Nerve Endings Firing Away

I am having the time of my life here in Bahrain. The food simply has been awesome and now I realize why Ash was so eager to get back home to have her mom’s cooking. Also, I am beginning to understand the real reasons behind my brother’s decision to return to India. Truly, the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach although once a sadistic young girl-friend (don’t miss the hyphen) had confessed that it actually is through his chest. I had a great time yesterday hogging four different kinds of meat — lamb, chicken, shrimp, and fish — and I guess after a while I realized that I was still eating when everyone else was done. A big fat hog — now that’s not a first impression you would like to leave but thankfully Ash’s dad was giving me company. I know I’ll fit right in when I saw that her family relishes non-vegetarian food as much as I do.

Her sister, Ankita is your typical seventeen year-old filled with teenage angst. She reminds me of a sister I never had — opinionated and overly enthusiastic but mostly good at heart. For all the bravado, she still gets scared and refuses to go to the bathroom at night after the mere mention of ghost stories. She hates my sad jokes though but I’ll give her a few years until she learns to appreciate the subtle nuances and brilliance of the beauty of PJs (not the kind you wear, stupid!)

Yesterday we all went to her British school to see tiny tots caroling and it was a long time since I heard Christmas carols and considering that I had to visit an Islamic country for that is kinda strange. Bahrain, however is a pretty liberal Islamic country (like the UAE) and although a stone’s throw away (no offense meant toward the Palestinians) from Saudi Arabia it retains the sanity that is expected from Muslim countries. We did visit the Bahrain-Saudi border via the causeway where they have a high observatory more for observing brilliant sunsets than anything else. By the way, the first thing you see on the Saudi size is a big-size MacDonald’s; so much for opposing western consumerism, eh? More later.