final client presentation

We filed through thick, 10 foot double wooden doors into a large room.  In the center of the room was a heavy U-shaped wooden table with white leather chairs stationed around its outer edge.  The U opened toward a built-in cabinet and large white screen.  We collectively gasped - it seemed more like a boardroom in the world headquarters of a multinational corporation than a room for meetings in a small city.  On closer inspection, we would find that the table was edged in gold, with golden claw feet.  On the table, facing each chair was a darkened flatscreen.

We scurried around, deciding where the presenters would sit for each team, where the client would sit, who would control the Powerpoints.  Sheela and I, presenters for the CSR team, sunk into the smooth leather chair in the middle of one arm of the U, farthest from the door.  Karen positioned herself across from us.  The team took most of the remaining chairs, leaving several at the curved end for our client and their executive who would hear the summary of our projects.  At one point, we thought it would be the mayor himself who would review our work.  Tahir plugged a cord into his laptop; we all gasped again when the first slide of our presentation flashed sixteen times onto the flatscreens waiting on the table.

Our project sponsors walked into the room, offering greetings.  A man in a striped vest and cravat began to pour the traditional single sip of Arabic coffee into white demitasse cups with a gold rim and the red logo of the Municipality.  Eventually, another Emirati would enter, dressed in the white dishtash and head scarf.  He would shake hands with his colleagues, nod to us and sit in the central seat at the end of the table. Pigeons cooed and fluttered loudly outside the window.

Knowledge Management subteam & sponsors

We had been told that the Knowledge Management subteam would complete their presentation first.  Each team had 15 minutes to summarize the month of their efforts, followed by a 10-minute Q&A.  As Karen began the KM presentation, the pigeons seemed to get louder and louder, bobbing back and forth and fluttering to and from their perch right outside the window.  They were in my line of sight as I looked at Karen, distracting.  The Emiratis at the end of the table looked at her, their faces unreadable.  The uniformed man returned with his small tray to collect the white china cups and replace them with hot sweet tea in small glass mugs.  Cups clattered and the pigeons cooed.  I noticed my tea was not the usual caramel color but a greenish-yellow; only the Emiratis had a similar tea.  I pinched the glass handle between my thumb and finger and quickly tasted:  it had the herbed flavor of a Ricola cough drop. 

CSR subteam & sponsors

Faiz, our graphics expert on the team, had spent the last couple of days designing a one page flyer that summarized a month of work in an easy-to-read format.  We had it copied and, as the meeting started, passed it to our primary project sponsor L at the end of the table.  He shuffled it out of the heavy cardboard folder with the Municipality logo and passed it around to the other Emiratis.  For a long moment, I wondered who would speak next:  I had asked L if he would like to say a few words to kick off our presentation to his superior.  He began to introduce our CSR project and I turned around to catch the eye of Tahir, Faiz and Felipe, glad he wanted to take ownership of the work we had done.  And then, it was my turn.  I quickly marched through the introduction to our project, method and the CSR strategy we had developed jointly with department representatives of the Municipality.  As I talked, the senior Emirati nodded occasionally with a relaxed face as he listened, his dark eyes intense.  And then he asked a question, and another.  I talked a little about how the Gulf and Middle East region is turning traditional CSR on its head and initiating social and environmental programs from the public sector, instead of the private, and emphasizing that the strategy and initiatives we had developed over the past month could set Al Ain on a track toward its goal of global recognition in CSR.  It was a compelling message and one that we had seen resonate in every meeting, as it did again.  Then I transitioned to Sheela, who spoke about the priority areas we had identified for the next 3 years and the 36 initiatives we were proposing to begin executing on the new strategy.  And then, just like that, our project was over.  #ibmcsc uae

UAE Team 2 & sponsors

L to R:  Imane, Asma, Melanie, Catherine, Sheela

final notes from home

In the third week of my absence, after a few days of relative calm routine back in TN, my family was back to having a hard time.  It took the form of Alex acting out at school again.  A note was sent home about his behavior and the immediate handling of the issue came from Daddy.  After that, I told him in my harshest Mommy voice, from half a world away via Skype, that his behavior was unacceptable and would not be repeated.  Thankfully, he's still young enough not to know that there was nothing I could do from the UAE and the last couple days of the week ended peacefully, with the direction-following respect-for-the-teacher all little 1st graders should have.

That weekend, I started getting texts from Steve, asking when exactly I was coming home.  It quickly became apparent he was pretty well done with single parenting.  One week to go.

And then the final week:  fall break.  Alex was off school for the entire final week I was gone.  I had asked Steve for months prior to the trip what he had planned for fall break.  His answer changed each week until  the time I left, suggesting there was really no plan at all.  Eventually, I decided I had to let this one go and I truly didn't think about it until the final week, when I learned that the plan was to take Alex to work for half days and then our favorite babysitter would come to stay with him in the afternoons.  Sophie would continue to go daily to her preschool.  I was skeptical it would work for Alex but I bit my tongue, since a goal for this experience was to step back from taking central responsibility for my family's life.  By midweek, there was a new plan and several more texts about how excited they would be to have me home. 

I'm proud to say I didn't feel guilty.  Working motherhood is incredibly, painfully, exhaustingly difficult.  Being good at a career and being a good mother dip from the same well, and over the past 6+ years, I've drained it dry.  I stayed committed to my idea that I came to my CSC experience to grow and have fun and take risks, all of which were happening in abundance.  I allowed myself to live in the precious moment, right where I was.  The fact that my family missed me and realized how important I am to them was a bonus.  #ibmcsc uae

phonology is phun

Once you're a speech-language pathologist, you always are, I guess.  You can imagine that having so many English-as-a-second-(or fifth)-language speakers around, I'd be having a blast figuring out what was going on with everyone's speech as they applied the sound system (phonology) of their own language to English. 

Mostly I was just jealous, since one of the great tragedies of my existence is that I absolutely cannot roll an [r].  Never have been able to.  And not for a lack of trying over the course of my rather extensive number of years on this planet.  Try as I might, it just sounds like a cat hacking up a furball.  Or gargling.  Or something that's not the smooth, exotic, flair-ridden speech that pretty much everyone who isn't American (or Canadian, sorry Tahir!) on the team enjoyed.  And, since I had Felipe, Imane and Sheela on my project team, with their ridiculously delightful rolling [r]s flying all over the place continuously, I had to have my nose rubbed in my own distinct inadequacy pretty much every other syllable for a month of endless conversations.

Sigh.

Nonetheless, I was pretty good at identifying the substitutions that any non-native speaker will make when speaking a different language.  Of course, they varied depending on who was doing the speaking.  I was good at imitating some of them too.  Trust me when I say I had a bunch of fun imitating my face off.  (Since we were doing a strategy project, I pretty much never said the commonly-needed word VISION with a [v])  But I could not for the life of me create the trills or the huge number of non-English sounds produced at the palatal, velar, uvula, or pharyngeal places of articulation (back of the mouth and throat for you non-linguist readers out there).  Those I couldn't even hear the differences among, let alone produce.  It was straight to a hacking, gargling cat.  I was mortified.  I probably should be stripped of my linguistics tiara.  (but I'll fight to the death to keep it!)

A couple of times I helped one of my colleagues produce an item using the standard English phonemes.  But then that made me sad because it lost that awesome, exotic, trilling and flapping flair.  It just sounded flat and boring, kinda like how I talk.  Well, that's not fun at all.  Stopped doing that pretty much as soon as I started and developed an attitude problem about speech therapy for accent reduction besides.

Sigh.

See?  I'm totally not making it up - here's 8 phonetic inventories!

On our next-to-last day, I had a little break while my colleagues were finishing up some stuff before a team review.  And then I really geeked out, linguistics style.  I decided to write the phonetic inventories (a listing of all sounds) in all the languages represented by our team.  What a super-radical fun thing to do!  (if you're reading this and thinking, yeah, that's about as much fun as filling a salt shaker with a teeny pair of tweezers... well then, you seriously need to re-evaluate your notion of fun, my friend).  So here's what I learned:

1.  I mapped 8 languages:  Japanese, Malayalam, Hindi-Urdu, Mandarin, Arabic, English, Spanish, and German.  The Indians got 2 languages, just because they're special.

2.  These 8 languages include a total of 59 consonant sounds.

3.  These 8 languages only share 11 sounds (isn't that amazing??!?!?):  [b], [p], [t], [d], [k], [g], [m], [n], [s], [l] and [j] (this is the "y" sound in "yellow").  Six of these are stops (produced by stopping airflow then releasing, they're the first 6 in the list just before this sentence). 

4.  Arabic has more sounds than English and many of them are produced at the back of the mouth and throat.  Spanish and Malayalam also share the trilled [r].  (jealous!)

5.  Malayalam also has a lot of sounds produced at the back of the mouth, especially those released through the nose (nasals).  English only has 3 nasals - Malayalam has 6!

6.  German and Arabic are the only of our 8 languages that have sounds produced at the uvula (that dangly thing at the back of the throat). 

7.  German has some interesting things going on with affricates (example is "ch" sound in English) but I'd have to study the whole thing some more to figure out what.  I do know I gave Stephan a hard time about his affricates, poor thing!

8.  Mandarin has surprisingly few consonants and vowels in comparison to the others.  This makes sense since it's a tonal language, but actually looking up the phonetic inventory really made this hit home.

9.  I couldn't even guess what to do with my tongue to make some of these sounds, in spite of knowing the anatomy.  Just trying to figure it out for a couple of German and Malayalam sounds knotted my brain so much I was rendered catatonic.

So, I'm sure there's way more to know here but, as I mentioned, it was a SHORT break before we reviewed our final client presentation.  Do you see what a team player I am???  I shortcircuited my own pressing, encompassing inquiry in the name of team collaboration.  Whew.  How global I'm becoming.

The bottom line for me?  English is boring.  I need to learn another language.  And somehow, some way, I gotta figure out how to roll an [r].  #ibmcsc uae

vblog series goes awry: meet imane

Well, if you've been following the vblog series Meet the Team, you'll know I had to do a whole lot of cat-wrangling to get videos of everyone.  And yet, alas, I didn't get everyone. 

Probably our most critical member was not an IBMer but our local facilitator, Imane.  She worked for the NGO (non-governmental organization) that implemented our Corporate Service Corp program locally in Al Ain.  As such, she negotiated our accomodations at the hotel, transportation to and from the airport and client, developed the Statements of Work for both projects and provided support to us throughout the month in Al Ain.  But she was so much more than that.

As soon as I met her, I felt that spark of recognition you get when you meet a new lifelong friend.  Imane is originally from Morocco (one of 6 children) and now lives in Dubai with her dashing American husband.  She is warm, caring, honest, open, generous and absolutely hilarious.  She's the one I consulted with my most pressing questions:  the potty, abayas, being Muslim, being a Muslim woman.  She made me taste stuff (even eggs! ack), tossing her favorite phrase, "life is short." 

She kept all of us laughing the entire time we were there - and I can say that the combo of Imane, Sheela and me probably bordered on being intolerable since we laughed so much.  She has much to say and firm opinions, the product of her intelligence and broad experiences traveling the world.  And, like other teammates who I admired so much, she spoke multiple languages.  One morning Imane and I went for coffee:  she chatted with the team and took orders in English, met a friend in the hall for a quick chat in Arabic, took a phone call in French, ordered the coffee in English, another hallway chat in Arabic and made a crack at Felipe in Spanish when we got back to the room.  Astonishing.  I was also amazed to watch her quickly develop 11 plans for all of us on our last day in the UAE.  Seemingly without effort and within about a millisecond, she came up with options for how each of us could spend our remaining time:  where to stay, how to get there and then to the airport, what to do and where to stash our luggage.  And then made the arrangements.  Without even batting an eyelash.  Eleven times!  All of us were scattering like rabbits!  As if this isn't enough, she cooks (treated us to a lovely Moroccan tea at her home) and she can trill an [r] like nobody's business. 

I'm totally bummed not to have the video so you could see her expressive face and frenetic waving of hands as she rapid-fires conversation.  I already miss her a ton.  Thank you is inadequate, Imane.  Until next time...  #ibmcsc uae

dinner in the desert

Four white SUVs pulled up to the hotel, driven by 4 men in white dishtash.  The red logo of Al Ain Municipality sparkled from their doors, signaling the official caravan that would take us to a Municipality retreat in the desert beyond the limits of Al Ain.  The 12 of us piled in and the drivers sped away from the hotel, one behind the other, driving for about 20 minutes until buildings gave way to the red sand of the desert.  The white SUVs entered a chain link fence, containing perhaps two acres of flat sand, with a 3-sided palm front hut and maybe two other small huts.  As we stepped from the cars, our host D sauntered out to meet us in bare feet.  The Municipality's reserved area looked barren, as did the rolling dunes beyond the fence.  A hot breeze blew across the flat red sand.

D welcomed us and led us to the palm hut, where the floor was covered by patterns carpets topped with rectangular cushions and, on top of them, large square pillows.  A flat screen TV stood in the corner.  He invited us to look around and make ourselves at home.  We had been told the dress code was smart casual, so most of us were wearing work clothes.  With a shrug, we removed our shoes and placed our belongings on the pillows, then walked from the hut across the sand to the far end of the fenced area.  One knotted tree stood just outside the chain link, tangled and thirsty.  Beyond it, the sun sank toward the horizon, deepening from white to orange.  We glanced at each other, unsure what to do here in the corner of a large expanse of fenced sand.  Two other of our project sponsors sauntered over to D and conversed in Arabic.  Then, our hosts sat down onto the sand, some sitting crosslegged or other on their legs folded under them, looking expectant.  Some of us would glance down at our work clothes, then sink onto the warm sand ourselves.  The conversation was tentative as several of the team dug holes in the sand and the shadows of the fence grew.

A bit later, our host trudged across the sand back to the huts and returned, holding a volleyball and soccer ball below his triumphant smile.  The men got up en masse and began kicking the futbol to each other in a large circle; eventually they would start an impromptu game with the Emirati men on the open plain of sand.  The rest of us, all women, sat down on a large carpet they dragged out from the huts and talked and chatted until the sun sank below the horizon.

Guy stuff temporarily discarded for futbol!

As darkness descended, we wandered back to the 3-sided palm hut.  Here we were mesmerized by a large buffet table filled with traditional Arabic foods.  We numbered about 18 people in total but the feast was enough for 40, perhaps more.  We were told it is traditional to return for more food three times and beckoned to start.  Large stainless steel pans of curry were flanked by china bowls of salad - cabbage with zata'ar, fatoosh, tabbouli - hummus, pita bread.  On the far table were two enormous platters, each filled with a mountain of rice and, perched on top, a whole roasted lamb, crowned by its head.  Two young women of Philippino descent poured thick juice from pitchers into tall glasses as we sat on low pillows and ate to nearly bursting.

After the meal, our hosts huddled in the corner, speaking to Imane.  D turned and asked us all to take our seats.  Then, one by one, he called each of us to the front and presented us with a certificate and an engraved glass statue, gifts of thanks for our work with the Municipality.  He shook our hand and the bright light from a camera lit up the room.  Then all of us would settle back onto our cushions and our hosts would ask us to each tell our favorite thing in Al Ain or the UAE.  The evening complete, we trudged back through the warm night breeze to the waiting SUVs, which would drive us back to the hotel.  #ibmcsc uae

vblog series: meet tahir

And, last but definitely not least, I come to our Canadian, Tahir.  This is a funny video because of the giant falcon mural behind Tahir in the hallway of the Municipality.  A great locale, because it nicely displays Tahir's sense of humor.  When we first arrived, Tahir was very serious, Mr. Get Down to Business.  He's a consultant by day and a Strategy Consultant at that, so he was well-acquainted with the methodology, topic and relevant frameworks for our CSR project.  There is no question that his background, along with Felipe's, were essential to getting our project off to a running start and kept us focused and efficient.  He's smart, worldly, extremely well-traveled and clearly great at what he does.

As time went on, Tahir started loosening up and (I think) having more fun.  In addition to being knowledgeable he's also intellectually curious, a powerful combination.  It turned out that he and I shared the same political perspectives, although I can say he was much more knowledgeable about current events worldwide than I ever could hope to be.  Tahir and I reacted in much the same way to the human rights and political issues we encountered in the UAE, which I think made us both grateful for our countries.  In our project, there could have been lots of opportunities for the 2 of us to clash but I think we had enough mutual respect that we were able to balance each other at the right points.  Tahir showed a new side the last weekend when we went dancing... he can rock!  Tahir's wife was also deployed on a CSC team in Tanzania while we were in the UAE, so his stories of her trials with tainted water, malaria, awful conditions and 10 hour trips to the client by bus kept us all thankful for the luxury our team enjoyed. 

Bonjour and hello, Tahir...  #ibmcsc uae

vblog series: meet paul

Paul was the third American on the team and, as you'll see, very happy to be from New Jersey.  He introduced the team to American football and got everyone involved in playing tennis and table tennis in the hotel after work, very popular activities.  He also saved me from being the second-oldest on the team, although I seemed to get identified as "old" nonetheless.  (I think the term everyone was searching for was actually "experienced.") 

Paul was on the other project, so I didn't get to interact with him as much as folks on my project but he did come out with some hilarious one-liners every now and then, just when you least expected it.  He was excellent at logistics - he was instrumental in collecting and disseminating money when we had to pay for things like restaurant checks and taxis en masse and in making sure our taxis were at the hotel sort of around the right time each morning.  Obviously a very important skill when you're trying to wrangle 11 people from around the world. 

Without further ado....  #ibmcsc uae

talking in arabic

Ok, I'm going to take a little break from the Vblog Series for a quick review on essential vocabulary in the UAE.  Clearly you have to learn at least a couple of words to get along when you go to a new place and show respect for local culture.  So, here's our top 5 Arabic vocabulary items, along with a bonus item we used constantly:

1.  Al salam alaykum = hello.  Nice, all purpose, for some reason it wouldn't stick in my head.  I always tried to say the next one, which just made me look clueless.  I did manage to get it right when we did our final presentation to the client, but that's only because I copied 4 of my teammates who introduced themselves right before me and started with al salam alaykum.

2.  Wa alaykum asalam = response to #1. 

3.  Halas = done, finished.  Very important, it is used to indicate something is totally over.  Like so:

"I'm telling you it's not a shawl!  Halas!"

4.  Inshallah = God willing.  The great thing about this phrase is that you can add it to the end to basically add "good luck with that" or "when pigs fly."  Observe:

"Oh, you want me to write the final paper?  Of course, I'll get it done tomorrow, inshallah."

5.  Yala = let's go or we're outta here.  Very useful, especially when you combine it with halas, as in:

"Ohmygosh, I need a bucket of coffee.  Anybody want something from Gloria Jean's?"  (at this point, whoever's going takes about 6-8 orders:  Americano for Karen and Paul, latte for Faiz & Imane and possibly Tahir or coffee with cold skim milk for Tahir, soy latte for Mel, tea with milk for Ritesh)  "Ok, halas, yala."

6.  Schlak = Ok, this one isn't Arabic but I'd be crazy not to add it to the list.  It's actually a made-up word that someone Imane used to work with said.  It kinda means the same as crap, which I probably should not be writing in a blog that may be viewed by children or the IBM police.  Maybe they won't see it, inshallah.  After Imane told us the story of this word, it kinda caught on.  Its usage in a variety of grammatical contexts can be seen in the following exchange between me and Imane:

Imane:  Ok, I'll be at breakfast at 7am and we'll leave at 7:30.

Me:  Schlak.  There's no way you're gonna be down by then.  I'll give you until 8 to show up.

Imane:  No, I will be.  If I say it, I'll be there.

Me:  Um, schlak! 

Imane:  What?  I'm telling you I'll be there at 7.

Me:  Yeah, ok,  I hear ya.  Care to bet?  Loser buys lunch.

Imane (laughing, as we shake):  Oooohhh yeah, I'm gonna schlak you tomorrow.

Me:   Try I'm gonna schlak you, sistah.

As it turned out, I was the one schlaked since she showed up 10 minutes early.  That's ok, she got up early, so the schlak was on her.  I still got a yummy lunch.  #ibmcsc uae

vblog series: meet karen

Karen and I met in the Atlanta International terminal before the flight to the UAE.  We agree before we left to look for each other at the gate.  I passed by the gate several times but couldn't find anyone who appeared to look like an IBMer ready to embark on a month abroad.  When the plane started boarding, I finally saw a woman, hat in hand, scanning the crowd.  From about 15 feet away, I hissed "psssst!  Karen!" and she spun around, strolled over and enveloped me in a big hug.  I knew right then we would be friends.  She managed to sweet-talk some dude into switching seats with me so we could sit together for the grueling 15 hour flight over, which totally cracked me up.

It was lovely for me to have her there... it's difficult to explain how she just knew what I meant without having to say the words.  Maybe it's because we've shared a common culture but it's also because she is so open, caring and supportive.  The night before my Survivor Anniversary, she and I shared a quiet dinner where she was fully comfortable with my excessive emotion spilling all over our table.  Without her, I would have had to be alone with the mess I was feeling, which is a good way to describe the general role she played for me during this month.  We talked extensively about what we were learning about being Americans (much of which was not flattering), about all the other cultures and the role of the U.S. in the world. 

When we arrived back in Atlanta after it was all over, we gave each other a hug and said our goodbyes.  Then, after we got through customs, she stopped outside the doors and came back over to me, saying "I just have to give you another hug."  It was a kick in the stomach to say goodbye to her.

I adore you, Karen... thanks for being my travel buddy and friend.  #ibmcsc uae

vblog: meet asma

Asma was our beautiful Emirati interpreter.  As you'll see in this video, she is gentle, engaging, earnest and simply delightful.  Her smile lights up her whole face and makes you feel happy simply to be in her presence.  She interpreted for both project teams and came out with us a couple times, much to the delight of the fine gentlemen in the team.  ;-) Asma talked to me quite a bit about abayas and explained going to the tailor to have one custom designed.  She has gorgeous taste - one of her abaya had peacock feathers on the sleeves with sparkly stones to highlight the pattern.  The one she's wearing in this video has pink satin edging covered in black lace.  Just beautiful, just like she is. 

Asma also went beyond the call of duty when she interpreted - she expressed interest in our topics and had absolutely no difficulty engaging our client in conversations and reinforcing the importance of what we were doing.  It was so lovely to meet her and hear about being an Emirati woman firsthand. 

I think it's fair to say I speak for the whole team to send a huge THANK YOU to Asma for being part of UAE Team 2... we were the better for having you with us!

Al salam alaykum, Asma...  #ibmcsc uae

vblog: meet catherine

Catherine was our fun and jovial teammate from China.  Catherine blew me away one of the first days we were in the UAE, as she started telling me the historical significance of some monument in a square in San Francisco that I'd never heard of.  Me and Karen just looked at each other and shrugged our shoulders - what did we really know about China?   Turned out it was a theme.  Catherine was incredibly well-read as well and talked to Karen about Shakespeare and a variety of other English authors.  Living in China has clearly not limited her knowledge.

Catherine was game for taking in as much of the UAE as she could possibly pack into our 4 weeks.  Even when the rest of us were tired and starting to fade, she had the courage to take the bus by herself to Sharjah and go to the world's most expensive hotel, Burj al Arab in Dubai, simply because they were on her Must Do list.  She swam about a million laps in the hotel pool daily and was always snapping hundreds of photos.  By the end of week 2, I think she had something like 6 gigs of photos - our Dropbox (online photo sharing for the team) quivered in its boots when Catherine got online.  When you see her in photos, she is invariably holding up 2 fingers in a victory sign or spreading her arms out wide, showing how much she lives her life for all it's worth.  When I told her right toward the end that I was feeling really sad about our experience coming to an end, Catherine told me you can't be sad about the end but be happy about the next thing coming.  Not a bad way to live... 

Here's Catherine...  #ibmcsc uae

the indian rule

L to R:  Ritesh, Sheela & Faiz
Aren't they adorable?

It's stunning that it's taken me nearly to the end of the month to write about this topic, since it's been a rule that was literally adopted within the first couple days of arriving in the UAE.  The Indian Rule (which I may have been responsible for codifying... I know that surprises you) has to do with the fact that we had 3 teammates from India who were critical to our successful maneuvering in the UAE.

Background explanation:  UAE society is made up of a majority of ex-pats from other countries who come there to find work - most of the service, construction and making-society-go jobs are held by people from Asia, especially India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Thailand.  Every morning, the team would take 3 taxis from our hotel to Al Ain Municipality, the government offices where we worked.  And, every morning, our drivers were Indian (mostly), with an occasional Bangladeshi thrown in for some variety.  India has lots of languages - each state has its own language - and the common language that unites the country is English.  Most of the Indian languages are not intelligible to the others.  So, the average Indian person knows not only the language of their state, but English, and maybe Hindi and a couple others.  It's really quite extraordinary and obviously prepared Sheela, Faiz and Ritesh to be truly global citizens.

Right at the beginning, the team decided to implement the Male Rule; namely, that there should always be a guy with the ladies.  Very nice, I like that rule.  The Male Rule quickly got trumped by The Indian Rule, which, in its most general sense, stated:

Never go anywhere without an Indian.

The Indian Rule had a special incarnation for our morning taxi ride:  One Indian per cab.  This was necessary because you could never be sure that all cabs would make it to the Municipality.  Also, the driver sometimes spoke broken English, sometimes just about no English, so trying to explain where we were going (especially until they figured out we went to the Municipality EVERY day) was not easy.  Enter the Indians, who simply chatted away in whatever language they deemed appropriate and we were off to the races.  (You think I'm joking here but some of those cab rides were... adrenaline-producing, shall we say?)

In the second week, we had to make a slight revision to The Indian Rule when we went to a different office of the Municipality with our Emirati interpreter Asma.  Not only could Asma speak to the driver but she actually knew her way around the city too, which resulted in the following:

Take a native Emirati with you as a first choice.  When Asma is not available, take an Indian.

 In reality, we only had Asma once or twice, but it seemed irresponsible not to update the rule.

Eventually, we would find that there was also a pecking order that had an impact on implementation of our Indian Rule.  Faiz could talk to anyone, and in fact, he did.  I swear, the guy never met a stranger.  Everywhere he went, he busted into conversations with everyone about everything.  So Faiz was definitely high on the list of Indians to make sure you stayed close to.  If you remember from this post, Faiz could survive anywhere for weeks with only lint in his pocket and make about 50 friends in the process.  He seemed to speak to people in Hindi most of the time when I was around.

Sheela kept meeting people who were from her state and spoke her native language, Malayalam.  Even though she could speak several Indian languages, she'd invariably pick her native and strike up a conversation with cabbies, bus drivers or any random person.  When I'd ask her how she knew which language to pick, she'd just casually say she looked at the name.  Huh?  I think it's actually some sort of  top-secret language-sensing radar Indians have installed at birth that they just don't want the world to know about.  Maybe it's installed by their CIA.  Maybe Sheela was doing me a favor not letting me in on their little secret?  In fact, I might be in jeopardy just mentioning it.

I didn't actually get to spend a lot of time with Ritesh because he was on the Other Project Team (ack!  THEM!  just kidding, love you guys!) and always seemed to end up in a different cab.  But, I did hear about one incident where he couldn't talk to a driver, so I was forced to demote him.  Very unfortunate.  He's still a nice guy and will, I'm sure, go on to raise a pile of multiple Indian-language-speaking kids with his lovely wife.

Felipe made a grab for getting on the Usefulness List when he met a Colombian at Al Ain Museum and spoke to him in Spanish.  Even then, I told him the most he could hope for was to be Useful Person #4.   I mean, yeah, it's impressive you hold a convo in a language other than English or Arabic in the UAE but how's Colombian Spanish gonna help if we suddenly encounter a date avalanche or stampede of camels?  Unfortunately, I was all the way at the bottom of the Useful Person list - that's right, blonde, English-only-speaking American me was #11 out of 11.   What an embarressment.  I did FINALLY figure out one teeny useful skill I had, but it took 3 weeks to happen.  I could hail a cab really quick.  Chalk one up for the blonde American chick.  #ibmcsc uae

sufi dancer, desert safari

Here's the famed Sufi dancer from our desert safari.  This is just a short clip so you get a sense of it but the guy spun around for 15 minutes at least.   I like the lighted costume... he must have the same stylist as Katy Perry.  And, yellow boots?  My hat's off to anyone who has the self-assurance to pull off yellow boots.

Enjoy!

vblog series: meet ritesh

Here's Ritesh... as you can tell from this video, Ritesh is the comedian of the group.  He is just hilarious and likes to say blatantly false things with a straight face, making you question whether he's telling the truth or not.  Usually not.  I quickly decided making stuff up is his default.  Ritesh and Stephan hit it off pretty thoroughly, meaning that the two of them were a mountain of (thoroughly comedic) trouble.   He's also a really nice guy who talked about his beautiful wife of 1 year daily.  He shared some lovely photos of their 4-day (yes, FOUR DAY) wedding, with both of them wearing incredibly ornate traditional costumes.  While we were there, he carefully planned a lovely week with his wife in the UAE after our project ended and got more and more excited over the month for her to arrive. 

I didn't get to spend a ton of time with Ritesh since he was on the *other* project team.  Nonetheless, I was really touched one night when I was running upstairs to get my laptop back from a teammate and found him in our hotel meeting room, pacing around the table at 10:30pm.  When I asked him what in the world he was doing, he shared that he was getting ready to help Kana prepare for a presentation to their client the next day.  He told me he wanted her to feel confident since she had written in her profile before arriving that she was nervous because she had never presented to a client before.  Then he asked if I would like to join.  How in the world could I say no to that??  So, Ritesh, me, Stephan, Kana and Karen stayed up until midnight helping her practice the client presentation.  It was really inspiring to be a part of it. 

Namaste, Ritesh...

dune crashing, desert safari

Here's a little video I made during dune crashing on our desert safari.  It's not going to be the most enthralling thing you've ever seen, I'll admit.  I say that only because I need to set expectations about my camera work and commentary while I'm being tossed about in the way back of an SUV.  I'm back there with Karen, behind Felipe and Catherine in the middle and Tahir in the front.  The guys are pretending they're Arabs, headgear and all.  I seriously think some of those screams you're going to hear are coming from them. 

The ride was maybe about 15 minutes and it was seriously like being on a rollercoaster, except smoother.  My brain knotted around how exactly we managed to be vertical, in a car, on the side of a mountain of sand and did not roll off.  In fact, I believe I ask that in the video....   #ibmcsc uae

desert safari

I've managed to mess up the order of things since I already posted about the final work week.  It's due to a variety of technical issues with my camera, Mac, and PC.  Sigh.  Between the camera not charging properly, then the Mac suddenly deciding its not going to recognize videos, then hosing up the Mac with too many photos (I think?), I've been pulling my hair out.  Technology is great until it's not.

So now I'm going to backtrack a tad and hit on something that I actually really really wanted to do before we came:  the desert safari.  We did this on Saturday of our last full weekend; Oct 6, to be precise.  I had heard about the desert safari (maybe assisted by Sex in the City, Part 2?), so I knew it needed to be on the Must Do list.  In my head, undulating hills of barren sand reflected the fiery setting sun as we gently bobbed along on camels to some isolated Bedoin tent, then we gently disembarked (potentially tangling layers of fabric fluttering in the gentle breeze), reclined on piles of cushions and were fed dates and flatbread by attractive Arab men (or women, for the guys on the team... I'm all about equal opportunity).  The mournful tones of Arabic music would entwine with fruity sheesha smoke and float up to the star-filled heavens.  The 11 of us would laugh and eat as night yawned over the desert and we'd head back to civilization, confident that we'd experienced life as a nomadic desert dweller.

Yeah, ok.  Turns out I have a vivid imagination.  (surprised by that, are you?)

In reality, you'll need to picture about maybe 300+ sweaty and disoriented tourists who arrive in SUVs that have just gone crashing over those undulating desert hills, with sand spewing into the sky.  This, my friends, is dune crashing.  I'll admit, it was super-fun and probably the best part of the safari (I'll post a little video from the back seat in an upcoming blog).  I got a bit of a clue when me and Karen hopped into the back of our SUV and discovered roll bars across the ceiling.  Yeah, ok... what's this??

Falcon - isn't he beautiful?  She?  I didn't really check

Ritesh with falcon - is that falcon saying, "whatchoo lookin' at dude?"

Karen and Kana about to depart on camel

Sheela and Catherine as camel assumes the seated position
their expressions are priceless!

When you arrive at the compound in the desert (a large area with little huts around a central stage, surrounded by a fence of vertical wooden posts like you'd see around a fort), you're greeted by a cacophony of whirring engines, then smacked by the smell of gasoline.  Not my favorite olfactory or auditory environment.   People descend on you to ride ATVs around a little circle outside the fenced area, or get your photo with a falcon.  There were 2 bedraggled camels that gave short rides to the tourists.  I did do a camel ride, but only because I had said from Day 1 that I Will Ride A Camel.  Well, my little vegan heart broke for those two camels because they had to get up, walk 20 paces that-a way, walk 20-paces back and collapse back down again.  Over and over.  On their bony legs with arthritic-looking knobby knees.  And they were muzzled.  And I wasn't wearing some filmy, layered, wafting in the gentle breeze exotic fabric thing, but jeans and a T-shirt.  Talk about killing a fantasy.

But then it started to pick up when we went into the fenced compound.  Inside the little huts were a henna artist and, what the UAE does best, shopping, for all kinds of little trinkets.  A bunch of the guys bought little bottles with sand art for their significant others at home and we looked around the other shops.  There was a separate area with trickling water and sheesha smoking - fine, I guess, if you're into that kind of thing.  I've maintained I have enough problems breathing just as it is.  Several of us girls got our hand painted with henna.  A small group of us also climbed up one particularly large dune to check out the sunset over the desert.  Just beautiful.

Inside the compound, there were long tables on top of patterned carpets.  Large cushions surrounded each table.  You sit on the ground to eat dinner and watch the show, which turned out to be some guys playing some nice exotic mournful music on traditional instruments (don't ask me what, a clarinet-type thing was one of them but at least it sounded like I imagined it would), a belly dancer (man, wish I could do THAT!) and a Sufi dancer (aka Whirling Dervish).  The Sufi dancer won for most bizarrely talented because the guy just spun around for 15 minutes straight, while doing interesting things with the many layers of his costume.  I would have seriously barfed after about 30 seconds and fallen on my face after 45 seconds.  But he just kept spinning, spinning, spinning.  The whole team was talking about him afterwards and for several days later.

For dinner, there was a buffet and they gave you enormous oblong plates that were more like serving platters.  Everyone filled up on roasted meats (chicken, I think?  obviously I skipped), salads, hummus (because it wouldn't be a meal in the Gulf without hummus) and rice.  Since pretty much every meal I've eaten in the UAE has consisted of hummus and salad, I would have been just fine.  Next,  I toddled over to the meat station (since I was obediently following the line), then when I realized what it was and said "oh, no thank you," 3 different guys started barking "vegetarian, vegetarian" at me and pointed crazily to a table in a dark corner.   Ok, first, it's a little freaky that my refusal of some chicken makes strange men bark the word "vegetarian" at me in the desert.   Second, it's a little weird to have to go by myself to some dark corner apparently allotted to vegetarians.  I don't think I need to tell you that my active imagination came up with all kinds of scenarios in those couple of seconds.  Turns out that on a desert safari, they also have more food for veggies, with maybe 3 different types of curries, in addition to my requisite hummus and salad.  Get OUT!  Vegetarian options in the desert?!?!  Well, this just turned the whole night around for me, letmetellyouwhat!  How is it that in Memphis, I can't go to a restaurant and get more than a wilty pile of barely green head lettuce with 3 strips of carrot, yet in the middle of the DESERT I can get a veggie buffet?  Are you kidding me?  So, I, just like the rest of my team, got an excessively large pile of food that I scarfed down with about 300 of my new closest friends while watching a young woman with jiggly hips.

Afterward, we rode back to Al Ain (little over an hour drive) and I got into a discussion with Felipe about politics and guerillas and life in Colombia.  Super interesting.  He says I'd be at zero risk of getting kidnapped by guerillas and starving in a remote mountain hut for years as the U.S. attempts to negotiate my release.  I wonder how many veggie options they have in Bogota?  #ibmcsc uae

final work week and some football

Our last week of work with the client came very quickly.  It seemed like we just got off and running and boom, it's over.  I was unanimously elected to write our final report for the client (how did that happen??), which kept me busy most of the week.  If you've known me longer than about 5 minutes, you know I love to write and I do it pretty quick.  That was the case with the report as well.  I gave myself an early deadline for getting it done (Wednesday) and spent two intense heads-down days Monday and Tuesday writing.  I only really got stressed about it Tuesday morning, when I felt like I wasn't going to make my deadline.  Much to the consternation of my team, I refused lunch on Tuesday and wrote straight through the whole day so that by the time Tuesday wrapped, it was 80% done.

Wednesday was spent working as a team on our final presentation summarizing our project for the client, then we left early and spent the afternoon working in our meeting room at the hotel.  Felipe spent much of Wednesday reading and editing the report and pointing out to me where I apparently had a blonde moment and didn't finish a sentence or had something out of place.  I was so impressed with this whole thing... Felipe was reading in his second language and giving me excellent and subtle feedback on my writing. Most people who are native English give me very little constructive criticism on my writing!  I was simply amazed at some of the things he pointed out.

Lest you think I went against my goal of having more fun on this trip, I can assure you that my team functioned really efficiently, so we had time to play as well.  On Sunday, Paul (one of the other 2 Americans) invited all of us to his room to watch his alma mater Rutgers play American-style football.  For me, it was fun because he put out an in-room tailgate - including broccoli, which I hadn't eaten in 3 weeks or so and was in major withdrawal - and because I got to sit with a bunch of my team around me as I explained the game to them and talked about the role of football in American life.  As I explained how football dominates university life and the amounts of money involved, it was interesting to watch the reactions.  I don't think there's any equivalent in the rest of the world.  And of course, in the interest of being completely honest, I explained the massive recent scandal at my own alma mater Penn State and the incredible heartbreak all of us associated with the school have had to suffer.  If there is one thing I've gotten out of this trip, it is the solid, impossible-to-ignore understanding that the U.S. does not have all the answers, although we are arrogant enough to think we do.  For every societal issue we point to in other countries, we have just as many, if not more, in ours.  The Penn State situation is just the worst-case example of the cheapening of secondary education by money via football.

Enough of my editorial... on Monday night, I had the distinct honor of getting to watch football again, this time, in the style the entire world loves.  The team went to one of the hotel bars and we all sat at a big table outside in front of a massive screen and watched Madrid vs. Barcelona soccer (really, it's football, since that's what EVERYONE except us calls it).  I sat beside Felipe, who returned the favor of the previous night and explained all kinds of stuff about the game, along with Sheela.  I actually recognized Ronaldo, I'm proud to say - my niece Lyndsey in the UK would be proud.  I was also able to say maybe 2 semi-intelligent sentences about Manchester City, Man United and the UK Premier League, thanks again to Lyndsey and her hubby Mark.  So, I wasn't a total dolt.  It was a great night getting to see a sport that is so important to the rest of the world, explained by amazing people from all different places.  How incredibly powerful to look around the table and see 11 people from 7 countries, drinking, eating and sharing in the fun.  #ibmcsc uae

vblog: meet kanako

Kana is the darling of our team.  She is a sweet, gentle Japanese woman.  When she came, Kana was very shy.  Over the course of four weeks, she blossomed so much:  she came out of her shell, even learning to use sarcasm in English.  I think Kana is incredibly courageous... she had never presented to a client before and by the end of our project, she not only had done that but also went to the local university as a guest speaker.  Kana also talked to me a lot about diet, something I'm interested in.  She and I are going to figure out a way for me to get on a project in Japan so we can go for a cleanse in the mountains together.  Wouldn't that be amazing??  

In her video, you can see her sense of humor at the end, as well as her kind nature.  We were headed into Al Ain on the bus when we taped and had a really nice day shopping for abayas.  Kana we love you!

vblog: meet felipe

Felipe.  Ah, yes, Felipe.  As you will see when you watch this video, Felipe appears to be a little on the quiet side.  In fact, he had most of us kinda fooled up until about the last week or so.  Then he got more animated (he gets really animated if you get him going, but of course I would never antagonize anyone) and zinged us with some killer one-liners. 

Felipe was on my project team so I worked and hung out with him a ton.  He was my neighbor in the hotel and every single day I could hear the hangers in his closet jangling repeatedly, which made me ponder every morning why this might be.  Maybe it takes a while to pick out a shirt?  He's a sweetheart... he brushes his teeth, calls his mom, calls his sister (for her birthday even!), holds doors, always lets his female teammembers go first, carries our packages.  I told him right at the beginning I was going to send his mom an email to let her know what a great job she did (Felipe's mom:  if you're reading this, great job!  Hope I do half as good with my son!). 

I've had some fascinating discussions with him about Colombia and all of South American politics, geography, people.  He has traveled widely - after our project here ends, he's going to Egypt for a week.  His perspective was invaluable to our project, since he had experience in our topic area.  He was the primary editor of my writing for the final report with excellent feedback, not something too many people give me, which just made me respect him more.  Felipe is awesome, that's all there is to it.  He can dance really well too, but that's a different post.  (Or an instant message?)

Oh, and one other thing.... Felipe claims I'm not remembering the SHAWL situation correctly, and that he didn't start it.  For the record, he so DID start it.  And continued it for 4 weeks.  (ha, Felipe, now try to say you didn't start it.  And it's a scarf.  I win!)

Hola, Mr. Colombia...

vblog: meet sheela

Ok, I've run into some serious technical difficulties so the intro to my Vblog series is currently out of commission.  But, I am undeterred.  The series must go on, fancy intro or not!

Here I'd like to introduce Sheela... she is the epitome of calmness.  I'd like to be supremely calm like Sheela.  She's smooth, controlled, confident - the quintessential IBMer.  And then, somebody makes her giggle.  Oh yes.  When Sheela laughs, the whole world laughs with her... she will laugh and laugh and then it gets to the point that if you even glance at her, she'll fall out again.  I've had many good laughs with Sheela and today I'm proud to say I made her laugh so hard she cried.

She speaks a ridiculous number of languages, which makes her incredibly important to the team's successful maneuvering around the UAE.  (More on that in an upcoming blog.)  I have so enjoyed talking to Sheela about everything:  she's worldly and smart and just a bunch of fun.

So Sheela, if you're reading this, sorry about the lack of intro... you're dah bomb without it!

Without further ado...

more fun in the bathroom

I pushed on the heavy wooden door and into a mass of black fabric flying around.  One woman had removed her abaya, another had taken off just the head scarf and was washing her face at the sink.  Others were milling about, speaking in Arabic.  A small boy toddled underfoot.  I spotted a baby staring at me, so I smiled and started to wave and make faces.  Having now been in the UAE for 3 weeks, I was already comfortable with this common scene in the bathroom:  women washing, possibly in preparation for prayer, and in various stages of abaya removal.  I paused a couple more minutes to coo at the baby, then stepped around the other women to head into a stall.

As I began to close the door, I heard a twitter go through the group.  Simultaneously, I looked up to see an abaya hanging on the back of the door I was closing.

"Oh, gosh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," I said.  "I'll get out of your way.  I just had to..."

"No, no.  I get my abaya," the woman said softly and her hand reached around the door and snatched it from the hook.

I closed the door and completed my mission, then washed my hands at the sink.  Even though there were only 4 women and me, the amount of black fabric made it seem like the bathroom was packed with people.  I dried my hands and took two steps into a small foyer area.

"You take picture with my baby," said a young woman.

I was a little confused, assuming she wanted me to take a photo of her group.  I glanced around the upscale foyer area, with a large mirror and wooden detailing on the walls.  

"Oh, sure," I said.

With that, she grabbed the baby from another woman and thrust her toward me.  Instinctively, I reached out.

"Oh my gosh, I haven't done this in a while."  I looked at the small girl, who was probably about 6 months old, and had large brown eyes and brown curls all over her head.  By the time I glanced up, a camera was staring at me and the child.  I smiled.

The little boy, about 18 months old, moved near my leg.

"You want a picture too?" the woman asked him.  He nodded his head and glanced up at me, smiling shyly.

"Oh, sure," and I squatted down, holding the baby in my right hand and putting my left arm around the little boy.  I felt a flash of fear as it occurred to me that if I dropped the baby, she would land on a marble floor.  I'm not sure how many photos they took of me and the children before I stood back up, thanked them, and pulled the door to go back into the hallway.  #ibmcsc uae

where's leo the lobster? #10

Where's Leo the Lobster?

He's looking at pottery from 2500-2000 BC
at Al Ain Museum!

al ain oasis

The Al Ain oasis sits in the middle of the city.  It is an area where there is water and many date palm trees, as well as the occasional lime or mango tree.  It has beige walkways with low walls that twist around the palms and is a good place to walk.  It is quiet here, with only the occasional twitter of a bird.  Throughout the oasis, you can see falaj, or irrigation channels that supply water to the palms.  Al Ain is known for its oasis and green areas throughout the UAE.  #ibmcsc uae

Path through the oasis

Dates hanging in a tree

Nets protect the dates from birds

Falaj

survivor anniversary

Today is my 2nd anniversary of being a survivor.  Celebrating it here in the UAE, surrounded by this incredible group of new friends from around the world, knowing that I have my family waiting for me, is the greatest gift I can possibly imagine.

The last 3 weeks, like the 2 years before them, have been about something really, really simple:  learning to live each moment with a sense of wonder and gratitude.  My journey is not over.    #ibmcsc uae

abaya shopping

By now you know I've got lots of interest in abayas, and as I shared earlier, they come in a stunning array of designs.  Here's a little photographic review of some of my favorite embroidery and beading during a weekend shopping expedition....  #ibmcsc uae

L to R:  Karen (US), Kanako (Japan), Felipe (Colombia)

Kanako in the abaya she bought, absolutely lovely