Chapter 11

Still In Bahrain

July 28, 2002

This month the temperature has really been high.  Our hottest day so far was July 22nd when it was over 116 degrees with a heat index of 124.  I’m very grateful for our nine air conditioners since I know I couldn’t survive here without them.  You have all heard the saying “it’s so hot you could fry an egg on the sidewalk”.  Well, here you could also fry the bacon and probably burn that egg.

We have also been experiencing “brown outs” since June.  The power will go off for anywhere from one to five hours. The worst part is we aren’t given any warning.  You would think an oil producing company would not have such a problem.  They say their power plant isn’t equipped to handle such a large demand with all the new buildings and growth in the population.  I say this is something they should have thought of before they allowed all these new places to be built.

The power plant isn’t the only thing they forgot…they need more parking spaces.  An Arab here will stop their car in front of a cold food store on the street and go in, never mind that they are inconveniencing others who have to maneuver around them.  I really believe the Arabs here think the traffic laws don’t apply to them since very few of them ever give a signal or actually stop at a STOP sign.

Our daily newspaper prints the temperature each day but they have it in Celsius and I have to check this program that Danny installed on the computer to convert it to Fahrenheit. No matter how much I try, I cannot get this Celsius “thing”.  This is just one of the things that is different here.

Now about that newspaper……..it’s has the latest news…….all except what they don’t want us to know.  This is of course anything that will make the Shaikhs look bad, or any Arab for that matter.  It has the TV guide, the theatre schedules, the sports section, the “Dear Editor” section, a celebrity page, a British crossword puzzle, ads and a help wanted page (and on this page they will advertise for a job by saying ‘BAHRAINI ONLY’ apply).  And as always…there’s several pages about the Jewish and Palestine conflict.  In this conflict, it’s always the Zionists who are at fault along with the USA as the mean old country who lets the Jewish bullies have their way.  They see nothing wrong with suicide bombers. Of course, they call them freedom fighters or martyrs.

My neighbor and friend, Charlotte took me to one of their movie theaters a few months back.  This theater can show six different movies. When you buy your ticket you are shown on a computer the seats and you get to pick your own.  Of course, on this day we were the only ones there so we had the entire theatre to ourselves.  It was noon but this was still a first for me.  The prices may have played a part in low attendance since they charge the same for their matinees as they do for their Prime time hours.

Another interesting thing I got a chance to see was this lone tree in the desert that has been around for a very long time.  They call it the “Tree of Life”.  Our friends Charlotte and Nick took us to see it last month and I was very disappointed in the way people have spray painted it with Arabic graffiti and trashed the site surrounding it.

Here are more Bahraini tit-bits

*April 1^st a Bahraini woman sued her husband for a divorce because he beat her.  She was granted the divorce and I assume this set a precedent since the newspaper said that women would now have this right.  As for the husbands, there’s still no law against them beating their wives as long as they don’t break any bones or leave any lasting damage.

*Their electrical system is 240 volts whereas we use 120 so we have to use these bulky transformers when we use any of our items from home.

*Neither Arabs nor Indians perspire.

*June 6^th school article in the paper said that girls out scored boys in all categories on tests. Now we know why under the Taliban rule they ban girls from going to school.

*Majority of Arabs hate pets and especially dogs. They think they are just dirty animals with no use at all.  Being that I am very fond of dogs, this really upsets me. 

*There’s lots of roadwork going on here. Instead of using a detour sign, they use a sign that says “diversion” which is just another British influence.

More to come…

Sylvia