Saturday reflections

 A shopping center in Abu Dhabi.

Quite unexpectedly, I got my first Moderna shot yesterday, on only my third day of eligibility.

I started navigating the various websites on Wednesday (and the IT professional in me found the mishmash of badly designed websites one must navigate a personal affront -- or would have, if I weren't so goddamned happy at finally being eligible for a shot.) There is no one place to go to sign up for available vaccines; New York state has one website, New York City has another, and the various pharmacies giving shots have to be checked individually.

I lucked out with the Walgreen's site and got an appointment for a first shot tomorrow. They called yesterday afternoon and asked if there was any chance I could come in right away? An hour later I was sitting in a drab Duane Reade pharmacy on 57th Street, waiting out my fifteen minute reaction watch. Mostly I was unnerved at being around so many people, even at proper social distance, but this morning I am reveling in my sore shoulder as though it's a first-place winning lottery ticket.

At the beginning of the week, I was trying not to be jealous of all my friends who've been vaccinated, and reminding myself that I'd definitely qualify by summer. Monday they announced eligibility rules were changing as of Wednesday, and Friday I got the shot.

By the end of April, I'll be able to take a bus to Central Park again.

Here, have some architecture

It has been an insanely busy week, leaving me with no time or energy to say anything intelligent about any subject -- including, but not limited to, adverbial phrases, subordinating conjunctions, lesson plan sequencing, intensive reading, extensive reading, and Covid-19 vaccine availability and scheduling in New York City.

So here are two fairly random architecture photos from Abu Dhabi -- the sleek Etihad Towers, and the ornate columns at the Sheikh Zayed Mosque.

Et in Abu Dhabi ego

I, too, was in Abu Dhabi, several eons ago.

I had my own scarf and tunic, so didn't have to borrow the long itchy hooded robes the other women visitors were wearing at the Grand Mosque. (Having been to Iran, I know how to dress for a mosque.)

Beach life

These aren't the most interesting pictures, but seen from the vantage of the final weeks of a very difficult winter, any beach looks good to me right now.

And I say that as someone who burns up faster than a vampire under the slightest UV exposure and considers sunbathing boring beyond belief. These particular beaches were in Abu Dhabi.

Urban poetry

A random street scene in Abu Dhabi, four years ago (a lifetime ago), far away from the glitzy towers and hotels.

Saturday reflections

 Here's some welcome color, courtesy of a window in Abu Dhabi in 2017.

There's not much distortion in these reflections, but I do like the way the condensation (or dirt) on the windows looks like more tree branches growing out of the window frame.

Flashback: Abu Dhabi

Snow is still coming down here, so I am thinking fondly of this desert barbecue in Abu Dhabi a few years ago, and having the chance to make friends with this beautiful falcon.

Saturday reflections

Since I'm doing some housekeeping, here's a reflection shot I never posted: the scalloped facade of the World Trade Center in Abu Dhabi.

Saturday reflections

A solarized version of reflections at the Sheikh Zayed mosque in Abu Dhabi.

Sunday bird blogging

Here's another look at the beautiful falcon from the desert barbecue.

And now I think I'm done with Abu Dhabi for the moment -- on to India!

These are the mosques I really loved

These neighborhood mosques were on almost every street in Abu Dhabi. The call to prayer echoed down the alleys between the skyscrapers, and cars pulled up, worshippers greeting each other on the steps as they prepared to go in and pray.

One more note about size

One of the first things you learn if you're interested in photography is how much better your brain is than your camera.

If you take a lot of pictures, you get used to how different the photographic image is from what your eye sees, because your camera doesn't have that clever brain to reinterpret and reassemble the image for you. For example, you can look at a building in shadow and see the sky behind it as blue, but in your photos the sky will probably be white because the camera can't resolve different exposures the way your brain can.

In architectural photography, the camera distorts angles and perspective and buildings curve where they should be straight and lean at improbable angles and you have to correct the distortions with software. If you have multiple buildings, or if one is particularly tall, it's sometimes hard to make it look real.

The Grand Mosque was so huge that even the simplest composition -- looking across the courtyard, looking along the arcade -- came out looking like something in a funhouse mirror. The pavements curved. The minarets leaned.

Here's one example which I couldn't quite manage to fix.

Showing the proper respect

I'm not sure where he got the headdress, but this was actually a Japanese tourist mugging for a friend's camera.

And yes, I get that it's a little hypocritical of me to sneer at someone else who's acting like a tourist, when I'm there as -- a tourist.

But it was so hard to have any sense of this as a holy place with all the crowds. It was just all too much.

Where did I put my shoes?

Fortunately, I took a picture of the shelf or I would never have found my own again.

Visiting the mosque

There are separate entrances for men and women because you have to go through a dressing room. I was wearing a long-sleeved tunic over pants and I had a scarf, so once I'd covered my hair I was dressed appropriately, but there were racks of blue and mauve abayas with hoods for women whose arms or legs were bare, or who didn't have a headscarf.

Men don't have to cover their heads but shorts and tank tops aren't allowed so there are robes available for them to wear if needed as well.

There are racks outside the main prayer hall for shoes, and this is where there's a logjam. Once you're inside, the space swallows you up, and there's no sense of a crowd.

No more chandeliers

Assuming you weren't blinded by the previous post, here are a few more pictures from the interior: the information desk (you can really the see the mother of pearl on the column in the foreground) and a closeup of some of the detailing.

But then there's this

I think I couldn't really see the beautiful detailing of the interior walls and domes because I just couldn't see around this chandelier.

Which photos do not begin to do justice to: it's more than 30 feet in diameter and almost 50 feet tall.

And there are more of them.

I have no words.

And then you go inside

Nobody who sees any of the thousands of magnificent photos of the universe sent our way by the Hubble can have any delusions that God is a minimalist. But this was way too maximalist for me, and  I wished it looked more like the exteriors.

The scale, again, was astonishing. This is the main prayer hall, which can hold 7000 people, and it's covered by a single carpet, the largest in the world. The carpet is more than 60,000 square feet and weighs 35 tons. It was hand-knotted in Iran.

The flower motifs represent Sheikh Zayed's love of the natural world, and the carpet is green because that was his favorite color. I love the geometric patterns and calligraphy in mosques, and I like the more abstract window designs here more than the flower and vine motifs on the columns. (The flowers and leaves are all mother of pearl and it is quite beautiful close up.)

The craftsmanship is so meticulous, and the decoration is so detailed -- and there's so much of it -- that it's hard to believe this mosque only took twelve years to complete.

Some exteriors

Courtyard

This is the other side of the courtyard.

One of the things that's most startling is how pristine everything is. The mosque opened at the end of 2007, so it's recent, but it's impeccably maintained. The marble gleams. Every piece of mother of pearl and semiprecious stone shines.