Summer in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Recent news broadcasts in the Philippines monitor the daily temperature. Many complain the hot summer reaching almost 37 degrees in some areas of Metro Manila. Good thing, rainy season is coming that usually starts on June. This now can give some relief from the heat. But the heat of summer in Manila is nothing as compared in Riyadh.

Rarely been outside home in Riyadh, I didn’t notice the heat of the summer here. It officially starts in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia usually during the month of May. It gets it peak on months of June and July. Although the city received a considerable able of rains last March and April, it wasn’t enough to stop the approaching scorching heat this May.

Well good thing, electricity cost is very low here in Riyadh. So there is no hindrance in turning your aircons here all day long.

Snowfall in Saudi Arabia

(c) uk.reuters.com

Snow fall in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is for real. There was a heavy snowfall in Tabuk, Friday 3 pm on March 2, 2012.  Several newspapers on their online reports stated there were some snowfalls since January 2012.

(c) arabnews.com

Recently, Arab News published on March 3, 2012 that “Tabuk cleaning up after heavy snowfall and rain.” The reports are not that sensational in the news because northern parts of Saudi Arabia experience this in the past.

riyadh sandstorm may 2012

Here in Riyadh, many expect that the summer season is about to come after the heavy sandstorm last February 25, 2012. But up until the first few days of March, still the temperature reaches below 10 ºC at night. Although the weather is still erratic at times nearly reaching 30 ºC, but majority of days and nights are still cold. There are occasional sandstorms as of this date.

(c) wikipedia.org

Tabuk is situated in the north western part of Saudi Arabia. The region is mostly desertous with summer  temperatures between 26 to 46 °C and between 4 to 18 °C in the winter with wide spread frosts. It may not be impossible that snowfall in Tabuk may happen due to its geographic conditions. It is near to Jordan, Israel and Egypt where there were snowfalls in some time. Tabuk being part of Saudi Arabia has numerous reports of snowfall in previous years as well because it is affected by Mediterranean climate.

Quiet! They are praying…

pray

One time while I was enjoying my new iPod 4G while working, my co-OFW got my attention and said “They are praying…”

I didn’t notice that my iPod was in full volume, even if wore the headset on, the sound was too loud that it resonated.

I felt annoyed, but not to my colleague. Why can’t I get used to be living in this foreign land, even if I’ve been working here as an OFW for more than 2 years now.

Why do we always need to adjust for them?  Why do we have to make ourselves fit living with them.

Well, the answers are obviously clear to me.  We just need to respect their praying, the fact that we’re foreign in their land.  But do we get the same respect as what we give to them? Can we pray as Christians here as well?  Saudi Arabia is still conservative in this issue that Christians are not supposed to show their religious acts publicly as opposed with other countries in the Gulf.  I remember my photo of Jesus Christ inside my wallet being asked by PAL employee to leave at NAIA in Manila during a 100% inspection before boarding.

In any case, I will still continue living in Saudi Arabia, and will be an OFW as long as I could.

Childhood Business Venture – 1 pc guava for 0.25 (Promo 3 pcs guava for 0.50 centavos)

My Guava Tree

I grew up eating guavas for snacks.  Our house is surrounded by guava trees and other fruit trees like balimbing (starfruit), chesa, star apple and kasuy.   There’s this one guava tree that distinguishes it’s taste from the other that even the fruit is bubot, it is sweet.

To add up an additional product to sell, I ended up adding it to the pastillas I sell to my classmates.  Here is the previous story about this.

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OFWs Can Pay SSS Contributions Online

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