PAP28 [Our Polish friends]

Jarec and Woitech "at home"
(home being Seder Village in Riyadh).

Jarec up close.

Jarec, Gary, Woitech, Blogger and Dennis
at Zee Noodles (in Jeddah).

Dennis, Chris, Blogger and Jarec drinking the night away
at Baher Villas.

Woitech, Dennis, Jarec and Blogger infront of
Baher Villas (in Al Khobar).

Woitech, Blogger, Chris, Dennis and Jarec
at Chili's (in Al Khobar).

Woitech, Blogger and Jarec at a breakfast table
in Al Khobar.

Jarec, Dennis and Woitech clowning infront of a
sculptural monument (or is it a monumental sculpture?) in Jeddah.

Woitech, Jarec and Dennis along the beach in the middle of the
King Fahd Causeway linking Al Khobar and Manama.

Dennis, Jarec and Blogger along the beach in the middle of the
King Fahd Causeway linking Al Khobar and Manama.

Woitech, Dennis and Jarec infront of a
popular coffeeshop in Al Khobar.

Woitech, Dennis and Jarec atop the dunes at Red Sand.

Dennis and Jarec infront of a lovely-looking mosque
along the corniche in Al Khobar.

Woitech and Jarec at Diriyah
(I have always spelled their names this way,
I'm not about to change them now, or else,
I would have to go back to many entries to make corrections.)

This is going to be a tribute of sorts to Wojciech Binerowski and Jaroslaw 'Jarek' Kubicki - our friends from Poland.

They are experienced program managers from Lucent in Poland recruited to provide support to certain projects in Saudi Arabia. They came to Riyadh in August and meant to stay only for a month or two but it's been almost four months now and they're still here! Either they're really good or Lucent Saudi is that desperate!

But whichever way you look at it, their being here in Riyadh has been a blessing for myself and my Bebe, for in Wojciech and Jarek, we gained excellent friends. Notably, they have also become friends of our other close friends such as Rene, Chris and Rommel.

It's so rare for Filipinos to get quite close or attached to people from other countries. If we do, most of the time, it would be to so-called Westerners. And maybe for some, to Arabs. But to Polish people? Quite far-fetched. But it happened to us and we're the richer for it.

We've traveled with them, dined with them, drank with them, swam with them, gallivanted with them, shopped with them, joked with them, cooked for them (and they in turn, cooked for us), played hosts and tourist guides for them -- in short, we've been having good times with them. And it is such an interesting, learning, fun, joyful, fulfilling and enjoyable experience!

Being with them accords us the chance to find out more about the usual Polish factoids, and more importantly, about a real Polish person - his attitude, his idiosyncracies, his eccentricities, his mannerisms, his personal likes and tastes and his dislikes. Nothing seems to be sacred with them as we ask them a lot of questions about being Polish (although we also stop short of asking too personal questions or avoid pursuing questions that they appear not comfortable to answering some more).

In turn, they too have learned to be curious about us being Filipinos. And how they have began to love listening to Asia's Songbird and to Annie Batungbakal (at least to Toni Gonzaga's cover in 'Hotsilog'), eating Filipino dishes (but they still won't try balut though) and laughing at Filipino words (yugyugan and bonggang-bongga come to mind; they can't easily pronounce Filipino words and phrases due to the huge differences between our and their sounds)!

In a way, we've made our own small contributions to world peace via understanding of each other's cultures. We're both foreigners in Saudi Arabia and yet we were able to forge friendships not only out of necessity but more importantly, borne out of genuine and sincere desires to be simply friends.

In fact, that our Polish friends readily took to us like ducks to water, is the most heart-warming aspect of this friendship. So thanks for the friendship and a lot of other things besides!

They're going to leave Riyadh soon and for sure, it's not going to be an easy goodbye. But hey, we can always visit Warsaw in the future, can't we? Or they can always make a side trip to Boracay, can't they?

That would be the day! Bongga!

Photographs by Blogger, Woitech and Jarec.

PAP26 [The 43rd]

The cake of the 43rd.

Blogger and my Bebe - the way we looked that night.

The pools at Baher Villas - there were 4 of them, excluding the sea.

View of the Gulf Sea from the beach.

Prendship Rommel and Blogger - busy-busyhan at the kitchen.

Uncle Bob and friends.

Friends as the only guests: the Cunanans and the Esguerras
(not shown: the Rosarios.)

More friends: Erwin, Ferdie, Chris, Elmore and Rommel
(not shown: Dale and Vergel - late kasi).

Friends galore again: Rommel, Rene and Chris.

This is long overdue. It should have been posted soon after celebrating my 43rd last June at a private resort in Al Khobar, Saudi Arabia. But it's better late than never, so to speak. So happy bert-day to me!

Photographs by Blogger, R. Segovia and E. Lim.

PAP25 [Najd Village]

Lighted lamp reminiscent of ancient lighting fixtures.

A typical Najd style window.

A typical Najd style door.

Detail of Najd style roof.

Another lighted lamp reminiscent of ancient lighting fixtures.

Photographs by C. Servillas.

NAJD VILLAGE

Courtyard of Najd Village where the event was mainly held.

Blogger with fellow Flips in the company including Cong. Jun Manalili (in pinkish santana barong).

Event manager with newly-recruited Saudi program managers.

Event manager with company big guns.

The gathering's lead event manager with Blogger.

Food served was also typical and traditional Saudi cuisine including lamb on a bed of rice.

Blogger by the door as one of the unofficial hosts.

Traditional-looking lamp lighting up beautifully.

Lentils and other grains typical of yesteryears' fare.

The restaurant's foyer/entry way.

The company was visited by top guns last week and we had the customary all-employee gathering on Nov. 13. It was a special kind of gathering since a lot of us were being recognized for our contributions to the business in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2006. We exceeded targets and got a cool A4 certificate for our efforts. We've been granted bonuses but we have yet to find out how much though. Sadly, there will be no salary merit increases (SMIs) for us this year since the company did not really do that well for the whole fiscal year.

The top guns wanted a gathering with authentic Saudi flair and ambience to it and the next best thing we can organize was at a restaurant called Najd Village. It is a replica of an actual house in the Najd style which was predominant in the Central region of Saudi Arabia in yesteryears. Of course, the city now boasts of modern architecture that the Najd style has gone the way of the dodo, except at specialty restaurants such as Najd Village.

Photographs by C. Servillas.

PAP24 [The road from Jeddah]

These are shots taken during the drive from Jeddah to Riyadh.

The drive to and from Jeddah for us Riyadh-based people, was long but not entirely tiring, if only for the views along the road. Stretches of desert gave way to mountain ranges, with the topography changing from sandy orange to grayish rock to greenish vegetation. Desolate-looking but breathtaking landscapes. Camels grazing and camels on backs of pick-up trucks. Isolated townships. Speeding cars. It was more than a thousand kilometers of fine roads and highways, with less than ten checkpoints with only about two that were actually manned. [Well, we drove during Ramadan and the news had not exactly been full of stories about shootings or bombings by deviants - aka terrorists....] Fuel and gas stations surely abounded but they of course paled in comparison to our mall-like Shell, Caltex and Petron stops dotting SLEX and NLEX. We stopped at one such station for what Gary called "rice and flies" and had our fill of unenticing chicken kabsa (grilled chicken on a bed of rice -- you could also have lamb if you like -- with a scoop of salad of cucumbers and tomatoes, without dressing, on the side), washed down with soda (the restaurant only sold Pepsi products!). [On our way to Jeddah from Riyadh, we had food and drinks with us since we were anticipating that food outlets would be closed during the day because of Ramadan.]
This time, we did not encounter the baboons of Taif since traffic was re-routed away from the Taif mountains. Just as well; we drove on even roads and highways and saved ourselves from getting dizzy had we gone up and down the winding roads of the mountains.

PAP23C [Diriyah Revisited]

PAP23B [Diriyah Revisited]