Ugg, only my third day and I already had a bad day! I decided to go out midday today with my Chicago roommate and found that most of the stores we wanted weren't open. The sweat running down my back informed me as to exactly why the stores aren't open midday. Man, it was friggin' hot.
There was a bookstore open. I'll tell you what, anyone who loves or hates the Twilight series would join together in laughter seeing all four books completely in Arabic in this place. I saw the Wall Street Journal and about 700 of our American newspapers and magazines. It is back to school season and my roomie and I were laughing at all the Saudi's with their kids doing their back-to-school shopping in the stationary aisles. It still shocks me, although I was told to expect it, that there are some women here who simply do not respect the religious idea of modesty and they actually walk around uncovered. It's funny because at home in the States it's the covered women who attract the most attention but it is the exact opposite here. We had to keep reminding ourselves that it is rude to stare, lol.
I made another mistake of rushing out the door with a bottle of water but not eating anything. My roomie went to a Baskin' Robins and grabbed a butter pecan ice cream but, as I said in yesterday's post, I am refraining from eating at American restaurants for a while so that I can absorb the culture better. Unfortunately I had a problem (once again) communicating. The people were nice, as usual, but they still couldn't understand me so I was unable to exchange the rest of my non-Saudi currency. I went all over to different areas with my roomie and taught him the fine art of negotiating for cab rides... he was grateful enough to opt into paying for all of our cabs today (real nice considering we only shopped for him today, lol).
All joking aside, it was hot. Funny that I am not burning even though I forgot to put on sunscreen (again). When we finally got home I was starving (not literally). I didn't eat all day and I needed to eat. We went upstairs (why did they put us on the fourth floor?) carrying all this stuff (ironing board, pots, and miscellaneous stuff) when my key broke in the door. Wow, that was not cool. I was thwarted in my attempt to kick down the durned door because roomie thought we would get in trouble, so we had to wait for an hour for these five guys to come over and break the lock off. It wasn't until that moment that I came to respect just how hot this place can get. What I don't get is why they have locks on the doors anyway. I can't tell you how many times in the past few days we have left our stuff (sometimes expensive stuff) just lying on the side of the street while we go in a store or go off to pray and we come back to find our things completely unscathed. Try that anywhere else in the world.
So we finally got in and I got my two hours of sleep for the day (this jet lag is killing me).
After a quick call to my wife I learned a couple more Arabic words (food-related words) and was able to buy some food all on my own and without any pictures or sound effects (ever make a chicken noise to tell someone what you wanted to eat? Then you haven't lived yet, lol).
Tomorrow is the first day of work and that should be a good thing because I will find out more about where I get to live and what I get to teach. No curse words for these kids... I promise
--Bill
--Bill
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