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Technically we aren’t in the desert yet.  Abu Dhabi is on the coast, so most of the sand I see is beach sand.  It is hot and humid though!  We woke up on our first day and went down to breakfast.  Free breakfast at that!  It was very good and had everything you would expect in States.  Except pork of course.  Muslims can’t eat pork.  They did have turkey bacon and for me that was close enough.

Alanna went on a tour with the other teachers after breakfast and left me with Logan.  He didn’t like formula very much, so he cried, then fell asleep and we both slept until Alanna got back.

Our hotel is actually connected to a mall.  Its the Abu Dhabi Mall.  Its huge, three stories and very clean.  They have similar stores as back home and some exactly the same such as Radio Shack, etc.  Their food court has many American fast food chains such as McDonalds, Hardees, KFC and Popeyes.  We chose Popeyes.  The food tasted basically the same except for the biscuits which just tasted a little… different.  Not bad, just different.

The mall is a good place to people watch.  Their are 3 types of people I’ve noticed so far.  There are the native Muslims, which seem to be the majority.  Lots of them wear the traditional robe type outfits – the men wearing white, the women black, with head pieces that sometimes cover their entire faces.  I call them robes at this point because

 there are about 50 names for them.  The second group, a large minority, are the Phillipinos.  They seem to travel from the Phillipines to the UAE to work.  They are the majority of the working class that I’ve seen.  Lastly, are people like me, who are called Expats.  Basically its any non-native from another country – US, lots of Europeons, etc.  Its strange to be the minority but so far everyone seems to just fit in here.

After the mall, we went back to our room and then down to the beach that night.  Alanna played with Logan while I jumped into the water.   You know that feeling – when you first jump into ocean water and its a cold rush?  Well, not

here.  The ocean, even at night, feels like your bath water at the very end when you’re almost ready to get out.  Its not warm, but its not cold.  Last night it was refreshing.  When I got out, I wasn’t cold at all.  The breeze on my wet skin felt really nice.

We ended the day by staying up until 4am.  Yeah… major jetlag.  None of us, including Logan, could sleep.  We finally got some sleep this morning, but we’re still not on a normal schedule yet.  Luckily, we still have 2 more days to do nothing before Alanna’s orientation begins.  

Thats all for now.

Tuesday was a long day. Alanna, Logan and I woke up at 5am at my parent’s house. By 6:15 we were out the door and off to the Charlotte airport. We were worried our luggage would be too heavy (5olb limit per bag) but were suprised to find that none of our bags were over the limit! They also checked them all the way through to Abu Dhabi. We had three legs of our journey to go.

First was a quick flight at 9:30 from Charlotte to DC. Logan slept like a champ and the flight was uneventful. We had a short hour layover in DC. We grabbed some snacks and then hopped on the plane to NYC. Another easy flight, nothing crazy to report thankfully. Well except for the flight attendent. She was rude. Yankees… pfft. We then had a 9 HOUR LAYOVER in JFK. We thought we’d be smart and get a hotel room so we could relax and refesh. The Ramada was the cheapest. And we found out why. It was a rat hole. The wallpaper was peeling, the drink machines didn’t work, room service wouldn’t answer, the only power outlets that worked were in the bathroom! Though it sucked, it still was better than staying in JFK for 9 hours.

We headed back to the airport and headed for our departure gate. We started meeting people along the way who were also going to be teaching with Alanna. They started boarding an HOUR before takeoff because the plane was THAT full and had THAT many people. The plane was full with mostly people from the Middle East and then about 150 teachers and family. We were booked on Etihad Airlines. Etihad is very nice. We boarded before everyone else because we had a baby. The seats were spacious and we had plenty of room to stretch out our feet. Each seat came with its own TV, so we could watch tons of movies, TV shows, play video games, view the travel map, or even watch the trip from cameras on the outside of the plane (watching that while we took off and landed was pretty cool). The plane has a killer first class and business section. You can lay down all the way and sleep and people wait on you hand and foot. Their TVs were as big as a typical computer monitor. Unfortunately, we were in coach. But coach was still very nice and we didn’t pay for the tickets. The trip from JFK to Abu Dhabi takes a whopping 13 hours. That’s just too long for anyone to sit on a plane! Logan was well behaved though. He slept or fed for most of the trip, and only got a little fussy right before we landed. I only took in one movie while we flew – Watchmen. It was… ok. I had skimmed the graphic novel a few times, so I knew the basic plot. Amazing camera work, but other than that it was just so so. I’ll stick with Superman. Alanna watched 17 Again. The one with Zac Efron. I think she has a crush on him. He is pretty.

Anyway, we landed in Abu Dhabi around 7:30pm local time. That’s about 11:30am EST if you’re curious. The Abu Dhabi airport is spectacular. Its very clean and looks state of the art. We were greeted by members of the ADEC (education dept of the government) as we came off the plane. They escorted us through to baggage claim, where a nice man (every teacher got a nice man) got all our luggage and pushed it around for us. After some general confusion of where to go and what hotel group we were in, we were whisked, and I mean whisked through Customs. Basically, we just bypassed it. They didn’t even check our passports or luggage. Stepping outside was the first major culture shock of the trip. As soon as we made it through the sliding glass doors, you could feel the heat. And it was dark already! My glasses immediately fogged up. I had to wipe them off a couple times as we made our way to the bus. The heat wasn’t unbearable, but it was definitely something you could feel. 

We got on a bus which took us from the airport to downtown Abu Dhabi. The city is the capital of the UAE and very busy. its very modern and looks just like any other urban big city in the US. We were dropped off at the Beach Rotana Hotel. Its a 5 star hotel if I’ve ever seen one! They greeted us at the door with a beverage of choice ( we drank some orange juice). After waiting a bit with the other teachers, we were escorted to our room. They had a crib for Logan waiting on us! The room is wonderful and we have a balcony that leads to a large balcony that over looks the beach and has beach access. Internet access is not free, but necessary to stay in touch. The TV has a lot of Arabic stations, and some here and there that we can understand. So our bags got brought up 20 minutes later. We ordered some room service and then hit the pillows for the night.

A very long first day indeed.

 

Here are some more pics from the trip…

 

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