personal with some very nice men from Sudan. Maybe it was a little too up close and personal at times, but it was definitely unusual Middle Eastern hospitality and something I will never forget. I'm just glad that the only real nuzzle I got was from a camel and not Salim!

VCU Qatar Women's Basketball

Because one of our good friends (English professor Jesse) is the coach of the women's basketball team at VCU Qatar, and because Brett needed some service hours for work, he volunteered to be the assistant coach for the team this season. Now this is a team made up mostly of Arabic girls who have NEVER had a P.E. class in school - EVER. There are a couple of players who played on the ASD team in high school, but other than that, these girls are all novices at the sport and competing at all. To say the least, they are brave pioneers in their own right.
Last year's season was quite difficult, from what Jesse has told us. He would hold a practice and maybe one or two students would show up. Sometimes no one was there. He finally asked his wife (Felicity, who is a graphic arts student at VCUQ) to suit up and infuse a little energy, skill, and camaraderie by joining the team. Felicity would be the first person to say she is no basketball expert, but her British education prepared her far better than the Arabic education had prepared these ladies.
Well, Jesse's idea worked, and soon more players were showing up to practices. They even started gaining some team spirit. The first official cheer that they made up went like this: "V-C-U! Do you see us?!" Now with that small beginning of a team, there wasn't much support from students and staff. Jesse had to beg faculty members to attend the games and cheer. He even bribed some adventurous professors to paint their faces yellow and black and yell like heathens. (I wonder what he had to pay them off with.) Even with Coach Jesse's great ideas and enthusiasm, the team failed to win one game last year. They were even beaten badly by both large high schools - Qatar Academy and The American School of Doha (that game ended with a 2-68 score).


This season was a different story. From the very beginning, the team had a different personality. They felt a little more confident with two experienced players helping out. They also had a more competitive edge and wanted to win. With the program running "smoothly" Felicity was delighted to take her place in the stands instead of playing.

You should have seen their joy-filled, disbelieving faces the first time the team won (against Texas A&M mind you). They won another game two weeks later against Carnegie Mellon. Abbey and I attended the last regular season game (against Northwestern). Brett, Abbey, and I all got some nice swag before the game at the first ever pep rally (shirts, buttons, stickers, and a messenger bag that Abbey proudly wore around the compound for a week). Before our eyes these quiet, reserved Arabic students turned into wild fans. Two ENERGETIC girls from Egypt (yes, they were wearing their hijabs) made themselves the unofficial cheerleaders and led the crowd with drums and dances I never thought I would see performed in public in the Middle East. The ending score brought our team up short but we clearly had won the loud crowd award. Because our fans were so loud, some of the over 40 Northwestern faculty proceeded to embarrass themselves by trying to enthuse their people and banter with our very outspoken cheerleaders.



By the time the playoffs started, the word was out that VCUQ's crowd was a first class operation. Other schools tried to gather support, but nothing compared to our school's enthusiasm. VCUQ made it to the final four. I know that sounds impressive, but there were only eight teams competing. Our girls ended up with a fourth place finish, but they felt like they had been awarded the first place trophy because of the great season of milestones they had.

So what were Brett's contributions you ask? Well, he compiled a very professional looking playbook for the players and the coaches. It was hardly used at all, but the players started noticing all the work and time that these two coaches were investing, and they noticed the energy and time their fan base was cranking out. At the final game I told Jesse that he had started building his basketball dynasty at VCUQ. He just laughed and shrugged off all the heart and effort he had put into this program. He was quick to mention that Brett was the new variable in this year. So Brett and I like to think he had something to do with this season's small successes, even if it was just being the lucky charm. I am just so proud of these courageous women who stepped into this groundbreaking program and gave it their all. Go Lady Rams!