Gifts

As it happens, people like to be my friend even in far away places like Abu Dhabi. Some woo me with just their company, and others like to throw in some presents. I'm not complaining, here are some of my favorites...

First up, Jill, my gal pal extraordinaire amazed me with this lovely hand-embrodiered dish towel. It's fantastic stuff, it's red too, to match my kitchen.


The script reads, "Insh'Allah", which means "God willing". To those of you that might not be familiar with Arabic language or Islamic culture, this is the tag-on phase to anything refered to in the future.

For example, during the teacher prep days at the beginning of school I ask my principal, "So the students come on Sunday?" She replies, "Yes Sunday, but Wednesday, ish'allah." Meaning, that hopefully none of the kids would show up for another week so we didn't have to start before the end of the Muslim holiday.

Another example, "So we get paid on the 28th of every month?" To which the payroll dude replies, "Ish'Allah."

Or, "Let's go camping this weekend!" "Ish'Allah!"

Everything gets its tag.

Another gift was some fish!
There's this guy that works at the travel agency at the mall across the street from my apartment building. He is quite taken with myself and another teacher, mostly in part because we are Western ladies, go figurah.

I get this call two weeks ago on Thursday (my last day of school for the week).
Hello?
"Hello! Miss Frances, how are you?!"
"I'm fine, thank you. Who's this?"
"Ali! Where are you, at home or at work?"
"I'm home now."
"Okay, you like fish? I bring you fish."
"Yeah, I like fish."
"Okay, five minutes, five minutes. I come."
"Ummmm, okay!"

So Ali comes by and pulls out about 15 pounds of baked and seasoned fish that he requested to be prepared for us at the fish market. It was delicious, if not boney. Mmm.


Then, it happened again last week. This time it was about three times as much, with crabs, shrimp, and calimari (not as good as my Aunt Maria's and Uncle Paul's at the Daily Catch in Boston though). Behold!


Photo courtesy of Blair Hoover, our host for the evening.

There was waaaaaaaay too much food. So the weekend goes by, and Blair and I spent the afternoon crackin' the shells open, pullin' the meaty bits out, and throwing it in a pot with lots of veggies. Two pints of cream and some salt and pepper later, we had delicious seafood stew. It was bangin'!

There are more presents, but I haven't taken pictures of those yet. As a teaser, I will mention that these include balloons, roses, tape, tires, motor oil, and grease. And no, it's not my debut as roller derby chicken car princess, you'll just have to wait and see.