Monica went to the beach and she saw....

I went to the beach this past weekend for lunch with my sister and ended up taking some pictures (click on them to see them bigger). This is what I saw:

A neat bird. I was walking along the beach with my sister, and we were approaching the end of the beach, and there were some men standing on those rocks you see in the background looking onto the beach (which is obviously private, this being a Middle Eastern country and all) I went to tell her that we shouldn't be walking towards these men but it came out like this; "Sarah, do you realize we're walking towards-a pelican!" Ok ok it's not a pelican, but it's a cool looking bird. In this picture it also looks like a dinosaur.

A crab hiding from me. This beach is FULL of crabs, it's crazy, but they're skittish little buggers. I was lucky to even get this picture.




Some barnacles close up:

(That is what they are, yeah?)

And some far away:


I like how in this picture one rock has absolutely none on top of it. It's strange, right?


And, apparently I like to take pictures of shells lodged in the sand:

I promise I'll learn to write for my next post and maybe even cook. I swear I can do more than take mediocore pictures. So let's hope my one reader in Texas (props to you for being vegan btw) doesn't give up on this blog lol. So yeah, I'll try harder!

Photo extravaganza!!

I know it's been forever since I posted (but what does it matter, not like I have any readers..). Work's been tough, I started a drama club at my school so that's been taking up some time. I also had an exam a couple days ago that I was busy studying for.. I haven't been up to much these days. Been doing some cooking here and there (made some chocolate chips cookies for a friend's party a week or so ago and everyone was shocked that they were vegan so that was fun) but nothing special.
I've got lots of pictures to share with y'all today:

Me and my sister on Halloween: She's a mouse and I'm a cat in case you can't tell... We threw these "costumes" together in a couple minutes and went on to have a delightfully dull Halloween..

Here are my friends, rapping up a storm... this was their first performance and they were great. I've been saying they should get a myspace or something, but there's nothing like that up yet... as soon as you can get their music online I'll definately link it here...


I made some soup the other day, this is simple; canned tomatoes, red and white lentils, brown rice, onions, celery, spinach, potatoes, and some frozen veggies (corn, green beans, peas, carrots) and some spices... Not bad considering we have no food in the house...

Here's my sister again, she's wearing gucci sunglasses. Yeah, that's pretty much the point of this picture. (no, they aren't hers lol)

So yeah, this is what I've been up to the past while... I have some beach pictures I want to share, but I'll do that in another post, this one has enough pictures I think...

OH almost forgot about this one; this happened right in front on my house on the worst day I've ever had ever, which also happened to be the day I left for Jordan (did I mention I went to Jordan? I don't have the pictures yet so I haven't posted about it) Anyways I guess this guy was having a bad day as well:

It's a nice Mustang too... people here should learn to drive..

I don't like bugs.

I was making a sort of black bean salsa the other day and grabbed a green pepper out of my fridge. When I cut it open it was the grossest thing I've seen in awhile; the inside was covered in brown stuff and half the seeds were gone. Then I took an even closer look, and screamed; there was a full grown caterpillar inside my green pepper. Ew ew ew... I have no idea how it got there since the pepper had no holes in it, but judging from the amount of caterpillar poo in the vegetable, it had probably hatched and grown up there.

Of course, I don't kill bugs (I'm vegan, yo) so I just put the little veggie house on the ground outside. If the caterpillar lives, whatev and if he gets eaten by a bird or something then it's natural.

I wonder if other vegans would agree with this? What do y'all think about killing bugs? I don't agree with it (how could I refuse to eat honey or wear silk but walk around squishing bugs, right?)

But I hate bugs.

Especially ants. We have an ant problem in our house (and this entire city I think). It's pretty bad, I can't leave food out for literally five minutes without it becoming covered in ants. Sometimes I have to brush off a table before I can use it because it's covered in ants. It's gross. But I don't kill them, and I don't let my family use poison in the house (mainly because I'm worried about it hurting my cat, and also because the ants will just come back anyways)


Ants are small so you can't tell how gross they are. So here's a close up picture I took in my kitchen the other day...


(click on it to see more detail... if you dare)

Look at those crazy Middle Eastern ants.

I'm creeping myself out here. And I've just realized that writing a post about bugs right before I have a nap isn't the best idea. I bet I'll imagine bugs crawling on me as I try to sleep. Or actually will have bugs on me, it's pretty likely judging from this post.

ew ew ew

A quick meal and a bit about Ramadan

So here's my meal... I tried Linda McCartney sausages for the first time today, and I was pretty impressed. They had a great texture and taste, but were very salty. I'm scared to see how much sodium I just ate... So just had those with some mashed potatoes (with soy milk, a bit of vegan margarine, and some parsley and garlic powder) and a bunch of plain steamed green beans.
Mmmm....

So this is just something quick and easy. I thought I had a bad cold, but it's been almost a week now, so I'm guessing it's a flu. So, anyways I haven't been cooking much, some veggie stew (and whole wheat dumplings of course) the other day, but it's mostly just peanut butter on toast and fresh fruit.

So, aside from food... what's been going on? Well it's Ramadan now. While I'm not Muslim, Ramadan has a huge effect on life when you're living in an Islamic country.
(What's Ramadan? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramadan)

Besides not being allowed to eat or drink in public during the day, Ramadan is certainly felt at my school as well. We've had more absences since it started, and some children have been a bit worse-behaved. I guess it's because the parents are allowing their kids to stay up until all hours with the rest of the family...

"Most practicing Muslims, especially children and the elderly, have a light meal or snack before dawn. This light meal is called Suhoor or Sohoor or Sehri, and is considered an act of Sunnah. This tradition is practised by Muslims worldwide. Cafes and restaurants, in Muslim countries, stay open till early morning hours in Ramadan to serve food and drink for Suhoor."
-from the Wikipedia article

(I guess it's easier to fast all day if you stay up all night...)

But I can handle the tired children because of Ramadan working hours! Normally I'd start work at 7:30 (technically, but I would actually get in by 7 everyday) and finish at 2. Ramadan hours are 8:30 (but I'm getting to school at 7:45) till 1:30...

So I have quite a bit more to write about but things just aren't flowing tonight and I'm sleepy, so tomorrow or sometime this weekend I'll finish this up.

I got myself a camera (and I'm nervous about truffles)

I finally got myself a camera (8.1 MP sony cyber-shot) and it's gorgeous and why else would I need a camera other than to blog with?
So let's excuse my absence and get started.
I went to Dubai twice over the past weekend and along with some standard can't-buy-it-here foods (whole wheat pastas, vegan margarine, Amy's kitchen foods, organic english muffins, etc..) I came across this Italian food cart thing. It was near the end of my second day of shopping, which was a relief since otherwise I would've spent all my money.
This is what I did end up getting:

There's some Bruschetta with Truffle, and salt with truffle. Each are 6% black truffle. I'm so excited about these but also nervous. I don't think I've ever had truffle before. What if I don't like it? Or what if this is just bad but truffle is good but I never try them again cause this scares me from them? So it might be some time before you actually see these products being put to use, but I can tell you for sure I'll be looking at them lovingly in my cuboard everyday.

UPDATE Wait a second! Are truffles vegan? People suck and they need to use dogs or pigs to hunt these fungi down. So what does that make truffles? This reminds me of the Steven the Vegan video "If a monkey made you a sandwich would you eat it?"

So what do you think? Truffles; vegan or not?

And here's the house...

I wasn't kidding when I said it looked like something made from a Barbie lego set. I still haven't even seen it, just a few pictures, and apparently it's very nice and we're moving probably within a week. I hate packing, bleck.
Anyways, I don't really have anything to say, just wanted to post this picture.

*cough*cough*

My cold is pretty much over, aside from a lingering cough. And I think that's not so much a cold, it's more my body rediscovering my asthma. Which sucks. I went for years using my inhalor only every few months, and now I'm using it every day. Geez. Let's hope I get over this soon.

In terms of food, I've been thinking about soy a lot these days. Soy is such a debated topic, and I tend not to believe most of the apparent problems. Basically, I think you should go for everything in moderation, and obviously not feed soy to young children as it's a common allergin. But I'm not sure how moderate I've been with it lately, is all. I started using my soy protien powder in shakes (with frozen strawberries, bananas, soymilk and a pinch of vanillin) and I've basically been living off leftover lasagna the past couple days (made with homemade tomato veggie sauce and textured soy protien, with spinach instead of cheese, since soy cheese is nonexistant here), cereal with soy milk, even my Boca products are soy-based. So yeah... I need to vary my protien sources again, I go through phases, and I should start with my beans and lentils again. I actually found a bean recipe I like, which is awesome since I hate beans, so hopefully I'll make that and have it with some rice tonight.

Another hot topic these days? People being designed, or however you want to word it, to eat meat. I don't understand why people are so proud of their canines, using them as evidence of our bloody destiny. I was reading about this and of course I went straight to a mirror to check out my teeth. And guess what? I think I'm a natural vegan because my canines are basically flat! Yep, there's no way I could tear into a raw cow with those pathetic little things. Either everyone else is like this, or I'm evolved. I hope I'm evolved, that would be cool.

Oh oh oh! I almost forgot! I took my English exam yesterday and I'm pretty sure I aced it. Well, maybe not aced, but I'm pretty sure I passed. And that's good enough cause it's only worth 30% of my final grade, and my grade going into the exam was something like 96% so as long as I pass the exam, I'm safe.

I've been hiccupping pretty much the whole time I've been writing this, gosh it's annoying. I'm going to go hold my breath for awhile, and then do some math.