Memory Lane

Another slow day in the office, but the monotony was broken by the visit of the indomitable Ms Koenig, and her friend Dolores, who were on a tour of the Middle East from Wyoming.

Ms Koenig was a teacher at my Elementary School, in Ras Tanura, Saudi Arabia. She led the 5th Grade trip to Bahrain over the newly opened causeway, in 1986 or thereabouts. We were the first busload of students (and in fact the first bus) over the new causeway, which was a thing of beauty and wonder in those days. I remember feeling terribly anxious that another bus would sneak up behind us and steal our glory. Funnily enough, Saudi wasn't teeming with buses at that time, and we were part of a straggle of expats and Saudi venturing across the bridge.

Ms Koenig used to terrify me as a child. She must have always been small, but is now not quite 5ft, and I towered over her in my work heels, which aren't even high. Nick and Jill came down to Bateel, and Mum and Dad, and we had a lovely lunch reminiscing about all things expat and Aramco based. Her poor friend kept directing the conversation back to things that she could join in with, as though she was also an expat from RT, she clearly had a whole different social circle. She clearly got bored of our chat, and became transfixed with the fact that everyone was wearing suits. In the DIFC. I don't actually mean to poke fun, as I really liked her, it was just really interesting trying to see the place through their eyes.

Apparently, Ms K has made the Guiness Book of World Records, for the largest collection of nativity scenes in the world. She has a museum that she built herself, which is unfortunately presently in storage, as she can't afford to buy another house (she lives in a rather spacious 7,000sq ft residence in Wyoming) and the free space that it used to be housed in has now been torn down. There should be a website, but I can't make it work, but if I do get it to work, I will definitely reblog with the link. She is a fascinating woman, someone who never quite made a relationship work, after terribly sad run in's with scam artists who tried to marry her and take all of her money - I think she fell for two such dodgy characters within a 5yr stretch when I was small, and after that, never allowed herself to fall again. Yet again, Aramco gossip being what it is, who knows if that was true.

Still, I walked them around the DIFC to see the balancing sculptures (as per previously posted pics), delivering them in to one of the golf carts that took them speeding around the roundabout to Emirates Towers, where Bronwyn would collect them.

Tonight, I'm off to a business networking event at The Monarch, a spanking new hotel that I haven't explored before. I'm toying with taking my car home, or ordering safe driver now from the blackberry phone (as I have stood them up from my normal phone). Big decisions, I know. Whatever will I do.

Too many people have died recently. I know that is a trite comment, but I'd like some happy news now please. The tragic accident that took Natasha Richardson, followed by the tragedy that was Jade Goody's life and death, and the senseless waste of the soldiers in Afghanistan, including an old colleague of a new friend here, were just all examples of the waste of human life. I know it happens constantly, and I know that it touches all of us - I've lost a friend, as have most - but some times you get these combinations of tragedies that somehow make each one worse, make all of them that bit more upsetting. I knew none of these people, but I'm sorry for all of their families.