Historic

Not a great picture, but it records a very special moment in time for us. For the Year of Tolerance, Dubai Opera was given permission to put on a performance of Handel's Messiah. It is such a big deal for us, I bought tickets immediately when I found out it was happening. History was made, and G & I were there!

It was a Russian orchestra who came over and local singers made up the choir. I counted around 32 men, 65 women and 27 musicians. Absolutely no sound amplification. It was such a treat to watch the musicians play their instruments!

The show didn't finish until 11 pm; later than I expected. There was a big rush out of the venue, so we hung around near the fountain and got something to eat. The strategy worked! Whilst walking to the lifts, it was clear we were with some of the singers. One of them was sporting a large manuscript of music. I'd love to have thanked them for a fantastic evening, but they were busy chatting amongst themselves.

Handel's Messiah is full of scripture and references to Jesus Christ. I couldn't help wondering how much of an impact the words have on those performing. I really hope that for the many who were there, that the evening wasn't just about a superb orchestral piece of music but more importantly, the person it is written about.

We had the usual morning chaos at the start of the week; bad traffic jams and it was just hard to get going. Work felt bitty with things not working, but I had got a few things done by the time I left. A little nap was in order to get ready for the evening. This was interrupted by a call from the office panicking at all that needs to be done, except they don't have the support from the Singapore office to keep it all going. Oh well. I did a couple more hours before we left to the Opera. This delayed us, and we only just made it to our seats in time.

We drove home with the windows down; it was not hot enough to have the air-conditioning on and not cool enough to drive without any kind of air movement. 27degC the car thermometer said. In December. Ugh!

PS. And this is my 2,800th blip! :)