Today we were out visiting a huge mosque in Manama (capital of Bahrain). Room for some 5-7000 people praying there. A nice elderly German guy named Abdullah Borek (I assume his Roman-Catholic parents named him something else) took us for a guided tour, which really was very short (nothing much to see in a mosque) but he offered a lot of background information on the whats and whys of Islam.
For instance what is the guy yelling from the towers at prayer time, when is prayer, etc. He also offered the muslims explanation to Jesus' (alleged) coming back at Easter: Why should Judas kiss Jesus in order for the Romans to find him? Because no-one knew what he looked like! So how would you be sure, that Jesus was in fact the one who died on the cross?

The Mosque was very well air conditioned, so much in fact that I needed the sweater I had brought along because we weren't sure if we would be allowed in wearing t-shirts. The girls didn't have that problem as the rule was for women to dorn abayas to be allowed entrance :o)

Afterwards we took a drive into the new parts of Manama. In Bahrain the new part of town, is where there used to be ocean. They're actively increasing the size of the country much the same way they're doing it in Dubai: Rearranging the ocean floor sand. We went to visit one of Carsten's friends who lives in a new part of town called "the floating village". Very nice, guarded neighbourhood, brand new apartments and a patch of grass down to the water. Downside is all the construction going on right next door, but with the speed at which they're building here, that can't be a problem for long.