News from the Jacobs family in Saudi Arabia
The kids are getting big! Not too long ago the family portrait we had done at the end of last year came through. Each year a professional photographer comes through to take school photos for the students and he does family photos after hours and on weeks for those interested.
We had quite a shammal blow in yesterday–lots of fine dust. It has been a cold, dry winter here so far but it sure beats the hot, humid summers. The dust meant no soccer practice so we headed into Khobar to purchase some birthday gifts for parties Kai and Nora are invited to and had a dinner out. On a completely unrelated note here are a few random shots from the last week or two.
Last week I took Nora to soccer practice and brought my camera along to capture a few pictures. She really enjoys soccer and especially loves when they play a scrimmage towards the end of practice. She definitely isn’t afraid of the ball and gets in there even though she is one of the smaller girls on the team.
Now that she has turned 5 Nora has joined the local youth soccer league. For the last two years she’s patiently attended Kai’s soccer sessions and watched from the sidelines so it was a big deal for her to finally be able to get out on the field herself.
We also took a trip over to Bahrain to pick up roller blades for the kids. They’ve both been asking for a while and many of their friends have them so we figured why not. We have a round of visa and passport expirations coming up so we figured we’d go now since we’ll be unable to travel for a bit while we process the renewals.
Here are a few more pictures from the trip to Sri Lanka. They are the last batch that didn’t make any previous posts and are in no particular order…enjoy!
The third major stop on our trip after visiting the high elevations of Nura Elliya was to head back down the mountain to the national park at Uda Wallawe ((Learn more about Uda Wallawe)). It was definitely more rural and off the tourist track. We stayed at a very small resort called Kula’s Hideaway that only had 7 rooms. Very nice digs for being so far from everywhere. On Dec 31st we took a morning Safari into the park and despite coming close to getting stuck in the mud twice we saw dozens of elephants, peacocks, a host of birds and two crocodiles. Kai loved playing “spotter” with the binoculars.
Chandrasiri arranged a New Year’s eve “party” down by the lake which we thought it would be rude to decline. He seemed very excited about it. Turns out it was with the same crew that managed the Land Cruiser for the safari that morning – Chandrasiri drove us close to the lake in the van and then we went the rest of the way by 4-wheel drive in the safari truck. As the sun set on 2011 we were on the shore of Lake Uda Wallawe with some bowls of wild boar and lake fish and a couple of bottle of the local firewater – coconut arrak. Drums were produced and songs started. Crystal and I sampled the food and were thankful that Kai and Nora didn’t want to touch it. The coconut arrak disappeared surprisingly fast. Nora kept trying to wander away to chase fireflies which made us nervous as at least one wild dog was prowling the perimeter looking for the chance to dart in and steal some food. It was definitely a New Year’s Eve with bit more character than recent years.
The first two days we spent in Kandy – a scenic city built on steep hills. There were a few valley bottoms with some flat land but most of the city is built on incredibly steep hills. Our hotel (the Amaya Hills – highly recommend it) was well up the side of one of the hills which gave it spectacular views but led to a white knuckle trip through the switch backs every time we drove up. Our mini van was too long for one of the turns and so the driver had to make part of the turn then reverse towards a precipice on steep incline and then get back into first gear and move forward again. About half the time he could manage this without stalling but then the wheels would spin for a brief instant before catching. I dreaded that switchback and we arranged our excursions so we only needed to leave/return to the hotel once per day.
After we left Kandy we went up slope even further to Nuware Eliya which Chandrasiri called “Little England” being on the mountain plateau it was rarely hot and of cold and misty (our room had a space heater that came in very handy). It was a popular refuge for the English colonials who would go up there to avoid the worst of the heat and also enjoy English style vegetables which grew there easily – we saw plenty of carrot, onion and strawberry fields in addition to hill after hill of tea.
Holiday cheer is in full swing on Sharar Circle. Trees are up, treats are made and Christmas specials have been viewed. The “Holiday” playlist on the iPod runs on shuffle-repeat all day long – with almost 700 songs it takes a while to hear any repeated though I must say that tracks from The Bob Dylan Christmas album make far more appearances that may be expected by chance. Enjoy the pictures…
Last week was the grade 2 musical performance – a collection of tunes from Suessical. You can’t go wrong with a bank of 2nd graders earnestly trying their best. Too much cute.
The holiday season is in full swing here. A singing group that Crystal works with recently put on an Elizabethan evening dinner/concert. It was a festive holiday feast complete with a king, queen and royal court–a fabulous show and when Kai and Nora heard that costumes were involved they were keen to get dressed up as well. Nora’s default of dressing as a princess seemed to work well enough and for Kai it was either a Jedi Knight, an alien or a pirate. The pirate seemed most appropriate. I thought that we could get him to pass for a monk with the help of his Jedi robe but he didn’t have much interest. Monks don’t pack cold, hard steel — pirates do!
