Bountiful Promises

Today's blog is a bit of a back-track in time, but I just found this picture in my archives and figured it would make for a nice story...I don't even think my family has heard all of this one!

This picture was taken from my plane window in Houston back on December 29, 2010. There was a lot of rain in Houston that day, which delayed my flight for about two hours (most of it after we had boarded the plane). Anyways, after sitting there quite bored for 45 minutes or so and having the pilot make 3 or 4 announcements that it shouldn't be too much longer, the clouds finally started to clear and ground activity started to pick up some more. I looked out my window (I had the window seat) and was greeted with this view...a gorgeous double-rainbow! What a way to start off a long-term trip overseas!
It was obvious throughout my travel over here that I was well Provided for. About 30 minutes into our on-the-ground waiting time, the guy at the end of my row (the only other person in my three-seat row) moved to the other side of the plane to sit with his buddies, so for the first 10 hour flight, I had three seats all to myself! I was sitting towards the back of the plane, which was soon designated the "child section", so there were about three or four babies (2 and younger) and several kiddos below 10 flying in the eight rows behind me with their poor parents. Fortunately, I like kids and I'm a heavy sleeper, so the uncomfortable plane seats kept me from sleeping more than the fussy babies did. I only hope and pray that if I ever fly with small children someday, the other passengers will do their best to be understanding and not make me feel any worse about the out-of-my-control situation than I already will at that point (especially since I know very well not one of those parents got even close to the amount of sleep I did)!
I was supposed to have a 5-hour layover in London (Heathrow), but since my first flight left late and it took a long time to de-plane, my wait was more like two hours! I  made it through security again just fine and had time to wash my face, brush my teeth, re-apply deoderant (etc....you know...start feeling like a real human being again), and email home letting them know I'd made it that far just fine.
My second flight was packed full! I again had the window seat, but sat next to a young lady from Poland, and had our row finished off with a good Southern man from South Carolina. The man was passing through Dubai (not even leaving the airport) on his way to another middle eastern country for a business trip. The girl from Poland was moving to Dubai for six months to work as a belly-dancer! We all talked for a little while about our lives, but then spent most of the flight watching our own movies, etc. The girl and I ended up waiting in line together to get our passports stamped, but I think we were both too nervous and tired to talk a whole lot (I'm still kicking myself for not getting her name and mobile* number). She ended up having to go back downstairs to get her work visa stamped, but since I had people waiting for me outside I couldn't stay and wait with her :(.
I got through customs just fine, wrangled my three big shipping totes onto a cart, walked down the hallway like a scared little kitten, through the doors, spotted a beaming familiar face in the crowd of people outside and had just enough time to see a brightly painted sign with my name on it being displayed by little miss Evan before I was enveloped in a huge Jerri K hug! The rest of the trip home was a bit of a blur--I do know Kevin got my trunks all out to the vehicle and loaded up for me, Evan talked a lot about Justin Bieber (her celebrity heart-throb), and Jerri K smiled a lot and kept looking at me like I might vanish into thin air :)! Then, we were driving through the city...tons of bright lights (it was a bit after midnight on December 30th--so, technically early December 31st...Dubai is 10 hours ahead of Texas), and lots of tall buildings and "spaghetti" (overpasses). Then we were home...got my trunks brought in and sat and talked with Jerri K until 3 in the morning! I unpacked just enough for the night and slept like a baby until 10 or so the next morning! It was lovely.

*Everyone calls cell phones "mobiles" (long "i" sound) over here (as in, "I need to get your mobiiile number before I leave today."). Also, text messages are called "SMS"...not sure why!

Bountiful Wittle Sisters!

Alrighty, yesterday's post was about the boys...tonight's post will be about the three other little reasons that I ABSOLUTELY love being in Dubai. They're pictured below: Evan, Bella, and Alex.

I'll probably give them each a little blog to further introduce them at a later time (sorry, I probably won't be doing that with the boys until later this year...I don't spend as much time with them as you will soon see, so I don't have as many stories to tell with them...however, they HAVE been doing a really good job of keeping me well supplied with funny quotes to share on my Facebook statusii...so you might want to check those out!).  

I am blessed enough to get to work with these three little ladies on a daily basis as a teacher, babysitter/nanny,  big sister/"role model", and in various other capacities as the opportunity arises. One of my primary functions with these girls is to teach them Bible classes each week after school. It is so exciting to get to watch the light bulbs come on for each of them! That's a fascinating experience as a teacher in any classroom...but when it's knowledge about the Bible it's just that much more thrilling! (It's also helping me to learn the stories a lot better for myself!) Then I get to take them out for gelato after school on Thursdays* if they've got their memory verse for the week memorized. My second major role with the girls is to watch them in the evenings when both their parents are out for meetings. This has been so much fun and provided lots of opportunities for "sisterly bonding times". On weekend nights, we'll sometimes have movie nights complete with pizza, popcorn, sodas, and a good Disney movie or we might just have a game/funny stories night. Weeknights we don't have quite as much time for just hanging out between eating dinner, packing lunches, and getting them ready for bed, but sometimes we get done early enough to all sit down and read a story together (love it!--we recently read an excerpt from The Secret Garden during which I got to practice my Yorkshire accent and Alex and Bella both decided it is very difficult to read a Yorkshire accent...I agreed whole-heartedly!). In addition to this, I occasionally pick the girls up from school and help them with their homework when their parents are busy with other things. And since my roommate, Jerri K, and I live in the maid's quarters of Evan, Bella, and Alex's family villa, we quite frequently have them popping over for whatever treat we might have on hand or a 5, 10, 30, or 60 minute conversation about life and all the exciting or bummer things that go on when you're 7, newly 9, or 12! 

I LOVE IT! 

So there's my brief summary of what I do with the girls...there will definitely be more adventures with them to share later, though. Suffice it to say that these three little chickpeas are just...well...words will never really do them justice...it's amazing to me how fast three young ladies could worm their way into my heart with their daily hugs and smiles and requests for stories about my family and sharing their funniest thing for the day...I just LOVE it!!!! 

* Thursdays are the last school day here...they're the equivalent of an American Friday...almost. Fridays here are like American Sundays (church day/everyone's off work), and Saturdays are just like Saturdays in America, except Sunday is our "Monday", so it's treated like a school night. :( 

Also, gelato is an Italian ice cream...very tasty...it's creamier and has less fat content and isn't quite as sweet as regular ice cream. They have this in America as well, so I'd encourage you to find someplace near you that has some (maybe a coffee shop or something) and check it out...it's fun and definitely worth a try! I think the two guys behind the counter at the gelato shop across the street from the girls school are starting to recognize us coming in each Thursday...so that makes it really fun, too! ;)

Bountiful Educating

(Jonathan and Jared with their new dogs Molly and Baxter)

The grandmother has spoken...her request? How are you involved with the boys' homeschooling? So here's my response (with plenty of backstory, of course). Jared and Jonathan are in 6th and 8th grades, respectively. They were accepted into an American school here, but there were no openings available, so they had to go a different route. They are using the K12 iCademy online program (I copied that shamelessly from their family's blog). Basically, all the work my mom did planning out our lessons for us is already posted online for them and laid out daily. Unfortunately for these guys, there are no semester breaks in this curriculum, so they're having to complete a whole year's worth of classes before the end of June (technically before the end of August...but who wants to work all through the summer?). This program has an office that's about 10 minutes from where we live (the boys' family's villa is a 5-10 minute walk from our house! Through the alleyway, past the mosque, around the corner and through the gate!), and they are assigned a teacher who looks over a sample of their work every month or so and is available for live web chats if they need some extra help. The boys' mom, Leslie, and I serve as their "learning coaches"... i.e. we check their work, motivate them to keep working, explain things to them (the whole time double-checking with each other to make sure we're correctly remembering different parts of speech and mathematical functions, etc.). So there's the backstory...now, on to what I do....

A "typical" day* at their house might involve any (or many) of the following: checking Jared's or Jonathan's worksheets (we finally discovered the Teacher Keys, so that task is tons easier than it used to be!), tearing out worksheets for both boys and putting them in their weekly folders (if they don't complete their daily assignments, the online schedule just moves all the lessons in that subject back a day...therefore, their ending date keeps getting moved back...we're hoping that by having the worksheets in a folder, they'll be better able to keep track of what they should be doing each day), cracking a lame joke or two to lighten some history (the bane of Jonathan's existence) or science (not really something Jared enjoys) or literature (neither particularly cares for this...me either actually) frustrations...and then encouraging them (sometimes nicely, sometimes not so much) to get back to it. 

Jared really seems to like the homeschooling...maybe he just doesn't heave great sighs in front of me, but he really likes school and is flying through it...similar to my sister Rebecca, I think. Here's a picture of us sitting at his "desk"...the Arab couch (quite comfy arrangement of different sized/shaped cushions on the floor...very brilliant!)...although usually most of his tutoring with me occurs at my "desk" (the leather couch in the middle of the living room).

Now Jonathan...he's taking me back to my middle school years...only this time I'm seeing it more from my mom's point of view (it's kinda weird)! Jonathan is less of a fan of school...he's smart, but I know he misses the social aspects of "real school". That being said, I feel like we completely connect with history...it's the worst subject ever (for all you history buffs out there, I apologize...but you probably don't enjoy dissecting flowers or memorizing the taxonomy of animals like I do, so...so there!)! I now appreciate my mom SO much more for wading through ALL that horrid history information with me (although it is a tad more fun to learn when you know you won't be tested on it...so you don't really have to learn it well)! Here's a picture of Jonathan studying up on some Renaissance art...yes, that's Michelangelo's David...and yes, that's a post-it note that Jonathan snagged from me...I told him to look for an answer to one of his worksheet questions on that page, at which point he gave me that "seriously?!?" look (I, of course, responded with a "teacher look") and when I walked back over to him...well...he'd improvised. :) (I told you he was smart!)

So, there's how I'm involved with the boys' homeschooling...hopefully this has been a suitable answer to that question (there was no answer key, so I can't really check my work very well). I'll save describing what I do with the girls for another time, but I do very much love what I'm doing here. For those of you who know me, you know I LOVE being a big sister...to anyone younger than me...whether they want a big sister or not! I don't know for sure whether any of these five kids here that I'm working with view me as that, but I definitely see them as younger siblings and am enjoying laughing with them and sympathizing with them and joking with them and loving on them and pouring into their lives academically and otherwise! 

* For the past seven or eight years, my least favorite question has been "What are you going to do after ____?____?" Now my least favorite question is "What does a typical day look like for you?". I still haven't figured it out for sure! Flexibility is key! Usually, my weekdays will consist of some work with the boys and then a Bible class or two with the girls, but other than that, there are relatively few guarantees...but this spontaneity is really turning out to be a lot more fun than I ever thought it would be!

Bountiful Snackies! :)

Allow me to introduce you to the best thing since sliced bread (incidentally, it's pretty good with sliced bread, too!). 

Okay, so, if you follow me on Facebook or got an email from me within the first week or two of me being here, then you've likely already heard about this stuff...but hommos* is just that awesome (that, and I'm kinda zonked, and this topic won out because made for a relatively short blog post........hopefully you enjoy brutal honesty in your reading...if not, please move on to the next blogger's site!)

Now, I realize that we have hummus back back in the States, but Americans don't eat it like people here do...it's used as a substitute for many condiments and is the ultimate dipping sauce! I've had it on cucumbers, carrots, tomatoes, and if I'd eaten any other veggies, I'd have put it on them, too (sorry Mom, but at least I am still drinking all my milk! :). It is especially good with Arabic and Lebanese bread (think really thick, soft tortillas)--torn into bite-size pieces and dipped into a bowl of hommos. I've found it also works the same way with sliced bread...the Arab bread gets moldy rather quickly, so I had to either run to the store or improvise one day...pretty fun little discovery. Also, I've had this stuff on french fries...not that I'm particularly proud of using carbs as a condiment for carbs, but it's very tasty (I've only done that once or twice)! 

I would also like to draw your attention to the label for a few more cultural pointers. You will notice the dates beneath the product label (Produced on and Use by: 18-01-11). I still have not figured out how long before hommos expires, but I'm fairly certain it's more than a day (either that or my sisters are very right about my indelicate digestive system)...it's definitely less than two weeks.... BUT, that wasn't the point I was trying to make! There is, in fact, no 18th month here...when listing the date, they place the day first, then the month, and end with the year. Looking at the expiration dates threw me off quite a bit during my first week or so here..."Why does everything expire on the first of each month!? And how in the world is this yogurt going to stay good until September!?!!!!"

You may also notice (if you have good eyesight) that the weight is listed in kilograms. Most things here are reported using the metric system only (not that that's a surprise, just not something I had really thought about until I got here). The more cooking I do, the more I wish I would have paid better attention to conversion factors between the English and metric systems back in middle school science! 

And finally, the price is in dirhams, so not only is this stuff really yummy, it's also really inexpensive!

I apologize for now having two food-based blogs in a row. I will do my best to have a non-food related post tomorrow. 

*Hommos (also spelled hummus, hommus, hummos, etc.) "is made from cooked, mashed chickpeas, blended with tahini, olive oil, lemon juice, salt and garlic" (thank you Wikipedia!). No, I have no idea what tahini is.

Bountiful Surprises!

Guess what I got today!!!

My family put together an awesome care package for me! It started out just as them sending some of my favorite coffee (San Antonio Blend from H-E-B), and of course my favorite coffee creamer (Hazelnut flavored), but then morphed to include a few more goodies. Jerri K and I have yet to find a really good coffee here that we like (other than the froo-froo stuff in the coffee shops). One of the stores we looked at only had instant coffee, so we got a Lebanese blend, but haven't really masted that yet. Another store had coffee grounds, so we tried a Sumatra blend (no, not the Starbucks kind), but it's taking us a while to get the coffee to water ratio balanced enough that we're not drinking tar! I was lucky enough to find liquid hazelnut coffee creamer about a week into my stay here, but I have not found it again in any of the stores we've gone to (and believe me, I've looked). We've discovered that if you find something you really like that's not a local thing, it's best to stock up on it then or it might not be there when you go back...for a long time!

The Oreos here are not too expensive (although they're only sold in single row tubes, not the triple row packs), however, they taste kinda funky. They'll do in a pinch, but I'm planning to take full advantage of the drier weather here and ration out this pack!

Pringles here are about twice the cost they are in the States. I think we've seen them for 11 or 12 AED (Arab Emirates Dirhams...roughly equivalent to $0.33)*. We have caved in and purchased one tube of those, and they tasted wonderful! :)

Jerri K and I have looked for Wheat Thins here, but with little success. As I was unpacking my package, Brooke (our hostess) pointed them out and said, "Oh, that's nice!", so I'm guessing they really don't have them here. We have found a few other cracker-type things here, but they're either very different from what we have back home or they're very expensive.

Two of the last three items in the pack were WONDERFUL surprises...candy! The jellybeans and Andes mints are going to be great (and surprisingly, the chocolate didn't melt...guess I'll share them since I won't be licking them out of the bag)! I have not looked for jellybeans here, but probably wouldn't buy them even if I did...they're a great treat to have from Mama, though! We do have chocolate here (which is very good news), and a lot of it is the same brands and candy bar types you would find in America...at pretty similar prices, I think. I did rediscover Bounty chocolate bars here...woohoo! AND I've found a Bounty ice cream bar (pretty inexpensive)...but I try not to keep those on hand (especially since they wouldn't be on hand very long if I knew such deliciousness was reposing in my freezer)!

And my final surprise was the cocoa covered almonds! I love those things!!! Mama gets them for Daddy at Sam's Club back home and then whenever I'm home I pull them out and eat half the canister...which Daddy hates, of course! I'm pretty sure I did a little jig when I pulled those out of the package! I wouldn't know the first place to look for something like that here. Surely one of the cultures represented in this country has something similar to that...hopefully I can find some before I return. (Now that I think about it a bit more, we went to a place called Global Village the other night--it has big rides like a fair back home might, and there are "marketplaces" set up for many of the countries around here. One of the countries--Iran maybe--had some really good candied pistachios...perhaps I will check those out again and bring a few home!)

*Interesting fact about shopping: the tax is already figured in to the price here, and most things are marked in whole numbers of dirhams (so it's very easy to do the math and determine EXACTLY how much you'll be paying). The grocery stores sometimes have things marked in dirhams and fils (1 fil = 1/100 dirham, I think), but since the smallest coin typically in circulation is a 25 fil coin, the cashiers just round to the closest 25 fils--you might get too much or not enough change back! 

Bountiful Complexities....

Alrighty, I've heard from you and have discovered I need to do a much better job of keeping up with this...so here goes. My friend Jerri K (whose blog I've heard many of you have been keeping up with...can't say that I blame you since she posts more than once a month)...anyways, she has been posting pictures of some of our daily activities. I'm not quite that organized, so I'm just going to post a picture a day or so, and then tell you the story behind it and/or activities that might accompany it--I'm shooting for a bit of randomness, I guess. Hopefully this method will bring a smile to your face (or outright laughter would be swell!), a bit of insight into life here, and perhaps be a small bright spot in your day. Here goes....

This lovely picture represents one of the many cultural lessons Jerri K and I have learned from experience! This is a picture of the door of a little (or perhaps, considering it's location, a rather large) shop in a "neighborhood" of Dubai called Satwa*. The store name is called City Man (you see that in the red and yellow boxes on the door there), but do not let the name fool you...I've been told that it a good place to get rather inexpensive churidars (traditional blouses worn by Indian women).  Jerri K and I ventured out in hopes of discovering the merits of this establishment for ourselves. I will not, in this space, attempt to fully disclose all the details of our adventure in its entirety, suffice to say it was one of our earlier outings when all the roads and routes were even more confusing than they are now (after 2 months of driving them!), and the traffic in Satwa is an excellent reminder that we do, in fact, share the roads here with people from countries who have less stringent driving laws than we do. After circling the block, or rather the strip of blocks, where this store is located, we finally determined this was our destination and located an unintimidating and rather uncongested looking parking lot nearby. We slinked into our choice of spots (conveniently located near the parking meter--they have those for entire parking lots here...that may occur in other large cities, but it is a new concept to me...shoot, paying for any street-side parking is a relatively new concept to me!!!), gathered our wits about us, and stepped out to conquer a new adventure...the parking meter. After squinting against the 2:30 sunlight, we determined that the little screen was informing us that parking was free until 4 o'clock! Such luck!!! After walking a couple of short blocks back to where we had seen the shop, we were feeling rather confident that we had managed well....

I now direct your attention back to the picture. You will notice beneath the store name a section labeled "Timing". Since I have the advantage of making the original picture larger on my computer, I will read it for you...ahem...

"Timing 

9 am to 2 pm

4 pm to 12 pm"

You will recall I mentioned the time a bit earlier...shortly after 2:30 pm. We have probably not looked that much out of place before or since as we just stared at the door for a good minute or two. We did decide that a two-hour lunch/nap break (while very unfortunate for us) is really a very brilliant idea before we started our defeated trek back to our lonely car in the free (until 4) parking lot. We have not yet attempted this excursion again, but now, at least, we have a better understanding of the street layout in Satwa and have learned a little more about the enigma that is the parking meter!

*Dubai is broken up into MANY different "neighborhoods" or "regions". I really don't have a good guess as to how many blocks it might encompass (look it up on Google Earth if you must know!), but some of them are primarily residential areas, some are primarily retail areas, etc. Satwa is like a large market--at least the portion we went to.

Bountiful Adventures!

Well, one of these days perhaps I will do a better job of publishing my life online, but for now it seems very difficult to find the time...perhaps because life has been so full of adventures these past three weeks! Packing for the trip to Dubai was quite an experience and got smushed into the 4-day period between Christmas and departure (with a sister's birthday on one of those days, as well); but I'm happy to report that the flights and all of the travel in general was very good--no real complications--woohoo!

The day after I landed (New Year's Eve), the team and I (all 11 of us) drove up to Jebel Hafeet, the highest point in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), so we could look out over the country as we kicked off our new year! On New Year's day, we all had a picnic in the desert and spent the afternoon dune-bashing (driving up and down through the dunes with plenty of slipping and sliding included...basically, the Arab redneck version of mudding). ;)

My first week here was spent trying to catch up on sleep, and getting unpacked and familiarized with the new surroundings. Here are a few interesting discoveries that I have made in my two weeks here: most of the stores are found in malls (including the grocery stores), light switches must be flipped down to turn electricity on and up to turn it off, most of the restaurants have delivery service (only a few have drive-thrus), the main currency is the AED or dirham (about 3.5 dirhams to a dollar), a can of Pringles is about $2 (not too bad), Fridays in UAE are the same as Sundays in USA (go to church, labor workers have the day off), Sundays in UAE are the same as Mondays in USA (start back to school and work), and all the gas stations are full service (I'm going to be VERY spoiled when I get back home!). Also, I've found two favorite foods already. The first is chicken biryani (pronounced bree-YAWN-ee), an Indian dish of rice and chicken (still on the bone, so plenty messy to eat) that is incredibly flavorful! The second is called a shawarma (pronounced SHWAR-ma), and is the Arab version of a McDonald's hamburger--it consists of thinly sliced meat, lettuce, tomatoes, sauce, pickles, and probably some other stuff wrapped up in Arab bread (think pita bread).

The traffic here is not nearly as bad as I expected it to be--it is actually somewhat like Houston with a touch of India (I guess) mixed in. The traffic can get pretty thick at times and people treat the lines between lanes as a suggestion, but there are very few wrecks (I haven't seen one yet). I've heard that some of the taxi drivers can be deported if they have a wreck, so the stakes for not driving safely are pretty high! The weather has been absolutely beautiful--today was the first rather hot day we've had. I've been able to wear long-sleeved or 3/4-sleeved shirts most days and not gotten too toasty at all!

Now for the most important part--the people! There are so many cultures represented here that people-watching is more fascinating than anywhere else I've ever lived! I've had the opportunity to talk with women from the Philippines, India (several regions), Russia, South Africa, the UAE (see story later on), Australia, and (of course), USA. I found myself very surprised at how similar people here are to people back home--obviously there are differences in culture, but once I looked past the differences in dress and (some) behavior, I was amazed! I love it!!! My favorite story so far (and I'll likely be telling it a lot when I get back home, so just prepare yourselves to smile through it again later) was about these two Arab ladies (presumably Emirati's) that Jerri K (my roomie) and I met in the park. They were both grandmothers (based on the depth of their laugh-lines and the face coverings they were wearing), and reminded me of two awesome ladies from back home (Debbie V. and Susan M., I met your Arab counterparts!). The essence of the story is this: neither of them could speak more than two words in English (apparently-- "hello" and "bye" were all we got), but we all had a great time jabbering back and forth in our own languages--them pointing and laughing and telling us all about it in Arabic, us pointing at what we thought they were talking about and laughing back and trying to clear things up in English, them chattering and laughing some more while shaking their heads like they didn't really understand but continuing to talk about it like they did (always in Arabic), and us smiling and laughing back with a little less zeal and just shrugging our shoulders. It was a great time and never in my life have I had such a great laugh with complete strangers--I loved it!!! =D I hope to have many other fun stories like that before I come home!

As for the girls I'm working with--they are sooo wonderful!!! Evan is 12, Bella is 8, and Alex is 7 (pictures will be coming soon), and they each have such different personalities. I can't wait to see what adventures with them lie in store for the remainder of my stay! Jerri K has been a great help in getting me used to the city and being an adventure buddy--I'm quite certain we both help to embolden each other enough to try lots of new things we'd never think of attempting on our own!

Guess that's it for now! Hopefully the next entry won't be quite the marathon this one was! :)