Friday, May 25, 2007
Monday, February 26, 2007
Theatre of the absurd
There have been lots of problems with the internet over here; various changes to servers and other stuff to technical and tedious to try to tell. So, while it has been almost impossible to get onto Blogger and actually impossible to get to post anything, there has been a bit of a lull. But now I'm back...
So, what's been going on? We've been cramming loads of stuff in to school. The last three or four weeks have been really busy with Sports' Day, parents' evenings, Football Festivals, going to Dubai, reports, rehearsals, curriculum rewrites, exams, courses and all that kind of thing. I suppose it's good in a way that we have a lot to do but it does feel as though there's one thing after another piling up the pressure on us. We might get a bit of a breather after this week as there's not much else in the near future.
The kids haven't been feeling any of it. Today is Hannah's busy day as she has swimming at school and ballet in the afternoon. She's getting a lot more confident in the water and can jump in and bob her head under and everything. Kim's been having swimming lessons for the last few weeks and she sometimes lets Hannah go along with her when she trains. James misses out a bit but he's been kicking his legs a lot as well. I guess we're lucky to be able to go swimming outdoors in February.
Hannah had her sports' day yesterday. We went along in our free lessons to watch her. It was all tricycle riding, space hopper bouncing and egg-and-spooning. She had a good time but it was a bit repetitive and Hannah started showing off to us and didn't always do the events properly. I'll stick some pictures up when I've downloaded them.
We've ordered the school photos of the kids for the family at home. There aren't any individual ones, just the group shots so you'll be able to see James sucking his thumb with the rest of the creche and Hannah looking off to one side as the rest of her class face the camera. It's funny; every class has one kid who looks like they are mentally defective. Thankfully, our kids are not one of them.
So, what's been going on? We've been cramming loads of stuff in to school. The last three or four weeks have been really busy with Sports' Day, parents' evenings, Football Festivals, going to Dubai, reports, rehearsals, curriculum rewrites, exams, courses and all that kind of thing. I suppose it's good in a way that we have a lot to do but it does feel as though there's one thing after another piling up the pressure on us. We might get a bit of a breather after this week as there's not much else in the near future.
The kids haven't been feeling any of it. Today is Hannah's busy day as she has swimming at school and ballet in the afternoon. She's getting a lot more confident in the water and can jump in and bob her head under and everything. Kim's been having swimming lessons for the last few weeks and she sometimes lets Hannah go along with her when she trains. James misses out a bit but he's been kicking his legs a lot as well. I guess we're lucky to be able to go swimming outdoors in February.
Hannah had her sports' day yesterday. We went along in our free lessons to watch her. It was all tricycle riding, space hopper bouncing and egg-and-spooning. She had a good time but it was a bit repetitive and Hannah started showing off to us and didn't always do the events properly. I'll stick some pictures up when I've downloaded them.
We've ordered the school photos of the kids for the family at home. There aren't any individual ones, just the group shots so you'll be able to see James sucking his thumb with the rest of the creche and Hannah looking off to one side as the rest of her class face the camera. It's funny; every class has one kid who looks like they are mentally defective. Thankfully, our kids are not one of them.
Friday, February 16, 2007
In the Jungle
Our latest outing was to a place called Mersal Village. It's another tourist attraction that isn't advertised, isn't signposted until you get there and appears to be suffering from underinvestment. I don't know why they bother sometimes. Quite a lot of money must have been spent originally and it looks like quite a good idea in practice. However, the usual failings were apparent. I find it's a good indicator of how well-cared for a place is to look at the toilets. Broken toilets: check. Complete lack of paper towels and toilet paper: check. Wet floors: check. At least these ones flushed, which puts them quite high up the pecking order, unfortunately.
All that' s not to say that we didn't enjoy it. We went with four other families and the kids all had a great time. The place is some sort of amusement park based around an African safari. Perhaps mersal means something safari-ish in Arabic. Anyway, there were plenty of little rides for Hannah, James and the other kiddies and some for older kids as well. They are still at the age of enjoying a merry-go-round or train ride so there was plenty to amuse them. Hannah even wanted to go on the log flume but she was pretty scared afterwards because she sat at the front and got wet.
Unfortunately, I didn't take the camera so there are no pictures. You'll have to use your imagination.
All that' s not to say that we didn't enjoy it. We went with four other families and the kids all had a great time. The place is some sort of amusement park based around an African safari. Perhaps mersal means something safari-ish in Arabic. Anyway, there were plenty of little rides for Hannah, James and the other kiddies and some for older kids as well. They are still at the age of enjoying a merry-go-round or train ride so there was plenty to amuse them. Hannah even wanted to go on the log flume but she was pretty scared afterwards because she sat at the front and got wet.
Unfortunately, I didn't take the camera so there are no pictures. You'll have to use your imagination.
Sunday, February 11, 2007
Happy Birthday!
Happy Birthday Sarah! Who'd have thought my little sister would now be 27? There are people working alongside me now who are younger than that. It makes me feel old.
Sunday, February 04, 2007
School Daze
From the Arab News:
A student at a high school in Hafr Al-Batin suffered a panic attack in the examination hall after realising that he had stayed up the whole night studying for the wrong subject. Teachers, convinced that the student was not lying, gave him a short reprieve and allowed him to leave the exam hall for a short while to quickly revise the subject.I don't think there is anything I can add to that. If I had an international league table of educational success, I'd put it up.
Monday, January 29, 2007
Technics
Somone made a comment on here asking what the benefit of moving to Blogger Beta has been. So, here's the answer;
Not much.
A few months ago, as I think I mentioned, Blogger started advertising the new Beta and giving people the chance to switch. I didn't because I'd heard that there were problems with Beta, as there always are, and I wouldn't know how to solve them. So, I carried on blogging merrily with the 'old' version. Then I started reading things on Blogging fora suggesting that Blogger was going to make people migrate to the new one sooner rather than later. I guess my herd instinct kicked in and I thought I may as well get it over with, so I switched.
Since that time I had a panicky few days when I couldn't get into the blog and now there's trouble with Flickr as well, which is why you may not be able to see the photos (I know I can't). I'm not sure if those troubles are associated with Blogger or with our ISP blocking lots of sites as we're in the Kingdom of Intolerance. Either way, there's a link between the switch and the problems.
To Beta's advantage, it is a lot easier to manage the blog, in terms of making changes to the things that you can't see or, at least, can't see the mechanics of. I can add things to the side bar much more easily, change the template colours and layout without needing to know lots of CSS and stuff like that. Perhaps you need to be a bit of a nerd to appreciate it. Perhaps it's been one big dumbing down exercise.
On the other hand, now I've got two columns instead of three and I haven't looked to see about how to change that. Also, a few of the things that I had put in my third column, I have not added into the new template. I don't know if that's what the person was referring to when they said that the new version doesn't look as good. It's a bit less cluttered, which is why I did it, I suppose.
If I could be bothered, I'd look into gettting a third column, putting more things in the sidebar, perhaps, and finally sorting out the blog header. But I can't. I have started a blog about my class though, so that's another way of keeping my toe in. We'll see what happens.
Not much.
A few months ago, as I think I mentioned, Blogger started advertising the new Beta and giving people the chance to switch. I didn't because I'd heard that there were problems with Beta, as there always are, and I wouldn't know how to solve them. So, I carried on blogging merrily with the 'old' version. Then I started reading things on Blogging fora suggesting that Blogger was going to make people migrate to the new one sooner rather than later. I guess my herd instinct kicked in and I thought I may as well get it over with, so I switched.
Since that time I had a panicky few days when I couldn't get into the blog and now there's trouble with Flickr as well, which is why you may not be able to see the photos (I know I can't). I'm not sure if those troubles are associated with Blogger or with our ISP blocking lots of sites as we're in the Kingdom of Intolerance. Either way, there's a link between the switch and the problems.
To Beta's advantage, it is a lot easier to manage the blog, in terms of making changes to the things that you can't see or, at least, can't see the mechanics of. I can add things to the side bar much more easily, change the template colours and layout without needing to know lots of CSS and stuff like that. Perhaps you need to be a bit of a nerd to appreciate it. Perhaps it's been one big dumbing down exercise.
On the other hand, now I've got two columns instead of three and I haven't looked to see about how to change that. Also, a few of the things that I had put in my third column, I have not added into the new template. I don't know if that's what the person was referring to when they said that the new version doesn't look as good. It's a bit less cluttered, which is why I did it, I suppose.
If I could be bothered, I'd look into gettting a third column, putting more things in the sidebar, perhaps, and finally sorting out the blog header. But I can't. I have started a blog about my class though, so that's another way of keeping my toe in. We'll see what happens.
Monday, January 22, 2007
Happy Birthday!
It was Hannah's birthday today. We managed to squeeze in a few presents for her to open on the day although the main one was this:
She had a little 'do' on the village green as well, with all of the other kids from the compound in attendance. We didn't really organise anything for her in terms of games but Kim did spend half the evening sorting out the party bags. I think she's reliving her childhood through Hannah and wants to do everything 'properly', which usually means the opposite of the way things were done for her. I suppose we all do that to a certain extent.
Anyway, she excelled herself with the cake, which disappeared in record time. It was mostly eaten by adults although the kids got to sniff it. I managed to get this as well:
so that's a clean sweep of all the kids blowing out their candles. I even managed to get William blowing his out as well. January has been a busy month for birthdays.
She had a little 'do' on the village green as well, with all of the other kids from the compound in attendance. We didn't really organise anything for her in terms of games but Kim did spend half the evening sorting out the party bags. I think she's reliving her childhood through Hannah and wants to do everything 'properly', which usually means the opposite of the way things were done for her. I suppose we all do that to a certain extent.
Anyway, she excelled herself with the cake, which disappeared in record time. It was mostly eaten by adults although the kids got to sniff it. I managed to get this as well:
so that's a clean sweep of all the kids blowing out their candles. I even managed to get William blowing his out as well. January has been a busy month for birthdays.
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