Conference and crystals

With General Conference this weekend, we weren't sure if we would be able to speak with Rachel since Saturday is her P-day, which, as Phoebe described it fairly accurately, is "the day that missionaries don't have to do any very much work and can just do things like laundry." It's also the day missionaries are allowed to write their correspondence and—in this day and age—call home. 

But she managed to arrange a time to call us between her breakfast and the beginning of conference, right around 5:00 for us. I had just taken the kids for a pre-conference stroll...

Sleep schedules

We've been in our apartment for two sleeps now—two sleeps that just happen to coincide with the weekend, which is always quite busy on Gewan Island, and has left us wondering when, precisely, anyone here sleeps. To be fair, while we can hear a distant hum of conversation coming from outside—where people are up and active until late in the evening!—on the first floor of our house, we cannot hear much at all from the second floor of our house (where the bedrooms are).

When I say "late in the evening," I mean that there are still families walking up (and running, depending on their age) up and down the Crystal Walk until 10...11...12...1 o'clock in the evening, which is pretty incredible considering school hours typically start at 7:00 am (I know this is the weekend, so we might see fewer children out on weekdays, but I don't know). 

Here's a picture from about 10:30 PM and you can see all the cafes are quite crowded:

Alexander, A Valiant Servant

We are busy getting settled in our new apartment, figuring out all the ins and outs of everything, unpacking, and so forth. 

The island itself has an electronic "access card" that we can use for island amenities, such as entering certain beaches, but also just for entering our block of apartments. Currently I think Andrew, Miriam, Benjamin, and I have that card.

There's also a separate app for our front door. We have a couple of actual keys (made of metal and everything) but we can open the door remotely as well. Andrew was getting that set up this morning before we left for church and he mentioned to the kids that "everyone down to Alex" should have access to the door from their phones/devices.

We didn't get everyone's devices set up with this app, however, because we had to leave for church.

Choir was pretty cool! We love meeting with the Tagalog Ward! 

Slow down! You're moving too fast...

Happy Last Day of September to all who celebrate!

In our family we apparently celebrate by...moving...because today was the day we moved out of the hotel (more or less) and into our apartment and today was the day that Rachel moved into the MTC (missionary training center).

What did you do to celebrate? (If you didn't move, it doesn't count.)

Andrew, Miriam, and I stayed up far too late packing up virtually everything in our hotel room and getting it ready to cart downstairs. Here's a shot Miriam took of our things in the hotel room:

Shifting and walking scientists

Shifting, as they call it here, is no joke! Moving across the city is certainly easier than trying to plan an international move...but there are still a lot of moving parts.

And I'm one of them!

I have maxed out my metro card three days running (each card is charged for a maximum of three rides per day—anything after that is free...and I have certainly been taking advantage of that this week). 

Yesterday Miriam and I carried big IKEA bags full of sheets and duvet inserts from the hotel to the apartment...while also dragging Phoebe along. It was...exhausting. 

And then today I packed up a big IKEA bag full of towels to take to the apartment (because we sure wished we'd have thought of bringing towels to the apartment yesterday). The towels were actually far lighter and much fluffier than the sheets and duvet inserts (which were packed rather tightly), so it felt much better to be carrying that through the metro. 

But then I also had on my backpack so I could do some work at the apartment (I have a proposal due tomorrow and a review due soon and homework due...all over the place). And the kids each had a backpack on. Only Phoebe didn't have a backpack—she carried her stuffed puppy Titus.

And still I wound up carrying her half the time. 

Moving In, Membership Station, and Personal Storytime

We got the keys to our apartment yesterday and to celebrate we went and got gelato. Both Benjamin and Alexander chose the black vanilla flavour (coloured with activated charcoal). It was rather horrifying to watch them eat it, but they said it tasted just fine (and, in fact, I think most of us sampled a little bit from their dishes).

How bazaar, how bazaar...

We went back for round two of volunteering at the service workers' bazaar this morning. This time our task was to arrange items in the category-sorted bins (last weekend's task) onto tables for people to shop from. Clothes were sorted out by size and gender, our family did a lot of toy and book sorting (which was somewhat difficult for some of our children, who are, by this point in time, feeling a little thirsty for toys themselves—we haven't had "stuff" for months now), and there were also kitchen supplies, linens, office supplies, and so forth. 

Exploding with happiness and medieval dolphins

We went to a birthday party this evening for a little friend of Phoebe's. There was an inflatable water slide that dumped the kids straight into the pool. Zoë knocked herself in the forehead with her knee during a failed cannonball. Phoebe swallowed a bunch of pool water and threw up all over the deck. Alexander broke his watch.

But...

They had an amazing time! 

Phoebe was overjoyed to get a birthday bag. She sang about it all the way to the uber (such a savvy kid—we all stared at the elevator, not quite sure what to do, and she just walked right up, punched the G and said, "G for ground! Going down!" so that solved that—to be fair, we had G, M, C, L, A, and B as options, in addition to the numbers. But G was the right call). 

"I'm so happy, happy, happy!" she sang as she got into the uber, which made the driver chuckle. "I am exploding with happiness!"

Call to prayer quiet

I went to the library by myself this evening for a book talk—entirely by myself. I got to read on the metro (since I wasn't keeping an eye on children), which meant I was only half paying attention to where I was, and was surprised to find my body leaning into the rhythm of the trip. I hardly had to think about where to go—when and how to switch trains—my feet just took me there on autopilot. 

I had a lovely chat with a woman from Iran/UK who came in just after me. 

And then got to listen to the book talk without having any little people interrupt me for any reason. It felt rather unusual. Our only interruption was the call to prayer, which sounds over the speaker system in the library. 

The author was in the middle of answering a question when the call to prayer began. He finished his sentence, then turned off his microphone and held it in his lap. And then interviewer did the same. The audience sat in silence, just listening to the call to prayer. 

Outside of the event hall we could hear the thrum of activity in the rest of the library, the buzzing of voices in the cafe area, the footfalls of people walking past the doorway. But inside the event all, it was the picture of tranquility. 

I once wrote a poem about how much I love the call to prayer—specifically in Cairo, the land of a thousand minarets—and how, since it wasn't specifically scheduled, the call would come to me helter-skelter, with different muezzins seeming to echo one another. And how I learned to even appreciate the dawn call to prayer, which would crackle through my window (we lived quite near to a mosque with a terrible sound system) and I would be up with baby Miriam and would hear the call to prayer and it felt so comforting to me...to know that I wasn't alone being up at that hour, that all around me in the city people were coming together to pray, and how I learned to take that moment to remember to pray myself...

And it felt very sacred and beautiful to write all this down.

And then my teacher was like, "This smacks of Orientalism" and discouraged me from publishing it (and rather encouraged me to leave off, not even revise, because it was an unredeemable poem). 

And...uh...that was crushing...because I typically rather value(d) her advice. And it isn't like I was making up crazy stuff in order to produce and perpetuate stereotypes. The call to prayer is...kind of a thing...

So, uh, I revised the poem anyway. And it did get published. And I think it's probably fine.

I find myself still so taken with the moments the call to prayer makes for me. And here was another beautiful moment where I was surrounded by a roomful of people who were, like me, suspended in time. 

Benjamin's poem drafts

 At the beginning of August (the 9th or so) Benjamin wrote these poem drafts:

Mirage. An illusion caused by heat.
The humid air condenses on the windows
forming an illusion of rain,
but there is no stead pitter patter of rain on the roof
the steady hum of air through the vents provides a
masquerade of wind in the trees out my window
it's an illusion of home
and it is my home.

Draft two:

Phoebe at the Fun Fair

Phoebe has been dreaming of riding on a ferris wheel (and in general to visit an amusement park) for quite some time and today that dream came true! 

Excerpts—it's what's for dinner!

We had a bit of a reverse school day today, spending the morning at the Gondolia Fun Fair with some friends and then the afternoon at home doing our lessons. It felt like an extravagance to take the kids to an amusement park, but as I was riding around on the carousel with Phoebe, I remembered many other times I'd taken my children on similar (contrived) adventures in the past. 

It's just not something we've done in the past...while. I'm not sure quite how long, but it's been years. Living in Georgia, specifically, such outings felt unobtainable (too costly, etc.). So this felt like a luxury (and is surely a luxury), but it's not entirely out of the ordinary...it simply feels like it because we haven't done anything like it in a long while. 

Drinking bubble solution (and neon green pee)

We finally got the purple water at the store! 

We were hesitant to buy it because it gives off serious "bubble solution" vibes, but it's just water! 

Phoebe started calling it the bubbly water, which was confusing because the kids have also taken a liking to sparkling water, which is also (actually) bubbly. When we pointed this out to her she started saying, "Pass the bubble solution!" 

So that's fun (and funny)! 

*****

Rachel's mission farewell

Rachel didn't know this (per se), but she was in charge of the FHE lesson on Sunday night (which is when we do FHE now, I guess) because that's when she was scheduled to give her farewell talk!

Phoebe was so excited to see Rachel on the stand. She waved and waved and waved and waved and then said, "Why won't Rachel wave back to me?"

"Because she can't see us," I explained. "We can see her but she can't see us."

"Oh, fine!" Phoebe huffed, throwing herself backwards against the couch to pout.

I don't know about you...but I'm feeling 42! (or, it's Andrew's Birthday!)

This morning we headed to GUQ for part one of a service project (part two is next weekend). It was the kind of service project that felt almost like cheating because there were so many people there that (from our perspective) we hardly had to do anything (I'm sure the organizers feel differently). We showed up, sorted a few things, and then before we'd even gotten into a rhythm victory was declared!

The very embodiment of "many hands make light work."

After a light lunch (and some time spent playing in the student lounge), we headed home (technically some of the kids went to our friends' house to play, with plans to meet up later at IKEA). We did some laundry and some homework. I took a little nap. So did Miriam (that poor girl work up at 4:45 am to attend a lecture...and ended up only catching the tail end of it because it actually started at four in the morning, not five. It was recorded so she was able to watch the rest of it this evening, but she was rather frustrated about her miscalculation). And...then we headed out to Festival City (where IKEA is). 

We picked out duvet covers and sifted through whatever was still available to cobble together some furnishings (there is quite a lot out of stock—we would love to see shipping passages open). I was excited to find an Arabic majlis sofa online (not from IKEA, which is going to be delivered next Monday). I love its versatility—it can be a couch or a bed! 

I really wanted to get a play couch for the kids (like a Nugget or whatever) to put in our shipment, but wasn't able to get one in time. The kids love building cushion forts—I figure that these majlis sofas will do just the trick!

Anyway, we wandered all through IKEA with our friends, looking at all kinds of things (most of which was out of stock) and selecting many other things to purchase, and then had a little dinner in the cafe (not the restaurant) before heading home for the sad little cake I baked. 

Rachel was pretty eager to get to talk to us on her first P-Day (preparation day: when missionaries get some time off of missionary duties to do laundry, grocery shop, catch up on correspondence, and relax a little). Phone calls home will typically be limited to P-Days, but Rachel's been calling a little more frequently since she's doing home MTC, has no companion, and is feeling a little lonely. 

Miriam has been doing companion study time with Rachel (on the phone). And my mom is trying to see if any ladies in her ward would be willing to take Rachel out for a walk in the middle of the day (like she's a crate-bound puppy—Rachel has been walking laps in the backyard during her class breaks). It will get better for her, I'm sure. 

And look! I don't know if you can see, but her name tags made it to her and she's now officially Chị Heiss! I mean, I suppose she was officially Chị Heiss when she was set apart earlier this week...but now she looks it!

Zoë's first primary talk in Doha

Zoë was asked to give a talk this past Friday. She wrote a first draft all on her own but grew frustrated when she felt that she hadn't covered anything very well (though she had covered many things and still felt like she had more things to cover). Honestly, the topic "God promised to send Jesus Christ to be my Savior" is rather expansive and open-ended, so we read through her talk and I helped her identify some threads she could pull at. She spent quite a lot of time rewriting her talk and then spent even more time rehearsing her talk to an audience of stuffed animals (and then delivered the talk to us during our evening scripture study) before finally feeling like she was ready. 

Here she is standing in front of the primary room delivering her talk:

Books from Memory Lane

One of my favourite childhood book creators is Pat Hutchins. 

We have a well-worn copy of And the Doorbell Rang at our house and every time I read it, I find it delightful. Just last night Phoebe and I read it again and she wanted to know whether the cat had been there all along and belonged to the family, or whether it had sneaked its way inside along with some of the many visitors the family welcomed that day. So we went back and found the cat on each page—and the cat kind of has its own little story within the story, which was fun to discover together. Pat Hutchins hides so many details—and alternative storylines—in her pictures. 

We also have Where, Oh Where is Rosie's Chick (though I believe that one is in our shipment, may it arrive in one piece), which is great for teaching children to look for information in the pictures that is not shared in the text. 

"You know, Pat Hutchins wrote a book that I really like called Which Witch is Which? But I've never been able to find a copy to share with my children and now that my children are all grown up, it doesn't seem worth it to find a copy at all. But I just love that book!" I said to Phoebe as we closed And the Doorbell Rang. 

Phoebe snuggled in closer to me and looked up into my eyes. 

"I am not all grown up," she pointed out. 

And she's right! There's still time to find and share my favourite books with my kids!

Though it seems as if it's a little bit out of print, judging by these prices:

To be fair, it is possible to order a used copy for a much better. I just haven't ever done it. 

What time is it? Some time!

I think we're reaching one of those pivotal points in history where a ball has started rolling and...it's going to just keep gaining momentum having a kind of snowball-like influence on surrounding places until it becomes a somewhat standard thing.

I know there's a word for this. Andrew suggested "cascade" and I suppose "domino effect" would work as well. But I told him I was looking for less of a vocabulary word and more of a bit of jargon and he finally gave me "policy diffusion." I think that may have been what I was after!

Alberta just announced their new time system—Alberta Time! They have done away with clock-switches and are going to permanently stay at their current time, aligned with Mountain Daylight Time, the same time zone Utah is in right now. 

BC made a similar announcement in March. 

The Northwest Territories did so in April. 

There's chatter about ending the practice in other places (such as throughout the United States—but that legislation is yet to become official), but I imagine we'll see other places adopting this practice soon. 

Of course, I could be wrong because good ol' Saskatchewan has been...sticking to their tickings...since 1966, and Arizona has been the odd-duck out in the United States since ending their observation of Daylight Savings Time in 1968. They have been on Mountain Standard Time ever since. 

(And I missed Hawaii in this list—they opted out of the Uniform Time Act 1967, the same year the act came into effect and they observed DST for a few weeks in 1933 before noping out of that, and again were "placed on" Hawaiian War Time in the 1940s for a couple of years—even then they only moved their clocks by half an hour. I'm still trying to figure out how changing clocks changes energy consumption...it seems largely like a remnant from wartime rationing than anything that sounds relevant for the way our power/consumption works today.)

Farmers don't like it (plants and animals don't care about it). Only 34% of the world observes it... 

I'm team "changing the time twice a year is insanity!" and am happy to be in Qatar where they've never participated in such games.

Alive and Well: A Banner Day in the Heiss Household

When our house went under contract, the closing date was set to September 26 (the day before we're set to get the keys to our new apartment), but then the buyers asked if they could move that up to September 15, so we very quickly made arrangements for that. 

This was mostly fine because selling our house was rather passive for us. We had given our neighbours power of attorney, so they went to sign the documents in our place. We just had to help arrange things and be present for an "alive and well" call with the lawyer (who we'd met previously). 

Because of the time difference, this happened right during the dinner rush before mutual. Andrew was just getting out of class, I was in the middle of making dinner, and we were trying to figure out how everyone was going to get to mutual (Andrew was recently called as a teacher's quorum leader so now he goes to mutual as well). Still, we found a few minutes to sit down and hop on a call with the lawyer, verify all our information as correct (for money transfers and taxes and so forth), and then we went on our merry way. 

Alive and well, having made it through most of September 15. 

Rachel, meanwhile, had been having a rough morning and still had much of September 15 ahead of her.

She had gone to get a few vaccines the day before and woke up feeling very sore and rather overwhelmed. 

Andrew and the kids came home from mutual, we put the little kids to bed, and then Benjamin and Miriam settled in to watch Inception (for Miriam's propaganda class) while Andrew and I sat down to hype up Rachel. We talked with her for a while, did our best to make her laugh, and motivated her to do a few of the "adulting" things she still needed to do before her mission started. 

And then we had to get ready for bed because her 7-hour countdown to being set apart for a missionary was also our 7-hour countdown of how long we could possibly sleep before getting up to be present for her setting part (9 PM for her, 6 AM for us). 

We did not get 7 hours of sleep...but we did eventually go to bed.

And we mostly got up to watch Rachel be set apart. 

We decided to not wake Phoebe up, in part because...she's just a force to be reckoned with and once she's up, she's up. It seemed silly to wake her up for this when we could just...leave her sleeping. So we...didn't wake her up. 

Clever signs

A lot of the walking around we end up doing happens to be indoors (so much so that one day Benjamin looked up symptoms of vitamin D deficiency and whether or not you can get vitamin D through a window when he realized he hadn't been outside the entire day...not that a single day without the sun will give you a vitamin D deficiency...but many days without it might). A lot of this indoor walking happens in malls. 

Mall life is alive and well here.

We like to be on the lookout for clever typography and/or names of things when we're out and about...and here are two we've spotted recently. 

First up, "eyewa" or "أيوا":

It's always a good day to accidentally teach your children the word "only" in Arabic

The day after we visited the falcon exhibition, the kids and I went through the worksheet we got on how to help preserve national heritage sites. I didn't pre-read the worksheet so the word "only" came as a bit of a surprise to me, although it makes sense...we say the something similar in English: "Take only pictures." 

And it isn't as "only" is a very difficult word. In fact, it's a pretty basic vocabulary word, so it isn't as if we're gatekeeping "only." It's just that...I dunno...I imagined this maybe said something a little bit different like, "I take photos," or something.

Again, given the fact that we say "Take only pictures" in English, it's perfectly fair that it would say this in Arabic as well. I was simply unprepared to have the discussion that we had to have when we sounded out this sentence around our table... 

The root of "only" is F-Q-T, which you can see above: فَقَطْ. 

You pronounce it as, uh, faqat. 

It was actually (gratefully?) my turn to sound things out when we came to this sentence and I started out very slowly, as one does, stumbling over every word: "'Al...ta... Alta...Altaqit suuuu...waaaaaa...ran... fa...fa... " 

But then I recognized the last word, so I said, "Oh—faqat!"

"MOM!" Zoë shrieked, her mouth falling open.

My bad! I didn't even think before I said it because...it just means "only." But it did inspire a lovely conversation with my children regarding language use. 

(And that's not even the only word that sounds like a curse word in English... Oh, and...for the record, in our household we typically eschew the use of "Christmas words" like stupid so for the kids to hear their mother drop an "only" (in Arabic) was quite...shocking...for the children).

*****

We met up with some friends at the library yesterday and T mentioned that Zoë had said something in the car the other day that he wanted to tell me about, but we ran out of time before we all had to leave, so he said he'd tell me later. 

And I was biting my nails that she'd shared her newly acquired "spicy" Arabic knowledge with her friends. 

But that isn't what it was at all! It was completely (more or less) innocuous (though we did have to have a conversation with her about how far she takes her teasing because it went a little far in the car). 

*****

In other news, I read the book Karma's Rabbit from cover to cover. It was a painstaking process, but I made it through, and Phoebe made it through beside me, and we learned a few new words and happily recognized others. 

On the very first page, Phoebe stopped the story to ask whether it took place in Qatar. I asked her why she thought it might take place in Qatar and she pointed to...

...the electrical socket!

I thought that was pretty clever for her to notice. 

I don't know whether the story really takes place in Qatar. The author, Taghreed Najjar, is Palestinian-Jordanian. The illustrator, Hassan Manasrah, is Jordanian, so I'd wager that neither Najjar or Manasrah were imagining Qatar when they worked on this book, but it's still cute that Phoebe noticed the different electricity. Most of our plugs do have those little switches by them! 

Falconry and things

I am typically a one-outing a day kind of a person, but today we had three outings that had us out and about the whole entire day. 

We spent the morning chatting with Rachel while getting ready to head out. She was up late, having been out late with friends. She remarked that since she's been living with my parents over the summer she hasn't had many late nights (which kind of made her miss her roommates and all the fun they'd have together), instead going to bed by 10 PM most nights and then getting up and going to work...and, honestly, while I'm glad she had a fun time out with her friends, she's going to be adhering to a missionary schedule pretty soon so it's not terrible that she's already in the habit of going to bed by 10 PM and getting up early to get the day started. 

It was wonderful to get to speak with Rachel for a bit, even if it was during our own morning rush. I can't believe she'll be starting her mission so soon (just a couple of days now)! But I'm definitely looking forward to only being 4 hours different from her instead of 9. Surely that will make arranging phone calls a little easier. 

Anyway, our first outing this morning was to brunch at the apartment of some people in our ward. They live in the same area that we'll be moving to and they have three little girls all right around Phoebe's age (3, 4, 6). It was fun to get to know them, even if the kids got a little rambunctious—many little bodies running around squealing and laughing in a small apartment with marble floors can be a bit of a recipe for disaster. I was glad when our hosts asked if they should pull out some LEGO (that seemed to calm the kids down significantly).

From brunch, we made our way to Katara for another visit to the S'hail Falcon Exhibition, this time with some friends. Here are Andrew, Phoebe, and Zoë walking towards an art installation by Lorenzo Quinn called "Building Bridges":

Falling down and standing up

Last weekend when the other kids were all off at various activities, Andrew, Phoebe and I went to the mall to look for a few specific things...but we also stopped by Max and Phoebe and I saw some cute dresses on the sales rack that we liked, so we got them—my dress was only 40 QAR and Phoebe's was 20 QAR. We were the fanciest gals on the block!

Late this night when we should have been getting to bed...

So, uh, the building across the street from us is on fire...which is (one of) my (many) worst nightmare(s). 

I think about it every time I get in the elevator and see the sign that says, "In case of fire use stairs. Do not use elevator" because we...live on the 40th floor. 

And I just can't help but think of what a nightmare it would be to navigating all those stairs in order to evacuate. I mean, we'd do it...but it would be with screaming, howling children...so not very fun.

I assume the screaming and howling because, well, today when we arrived at the metro station a train was already at our stop and getting ready to head off. We kind of hesitated about whether or not we could make it on, but ultimately decided we couldn't—not with our party of seven!—so we collectively decided to wait for the next trains (they literally come every six minutes so it's typically not a big deal to wait).

Oh, except that Benjamin missed the memo about waiting for the next train and hopped on board! 

The doors closed, and off he went.

Phoebe immediately started wailing. 

"We will never see Benny again!" she cried. "He's gone forever!"

Katara International Hunting & Falcons Exhibition

It was Alexander who saw the advertisement for the Katara Falcon Exhibition on the metro. He tried to tell me about it on the train but sometimes the train is just too loud to hear him speak (not because others are talking but simply because the metro is moving fast and that creates a lot of noise). So when we got out of the metro he gushed out all the information with syncopated, breathless excitement: "Falcon festival! September 8 through 12! At Katara! Free admission! Can we go?"

A better day (in which no one gets impaled)

This morning was much smoother (thanks in no small part to the slight temper tantrum I had at dinner after Andrew came home, in which I ranted about everything that had happened during the day). 

The little kids got up and worked together to put away the clean dishes, practiced the piano, played a dominoes counting/adding game with Phoebe that I made yesterday but she refused to play, and started on their math work. Phoebe played nicely while I got a good bit of writing (for my coursework) accomplished with minimal interruption. 

It was (compared to yesterday) so marvelous. 

Here's a list that Phoebe made for a hypothetical sleepover that she'd like to go to some day:

The parable of dumping all the silverware into the bottom drawer

This morning was rough. 

It didn't really stop at the morning because the whole day was a little bit rough, if we're being honest. 

But the morning? It was rough.

I won't tell on everybody, but I will tell on the four year old. 

I interrupted Phoebe's play to ask her to help me unload the dishwasher, which—granted—was rude of me. Like, why should she have to do chores? Pretty rude. 

But she eventually decided that the dishwasher could be on the plane, so unloading it could be part of her game. But, like, if any turbulence happened she'd have to go back to her seat...which sounded fair enough.

Though...also...things did get turbulent.

First, though, here's a picture of her earlier in the morning setting the stage for today's pretend play:

Tour de famille (and a stop in Banff and BC)

Rachel will be set apart as a missionary in about a week. She and Auntie Josie took a road trip up to Canada to see some family and some places before Rachel settles down to business. 

Here they are at Elizabeth's house on the first night of their journey. She lives in Rexburg, so they didn't get too far their first day, but there's just something about driving 10 hours versus driving 13 hours that feels so much more doable, so I'm glad they stopped. Plus they got to visit with Elizabeth and her family!

Ingrown hairs

The first thing you need to know is that I pulled out an epic ingrown hair the other day. 

It wasn't the kind of ingrown hair that knows its confused and grows into a tight little spiral, having obviously been doing its best to find its way out—the kind that sort of sproings out of your skin triumphantly, being just as pleased as you are to have finally corrected its course. 

No, it wasn't that kind of ingrown hair. It wasn't sensible.

This particular ingrown hair was an ingrown hair that was suffering severely from the Dunning-Kruger effect, a "cognitive bias that describes the systematic tendency of people [or hairs] with low ability in a specific area to give overly positive assessments of their ability." 

Yes, this ingrown hair put undue confidence in its non-existent navigational skills. It was forging its own path, certain it was doing A+ work when really it was failing abysmally at the one job it has. 

This hair had grown about an inch long in a relatively straight line just under my skin...which rather explained the constant itching of my ankle that I hadn't been able to satisfy in recent history. 

So I took a pin and punctured my skin, looped the hair up, and tugged it out with tweezers. 

As one does. 

It was very satisfying. 

So I had to tell Andrew all about it when he came home and naturally had a rather nosy audience of bystanders (read: children) listen in as I related this tale. 

This raised some questions about what, precisely, an ingrown hair is. Before we could even explain it, though, Alexander said as if he had solved a great mystery, "Ah-ha! So that explains why I sometimes get hairs in my mouth."

We quickly disavowed him of that notion (that any hairs he found in his mouth were simply ingrown hairs from the top of his head that decided to sprout in his mouth instead of into the sunshine) and explained what ingrown hairs actually are. But...that's a pretty funny thought!

Daily studies and other stories...

Alexander picked this position to do his writing work this morning:

The Villaggio Mall

Phoebe spent the day as an only child, a position she took to quite well. 

She is rather emotional and tends to be rather strongly affected by nostalgia—which is odd because she's only four. How nostalgic can she really be, right?

Remember how just hearing the song 'There's Always Tomorrow' from Rudolph would set her off crying all the time? Like, we could just start singing it and she would start crying? 

It was hilarious, but very indicative of her personality. 

The song just made her so sad that she couldn't even handle it. 

Similarly, she had to laugh boisterously through the entire (loud) call to prayer because it was so loud that once she was startled she was going to either laugh or cry and she settled on laughing and...that was that. Like, those giggle weren't going anywhere until the emotions had fully run their course.

Well, last night we were getting ready to play Nerts together, which Phoebe had uninvited herself from because it's too fast-paced for her. Instead she sat down with a phone and asked it to play some memories for her. She loves the little video montages Apple puts together. So she was just sitting down and watching one of those movies when she started sobbing. 

"Oh, Phoebe! What's wrong?" we asked. 

"Do you...do you miss me?" she blubbered. "Being this little?"

"Oh, of course I miss that sweet little Phoebe! She was so cute and cuddly and funny! But we also love this Phoebe," I said, giving her a hug. 

"But I was sooooo cuuuuuuute!" she wailed. "And I was so little! Just look at me!"

"You were so cute and little! You were my favourite little Phoebe in the whole entire world! And it is so hard to watch you grow up because I always miss little Phoebe. But it is so fun to watch you grow up because you become more incredible every single day!"

We watched a few movies of her being little and cute and fun and we laughed and hugged and blew our noses (or at least her nose)...and...she's not quite over wishing she could reclaim her babyhood, so today (Saturday) was a good day for her to be an "only child" for the day.

Benjamin slept over at G's house last night. 

Miriam left for the library to hang out with her knitting group friends early this morning.

And then Andrew took Zoë and Alexander over to G's house to hang out with G's younger siblings. 

So it was just Phoebe and me and Daddy for most of the day, which was perfect for Phoebe.

We did some window shopping at the mall at some home goods stores, just to see what's available furniture-wise (since we have none), and she quite enjoyed walking around, trying out furniture, and imagining putting a room together. 

Oh, and convincing Andrew and me to carry her. 

I don't know what sweet nothings she was whispering in his ear when it was his turn to carry her, but I had an ongoing rendition of "Oh, how I love my beautiful mommy! She is so nice and sweet! And her cheek is soft and she's wearing black pants! Oh, how I love my beautiful mommy!" going the whole time I was carrying her. It involved lots of nuzzling into my neck and hair. She was very clingy. 

But here she is down for a moment in the rug section (she claimed this area as her fort):

Lotion!

It has been one month since we left the United States, so today I'll confess that I didn't pack lotion. I packed a lot of things, but I didn't pack any lotion. In fact, I gave away a few perfectly good brand new bottles of lotion that had been sitting in our storage room because I didn't want to pack them all the way here. 

Why?

Because they have lotion here. 

Obviously. 

I packed an extra bottle of hair detangling spray because I wasn't sure that they would have that here (I don't know why), but we found some right there beside the children's shampoo (which is in the baby aisle), and it was a good thing, too, because that extra bottle of detangling spray I packed broke on the way over here. 

Which is precisely what I envisioned a bottle of lotion doing.

So I didn't pack any because for sure, for sure they have lotion here, right?

Apparently wrong. 

Rachel's Alberta roadtrip

Rachel and Auntie Josie decided to take advantage of the Labour Day weekend and drove up to Alberta to do some visiting before Rachel leaves on her mission. They drove up to Rexburg on Wednesday after work and spent the night at my cousin Elizabeth's house, and then made it all the way to Grassy Lake to my cousin Eric's house on Thursday. 

I'm so proud of them for taking this road trip! What cool people! 

Earlier in the summer Rachel took a solo roadtrip from Atlanta to Tallahassee, which she was terribly afraid to do, but which she said kind of changed her brain. She managed that drive all on her own, and she managed the drive up to Alberta with Auntie Josie just fine (she said it was even better than all the city traffic in Atlanta/Tallahassee areas....and I believe that...I quite like driving in the middle of nowhere compared to city driving). 

Here's Rachel, having just made it to Alberta:

Crystal Walkway and Hala Summer Contests

Andrew got his residency card and that mean's we're apartment shopping.

Today we looked at some apartments at The Pearl. 

Really I wanted to look at this great apartment right off the Msheireb metro station...but alas it was snapped up before we even got to look at it. But our real estate agent suggested some other apartments at The Pearl.

We looked at one and were not very impressed. I just don't see how it could possibly be as big as they were telling me it was (or perhaps it was simply that a lot of the square metreage was a terrible use of space) and it was rather...run down...though we were still considering it. 

And then he took us to another place that was incredible. It was a little over our housing allowance (meaning we'll have to pay some of our rent out-of-pocket), but for its size and location it feels worth it. Plus, most utilities are included (whereas at the other place no utilities were included). Plus, we get a percentage off because of our corporate connections...so...it all...seemed to even out in the end. 

Eventually we won't need a place quite this big, but with five kids (all homeschooling), it feels necessary. 

We wish the pool were bigger, but it also comes with access to the beach and a long, air-conditioned pedestrian promenade called The Crystal Walkway, which looks beautiful enough in the daytime...but our real estate agent said we had to return in the evening to see it all lit up:

Church City, license plates, and little things

Church City is a designated quarter of the city where churches with official status can rent out buildings for their congregants to worship in. Our friends attend the Anglican church, which shares its facilities with the Seventh Day Adventists. There's a Catholic church as well as a Coptic church, Greek Orthodox...and a handful of other officially recognized religions. And they all meet in that quarter. 

Privilege

We went to IHOP the other day, which was a bit of an extravagance...but was also really good...so I suppose it was somewhat worth it. Phoebe got a funfetti pancake and was thrilled to pieces.

She got ridiculously sticky eating it, so Andrew grabbed one of the "moist towelette" packs the waiter had left on the table and offered to clean her up a bit. 

"What is this?" she asked. 

"It's a moist towelette," Andrew told her.

"Huh," she observed. "It's not even hot! The ones on the airplane are hot!"

We were given hot towels to freshen up with at meals and at waking time on the plane. Miss Fancy Pants thinks that should be normal, apparently.

Ella's chair and cutting with scissors

As promised, here are some pictures of the adaptive chair Phoebe made to help Ella be able to join her friends at the table. 

Phoebe-isms

Today Phoebe was running into our bedroom at top speed—which requires multiple turns down a hallway and a brave dash past the scary full-sized portrait of a falconer—when she "stabbed" her toe. 

"I stabbed my toe!" she shrilly announced. 

"You did what?" I asked. 

"Stabbed my toe!" she repeated. "I stabbed it right into the wall!"

She meant "stubbed."

*****

Every time we get on an escalator—which is a lot these days—Phoebe makes some remark about getting to ride the "excavator."

She also saw a sign at the airport in Turkey that used the word "travelator" for "moving sidewalks" and since that was her first exposure to them, that is 100% what they are to her. She will not be convinced otherwise. 

As I was saying...

"I won't say that the call to prayer is ever disappointing to hear, but we've mostly heard it played quietly over the speakers in the mall or the library, almost like soft background music. We had high hopes that the muezzin at the suq would really belt it out...the way they did in Cairo when we lived there...but it ended up being much quieter than we expected (which was a little disappointing)..."

—me, like two days ago 

This evening was a bit of a circus with Andrew staying late on campus, me having meetings at 4:00 and 7:30, Miriam having a YW activity in one location (7:00), and Benjamin having a YM activity in another location (also at 7:00). 

After my meeting, Miriam and I heated up some boxed soup from France (so fancy) and we quickly ate dinner. And then I took all the kids on the metro down to the Corniche station and then walked Benjamin down to the soccer pitch while Miriam took an Uber to her activity (which isn't precisely on the metro line). 

There was some confusion about which pitch was which (the security guard was certain we* hadn't reserved the pitch we had so wouldn't open the gate), but since Benjamin was with his leaders and peers, we left him to walk across the street to the playground on the other side. It was quite the hike to get to the pedestrian bridge! It looked so close, but the access point was so far. 

* We is doing a lot of work in this sentence because here "we" means...the church? The YM leaders? I think actually the bishop reserved the pitch. We (as in me and the children) merely showed up. We contributed nothing to the logistics of the evening.

I was in a hurry to get to the park and send the kids off to play so I could hop onto my meeting. A lot of video call features on social media apps are blocked in Qatar (like FB is...even WhatsApp), but thankfully Zoom is not, so I was able to connect and have my meeting from the park, which was very convenient. But I wanted to make it to the park before my meeting, so was rushing the children along. 

And then I heard, off in the distance, the call to prayer. 

"Hush, hush," I said to the children. "Be still and listen and you'll hear the call to prayer."

"Oh, yeah! I hear it!" Zoë said. "Where...does it come from?"

"Well, you know the tall towers at the mosques? Those are called minarets and they have a special kind of balcony where a muezzin stands and sings the call to prayer, which is then usually broadcast over a loudspeaker..."

"Too bad," Zoë said looking around. "I don't see any minarets nearby."

"Me neither. Shhh...we'll just listen quietly for a minute."

Arabic Story Time II

We made it to the library for Arabic story time again and it went a lot smoother than last week. It was a different storyteller/librarian, who was much more...excited...about story time than last week's librarian (who, granted, was filling in for someone else). 

Here's Zoë in a little reading nook while waiting for story time to start:

Suq Waqif

Having been here for three weeks and not yet having visited the suq, I suggested we head out for the evening on Thursday and see what the suq had to offer for dinner (Andrew was also in the middle of having an argument with Phoebe about whether or not dinner at McDonald's was a good idea—I'll let you guess whose argument was which). 

Our hotel apartment has a kitchen, but the stove is highly inefficient and the oven is (as a friend put it) EasyBake oven-sized. Our washing machine (which we are very grateful to have, but which is running nearly constantly) also seems to have been made for elves. 

Hotel life is great but...perhaps not suited for a family of seven. 

It's hard to make a full meal with the limited space and dishes that we have and we have laundry hanging to dry everywhere all the time. 

It's fairly glamorous. 

I mean, we love the view. We love that we have beds for everyone. We even enjoy having housekeeping come by three times a week (though I also like they days they don't come by). But we still feel a little bit like we're just camping out...still.

It's been a long time of feeling displaced, first living in our own house for six weeks with little to no furniture, and then living here in our temporary—wonderful but less-than-ideal—apartment. 

Anyway, all that is to say that we've gone to McDonald's three times since moving here and Phoebe thinks it's the absolute best (we used to only get McDonald's on our way home from the beach and whenever the power went out and we couldn't cook any food). She's always trying to convince Daddy it's a good day for a trip to McDonald's.

But I was like, "Why don't we go to the suq, see what kind of places they have down there..."

Andrew thought that was a great idea, so that's what we did. Even though it was hot.

Gold club lite

Every metro train here has a "gold club" car, followed by a "family" car, followed by however many "standard" cars. We have mostly travelled in the family car, although I don't know why because this isn't Moscow or London or DC or Cairo or Rome—Doha has one of the lowest crime rates in the world. The likelihood of getting harassed or assaulted or pickpocketed on the train in Doha is virtually nil. 

But the first time we rode the metro here everyone directed us down to the family car, so...that's where we sat and then, as creatures of habit, that's where we continued to sit. 

The children—particularly Phoebe—have been staring at the "gold club" car with quite a lot of longing (perhaps even with a tinge of coveting). You see, there are two chairs at the front of the "gold club" car, through which you can see out the window and down the metro tunnel and that is very exciting. 

Sure, there are windows on the side of the train, but it's really so dark that you can't see much of anything through them (so they're a little disappointing—our friends went to a Harry Potter themed restaurant and were telling us that the windows of the train cars were screens that showed scenery passing by...perhaps the metro also needs these windows).

Here are the kids staring into the gold car, wishing they could use those seats. But a ride in the gold club car costs a whopping 10 QAR (while standard fare is 2 QAR...which is only like $2.75 compared to 55 cents...which is still honestly a good price for a metro ride...but you also have to buy a gold club membership and...anyway...we just keep telling Phoebe no):

Look! A diversion!

Last week we were on our way to church, all piled into one large Uber, when we saw a big sign with flashing lights proclaiming: DIVERSION!! →

"Look!" I whispered to Miriam. "A diversion!"

"Where?!" she gasped, playing along.

One of the oldest tropes in the book. Unfortunately, I was too slow to take a picture.

What it really was doing, of course, was pointing out a detour route.

*****

Miriam was called as the ward pianist on Friday morning. She's the first one in the family with a calling! 

And it's pretty good timing, too, because we just got Miriam's organ manuals set up! Her pedalboard will soon be on its way from Germany. We shipped them to our friend's house because...we don't have a permanent address yet...and they brought them along with them when they dropped Zoë and Alexander off after their sleepover (Wednesday to Thursday). They arrived a lot sooner than I thought they would, all things considered.

Here's Phoebe helping to open the box:

Mango Pickle

In 2020, we finally got around to watching the eleventh season of Doctor Who, the sixth episode of which, "Demons of the Punjab," centers around the Partition of India in 1947.

Sometimes people ask me about our homeschool curriculum, and I tell them that we use such and such for math (Singapore Math, Beast Academy, Art of Problem Solving, Khan Academy, CTC Math...) and such and such for science (Mr. Q, Science Mom...) and then I about fall apart at social and language studies because the answer of, "Well, we kind of just do whatever suits our fancy..." doesn't entirely sit well with everyone. 

That is to say, in 2020 we watched "Demons of the Punjab" and then fell into a unit on the history of India...as best we could. We watched things like Lagaan and Bride and Prejudice. We read The Night Diary. We read The History of India for Children. We read Mangoes, Mischief, and Tales of Friendship: Stories from India—this particular collection of stories was very impactful for the children.

The main character frequently discussed his love for mango pickle and the kids were anxious to try it. 

But...I dunno...it was the middle of COVID...so we weren't spending time looking for mango pickle, I guess. We were more concerned with acquiring, like, toilet paper and hand sanitizer and things like that. 

I don't remember what research we did on mango pickle, all I know is that it was described in such a tantalizing way that the kids have been thinking about it for the past six years. They've brought it up regularly. We have never been able to satisfy their curiosity...until now. 

Well, good

This morning I was doing Phoebe's hair while she was playing Minecraft and she was prattling on and on about everything:

"Mom! Do you want to look at my house? I decorated it so goodly! I mean well. I decorated it well. Did you know that well and good are the same word, but you can only use them sometimes. You can't say that you do anything goodly. You do things well. Not well-ly, either. Just well. Like, I decorated my house well, you do my hair well. But things can be good, I think. Like this is a good house or this is a good hairstyle. You can't say well hairstyle. It's always good."

*****

Miriam and I are watching The Other Bennet Sister, certainly a pleasant watch (which diverts from Austen quite markedly, is drowning in anachronisms, and seems to be at least a little cloying (according to the linked-to review)—not only because our television seems stuck on "soap opera effect"). I'm reading The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion and this series seems like a lovely companion to that. I'm pretty unconcerned with doing Jane Austen justice or perfectly replicating society as it was during the Regency or Victorian eras. I'm simply happy to enjoy a rather wholesome retreat from the world and both serve that purpose. 

Light, fluffy, uplifting, occasionally quite humorous. 

When Mary is talking with Mr. Sparrow at a ball, he mentions something about "less oysters" and Mary quickly says, "Fewer. It's fewer oysters; not less." Miriam and I just about died laughing. I don't know that this was a joke in the series, per se, but it certainly is an ongoing joke at our house.

What's in a name?

In 2013, Qtel (Qatar's leading telecommunications company) decided to rebrand themselves as Ooredo. Ooredo has a very visible presence in Qatar today, being one of their leading telecommunications companies, but there is still evidence of Qtel's existence in utility infrastructure throughout Doha. 

I'm a little obsessed with these covers because in Arabic it phonetically spells out Qtel...like kyoo-tell:

And it just makes me laugh a little every time I see one of these because the Q in Qtel is obviously for Qatar...and in Arabic Qatar starts with a ق (q), not a ك (k). Perhaps I'm just easily amused. 

Ophthalmology, gastroenterology—what's the difference?

Let me begin by stating that I'm feeling much better. So much better that I almost feel silly for having gone to the doctor at all. But, honestly, there were some concerning symptoms so...anyway...

The clinic was on the third floor of the mall across the street. Rather, it was the third floor of the mall. It was a clinic with everything: pediatrics, OB/GYN, dental, vision, surgery, x-ray, lab, pharmacy, family practice, and just about every speciality one could think of. Quite convenient to having everything together, I think.

Andrew asked if I wanted him to come home to go to the clinic with me, or watch the kids, or something...but I told him it was fine. The waiting rooms are gender-segregated anyway. And the big kids could watch the little kids while I was gone. 

I had to head over to make an appointment. And then I had to head back over for my appointment. 

But it was all fairly straightforward, except for my own confusion when the front desk handed me my paperwork and told me to proceed to clinic 3 and take a seat.

Actually, that part wasn't terribly confusing. I understood that perfectly well.

My confusion set in when I got to clinic 3 was it labeled quite clearly—in large capital letters—OPHTHALMOLOGY. 

Huh. 

"It's always a good day for lemonade in the desert!"

This morning Phoebe didn't wake up until 9:00 (which is incredible, considering Alexander and Zoë, who were away at a sleepover, have been claiming it's been she waking them up early in the morning) and Miriam left for the library around 9:15, so it was just Phoebe and me at home for about an hour before the bigger kids came home. 

She stared out of the window for a long time (we are all still charmed by the view) before sighing and saying, "It's always a good day for lemonade in the desert!"

So those are her window-staring thoughts, apparently.

*****

Last night at 10 PM it was 34°C (93°F), with a dew point of 31°C (88°F), and a humidity level of 84%. This meant that at the 40th floor we saw a lot of dew forming—so much that we could almost imagine it was raining!

Croissants, cows, and not loving walls

Milk is rather expensive here (or at least it feels rather expensive here). It is 100% Qatari produced (at Baladna Farm, which is probably worth a visit someday) from a herd of cows flown in from various countries throughout the world (including 6000 cows from Canada) during the 2017 blockade (with more added since then to bolster the herd)—but even though I grew up brainwashed to support the Canadian cattle industry (I ♥ Alberta Beef!) we have been encouraging the kids to expand their breakfast repertoire away from cold cereal + milk. 

They've been enjoying yogurt and eggs and leftover rice (we've been eating a lot of rice-based meals because we bought a rice cooker for our little hotel kitchen) and these prepackaged croissants from Saudi Arabia. They're pretty good, as far as taste goes.  

As far as typography goes—most excellent!

Story time at the library (and our house is under contract!?!)

I signed Phoebe up to attend Arabic story time at the library yesterday and we met up with friends beforehand so they could finish a game they'd been playing.

Phoebe was very excited to ride the metro again. She loves the idea of being on a train, but is perpetually annoyed that we haven't purchased her a "gold club" membership and instead make her ride standard fare. The "gold club" car is much fancier than the ordinary car and there are two seats right at the front of the train so you can see where you're headed (which is very exciting) rather than looking at the windows at the blackness of the passing tunnel.

When we got on the metro, we found the door between the gold club car and the family car had been left open (and the car was empty). The children enjoyed looking through the car out the front of the train...until Benjamin decided that the door was probably supposed to be closed and shut it. 

Place Vendôme Mall

This afternoon we headed to Lusail to visit the Place Vendôme Mall, which is based off of French architecture:

Public art and the deep, dark underbelly (with kittens!)

Miriam and I went for a walk together last night. We were going to stay in the mall and do a few casual laps, but the weather outside was relatively decent, so we headed outdoors instead. Our goal was to find the metro entrance nearest to the tornado tower (and we did, but its location surprised us since the tunnel didn't go under any roads or anything—it just goes under the plaza, which you can just...walk across...so maybe it just exists for, like, the heat or something...I don't know). 

Here's Miriam with one of the Hala Summer guys:

Feeling hot, hot, hot!

Grandpa and Darla shared a humorous story about adjusting from pounds to kilos, which resulted in the delivery of far too many sweet potatoes. Today I share a humorous anecdote about adjusting from Fahrenheit to Celsius...

This one involves Alexander and an air conditioner. Here's a picture of the kids waiting to eat the Oreo (adjacent) moon cycle they made as part of their science lesson: