Eid Mubarak!

Eid Mubarak - meaning "blessed festival" or is used as a greeting to tell someone "may you enjoy the blessed festival."  Eid here means several things to us.  Nothing gets accomplished that deals with gov't type services, shopping malls are out of control (like our shopping season of Christmas), but most importantly we can eat out in public regardless of the time of day!  EID MUBARAK!  Even hours are reduced at certain places.  What was even more crazy is that if you got some hours of operation on Monday - they probably changed come Tuesday because of when Eid was "declared" based on the moon! 

But...

More things have finally been accomplished!  The kids are registered for school!  Now getting to this part of the “game” was not exactly easy.

Three families pitched in and rented a Toyota Hiace – which is a 15 passenger van.  It’s not like a nice new rental we’re used to renting.  This vehicle is standard, and the air conditioning was terrible for the people who sat in the back part.  Since Yolanda was the driver and I was the “navigator” we were given the royal treatment with working ac vents. 

We set out to find the rental place at 8 am from our hotel.  We get in the taxi and of course he has no idea what we’re talking about.  But luckily (which turned out to nothing) I asked the rental place for directions.  They said 4^th street between 11^th and 9^th.  Easy Enough.  Or so we though.  We ride around in the taxi for 30 minutes and 25 dirhams later we finally decide to get out and walk or something else.  After walking around with no idea of where to go, we stopped and I called Jennifer.  She looked online and attempted to give me directions from a map that used names and letters for streets we couldn’t see.  After walking around for 30 minutes and sweating was out of control, I then found another rental place – Dollar.  One would think they’d know where their competitor is.  NOPE!  But at least we were able to cool off a little in their office while we waited to figure something out.  I had attempted to call UCR to find better directions but no answer. 

FINALLY after 9 – they answer.  They didn’t even open until 9 – which they told me to come at 8 to pick up the van.  So we get directions and go straight to some building that someone said they were near. Still can’t find it.  So finally the guy at UCR says wait there and I’ll come pick you up.  Where did he take us?  RIGHT WHERE WE GOT OUT OF THE TAXI!  There was no name on the store front because there is construction and they’re about to move to a new office.  Wish they would have told me that on the phone! 

But finally around 10:30 we get to the hotel and pick up everyone and we’re on our way!  Driving to Al Ain wasn’t bad since we’re on the outskirts of Abu Dhabi.  About 30 minutes into the drive the speed limit goes to 120 km/hr which is roughly 75 miles per hour.  But the van starts beeping when you hit the 120 km/hr.  We started getting nervous when we heard the beeping but called and got it sorted.  Whew….

So we get o Al Ain and no one had any good directions to the school.  NOT EVEN THOSE WHO WORK THERE!  They couldn’t tell me how to get there from the main road into Al Ain.  It was nuts.  So we drove around and around and asked 4 or 5 people for directions – no one really knew.  Finally we find a cab driver in this remote type area.  We did see lots of schools but not Manor Hall.  This cab driver gave us awesome directions except we were behind the school which was not labeled.  And at this point we had no idea what we were able to take care of when we got there since the registration folks were “gone for the day – it’s EID you know”.  EID…yes we know….INSHALLAH, right?!?!?!

We pull up at Manor Hall and the gate was open.  We just walk in like we knew what we were doing.  They give us a brief tour – we just wanted to see the classrooms.  But since it’s still summer here they’re doing cleaning and the rooms are not set up.  The other two families with us check out their area and we start the paperwork.  I was smart and brought all our documents and stuff with us.  We had to give 3 passport photos, shot records, birth certificates, and passport info page copies.  By this time there were probably 4 or 5 more parents that showed up to check out the school and register.  So now the lady helping us called the director to come. 

So we had to pay our registration fees and of course – cash only.  Do we have 1000 dirhams cash – no of course not.  1000 dhs is about $367 usd.  But Khalil, the director of research and development, takes us to the atm machine.  He is like the GM.  It’s a family school.  His sister is the HR person and does the hiring.  They have two other schools that are Arabic schools and they run a few other businesses.  Khalil’s wife also comes in and was super nice.  She chats with us about all kinds of school related thing, and so does Khalil. They were making us totally comfortable which made an awesome impression.  Come to find out – his wife – Sahar – is from Tennessee! 

So we’re registered!  The kids will go back on Saturday and take some sort of assessment to see where they are at.  Khalil assured me that Americans never have a problem “qualifying” there.  Hopefully the kids aren’t shy and really show what they know!  

Manor Hall follows an American curriculum – Harcourt. They have about 22 teachers (not sure if my numbers are accurate) 14 or so from America and the rest from Canada.  There have been lots of discussions on facebook on the schools and there are lots of LT’s who are moving their kids to Manor Hall this year.  So we feel good about the school.  Cole and Caralyn will have different teachers too which is exciting!  They will also have Arabic class!  They have a swimming pool which I think is for the swim team and they do sports but I think all the extra curricular stuff is for grade 2 and higher. 

After dealing with the hours at Manor Hall we ventured around Al Ain.  We dropped all of the home stuff we purchased at our villa and good thing we did because we had to turn in a maintenance request to have several things fixed. Hope this is not a sign of things to come!  Then we explored the Al Ain Mall which has some nice stores and a MegaMart where we found some backpacks that are reasonably priced.  We even signed up for our phone and internet too!  Now when it gets installed might be a different story – again – inshallah! 

Finally we made it back to Abu Dhabi.  We were so exhausted.  We ate dinner, let the kids swim for a little while and off to bed! 

This afternoon we’re renting a Honda Civic (4 door) for a month.  Then we’ll decide if we’ll buy a used vehicle or what.  We’re thinking we can live with one car because our schools don’t see too far from each other.  My school is actually 3 round-abouts from the kids school.  Can you see we’re adapting to the directions here!!!  While it does make us laugh now – when you’re in the middle of trying to get somewhere it’s not funny at all!

Stay Tuned…

Here are some photos:

Manor Hall - The Kids' School!  It's grades K through 9. 

KG 1 kids can be as young as 3 which KG1 in the US would be like Pre-Kish? 

If you're bored or curious - check out their website - http://manorhallschool.com/

The kids' table at Al Ain Mall.  It was nice to acutally be able to eat somewhere during the day! 



Yolanda - our driver!  She was great. 




Tawam Hospital near our Villa.
They have some partnership with Johns Hopkins.



Our Al Ain Bus Group! 
Yolanda and her kids are from Houston (Humble/Kingwood area). 
Kris and her kids are from Clear Lake area. 
Cole & Caralyn love these kids!

After Kris and I were talking about Webster - come to find out - she lives in Pipers Meadow - where I lived in the early 80's before we moved to Alief.  Small world!  She asked me where in Pipers Meadow, and I said, "15927 Eastcape Drive".  I was surpsrised I still remember the address!

It's hilarious we travel 8,200 miles across the world and meet someone who lives where I used to live. 



Cole was so sweaty on the "bus" he had to take his shirt off! 




It was crazy - all along the road we saw people standing like they were hitch hiking.
I think they thought we'd transport them because of the vehicle we were in.



120 km/hr which is about 75 mph.

I'm sure we saw some going close to 90 or 100 mph! 

It's crazy seeing all the luxury vehicles here.  We did see a Ferrari too today!

Loved this picture...Almost sunset in Al Ain!

Did I already post this?  These are dates - from two different countries.  Not sure which are from which. 
I liked them - the others wern't real crazy about them.