A few weeks ago, I travelled with the DHS varsity volleyball team to KAUST for our Saudi Arabian Intra-Kingdom Activities Council (SAIKAC) tournament.
First of all, we were the champions! It was really fun coaching because my girls are very talented, they played well in the games, and they were good sports the whole time. The teams we played against were either American or British schools around the Kingdom.
To get to KAUST, we flew from Dammam to Jeddah, about a two hour flight. Then we took a bus for 1 1/2 hours north to KAUST. The girls are all seasoned travellers but keeping track of everyone's boarding passes and checking on them for curfew was still a little work. I had a co-coach with me, as we have to have both a male and a female chaperone for travelling with students.
At KAUST, the girls stayed with host families, mostly the KAUST players. Brandon, the other coach, and I were hosted by the school nurse. She turned out to be the wife of KAUST's Chief Informations Officer, so we stayed in the "upper management" part of the campus!
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| The beautiful mansion we stayed in for the weekend |
KAUST is, as I mentioned, an hour and a half away from Jeddah. The University is the main part of the campus, and obviously the reason for its existence. But the campus also contains a preschool and K-12 school for University employees' children, several mosques, many restaurants, recreation facilities, two beautiful beaches (with sand imported from Spain because there is a sand shortage in Saudi), a golf course, and housing for all employees. It is a self-contained city. And it is so green, with grass and trees and gardens everywhere.
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| The main mosque |
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| Housing next to one of the rivers on campus |
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| The center square where many restaurants are located, next to the university |
KAUST is progressive in many ways. It is the first Saudi-sponsored co-educational University, for one thing. On campus, women are allowed to drive and abayas are not required. They have many Saudi staff members, and have needed to create an all-girls wing on the K-12 school because some of the families are uncomfortable with having their daughters educated alongside boys. Overall the campus had a very fun, relaxed feeling and I really enjoyed my visit there. Mostly I enjoyed driving my host family's dune buggy around!
