Home Is Where The Plane Lands

Well well well. What a difference High Speed Internet makes. I really don’t know how anyone lives without it. I do remember the days when I had a tiny little modem that made an awful noise when it dialed and connected, but I wouldn’t call that “old school” or anything. Progress is good. So we’re all “connected” now and have normal high speed internet, so this post should (cross your fingers) have more pictures!

We’re settling in nicely here in the little oasis that is Al Ain. Alanna’s work is slowly getting better and better. She doesn’t come home mad every day now, so again, progess is good. I love spending my days with Logan. He’s actually fallen into a wonderful routine. We get up usually between 9 and 10am, and play in the bed for 30 minutes. Then its an hour or 2 of the Disney Channel. His favorites are Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Winnie the Pooh. On a side note, I’m glad my child is learning about Mickey, Donald and Goofy. I think kids have forgotten these guys! Anyhoo, after TV time its lunch time. Logan now happily drinks a full 7oz bottle (exactly what he should be drinking for his age) of formula around 11:30am. After that, his belly is full and he’s sleepy. He takes a nap, usually in my arms, for about an hour until 12:30, sometimes all the way until 1pm. We then play or watch TV or just have conversations in baby talk until 2pm. Then Mommy comes home! He’s generally a very happy baby and I love that his routine stays mainly the same.

The week that was, was good. I’ll be telling you some stuff that my wife put in her blog, so if you’ve read that already, just pretend you didn’t and enjoy mine!

We did indeed go to a church. Like Alanna said, it was a little room, an L shaped room where if you sat in the back side, you really couldn’t see people in the front to the right. They sang praise and worship songs that were “sort of” like what we sing back at home. It was all very rustic, but those people really do love God and its neat to see that smack dab in the middle of the Muslim world. We were going to go back this week but…

… We spent the night in a hotel on top of Jabel Hafeet! Alanna absolutely LOVES to stay in hotels, so we got a good deal and stayed in a beautiful place on top of the highest mountain in the UAE. The views were great; we played mini-golf and met up with some friends for good times! It was a nice way to relax. We had a “slight” mishap on the way back from the hotel the next morning. There are some enormous sand dunes on the way back from the hotel. We’ve wanted to stop and take pictures on them, but just haven’t done it yet. So this time we stopped. We get off the road, go about 1000 yards and the payment ends and turns into a sand road. The sand road, to my poor eyesight, just looked like a dirt road. I thought I could just drive right over it. About the time Alanna says, “I don’t think the car will go through that”, I felt all four of the tires get stuck in the sand. I tried a few snow spinning techniques to get the car out, but it only made matters worse. We called the Police and Roadside Assistance, neither of which seemed like they would be able to help. Well little Logan was going to get fussy sooner or later in the desert so I got out and hiked back up to the main road. God was obviously watching out for me because as soon as I got to the main road, a really nice Emirati in an SUV turned down my road. He spoke perfect English and was more than happy to pull us out of the sand. He even had a handy rope chain to hook to both vehicles. He had us out in 2 minutes flat. Moral of the story – When you see sand, stop the car, get out and walk.

I also got paid by the House of the Arts last week. Math is NOT my strong point, that’s for sure. I got paid double what I thought I was getting paid. I just didn’t add it right. Alanna is letting me use my paychecks to just… do stuff… mostly, since her paycheck pretty much pays for everything. So I went out a bought us a 42” Plasma HDTV. We really did need something bigger to go in the living room, and prices over here are about 25% cheaper than what they are in the States. So I got a really good deal on an ok TV. It of course wouldn’t fit in our tiny rental car so they’ll be delivering it tomorrow night. I also bought a cheap DVD player and a TV stand so we’ll be all set once the TV gets here. Hey, I’ll finally get to watch my 4 hour wedding video that I’ve wanted to see!

We had dinner with friends (Alma, Lori, Ruth, the gang) on Friday night. It was a fun time. We were going to play Monopoly but we talked too long and it was too late to start by the time we got around to it.

We started me and Logan’s residency process today. It takes a little wheeling and dealing, a lot of money, and then I have to do a medical check (Logan doesn’t have to, thankfully) and then we get our visas. So no more border runs soon!

Ok, that’s enough for me. I have to go check my fantasy football score. And the Redskins have been scored on twice since I began this blog. But at least the YANKEES ARE WORLD SERIES CHAMPS.

It is almost the end of October here in the UAE. While the temps are still hot during the day, the weather feels GREAT at night. Not too hot, not too cold. Wonderfuly pleasant one might say.

We finally invited some friends over to our place on Thursday for Game Night. We all made Mexican food (well I bought some chips and salsa) and sat around talking and playing board games. I love board games, and good conversations, so the night was a big success. Hopefully we can bounce around to different people’s places and do this one a week, or as often as possible.

Our apartment is also finally in working order. The guys eventually came to fix the lights one day, and then a few days later they got the A/C running in the living room. So now, for better or for worse, we have a live able apartment. We do need some rugs and stuff to hang on the walls to spice the place up a bit though.

Being somewhat involved in the entertainment business (my job at House of the Arts) still has its benefits. When I went in to teach last Wednesday, they gave me two tickets to see the New York Philharmonic Orchestra which was playing in townon Saturday. We wanted to go anyway, but the tickets were really expensive. So I told Alanna the good news, we lined up a babysitter (the lovely Alma Joy), got all dressed up, and headed out on Saturday night. The orchestra was playing inside Al Jahli fort, which is a 100 year old fort on the east side of Al Ain. It was very important back in the day as it was a defensive position to guard trade routes and protect the natural oasis. I have taken many pictures of it, but never went inside. So we got there and there were a ton of people, mostly expats. Many were dressed to the nines in tuxedos! Our dress choices put us somewhere in the middle, which was perfectly acceptable. We passed through the giant wooden gate doors and were led to our seats. We are in the middle section about 20 yards from the stage they had set up. The inside of the fort has no top, of course, so you could see the moon and stars. Such a great view! The orchestra started at 8pm and from the first note I was amazed. It literally sounded like something that you listen to on the most expensive and technically advanced stereo system you can buy. They played Brahms’ Violin Concerto, and then Beethoven’s 7th Symphony. I figured going in I would like the Beethoven piece more, but the guy who played the solo violin parts on the Brahms’ piece was so amazing. That dude has more talent in the tip of his pinky finger than I could ever hope to have in my whole body. All in all, it was a wonderful experience and a lovely date with my wife!

Some guys from Brazil moved into our old apartment complex in Al Ain after we left. Turns out, these guys were brought over by the UAE government to teach Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu to high school students. I also heard through the grapevine (Alma Joy is buddy buddy with one of the guys) that they would be offering an adult class to anyone who wanted to come out. Now I’ve always wanted to “try” something like this. I am a avid fan of Mixed Martial Arts and enjoy watching the UFC whenever I get the chance. For the uneducated, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is a martial art that involves taking your opponent to the ground and getting him to submit (tap out) by applying different holds to various parts of the body. You can choke a guy out, you can put him in an arm bar, a leg lock, an angle, and many other nasty holds. If done correctly, either you tap out or you’ll either a) be choked out or b) have something dislocated or broken. Yes, sounds very unpleasant but its something I’ve wanted to experience. Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not the type of guy who watches that stuff on TV and thinks, “Oh, I can do that. I can kick some butt!” Oh no, that’s not me. I am usually the guy who turns the other cheek. But again, I wanted to at least give it a shot. So they let you attend some classes for free to see if you like it. Tonight, was the first class. I went with Alma and Lynea, two of Alanna’s teacher buddies. I didn’t know what to expect. I thought it would be more like a self defense class where we’d sit in a little circle, some guy would ask for volunteers and he’d show us some moves. Well… I was wrong. We walked into the gym and there were about 30 guys already there, most of them dressed in those karate type outfits. I was in a t-shirt and sweatpants. There was a good mixture of Brazilians, Expats, and a few Emirates. It was a little intimidating. Of the 30 guys, 10 of them were over 6’3” and were built of pure muscle. The other guys were all about my size, but ripped. There were a few out of shape guys like me, then one really out of shape guy who didn’t make it through the whole night. So I sat down in a chair with the girls because, well, I didn’t know what I was supposed to do. A few minutes pass by, and then some giant Brazilian man walks up to me and asks, “Would you like to train?” Of course I say yes. So I take off my shoes and socks and then move to the large mat, which comfortably fit all 30 of us. I bowed as a stepped on the mat, as I saw guys doing this every time they entered and exited the mat. We got in a few lines, 4 or 5 leader guys up front looking at us. We all bowed, then got into a big circle and starting running around the edge of the mat. I expected some type of short cardio warm-up, so this didn’t surprise me. Even though I haven’t done much cardio in awhile, I can usually hold my own with basic exercise. So we ran, did some high knee lift running, then some running where you slapped you hands with your feet from behind, then we bounced around on both feet. Next, we continued the running, but after each lap, we would drop down and do 10 quick push-ups. At this point I was starting to build up some perspiration. Next, as we got to each side of the mat, we were told to do various things – sliding knee lunges across the mat, front rolls across the mat, back rolls across the mat, even this weird thing where we laid (lied? Lay?) down on our back and shifted our weight from side to side, scooting across the mat. I managed to do this stuff and not look like a complete moron. The only thing I noticed was that when you’re barefoot on a wrestling type mat, you quickly begin to get rug burns on your feet and knees, when you slide them across. And by rug burns, and mean the skin was peeling off my toes. After that, we continued to run around in circles, but then were asked to partner up with someone. I picked a guy beside me, a very nice Brazilian guy who spoke little English, but seemed to know exactly what was going on. I later estimated he could have killed me with his pinky. I’m not making that up. So yeah, we partner up while we were running in the circle. We were instructed to turn and face our partner, then pick him up, sort of like a fireman’s carry on the shoulder, except you just pick him straight up from his knees and lift, no putting him on your shoulder. You pick him up, walk a few steps, then put him down. You repeat the whole process a bagillion times around the circle, then switch and the guy picks you up. Thankfully the guy was about my weight so he wasn’t too difficult to pick up each time. Well that ended the warm-up, some 45 minutes later. I was sweaty, tired, but in good spirits. Next, we partnered up again (got with the same guy, don’t remember his name though) and were shown some various ground moves by the head guy (who I later found out was a black belt in the art form). He would explain the move, then we would practice for two minutes. By practice, I mean you had to do the move over and over again as quickly as possible – so the cardio never really ended. We did some easy moves first – basically moving back and forth over our opponent to establish a half or full guard, then under them to try and get out of the guard. One was a pretty complicated series of about 10 different moves until you have the guy trapped like a pretzel and you can flip him over, then use his own weight to pull you on top to be in full guard. Memorizing the different moves was a little complicated, but I got it right a few times. The guy I was with was very helpful and polite, and very patient with me being a complete newb. We did a few more moves, but the instructor saved the best move of the night for last. It was a rolling arm bar thing-a-ma-bobber. Basically, you start off on your back, the guy on top of you, then pull the guy’s arm across your chest to pin it between you and him, scoot your hips to the side, sling one leg over the back and his head, push him down and flip him over with that leg, while trapping his arm between your legs as you lie flat on your back. From this position, the slightest pressure you put on a guy’s elbow can be extremely painful. It doesn’t take much for someone to tap out in that position. Well, it didn’t take much for me to tap out anyway. Maybe I’m a wimp, but that move really hurts when done correctly. By this time of the night, 1 ½ hours in, I and plum tuckered out. But we’re not done yet. For the next 30 minutes, the last 30 minutes thank God, we were partnered with different guys and told to… “go at it” for 5 minute sparring sessions. This is where I got a little worried. I sat at the first 5 minutes to just watch. Some of the guys we’re really intense, rolling around on the floor, doing crazy stuff, choking, arm barring, leg holds, etc. This was business time. No playing around. Some guy grabbed me after the first session and wanted me to have a go. He matched me up with another expat about my size. The guy was nice, but pretty much OWNED ME for 5 minutes. He stopped here and there to show me a few things, some type of wrist lock that hurt REALLY bad, and a few other things. The rest of the time he threw me around like a ragdoll. I just tried to play defense and not have him hurt me too bad. He put me in a few choke holds where he basically was choking me out with my own arm. I quickly tapped out each time as soon as I felt hopeless. At the end of the 5 minutes, I was completely drained, but immediately was paired up with someone else – this time with a really nice, polite Brazilian dude. This guy had more muscles than Arnold. He wasn’t big or anything, just ripped all over with no body fat. This guy also didn’t speak a lick of English. One of the instructors came over and told ME to take it easy on HIM. I laughed, though on inside I cried like a baby. This guy was all business once we started. He was so quick and strong. He pinned me to the ground, and just the way he positioned his chest on top of mine made me not able to breathe. He put me in a rear naked choke three different times. The first two times, I tapped as soon as he got it clamped down. But the third time I thought I’d be brave. He “got my back” and applied the choke, but I was able to work my hand between my neck and his arm (and by able to, I mean I am 100% sure he let me) and struggle with him for two minutes. Finally, I tired out and he locked in the hold. But I didn’t tap. No no, stupid Rob tried to hold on for awhile. And that’s when I started seeing stars and things started to go black. Yeah, I was about 3 seconds away from completely passing out. So I quickly tapped his arm and he let go of the hold. Immediately though all the blood came back to my head and I was fine. He continued to torment me the rest of the time, using that rolling arm bar on me to make me tap quickly. After 30 minutes with various partners, we stopped, lined up, bowed to the instructors, then went around bowing to each other and shaking hands. I was very glad it was over. I was soaked in sweat, was dead tired, and there wasn’t a spot on my body that didn’t hurt. I also had rug burns on my feet, knees and knuckles. I had plenty of respect for the guys before I even stepped in the door, but now I have even MORE respect. All of them were very polite and professional. There was no macho crap like you see when you watch the UFC. It is an amazing art that I would have been OK at – 15 years ago. I just don’t think my body can’t take that kind of punishment week end and week out. It was a very neat learning experience though. Now I’m sitting at home, popping the pain pills and aching all over. I know tomorrow morning I will barely be able to get out of bed. To sum things up, I spent two hours of my night getting taken behind the woodshed. They stomped a mudhole in me and walked it dry. These guys were the real deal indeed. I can confidently take Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu off the bucket list.

Another week has come and gone here in Al Ain, and it all begins again tomorrow. Tomorrow will also mark one full week of us being in the new apartment. While the Hotel Rotana did have it’s perks, I do enjoy having more space. Most of the little apartment problems have been fixed. The only concern we still have is there is no thermostat for the A/C in the living room, meaning – there is NO AC IN THE LIVING ROOM. So it’s a bit hot. There are also no lightbulbs in the ceiling outlets in the living room, meaning – there is no light in the living room. The ceiling is 15ft high so I’m not going out and buying a ladder. I think I’ve told 4 or 5 different people who apparently work here about the problems. Each one of this people say they will, insha’Allah, be back tomorrow to fix it. Insha’Allah means “God Willing”. They use it all the time to here to basically say that if God is willing, they will do something. It’s a nice way to get out of doing stuff. Just blame Allah if you don’t show up. Whatever. They haven’t fixed my stuff yet. I sort of fixed our other problems. I climbed up and into the ceiling to adjust the hot water so we could stop taking luke warm showers. I also, with the help of my good friend Darrell, but blinds up over the windows.

We got cable TV installed, which is REALLY NICE when you don’t have much else going on for you right now. They installed it last Sunday, but it took a full day for the DVR box to download the channels (They told me, insha’Allah, it would be done in a few hours after they hooked it up, Mmhhmm.). Well I get up the next morning, Logan is crying is eyes out and suddenly the cable kicks in. And to my wonder… a baseball playoff game was on. The Dodgers were playing in LA so the game was still going on when I got up. So I got to watch a little baseball live. I also get to watch the first round of NFL games each Sunday. And there are a good amount of American channels to keep me and Logan entertained. So yay for cable.

Internet – still not so good. They called the other day to confirmed where we live, but I haven’t heard from them since. Insha’Allah, tomorrow! Not. The USB internet port thing isn’t so bad. We just had to move into the hot living room to get a better connection. So while its still slow, its now much faster than the dial-up like speeds we had been experiencing.

My teaching job at House of the Arts is still fun. We had our first performance with the Youth Choir at Bawadi Mall last week. It went really well. You couldn’t really the hear the kids, because it’s a mall, but those who were close seemed to enjoy the show. And all the parents seemed to like what I did with their kids, and that was very good. I am now teaching 3 drama classes every Wednesday. I have 4 to 7 year olds, 8 to 11 year olds, and 12 to 16 year olds. Every class has a variety of expat kids from all over the world, so the accents are fun to hear.

I really am enjoying myself here in the UAE. My health seems to have gotten better. Don’t really seem to have bad allergies in the new apartment. I have been getting nose bleeds, which a got when touring in 1997 from the dry air, so we may be a humidifier. Supposed to be good for babies too. I have also lost 11 lbs since moving here. No fancy diet or exercise routine, I’ve just not been eating as much. I’d like to lose about 20 more though! So maybe I should run.
Funny story – So I went to the grocery store this morning to pick up a few things. The place is called Lulus. It’s a western style grocery store, kind of like a mini superwalmart. We do most of our shopping there. Anyway, today, as I walk in they have the music blasting all over the entire store. And do you know what’s playing? Eminem. Yeah. That’s the type of genre you want your kids to listen to why you’re picking up some diapers. They were playing his radio edit versions, but even most of those were still pretty raunchy. Just not something you’d expect to hear when you’re shopping for groceries.

I had a skydiving binge last night. Binge – meaning a spent hours on the web looking at stuff and places about skydiving. There is ONE place in the UAE to skydive and its about 2 hours north of where I live. It is also CLOSED for remodeling at the moment and who knows when it will reopen. I really really really want to get my A license. Did I mention I really want it? Maybe I can do it this summer or next. There are a couple local places in NC that do the course, and its cheaper than the Chicago area place. Of course, everything is cheaper than Chicago!

In other random news –

My one and only fantasy football team is 4-1 this year. Doing much better after playing in too many leagues last year.

The Yankees are moving nicely through the playoffs. Jeter is the man.

As seen on my Twitter page – Alanna got her UAE driver’s license. We went for a test drive today to help her out. I was not harmed.

Since I have limited internet access, I can’t download my TV shows this month – so no Smallville, Heroes and Flash Forward until, insha’Allah, next month.

We are going to host a board game night this coming week. I love board games. Food them is Mexican.

Ok, enough news.

Here are some more pics!

Update – No new pics. Took me 10 minutes to try and upload one and it failed. I’ll try to post them on Facebook.

Hello folks.  Long time no talk… again.  I’ve just been lazy about blogging. 

Tonight is our last night in the Hotel Rotana.  We FINALLY got our keys for the apartment – the nice one – with 2 bedrooms and 2 1/2 baths.  We moved some stuff over today from the old apartment and the hotel, and we’ll finish moving the rest tomorrow by 5pm when we have to check out.  We also have a maid coming over tomorrow morning to clean the place.  It needs a full cleaning.  Its not digusting, but its very dusty the the floors are a little grimy from all the construction.  I’m not complaining though – it is 1000% better than the old apartment.  We won’t have internet regularly for about a month though.  We’re buying a little thing that you plug in and can get wifi or something, but we can only use it a few times a week.  So I’ll be around, just not as much.

Its been a very productive few weeks for my “job” at House of the Arts.  I have been working with the youth choir for an upcoming production at one of the big malls.  They will be performing tomorrow night!  We won’t be doing much, but a few of the things we’re doing are pretty neat.  And…  I’ll be teaching 2 drama classes every Wednesday.  The group that was coming from Dubai every week didn’t want to do it anymore, so they asked me to do it.  I got thrown in the two classes today on short notice.  The first class is a small group of 4 to 7 year olds.  The second is a larger group of 8 to 12 year olds.  I basically just did some intro work with them today, some icebreakers and mime stuff.  It was pretty fun.  I’ll be putting together some more lesson plans and hopefully doing some drama performances with the older group around Christmas and the spring.  The House has also hooked me up with a adult drama group here in Al Ain.  I’ll be going to one of their meetings sometimes soon and see what I can do with them.  I don’t want to do TOO much, because my whole reason for coming here was to be able to spend more time with Alanna and Logan.  But I do want to have something to do once a week or so!

I’ll be doing another border run this weekend.  Logan and I once again have to get new visas.  Our friend Brock is going to take us again though so it won’t be much of a hassle.  Hopefully we’ll get our residence visas soon so we won’t have to make another run.

Anyone watching TV over there?  We’ve been downloading episodes from the web.  We’re watching Heroes, which has been ok so far.  I of course am still watching Smallville.  And we’ve both been watching new show Flash Foward.  It seems pretty cool so far.  Oh, our cable TV will be hooked up by Monday I hope.  And with the package I’m getting, I’ll be able to watch some NFL games on Sundays and most of the MLB playoffs!  That is REALLY GOOD NEWS.

I’ll post some pics of the new place soon.  The living room is so huge.  I could put a slip -n- slide in there!

Last week is come and gone and I’m already well into babysitting this week.  Logan takes 1 step forward and 2 steps back every day.  Not literally.  He won’t walk for another 5 months probably.  Oh, he turned 4 months old a few days ago.  There’s another 4 month old baby here in the hotel.  Logan is twice as big as that baby.  He is a monster.  He’s such a cutie though!

I was pretty much sick every day last week.  Not sick sick, just allergy sick.  We finally decided to go the hospital to get checked out.  (They don’t have family practices here, so everyone goes to the hospital)  The hospital experience was, in a word,  nightmare.  Some background  – I am deathly afraid of hospitals.  I always have been.  It started when I was little and only got worse as I got older.  Even if I’m just going to visit someone there I get a little freaked out.  I also think I have that whole “I’m a man and I don’t need to go to the doctor/hospital” thing going on too.  It got much worse at the end of college.  I had kidney stones for the first time, and not knowing what they were, I went to the emergency room and stayed over night for observations.  The next morning they wheeled me down on the bed to get x-rays.  They left me in a hallway outside the x-ray room for 20 minutes.  Beside me in the hall was an old woman on a bed who was screaming in pain and saying she couldn’t take it anymore and wanted to die.  I had to listen to that for 20 minutes.  Still haven’t gotten over it. 

Wow… I rent on a rant there.  Anyway… the hospital.  We get  there and go to the front desk.  We tell them my symptoms and the girl there says we should go see the allergist.  We go up the 2nd floor, check in there, and then wait about 15 minutes.  Not a bad wait time, kind of like in the States.  We go back to a small office room with a doctor and he asks what my symptoms are – sneezing, coughing, shortness of breath, chest tightness, etc.  He looks confused and ask if I have skin problems, because he is a dermatologist and doesn’t deal with my type of allergies.  Well, he tells us to go back to the desk and ask for a general doctor.And of course, the regular doctor can’t see me today.  They tell us to make an appointment, which the earliest was the next afternoon at 5:30.  Being the stubborn man that I am, of course I didn’t go back  the next day.  Fortunately, one of Alanna’s teacher friends had a husband who is a doctor.  He actually stopped by my room, listened to my breathing, ran some tests and told me there was nothing serious to worry about.  So that made me feel better.  The beginning of this week has actually been better.  I’ve had no serious attacks, just lots of coughing.  I can’t wait to get out of the hotel!  We heard we’re getting our keys this week.  I won’t hold my breath.

I watched the season premieres of Smallville, Heroes and watched 2 movies at the cinema in the last week!  I downloaded the TV shows.  Smallville was pretty good, much better than how last season ended.  Heroes was… heroes.  I still think they have too many characters.  Its just confusing following that many plot lines every week.  Zachory Quinto is the man though.   I also saw Inglorious Basterds at the movies.  Very good movie.  I’ve never really enjoyed Tarantino movies.  They’re normally too violent for no reason whatever.  Inglorious Basterds did have some very graphic violence, but it fit in with the movie so it wasn’t too bad.  I hate Brad Pitt.  Its not fair to be THAT good looking and THAT talented.  He was hilarious in the picture.  Saturday night was date night.  We dropped the little man off with a babysitter and again went to the movies.  We saw a romantic comedy – The Ugly Truth.  It was pretty good as well.  It had a good bit of comedy and less sappy stuff so that made me like it more.  It was just nice to have some adult time with my wife.  It was nice just to hold her hand and be on a normal date for a change. 

Did I mention I can’t watch American Football here?  I can sort of find it sometimes on the web, but its small, blurry, skips and is on way too late at night.  Boo.

I also had my first rehearsal with the kids from House of the Arts.  We’re doing a short musical program in October.  I worked with them, throwing in a little drama and some dancing.  It was really fun.  I can’t wait to do more stuff with them this week.

OK, Logan is crying and Alanna is giving me… the look.  Take care, all!  Pics next time!

Forgive me Blog, for I have not posted lately.

This week, under Muslim law, started with my birthday and ended today with the last day of Ramadan.  My 34th birthday was nothing to shake a stick at.  I think as you get older, at least in my case, birthdays are just a reminder

 that you’re one year older.  Nothing really to celebrate in the revelation.  My amazing wife orchestrated a party for me Friday the 10th though.  I had a great time with a lot of new friends.  Sunday, my actual b-day, I don’t think we really did anything, which was fine with me.

The rest of the week was mostly routine, aside from a few bumps in road, both figuratively and literally.  Alanna started her first week of school.  The kids won’t show up until next Wednesday, but she was there with the other teachers.  Basically she’s been sitting in a small pink room doing nothing all week.  Oh well, she gets paid well for it!  Her absence left me in the hotel (still in the hotel, yeah, more on that later) being a stay at home Dad for Logan.  Logan has been pretty good though, so no complaints there.  He is your typical baby – happy, sad, crying, pooping, peeing, screaming, you know, the normal stuff.  It was his father who as been abnormal.  I have allergies, and I’ve had them since my college days.  Until now, they’ve been mostly seasonal or triggered by dust, etc.  Since I’ve been here in the UAE though, they’ve gotten worse.  I wake up almost every morning with watery, itchy eyes, then  proceed to sneeze violently for an hour.  Many of the reactions also bring on shortness of  breath, my chest tightening up, wheezing and coughing.  Don’t freak out though.  I feel ok.  Its not like I need to be rushed to the hospital.  We’ve tried different medications over here, the last round of OTC pills seem to help if I take them every 12 hours.  If I forget, then they wear off and here comes the sneezing frenzy.   This only happens in my hotel room though.  We’ve narrowed it down to maybe the detergent they use of the bed sheets and towels, or maybe something in the A/C unit blowing down on me.  I can’t think of anything else that would trigger it.  So right now its just really an annoying part of my day that I hate dealing with.  Hopefully once we get out of the hotel, the problem will be solved.

Speaking of that… yeah, still in the hotel.  Its nice, but its still a hotel.  We’re crowded into a small room with no real way to cook.  We have a washer/dryer at our apartment for laundry, thankfully, so we are no longer washing her clothes in the sink and bath.  Its not fun living out of a suitcase with only one room.  We keep hearing rumors our family apartments (the ones we wanted to be placed at in the first place) are close to being ready.  So hopefully we’ll be out of here in a few weeks.  Ramadan has really screwed us over  I think.  No one works during this month, so things like… I dunno… finishing apartments so 100s of people can move in don’t get finished.

I shouldn’t complain though.  Overall, I’m still loving my time here and think Al Ain was the exact place I needed to be.

Moving on…

We went to the mall with Alma Joy on Friday night.  We saw that there is a 3rd floor where they are building an

indoor ski slope.  Yeah, you heard that right.  We also saw a sign for a Papa Johns being built in the mall.  We were rather excited but that tidbit of good news.  Alma gets hit on by every guy in Al Ain.  We went into a clothing store and one of the workers there followed her around and flirted with her.  As a last ditch effort to win her affection, he shouted “God Bless America” as we left the store.  I guess thats how you pick up the mamacitas Al Ain.  Don’t think Alma took the bait though.

Oh yeah,  I rented a car.  No more taxis for us.  I’m driving this tiny little 4 cylinder thing that does from 0 to 60 in about a week.  But its better than paying for taxis and trying to explain to them in my very poor Arabic where I want them to take us.  Driving here is a little different from the States.  They have NO CONCEPT OF SAFE DRIVING WHATSOEVER.  People speed like crazy, change quickly across three lanes with no signal, you name it and they do it.  I know they do all this stuff in the States, but trust me when I tell you its a whole new ballgame here.  And worst of all are the round abouts.  Who invented these things?  They are everywhere in the UAE, at every intersection.  Its basically a big circle with three lanes and 4 ways to go.  I’ve gotten the “pattern” down on how to traverse these death traps, but its still something you must do with extreme caution.  Defensive driving is a must here.  All in all though, I’d rather drive in this then be stuck in a 2 hour traffic jam outside of Chicago!

We went to Jabel Hafeet last night, which is the tallest mountain in the country and is located right outside of Al Ain.  The drive up and down were fun.  You know the curvy roads you go up and down when you drive through the NC

 mountain area on I40?   Well these are even crazier.  You take a 15 minute drive up the mountain and the craziest, but still busy, twisted road I have ever seen.  You basically go about 50 feet and make a u-turn and go up, then do the same thing every

50 feet.  Thankfully though the road looks brand new and is well lit.  The view from the top was great.  You could see the whole city of Al Ain lit up 1000s of meters below.  We’ll have to go back in the daytime to see the view as well.  There is also a hotel at the top and magically healing hotsprings at the

bottom.  Last night we just perched at the top and ate some Hardees.  Yeah…  a Hardees picnic.

On our way back to Al Ain we got a little lost.  Alanna is notoriously bad at anything involving directional skills.  I have trouble seeing some roadsigns at night, so combine those two and well we weren’t on the the road that we needed to be.  Thankfully, its a desert at night, so you can look and see off in the distance the bright lights of Al Ain, so we were never truly lost.  Anyway, as we went down the wrong road, I spotted camels off to my left.  They weren’t moving so I had to ask Alanna if they were real.  She confirmed they were.  So I booked it to the next round about (cause there is absolutely no way to go back the other way unless you use one), turned back and stopped the car near where I saw the camels.  This was the desert.  The road was well lit, but there were no cars out here.  We were alone with the camels.  Well except for the two cars who came by twice, racing each other at speeds of over 100mph.  No exaggeration.  I made Alanna come down from the car quickly in case the loonies didn’t see us.  Ok, back to the camels.  When you think of the desert, you think of camels.  At least I do.  And so far in my time here, all I’ve seen are two camels sitting down in the back of a pickup truck.  But last night I saw a a bunch.  They looked like were on a farm.  They were a fenced in area of sand about the size of a football field.  I’m guessing there were about 25 of them.  I walked up to the fence and in a matter of 30 seconds, I had 10 camels lined up along the fence staring at me.  They just walked right up and stood in a long line, leaning their long necks over the fence.  I did my best to pet them gently, but most of them were pretty skittish.  They let me pet their noses a little, but then would pull away.  Alanna was sure I was going to get spit on or something.  Alanna joined me along with Logan after some coaxing.  She even petted one of them too.  There were some black camels too.  Don’t remember ever seeing one of those before.  We took a bunch of pictures.  It was such a neat experience – out in the middle of the desert, not some petting zoo.  We finally got back in the car and after getting a little more lost and arguing about it, we got back to the hotel safe and sound.

I’m just happy we got to see something besides a mall.

Ok, here are some more pics – mountain and camels –

Things have been a little more stressful here in the Middle East as of late.  Our housing is… not quite what we were hoping for.  It just looks like they rushed to get it completed.   Besides it being very dirty, there are electrical problems, drainage problems, mold problems, floor cracking problems, and every other problem.  All the other teachers in the building are having the same problems.  We have banded together to try and get something done about it.   I’ll update that when I know something.

We did buy our appliances and furniture.  The appliances have all been delivered.  We got the basics – fridge, washer/dryer, microwave.  No stove/oven though.  There’s just no room for it in our current kitchen.  We did get a toaster oven that has two burners on top of it though so that will do for now.  The delivery process was a hassle.  None of the guys spoke english, and our new place isn’t exactly on the map yet, so you put those two together and… well there were problems.  I mostly had to just bring the delivery trucks to the hotel, then either let them follow me over to the apartment in a taxi, or like today, actually get into the delivery truck with two guys and ride with them over.  Let me just tell you – riding in the middle of two sweaty, smelly delivery men who don’t speak a lick of english is not a pleasant experience.  But we got it all in there so all is well in that regard.  We also go Logan’s crib in today, but I didn’t want to unpack the bedding because the floors and walls are still dirty.  We’ll still in the hotel until at least Thursday (hoping it gets exended another week) so hopefully we’ll get the place cleaned at least.   Our living room couch and bed won’t be here for a few more weeks (back stock), so we’re gonna have to buy an air mattress and sleep on that for a bit.  At least Logan gets a nice crib.

In other news…

We went to a pizza place with a bunch of teachers.  For my pizza, I had a pepperoni and hotdog pizza.  Yeah, I did.  It was basically just some type of…  hotdog meat cut into circles and put on the pizza.  It was very tasty.

Not sure if any of you southern folks remember, but Hardees used to have Hotdogs when I was little.  Well, the Hardees here have hotdogs.  Not pork of course, but close enough.  They come loaded with mustard, chili and onions.  Once you add ketchup from the packets, its all good. 

We no longer have free internet in the room.  They found out and turned it off.  There is free WiFi in the lobby though so we’re using as long as we’re here.  Once we move in to the apartment, I’m not sure when I’ll be up and online again.

I bought Logan a really cool baseball lamp for his room.  I’m so excited to teach him how to throw…  in a few years. 

Oh…  I forgot to mention about my job interview.   I went to the music school and spoke with the director.  She is very excited and wants to work with me.  She wants me to direct their Christmas musicals (30 minute little shows at nice hotels).  They want to add some drama into the program.  They just sang Christmas songs last year so anything I can do to spruce it up would be great.  I may also teach classes there as well.  I will be paid, not much, but its something.  I’ll only go maybe once a week at the most, and in the afternoon so we don’t need a babysitter.  I’m gonna do some brainstorming about everything meet with the director later on.  So yay.

And finally..  I found out that my name… Rob… means Yogurt in Arabic.  Lovely, huh?

My hair grows pretty fast and was starting to look nappy, so I headed down to the hotel barbershop to see what could be done about it.  A very nice man greeted me at the door and offered me a seat in a chair.  I told him I wanted him to shave my head.  He laughed, of course.  I had discussed this Alanna, so I wasn’t going to get in trouble.  I didn’t want my head to be shaved, just really short, you know… buzz cut or something.  I explained this to him and he understood.  He put on a number 4 guard on his clippers and 5 minutes later I had a buzz cut.  I think it looks fine.  It is definitely not as hot, and much easier to manage.     Once the barber was done, he asked if I’d like shave.  Of course I said yes.  Its a very relaxing, “old school” experience when a barber shaves you.  He used the little lather brush thing ( I need to get one of those) like my Dad used to use, and then shaved me with a straight razor.  He nicked me a few

places here and there, but nothing too bad.  Next came the aftershave.  You know that scene in Home Alone where Macaulay Culkin slaps the aftershave on his face then screams really loud?  Well… I didn’t scream.  But thats what it felt like.  I’m the type of guy who uses the nice, sensitive skin aftershave.  You know… some type of cooling gel or whatnot.  Well, they are old school indeed at this barbershop, which by the way they call saloons here.  No bar at this saloon though.  Anyway, the aftershave felt like pouring alcohol on an open wound.  I did my best to be macho and pretend like I was used to this, but ohhhhh boy did it hurt.  All in all though, it was a good shave and haircut.

 

I sort of applied for a job today.  Alanna brought home some information about a school of the arts.  They teach drama classes to kids on Wednesday evenings.  I figured I’d at least see if I could offer them anything, so I sent in my cover letter and resumes.  Yes, I have 2 resumes.  Actors are weird like that.  They also offer guitar lessons at the school and I might check on that too.  Hopefully that won’t mind me being a southpaw.

Speaking of other hobbies, I’ve checked into skydiving here.  We had thought there was a skydiving place here in Al Ain, but turns out the place is actually based just north of Dubai.  So its probably about 2 hours away.  Not horribly far away if I only go now and then.  Cool thing about this place though is you jump out over the Persian Gulf.  Yeah, jumping out over water sounds awesome!   The place does have a school to get you certified so maybe that’s something I can do!  We’re gonna look into to it for my birthday.

I made use of the hotel fitness center today.  Its very nice.  I worked out for about 30 minutes, which is a good amount for lazy old me.  After the work out, I headed to the steam room.  Weird place.  Most steam rooms I’m familiar with are kind of square and have a couple rows, one over another, to sit on.  This room was small, round, and looked like an escape pod from the Enterprise.  There were 7 seats, white, sort of egg shaped, arranged in a circle against the wall.   I would have taken a picture, but that just seems weird.  Anyway, the experience was the same even if the environment looked different.

Logan does something new everyday.  I love being able to watch him grow.  Tonight at dinner he grabbed a straw (with his left hand!) and swung it around like a sword.  Ok, I may have “helped” him swing it like a sword, but he was holding it tight.  He also grabbed some lettuce from Alanna’s plate a few times.  I never thought watching a baby grab things would be the highlight of my day, but it was by far!

Here are some more pics…

 

 

 

 

I’m glad this week is behind me.  Alanna was gone for 10 hours each day Sun-Thur.  Logan was pretty much exclusively fed by her since he was born, so the bottle was something he didn’t want to take well.  Also, when Logan feeds from Alanna, most of the time he gets sleepy and goes to bed.  Not with the bottle though.  he just dirnks and stays up.  He is getting the hang of the bottle now thankfully, so next week will be much better.  Alanna will be in the SAME TOWN, and she will only be working 3 or 4 hours a day.

We found a great place for groceries and everything else this week.  Its called Carrefour.  Its basically a super walmart, but better.  They have pretty much everything we’ll need furniture wise, including refrigerators, microwaves, TVs, etc.  The only thing they’re missing are couches and beds, but we found those at another store,  not that we bought any of that.  We have no clue when we’ll be moving out of the hotel and into our apartment.   Carrefour has cheap clothes too so I’ll probably stock up there when I need something.  We also found some sliced roast beef and turkey, so I have normal sandwiches this week. 

We had heard/read that there was a Krispy Kreme Doughnuts in town.  We’d been looking it when we went out, but had yet to find it.  Thursday night we made it our mission.  It was at one of two places, and we chose the wrong one first.  The taxi driver took us to the second place though and we found it!  Yay.  I was also very happy to learn that the doughnuts tasted just like the ones from back home.  We took a dozen home with us, and by this morning, they were all gone. 

Last night I also tried some geocaching.  For those of you who are unfamiliar – geocaching is a hobby where people hide objects, a small box, even something micro with just a logbook in it.  They hide these things all over the world and attach GPS coodinates to it.  Your job is to find them and leave a note on the log that you have been there.  I just got into it before I left the states.  I found out there are over 200 of them in UAE.  Looking it up yesterday, I found out there was one in the park we went to the other day across from our hotel!  The clues on the website said to go at night because the park is all lit up and looks cool.   So last night, at 12:30, I headed over to the park.   I figured it would be empty.  I’d get in, find the cache, and get out.  I was mistaken.  To my shock, the park was filled with 1000 people.  I’m not kidding.   Adults, kids, everyone was there.  I’m so used to kids going to bed early in the states.  But here, there were hundreds of kids playing on the playgrounds, kicking soccer balls around, all having a great time – at 12:30am.  I guess when its 115 degrees during the day, it make sense to go outside at night.  Its also Ramadan, so I suppose a lot of them were breaking their fasts since it was night time.  So I made it close to the cache area, but there were just too many people around.  I didn’t want to look like some creepy guy lurking in the bushes.  So I left and decided to try another time.  On the way back to the hotel, I stopped by and played with the pack of dogs.  There are 6 of them, none over a year old I’d say.  They were very friendly though and seemed happy to play with me for a bit. 

Today was the first day of the weekend and we… did… nothing.  Which was fine with me.  Alanna has a nice little stomach bug, so she didn’t feel like going out anyway.  And I was more than happy to catch up on some sleep.  Maybe we’ll get out tomorrow!

The weekend was nice, although we didn’t do much.  We visited the Al Ain Mall.  Its just as nice as the one in Abu Dhabi, but this one has a ice skating rink!  Seeing Arabs skating around in robes is quite interesting.  They also have these things for beginning skaters to use.  They look like walkers for old people.  You just push them around as you

 skate and they help you balance.  We took a taxi to and from the mall.  There are two types of taxis here.  One’s with the green signs are unmetered and you try to broker a deal with them.  Then there are the silver ones with yellow signs.  They are metered and much nicer.  Both were close in price so we’ll try to take the nicer silver ones when possible.  If you’re curious – a taxi ride across Al Ain cost about 2 bucks.  I can handle that.

Friday night Alanna had me take a walk to a local shopping area.  It was rumored that it was an “all male” area so the wife was weary of going.  We wanted to try some of the local food so I figured I’d give it a shot after dark.  After verifying where it was with the hotel guys ( one of them is Nigerian and he’s my friend.  I don’t know his name though, but he’s nice and always talks to me) and took off on foot.  It was about a 10 minute walk and at night its very pleasant.  Only thing is,  I was on a mission, so I was walking with a purpose.  Seems like all the Arabs were taking leisurely strolls.  I kept stepping into the street to pass people.  Oh and the taxis kept honking at me.  I guess when they see a white guy like me walking  down the street, they figure I could use a lift.  I kept on going though.  This “all male” shopping area was indeed all male.  I only saw one woman the whole time, and she was a Europeon lady buying some groceries.  Other than her, there were all men.  Its a small strip mall with about 15 or 20 shops.  There were 4 or 5 male only barbershops, 3 or 4 grocery stores (think 7-11, but smaller) and about 5 food type places.  I walked up and down the shops a few times, then made my way inside one of the food shops. 

The shop was skinny but long.  Behind the first counter were three spindle type things that had giant triangular type slabs of meat on them.  They were spinning slowly and being cooked with fire.  The cooks would slice off the meat and

sell it.  They also had a type of Rotisserie grill that was spinning some good looking chicken.  Well, I know how to say two things in Arabic – “Do you speak English?”, and “Thank you.”, and I used them both in the shop.  I asked if anyone spoke english and this nice man stepped forward and said he did.  He then explained me to what my options were.  I got some of the sliced off meat, which they gave me bread wraps for.  I also got one of those whole rotisserie chickens.   I got some hummus and salad as well.  In the states, this would have all cost me over $30 easily.  Here I got it for less than $10.   I took it back to the hotel and Alanna and I both loved the food.  It was very good!

Saturday afternoon Alanna and I onced again braved the heat and ventured out of the hotel.  We went across the street into a beautiful park.  It was so well designed – lots of trees, soft grass, fountains,

 playgrounds.  We were also slightly confused by the bathrooms.  The women’s sign sort of looked like a woman with a black headpiece on and the men’s had one with a white headpiece.  Check out Alanna beside her bathroom!

We walked around the whole park and then headed back. 

Saturday was also the first day of Ramadan.  For those of you who are unlightened, its a month long holy holiday for muslims where they fast from sun up to sun down.  They must also refrain from all kinds of other wordly stuff during daylight hours as well.  Non-muslims, by law, are not allowed to eat or drink outside or basically anywhere in the presence of Muslims during this period either.   You can only eat or drink in private or in special rooms in the hotels.  Pretty much all the food places are closed down anyway, so you have no choice.  Once the sun sets though, everyone starts eating like crazy.  It becomes a fesitval type atmosphere.  We had a big dinner buffet in the hotel.  The spread was excellent.  They also gave us some kind of hot perfume tea.  Was weird but good.  So this is something we’ll have to deal with for the next month.  Ramadan Kareem!

The work week is Sun-Thur here, with Fri and Sat being the weekend.  Which meant Alanna had to work today.  No idea why – but they are busing all the teachers in Al Ain back to Abu Dhabi every day this work week for orientation.  The bus ride there takes about an hour and a half, so Alanna will be gone about 10 hours every day!  So… I was alone with Logan for a looooooong time today.  He hasn’t really mastered the art of bottle feeding quite yet.  So this morning he screamed for about 3 hours straight.  And I meaned screamed.  We tried to bottle 3 or 4 times, but he was once again having nothing of it.  Maybe he’s Muslim and is trying to fast.  Anyway, after a nap and a messy diaper (I think he needed to get that out), he finally took a whole bottle and slurped it all down.  So at least I know he can do it.  It will just take some time and patience to get him to do it without screaming first.  I searched the internet and got a lot of nice tips, so that will help.

Tonight, Alanna and I went back to the mall because the main branch of the bank she will be using is located there.  Because of Ramadan, the bank was open tonight from 9 to 11, as was the rest of the mall.  Some stores, like the baby store we went in, stayed open until 2am.  Crazy.  Alanna thankfully was able to finally get a hold of her furniture alliance money.  We used a little of it to by Logan one of those vibrating rocking chair thingamabobbers.  He seems to like it so far.

We’re back in the hotel now and I’m gearing up for adventures in babysitting – day 2.  Stay tuned.