Line dancing on Wednesday night - I will learn to do this!!! It is not easy - so many steps. The shuffle is a major thing for me to learn, to say nothing of the hoppin', skippin' and stuff. There was Irish dancing thrown in, as well:) It is a lot of fun, though. All the folks in this group are helpful and encouraging, so it will come :)
Friday morning was drawing in the mess hall. Had a young Saudi man come over to ask questions about drawing and I spent nearly half an hour showing him some basic drawing exercises and told him to come back to me in a couple of weeks with some examples of his completed exercises. We'll see if he comes back. Did manage to finish one shell drawing :)
Friday afternoon was at the Yacht club teaching the ladies to sail Sunfish. Took out three ladies, including my friend, Claudia - she is almost ready for her solo. Nicole was there and took a solo trip at the end - I think she is going to really get involved with this group -way cool! Helped to put everything away before heading back to the dorm/hotel. There I was greated by Omer and Peyton to go out to dinner with the gang to an Arabic restaurant where you sit on the carpet and eat from the platters set in front of the group. Using your right hand, you just pick up the rice and stuff, roll it in a ball and eat it. The rice is served with lamb and chicken and organ meats. It was good, but sitting and eating on the floor is hard :) Somewhere between the yacht club and Steineke I lost my cell phone and ruined my binoculars by dropping them :(
The next morning we headed for Bahrain (Nicole, Gillian, David and Caroline Foresyth and I) where we met up with Bob Roberts for some bird watching. Saw a lot of Graceful Prinia, herons and terns. Added several new ones to my checklist. By 10:30 we were into the hotel for breakfast and a little cool air, followed by some shopping for things we can't get in Saudi, a nap, and another birding excursion with Brendan Kavanaugh - we hit a number of places along the eastern shoe of the island and managed to cature one Black-winged Stilt fledgling, band it and release it back to its family. Rushed back to the hotel for a quick beer with fish and chips, a shower and change of clothes in order to get to the string symphony performance by 7:30 pm. Great performance by local artists! David played the viola, Bob played the cello, and my friend Jon Cole, played another cello, so the symphony was made up of a lot of professionals for other than music professionals. It was a long ride back to the Aramco Compound - traffic was awful- took us about two hours to cross the causeway and get home :(, but I had two lovely ladies sitting beside me to make the trip more enjoyable :)
Picture of Nicole and the Black-winged Stilt ready to receive his ring or band.
No comments:
Post a Comment