Dear Friends and Family,

I had a definite low point of my time here in Saudi Arabia so far, last week.  I was grouchy and out of sorts all week long.  Every day things rubbed me the wrong way. Naturally I assumed I was suddenly and inexplicably surrounded by idiots! Well, Carolyn chilled me out, informed me it probably wasn't them, rather it was me, and now I can only surmise that I was having a bout of culture shock.  On September 13 it will have been exactly one month that we’ve been in a completely new and often surprising, sometimes disconcerting environment and I think it just caught up with me.

That said, I feel like I’m on the other side now.  We are one day into our weeklong vacation to mark the Muslim celebration of Eid.  Here are a few things that cheered me up:

• Carolyn and I managed to obtain our mobile phone plan yesterday - an event made possible because I finally received my iqama (pronounced Ee-Kama) - otherwise known as your resident papers for Saudi Arabia.  A great number of things depend on having this document including your ability to re-enter the country upon leaving it, get a driver’s license, register a car, open up a bank account, and the aforementioned cell phone number.
• Time off from school (even though my class is delightful)
• New friends (more about this later)
• I finalized my gym membership

Myself with a good friend of mine - Steph Curry.  Maybe you've heard of him?
His and Labron's jersey are the only ones available here in the Kingdom.
Sorry Blazers!

Our biggest decision was putting down a deposit on a car.  Someone on the compound here was selling his SUV and I jumped on the chance to pick it up.  For those interested, it is a Hyundai Santa Fe with 4WD for driving in the sand. Carolyn and I are hoping to do some desert camping at some point here in Saudi as soon as we can find knowledgeable people to throw in with.  Also, we were advised to get a bigger car as a way of mitigating some of the...shall we say unfamiliar driving habits in Saudi Arabia.  

But to come back to my previous point about new friends...I made a connection on the compound with a woman while on one of the shopping busses (our compound provides bus rides free of charge every day) who is Ethiopian.  Last night Sunni invited Carolyn and I out to celebrate Ethiopian New Year with her family and friends.  

At the center of it all...Ethiopian coffee.

It was a lot of fun with the added bonus of delicious coffee, Ethiopian music, a chance to brush off my Amharic, warm hospitality, Ethiopian dancing (which I declined to the relief of all concerned) and...you guessed it, Ethiopian food.  

OK, so the spelling is off.  Delicious anyhow.  And Hppay New Year to everyone!

Carolyn and I stumbled home four hours later having destroyed our diets and laden with even more Ethiopian food for the following day.  It was mind-bendingly fun to land on a little island of Ethiopian-ness amid the sea of British-ness and Saudi-ness on Sara Village.  

Me with my new friends.

Carolyn and I will probably spend the entire week here in Al Khobar (our fair city) this vacation week simply because 1. Travel is super expensive this time of year  2. My iqama isn’t actually completely in hand - that is to say, I have my iqama number and my exit/re-entry visa but not my actual iqama card which has not yet been printed and 3) Carolyn has been under the weather fighting a bug and has low energy.

On one final note, the gym here on Sara Village is extensive and I now have the ability to make full use of it having completed the orientation and safety session.  The guy who runs the fitness center is very warm and a fount of information so he started me out on a fitness regimen for wimps which almost killed me.  In any event, upon finishing up this blog entry I need to drag my sore muscles and sorry self back up to what seemed at first like a castle of fun and play and now seems like a dungeon of dread to continue with day two of my training.