Three Hour Tour

actually, more like four.

during our sojourn in qatar, one of the highly controlled environments into which we were allowed to venture was a little morning jaunt into the persian gulf on a traditional iranian dhow. leave it to me to get trapped in the desert for a year, and yet still find a way to put to sea! huzzah! like unto melville's ishmael, the sea "is my substitute for pistol and ball," which is rather fitting as i had to turn in my weaponry before departing iraq. also, on any given day there, i'd love to shoot a not uncertain number of people... none of which are local nationals, i might add.

the vessel pictured below is not the one on which we sailed. although in design the two were much the same, this, despite its state of being repaired, was far more pleasing to the eye, and crafted largely out of what i might only guess to be teak. of course, neither was outfitted with sails, as would be most proper--god forbid a waterborne vessel require some measure of talent to get underway.


during the course of the voyage, we sputtered out of the harbour to an uninspiring little peninsula where we dropped anchor for a few hours, swam in the dreadfully salty gulf, and dined upon supposedly traditional persian cuisine. the most picturesque moments were actually within a few hundred yards of the pier, as you can see in the photo below.


of course, any shot we had at atmosphere (or being inconspicuous, for that matter) was irrevocably shattered by reggaetton--a horrendous puerto rican rap--blasted so loudly i felt we ought to take on ballast so we could ride closer to the waterline. anybody observing our movements would have been unsurprised to see the vessel pitching erratically on hydraulics. the music was supplied by one dumbass soldier, and thankfully there was eventually a mutiny of sorts, once everyone got calle chulo!ed out, and we shifted to less aurally offensive fare.

in addition to the disappointing lack of local culture, there was also a disappointing lack of local flora and fauna (except on my plate... there was plenty there!).

fishies! in a sphere!


i got crabs!


yum.

honestly, the whole excursion could have been an hour shorter, at least as far as the at-anchor portion was concerned; there's only so many times one can pee in the ocean before it gets dull. i mean, the biggest buffer in the world, right?! one's effect on pH and salinity is so localized, minuscule, and momentary that it hardly bears thinking about.

i feel confident that i could have at any point submerged the dhow, but i was unable to solidify a plan for surfacing, so i disappointedly kept myself from systematically staving it in about the ribs. sadly, i was even further unsuccessful, this time at conjouring a storm and marooning the craft indefinitely on a tropical island. of course, tropical islands seemed rather in short supply, and i would have been quite the pointless professor without a mary ann (you know there were shennanigans there!).

the most entertaining aspect for me--and i'm quite sure my senior chief mate and i were the only two to notice we were making far too much way moments before this--was slamming into the floating dock during our landing. whee!


i am toying with the idea of starting some video blog entries. we'll see if i can stomach being trendy... i'd hate to be, like ford prefect, so hip i couldn't see over my pelvis.