Lessons learned after one month in the Kingdom

We've been here four weeks today, but I'm going to call it a month because I can.  We've learned a lot this month so I thought, for our benefit and the benefit of anyone who may ask us what advice we have or how we're doing, I would write it all down.

- Driving.  We were warned about the driving here.  It is crazy, but honestly not as horrifying as I was anticipating.  I've found that as long as you expect every driver in every situation to do the very dumbest thing possible, then you're never surprised when they do.  Four lanes of traffic and when the light turns green the guy in the far right lane speeds across all the lanes of traffic and turns left...sure, I figured that might happen.  Going the speed limit in the left lane and a family in a little car speeds by, easily going twice our speed, on the right shoulder with two young kids hanging out the sunroof and two on laps in the front seat...Yep, that's normal.  Merging and lane changing are a mess.  A nonsensical, I'm coming whether you're stopping or not, mess.  Glenn drives half an hour every day to and from work which is a breeze compared to his commute back home.  But I do worry more about him driving here.  It's just completely unpredictable.  Luckily, Glenn is great at driving here.  He has figured out how to get us around safely and to be aggressive when he needs to be.  He's wonderful and I'm so glad we have him.  I don't know if I'd want to drive here if I could.  I'm very content to let Glenn take the wheel.  Wish I had more freedom to get myself places without having to rely on the aramco busses or whether or not a taxi is available, but I don't know if I'd want to drive...  I did drive around main camp yesterday a bit and it was SO awesome to have a little freedom in a place where the driving isn't insane.

- Food.  The night after we arrived we went to some new friends house for a dessert potluck.  One of the ladies gave me the advice to start over collecting and trying new recipes because all our family favorites wouldn't taste like our family favorites anymore and we'd just be disappointed every time we try one so it's a better idea to just start with things that we've never had before so we don't have expectations.  I was kind of stubborn about that for a couple of days.  Then Glenn made our favorite cabbage salad and we had to make a few substitutions...and it did not taste the same.  I may have cried.  So while I'm sure I'll try some of our favorite recipes, I have started trying new things because it's just not comfort food when it doesn't taste the same.  After a month, we've been able to find almost everything we have at home.  Almost.  Everything is slightly different.  The sugar has larger crystals, the brown sugar is different, the milk is different, everything is just a little different.  Even some of the things that are the same brand as home don't taste exactly the same.  We paid way too much one time for blue bell ice cream and it was not good.  You could tell that it had been thawed and re-frozen a few times and it had a sandy texture.  Yuck.  Then there are things that you can't find or things you can find once in a while and you stock up like a crazy hoarder when you find them.  I've been looking for canned pumpkin because I just wanna make something fall-like.  I kept hearing people had found it at different stores but when I got there the whole shelf would be empty.  I finally found one and I'm trying to find one great recipe to use it on.  It is a precious commodity.  Talking to ladies on camp is really helpful.  I won't be needing tampons for a while, but I've been told that they are available now and people are stocking up because they may not have them again for a year or two.  Crazy.

Another thing Glenn and I have decided with food is that, at least at first, we are going to spend the ridiculous amounts of money for the food that we want because we are spending so little for living expenses so our grocery budgets will probably be doubled here so we can buy what we want.  It's a huge shift in thinking from home where I couponed and bargain shopped.  It just takes so long to get out to do a grocery run.  I have to wait to go after Glenn gets home so he can drive us, the traffic is usually worse at night, and then we have to account for prayer time and we are rushed so we can get home in time to get the kids to bed early, so bargain hunting and shopping at several stores every week is just not worth the time for us.  I'm sure in time I'll figure out how to work it better but we're still in survival mode a bit and for now, if we find a cereal or cleaning product that we really like, we'll buy it.  Even if a box of cereal costs $10 or that bottle of floor cleaner that I know I like the way it smells costs me $20.  Whatever.

- Attitude.  After meeting and talking to several ladies here, I've sort of figured out which women I look forward to talking to, and which women I know will have mostly complaints and bummer news every time we talk.  While I do think it's kind of impossible to have a conversation here without the hard realities of living here coming up, I really enjoy talking to people who address them as something that's more funny than devastating.  I just can't let every little bit of bad news or large mountain of devastating news beat me down for very long here because, if the trend of this last month continues, I'll receive bad news of some sort or hear crazy stories of some sort every day.  Things I just have to accept as the way things are here because of culture or whatever, and then I have to get over it and move on.

So our eboxes showed up and our printer is busted.  At least that's the only thing that's busted or missing!!  And they came way faster than I anticipated, especially accounting for Saudi standard time!

So someone's shipment showed up and was completely moldy.  Everything, every item of furniture, every appliance, everything they owned is completely ruined.  Okay, so I guess I better just start preparing for the worst and be super happy and surprised if any of my things arrive the way I sent them because losing everything is a possibility.

So I may have to have a c-section depending on what the doctor on call at the time I come in is comfortable with...okay...well I'll have a good cry about that and then I'll pick myself back up and start doing some research and asking for advice on recovering from c-sections because I may not have a choice even if everything is fine going in.

I was having a conversation with some ladies last week about the busses to main camp for the costume parade at the elementary school.  Someone asked what time they were leaving, and my new friend said, "Oh I'm sure we don't have to worry about anything.  There will be plenty of room on the busses, they'll be on time and we'll get to the school in plenty of time."  We all laughed.  And I realized, holy crap, this is a funny joke now.  The fact that we can reliably expect the worst case scenario and be really surprised if things go right, is our reality now.  That's crazy.  The same friend had a birthday this week and when I asked her what she was going to do she said, "Well, my husband is going to watch the kids and I'm going to run to target and get some cute things for myself and my house, then I'm going to wander around just for fun.  Then I'm going to get a massage and then come home.  And I'm going to do it all in just 2 hours."  We both laughed at how amazing those simple things sounded.  Not even remotely possible here.  But it's kind of funny to think of the way we were so spoiled with simple things we took for granted at home.

I came over here with overly optimistic expectations about our time frame for our shipments arriving and our length of stay on Rakah.  It's been disappointing to realize that my status as a "high risk pregnancy" doesn't matter to anyone.  Unless something goes very wrong they're going to treat me just like any other pregnancy and my being a half hour drive from the hospital (and that's IF Glenn is home, or there is a taxi immediately available, or there is a bus leaving immediately) and the fact that I'm "supposed" to see a high risk doctor and be monitored more frequently does not matter one little bit.  It's been disappointing to hear every bit of bad news but I've just decided that every day here is going to be a lesson in patience and choosing to look on the positive side.  Dwelling on the negative things about this country and this life that we CHOSE to live for a while, helps no one.  So we're not going to do it.  This means that there are days on occasion when I'm on the verge of tears all day.  Or when Glenn gets home and I'm just quiet and the poor guy tiptoes around wondering if there is anything he's supposed to do or anything he's done wrong.  Nope.  I just know that that day, if I open my mouth, I'm going to complain or cry and I don't want to do that.  So I'm just quiet for a day and then the next day is better and I pick myself up and move on.

- My children.  I've been so pleasantly surprised where my kiddos are concerned.  They've had their bad days.  Their tantrums and disobedient streaks and ornery days and nights that make me crazy and try my very limited patience.  But overall, both my little sensitive kind-hearted boy and my tough, "don't touch me, mom" boy are doing very well.  Tate has a hard time some mornings getting on the bus.  I know he does fine once he's out of the compound and has friends to talk to on the way to school.  He loves school and comes home excited to tell us about what he's done that day.  The kids at school seem to be good kids who are generally kind to each other and well-behaved.  I can't imagine what it must be like to teach at a school like Tate's school.  The class sizes are small, each class has a permanent aide, and 99% of your students have 2 parents and one of them stays home to care for the kids.  That's pretty incredible.  We had a parent teacher conference yesterday with Tate's teacher.  I wasn't sure what to expect since he's only been in her class for 3 weeks, but I was very pleasantly surprised that she had him figured out so well in such a short time.  She had specific stories that demonstrated different aspects of his personality and knows his strengths and weaknesses and just loves him.  It makes me feel so good to know that if I have to ship my exhausted little boy off on a bus and not see him ALL DAY, that at least he's happy and being well cared for there.

Finn has been happy too.  He's content to play at a park until he's all sweaty or go bowling or take a shopper bus to a mall or to main camp to meet Dad or run errands.  He's my little buddy and has luckily been pretty flexible so far.  I'm still really stubborn about his nap schedule.  He takes such amazing naps every afternoon and that's going to come in handy when the babies come so I make sure we're home for the afternoons if at all possible.  We've started doing his own "reading practice" every day.  He has his own sticker chart and gets to earn a short episode of some show he likes (usually super why right now), if he does a good practice with me.  Right now we're learning letters and sounds and he's picking them up pretty well.  Smart little kid.

I've been dragging my feet getting him potty trained waiting for a week when I can stay home all week and not have anywhere to go.  Hopefully that will be next week.  I'm dreading it.  But I'm not so secretly excited that none of this is my furniture, and the fact that all the floors are hard floors will be a huge perk for that phase of our lives.

I was told that the kids adjust much easier in general, than the parents and I've certainly been lucky to find this is the case with us.  I'm sure we're not through adjusting and there will be more difficult things to wade through with our kiddos.  But thus far exploring all the new cultural things and fun new places to go has been an adventure for the kids and I'm very grateful for that.

- Packing.  We got our eboxes this week which was amazing.  I wasn't expecting them for another few weeks yet, so to get them a couple of days before our 4 week mark was incredible.  It was really exciting going through and unpacking.  It was also a self-revelatory process, realizing which things I thought I would NEED that I could now do without, and which things I just put in on a whim that I had no idea I would be SO excited to pull out of a box.  So in the interest of keeping a record, for my memory and in case I can be of help to anyone else along the way moving over here, here's a list of things in those categories for me:

Things I wasn't expecting to be thrilled about (and wish I had brought more of): 

-carnation instant breakfast, SO nice to have a fast way to get something down Tate early in the morning when he's exhausted but we have to eat a quick breakfast and get to the bus!

-pumpkin pie spice and nutmeg, didn't know I had packed any and am so glad we brought some!  Can't find them over here.

- Clorox wipes, they have some over here but they kind of smell funny and it's nice to have a quick way to wipe up the counters

- Goldfish crackers, they are really different here and the boys don't like them.

- our waffle iron, LOVE our waffle iron.

- Protein powder from costco.  Wish I had more of this for our morning shakes.

- Our towels.  I LOVE having our nice, fluffy towels and bath mats instead of the thin ones Aramco provides.  Our bathrooms feel much more homey, which I know sounds strange.

- bouillon cubes.

- our crock pot.  It will be a huge life-saver when I have to be gone for so much of the day for any appointment or shopping trip since I have to rely on the bus schedule to get around but I still need to do something for dinner.

- Toaster and Microwave.  I had no idea how spoiled I was until I had to warm up everything in the oven or make toast in the oven.

- my land o' lakes hot chocolate mixes.  They are SO good.  Comfort food at it's best.

Things we brought in our eboxes that we could have lived without 'til our shipment arrived:

- Laundry pods.  This one's tricky because we thought we had to bring them in our eboxes so they wouldn't melt or get confiscated because they have gel in them.  And we really can't use them until our new washer and dryer arrive with the shipment.  But the laundry detergent here is not my favorite and I wish I had brought more of the kind we like but maybe just in our shipment with everything else because we can't use them in these machines anyway.

- Cereal.  We brought tons of cereal and there are some, like Oh's, oh I love Oh's, that we can't get here, but pretty much everything else we can.  It's more expensive, but we can find it so we probably didn't need to take up ebox room with it.

- extra blankets and sheets.  I think these mostly got packed because we needed things for packing around our items but they're just sitting in our closet here now.

- ziplock bags.  We bought huge boxes of gallon and quart sizes from costco because we use them a lot for marinading meat and school lunches.  They have them here.  We didn't need to bring them.

- costco kitchen drawstring garbage bags.  SO glad we have them as I've found them hard to find here.  Not many large garbage cans and so it's hard to find large bags, especially with the drawstrings...however, we're doing fine with the small garbage that Aramco provided and we could have waited for these until our large garbage cans arrived with our shipment.  We're not going to use them until then.

- We actually brought a brita pitcher in our suitcases.  We don't need it.  It takes up unnecessary room in our small fridge, and everyone here just has water cooler and buys bottles of water for them so that's what we've done.  Wish we'd known that.

Things I wish I had brought that I had no idea I would miss:

- graham crackers, they're different here.  And not very good.

- ranch dressing mix

- neosporin

- bandages and first aid stuff.  The clinic here can only do so much and then you have to get yourself to main camp to the hospital for further treatment.  They can't do stitches, for example, and it's not a life-threatening emergency so they could bandage you up but then you'd have to find a taxi (which are frequently not available) to main camp because their ambulance wouldn't take you for stitches.

-  A steam mop or wet vac.  All our floors are either tile or wood laminate.  Wish I had a quicker way to clean them.

- Some kind of house shoes.  Slippers with grippers on the bottom, or just comfortable flip flops.  Some way to keep our feet more comfortable on the hard floors and maybe, just maybe, keep the floors a little cleaner.  I've looked at a few stores but can't find anything here that would be perfect.  Looking at 5 stores would take MUCH less time at home and I know I'd be able to find something!

- Silverware drawer organizer

- big plastic cups.  We drink WAY more water here, and Glenn takes shakes to work in the morning but all we can find at the stores are glass cups.

- my body pillow.  I knew I would miss this.  The beds are rock hard here and this momma is SO sore in the mornings.  They packed my body pillow before I could get it in the e boxes and we couldn't find it.  Sad day.

- toy storage of some sort.  We brought lots of toys in our eboxes but don't have anything to clean them up into.

There are, of course, plenty of things we packed that we knew we would be excited about (extra clothes and shoes, all our baby clothes and supplies, the boy's toys, games and Christmas presents for example), but these are just the things we felt differently about than we expected.  Our printer is busted, which is a bummer but not devastating.  We can just buy another one here.  And somehow our new phones for the magic jack didn't make it.  Either they didn't get into an e box or they were taken?  Everything else is good which is super lucky!

So that's it.  One month down and I'm pleasantly surprised to say we're doing okay.  It's hard some days, but overall, we're trying to embrace the adventure.  We've been told to expect at least a year of rough adjustment so we're taking it one day at a time and buckling up for the ride ahead.  Especially with two babies coming in the next couple of months.

We are going to Bahrain this weekend and it will be nice to get out of town for a couple of days!  So excited to get our first taste of travel in this part of the world.