Page 672 - Belgrave Diaries(N)_Neat

670

1931

Saturday [12 December]

Court, Sulman did not appear as he was with the Shaikh hunting, old Shaikh Isa came over for his usual annual hunting trip of
three or four days, he is getting on for ninety but still keen on hawking, I hope the cold weather will finish him off, he costs the
State over sixty thousand rupees a year and does no good, all the money is taken by his wife who gives it to her favourite
relations and then asks for more. Dined at the Parkes, Holmes, Ham were there and after dinner we played Bridge. Parke was
very rude about the Bridge, he takes it too seriously, not as a game but as a means of making money and if anyone talks while
he is playing he gets quite angry. Their house is quite nice, they have a good big drawing room, longer than ours and so more
convenient and takes more people easily.

Sunday [13 December]

Spent most of the morning at the Wakf Department going over the accounts with Mohamed Dweyger, found things in quite
good order in fact better than I had expected. Nasty morning, very windy and a lot of dust blowing everywhere. Mail. Now
that we have a weekly down mail there seems to be a post very often. Went out for a drive in the afternoon and then thought of
calling on someone but we found that everyone seemed to be out so came home. Prior came in after dinner to talk about the
arrangements for his party and to hear my dance records to see which tunes to have at his dance.

Monday [14 December]

Office, busy morning, lots of people to see and among them people in a case about one Ahmed bin Rashid al Naimi, a young
man who was entrusted with the estate of his young brothers and sisters valued at about four and a half lacs of rupees two years
ago, he used all the money for buying pearls and as the market went bad he lost it all, its a bad case but there are many others
like it. M had a Bridge morning. Tea at Major Holmes, he had quite a big party with Bridge afterwards, I enjoy his shows, he
puts up such good teas with lots of real Scotch scones. Afterwards to the Parkes where we played Bridge and in the evening to
a dinner party at the de Greniers, quite a big dinner, Prior was there, very sulky as he professes to dislike their parties, he was
really very rude at dinner and hardly talked at all to Mrs de Grenier. They have Father Lamb, the R.C. priest from Bushire,
staying with them, a nice little man and a wonderful conjurer. After dinner we played roulette but left before midnight. The
weather is queer, it seems to alternate between terrific gales of wind and quite hot days which are more like the summer, very
damp when it is not very cold, there has been no rain so far so they cant sow any rain crops this year.

Tuesday 15th December 1931

Meeting of the Biladya, Manama, a very dull one but fairly short. We seemed to spend most of the time discussing a revision
of the motor fares for taxis and some other equally dull subjects. My car was out of order, a piece of the spring broke, the
roads are very hard on motors here especially when one goes across country in them as is sometimes necessary. M called on
the wife of Abdu Ali bin Rejab in the morning. Went a drive in the afternoon with the Land Dept car, in the evening we had
Father Lamb, the de Greniers and Major Holmes to dinner, quite a pleasant little party, played Bridge afterwards. They left at