Volcano

Call it a boondoggle if you want. I knew that I needed to get out of the compound for the day to do some.. reconnaissance. We had heard reports that our waste recycler was dumping the non-recyclable part of his waste shipments in various ditches along the paved road to Al Mukullah. I figured I better go investigate before things got out of hand. So armed with my trusty armed guard and a driver, I set off in search of windmills.

OK, it was a bit of a BD.

We didn't find any Yemgas garbage dumps, and I'm pretty sure that my companions still have no idea what we were doing out there. They eventually came to understand that we were looking for something, but even if I knew the Arabic words for "large amount of garbage from the construction project" I don't think they would have understood the purpose of our quest. Garbage goes on the ground in this part of the world. Where else would it go? Spending time and resources trying to track down some discarded trash so that it could be picked up and hauled off somewhere else is more than foreign, it's like moving a pawn sideways. I am reminded of the story about an Arab man who visited California. He had fallen in love with a movie star, I think it was Farrah Faucett or someone like that. Anyway, he saw her one day walking on the beach with her dog. He was awestruck: here was this larger-than-life image of a famous, rich, radiantly beautiful woman. But what was it in the plastic bag she was carrying that appeared to be, yes, he was quite certain of it now, it... was... dog poop?? Knights pawn to Bishops pawn.

Anyway, Abdul, Ahmed and I enjoyed the break in the routine, and we got to do some exploring, which was pretty cool. Among the nifty places we found was a volcanic caldera, which was filled with water. I took some photos, but I couldn't capture the unnatural greenish tint of the water. I later learned that the color was from volcanic sulfuric acid.