Well, after living in Doha for 5 years, I finally made it to the camel races. I did not SEE any camels racing, but we were there. We have been told by many people that they begin at 1PM every saturday and you can just go and all of the action will be happening. Knowing that they would stop after March due to the heat, we knew we HAD to make it happen in March. Now, you may be thinking - why not just call or go to their website to verify what time they start? or that they are even happening at all? Ha - you clearly have never been to Doha. I happened to talk with a friend that morning who said, "oh, they all begin at 1130AM. BUt maybe they also run again in the mid afternoon." What the what?! Now, we are trying to do this and still get naps in, so we have to get a move on! In order to pack a lunch for 5 and leave and hour and a half before we planned (oh, and shower and entertain the boys while we are doing the other two things) curt and I are SUPER annoyed with the lack of organization here.
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| GBA - on our way to see the came races |
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| Camels - lots of camels heading to the barns?! |
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| How you catch a camel - by the reins . .. and tail. |
We get to the camel racing track(s) just after 1130AM (Whew) and see TONS of camels . . . walking back to the barns. hmmm . . . so we drive toward where they are coming from and it appears they are just doing some training - hundreds of them. We drive around the complex (no signs explaining much of anything, like where you watch) for awhile, nearly get hit head on by an owner whose camel is running down the track with his robot jockey (not kidding) and finally decide to get the boys out of their car seats so they can run around a bit. We did get to watch some of the insanity at the end of the track (see pics below) and at one point, a man riding a camel gives me the "1" - i assume for one o'clock and he smiles at me. Now I think he is telling me is he #1. We saw NO camel races as every single one of these stinking beasts went back to the barn. boo.
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| The guy on the right was the one who is #1. punk. |
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| Half of these men wore sandals. The other half seemed to be barefoot. Not joking. |
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| More camel wrangling with tails (notice the barefoot guy!) |
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| Literally, dozens of camels hanging out on the fence. BTW, they are STINKY. Like, close the windows and put the AC on recirculate, stinky |
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| More camels. They really are not the most attractive of creatures. |
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| Camels getting squirrely and getting all tangled up with each other. |
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| I would LOVE to know what this orange stuff is! About half of them had it on their faces. |
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| Those yellow things by the guy's feet are the robot's that "ride" the camels (controlled by an R/C in a Landcruiser driven alongside the race). It used to be small children between the ages of 4 and 6 until it was outlawed. no joke. |
When we let the boys run around on this huge lawn, it devolves into a total wrestling match. It is awesome. They are laughing and running and just having the best time. It's a great day to be a parent.
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| The running and the falling (BGA) |
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| And the wrestling (GBA) |
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| I swear there is laughter this whole time (BGA) |
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| ABG |
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| More running - GAB |
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| Hamming it up for the camera on the way home (B&G) |
This winter we were invited to celebrate a friend's 3rd birthday. They rented a bounce house for their backyard (awesome and cheap) and after Johanna's party the boys would say things like "Can they come to my birthday party?" or "Can they have some of my cake for my birthday?" when talking about some of their friends. Knowing that we would not BE here for their birthday, sort of broke my heart and I wanted to both celebrate the boys' birthdays a smidge early (ok, 6 months) but also enjoy the weather and enjoy our friends. So 2 days after Curt got back form his conference in Boston, we hosted a few friends/families over, grilled out and just enjoyed the day. It was wonderful. As you can see in some pics from the previous post, the kids had lots of fun and so did we. As the boys grow, I'm more aware that the choices Curt and I will make will impact them in MANY ways. Before, we could have moved and wouldn't have mattered to them at all, but they are getting to an age where they have friends and their routines mean something to them, outside of just knowing they will get food and sleep at regular intervals. While I don't think this will scar them for life or anything, as a kid who moved a few times, I remember how tough that was. The nice thing is they will ALWAYS have each other, but it still makes me want to enable them to have either 1) the desire to move around a lot - hard to do or 2) provide them with stability and to stay in one place - hard to do in student affairs.
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| Brady and Tess jump before they come take away the bounce house |
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| Brady - a little backwards sliding |
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| Aidan - make that in reverse please |
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| Gavin is so chill when he does this |
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| Our awesome Batman House. Brady said "Why are there fish on it?" yes, batman and under the sea totally go together. I'm guessing Batman wasn't getting any royalties on this one . . . |
Swimming - pool weather is back and the boys are taking off with their confidence. mostly. After Gavin's scare with the lifeguard this fall who pushed the floating crocodile he was sitting on into the pool in spite of my telling him not to over and over, Gavin has been much more scared in and around the water. For awhile, he would only play on the side. Then walk around the little kiddie pool touching the sides (but not leaving the sides at all). Well, their good friend Santi has been taking swim lessons and he is a FISH! As in swims without ANY devices in a frigging triathlon held at American School of Doha (ASD) for his age group. WHAT?!?!?!? anyway, we thought it might enable some positive peer pressure for us to swim with them (and the kids all just love each other). Boy were we right. Gavin sees Santi jump in the deep end of the pool and he just goes over to the side and hops right in while holding onto the side in a 10 foot deep pool. No water wings or noodle - nothing! Then at various points in the morning, Gavin would just put his whole face in the water without goggles on for several seconds!!! It was CRAZY! Aidan was totally cool to float and swim with water wings and Brady was up for trying it for awhile as well but he got a little tired. SUCCESS! In the swimming we have done with and without friends since this weekend with Santi, etc the boys have all been growing in their water confidence SO MUCH. Aidan will go down water slides with his water wings, and is a regular fish kicking and floating and just loving the water on a noodle or without. Brady has gone down the water slides a few times, but several times I have seen him floating on his back, just testing out the water wings and what he can do in the water. Gavin has allowed me to take him out into deeper water with his water wings on and practice just kicking around and having fun. We also were able to talk about swim lessons and how they will be able to swim like Santi when they take them. So far everyone is excited about taking them in IC, except when Gavin is in his opposite phase (which seems to be about every other meal these days - anyone know when that will stop?!). I just hope we will be able to get them in this summer!
Some fun video from the bounce house . . . check out the new way Gavin found to come down the slide. He is a daredevil!
