Laura's Trip to Berlin

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!  We celebrated Thanksgiving twice, on Thursday at the compound rec center, and Friday at our neighbor's house.  I was in charge of pumpkin pies yesterday, and turkey and gravy today.  I will post pictures later...today my post is about my recent trip to Berlin.

First of all, it was really, really hard to be away from Jack (and Rob) for a whole week.  It was hard because Jack is learning new words daily, so while I was gone he learned to say "cookie monster" and "santa", and how to give hugs!  Rob (aka Super Dad) kept him busy during break, and then got him ready in the early mornings for school. He employed a few of the compound teenagers to help out, filled the house with new toys, and taught Jack some new dance moves (videos to come another day).

On the other hand, I had a good time on the trip.  As I mentioned before, I was co-chaperoning a group of high school students for a Model UN conference.  The students were incredibly focused on the conference, and they were all very well-behaved.  We had a good mix of fun and work.  The weather was cold and a little rainy, which was a refreshing change from Saudi's heat.  (Side note: the weather here has cooled down quite a bit (65-75), so that Jack is required to wear a sweatshirt when he goes outside at nursery).

On the first day, we had a bus tour around Berlin before going to our hostel.  We stopped at several Berlin icons, including the remains of the Berlin Wall, the Brandenburg Gate, and Checkpoint Charlie.

This brick line marks where the Berlin wall used to stand dividing East and West Berlin.

The high schoolers in front of the remains of the Berlin Wall.

The entrance to the Berlin Zoo.

The next four days were spent at the JFK American School for the BerMUN conference.  Students play the role of delegates from various countries to the UN.  They research their country's stance on current world issues and write resolutions to present.  They then lobby to get other delegates to back their resolutions, debate, and vote.  Our students represented Venezuela and the USA.  The students were amazingly knowledgeable in world affairs and represented their school well.  We took the subway from the hostel to the school everyday, and in the evenings we went to dinner or ordered pizza.

One of our students giving a speech at the opening ceremony of the conference.  Seated at the front table are students from various schools who were chosen to serve as president of the UN, secretary-general, and other positions.

The students had to act as their country's delegation the whole time, putting their personal views aside.

After the conference was done, we took the kids to see the new Harry Potter movie and the Blue Man Group, and ate at the Hard Rock Cafe.  We spent some time in the Christmas Markets that are set up all over Germany, shopping for Christmas items, eating bratwurst, and even sledding!  Some of the students had never been sledding before.  Even though it was a wooden hill with man-made snow, it put me in the Christmas spirit.

This bear is the symbol of Berlin, so they were everywhere.

Sledding!

A public toilet... 1 Euro ($1.40) for the toilet, 7 for a shower.

The last day we were there, we went to Potsdam, a town near Berlin.  We went to a museum about the Holocaust and stopped at several palaces.

Sanssouci ("no worries") Palace

The gardens of Sanssouci

The windmill at Sanssouci

Schloss Cecilienhof, the location of the Potsdam conference between Truman, Chuchill, and Stalin.

Snow White and the Seven Dwarves at Legoland

All in all, it was a busy and fun trip.  It is nice to spend time with students outside of school, and a good challenge to lead teenagers through a foreign city!  The students are so sweet, always offering to carry my bags and asking if I missed my family. These students are literally world-travellers, but I was surprised that several of them have no street sense!  They walk in the bike paths, don't understand the subways, etc...I guess that's what living on compounds in Saudi does.  This is a very safe, sheltered place for kids to grow up, and I'd rather have a polite, caring, sheltered child than a street-smart one :)

Thanks for reading! 

A Trip to Bah'rain

This week is Eid al-Adha, the holiday when Muslims around the world flock to Mecca for the Hajj so we (again!) have the whole week off of school.  The celebration of Eid al-Adha also includes sacrificing goats, and Jack has made friends with a goat tied to a post at the end of our compound.  Hopefully he won't notice tomorrow when it disappears.

On Wednesday afternoon, the last day we worked, Rob and Jack both got their exit/re-entry visas (I had mine already) so we decided to leave the country!  T.G.W.G.S. and his family invited us to join them on a trip to the Kingdom of Bah'rain.

"Bah'rain" means "two seas" which is fitting since it is an island country.  We only needed to drive across the King Fahd Causeway which runs from Al-Khobar to Bahrain.  Along the causeway are five tollbooth-like stopping points where we had to pay a small fee and get our passports and visas stamped.  On the way back, there is a customs checkpoint as well, but we'll get to that later.

Bah'rain is not really that different than Saudi, as it is still a Middle Eastern Muslim monarchy.  The draw is that it is not nearly as strict as Saudi.  People drive over mainly to have a beer and eat pork, which are both haram, not allowed for Muslims.  To get pork in Bah'rain, you have to go into the "Non-Muslim Section" of the grocery store or restaurant.  The shopping is also better in some ways.  For example, there are no fitting rooms for women in Saudi, so women like to go to Bah'rain to shop for clothes.  Also, there are Christmas items and a certain things that are hard to find here, like swim diapers.

My main goal for shopping was to buy a Christmas tree and sneak it back across the causeway. We took the label off the box and put it, along with Christmas wrapping paper and nutmeg, underneath our luggage and other purchases.  The border guard asked, "Do you have any whiskey or meat?"  We said no, and he sent us on our way.  Now this daughter of a Wisconsin Christmas tree farmer has a beautiful fake contraband tree in the living room!  Jack helped Rob put it together and is really proud of it.

Life in Saudi Arabia is not difficult by any means.  It is just sometimes inconvenient, as life in any country other than the one you grew up in would be.  Our visit to Bah'rain was relaxing.  We could walk to restaurants from our hotel, and there was even a Caribou Coffee (a MN company).

Jack and Rob in Bah'rain

A lot of the restaurants have bicycle delivery.

There were a lot of interesting skyscrapers along the road.

A view of the King Fahd Causeway

All in all, it was a very nice trip.  We will return to Bah'rain in a month to pick my parents up from the airport there!

Tonight I leave for a school trip to Berlin for seven days.  I will be chaperoning the Model UN club as they go to a conference there.  I'm excited to go, but it will be hard to be away from Rob and Jack.  I'm sure they will have a great time fixing things and jumping, Jack's two favorite activities.  Here is a sample of what they did last time I left the house...

Trick or Treating Saudi Style and Jack's First Haircut

On Thursday we had Halloween on the compound.  Jack was dressed as a giraffe, but he was not keen on wearing the hood that looked like a giraffe head.  He sat nicely for group pictures with all the other kids, and then he and Rob made it to about 4 villas to get candy (which I obviously ate).  If you couldn't tell, in the video above he is saying "trick or treat."

On Friday, Jack went to our neighbor's 6-year-old birthday party at a play area about two blocks away.  Every mall and shopping center has a huge play area with rides.  I think this is because the hot weather prevents kids from playing outside, or maybe just because Saudis love kids.  There is a kids' barbershop inside the play area so I took the opportunity to get Jack's first haircut.  He sat really still, maybe because there was a tv with Tom & Jerry playing right in front of his face!  Then he and the other kids played on rides and ate dinner and cake.

Before...notice the chair is a bicycle!

Apparently it was necessary to style it also...Jack amazingly didn't mind the blow dryer!

This is what it looked like the next morning when he woke up...

The play area included lots of toddler rides, as well as bumper cars, a water ride, and a roller coaster.

Jack and his friend on a ride.

Jack's favorite, the train ride.

On Sunday, the kids at school all dressed up.  Not so much high schoolers, but everyone from nursery to 8th grade had costumes, and they had a Halloween parade that was really cute.  Jack went as a Minnesota Gopher with big muscles.

Tomorrow and Wednesday we have the ISG Conference.  ISG is International Schools Group, the district we work for.  All the teachers from the seven ISG schools across Saudi Arabia are coming to Dhahran High School for this conference.  There is a guest speaker and we will do small group activities.  I'm excited that breakfast and lunch are provided AND it starts half an hour later than usual!

Hope everyone had a good Halloween!  The weather here is much cooler and actually feeling slightly fall-ish.  There were pumpkins for sale here for $60 each!  One thrifty teacher carved a watermelon instead.

License to Ill

I got my driver's licence!  Now I can finally get some booze, purchase lottery tickets, and buy a car.  On the bright side, I've spent a lot of sleepless nights wondering what my blood type is. . .

A Trip to Riyadh

On Wednesday, I embarked on a four-hour bus ride to Riyadh, the capital city, with twelve high school girls and one bus driver who spoke no English.  We went to the American International School of Riyadh (AISR) to play in the SAIKAC volleyball tournament.  SAIKAC is the Saudi Arabian Inter-Kingdom Activities Conference, and the organization that handles all of our athletics tournaments, as well as spelling bees and other activities.

The drive from Al Khobar to Ar Riyadh is, as I said, about four hours....if....you know where you are going.  Most of the trip is on one highway, known as the Dammam Highway.  The problem comes in when you get to Riyadh and the GPS unit, which is supposed to guide you there, guides you wrong.  Then you would have to read a map of a city with no street names, just landmarks, and tell the directions to one of your volleyball players who speaks Arabic, and then she can tell the bus driver.  That might take you an extra hour or so!  Anyway, we got there safely, and we didn't even miss any games.

Along the way, there are camels everywhere!  I had no idea that camels could be white, brown, and black.  There were some very small towns, mostly consisting of a gas station combined with a mosque and a few small houses.  We also saw several Bedouin camps.

A Bedouin camp with camels, a water truck, and some tents.

As we neared Riyadh, we saw the famous red sand dunes.  They were really beautiful, but that is hard to capture in a picture taken through a bus window.

Red sand dunes

One might think that the closer you get to a large city, the fewer camels one would see.  Nope!  That is where the camel markets would be!

Look at the white camel calf!

Prospective buyers checking out the camels.  I have heard that a good camel can sell for $25,000!!!

Some buildings in Riyadh

Once we got to AISR, we were treated to lunch in the cafeteria.  The school is very nice, and the weather is much drier than where we live on the Gulf.  That evening, the girls each went to stay with a host family from the school, and I met the AISR teachers I was staying with.  I walked in to see a teacher  that Rob and I worked with at Ramsey in St. Paul four years ago!  What a small world!  We ate dinner at the compound restaurant and caught up.  Also, the other coach who stayed with us grew up in Eau Claire, WI.  I cannot believe how many Midwestern connections there are here!

AISR outdoor courts.  Our games were inside the gym.

The center of the AISR campus

While I was in Riyadh, Rob and Jack held down the fort.  They made all sorts of preparations for my birthday, including shopping for a new camera lens, setting up a luncheon with a bunch of ladies on the compound, and arranging a manicure/pedicure and massage for me!  Wow, what a nice, relaxing birthday.

By the way, Jack had the stitches out on Monday, and the doctor said it is healing well.  This visit to the hospital was much easier than the first.  My brave little guy didn't even cry when the doctor took out the stitches.  And, after the doctor gave him a sucker, he pointed at him and said "friend".

Virtual School

Last week we had Virtual School for three days.  All the teachers, from Kindergarten to 12th grade, put their assignments on a webpage and students did all their work from home.  They had to check the webpage for each class and upload assignments for us to correct.  

King Abdullah

Apparently the King of Saudi Arabia sometimes makes a decree and closes all schools, because of a health risk, or security risk, or just because he's visiting town.  Last year the school was closed for three weeks to prevent the spread of swine flu, and the teachers had to scramble to figure out how to continue classes online.  The administration is being proactive now and having us practice so we are prepared for the next closure.  

And, the next closure almost happened this week, when the power at school was out all weekend (Thursday & Friday, remember...).  No power means no air conditioning!  Yikes!  Luckily  they fixed it by Saturday morning so we could hold school as normal.

Rob and I both really enjoyed virtual school.   We put our assignments online the night before, and some teachers were very creative.  The kindergarteners made homemade playdoh, the band class had to watch two performances of the same piece of music on YouTube and write a critique, and the weightlifting class had to make videos of themselves working out and send them to the teacher.  The teachers still went to school, and we spent the day answering email questions from students and looking at submitting assignments.  Everyday we had a "mandatory" catered lunch in the staff lounge.  I could handle a few more days of virtual school!

On Wednesday, I leave for the capital city of Riyadh, about a four hour bus ride from Dhahran/Al-Khobar where we live.  I'm taking 12 girls to play in the Inter-Kingdom JV volleyball tournament.  We will play against American, British, and International schools from all over Saudi Arabia, including Jeddah, Yanbu, and Jubail.  I'm excited for the trip, because I haven't gotten out into the desert yet, and I've heard the sights along the way will include many camels and sand dunes!  I will definitely take pictures for a future post. 

FYI: On the map to the left, you will see our city, Dhahran, which is on the Arabian Gulf.  We call it the Arabian Gulf  because this shore belongs to the Arabs.  If you live in Iran, you might call it the Persian Gulf, because the other shore belongs to the Persians.  Fascinating.

The post about our first trip to the ER

Last week we made our first trip to the ER.  Jack fell off the bed on Wednesday night.  On his way down he cut his head on the night stand.   Our neighbor Shane drove us to the hospital.  I had my suspicions that Shane was kind of a bad-ass, and the ride to the hospital confirmed it.  Slamming on the accelerator, weaving in and out of traffic, going the wrong way on one ways, jumping curbs. . .  

The best part of the night was when we were asking him about his friends to distract him from the doctor examining his wound.  "Is Mommy your friend?"  "Yes"  "Is Daddy your friend?"  "Yes"  "Is the doctor your friend"  "No".  It was probably because the doctor thought he was a girl.  

We actually went to two hospitals, the first didn't have a plastic surgeon on staff so we were referred to a second hospital downtown.  The second hospital didn't accept our insurance, so I was nervous about the bill.  But even after having a plastic surgeon come down to the ER to do the stitches it only came to 200 dollars.  The whole process took 3 hours and Jack was in bed by 8:15 with 5 stitches.  

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I promptly went on baby lock down, and disassembled our bed, moved the nightstand across the room, installed about 20 more safety locks.  Security cameras, voice recognition software and laser beams will have to wait until next week.  

The next morning Jack woke up and was in great spirits.  T.G.W.G.S bought him a gun that is shaped like a dog that shoots bubbles (it's a think-piece).  His daughter Trinity and Jack spent the morning chasing bubbles.