September 2010
1 post
Year 2
Today I was watching an intramural volleyball game and noticed that the six players on one side of the court represented 5 continents. Things like that are so frequent here that it is easy to lose sight of how amazing something like that really is.
KAUST is now well underway into its second year. We are finishing up our fourth week of classes, and that has been enough time for many...
August 2010
1 post
Don't Let us Forget
The old expression, “out of sight, out of mind” is applicable to the present situation in Haiti. Just because it seems there is more need in this world than could ever be met, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try our best. I received this email from one man who is doing his best. The desperation he expresses compelled me to share:
Dear Friend,
Thank you for your interest in the fight on poverty in...
July 2010
1 post
A Mid Summer Day's Blog
I find myself two months and 9,500 miles removed from my last blog. Far from the sand, sun, oil, thobes, abayas, dates, crescents, rugs, shisha, mosques, calls to prayer, security checkpoints, Al Baik, fish markets, and people of the east shore of the Red Sea, I find myself on a different west coast. There is still plenty of sand and sun, and I’m eating a date, but in many ways Irvine,...
May 2010
4 posts
jeddahfood asked: What are the restaurants like at KAUST and in King Abdullah City?
John Sikorra
http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-0514-plaschke-20100514,0,1002344.column
If you have a minute to watch this clip or read the accompanying article, it is truly touching. I met John and his family about four years ago. At that time he was hoping to enter high school. Though his disease left him without the cognitive capacity necessary for high school, his parents wanted him to be able to...
stay-alert-deactivated20110530 asked: 1) Why did you choose KAUST?
2) Some bloggers give the impretssion that it's boring there, is it?
2) Some bloggers give the impretssion that it's boring there, is it?
The Other Side of KAUST
KAUST is a great place for learning. Minus delays in labs being ready, the atmosphere and facilities, as well as the personnel do give great opportunities for pursuing academics. The multicultural, multinational community gives opportunities to learn perspectives, politics and customs from all over the globe. KAUST even employs professionals to help you learn a variety of sports if you so...
April 2010
1 post
Freedom in the Spring
Today is Good Friday. It is the day which we stop and reflect on everything that our LORD did for us. It is the day we are reminded that everything we have is a gift, and that although we sold ourselves into slavery, our Father came and set us free, paying the ultimate sacrifice. We are reminded of what forgiveness means. We are shown what love, true love, looks like.
On this day, about 2000...
March 2010
1 post
Religious Extremism
I don’t know how many times I have heard of terrorism, wars, or many of the world’s other ills blamed on “religious extremism”, “religious fundamentalism”, or “radical Islam”. These terms become useful in an attempt to associate problems with a religion, while not wanting to criticize the religion itself, and not wanting to stereotype everyone who...
February 2010
2 posts
Just Studying in the Library
Often KAUST seems like any other university, and like any other university many students and I are studying in the library. Every now and then, however, we get reminders that we are somewhere very unique. One of these instances was about two minutes ago, while studying in this library, a large group came on a tour of the library. It is not entirely unusual here, as every week or so a group of...
Recent KAUST Happenings
I’ve come to the conclusion that KAUST is the most diverse small town in the world. It’s really starting to have that feel to it, which is awesome. More and more it’s becoming a community where everyone knows everyone else, and you can usually talk to anyone about anyone else and expect them to know who you are talking about, people know that Abu’s or Ali’s little...
January 2010
2 posts
WEP
If you are here at KAUST you know that WEP stands for Winter Enrichment Period. They have made this point very, very clear. They have gone to the extent of having signs all over campus defining both enrichment, and rich. There are many banners that must be about 20ft x 30ft all over, just to remind you that it is the Winter Enrichment Period. There is even a huge banner on the entrance to the...
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year
As usual, as I sit down to write a blog here, I realize that I have way to much to say for one blog. I will do my best. Anyways, since my last blog I have traveled across the world and back, reunited and reparted with loved ones, met knew people, tried knew things, and hopefully learned something along the way.
My flight from Saudi Arabia to the United states went smoothly, despite my idiotic...
December 2009
2 posts
Reality Check
As the round of KAUST finals approaches, stress levels on campus are noticeably rising. It seems that everyone has 2 assignments, 1 presentation and 4 projects to finish while trying to study for their tests. The library remains crowded well into the night every night now. I have to admit that I’m letting the stress get to me as much as the next person, so this is my break to try to...
Jeddawis Join Together to Help Victims of Flood
I must admit that when we first got rain, I was among those excited for it and enjoying it. I had no idea how much damage a few hours of steady rain could do. At KAUST there was some water damage to houses, cars, and buildings, but we were well taken care of, and to the best of my knowledge nobody was injured as a result of the flooding. Parts of Jeddah weren’t so fortunate. It has been...
November 2009
4 posts
Rained out of school!
I have never had a snow day in my life and have been slightly jealous when I hear of people getting days off due to extreme weather. Today I got one! No, there was no blizzard. No hurricane, fire or earthquake. There was rain. Here is an email I just received:
Sent on behalf of Nadhmi Al-Nasr
...
PDE's night 4
So despite my greatest efforts at good time management, the inevitable PDE’s night 4 is here. We had eleven days to do ten problems. Easy right. Granted they are hard problems, but I was determined to do a problem a day. That failed on the first night, when at 4am I called it quits. The past ten days have consisted of trying to catch up, trying to do my work in my other classes, and...
Saudi Arabia
Even though I am half way across the world in the middle of a theocratic monarchy, life for the most part seems normal. I get up, go to class, study, eat, play basketball, ultimate frisbee, and soccer ( i guess soccer’s a little different), talk with loved ones on skype. After a week or so thobes and abayas (traditional male and female clothing, respectively) don’t seem so eccentric....
A Royal Party
The only way to explain why they called the original opening the “soft opening,” is to explain the real opening.
From the day we arrived in Saudi Arabia, rumors were spreading about the September 23rd opening of the school. The one that the king was going to be at-and all of his guests. Rumors were spread about who those guests would be (from Obama to the Pope), about who would be...
October 2009
4 posts
Beginning of School/Opening ceremony
I suppose that every new school has some sort of ceremony when it opens. We had two. Two big ones. On September 4th, the night before our classes started, we had what they called a “soft opening.” The soft opening began with having all the students, faculty and everyone else walk around what will soon be our rec center. There was a long circular hallway that had a booth set up for...
1 tag
So I’m thinking I will try to update this every weekend (which here is Thursday and Friday). This week was awesome, but I will pick up where I left off from last time. So… after hours on planes and in airports, being finger printed and photographed, and signing a customs check sheet that said in big bold letters DEATH FOR DRUG TRAFFICKING, we were in Saudi Arabia and bussed across Jeddah to the...
First Ever Blog
Hello everyone. Greetings from Saudi Arabia. I realized that I am terrible at relaying information to people, or remembering whom I have told what. Hopefully this blog will remedy all of that and give you all a taste of life in multi-billion dollar institution which is fenced in and heavily guarded to protect us from the ever-looming, seemingly endless expanse of sand which surrounds us in 3...