Hijra New Year and Other Stuff

Before I get into the Islamic New Year and what I did on my long weekend, let me back up to my birthday.  You already know that I got a really nice necklace from one of my students that I had to turn in to the parent care officers.  Well, it turns out that I had to give it back.  That means it must have been really expensive and probably plated in real gold.  I knew it was nice, just not that nice.  The PCOs gave it back to me and told me to give it back to the student.  So I had to explain to Mohammed that although I loved his gift I wasn't allowed to accept it due to school policy.  He looked quite hurt.  The PCOs did say that they would call the mother and explain to her, but I don't know if that got done or not.  I just wish that I wouldn't have had to have told Mohammed.  I think that's something that the PCOs should have done, or at least the principal.  I mean it's their policy, not mine.  Shouldn't they be the one to explain it to a 9 year old?

Hijra New Year.  Islamic New Year.  This holiday celebrates when the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH - peace be upon him; that always follows his name when it's in writing) and his followers made the journey from Mecca to Medina, due to an attempt to assassinate him.  They made this journey in 622 so according to the Islamic calendar it is the year 1434.  Not sure what that has to do with anything because as far as I know they don't use that calendar.  Anyway it's a holiday and we got a day off.  It was scheduled for Wednesday, but thankfully they moved it to Thursday which meant a long weekend.

I started the holiday by cleaning my apartment for my guests.  Kristie, Vanny, and Jane were coming from Dubai to spend Thursday exploring Al Ain.  I picked them up from the bus station at about 10:30pm and then we went grocery shopping.  They hadn't eaten so they bought dinner stuff along with what we needed for breakfast the following morning.  They were surprised by how quiet it was in Al Ain Mall and on the streets.  I must admit I was a bit surprised too.  I mean the mall is usually quite busy at night.  I guess because it was a holiday everyone had already left for Dubai or Abu Dhabi.  We got the shopping done and headed home.  They loved my apartment; mostly because it's like a home.  OK a bit about Filipino accommodation.  Kristie, Vanny, and Jane don't live together but they rent out what's called a "bed space" in a one bedroom flat.  Accommodation isn't provided by their employers so what they do is section off a one bedroom flat into many different "bed spaces."  There can be at least 8 people living in a one bedroom flat in Dubai.  It definitely was an eye opener when I saw where they lived.  So because mine isn't sectioned off it's more like a home and they liked that.  After dinner it was time to figure out sleeping arrangements.  I had thought that one could sleep in the bed with me, one on the couch, and I could take the cushions off the armchairs and put them on the floor for the other one.  Well, they didn't want that.  They all slept on the floor!  These floors are hard and cold!  They are marble tiles.  They laid a blanket on the rug and slept on that.  I was totally embarrassed.  I didn't want them to sleep on the floor.  Talk about being a bad hostess.  They would have nothing of my plan saying that it's Filipino culture to sleep on the floor.  I don't know about that, but I guess if they wanted to who was I to stop them.  So sleeping arrangements were figured out and we went to bed around 2am.  I haven't stayed up that late in a very long time!!!

We had a late start to the day due to the late night.  After we were all up, around 8, Kristie made us breakfast.   She made a huge omelet, fried onions (which of course I didn't eat), toast, and soup (I didn't have any of that either).  But, what I did have was very good!  Then it was time to shower.  That was a process since I only have one bathroom!  Oh well, we made due and had some good fellowship while we waited for everyone to get ready.  Kristie and Vanny wore short shorts, which would turn out to be a problem at the zoo.  I didn't think it would be because we would be outside, but I was wrong.  We got to the zoo around 12:30 and the line for tickets was almost to the road.  Vanny waited in line while the rest of waited for her to get the tickets.  With tickets finally in hand we went to enter the park, only to find out that Vanny and Kristie couldn't enter because of their shorts.  They were told it was a new rule that was being enforced.  Only thing was it wasn't being equally enforced.  As Vanny and Kristie went back to the car to get a shirt to tie around their waist, Jane and I saw many western women with short shorts on.  Evidently it's only being enforced if you're not white.  Kristie and Vanny returned with a shirt tied around their waist and we entered the park.  It was hot, there were lots of people, and they weren't running the train so we didn't stay long.  We saw a few of the highlight animals: white lions, rhinos, hippos, and monkeys along with the tons and tons of gazelle and the bird house before leaving.  Probably not my best experience at the zoo, but I don't think they were comfortable and they were hungry for lunch.

We had Al Noor for lunch!  Of course I had to take them to my favorite restaurant!  They enjoyed it and we had tons of leftovers.  As a matter of fact, I still have leftovers in the fridge.  They probably need to be thrown out now!!  We had the traditional mix grill (lots of different kind of kabobs), hummus, fatoush, foul (beans), and fresh juice.  Yummy!

After lunch we headed to the Rotana to watch "Breaking Dawn 2."  I didn't really want to see this movie, but that's what they wanted to do, so that's what we did.  I knew there was a movie theater at the Rotana, I just didn't know where.  Turns out it's underground!!  Who knew!  The good thing about this movie theater is that it's hardly ever busy.  I think there were about 15 other people in the theater.  So we had our choice of seats.  I thought that I would have difficulty understanding the story since I hadn't read any of the books or seen any of the other movies, but surprisingly I could follow the story line pretty well.  Sorry if any of you reading this are Twilight fans, but I didn't think it was a very good movie. 

We wanted to head to Jebel Hafeet after the movie, but it was 6:30 and that meant it was dark.  Too dark to see anything.  So a trip up the mountain would have been wasted.  So we headed back to the apartment for dinner made by Jane and then entertainment from Kristie, followed by an early night so we could be on the road to Dubai by 8:30.

Friday after church I went with Lucia, Karen (her daughter), and Angel (Karen's friend) to Global Village.  Global Village is a huge bazaar with various countries represented.  Many different countries have an area where they have entertainment and sell handmade crafts from their country.  I bought Christmas presents from Jordan, Turkey, and Africa and a souvenir for myself from India.  It's a really neat experience to be able to see what each country has to offer without leaving the UAE.  Although it is a nice experience I was getting tired of hearing "mashallah" (kind of like wow!) and being stared at by men.  I did turn into a tourist attraction though.  A group of teenage Pakistani boys asked to take my picture with the tallest of their group.  They were nice about it so I obliged.  After that a cute little old lady from Jordan asked for her picture with me.  She was so cute that I had to let her get a picture.  Then an Emirati dad asked if his daughter and son could get a picture with me.  His daughter was 9 and she's quite tall already.  Maybe I should use my height to make money!!  With pictures done we walked around to various countries (Egypt, Kuwait, UAE, KSA, Syria, China, Bahrain, Qatar and other ones) before heading back to Lucia's for the night.  We left Global Village around 11:00 and I was exhausted.  I guess that was the beginning of my sickness, only I didn't know it then.  I just thought I hadn't gotten a lot of rest during the weekend and it was catching up with me.

Saturday morning I took Lucia to the doctor for her bone density exam and then headed home around noon.   I had to go grocery shopping, do laundry, grade papers, and plan and I was still exhausted so I wanted to be in bed early.  About 1/2 way home I realized I was too tired to go grocery shopping so I decided that I would go home and take a nap.  I got home around 2:30 and slept until 5:00 when I forced myself to get up and get some work done.  I looked at the planner and math book and had a little dinner and was back in bed by 8:00.  During all of this I was thinking that I was simply overtired from my long weekend so I didn't really worry about anything.  I figured that I would wake up fine Sunday morning.  Wrong.  I had to fight to make it through the day.  I had a terrible cough and body aches.  Thankfully I made it through the day and headed to LuLu for the groceries that I didn't get on Saturday.  As soon as I got to LuLu the panadol (Tylenol) must have worn off because I was freezing and my whole body ached.  I'm sure I looked like death warmed over as I was walking around LuLu.  I got some soup, pie crusts, yogurt and medicine from the pharmacy and headed home.  It was another early night as I was in bed by 7.  As long as the panadol was working I was fine, but as soon as it wore off I had a fever and body aches.  I took plenty of panadol and went to work on Monday; thinking that I was feeling better.  Well, I wasn't.  So I decided to take Tuesday off work and go to the doctor.  Turns out that I have pharyngitis which is causing a sore throat and a slight ear ache, a cold, and flu-like symptoms.  The doctor gave me an antibiotic for the pharyngitis, cough syrup for the cough/cold, something for congestion, and panadol for the flu-like symptoms along with 3 days off work.  It's Wednesday now and I feel a bit better, but I'm still coughing and my throat still hurts.  Right now my fingers ache, but that could be because I've been doing a lot of typing and I haven't taken any panadol yet today.  I'm not sure if I'll be going to work tomorrow; it's all going to depend on how I feel tonight.  Thursday I'm supposed to go to Sharjah for Thanksgiving and I'm supposed to bring apple pie and pumpkin pie, but I don't know if I'll be going to that either.  Again it will depend on how I feel tonight.  Hoping I feel better soon because I'm home in 3 1/2 weeks and I can't be sick.

81 degrees at 11:30am.