In Kuwait...

Afternoon!

I am now in Kuwait...

After the cold of Amman (32 degrees) I am now back in the Betty Swollocks weather...
46 today... How do they live here...

This was the view when I arrived yesterday. If you look closely you can see the three ball towers in the distance on the right.

This was myself and Colin with our agent out here. We did a demo on some of our gear and gave some training to Mr Muhammad... (Aren't they all called that???)

This is the famous VisIR640 yellow camera on the desk. Doesn't look much for a camera that costs 20.ooo GBP...

Again the view out the hotel window, I thought the picture would come out better but my camera on my Nokia 96 is pretty shite...

After the agent meet we went out for a curry and I had a really good rojan josh. Because of my chilly withdrawal I had asked for extra spicy and the waiter was a good listener, my arse is on fire hahahahaha!!!

OK, we have one more day here and then its on to Lebanon... Time for some good kebabs... and then finally, after 4 days it will be time to get home. Its time to see the missus, I miss her on these long trips...

That is it sofar from my Middle East trip...

More later,

Alex.

In Amman Jordan...

Afternoon!

And here I have arrived in Amman Jordan. We have some cement plants to visit and our agent out there. After a week of over 40 degree heat Amman is heaven, its only 30 degrees here Yippee!!!

This was the chandelier in a bedioun style restaurant in Amman. Our agent felt obliged to make us eat all the typical Jordani and Palestinian food he could find.

This is Colin and Mr Ahet and Mr Jebril. Here we had a huge portion of the Jordanian national dish Mansaf. Mansaf is goat stewed in milk served on rice with almonds. Very very good!

We sat in this bedouin style tent and ate of huge copper plates, very atmospheric...

Mr Ahet contemplating life after quaffing three goats and some kids...

Mr Alex with stupid grin after stuffing myself with as much goat as I could get down my neck hahahaha!!!

This is one of our prospective customers, Al Najri Cement. A new plant still under construction. While we were there I did a demo on our Thermal Imager. I took a picture of a typical Middle East electrical installation... As you can see in the picture below that office will be on fire in the next few days. That wire that is showing up in yellow is an earth yellow/green wire. It is not supposed to be 50 degrees hot... Ah well, at least it showed that our Thermal Imagers work...

The fire awaiting to happen...

This was another restaurant that Ahet took us to. Its the Pine Restaurant on Pine Hill. We had some excellent food there. Kebabs, quail, tabulleh, hoummous, labneh, all sorts of lovely grub...
One thing they do not do is spicy food. I am getting withdrawal symptoms from lack of chillies. Luckily when I get back my four chilly plants in my garden should be ready for harvesting!!!
Bring on the burn!!!

OK, after this its back to the heat, I'm on my way to Kuwait where its 48 at the moment...

Taraaa,

Hoummous Alex.

Ras Al Khaimah...

And the next Emirate... Ras Al Khaimah...

I had been to this place before so I sorted the hotel. So this time I found one with a view and with lots of nice female german tourists around the pool hahahaha!!!

This is the view from the pool of Ras Al Khaimah harbour. The little waterplane belonged to the hotel and you could rent it for day trips...

The second day Colin got us lost again and we ended up driving through a herd of bad tempered camels... Camels gotta be gods idea of a joke animal, what ugly bastards. Colin had a good description of them...
He said 'A camel is a horse designed by a committee!' Class joke Colin!

At least when he drove the wrong way on the motorway it didn't matter as the roads were largely empty.

We had a good visit where we visited some good TTX customers. We even had half a day on sunday to do some sunbathing... (Sunbathing Colin, not perving on girls!!!)

Cheerio,

Alex.

In the United Arab Emirates...

Afternoon,

This time I am in Dubai. After flying from Muscat to Abu Dhabi we rented a car and tootled of to Dubai, only a short 160 km ride. One problem was that my dear collegue and mentor Mr Colin was driving... Man after three days in the car with him I kissed the ground like the pope does after a plane ride. The man scared me half to death on several occasions. The best one was where he decided to drive the wrong way up the motorway. I don't think I will forget the sheer terror to be faced with 4 lanes of traffic hurtling at me at 100km an hour....

This is the view up the Creek in Dubai. The Creek is full of peculiar fish called Plastic Bag Fish...

This is the famous Burgh Al Arab hotel... Its in the distance as I couldn't be arsed to drive closer, they won't let me play tennis on there like Federer anyway...

This is the view of the business area with the tallest building in the world in the background...

These were some of the Dhows moored in the Creek...

The Spice Souk...

More rotten old wooden boats... Eh I mean, beautiful wooden Dhows...

Me sweating my arse off in 42 degree heat on the Creek...

The usual quiet traffic on a sunday in Dubai.

What we really noticed was how quiet it was in Dubai. Since the Credit Crash has started a lot of the huge building projects have a stopped. A lot of foreigners have left the place and there are loads of appartments for sale... Never mind, I can't say I care a lot for a place that is 45 degree hot and boasts the largest indoor ski slope in the world....

After this it is off to Ras Al Khaimah, the poorest of the Emirates...

Taraaa,

Alex.

In Oman...

Afternoon!

This time you find me in Oman. I am doing a tour of the Middle East and the first stop was Muscat Oman. We met our agent out there to give him some training on a new piece of equipment. We did get a little suprise though. When we met him in the morning he told us that the staff we had to train was in the oil fields north of Muscat and we would have to train them there...

They took us in a sturdy landrover with roll cage etc for a 3 hour drive to Fahood. While travelling we noticed on the dashboard temperature gage that it was getting a trifle warm...

If you look closely on the display on the right you will see 48 degrees displayed. This is no joke, it really was that hot...

This was the compound where they made us stay overnight. Comfortable but not to much in the way of entertainment... Unless you count 'Squash the Cockroach' a good past time...

This is me at 9 in the morning just to set out for an sample survey of a 33KV powerline, it was already 49 here. Nice, wearing a tie and all...

This is the exciting landscape near Fahood oil fields...

Nevertheless we had a good trip, the staff got trained and everyone was happy with the performance of the new Infra Red cameras.... (And No, Mr Ahmad, you can not see through womens cloth with these cameras....)

OK, on to The United Arab Emirates...

Alex.