Memorial Day at Millennium Park

In Chicago, we have a standing belief: If you plan an outing or a picnic on a holiday, then it's sure to be cold and rainy.  But not so, this past Memorial Day!  The temperatures rose to the unseasonable 90s (F). No matter, celebrations went on swimmingly at the fountains of Millennium Park. It was better than going to a swimming pool, and it was open to everyone.

It was delightful to see quite a lot of people at Millennium Park.  Children in some neighborhoods are wont to wrench open a fire hydrant, and enjoy the rush and the cool of water on a hot summer day.  Of course, that's not really cool, as it's wasteful of water and it depletes supply for putting out fire.  But the fountains at Millennium Park were a wonderful, more resource-conservative alternative for children and their families.

Created by artist Jaume Plensa, the Crown Fountain streams captivating, animated faces on monument structures.  I gathered some Chicagoans have asked whether their faces can be displayed, too.  The answer is no, apparently, as the School of the Art Institute of Chicago curates the display, according to an agreement with the City, benefactors, and the artist.

I'm sure it's just a passing curiosity.  The fact that these monumental faces spew a stream of water, periodically from their mouths, adds more than enough delight to families' outing.

Chicago Sax Man

Dusk in the Chicago Loop, when most everyone has left for home and the crawl of traffic has dissipated. Even in May, the temperatures are still at the edges of cool and warm, so a light jacket is apropos.  Enter, Mr. Sax Man.  You could hear his music a mile away. Sometimes street musicians have a way of shifting your mood, and they do so unknowingly.  I asked him if I could video him, and he nodded. We shook hands, and he graciously gave me his name. Joe.

I love downtown Chicago.  When I moved back here in late 2011, and my family and I spent a day at the Museum of Science and Industry, we passed through the Loop.  I realized how much I missed it.

People are not exactly warm and friendly, in the ways I've found them to be in the Middle East.  Downtown is where they work, and their public mind and demeanor are merely in transit between office and home.

Still, Chicagoans have an energy and vibrancy that I feel at home with, and it's the commerce and culture of the city that drive them.

One such people are the street musicians.  I was thankful that Joe let me video him, as he edges out a small living with his anonymous music, which is less so now.

The Waiting Game across Airports

Istanbul Atatürk Airport

I’ve been here many times before, but the last time was three years ago when I was with Karen and Eva en route to Dubai.

There are now two long tables with proper outlets for plugs at the food court.  As a consultant, I searched for these outlets everywhere, especially at airports, as I waited for my flight. The travels of a consultant are about plugging in and staying connected, keeping time zone differences in mind, and watching the flight timings across these zones.

It was 8:30 AM, local time (10:30 AM, Dubai), and for over an hour, I sat watching people, reflecting absentmindedly, writing down notes and reading ‘The Sand Fish’ and WH Auden. I packed up and got up, when I decided I was going look for a place where I could plug in. Then I saw these long tables, and waited a handful of minutes for someone to finish. I thought that if I could do this, I could spend my time writing poetry.

It was AED 40 taxi ride to the Dubai International Airport last night, having left at 1 AM, instead of 12 M. But it was still perfect timing, as I never had to rush to get there or check in or get to the gate. In fact, the gate wasn’t open, yet, and passengers crowded the seating along the open corridor outside the gate.

I walked off, looking for a place to sit, and found myself at the food court. I sat there, playing with my BlackBerry and smelling the oily, salty scent of McDonald’s. After several minutes, I gave in, as that scent gnawed at my resolve not to spend anything on food or drink at the airport. I bought a Big Mac dinner for AED 24.

I was duly satiated, and even more so on board Turkish Airlines, with the meal the flight attendants served.

Here I am not likely to spend anything. I have energy bars in my bags, just as I did on my Kuwaiti trip. I don’t have the right currency to buy anything here, and I don’t have a credit card either. Besides I’m still full from all that I had eaten last night. Remember, I also had a peanut butter and Nutella sandwich before I left my flat, thinking it would allay any hunger I would have. Wrong.

Rolling Along with Business Projects

(image credit)

I’ve just capped an amazing week “off.” An interesting one, too.

I got involved at high levels with two Filipino organizations, viz. Philippine Business Council - Abu Dhabi and Filipino HR Practitioners Association.  Each one affords me really good opportunities to get active and advance multiple priorities, especially supporting the Filipino community, connecting with key people, building my network for “Taas Noo.” I had great conversations, e.g., at Agnes’ home on Friday evening.

I joined the American Chamber of Commerce in Abu Dhabi, and attended my first event last night:  the 4th of July celebration, and what a celebration, indeed.  I met Ambassador Grace there, after having met her just for the first time during BizTalk (23rd June).

I met with George at Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry. After all these months, I believe I’ve connected to the person who can advise me effectively with my business.

It looks like there could be some interesting business and social possibilities in working with BRS (Mersad, Mahmoud, and Farhang).  In Iran, no less.  The three seem to be fine gentlemen.

I’ve had good Skype calls with Tom, and things look good for finally getting my SJCM website up-and-running.

I met with Sree (Professional Speakers Association - Middle East) for lunch last Thursday, and this, too, presents some interesting business possibilities.

I even completed a rough draft of my Anime storyline (love and conflict, loss and renewal). Plus, I conceived my ‘poetic opera,’ probably on Mozart’s “Requiem.”

Unhappy Hoteling at the 'W' in Doha

My room at the 'W' looked like this

It’s a stylish hotel, for sure. But there are clear problems with their setup and service:

I could not use my ATM banking card, as a credit card. This hotel and the previous one I stayed at, in Doha, also required a cash deposit for incidentals. But the fact that I had to withdraw cash was an inconvenience, imposed on a guest of a 5-star hotel!

They had the remote control practically hidden on a lower shelf by the bed. I had to search for it.

Its shower system needed a bit of figuring out, which was fine. But after a night of hot-and-cold chills, I resented turning it on, at first, and having cold water come pouring on me.

Like the Ritz-Carlton in Bahrain, which was worse after its renovation, this hotel had very little surface. By this I mean, its various table top was crowded with stuff already, such as little signs, items, pamphlets. I had no place else to put its two book-size folders, so I just tossed them on the floor. The sitting table was a bit small to begin with.

At lunch, their waiters were practically vultures. They were buzzing around us, ready to pounce on our table and take our plates and items away. But four or five times, we had to tell them, “No, we’re not done, yet.”

Journeys to the Middle East: Part 2

Second, I led more or less a sheltered life while growing up in Chicago. I’ve mentioned in previous articles that for various reasons, my parents separated us from Filipino people and things. So I effectively lost my country, my culture, and my native tongue. But, unexpectedly, I found so many Filipinos working throughout the Middle East. I hadn’t been around so many of them, since I was a little boy in Manila. They’d smile that knowing smile at me – knowing that I was their kababayan (fellow Filipino). Funny thing, though, once they’d hear my American accent, they’d get confused and wonder where the heck I was from – Indonesia?  Malaysia?  Japan? I’ve had Filipino friends in Dubai jokingly tell me to keep my mouth shut and let them do the talking.

I joined this consulting firm, because I knew they had a strong presence in Asia – and more specifically because I thought I’d have an opportunity to make my first visit to the Philippines in ages and ages. Well, I never made it to Asia, while I was with the firm, even though I pushed for a year to join a consulting project there. Instead, I landed in the Middle East. One key reason I felt so at home in the Middle East was the wide presence of my kababayan.

Third – and this is the main reason why I felt more than just at home, but fated to be here in the Middle East – I had a particular series of conversations, over time, with various Saudis. A couple of them, on separate occasions, said I looked Saudi. I was flattered, and thanked them. But another incident made me shudder. Three Saudi men asked me if I had trained them before. I said, “It’s possible. I’ve done many training programs before. Where were the programs held?” “Jeddah,” they replied. “Well, no,” I corrected them, “It wasn’t me, because I’ve never been to Jeddah.” These men were actually not asking to begin with. They were convinced that I had, in fact, been their trainer. When I joked, “Well, it must’ve been my twin brother,” they were not laughing in the least! (Oh, man, I exclaimed to myself, I just had to slide out of that conversation.) What I came to learn was that the Western province of Saudi Arabia, where Jeddah is located, was populated with Central Asians and other Asians. One gentleman said I must be a “Bohari Saudi.” I related this story to a Pakistani driver in Riyadh, and he confirmed that I looked as such.

So I had begun to wonder, Do I have Arab blood in me? I suppose it’s possible that I have ancestors from Central Asia. But what I think is a more plausible explanation is this. I do have Spanish heritage, with Spain having colonized the Philippines for almost four centuries. And we know that Arabs had a strong presence in Spain at points in history. Maybe some of my ancestors – from my great grandfather, and back – were Arab Spanish.

My friend Herdie, the most Arabic non-Arab I know.  Me, do I look Arab?

But did fate bring me to the Middle East, because somehow it knew that this region was my home?  I’ll tell you, my relationships with the Arabs in the region were more than just about friendships. There was a resonating connection we forged with each other. Honestly, I think they loved me, because I could understand them. I listened to them, with the kind of empathy in which I placed myself mind and spirit in their bodies. In turn, I loved them because they’d share their personal stories and helped me learn and feel comfortable. Over dinner, another Saudi gentleman mentioned having traveled to Makkah in the last few days of Ramadan one year. He had brought his son with him, but he felt the need to be in the mosque by himself, so he had him stay with his sister. He told me about being very uncomfortable sleeping on the floor the first few nights in the mosque. But by the fourth or fifth night, it was a sort of revelation he had. His eyes lit up in the dim light of the restaurant, as he related his story. He said he felt close to God, at that point. Americans don’t often talk about religion. The country is so secular in its separation of church and state that it’s outside business protocol to talk about God or religion. You just don’t do that. But there I was, with this Saudi gentleman, talking about this very thing – the first of many such open conversations I’ve had.

Such talk of God didn’t so much shape my religious ideology and values, but more, I think, it gave a forum for the things that were already inside me, then, to come forth. Interestingly, some friends have not only wondered whether I was Muslim, but have complimented me when I had said something that mirrored Islam. This is my story – I was born Catholic, but gave up this religion in my teens for reasons I talked about in a previous article. I had never studied Islam, except for reading a few articles and a couple of books on Arab culture and history. But clearly what was emanating from my heart and mind, naturally, was Muslim!

We did our best to accommodate prayer times, in scheduling our programs in the Middle East. Besides the curiosity and learning I had around this, I came to pine, quietly, at the relative lack of sacredness in American society. A Muslim friend tells me, his daily prayers help him not only to feel close to God, but also to rid himself of any negative feelings about anyone. How wonderful, I thought. Since arriving in the Middle East, I’ve incorporated prayer in my daily sitting meditation.

*

Note:  A version of my article was posted on Relativity Online.    

Journeys to the Middle East: Part 1

Have you ever visited a place, and found the place changing your life before your very eyes? Is there such a thing as fate that happens in your life?

Six months after the horrors of the September 11th terrorist attacks (2001), I made my very first trip to the Middle East. And nothing about my life could ever be the same again. It wasn’t anything that I chose to do – but, as I’ve come to see, a thing that somehow was chosen for me. What’s more, to feel so much at home in the Middle East was something I could not have imagined in a million years.  I was a privileged boy from Manila, who became an American citizen from Chicago and who had rarely traveled outside the North American borders.

How and why does a Filipino-American feel at home in Middle East? I’ll tell you the story.

Diplomat Radisson, Bahrain, Friday brunch (2004).

I was working for a US-based international consulting firm, and a colleague contacted me about a consulting project in Bahrain – leadership programs. Apparently my General Manager had assigned me to be part of this team, because of the successes I’ve had in consulting on such programs – and because, I imagined, he knew I was ‘game’ to travel to some place new. At first, I had no idea where Bahrain was on the map. So, yeah, it was new alright!

The client was Saudi Arabian, the biggest oil producer in the world. And, collectively, the projects we were doing for them came to be among the top two or three projects that our firm was doing worldwide. Fairly quickly, I was involved in something that had high visibility in the firm – not just because of the business potential of working with this client, but also because there was quite a stir in the American media and public about the fact that the majority of the terrorists were Saudi.

*

The trip from Chicago, through Amsterdam, then to Bahrain in March 2002 was interminable. We arrived in the middle of the night, tired but too restless to fall asleep. Our client planned to take the team out for lunch, so he met us at the hotel. The noonday sun was way too brilliant for my eyes, even while standing inside the gilded lobby of the Intercontinental.

Well before this trip, we were oriented to Arabic culture and trained on how this project was going to be different from others we had done. We were schooled, for example, to never show the soles of our shoes, and this meant that we were to keep our feet on the floor whenever we sat with our client. On our first meeting, I sat nervously like this, upright with a stiff back and as alert as possible in the haze of jet lag and sleeplessness. We were also told not to eat with our left hand, so even lunch and dinner were, at first, an awkward experience, as I kept my left hand on my lap and ate with my right hand.

Further, we were not to extend our hand to shake an Arab lady’s hand, unless she extended it herself first. Remember, we were working with a client from a country that was among the most conservative and strict in the Islamic world. So, knowing this, I took these cultural lessons further and made sure that I made no eye contact with Saudi ladies (many were completely covered). I also made sure that there was absolutely no risk of brushing up against them. Now, don’t think I was taking this to an extreme. I was spot-on with the extra caution I was taking. In fact, our security detail in Riyadh, for another Saudi project, told me that, yes, even the slightest, incidental contact with a Saudi lady could land me in jail.

David, one of my consultant pals.  We ventured to the Van Gogh Museum on our first layover in Amsterdam.

Thankfully, all such nervousness passed in short order. I quickly and markedly came to relish my trips to the Middle East – which were about once a month, lasting two to six weeks.

I found the diverse people in the region to be the friendliest I’ve known, without question. For example, I was in Kuwait, and had a business meeting scheduled with a prospective partner. But the taxi driver didn’t know exactly where the office building was, so without speaking English, he vaguely pointed me ‘somewhere over there.’ After walking around for a few minutes, and running late for my meeting, I walked inside the Kuwait Finance House for help. The Arab gentleman at the front desk must’ve seen on my face that I was lost. Well, he not only gave me directions, but he actually got up and walked me to the office building! No way would this happen in Chicago.

What’s more, the Saudi managers we were working with often invited us for dinner at their homes. I had my first ‘dose’ of their hospitality – and further lessons on their culture – when a colleague and I arrived to find our host’s wife and daughters separated from anything we did. The four of us, including his brother, had a lavish spread for dinner, which his wife had prepared for us. An Omani manager I was coaching offered to show me around Muscat, as our visits were often consumed with work so I had had very little chance to tour the city. In Dubai, too, I easily made friends, in just a matter of a day or two, during extended layovers, for example, from Riyadh to Muscat. For instance, an Emirati gentleman took me out for dinner, the first time we met, and we talked for hours as if we were brothers.

Interestingly, I’ve had a number of friends tell me that people in the region weren’t very friendly. So they’d look at me with a fair amount of skepticism, when I kept saying the opposite.