April

April has been a busy month. It seems that there has been more to do this month than usual. We planned our family trip to UT, went to the International Festival, Day of the Arts, Timmy started baseball, Laurie is winding down her year as librarian and is learning the elementary secretary job along with getting ready to start her Master’s degree, I finally finished writing a course (over 700 pages…I’m grateful for cut and paste), entertaining friends and…all the regular stuff that comes with living here.
The International Festival was outstanding. It was beautiful sights, awesome sounds and outstanding food. The American school did a great job as host.
When we walked in there was music…rock and roll..a band playing. I wondered if I was still in Saudi Arabia. It was awesome. As the night went on there was more music, dancing and singing. It was really surreal at times to think that I was in the desert, the big city of Riyadh, listening to and seeing these great talents.
The dancing was something to see. All the nations seem to have a dance..except the US. There is no national dance for us or traditional dress (maybe blue jeans, t-shirt and tennis shoes). But the other nations…wow. Some of the performers were from school while others came from outside the school. The Lebanese men they can dance and seemed to get the biggest applause. When the Arab women dance it seems that they put men into a hypnotic state (no wonder their men don’t want them dancing in public). Even the Saudi men were dancing and playing national instruments. It was all amazing.
Wandering around we got to see booths from all nations. There were traditional handicrafts and food along with advertisements to come see Country X. Everybody seemed so proud of their countries. Laurie told me that the Italian ambassador was so impressed that he’s going to ensure that the Italian booth is even better next year. The only booth that seemed a little sad was the US booth. But I found out that the students had gotten little help from the US embassy and no help from their advisor. So the students came up with the idea of quilts and decorated the booth themselves. When I looked at the booth again..it was still sad but I was proud of the work the students had put into it. The most popular item..a life-size cut out of President Obama (lots of pictures were taken).
The food that the restaurants were selling was incredible. I kept walking around trying to decide what to spend my Saudi riyals on. I settled on the Noodle House and was not disappointed. The spicy chicken, vegetable fried rice and fried ice-cream (yes fried..not rolled in cornflakes and then passed off as fried) with honey..well I was in heaven. The PTSO President made sure that the Noodle House packed up some food, free of charge, for us to take home and it was even better the next day.
All in all the evening was a great success with the school making money, people showing off their talents and all of us being able to just enjoy.
We recently entertained some friends with a Southern night. Laurie bought me a new cookbook and I have been dying to use the recipes. We had gourmet grits with corn and onion, pan seared chicken with bacon and garlic (Timmy’s new favorite dish..”Dad this is the best ever”), black-eyed peas and rice (the peas cooked for about 5 hours and even Laurie, who can’t stand black-eyed peas, said they made the house smell delish) and for dessert blueberry cobbler. I was a little unsure about how people would receive the grits. I was not prepared for all the compliments…really. It did make me feel good. What made me feel the best was watching Jacob eat…17 and with a hearty appetite (his Dad told me that they had had refried beans three times that week…Mom is in the States for the next couple of months). This new cookbook is making me want to have more dinner parties!
Today was the second week of baseball. It’s awesome to see Timmy get better. Last year Laurie and I told him that he needed to hustle more and this year he is. I love watching Timmy…he’s not the best but he really does do his best. The heat was killing me today..and today the coach asked me to help. So for an hour I was helping in that hot sun. It was over 100 at 0900!!!! I made sure my group took some extra breaks. Then a game between the two teams and training was finished for the week. We still have three more weeks.
Summer vacation we’re going to UT. I’ll be honest…I’d rather go to GA and see our land and do something with it. But we haven’t seen Laurie’s family for 2 years and I have a brother that lives in UT that I haven’t seen for about 10 years. It’s time to visit UT. Laurie’s Dad is renting a house in the mountains and hosting a family reunion…the first ever. The house is supposed to sleep 26..it’s 4,000 sq feet. I told Laurie that’s smaller than our villa and I couldn’t imagine 26 people staying with us. I know we’ll have fun and we are looking forward to seeing everyone.
Laurie is starting her Master’s next month but wanted to keep working next school year. However, being the librarian would have been too much. So she is going to be the part-time secretary for the elementary school (which means Timmy can still go and see his Mom when he wants to..he really likes that his Mom works at school…he told us that it makes him more popular...haha). This month Laurie has started learning her new job and slowly giving up “control” of the library. I don’t know who is going to plan the Halloween party, Dr Seuss week or all the other fun activities that Laurie does…but it’s time for a change and good luck to the new librarian!
I’ve been working on writing a course since January. In February I was asked if it was finished. I chuckled and told him it might be ready in March if I could work exclusively on it..my wish was granted and I started working. I didn’t finish in March but was finally finished this month. I’m glad that I found AF documents that had the info I wanted and was able to use them. I also found other information that I included. At times I thought I was going to go crazy. But 6 blocks and at least 700 pages later I finished with the student manuals / study guides. Now I have to create tests and slides and an exercise. I’ve got to work hard because we just briefed our big boss on our accomplishments and my understanding is that we will probably be teaching next year (at least we have this year to create and finish up). I’m not the only one working..all three of us are working on some course that has to be finished before next year.
Finally…Day at the Arts. The school put together a day to showcase the children’s talent. It was fun. Timmy has been practicing and practicing his recorder and did really well. He was also very excited about telling Laurie and I to look for a backdrop that he and Henry had done…it was a very nice backdrop for the 3 Little Pigs story (this one was different from the ones I remember…I don’t remember the wolf eating the pigs).
There was trip to Bahrain to "relax" and play tour guide. The Brit I work with wanted to come and he and his wife followed us. Up early on a Thursday morning. As we were crossing the causeway the Saudi's made him get some extra paperwork since he was driving his car over for the first time...that was fun. We finally get across the causeway and check-in at the hotel..The Elite Resort and Spa (all the rooms are suites and THAT was heaven). We went to the base, movie, Macaroni Grill, Taco Bell, Dariy Queen and an Indian Restaurant. It's always a fast weekend but we enjoy getting out of Saudi on occasion. And we love that we can shop at the Naval Base and get American bread, grits, cornmeal, poptarts (which are always gone in a week), laundry soap that we like and...the list goes on. We always come back into Saudi with the car loaded with groceries.
As I write this blog I realize what a great month it’s been. Life here can be exhausting, challenging and sometimes irritating….but..it’s never dull!!!!
See you all in May!