Hope you all had a great Christmas. I’m visiting my parents at Bahrain on a 3-week vacation.   The weather is perfect: pleasant mornings, sunny afternoons cooled by a mild breeze, and chilly evenings. No matter how much you go around a place by car, there’s nothing to beat the sights, smells and sounds one experiences by foot. Don’t you agree? Every afternoon I go by myself with camera for company taking pictures of a new store, huge pots lining the streets and the colorful petunias along the medians. Despite being in the Middle-East, the festive spirit of X’mas and New Year is hard to miss in the stores.  The shelves are filled with tree decorations, stockings, bells, lights, scented candles and holders, incense holders and lanterns. So lovely and so very tempting to indulge in retail therapy… I picked a few lanterns and Arabic style incense/aroma holders.. It is fitting…