Into the World:
The Random Thoughts in My Mind

"You know, all the countries in the Gulf...they are very different!" Almost as soon as the taxi driver heard that I had just flown into Bahrain from Kuwait he began listing out the subtle nuances that distinguish his Arab petrostate from the neighboring ones. "In Kuwait, they have so much money...but the roads are no good," he pointed out as we drove on the smooth highway into the city. I had to agree, even though I had been in the island country for less than an hour. The spiffy international airport and roads in Bahrain were a far cry from the not-so-well-maintained counterparts in Kuwait.

There is a big secret inside the otherwise nondescript house in an otherwise nondescript suburb of Kuwait City. In front of the Tareq Rajab Museum was an elderly man, staring at the white walls of the small lobby while he fidgeted in boredom. When I visited, there was no one else occupying the more than 30 seats in the room. Excitedly by perhaps the first visitor in the afternoon, the man quickly ran over, a cardboard ticket in one hand and the credit card reading machine in the other. As soon as he heard the authorization "beep" of the machine, he ran into the rest of the house, turning on the lights as he went. 

"And here is your card, valid until December 2025," the nice lady at the Malta residency office explained as she handed over my new residency card. And just like that, I am welcome to another year of living the slice of the Mediterranean paradise. Also exactly one year after delivering my first post from this little island, I am here to summarize the year before in an always vain attempt to predict the upcoming year's trajectory. As is always the case with the first of the year, checking off what has been completed helps to focus the mind on some truly new experiences that can still be had.