I have been distracted

Abu Dhabi is my current location. Long story, after only one night in Riyadh I had to fly to Abu Dhabi to do some work. Yas Island is where I am staying. Great place next to the Formula 1 race circuit. Tonight there is a Guns and Roses Concert and in front of the hotel they are pitching up the background and equipment for the next " Celebsrity Chef" shooting.
What a wonderul place this is, so close to where we are working and yet so far away. I will take more time off and visit the Emirates here.
Tonight I am flying back and next week back to Munich for a few days.

happy holidays for all of you

A little Detour

I thought I would be going to the East Coast on Sunday however, I am in Munich. The weather is miserable and there is only very little of my weekend left. How could this happen? Well on Tuesday my Line Manager grabbed me and asked me if I could fly to Munich and rework a bid for the company. No problem got a business ticket and on the plane that night only to learn that this bid was significantly messed up, it was written by a team of 20 people over several month and now we where three guys to re-work it. Mission impossible. I don't want to go into details but it's a nasty story. So I am stuck in snow covered Munich flying back on Monday and than I hope to join the team on Tuesday at the Arabian Gulf.

Enjoy the x-mas season, I will be working.

The Edge Of The World Tour

This was a 5 hour tour into the desert near Riyadh. The place is called the Edge of the World, And from there you really can't go anywhere but back. Breathtaking views and silence. No tourists and no garbage. You have to drive southwest from Riyadh towards Mekka and after you pass the Check Point on Route 40 you turn off to the north west and drive on dirt and gravel for 1 1/2 hours. All along the cliffs bordering the Acacia Valley. The valley is part of the old Darb al Hjaz. (Darb is the word for way or route) You can find lot's of Camel Trails which where build into the mountains to get the animals up the slopes and up the escarpment. It's at roughly 1000 meters of elevation and on a perfect day like today it was a wonderful tour. I hope there will be many more to come. You just want to take a backpack and a tent and track through this wonderful landscape.

It's confirmed now

We will start the big Site Survey on Saturday. It will bring us around the entire border of Saudi Arabia, this is exciting. I will fly and drive around to inspect the 4 teams we have on the ground. This will take until mid February and is quite an expedition to move everybody into the different locations. M y first trip will take me to the East Coast with short visits to Manama and Doha over the weekend.
We will have to skip x-mas and New Years as the customer expects us to make up for the lost time in the project, fair enough.
In between I am thankful to being invited to the German Embassy here in Riyadh for the weekly Wednesday bar evening. This is a nice closure of the week sipping a Weizenbier with nice people.
I will drive out on 10 December, so look out for a higher frequency of posts here.
If you are snowed in in Europe, be brave it will go away sooner or later. In the meantime we try to avoid sunburn at the pool.

Take care.

Long Time No Entry

I know I am guilty, I did not post a word for quite some time. Where should I start? There are so many things that kept me busy and prevented me from a lot of things I had on my mind. I intended to see more of the surrounding country side, go downtown more often; I missed it all.
On the other hand I had a couple of good things on the agenda. I went to Bonn over the Hajj week and had time to be at the real home. I had some successes on the job which where nice and rewarding.
Still it's very interesting and challenging to work here. I like it a lot. Certainly the wx is much better. No wonder. I am still loosing weight and that is good. Time for pt and sauna is left as well so not too bad after all. I hope that our tour through this country will soon kick off so I can report more of my adventures.
So hang in there and watch out for news.

Getting around in Riyadh

It looks like I will get my own car today. Despite the fact that one must be a bit insane to drive around this city, it is mandatory to get wheels. Taxis are cheap but it's always uncertain if the driver knows what you men and the safetey is just not existing. Unbalanced wheels, worn out suspentions, no mirrors brakes without real performance and drivers who are at war with the other drivers on the road. Bottom line is that you are better of being in control of your own fate. One more reason is that I am not good at car-pooling. I don't want to go down this rabbit hole now.
One more topic to write about then.

Moving In

We had a couple of busy weeks lately. That explains the lack of postings on this blog. As of yesterday we moved into our compound. The Al Ja Whara Village in Al-Dir’iya. It’s located in the north west of Riyadh on the slopes of the Wadi Hanefa. Yes it is a bit remote but it is absolutely quiet here. The pool is great and the villa is ok. It is certainly not high-end luxury homes however; it’s a home away from home. After we moved all our belongings from the Radisson hotel it took a while until I had all my things sorted out and stowed away. As a sort of welcome party I had Klaus over to bake Reibekuchen for the two of us. Freshly out of the pan we even did not fancy to sit down, we stayed in the kitchen and ate the potato pancakes right there. Now I have frequent visits from the maintenance department, every single worker gets a chance to repair my hot water boiler upstairs, 6 of them have been here already, all nice and friendly young boys form India. The first two just flipped switches, as if I had not the same idea before. The next two tried to exchange the indicator lamp; the new lamp did not do the trick. Obviously there is a direct relationship between the lamp not glowing and the heater not heating. This discovery certainly now called for an electrician. He disassembled parts of the heater, left the villa more puzzled than he came and mumbled something like …chief engineer will come…. Since then it is quiet. The guy with the correct key to my back door was supposed to show up in 10 minutes, it’s now one hour later. The taste of Arabia.
Other than that I rearranged the furniture in the living room. Still have to buy some things but it’s pretty much ok now. I attached some pictures to give an impression.
Stay safe, I will try to do the same. So long.