Bluecat

I find swearing helps me!

I'll add my wishes for his complete recovery! My nephew was born quite premature, and much too fast (second stage of labour took 20 minutes). Because it was so quick he was born in his parents' bedroom while my brother was dialling for an ambulance. His lungs collapsed when he was a minute or two old. The ambulance crew saved his life. Then he contracted jaundice. He spent the first 6 weeks of his life as a little wizened yellow (and furry - a consequence of being so premature) creature in an incubator at the John Radcliffe National Health Hospital in Oxford, UK. I'm glad to say he is now a healthy bonny 10 year old and learning to play the trumpet. He tells me he can make it sound like an elephant breaking wind.

I met someone a couple of years ago who had the shaggiest dog I have ever seen. I commented on this and she said she had knitted a waistcoat from his sheddings... so it can be done!

Gertrude Dyck, a Canadian nurse and midwife who died on Saturday aged 75, was the second western woman to live in Al Ain, a desert town in the United Arab Emirates on the border with Oman. At that time (1962) the city did not exist (it was called "Buraimi Oasis" and there were few permanent buildings apart from the forts), the UAE had not yet been unified (it was a collection of independant emirates called "The Trucial States), and there was no paved road. She joined a married couple of doctors, the Kennedys, also from Canada, at Abu Dhabi Emirate's first hospital, where she was known as "Doctura Latifa" - Doctor Kindness. I was lucky enough to meet her in the UAE, at an Emirates Natural History Group meeting in about 2001, and I have her book "The Oasis" which has amazing photos of what it was like then. http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20091019/NATIONAL/710189848 She will be very much missed.

Happy Diwali to all. Here are some photos of the festival from around the world: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/gallery/2009/oct/18/religion-india?picture=354422300

Well the books themselves may not be awful - it's the titles and the cover designs, mainly. It's true that old fashioned things can look quite funny from the perspective of today. And some things (I'm glad to say) look awful.

http://awfullibrarybooks.wordpress.com/

Hah! I get to go to TWO thanksgiving suppers, Canadian and US - and I'm a Brit! BUaaahahhahahhahahaha! Have a great time. It's always good to give thanks. With a nice meal and good friends especially.

"For all pilgrims and travellers" Blessings

It's a nice quote - thank you.

Thank you for posting this. Please pass on my best wishes for his recovery. Sarah (bluecat)

Blistering barnacles, shipmate, I've missed it again!

Eid will start this weekend (don't know when exactly) and it's my last day teaching for a week. Hurray!!! Eid Saeed to all.

My pleasure. One thing I have noticed living in countries which have climates rather than seasons (hot or very hot, as here, or wet/dry as in South East Asia), is how much more important the moon becomes as a time marker. Here, everyone (that is, every Arab) seems to know exactly what time the moon will rise, where on the horizon it will come up, and what phase it is in.

Ramadan dates (and all dates in the Muslim year) change from one year to the next, because the Muslim calandar is based on the moon, and a lunar year is 11 and a bit days shorter than a solar year. So over 30 years or so, Ramadan moves all the way around the calendar and back again. When I was a student in the early 80s it was in June (I knew a few Muslims even then). When I first worked in the Gulf in 2000 it was in November/December. This year it started on August 22nd. Ramadan is a lunar month, 28 and a bit days (called Ramadan or Ramazan) - the 9th month of the lunar/Muslim year. Some Muslim countries (Oman for instance) just timetable it in for when they know the new moon will occur, whether or not they see it, but the UAE (where I am now) and Saudi Arabia, for two, actually send a moon-viewing committee out to sight it. If they don't spot it on the first possible evening then Ramadan starts a day later. Which means that some years I can cross the border into Oman (just a couple of miles from my house here) and it could be Eid one side and still Ramadan the other side... Eid means "Holiday" in Arabic (in Turkish it is "Bayram" - I don't know what it is in Persian) and there are two Eids in the Muslim year: Eid al Fitr ("small holiday") which marks the end of Ramadan and the first days of the lunar month Shawwal, and Eid al Adha ("big holiday"). Eid al Fitr depends on when the next new moon of Shawwal is sighted, so again the date is only predictable to within a day or two (we're expecting it 19th or 20th September). Eid al Adha comes on the 10th day of the lunar month Duul Hijja, so as soon as that month starts (the moon again) we'll know when Eid al Adha is due. It'll probably be 27th or 28th November this year. Clearer now?

Sorry, that's the collective "we" which may or may not include either of us. Like "we beat the other team" when "we" personally did not go anywhere near that pitch. X (a Brit) met Y (an Aussie) yesterday and said "We won the Ashes" [that's a cricket contest: cricket is thought by some to be a game...] In fact you and I were not even born when Christians started charging interest. It's still a live issue in the Muslim world. "Sharia-compliant bank accounts" are the norm here and students who know a bit about the Bible often ask why we (the West) permit usury...

Sorry, I forgot to add the link to the Muslims in Alaska story: http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090825/NATIONAL/708249891 Barnacle geese were apparently declared seafood... but in the Middle Ages "white meats" included poultry, fish, eggs and cheese, so you couldn't eat those either. You also weren't supposed to make war during Lent and Advent. When did the West give up fasting? And when did we decide the prohibition on lending money at interest need not apply to us?

Naturally, there are special fatwas covering that:

No solids, no liquids (including water!), no tobacco (however imbibed), no sex, no gossip and no backbiting! This runs from dawn till dusk (Fajr to Maghrib) , so if you're a Muslim in Alaska or in Lappland right now, it's a long haul.

In the days of the Raj, I believe, Ramadan was considered a danger point for rioting... large crowds of hungry people getting tetchy, basically. Here and now, it's very much like Christmas is with us - a huge marketing opportunity and a jolly family festival, interspersed with plaintive voices asking whether we have forgotten the real meaning of [insert festival here]. I've just received a mailing from my local hotel/resort telling me I can celebrate the season of fasting and generosity in their all-night Iftar tent (Iftar is the meal taken after dark when you break your fast) with VIP diwans (sitting rooms), sheesha (water pipes) and luxury dining... Not exactly asceticism, but good business. Quite a few people suffer during the fasting (especially in the first week) because they can't drink or smoke either (fasting means no intake of anything, not just food). Just before twilight the roads are full of caffeine- and nicotine-deprived drivers speeding to their Iftar destinations: it's more dangerous even than usual. Students are sleepy - often they are up very late with family and then they wake up a couple of hours before dawn to have their breakfast - or they have low energy (especially if they sleep in and miss breakfast). By the end of the month they are flagging. Some of them positively glow with religious feeling, mind you. The last week of Ramadan has "the night of power", which is the night the Koran "came down" - ie was revealed. It's in that week, but nobody knows exactly which night it is, so that keeps people on their toes. Prayers are supposed to be particularly effective then and people may chant prayers or recite the Koran all night long.

Ramadan Kareem to all my Muslim friends. It started on Friday night with the sighting of the new moon here in the UAE, though it may have started a day earlier/later elsewhere. Back at work on a reduced timetable

Happy Birthday dear Reverend!! Have a great year.

Yes, Happy 4th July!! We passed through London on our way back home on Saturday. Stopped at a pub that was covered with stars and stripes bunting...