Being involved was never so exhausting....

So anyone who knows me knows that I tend to be somewhat of a loner and a hermit, yes me the person who moved to another country on her own is independent...shocker!  Since moving to Abu Dhabi, I have been making a vested effort to make friends and actually hang out with them on a regular basis...I didn't realize how tiring it can be to be so social. Eileen, one of my girls here, knew a girl through a friend of hers and that girl has lots of friends so initially we were invited along and now we are starting to become a fixture in the group, which is great...it can just be hard to remember so many peoples names at times.  Then we have met other people through going out and such...needless to say now we get invited to things and my week fills up. I somehow got roped into playing rugby...no that isn't a typo.  We have a coach and a captain and practice twice a week.  Practice is like any intense hour and a half conditioning practice, but add to that intense heat, humidity, and the air is very different then it is in Minnesota.  So if you haven't drank enough water during the day, be ready to get dizzy and maybe have tunnel vision.  You sweat so quickly you have a thin sheen of water constantly on your skin, luckily practice is at night and its a bit cooler then.  The ball handling stuff was a lot of fun and I look forward to doing more and getting in shape.  Plus all the girls on the team are very nice and supportive to a green player like myself.  I have also learned about these things called brunches.  They start mid-day, you pay a base fee, and you get prettymuch all the food and drink (wine, beer, etc) you could want.  You basically eat all afternoon and then try to stay awake long enough to go out in the evening.  I have my first brunch this Friday and from what I hear they can be awesome and a bit crazy...my life is very interesting right now.  Still no apartment, but I know I am teaching at a high school near the downtown area of Abu Dhabi and that I will get my keys in the next two weeks here so I will make sure to keep you updated.  Have to go get ready for rugby practice, say a little prayer that I make it through alright!

LOOONNNNNGGGGGGG Week

Last time I checked in I was going to be waking up early for three days to go to orientation.  We had to get up by 6ish so we could get down to eat before 7:30, which was the time that we had to be in the lobby to get on the buses for the trip to orientation.  Then the trip to the Paris-Sorbonne University took about 30 crowed minutes on the bus.  Some buses even got the privilege of waiting outside the University complex for thirty minutes while they made sure we were safe...so you got to know your neighbors a bit better during those times.  Then once in the complex we had to sign in, get a name tag, and figure out where our "break-out" classrooms were.  Then we were shepherded into the auditorium for a couple hours of speakers telling us about the vision of Abu Dhabi and what we can expect in the coming weeks and such.  By about half way through the speeches I was giving thanks that the chairs weren't very comfortable because it meant that I couldn't easily give into the sleep that pulled at me as speaker after speaker stood behind a podium and delivered their power-point accompanied speeches.  Only three of the speakers really made an impact and that was because they moved around and included humor in their speeches, which was much needed by 12:30pm.  We got a half hour break at about 11 where we were again shepherded into a screened off room where we could have a snack, now what no one realized was that we were supposed to bring our own snack, which made for some grumpier people when the speeches resumed.  Then we went to "break-out" sessions where we talked about our thoughts about the program so far...or at least we were supposed to...my group decided to ask some unrelated questions and then got bogged down talking about the price of renting vs buying a car in Abu Dhabi.  I can tell you it was incredibly awe inspiring discussion...  The next day, Wednesday, was a bit different in that the secondary teachers were taken to a high school in Abu Dhabi to discuss curriculum and the other teachers went to the University again.  It was a lot more interactive the second day and we got a lot of information on the curriculum...but we were given it during the meetings and didn't have much time to read through it, so when question time came, there were a lot of questions being asked that could have been answered by reading the packets of information.  Day three was a bit like day one, but longer and more interactive.  By the time we got back to the hotel at around 3 or so all the teachers were starving and sleepy, where as I was about bouncing off the walls.  Now we come to the weekend.  I have learned that we are a bit spoiled in Minnesota as people cannot smoke inside places anymore.  There was a beer pong tournament at P.J. Riley's Pub which meant a lot of people smoking in an enclosed space...after a couple hours my eyes were burning and the sleepiness I had not felt earlier hit me like a wall.  Mix that with the frustration of getting hit on by very inebriated guys my dad's age it is understandable that I left before the normal 3am closing time.  The next night was much better as we got to go to a late brunch at Bamboo restaurant which meant that you paid 200dhs and received all the food and drink you wanted.  It was the best Chinese food I had had in a long time and eating with about fifteen other wonderful people, my night started well.  We then went to the house of a friend I had made the week before and commenced in chatting and dancing and all around fun.  If I wasn't tired by the end of that night, last night must have exhausted me as I was taken to an amazing Italian restaurant in the Fairmont Hotel and wined and dined better then I ever have before courtesy of one of my new friends.  Needless to say I slept in until past 11am today and plan on a relaxing afternoon.  Now I must head to the pool and to see my friends who are no doubt worrying that I have lapsed into a coma.  Until next time...

Fun, Sun and Abu Dhabi

I have been here a little over a week and am realizing a couple major things about life in Abu Dhabi.  1.) It is hot in the summer here, really hot, almost suffocating at times. 2.) Hotel life of sleep, pool and food is only fun for about a week then you are wanting to get into your own apartment. 3.) There isn't much going on during Ramadan.  Knowing those three things, it is understandable that this past weekend I have done everything possible to get out and see Abu Dhabi outside of the hotel.  I went to a party at the Marine House Bar called Chesty's, I played beer pong at an Irish Pub downtown, and went on a half-priced Desert Safari complete with Dune Smashing, Sand Surfing, Camel Riding, Iftar and Hookah.  At the Marine House party I met some really nice people and made some friends, I was able to hang out with some of those friends at the Pub, and dune smashing is always a favorite of mine.  I still haven't been placed in an apartment yet so that makes looking for and buying furniture for the apartment difficult...as does the fact that they have yet to put the funds into our accounts for buying furniture...interesting.  In addition we are supposed to have orientation Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday this week but we don't know for sure how long or at what exact time we leave in the morning. Oh well, shway shway and inshallah every thing will end up all right and I will be in an apartment before school starts...hopefully.  That is all for now, more will come when I can finally begin preparing for my first place on my own.     

People Need to Relax

Okay so yesterday and the day before were two very good examples of what to expect from living in this culture..and that is that things tend to take a while and aren't always well organized.  Sunday night was our first orientation night.  We were supposed to be there at 5pm for registration (none of us knew what we had to register for or what we needed to bring, so that was the beginning of the confusion) and it said that orientation would end at 11pm.  So we all go down to the meeting room, as we get there we see people in copier lines.  We ask them what they are making copies of and why and miraculously no one seems to know.  I laughed and shook my head, there have been several rumors flying around about what is going on and what we need to do, all of which somehow contradict each other.  My new friends and I take a seat, arriving at a little before 5pm.  At about 5:30 a woman comes in to tell us that we don't actually need to be there until between 6:30 and 7pm and that now is simply for making copies.  We find out that we need to make copies of both our stamped passport and visa, for something we need to do later, by word of mouth.  I was about falling asleep on my feet so one of my friends was nice enough to copy my visa for me while I went to take a catnap.  I came back down at about 6:30 to mass chaos in the area outside the meeting room.  There were four tables and, by talking to my friend Ilene, I found out that each table had two lists with names on them and I had to find which list/table had my name so I could get my back account oped at the National Bank of Abu Dhabi.  This seemed simple enough except that teachers kept taking the lists from the table and not putting them back, so instead you had to find the people holding the lists and figure out which table they went to.  Now this would have been bad enough without the 200+ teachers all cramming into a space meant for about 50 or so.  Needless to say, tempers were high and hysterics were beginning.  I was in a perfectly good mood having taken a nap and the sun was setting right outside the window so I calmly found my table, happened to get the third place in line and prepared to wait.  I stood with a smile on my face both due to the beauty of the sunset and the hilarity of the people around me.  People were crying, yelling, swearing, and overall having hysterics.  I got to the hot seat quickly and it was a manner of minutes till I had my bank account open and was again free to do as I pleased until 8:30 when our bosses would actually arrive and orientation would commence.  I was lucky enough to get my account before the bank tellers left for a brief Iftar meal, which I thought was well deserved with how hard they had been working and the fact that they hadn't eaten since 4:30am.  However, I was a little miffed to hear some of the teachers complaining saying "how dare they take a break to eat, we need to get our accounts." After some gentle reminding that they had not been able to eat for over fifteen hours, such teachers learned to keep their comments to themselves.  Having nothing to do and being a bit hungry ourselves, my friends and I went to my room, brought some food, and had a little snack of our own.  We had a great time laughing at the attitudes downstairs and then went down a bit before 8:30 to be ready for orientation.  Orientation started ON TIME yet many teachers were rudely outside getting their accounts open or chatting while we were getting information inside the meeting room.  Therefore, when it came time for the question and answer period people were coming and going or simply not listening and therefore many questions were repeated.  Therefore the orientation that could have taken a half hour took almost two hours.  Oh did I mention that before orientation we were each given a bag that had information for us and a zip drive.  The information packet had a most asked questions part...that answered almost all the questions asked during the Q & A...funny.  Due to the idiocy of many others and the very funny answers by the host of orientation, Ilene, Mary Beth, and I were almost rolling with laughter.  After orientation finished, we all had to get in a line based on our group number...mine was 7...and hand in our Visa, Passport and Copies in order to get our residency and work Visas.  That went relatively quickly and then a bunch of us went upstairs to have a well deserved glass of wine.  I ended the day with fun conversation and by meeting three very nice Italian men.  Yesterday was a bit better...a bit.  We had our medical checks and each group had a time that they needed to be ready to go to the bus.  Some people expected to get in and out while I expected the whole thing to take at least three hours.  It turned out I was right.  I was the last group to go and I was supposed to leave the hotel at noon, we didn't end up leaving until 1:30.  It was about a 45 minute drive to the hospital and then we went up to the 15th floor on a less then completely sturdy elevator.  We sat in chairs and got a number.  Our numbers got called to go to a desk and give them our information.  Then we were pushed through to get our blood pressure and weighed.  Then we had to have a seat until we had a skin test, which consisted of lifting up our shirts and turning around so they could check for leprosy. Then we had to wait again till we could get our blood tests, the people taking my blood laughed when I said my name because apparently when you say my name out loud it means "my dog" in Arabic.  Then we had to wait to have an x-ray to look for TB.  The longest waits were for the skin tests and x-ray.  Knowing it would take a while, I had brought my kindle.  The hospital was clean, air conditioned and the chairs were decently comfortable...I was a happy camper.  Others were not as positive.  Some women rudely asked the helpers if there was a way to speed things up, complaining that they had been waiting for too long, others would get up in a huff to go somewhere else rather then wait with nothing to do, thus making the helpers have to search for them and thereby prolonging the wait of others.  The whole process in the hospital took about 3 hours and I was back at the hotel by 5:30.  I had a two hour nap, went to dinner at the Arabic restaurant in the hotel and then went back to my room hoping to get more sleep then I had the past couple days...I ended up getting 6 hours, one more then normal.  Today, I had a wonderful breakfast and am looking forward to hanging out at the pool and then going to my 5pm aroma therapy massage so until next time, Ramadam Kareem!

I have arrived!

So Thursday I left Minneapolis, MN to fly to Chicago and then on to Abu Dhabi.  Saying goodbye to my family was difficult, but surreal.  It feels more like I am going on a long vacation then moving to another country for a couple years.  The trip from Minneapolis to Chicago was booked to the brim and I had to put my not so small carry-on under the seat in front of me, making the already my already sparse space even more cramped.  However, my discomfort was made instantly better by the tv show, Big Bang Theory, that they had on for us to watch during the flight.  Then my only worry was that I wasn't laughing to much and making a spectacle of myself.  Arriving in Chicago, I had to walk down to the opposite end of the terminal, leave the terminal, walk across an overpass to the transit that I would be taking to International Terminal 5 to check into my flight...I would just like to note that in Minneapolis, when checking my bags, I was told I would just have to get off the plane and there would be a transit right there for a quick trip...no one said anything about all the ups, downs and arounds that you have to go to make it to the international terminal.  I, happily, arrived at the terminal to find that there was a long line of other teachers and nationals also checking into the Etihad flight.  I met a few other teachers who were also on the Minneapolis flight, they were all very nice and as clueless of what was expected of us when we arrived in Abu Dhabi as I was, which made me feel loads better.  I got checked in, finding out from the helpful woman that I didn't have a very good seat, and went on through the gate.  My carry-on was not weighed like so many others.  I got lucky as a few of the other teachers had lighter bags then me and still had to pay fees as high as around $100.  Also, they don't tell you that if you want to get a real food you need to get it in the fast food restaurants that come before the security check otherwise you can either get some snacks (chips and candy and such) near the gate, or go back out and have to go through the security check a second time.  I luckily had some trail mix to enjoy to tide me over.  There were many other teachers and I was fortunate to sit with and get to know a few of them as we waited.  Getting onto the plane was a long process and my seat was on the side in the middle of two people, but the people were nice and it was near the front.  I sat next to a woman who was teaching in Saudi Arabia and a man originally from Abu Dhabi.  The first thing he asked me upon sitting down was if I was Arabic, saying I looked Lebanese (you called it Laya).  I guess I may fit in a bit better then I thought.  The flight was long and I only slept a few hours, but there were plenty of good movies, tv shows and games to keep me busy...also, they constantly feed you so you never really get hungry and the food is really quite good.  Upon getting to Abu Dhabi I could see the water and sand dunes, it was amazing.  Getting off the plane all we followed the tunnel and at the end of the tunnel was a wonderful woman holding a sign for ADEC Teachers, which they call adeck.  We then got our visas and eventually went to get our eyes scanned and to go on through customs...the lines were long and it was quite warm in the terminal.  Then we were directed to baggage claim where we, along with the teachers from Dublin and Toronto, collected our luggage, put it on a cart and went on a long trip to where our buses were waiting for us.  It was warm and humid outside but our bags were put in a big truck and we were all brought to our hotel.  The airport is huge and the roads are very nice.  Upon seeing the Yas Hotel and realizing that was where we were staying made everyone in the bus start chattering with excitement.  To get to the then glowing bluish-purple hotel we had to go over a beautiful bridge, which passed over the Yas Marina Circuit.  Arriving at the hotel we were immediately directed to get our room keys, which they gave with the accompaniment of a wonderful glass of cranberry or orange juice.  We had to give them our passports for some information, but most of us got our passports back that night, I will have to get it this morning.  Then we went back to the lobby, told the nice hotel men which was our luggage and what room to bring it to.  I looked at my wonderful room, showered and dressed for some late dinner as I was then starving.  Because it is Ramadan we only have a limited menu at certain times.  After dinner in the hotels club, I went to my room and looked out at my balcony.  It was wonderful, but then I couldn't close the sliding door and had to call the desk to have them send someone up to close it for me.  I then got dressed and had a blissful 6 hours of sleep, I have a feeling I will need a short nap this afternoon.  As it is I need to get dressed and go eat breakfast before it closes at 9:30.  Then I may try a half priced back massage or mani/pedi that the hotel is offering to the ADEC teachers as today is our free day.  Ramadam Kareem!  Oh and Ferrari World themepark is only a 10minute transit ride away :)