Today is a holiday. It is not an official Saudi holiday but one engineered by and for Aramco. It has been a few months since there was a company-wide and/or national holiday--Aramco likes to intersperse those 3-day weekends throughout the year. School just ended here, it is close to July 4 (not that the Saudis care about that but the positioning of the holiday near an American one is an anachronism from the days when Aramco was an American company), the eid following Ramadan is still about 8 weeks away...all factors pointed to the need for a holiday sometime in early July.
It would have been a much more enjoyable holiday if we hadn't been hit with a major dust storm on Thursday morning. The worst of the storm lasted almost 48 hours. The Eastern Province has a nearly constant haze of dust and salt in the air but the furnace-blast wind and dust in this storm were particularly ferocious. We didn't see the sun on Thursday and the sky was a murky orange all day.
We haven't had a true shamal (sand storm) here in the two years I've been here but we frequently get the tail ends of them. The sand blows itself out somewhere between Riyadh and the coast, leaving us with the dust, so baby fine that it manages to work its way into every crack and crevice. My sinuses feel like they have been extracted, thoroughly pounded with a meat cleaver, sprinkled liberally with something suitably caustic such as Drano, then stuffed back into my head.
That this area is unsuitable for long-term human habitation is clearly demonstrated by the absence of ruins of towns. Oh, sure, remnants of the occasional Bronze Age seasonal fishing village are stumbled across, unless the Wahhabis get to the site first and destroy it (destruction and denial of pre-Islamic civilization on the Arabian peninsula is a refined cottage industry here). But even these tattered bits attest to the larger point: nobody lived in this god-forsaken landscape year-round. (There were towns along the western trade routes, but those were established by different peoples altogether.)
I'm preparing to leave this vile weather behind for a bit--my annual government-mandated repat leave is coming up soon. We are required to be OOK for 14 consecutive days each year. Add on the Aramco-mandated travel days and it turns into something like 21 days off from work. Doesn't matter where we go, but go we must. Aramco ensures our cooperation with it all by paying us extra to leave.
In other news, both dogs have a nasty case of dermatitis on their feet from the toxic combination of raw irrigation water, dust, salt, and sand fleas. Their front feet are most affected as both have lots of tiny bites between their toes. It doesn't help that we take most of our walks at dawn and dusk when the nasty little fleas are most active. I'm going to try spritzing their feet with an herbal insect repellent to see if that helps at all. Mimi licked her front feet so much that she gave herself a yeast infection (the vet, after taking a whiff of her feet, agreed that they did have "quite a pong"; he's a Brit, in case you didn't guess). He told me that nearly all dogs in camp develop this dermatitis after a year or so--it is just part of living here. We do have ticks and regular fleas so the dogs get FrontLine but it is not effective against the sand fleas, unfortunately.
Since cooking is one of my hobbies and I'm not exactly a shitty cook, I thought that I would start adding a semi-regular cooking or recipe note to the blog. So here's the first one (I'll start adding photos once I see how this goes):
Mango season is winding down at last. I'm a bit of a philistine when it comes to mangoes--I like nearly all varieties--India, Africa, Pakistan, Mexico--bring'em on! I don't care much for melons or papayas or other tropical fruits but I really like mangoes. I stumbled across a great recipe that uses up as many mangoes as you need it to. Even better, this mango salsa is quite a crowd pleaser at parties. It's so simple to make! No fat! No salt! It's all good for you!
1 small red onion
3 large mangoes (if you use more than one kind, you get interesting variations in color and texture)
1 medium red bell pepper
1 hot pepper, about index-finger length (I buy the red Thai peppers but hot green ones work too)
1 lime
2 cloves of garlic (optional)
one bowl large enough to hold all ingredients
Wash all of your veggies well! Finely dice the onion. Deseed and finely dice about 1/3 of the hot pepper (add more if you are brave or your guests are hardy). Now wash your hands, the knife, and the cutting board. You just handled that hot pepper and you don't want those fiery juices getting places they shouldn't. Finely dice the garlic if you are using it. Mix these ingredients well with the juice of the lime. No hurry! Letting the onions and hot pepper sit in the lime juice allows their flavors to mix and mellow. Dice the red bell pepper. Peel and dice the mangoes. Mix all ingredients. Keep in the fridge until ready to serve with crackers (otherwise the mango bits can get kind of mushy). Also works wonderfully as a relish or salad for curries and grilled meats. Keeps for about 3 days in the fridge.
Bon appétit!
It would have been a much more enjoyable holiday if we hadn't been hit with a major dust storm on Thursday morning. The worst of the storm lasted almost 48 hours. The Eastern Province has a nearly constant haze of dust and salt in the air but the furnace-blast wind and dust in this storm were particularly ferocious. We didn't see the sun on Thursday and the sky was a murky orange all day.
We haven't had a true shamal (sand storm) here in the two years I've been here but we frequently get the tail ends of them. The sand blows itself out somewhere between Riyadh and the coast, leaving us with the dust, so baby fine that it manages to work its way into every crack and crevice. My sinuses feel like they have been extracted, thoroughly pounded with a meat cleaver, sprinkled liberally with something suitably caustic such as Drano, then stuffed back into my head.
That this area is unsuitable for long-term human habitation is clearly demonstrated by the absence of ruins of towns. Oh, sure, remnants of the occasional Bronze Age seasonal fishing village are stumbled across, unless the Wahhabis get to the site first and destroy it (destruction and denial of pre-Islamic civilization on the Arabian peninsula is a refined cottage industry here). But even these tattered bits attest to the larger point: nobody lived in this god-forsaken landscape year-round. (There were towns along the western trade routes, but those were established by different peoples altogether.)
I'm preparing to leave this vile weather behind for a bit--my annual government-mandated repat leave is coming up soon. We are required to be OOK for 14 consecutive days each year. Add on the Aramco-mandated travel days and it turns into something like 21 days off from work. Doesn't matter where we go, but go we must. Aramco ensures our cooperation with it all by paying us extra to leave.
In other news, both dogs have a nasty case of dermatitis on their feet from the toxic combination of raw irrigation water, dust, salt, and sand fleas. Their front feet are most affected as both have lots of tiny bites between their toes. It doesn't help that we take most of our walks at dawn and dusk when the nasty little fleas are most active. I'm going to try spritzing their feet with an herbal insect repellent to see if that helps at all. Mimi licked her front feet so much that she gave herself a yeast infection (the vet, after taking a whiff of her feet, agreed that they did have "quite a pong"; he's a Brit, in case you didn't guess). He told me that nearly all dogs in camp develop this dermatitis after a year or so--it is just part of living here. We do have ticks and regular fleas so the dogs get FrontLine but it is not effective against the sand fleas, unfortunately.
Since cooking is one of my hobbies and I'm not exactly a shitty cook, I thought that I would start adding a semi-regular cooking or recipe note to the blog. So here's the first one (I'll start adding photos once I see how this goes):
Mango season is winding down at last. I'm a bit of a philistine when it comes to mangoes--I like nearly all varieties--India, Africa, Pakistan, Mexico--bring'em on! I don't care much for melons or papayas or other tropical fruits but I really like mangoes. I stumbled across a great recipe that uses up as many mangoes as you need it to. Even better, this mango salsa is quite a crowd pleaser at parties. It's so simple to make! No fat! No salt! It's all good for you!
Mango Salsa
1 small red onion
3 large mangoes (if you use more than one kind, you get interesting variations in color and texture)
1 medium red bell pepper
1 hot pepper, about index-finger length (I buy the red Thai peppers but hot green ones work too)
1 lime
2 cloves of garlic (optional)
one bowl large enough to hold all ingredients
Wash all of your veggies well! Finely dice the onion. Deseed and finely dice about 1/3 of the hot pepper (add more if you are brave or your guests are hardy). Now wash your hands, the knife, and the cutting board. You just handled that hot pepper and you don't want those fiery juices getting places they shouldn't. Finely dice the garlic if you are using it. Mix these ingredients well with the juice of the lime. No hurry! Letting the onions and hot pepper sit in the lime juice allows their flavors to mix and mellow. Dice the red bell pepper. Peel and dice the mangoes. Mix all ingredients. Keep in the fridge until ready to serve with crackers (otherwise the mango bits can get kind of mushy). Also works wonderfully as a relish or salad for curries and grilled meats. Keeps for about 3 days in the fridge.
Bon appétit!
2 comments:
Yum! Am planning to make the mango salsa for a get-together later this month. It will be a wonderful change from the usual dips. Keep those recipes coming!
You must have read my mind... I've been wanting to make some mango salsa for the last few weeks. Now I have no excuses.
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