Family Time in the Woods

Redwood Memorial Grove, Whakarewarewa Forest, Rotorua, New Zealand

Skye is 5! At the rate the kids are growing, they’d be grownups in no time! With COVID around (and doesn’t look like it’s going away anytime soon), can’t even plan when we’d be able to fly again, let alone have the kids meet their cousins!

Sigh, summer is in full force (although summer officially only begins on 15 June in the UAE, but whaddya call temperatures of 43C, 44C???), where can we go without baking our skin off and eating desert sand?

…Here’s a little memory trip of a more pleasant time and weather. A trip to the woods with the family in NZ in 2018 Dec. Pray that the pandemic would end soon and for things to get back to ‘normal’. If it ever does…


Little Skye (2.5 years old at that time), with her mommy and aunts, at the Redwood Forest, Rotorua


The redwoods (giant sequoias) are native to California, USA and were planted in Rotorua, NZ a hundred plus years ago








Redwoods Treewalk – a suspended walkway among the majestic redwood trees – nice for a quiet time of contemplation


I did it! Anu is afraid of heights. But surprisingly, she fared quite well on this trip.




What are these? Homes of the tree elves? Nah, they’re lamps that light up at night


These woods are ideal for playing hide and seek. Hey boys, where are you???


There you are! Jayden with his NZ cousin, Jared – Redwoods Forest, Rotorua, NZ, Dec 2018

Jedis Don’t Need Toilet Seats

Hello. I’ve decided to come back to Star Wars Country for this post, since I’ve already sorted out all the photos preparing for the earlier posts, hehe.

One strange thing we noticed when we visited Southern Tunisia was that somehow, the toilets here DON’T HAVE TOILET SEATS. You know those plastic seats and cover that’s fixed to the toilets? They’re nowhere to be seen. And no, it’s not the one restaurant or hotel that this happens. We’ve not seen a single toilet seat in any of the toilets we came across in the 3 days and 2 nights we were in Southern Tunisia. That includes Luke Skywalker’s Tatooine home, Lars Homestead (Star Wars Hotel or Hotel Sidi Idriss) which we stayed a night in.

Ask anyone about toilet seats, and they’d be like …huh? Why d’ya need that? It’s like they’ve never existed in this part of the world! The toilets are there alright, clean, with working flush and all, but they’d have two empty holes – “holes for you to screw in the blasted plastic toilet seats and cover, man!” Maybe it’s something to do with the Force, …maybe Jedis just love the feel of the cold bare porcelain on their naked butts early in the cold morning. Awakens the Force in them and helps them channelize. Or something like that. If you find out the exact reason, please share willya?

The city of Gabes was the first place we noticed this strange custom – we were travelling from El Jem to Tataouine and stopped for lunch in Gabes – a cheap and nice chicken lunch, …but, you guessed it, no toilet seats…


New Mosque of Jara, Gabes, Tunisia – this was near where we had lunch, before we continued our journey to Tataouine to stay for the night

Then we had the ‘privilege’ of visiting 3 separate ‘hotels’ in Tataouine City, a dormitory and 2 guest apartments, before choosing the last apartment to settle in for the night (we had no bloody choice, it’s either that, or sleep in the car as it was too late to go look for another). None of them had toilet seats! Yeah, not one, not even on any of the shared toilets in the dorm!

When we got to our hotel in Matmata, Hotel Sidi Idriss which is the place they used as a setting for filming Star Wars’ Luke Skywalker’s home (Lars Homestead) in Planet Tatooine, none of the toilets there had toilet seats! And this was at quite a pleasant hotel!! With hordes of visitors throughout the day (yup, the hotel is a main tourist attraction of Matmata nowadays).

Anyway, enough about the toilet seats, here’re the rest of our photos taken in Southern Tunisia. Enjoy!


Slave quarters in Tatooine? No, just another ksar / fortified granary. This one’s at Metameur, just northwest of the city of Medenine en route to Matmata – Notice the brewing storm in the sky??


Ksars are all over the place in Southern Tunisia. This isn’t one of the popular ones like Ksar Ouled Soltane or Ksar Hadada. We just noticed it off the road, and drove towards it…


Start of the hills – view of the Metameur / Medenine area from the road to Toujane & Matmata – see the multiple rainfall locations at the back of the photo?


Suddenly the road narrowed… What’s this interesting place? Welcome to Toujane Village




Toujane Village, Tunisia – We noticed tourist buses stopping with hordes of tourist taking photos of this interesting Berber mountain village – We later learnt that Toujane featured in the Call of Duty 2 video game. So it’s not only Star Wars that found this place interesting…


Looking back at Toujane Village, from the road to Matmata


Lars Homestead, Luke Skywalker’s childhood home on Planet Tatooine – This has become a hotel now, Hotel Sidi Idriss, or the Star Wars Hotel. It was where we stayed a night and it was nice, regardless of the shared bathroom and the lack of toilet seats. When in Jediland, do as the Jedis do… May the Force be with you!


Matmata Village – on the surface. Don’t be fooled. Many houses are underground, like the Star Wars Hotel. In this picture, the hole in front of the buildings, is actually one of the courtyards of the Star Wars Hotel!


The kids in a dining hall in Hotel Sidi Idriss, Matmata, Tunisia


Bye-bye, we’re going north again – On the road north, with storms chasing us all along the way – we saw over 10 separate rainbows!


The typical landscape along the highway, acres and acres of olive farms. After all, olive oil is Tunisia’s green gold


Ahem, yours truly with a prickly pear cactus, near the road to Monastir. Prickly pears are also all over the place! I would’ve put in a photo of the missus, or the children (unfortunately, the missus is a far better photographer than yours truly, pah!)

An Old, Old Mosque

It’s Eid!!! Eid Mubarak! Selamat Hari Raya! 4 days off work! How nice? Now, let’s see what the wife has up her sleeves… Spring cleaning? Time for the annual curtains wash? Get the kids in shape for their exams? Some home maintenance maybe? But definitely more exercises and stretches to tax the poor ol’ bones of yours truly? Nah, just kidding, it’s good fitness fun, haha!


The Great Mosque of Kairouan (Mosque of Uqba), Kairouan, Tunisia

Anyway for Eid, here’re some photos of an old, old mosque, for your pleasure - the austere looking Great Mosque of Kairouan, aka the Mosque of Uqba in Tunisia. It was built in friggin AD 670, …let’s see, 1,350 years ago! It is one of the oldest places of worship in the Islamic world, and a model for the later mosques of the Maghreb (North West Africa – namely Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco). Here goes.


The mosque looks like a castle from the outside, with thick walls, buttresses and …cannons!








The streets around the great mosque are like something out of the Aladdin movie – Don’t believe me? Ask the kids. … HEY KIDS! BEHAVE!!!


The southern façade, Mosque of Uqba, Kairouan, Tunisia


Anu and the Minaret




Fooling around the walls of the Great Mosque, Kairouan

And here’re some photos of our journey between Sidi Bou Said to Kairouan…


The Zaghouan Aqueduct – from the car


I think this is Zaghouan Town


That, far off on the hill, should be Takrouna Village


Driving southwards past Takrouna, Tunisia

That’s all for now folks! Eid Al Fitr Mubarak! Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri! Happy Holidays!!!

Planet Tataouine

Slave quarters, Mos Espa, Planet Tatooine (Just kidding, read on to find out more)

It’s May the Fourth. May the Force be with you, my friend. It’s Star Wars Day. (Yes, there’s such a thing, due to the similarity of the sound of the date, May 4th with the Jedi’s main greeting phrase).

While Ramadan continues, and yours truly continue to be loaded with work, here’re some photos I’ve collected just for an occasion like this, hehe. What better way to commemorate Star Wars Day, than to post some pictures of the main planet in the Star Wars Saga, Planet Tatooine! Tatooine is actually named after an actual place in Tunisia, Tataouine! Tataouine is a city in southern Tunisia and the capital of the Tataouine Governorate. Locations around Tataouine were used as film settings for the Star Wars Planet Tatooine. Many of these locations are actual places and are still around, like the native Berber’s underground houses used as a setting for Luke Skywalker’s childhood home, Lars Homestead (which I’ve posted a year back). Here’re some fortified granaries (Ksar) used by the local Berber community which doubled up as the slave quarters of Mos Espa in Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace. Enjoy!


Ksar Ouled Soltane, Tunisia


Where have all the aliens and droids gone?!?






Gary Siteworker and his family exploring the place hoping to find something of value - a light saber, perhaps??


It was bone-chilling cold that day, with a freezing wind constantly blowing across the place. Huddling up with others is the best way to keep warm. Hello, can I borrow your blanket? – Ksar Ouled Soltane, Tatouine, Tunisia


Is it really that cold Jayden? This is at another ksar near Ksar Ouled Soltane, Ksar Ez Zahra (but in Google Maps, it’s marked as Al Karashiwah??) These fortified granaries are usually located on hilltops (that explains the cold), to keep them off from invaders


‘Jedis’ braving out the cold… in front of a shop


Hey, are you Obi-Wan Kenobi? So, George Lucas actually borrowed the idea of Obi-Wan’s costume from local attire – Ksar Ezzahra, Tataouine, Tunisia


Let’s get out of here before we freeze to death. Looks like a storm’s gonna hit anytime – Ksar Ezzahra

Ksar Ezzahra was not in the Star Wars film. The main ksar used for the Star Wars film was I think Ksar Hadada (which we did not visit). That would’ve been a ksar too many, I think.


The actual Tataouine – Photo taken from the balcony of our sub-sub-standard rented room in Tataouine town. There’re not many hotels in Booking.com to choose from in Tataouine. The room we booked was cancelled by the guesthouse. We immediately booked another room at the only other guesthouse listed, but we didn’t really like the place. Then the people at the first guesthouse (who cancelled us) eventually helped us get another room… Long story. This place is on the P19 road near the edge of town, just before the Mémoire de la terre roundabout


The countryside around Tataouine – That hill is called Ksar Beni Barka and has the ruins of a ksar on its peak (no, we didn't go up)

OK, calling it a day. Tunisia was our last overseas trip (Dec-2019) before COVID struck. It’s nearly 1.5 years now since we went anywhere overseas. When will this pandemic be over?!?!???