School orientaion started today. Having to work on a Sunday really isn't a big deal, other than the fact that I think it's Monday! That's going to take some time getting used to.
Today we just went over Abu Dhabi's 2030 plan and the strategic plan for ADEC. The 2030 plan is pretty impressive! The strategic plan for the schools is quite impressive as well. They want to completely overhaul their schools. A lot of poor performing students and schools. They want the focus to be on English so their students can be globally competitive, but they also want them to stay in Abu Dhabi to help them reach their 2030 vision.
I also had some time to learn some Arabic. 45 minutes is not enough time to learn Arabic. We will have Arabic lessons for 45 mintues each day this week. They are teaching us common survival Arabic and we learned simple greetings today. "shoeismick" what is your name; "issme _____________" my name is_______; "kef halak?" how are you?; "zane al hamdulilah" fine thanks; "assalam alaykum" hello; "ma'a salama" goodbye. It's a start and I know I will have to practice in order to fully learn these phrases.
After orientation Cassandra, Lakeesha, and I tried to do laundry so we got in a cab and told him we wanted to go to Spino's, he had no idea what that was or where it would be so we had to improvise. It's funny to try to use hand signals and easy words to talk about doing laundry. He thought we wanted to buy clothes, or soap, He was getting ready to take us to the Abu Dhabi Mall! We eventually got him to understand by saying dirty clothes, make clean. Weird. Then we found out they were closed due to Ramadan and we went back to the hotel where we found out they don't have actual laundramats here. You leave your clothes at the laundramat and they wash it and bring it back. It was too late to do that so we'll have to do that tomorrow. So we went to dinner. We ate at a very different and highly recommended restaurnat Lebanese Flower. It was good, but not the best. I had chicken shwarma with hommas. Chicken shwarma is thinly sliced meat like gyro meat, but it doesn't taste like gyro meat. After dinner they gave us complimentary dessert that tasted like soap!! Really it did! It was a pancake wrapped around some white filling that tasted like soap and there was syrup on top. We couldn't stop laughing when I said it tasted like soap! Well we won't be going back there again!
It was still relatively early so we decied to walk around and see what was in that area of town. Bad idea! This black guy in a white SUV began following us and beeping his horn. We didn't think much of it until we saw him following us for a while. So we went in a store and looked at refrigerators. Cassandra noticed that he had gotten out of his car and was waiting in front of the store! We didn't know what to do so we talked to the shop owner about shipping stuff to Al Ain. He must have thought we were crazy! We eventually were able to leave the store and hurry to find a cab, but as soon as we turned the corner he was there. Oh my gosh were we scared. We had to get a cab quickly! We hailed one down and even as we were walking to the cab he was still following us. We got in the cab and he stood right by the cab! SCARY! For a city with a very low crime rate I didn't feel very safe. We told the driver to get out of there fast. No big deal, cabbies drive fast in Abu Dhabi. We made it back to the hotel safely and agreed that's the last time we would be in that area at night.
Oh, I witnessed call to prayer tonight. It was pretty neat to see all the Muslims head to the mosque on the street. They were walking with a purpose. The sight was different than I expected because I thought they would just stop in the middle of the street, but they go to mosques.
Talked to Lexi today and she broke my heart when she asked when I was coming to her house again:( I miss that little girl! It's been great having Skype to be able to talk to and see my family. I have talked to Mom, Dad, and Amy quite a lot this week, and Mark and Nancy today. It will definitely make this move a lot easier knowing that I can see them even if I can't be with them.
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