Exotic Locales, Family, Humor and Iowa
15 Jan 2012 1 Comment
in Stories from Far Away Lands - Travel, When Dragons and Rabbits Make Me Laugh - Humor Tags: Amman Jordan, blame, misery loves company, proverbs, Royal Automobile Museum, twins
"Who pushed the green button?" Outside the Royal Automobile Museum, Amman, Jordan
Good luck seldom comes in pairs but bad things never walk alone.
– Chinese Proverb
Misery Loves Company.
– English Version
Next time don’t listen to your brother. Ask yourself – is this a good idea?
– Mom’s Version
16 Dec 2011 4 Comments
in Island Tales - Expatriate Living, Stories from Far Away Lands - Travel Tags: Amman Jordan, Bahrain, Christmas songs, palm trees, Snow, UGG, White Christmas
60 Degrees. Baby It's Cold Outside
As I put up the Christmas decorations (by myself) I clicked the CHRISTMAS playlist on my Ipod for the first time this year. Bing Crosby reminisced “I’m dreaming of a white Christmas just like the ones I used to know.”
Although I was born in Colorado, having lived in the Middle East and California most of my life, I am more accustomed to Christmas where “the sun is shining, the grass is green, the orange and palm trees sway.”
UGGs
My family in Iowa and Colorado can hardly believe 60 degree weather means it’s time to pull out my UGGs and wrap a scarf around my neck. But I’m not the only one wrapping up. The men have pulled out their dark winter thobes and leather jackets. The Nepalese guard is wearing ear muffs. All the ladies are wearing knee high boots and long sweaters.
It’s all relative.
The desert temperature has dropped 70 degrees from last summer’s high of 130 degrees. Our cinder block houses with tile floors do not have heat or insulation. Once the sun stops shining the cold concrete freezes my feet. On a sunny day, it’s colder in the house than outside. To me, it still feels like the Christmas season has arrived even though we don’t have rain or snow.
It had to have been the Christian Europeans who decided Christmas should be white. Jesus, Mary and Joseph came from the Palestinian desert, present-day Jordan, where the average rainfall is less than 8 inches a year. Although I’ve been in Jordan when it snowed, the icy snow barely lasted a day and everyone agreed it was quite a phenomenon.
Palm Tree with Snow. Amman Jordan December 2006.
I saw my Mexican friend in the grocery store the other day. She was feeling blue because they were spending their first December holiday in Bahrain. She said her daughters were wondering how can it be Christmas without snow?
“But you are from Mexico City, it doesn’t snow there.”
“That’s true,” she mused. “But the girls were not born there. We have always spent Christmas in France with my family.”
So really my friend was missing her family during this Christmas season. That I could understand. That was universal.
