oh the joys

Today was "Every Male on the Island Stare at Jena Day." No one told me. If they had, I would have stayed home.

Ice Hotel

The end of the school year is rapidly drawing to an end. The students are feeling it, the teachers are feeling it--everyone is just ready to be done. Following this spirit, my classroom activities are falling more to the entertaining side rather than the educational side. Take for example last week's project. We read a Russian fairy tale about a snow girl who comes to life. Then we read a short article about a hotel in Sweden made entirely of ice. That got me thinking...what could we do in class that relates to this? Then it hit me: we should have our own ice hotel building contest. However, considering that the temperatures are now 100+, we can't use real ice. The next best thing? SUGAR CUBES!! I divided the students into groups and gave them each a box containing the following items: one box of sugar cubes, macaroni noodles, 10 straws, 6 paper clips, 3 pieces of white paper, 2 pieces of tin foil, one piece of cardboard, and 30 Q-tips. The students had to use these materials, and only these materials, to create an ice hotel in 30 minutes. Oh yeah, and just to make things interesting, they had to use frosting instead of glue. Below are some snaps of the chaos (I mean fun!) that ensued. :)

not so sunny rise

The dust has been really terrible around here again lately. Here is a little "snapshot" to help you get an idea of the kind of air pollution that exists in this place. I've recently started walking/running again in the mornings. That means I am up and going by 4:45. Yes, believe it or not! Since summer is just around the corner, the sun is rising earlier and earlier. By the time we get to the beach at 5, the sun is already up. You wouldn't know it though. You can only see a faint horizon, mostly a cloudy purplish gray color. It takes a while to spot the sun, which is about 10* above the water. It's outline is faintly seen through the dust. Ten minutes later the full shape of the sun can be seen. A pale yellow color, it hangs about 30* in the sky now and seems to resemble the moon rise more than the sun rise. The color is so muted, you can look right at the sun; it's not bright at all. So much for the morning "rays." Only after about 30 minutes, when they sun has fully cleared the dust belt along the horizon can you see the sun shining. It's rather sad.

video games

Every day my students start class by writing in a journal. Sometimes I ask meaningful questions; other times silly questions. My goal is simply to get them thinking about something and writing down their thoughts. The other day I asked them if they thought video games were bad for kids and why or why not. Here is the overwhelming response I got:
Yes! video games are bad for kids because it makes their eyes bad. After staring at the TV so much, a lot of kids need to get glasses!
Not exactly what I was getting at, but it still brought a smile to my face.

Sandy Spring

The "skyline" of Bahrain. These pictures were all taken in the middle of the day.
The ocean view. It is the current trend on the island to reclaim land from the sea. A few years back, the building from where I took this picture did not exist. The area was underwater. Developers are now reclaiming land from the sea by pumping in sand. These areas are becoming the new home of skyscrapers, luxury hotels, and business towers. As you can see from the picture, they are creating "islands" that will be the financial center in Bahrain. The increasing frequency of dust storms is due in part to this kind of construction work.
Creating new islands on the north end of the Bahrain.

This year has been marked by some unusual weather. We had one of the coldest winters in history with temperatures dropping down to 6* Celsius, and now our spring is bringing more sand storms than ever. Since most of you have probably never experienced a sand storm, I will try to paint some pictures (and show you some real pictures) so you can get a feel for it.

When you wake up in the morning, the sky is a whitish gray, like you would see during the long Midwest winters. :)

Visibility is almost nothing. It seems like a really foggy morning, but the fog persists all day.

People walk around withe their mouths and noses covered so they don't inhale so much dust.

By the end of the day, everything is covered with a fine layer of brown. Due to the construction of most buildings here, the dust also gets inside. Air conditioners are a big culprit as the wall units allow dust from the outside free passage inside. It is almost impossible to stay on top of dusting in this country. I sweep the floor of my bedroom, and I'm not just sweeping up dust, I'm sweeping up a layer of sand/dirt that you would expect to find outside.

Hawar

Last weekend I was able to attend the youth group overnight retreat on the island of Hawar. I've been working with the youth group since August, and the weekend retreat is always one of the most anticipated events. This year about 31 of us met after church to head out to the island. Of course, we were planning to leave around 12:30 and didn't end up leaving until 1, but unfortunately, I'm getting used to accuracy of "Middle East time." :) After all donning our new youth t-shirts, we piled into the vans for the 40 minute drive south to the jetty where we would be departing. In my opinion, we were about to start one of the most exciting parts of the trip: the boat ride to the island! We split the group into two speed boats and headed out into the open sea. At one point we couldn't see land anywhere around us. On the hour ride to the island of Hawar, we even saw some dolphins! After arriving on the island, we headed to our apartments to unpack. The island is kind of funny because on one end is a resort. There is a pretty nice hotel, two outdoor pools, a water slide, a pretty nice beach, and a four wheeler race track. Of course there are the typical palm trees you would expect at an island resort, but the rest of the area is brown; the island is still a desert. And outside the fence of the resort is nothing but uninhabited desert land, used as a base by the Bahrain Defence Force. Not exactly what you would imagine when you go to a retreat on an island in the Gulf! Nonetheless, that didn't stop us from having fun. Some of the highlights were the two big water slides, the poolside dinner buffet, and a praise and worship session on the beach. New relationships were build, old relationships were strengthened, and a good time was had by all.

youth retreat