You can take the boy out of the desert . . .

One of the most interesting things to us that we've noticed recently in this part of the world is how attached many Arabs are to their nomadic roots. During our trip to Jordan--from which I hope to get pictures posted soon--we saw many people living as their ancestors did for centuries, or even millennia. OK, most of the tents had a pickup truck or SUV parked outside, and I imagine that many of the tent-dwellers have mobile phones, but otherwise life for many of these people hasn't changed much. Here is a Bedouin tent we saw in the desert at Wadi Rum.













Here in Qatar, the locals are wealthy enough that I don't think there are many people (if any) left who live in tents. However, they still have a very strong attachment to outdoor living--on the weekends, the Qataris clog the roads in their Land Cruisers to head out to their desert campsites. Admittedly, the tents these days have luxuries the Qataris' ancestors wouldn't have dreamed of, such as diesel generators powering everything from window A/C units to TV sets, not to mention porta-potties.

What we have found the most amusing is the prevalence of tents in town right next to houses. That way the local men (sorry, but I'm guessing this is a guy thing) can hang out in the house for a nice meal prepared by the hired help, and then retire to the tent for an evening of shisha and coffee.

Party on, Wayne

Living in a country where most commerce happens in English, but where native English speakers make up a tiny fraction of the population, linguistic mishaps are bound to happen. Sometimes they just make you laugh and scratch your head, like the store whose sign says "Al Istliqal for Chicken Sell." Often, though, there's a double entendre that would be lost on non-native English speakers, and sometimes even those require knowledge of a specific cultural reference to understand.

The below truck is probably not the least bit funny to most of the locals, and even to native English speakers unfamiliar with the "Wayne's World" Saturday Night Live skits and subsequent movies, it probably won't mean anything. However, if you've seen any of the skits and/or movies, you will appreciate this.