Autumn on a Desert Island

Autumn on a Desert Island...

I know somewhere leaves are falling and the warmth is giving way to crisp cool days. There is major jealousy in this knowledge. Though there is no warm cider and leaf piles here, the weather is finally cooling. Well maybe it is more that the humidity is leaving and letting us be outside of our apartment.

Coming back to this heat seemed more challenging and depressing than last year. I suppose at the same time last year we were swept up in the chaos that comes with relocating to a new country. But with out such a frenzy to distract us, I kind of fell into a slight "It's-way-to-freaken-hot-and-miserable-to-live-here" depression.

But I am back.

Fishing....

Pretty much all of September was spent on fish politics. Although it is bleak circumstances that has brought this all upon, there are some positive outcomes. I have connected to some pretty cool people in our fishing community and I have seen that with commitment, fortitude and team work one can really get some shit done. A group of people who didn't even know each other a few months ago have come together and moved a few mountains. A victory was being able to skype into an intimate meeting with this group and the Commissioner of Fish for the state. Yeah, pretty cool.  There is a long road ahead but I no longer feel that we're a lost or uncared-for cause.


Kiteboarding...

Since we have been released from our airconditioned prisons, we have spent most weekends and even some week nights at the beach. We started to learn to kitesurf at the end of last year, and now wish we had started earlier. Aaron, my psuedo superhero husband, pretty much picked up the sport in five seconds and was doing tricks in about ten; making me look like some type of wounded child. But, with his sometimes sweet patience I can now ride at great speeds...one way. The hard part is getting back. I want to go switch, I have tried but my body is not on the same page.

There were moments where I wondered if I was even going to like this sport, and yes I still have those moments. Actually I had this moment last week when I split my foot open on some coral and had to superglue it back together.  Aaron on the other hand is 100% committed and has admitted that kite boarding is the only thing he is really interested in doing anymore while we are here. Shit, I hope I grow to love it this much.

Here are some photos of a new spot we found for kite surfing. A wide shallow spot ideal for kitesurfing but not the best enviroment as kids come and do donuts in the sand and taunt the white girl in a bathing suit  and a cut up foot.

A Pakistani worker helps Aaron roll up his kite.

Quick sand...looked but couldn't find it.

How most of the world recycles

Sunsets never really get old

Dubai...

In the heat craze we decided to go to Dubai, since after living here a year we had never spent much time there. Aaron was on board because we needed to get a part of our kite and our Roommate Terri was also wanting to get out of the house.

Most people have never really heard of UAE or Abu Dhabi but pretty much everyone has heard of Dubai because, well because it is Dubai. It is all about being over the top. People say it is the Vegas of the Middle East and I have to say that it is FAR more classy than Vegas but just as kitschy. We are not too much into the fancy shops, fine dining or glitzy attractions. In other words, we are cheap. No big news there.  So after looking at the Burj Khalifa (the tallest building in the world) from the outside because over my dead body was I paying 100 bucks to go to the top, we headed over to the old souq. A canal full of large wooden shipping boats from Iran. Here we traveled by boat to see some of the souqs (markets) that line the canal.

 828 metres (2,716.5 feet) and more than 160 stories

Indian Souq

Ferry for crossing the canal

Frankincense

Spices

Omani hats

Bags of strange dried oranges from Iran and a cushion-less couch

Sinking ship

Beirut, Lebanon....

Our school apparently has a pile of money somewhere that is set aside to send us off to exotic cities to learn new fantastic stuff on how to be a better teacher. So, when we found out last weekend that there was a conference in Beirut, we knew we had to go. For obvious reasons.

Okay maybe not so obvious if you don't live in the Middle East. And if you do not, which if you are reading this you most likely do not, let me explain. Beirut may conjure up some negative associations perhaps about civil war, bombs, terrorism, refugees and the such. And yes perhaps Lebanon has had a rough past and a somewhat shaky present, but in this part of the world it is were people go to party.

We didn't really get to experience too much of that since we were having to wake up at 7am to go to conferences, but we still got to swim in the Mediterranean, smoke double apple sheesha in a hip terraced cafe, visit the worlds oldest continuously inhabited city, and see how a country literally rebuilds its downtown after a civil war leaves it in shambles. Beirut felt safe and metrapolitin, it actullay felt far more European than Arab. It was fascinating to see building still wounded with bullet holes, bombs contrasted with a sparkling new village they built up after the destruction.

Fisherman on Beirut's coast

A building left in shambles from the recent civil war

Cable car that goes to the mountain top to a christian religious site is. Lebanon is a mix of Christianity and Islam.

New Mosque in the rebuilt down town

Sunset in Byblios, the world's oldest inhabited city.

The most common car in Beirut was the Mercedes

Fisherman

Interesting time at immigration....where they asked us not once, not twice but THREE times (in a very I-am-not-f*cking-around- voice) if we had ever, once, ever, ever, ever been to Israel. By the third time, we were almost ready to plead guilty even though we really never had.

Terri....

Time is playing a trick on me right now. Sometimes it runs so fast I wonder where it goes but now as I start another month I find myself thinking it is ONLY October. Sigh. This could be related to the fact that our roommate and closest (and one of our few) friends here...is leaving. She wanted to try to stick it out with us to June but after four years she can't take it here anymore. I am pretty sure life is going to suck with out her. We met her last October at the border to Oman, our connection to Alaska was the initial thing that brought us together. We learned quickly that there was much more than our connection to Kenai that would unite us. Unlike many friends we have made abroad, we know that she will be a life long friend and perhaps a neighbor in the future. We didn't really want a roommate and now we are not sure how it will be without one. 

Aaron and our almost-xroomie Terri

But when one door closes another one opens. This Christmas we had planned on traveling to Sri Lanka but then our long time friend said she may visit. I had heard this before from many people, and although I know lots of people have good intentions and really do want to visit, there are many obstacles that usually make it unlikely in the end. It is for this reason I didn't let myself indulge in this dream of having visitors for the holiday. But just like that they bought there tickets and now we are planning an awesomely wonderful adventure through Oman. Their visit occupies our mind constantly and is now the carrot that will get us to December. 

From Hip Boots to Hijabs

A plane travels over 550 miles per hour, moving you from one country to another with little time for your mind to adjust. Over-tired, jet lagged and exhausted from a mentally draining summer I felt it hard to readjust to this new reality. Coming from a beautiful beach where our free lifestyle sits well in my heart  to landing in a part of the world where freedom does not come so freely.


Summer Re-cap

This was a really emotionally challenging summer. Because for the first time in my life I had to truley fight for something I love. I have grown to love every part of setnetting since I started over 12 years ago and I never dreamed that after all of our hard work that we would have a summer like this. For the first time in history our fishery was shut down. We spent the summer being strung along and hoping for a chance to fish.

In the end we did not fish. Instead we united with the other setnetting families and realized that we all shared this passion and pride for what we do. There are very few people left in America who can say they work with their hands, they work for themselves, with their families and they are proud and in love with what they do. We are part of that group and now what we had thought would always be,  has been taken away. Through a turn of events I luckily connected to two other fisherwomen and we are still working together to fight what needs to be done to hopefully find a solution for our fishery.

This is a video I had made to explain our situation.

But beyond the hardships there was plenty of fun.

Raph, Aaron and I had no troubles keeping ourselves busy with many projects. Despite the lack of fishing I couldn't think of a better place to be and with better people to be there with. One of our projects was making a wood fired pizza oven.  We were able to find most of the materials locally on our beach; including clay, rocks, sand and hay.

Here is the process

Cutting Hay for the cob mixture

Building the base from rocks we collected on the beach

Mixing concrete to make the slab for cooking the pizza

Mixing the clay we gathered from the bluff

Building the form from tree saplings

The base, slab and form, ready to add cob

Mixing the hay into the slip

Adding the cob to the form

Ready to fire

Then we had a big pizza party with all our neighbors.

Art Swap

This year was the 9th annual art swap and despite my fears that it would be a flop with the fishing situation being so dismissal, we had another record turn out. With 38 participants, more spectators, live music and a new addition of the burning man.

A collaborative poster of fellow fishermen

Reading the collected thoughts of neighboring crew members- we shared all of our positive thoughts from the season

Humpy Point Burning man- genius addition (thanks James and Sarah) to our art swap, a group effort to build. Including a heart that was stuffed with our negative baggage from the season- that we burnt away

An amazing end to an unforgettable evening. An evening filled with friends and neighbors, art and live music, hope and fear, food and spirits, burning man and skinny dipping. Looking forward to the 10th annual!



Then......to the east



With just a few days left of summer break we had time to stop over and visit my family. And once again it was so nice to see everyone and I was reminded how blessed I am to have such kick ass cousins.

Beer Works

Got to see mom and dad...

Then even further east....

Once back home we go the news that our school opening would be postponed. It was the end of Ramadan (Islams holiest month) and they wait till  they can see the moon to actually call the end of Ramadan (called Eid) and long story short they were going to be calling it later than expected which meant an extra week off for us.

We decided to go to Jordan.

I have no idea why. Expect that it is only 3 hours away and is suppose to have some cool sights. Including some place where Indian Jones was filmed.

For me Jordan is a place I wouldn't go back. But than again for me a little bit of Ruins goes A LONG way, I have seen enough castles to last me a life time.

Beyond the tourists sights the two highlights included.....

 Going to a concert of a big Jordanian Pop star. A guy in the audience told me the guy was the Jordanian Bon Jovi. I didn't have the heart to tell him that Bon Jovi was neither the leading pop singer in the US or that he didn't sing about current political issues like the Palestanians plight. The music was great, the people were beautiful and the whole scene was so magical that I wish I could show the US that this is the normal side of the Arab world. Children dancing on tables, friends arm and arm and people proud of their country.

Second highlight  meeting a guy in a small village during Eid (their big holiday-like our Christmas) and him inviting us in for tea and hooka. He taught us much about his country and culture. His wife, fully covered, served us homemade date cookies and waited in the other room if we needed anything. When I asked to use the toilet she gave me the signal for "one minute." She came back stinking of bleach - I went in the bathroom and she had scrubbed the whole thing top to bottom, the floor was soaking wet. Too funny. Over all it was an interesting experience for all of us and a true look at what different worlds we live in.

 

The Dead Sea- the lowest place on earth at 400 meters below sea level. We were told that we would float, and I have been to salty oceans so I thought it would be the same. But it really was CRAZY.  It was extremely buoyant... you couldn't even keep your legs beneath you. It was crazy hot, both the water and the air. The salt content unfathomable.  

 

Petra- A historical and archeological sight from 312 BC- Beautiful but way too touristy. Probably similar to going to the pyramids. 

 

Tunnel escape from the castle- a place that you are free to roam and do whatever you want. Like shit in a whole, which we opted not to do but funny enough many people had. This passage was a dark tunnel that we navigated 400 feet with one head lamp.

What not to wear in 100 degree weather.

Oddly enough, the most popular toy for the children to buy on Eid (a holiday meant for resolving past conflicts among friends and family) are toy guns. 

So now we are back. Back to reality and to work. I have to say it is a hard adjustment leaving my favorite place in the world (our Alaskan beach) and coming here. My mind is 100% occupied with fighting for our fishery. I spend most of my time reading, emailing and talking to other fisherman and my heart has not yet transferred to the classroom. I am stressed but very hopeful for our fishery, because we are all working hard and making headway.

But last night our closest friends here came to visit and being with them just makes you realize how trivial our problems really are. These friends are Syrian and all of their family members are in the heart of the war zone in Syria. They live in constant fear for the future of their country and the safety of their family - and they are fighting to even be allowed to have their family visit. I can't even relate to the hardship they are living. They showed me videos of the situation and I was stunned with the gruesome reality of the war being waged there. It was a wake up call for me to be with them and share this reality with them. It puts things into perspective.

Well I hope this finds everyone wrapping a beautiful summer. Take care and be in touch.