That Saloon Thang

There's loads of saloons in Al Ain, in fact there are loads of them in the UAE. They have to round the cowboys up at closing time when they're all swinging on them saloon doors having drunk too much wallop. Often you'll find a guy playing honky tonk in the corner, the gas lights flicker and then in walks the local hoodlum, guns a-blazin'. Everyone ducks under chairs, the buxom broad upstairs starts screaming and then it all goes quiet. The lights go back on and it appears that the hood has left and everything returns to normal once the glass has been cleared up and the sawdust changed.

We don't have this kind of excitement in Al Ain saloons. Oh no, just a quick trim and a splash of scent. The rest of the world call them SALONS. Hats off to the one place in Al Ain that's got it right: Lou Lou Salon near Choithrams and that's coz the lady who runs it knows French. They do a great eyebrow thread, by the way...















Getting ready for guns at high noon.....

Tolerance

Excuse the lack of blogging recently, it's been a tough couple of weeks since my return to Al Ain. When things are bad I blog about soya protein..

Everyone seems damn miserable here in AA at the moment. Call it the post festive blues, call it what you want but I don't know a single happy soul in this city right now. Maybe I mixing with the wrong crowd or maybe everyone has a good reason to be so glum.

I have come to the conclusion that happiness here is directly connected with tolerance. Tolerance is usually seen as a positive thing but taken too far, it can lead to masochism. People are usually so proud of how much they can tolerate that they stop being able to see when people are taking the p***. My happiness began to decrease with my tolerance. For example: when seeing the condition of the labourers here, when a colleague and friend was sacked for no reason without appeal, when people die in car accidents yet THOSE WHO SURVIVE* continue to drive recklessly/wrecklessly and without seatbelts, when animals are abused for fun; just a few examples. When I could no longer turn a blind eye to these things, no longer be tolerant, I became unhappy.

Is it good to turn a blind eye for the sake of personal happiness?


* for the benefit of Anonymous at 9.22 pm so there is no misunderstanding.