Going home

So glad we are going home today. The weather is getting a bit overcast and windy. Still, obviously, very warm though. We do not get picked up until 2200-2230 this evening, but since June is still unwell, we are able to retain our room instead of checking out at 1200. Rooms are at a premium here, although every staff member keeps telling us how quiet it is. It also puzzles me, that since all the rooms are generally occupied, and there are quite a lot of room, why the lobby bar has only about thirty or forty people in it every night. I know the entertainment is crap, but...
The disco, and I use that word lightly, is even more sparse. The DJ appears to be the chap that does the aerobics etc round and in the pool, often has nobody in the room that he utilises for that. Although we saw one English couple, who both celebrated their 50th birthday whilst here, venture in there last night.
One couple we met have the availability of a courtesy room, whilst Lewis and Norma can keep theirs until 1430. Fortunately for them they have a much earlier pick up, around 1730.
The last day of vacation is always the time to look back on the experiences, both the good and the not so good.
Gladly the former outweighs the latter in our case. But we have had some unfortunate events during our stay, with June not being well surely the lowest point. Going swimming in the sea without removing my hearing aids is another downside, an expensive one at that. June has also lost a lovely silver heart necklace, although we have a hope that that will be returned today. When we came back from the Sahara trip, I emptied June's bag over the balcony to get rid of all the excess sand, and the necklace must have still been in it. Norma, just yesterday, enquired of the French lady that she had made an acquaintance of, the one who occupies the room directly below us, if she had found it, and she intimated that one of the young gardeners who was helping the guy who was pruning the trees, had came across it and asked her if if was hers. She, being an honest person, replied in the negative, and thought no more about it until the conversation yesterday. She then, kindly, went looking for the young fellow, but he could not be found.
I then went to the morning reception staff and informed them, one of whom remembered June reporting it missing on Tuesday last, and I left it with them to try and trace the man. By afternoon nobody had for back do us, no surprises there, so I went to see Mohammed who comes on shift for the afternoon and evening. He immediately got on the phone and assured us that it would be returned to us today. As yet it hasn't, but hopefully it will be back in our possession this
afternoon.
There have, obviously, been an lot more positive and very memorable, for the right reasons, experiences. Most of which I have already intimated within this journal. But other things that I recall that brought a smile to our faces include seeing shepherds in the fields, the brown fields with barely any green to succour their sheep and goats or cattle. No one occasion on man, whilst standing watching after his flock, was on his phone texting. The modern world is everywhere.
Further evidence, if needed, of this was seeing Beduin tents or rush built huts, with not only mopeds outside them, but some had satellite dishes also.
If, in Britain in particularly, you think we have a problem with speed bumps everywhere, here they also have them. But mainly though they are situated on the main roads just as you enter and leave the towns and villages that you pass through. They also have roundabouts. The roads generally though are not in any great shape.
Litter does seem to be a problem here. You can tell when you are out and about, when you are approaching a built up area as the proliferation of garbage lying about, with blue plastic bags seeming to be the main eyesore. In some cases whole bushes are adorned with them, making them look like very unusual blooms.
Apparently before the Arab Spring uprising of 2011 this would never have been the case. But now, as well as the decrease of tourist numbers for some strange reason, a lot of negatives have been acquired along with the new free regime. People are hoping that after the elections, which I believe are next year, things will improve.
This hotel has been one of the most fascinating hotels I have ever stayed in for the most variety of clientele that I have witnessed.
From the most elegant and chic of French older women, to charlatan looking Tunisian men in small groups. Beautifully attired Tunisian women, looking elegant in their tradition garb, also grace the dining room.
Everything is more or less perfect, but still some continentals, a few only mind, find room to complain. I heard of somebody complaint today that there were no bagels on offer. I mean, really,this is North Africa, not North America. She also moaned that the tea was awful and demanded that the waiter fetch her a fresh pot, despite the fact that the tea was self service. Only the coffee was regularly brought to your breakfast table. But no doubt the gracious and ever smiling waiting staff were only too willing to please, and did as the person requested.
Speaking of the waiting staff. At breakfast they are alway dressed in black trousers, white shirt, white bow tie and white tuxedo, whilst in the evening they have replaced the white tie and jacket with black tie and black waist coats. Still looking all very elegant with long aprons on and always a white serving cloth draped over their arms. Since the food is always self service, and one of the two assigned to your part of the dining room takes your drinks order, whilst the other, on our case a charming young fellow cloaked Oubaid Allah, delivers and pours your drinks order. He has a neat way of pouring your glass of beer, he opens the bottle and rests it gently against the glass, uses the bottle to tip the glass towards him and pours. Thus never handling the glass. and I have only see him topple a glass over just once, and that was, I am glad to say, not mine.
The other, and more senior waiter, goes by the name of Kaies. He doesn't have a great grasp of English, but alway just says , " Yes," charmingly.
Oubaid, says he likes going to the disco after he finishes work, and he stays there until late. They appear to only get one day off per fortnight, but they don't seem to mind at all.
The next entry in this, will see us back in Scotland, and it shall either be from Glasgow, where we are due to stay for two nights, or from back home in Ellon. When I say 'two nights' I don't mean that quite literally. Our plane does not touch down until 5 in the morning, and although our hotel is situated just a few yards from the terminal, I don't reckon that we will be in bed their until nearer 7am. I think we will have to have breakfast before we retire, as it will be finished by the time we eventually surface
The picture today is old pots outside the back of the hotel, where only staff, and us, go.