MinneSAUDI: September 2016

Saturday, September 24, 2016

Post #3 from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

Day 43 in the Kingdom: September 25, 2016

It's taken 42 days to get my cell phone working here. Yesterday, I had to go to the "Ladies Only" section of the Rashid Mall and into the "Ladies Only" STC store for my SIM card. [This country.....ugh.]

It's taking more than 43 days for us to be able to wire money back to the USA. [Again, this country.....ugh.]

We have not seen one drop of rain in 43 days.

Since my last post 14 days ago, the weather for each day has been: 103, 104, 104, 104, 102, 104, 104, 111, 102, 111, 102, 102, 105, 108 & a balmy 105. [And again, this country.....ugh.]

In the last 43 days, we've either been driven by a private driver or taken a compound bus wherever we need to go. This is a new lifestyle.

I met Xiu Mei Pan from China who works at "The Spa at Sara Village." She is an amazing practitioner and I have already enjoyed two therapy sessions, a one hour massage and a one hour reflexology treatment. It was my first time experiencing reflexology and it was very interesting. She definitely hit specific pressure points on my feet which corresponded to other areas of the body or systems. When she whispered that the one hour session was over, I couldn't believe it. It felt like only 10 minutes had passed. I may have to try that one again, although the three outer toes held a lot of pain and I'm not sure I want to feel that again anytime soon, although that is exactly what I probably need. Each one hour session cost $31.99. [This country......yes!]

On September 14th and 15th, we took a very short trip to the country of Bahrain. Our hired driver, Bhilal, is from India where his wife and 6 year old son live. He travels home for one month a year to see them, otherwise he owns his own driving company and makes a very good living in Saudi, which is what he must do since he can not make a decent living in India. While here, he rents an apartment with three other men that shares a common living area for 1000 Saudi Riyals a month. [$266 divided by the 3 men.]

To get to Bahrain, we traveled 25 kilometers [15 miles] on the King Fahd Causeway which included five security controls and six gates. It only took us 2 solid hours to travel through security as often times the back-up can take 4 to 5 hours. At the controls, they asked to see our passports, Iquama and entry/exit visas. They checked underneath the vehicle, collected money and checked Bhilal's insurance. There was also a driving lane "For Ladies Only." We saw many fancy, clean cars and loaded SUVs with license plates from Bahrain, KSA, Kuwait and Qater.

The Baharinin currency is the Dinar which is basically 10 Saudi Riyals. One Riyal is $3.75, so we were doing some crazy calculations between the three currencies in our heads every time we made a purchase! Let's just say that math is not our strong suit [I can hear Megan laughing now] so eventually we just estimated the conversion, said f** it let's buy it and be done.

While there, we went to the movie "Sully" which was a REAL TREAT to be in a movie theater! [There are NO movie theaters in the Kingdom, this country.....ugh.] We ordered the combo and the popcorn was a mixture of regular and caramel! Wow, that was snazzy! I really liked the movie.

In the evening, we sat in the hotel courtyard surrounded by the aroma of tobacco and observed couples, men only and women only smoking from hookahs. It was an option to order a hookah. Instead, we ordered two tall Heinekens, admired the full moon and watched a giant music video screen only to realize that the music we heard did not match the video we were watching in the slightest. I thought, "My God, doesn't anything make sense over here?" Geeesh, bring another Heineken.......Ahhhhh, as I sipped my tall cold glass of beautiful beer, I sensed someone standing next to me, looked over and there stood one of my 6th grade students. "Hello Mrs. Wyant." OMG. Seriously? He pointed out his family sitting behind us. "Mr. Jacob" and I turned around and the family of 6 all waved at us. Later, we made our way over for the "meet and greet" and as we approached, they all stood and remained standing the entire conversation. The Muslim mom was completely covered and as I stood there sweating from the night humidity, I thought that the customs of this culture and Muslim religion really make the women endure more than they should in this climate! As the family left, the waiter informed us that they paid for our pizza and beers! Wow.

We made our way back to our super huge luxurious room [http://www.elitegrouphotels.com/elite-seef-residence/elite-seef-residences.php ] and proceeded to scan the TV channels, all 2000 of them. One was "Iran Fun." That channel didn't come in.

Jake's healthy outlet.

The next day, we took a taxi to the "The Skate Shack" where we purchased a TREK mountain box for "Mr. Jacob." At this point in our Kingdom adventure, this purchase was a necessity for my husband's mental well-being. He enjoys his "Tour de Compound", along with other riders who exercise in 3 mile circles around Sara Village. Some purchases within a marriage don't seem logical, given this environment or lack of it and sometimes wives don't question, we just support. LOL. [This country.....ugh.]

While we can say that we've visited a new country, this constitutionally monarch ruled country with its archipelago of 33 islands in the Arabian Peninsula specializing in oil, fishing and pearls was nothing special. Once was enough for me, although if we want to go to a movie theater, we'll have to endure the five checkpoints and six gates to get there.

One of my favorite lines from the movie "The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" sums up how I feel SOME of the time: "This is a new and different world. The challenge is to cope with it. Not just cope but thrive.”

The ISG Dammam Varsity Girls Basketball Season officially started last week with our first practice! I walked into the gym where 18 girls in 10th-11th and 12th grades were waiting. I said, "You here to play basketball?" "Yeah. Yes. Yes Miss. Yes Mam" "Good, I'm Coach Wyant, line up on the baseline tallest to shortest, let's go." And so it began......

One girl wore her hijab during the entire practice. I said if we don't make 50% of our lay-ups this first practice, we're running. Didn't make 50%. I took off my whistle, said "Line up behind me, single file, we're playing follow the leader." After lap #3, the girl behind me panted "Coach, how many laps are we doing?" I said, "10." I could hear the number 10 being passed back through the line and we continued running......in silence...... until the 9th lap when they were happy to be almost done! [Let's just say that the next 3 days, I was VERY sore!] After 1 hour 30 minutes, we had our first team meeting. It was a great first practice. Stay tuned for more news on the Leopards because I've recruited fellow colleagues and formed a staff BB team to scrimmage against my team and I'm organizing a team bonding event on the compound.

My Ukrainian Russian friend, Olga.

OLGA is doing well. She has the middle school science lab completely organized and is working on her English skills. She asked me what the word "defect" means. You can imagine how my wheels were spinning after she left my classroom. The next day, she asked me to read an email she wrote to see if it sounded proper. The email was about one new microscope that was shipped to the school and not working and how it has a defect. Dang, that shot my spy theory to pieces, for now.......

The overgrown, unloved patio.

We're hiring a gardner from the compound staff to clean up and help rebuild our patio and landscaping. Stay tuned for the updates in the coming months.

We've also booked our flights for Christmas vacation, departing December 17th from Dammam to Bangkok, Thailand. Jake and I will explore the sights, including the River Kwai before we board the train on December 23rd to Suratthani and pick up our SUV and drive to the Poseidon Bungalows

Where we will be Dec. 23rd-Dec. 31st.

[ http://www.similantours.com/ ] We'll settle in and wait until early Christmas morning, drive to the Phuket airport and pick up Megan and Jonah! We're looking forward to a day of snorkeling in the Similan Islands, trekking through the Khao Lak National Park on an elephant and hanging out at our beach bungalows! The kids will fly back to the states on New Year's Eve and Jake & I will be back in Bangkok ringing in 2017!

Here's the new addition to our villa, a clock with Arabic numbers! Bought it at the second hand store on the compound for 20 Riyal!

The sideways villa clock with Arabic numbers.

Finally, I must end with the positives about our adventure life here in the sand box..... We are having a blast together. We go out to eat to eat on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. On Wednesdays, we have authentic, homemade Chinese dinner at the Oasis restaurant. On Thursdays, we are at Bo Diddly's Poolside Restaurant for fish & chips or grilled ribeye and on Saturdays, Senjay, the chef from India, grills us salmon or lamb chops at Harley's restaurant. On these three days, we eat with our friends, Ann & Clay from Florida and Carolyn & Chris from Oregon.

I continue to follow home by reading Google News every morning, the Aitkin Age, scanning Facebook and sending/receiving emails from friends and family. Again, if you have a moment, please check in with my mom by sending her a quick email: wyants@frontiernet.net.

Until next time, my friends.

Sunday, September 11, 2016

Post 2

TODAY: Day 29, September 11^th, 2016: GOD BLESS THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA and stand up for the National Anthem!

Yesterday I experienced a 1.5 hour Access Consciousness Bars Therapy session by a masseuse from the Czech Republic. She was trained in Canada, Poland and the USA. It was a new experience which I enjoyed and benefited from. I will try it a second time. To learn more see: https://youtu.be/X2HWH9fG_40.

We are enjoying a 9 day break from school while the Muslims celebrate Eid al-Adha [Festival of the Sacrifice.] See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eid_al-Adha. We have seen semi loads of sheep on the drive to and from school this past week.

Jake and I took the shopping bus this morning to LuLu’s and bought the most delicious hummus, tabouli and two felafels for lunch! http://www.luluhypermarket.com/SA/all.

It took 26 days to obtain the necessary identification [Iqama] and entry/exit visas in order for us to travel outside of the Kingdom. It took Jake FOUR trips to Samba Bank to set up our account and yet the international beneficiaries [Bremer and Members COOP] are still pending, so we are unable to wire our money back to the USA at this time. Nothing moves smoothly or quickly here.

Gas is 70 cents a gallon.

The Sri Lanken jeweler and his wife have two shops on the compound which sells only eco-friendly gifts and unique Middle-Eastern items such as camel hide luggage. His brother designs leather journals and was commissioned by the Games of Thrones producers to design the leather bound books for the series. There’s a compound fun fact!

We had a Mad Max Moment on the highway last week with our driver, Sunil. There was a bad accident that rerouted traffic. The second there was an opening in the median, cars, semis and vans started back tracking on an on-ramp OR cut across the desert back to the main highway! Guess which one Sunil picked?! It was a frickin free for all. We couldn’t believe it. All we could do was clutch the seat in front of us and hold on! There were a lot of comments in our van such as “Holy Sh**”, “Oh Oh Oh!” ‘Dear God!”

So the canteen, a.k.a the cafeteria, is the exact opposite of Rippleside. Think of the stoplight. If that contraption were in our canteen, the red light would have blown up after 10 seconds of lunch beginning because kids come and go, sit where they want, visit, laugh, stand, eat, play on their cell phones, read a book, play with a soccer ball in the corner and SOCIALIZE. I have duty once a week and I only need to make sure that kids are NOT running in canteen.

We had our first emergency drill at school. I was impressed with our procedure, however, Olga filled me in what happened to Miss Heba, our Middle School secretary when she painted our classroom paddles which we hold up outside to indicate our class……Earlier that day, Heba had an EXTREME reaction in our staff lounge and was taken by ambulance to the hospital. Before school was over, Olga stormed into my classroom. In her Russian accent: “Amy, give me your bottle.” “My bottle?” “Yes, your bottle right now!” “Olga, you want my water bottle?!?!” I asked puzzled. “NO! Amy, your bottle dat is red on one site and green on de otter site.” “Oh, you mean my PADDLE! From our emergency drill! Got it. The word is paddle, not bottle Olga. Why?” “I need it because the paint that Miss Heba used to paint the bottles contains poison!!!!” Damn straight I gave Olga my “bottle” and I have not seen it since. Olga has my back.

6^th grade writing assessments were last week over the course of three days: My students received one prompt each in narrative, informational and opinion. The students wrote for 45 minutes . Our language arts department met for two afternoons and began the process of evaluating their writing based on a nine section rubric. Good stuff.

Our Minnesota principal and his wife, Jon and Cheryl, invited us to a social at their huge home on a different compound last Thursday after work. [Administration is provided with nice pads!] There, we met the most lovely couple from Syria. He’s a neurosurgeon and she works at our school. I shared Jonah’s 10^th grade story of “Timmy the Tumor”. He knew exactly what I was talking about. Visiting with them about the current state of Syria absolutely made my head spin. Their family is still there and so far they are in a safe zone. Again, the stories that people share and the amazing resiliency against tremendous odds is absolutely awe-inspiring…..and to think that some back home are all bent out of shape over a round-about…..

The temperature has been hovering around 105 to 116 degrees. Sometimes at night when it’s ONLY 98 degrees, I walk the perimeter of the compound security wall which is a solid 3 miles. Otherwise, Jake and I are becoming regulars at the Lagoon pool. We sit in our same cedar pool lounge chairs situated underneath the bamboo thatched umbrella while I read the Arab News: http://www.arabnews.com/. Yeah, we feel pretty cool…..

First major cultural FU: So there I was, at the Dhahran Mall http://www.dhahranmall.com/ without Jake. He was at the bank for the third time. Our school van stopped after work for two hours, so we split up and shopped. Well, after 15 minutes of being there, I heard the prayers start over the loud-speaker. Oh NO! Shops started to close. I power-walked up to the third floor food court and got my spinach chicken lasagna order in right before they shut off the lights. I sat at the nearest table and waited 15 minutes while it baked. I could feel staring as I realized that I was the only white person, let alone a white woman sitting there. I could hear Mitchell’s voice in my head saying “Mom---always be alert, situational awareness.” Men would walk by and glance longer than felt comfortable. Saudi women dressed in black with their faces fully covered carrying the most expensive designer bags one can buy strolled by behind their husbands. I started feeling nervous. The prayers were audible over the speakers which I find quite eerie. Finally, my lasagna is done so I picked it up and moved to a table along the wall without making eye contact with anyone. Men everywhere. Looking, staring, I inhaled my food and threw half of it away and got the f*** out of there. As I shared my story on the van ride home, my colleagues reminded me that I sat right in the middle of the “Men Only” section. OMG. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. At the time, I didn’t even think about the segregation of seating. Lesson learned. Big time. I felt glad that no one approached me and although as a Western woman, I am allowed to walk alone in public places, I have informed Prince Jake that I am not doing that again.

Our Middle School International Week is coming up in October. We’re supposed to wear clothing that represents our country—What do you wear when you’re an American? I seriously don’t know what to do.

WOW Week for the middle and high school students is scheduled for February 16^th-26^th. Week Outside the Walls is a time when students are encouraged to travel all over the world. Multiple trips are offered and scheduled. Those who do not travel internationally are able to particpiate in unique camps and learning opportunities at our schools and in the KSA. This year, some of the trips that my middle schoolers are offered include the Grand Canyon, Thailand, Jordan, France, just to name a few. WOW is built into our school schedule to support the growth of world citizens and to expand our students’ perspectives and understanding of others.

Indian head wobbling: So I work with several women from India and noticed the consistent wobbling of their heads when they interact with me. I really did not understand what was going on until I asked my colleague who has traveled all over the world. What I took as “attitude” is actually cultural. I feel better! New knowledge!

Learn more: PHOTOS: Enjoy the varied images of our life in the KSA.