New Home

We finally moved into our permanent housing!  This permanent housing was supposed to be ready in June, and is still only 20% occupied because the rest is under (major) construction... Construction that starts every morning at 6 am.  Oh well, hopefully we'll have more neighbors soon.  The compound should be full by the beginning of next year (or in Saudi time, maybe like April). 

Jubail Views, our new home for the foreseeable future.

This is what most of the compound still looks like.

So we moved to Jubail from Khobar, a much larger city, whose claim to fame is probably this enormous mall that every single Saudi (and their 4 children under the age of 6) goes to on the weekend.  Shopping is like the Saudi national pastime, I guess because it's air conditioned, so it's always PACKED.  That mall and the Ikea across the street have been the biggest source of stress in my life since we've been here, so I can't say I'm sad to leave them.

Notice the various children running amok.

Sidebar:  speaking of air conditioning, I spoke too soon in my last post about the heat and lack of humidity.  Since that post, the humidity has been around 75-85% every day.  It's like Louisiana...BUT WAY WORSE because it's still like 108+ each day.  Luckily we've been told that the humidity only lasts 3-4 weeks a year here. 

Anyway, Jubail is much smaller, and is the home to a private beach club at the Intercontinental Hotel that's pretty nice, and a stand-alone Dairy Queen...very important so that I don't have to brave the insanity at the mall to get a Blizzard!  The best part is that it is much closer to the plant, so Brian's commute is a lot shorter now.  More time for floating in the pool in the evenings!

Here are some pics of our new place:

Laundry

My bathroom

Living room

Master bedroom

Tiny kitchen

Dining room

Brian's bathroom

Balcony

Entrance to the compound

Spare bedroom/workout room/Brian's dressing room

View of Jubail from the stairwell in our building.  Yes, all of Saudi is pretty much tan.  Even the buildings and walls.

Huge parking lot, which is ironic in that very few people are allowed to drive here.

One of the pools.  The other is not finished yet (shocker!).

Finally, the appliances here take FOREVER to run a cycle, but at least when they're finished they sing a happy song!  Here's our Dryer Song from when we lived in Khobar.

When more of our recreation center is finished I'll take some pics in there, too.  We go for our mandatory cultural training tomorrow... looking forward to spending the day learning about Saudi culture!

Random KSA Observations

It's hot.  Like, really hot.  Every single day.  But at least it's not humid?  Instead, it's like being in an oven.  August is supposed to be the worst, so hopefully it will start cooling off sometime soon.

Chance of rain?  Never.

When shopping for a pool float, I came across all sorts of sharpied up women on boxes.  This was hilarious to me.

I don't want to be accidentally turned on by a girl on a box!

My favorite kind of salad is definitely French fries.

Can I eat all of the salad, please?

Dates come from trees.  Who knew?

This date palm is right outside my villa.  The only rain we get are the falling dates.

There are no postal addresses for anything here.  If you look up a restaurant, you'll find the street it's on and a general location, so we usually just end up driving down the street looking for it (with occasional success).  That was how we found the restaurant we ate at last night, Quick Bites, which was delicious!

When it's prayer time, everything gets shut down.  While eating last night, the employees turned off most of the lights, locked the doors, and all of them went in the back to pray.  It was just Brian and I in a completely empty restaurant... kinda cool!

Quick Bites in Khobar during prayer time

We can find most everything we need here, except for pork and alcohol, both of which are illegal.  Don't worry, there are alternatives!

Pork bacon is far superior to turkey bacon

Fancy restaurants with their fancy mocktails

Getting There is Half the Fun???

So the road to Saudi Arabia was not the smoothest.  When I got to New Orleans, I was told that the third leg of my journey, from Amman, Jordan to Dammam, Saudi Arabia, did not exist.  I called Orbitz and was basically told, "oh well, we sent you an email six days ago, figure it out."  Ummm I definitely wouldn’t be standing here trying to figure out how to not be stuck in Jordan if that was the case!  No call from Orbitz… no email… nothing in the spam folder, even.  Royal Jordanian Airlines was more than accommodating, however, and assured me that I could stay in a hotel in Amman overnight, and there would be a shuttle to take me back to the airport the next day.  

 

With that assurance, I hopped a short flight to Chicago, and then settled in for the 12.5 hour journey from Chicago to Amman.  Even with a middle seat, the flight wasn’t bad.  The movie selection wasn’t the best, but at least they had individual televisions.  I slept a good bit and read The Farm by Tom Rob Smith.  It was an interesting story that kept my attention, though the mystery/psychological thriller genre is not usually my favorite. 

Once we landed in Amman, I had to find the Transit desk and figure out how to get to the hotel.  A girl from Atlanta studying in Sudan, a boy from Wyoming going to visit his family in Iraq, and I found ourselves standing around looking confused.  Apparently being American and standing around looking confused is the fastest way to get where you’re going.  A very nice Jordanian man who looked an awful lot like Bob Barker took us under his wing and helped us fill out the necessary paperwork and get to our bus.  He spoke only a little English, but he knew everyone working in the airport and was able to get us where we needed to be by sweet talking everyone with his million watt smile.  We even went through the Jordanian nationals line to get our passports checked.  Without him, we might still be standing around the airport trying to figure out where to go.

The guy at the airport who helped us had a nice suit, orange-ish skin, and stark white hair.  He was basically the Middle Eastern Bob Barker.

We left Bob at the airport, and once we got to the Amman Airport Hotel, the three of us were back to standing around looking confused.  Eventually we were given our rooms, but not before a hotel employee opened two different rooms that were already occupied.  One of them had guests sleeping in it!   With a “Sorry, Sir!” we were quickly ushered back down to the lobby to get actual empty rooms.

I got free dinner and breakfast at the hotel (buffet style), and was able to watch two stations on the television.  The dinner was pretty good actually, but the breakfast wasn’t the best.  The “sausages” tasted like greasy Vienna Sausage from a can, and they had some kind of beans in a brownish red sauce that were still a little crunchy.  They did have hummus and pita on the breakfast buffet, which I will never complain about!  

Because I did not get a Jordanian visa upon arrival, I was forbidden to leave the hotel.  This was all I could really see of Jordan.  But I liked what I saw!

I caught the shuttle back to the airport and got on my flight to Dammam, Saudi Arabia.  It was about a two hour flight.  When I got there, after 41 hours of traveling, I was greeted by my awesome husband with some beautiful flowers and a can of Diet Coke.  Best. Welcome. Ever.

 

Summertime Fun

The house is empty, our stuff is packed, my plane ticket is purchased, and my visa is complete.  It has been wild trying to decide what to take, what to keep in storage, and what to donate.  You don’t realize how much stuff you have until you have to inventory it all.   

Here is our life in a 7.5 x 10 storage unit.  (We have to leave behind our vacuum cleaner because I obviously cannot fit one more thing inside here.)

 

Here is my stuff getting packed to ship to KSA, in a size “D” shipping container (a.k.a. a really large cardboard box).  

I visited a CoinStar to get rid of our piggy bank change… we had almost $92 in coins!  FYI if you get a gift card to one of their participating partners, there is no fee.  If you want straight cash money, I think it’s like 10% or something outrageous. Woooooo amazon.com shopping spree! 

The CoinStar did not like the rogue British pound and Thai Baht that made its way into the piggy bank.  It spit those back out at me.

Then there was the little matter of what to do with the piano bar… luckily I have some great friends who rose to the challenge. 

In between all the moving fun, we’ve had a chance to have some actual fun.  Brian came home from Saudi twice this summer to attend the weddings of two groups of awesome friends, and both were a great time.  We also celebrated our second wedding anniversary in New Orleans at Restaurant August.  It was quite possibly the most delicious meal I've ever had in my life.  Not exaggerating.

I officially become an expat at the end of this month!!!

Camels and Vegas!

Brian took a trip with some coworkers last weekend and got to ride a camel!  Here are some of the pictures:

Camels apparently are not too fond of people riding them.  He said the camel would immediately start walking off as soon as any weight was put on it, so you had to get on quickly!  Brian was successful, but some of his coworkers weren't quite quick enough and ended up falling off. 


Meanwhile, I did pretty much the exact opposite of riding a camel in the middle of the desert, and spent my weekend partying in Vegas for Julie's bachelorette party.  We had the best time!
 

Fancy cocktails, mimosas at the pool, tapas, Spice Girls karaoke, party dresses, and penny slots... Can't beat that kind of weekend!  Unfortunately, we were all reminded every morning that we are not 21 anymore!  :) 

May: winding down work

It's been a little over a month since Brian moved to Saudi Arabia, and he's been adjusting well.  In addition to work, he takes Arabic classes a few days a week and goes to the beach on the weekend.  Tough life... :) 

I have a few days of work left until school gets out for summer.  It's going to be so bittersweet.  When I accepted the job four years ago, I didn't even know if I wanted to continue teaching.  I just knew I couldn't teach at my former school anymore.  Being hired at McKinley was a breath of fresh air, and I flourished there.  Don't get me wrong, there are definitely days when the kids drive me completely crazy!  But then they go and do something like this:

It's going to be so sad to tell some of these sweet children that I won't be on the 6th grade hallway next year.  Though I'll miss the kids (most of them, hah), I am definitely looking forward to summer break and my last few weeks in America... hitting up Vegas, Biloxi, and Pensacola for weekend trips, along with wedding fun in Baton Rouge and Washington, DC in June and July.  I can't wait! 

The last few weeks...

The last few weeks have been super busy and emotionally exhausting!

We had to really start packing up our stuff.  Both Brian and I get an air cargo container to bring some personal belongings to Saudi Arabia.  We also have a 7.5x10' storage unit for things like our Christmas trees, artwork, and the furniture we just can't part with.  Everything else has to go.  It's been pretty liberating to say goodbye to stuff we've held onto for too long.  We are keeping the St. Vincent de Paul store on Government Street fully stocked!  We have also been trying to get the house fixed up in preparation for renters.  This means all the little things that we've put on the backburner for two years are now getting fixed, cleaned, replaced, etc.  I even installed a new light fixture!  Brian was much more handy, and with help from my dad, replaced some of our siding.  We've touched up paint inside and done some other small things too...makes me wonder why we didn't do this when we first moved in?!  :)

Last week was spent meeting up with our friends and family so Brian could say his goodbyes.  We had dinner throughout the week with our friends, my grandparents, and our parents, and then went to Houston over the weekend to see two of our friends get married in a beautiful outdoor garden ceremony and hang out with Brian's college friends.

Yesterday we finished packing up Brian's suitcases and he began the long trek to his new home.   He left from Houston and flew to Istanbul, Turkey for a short layover, then on to Dammam, Saudi Arabia.  He'll be in a temporary bachelor housing compound while they finish building our family compound.  His apartment is about 450 sq feet (quite a change from what he's used to!) and will house only single men.  Hopefully I'll get some pictures soon and be able to post them!

The next few months are going to both fly by and drag on, but I'm looking forward to seeing my husband again in either June or July!