A trip around Bahrain

Today we began a 4 day weekend. The king of Saudi Arabia declared that the 22nd of Sept. (the 1st day of the work week-Sunday) a holiday because the National Day of Saudi Arabia is the 23rd of Sept. With the extra day we went into the neighboring country of Bahrain went shopping & attended services as the NSA Bahrain before we ventured out to see the rest of the island nation, which isn't much but desert, oil fields, refineries, & other military installations. Outside the capital city of Manama there are other towns such as Isa, Sitra, Riffa, etc. Some of these towns there are pockets of unrest as the locals disrupt the flow of life due to their circumstances. Today we ran into one of those disruptive activities when going down a street we found out it was blocked off with burning tires, 4 in a row. Nothing very serious but what was strange was that was it. No one was on the streets protesting or any other signs of folks being disgruntled. So we drove around this small annoyance & progressed on to see Durrant Resort which was basically an exclusive gated community, the Tree of Life (a large tree growing in the middle of the desert surrounded by oil production & carved-tagged to bits), & basically, the lay of the land. I did get stuck in the sand but some very nice gentlemen from Pakistan and locals help me push my vehicle out. Thank God.

Eat well in a neighborhood

Perhaps one of the best tasting & cheapest foods here is the shawarma. Not sure where it comes from but around here it is a common staple & everyone has their favorite shawarma shop. I prefer one in old Khobar near a place we call the Pilipino mall. Many Pilipinos work here. Unfortunately, the neighborhood is old & dilapidated as you can see from the photos. The area around the shawarma shop use to be a mall that burned down & just left to “rot.” Still, it is worth the crazed driving to get your tasty shawarma.

A "canned" party

There is nothing in common with the two photos you see. One is a can of Arabic "Spam" (either beef or chicken) & there seems to be a variety of canned meats at the market. So may be for our "earthquake" kit I'll get some. The other photo is from last night's (5 Sept. 13) birthday party at a neighbor's villa. On the compound there are various group gatherings & Jodi is posing with Eileen at a themed party. It was nice to see most of the folks back & into the swing of things.

The 1st week of school

We just finished our 1st week of school & boy did it seem quick. I'm spoil as I have a sweet adorable group of 4th graders that will melt your heart! Also, I only have 14 of them! Well, that many for now. Due to security reasons I cannot post photos of my students or classroom activities so you'll have to take my word that they are just adorable. We finished the week off with brownies, which I made, & off they went happy go lucky with not a care in the world! Next week, we really begin our work but the school has not received it's shipment of teaching materials & quite a few teachers are still waiting for their visas! OUCH!

Good eating!

One of the great benefits of teaching overseas is meeting other teachers from various cultures & sharing a meal together. We're blessed to have teachers from So. Africa & one of them brought over a typical bread they eat called "mealie". Think of it like heavy cornbread. Man, it was good eating!

Not too RC (religiously correct)

Living over here one notices that you are living in a very religious culture and the nationals take their faith seriously. Now with that in mind I get a laugh or scratch my head wondering at what I see around me; for example this t-shirt being sold at our local store. I wonder if they knew what it meant?

Setting up the classroom

Eileen & I have been going to the school for a couple of hours to see what we could get done & to drop off all those books I carried back with us. A duffle bag full of children books! Well, they place was rather messy with the janitorial crew doing their jobs cleaning the carpet & other things around the school. We had to cover just about everything with plastic sheets or butcher paper before we left for the summer so we just took those items down & stored it for next year. The next few days we'll set up the desks, get the classroom organized, & hook up the computer & printer. Next the bulletin boards & some lesson planning; then just wait for the kiddos to arrive. I'm so glad to be back early to do this junk because next week when teachers are suppose to be back to work there will be so little time with mandatory meetings taking up most of the day. Around the school the new preschool-elementary building is almost finish, "inshalla" (if Allah wills) in 2 weeks. Man, I'm just happy I don't have to move my classroom as some have to. As for the head count, I have no idea how many students I'll have in my class but I'm expecting a full group (24). Above is the classroom packed for the summer & the next photos will be the classroom ready for action!

Where have I been?

Hey folks! After a year hiatus we’re back on the blog. I almost forgot the password and such. Well, we finished our first year & what a year it was being frantic, frustrating, & fun. After all the adjustments we are back for more action here in the kingdom. Just a quick summary, I ended up teaching 4th grade. Eileen came 2 weeks later due to visa problems & was a great 3rd grade teacher. It took a while to set up the home, figure out how to get around & get things done but after that that, it was a rather work focused year. Still we had great vacations to Sri Lanka, the United Arab Emirates, & Oman. I have a lot to catch you all up on but I’ll get to it one step at a time. Let me start with a seasonal update on what I think is Saudi’s second biggest export & that is the product call dates. These very sweet fruits come from palm trees & this time of the year they are harvested & processed for export. I have a bunch in the front & back of our villa. The series of photos show unripe to ripen dates. I can only have a few as they are so sweet. More later.

Almost to the Kingdom!

We’re near the end of our summer break having a great time with family & friends but struggling to get Eileen’s visa processed. The problem has to do with her diplomas from the two schools she attended, one for her undergraduate & the other for her teaching credential program. Since we are dealing with several organization to process the visa it has been frustrating. Mine was processed quickly because at least one of the schools I attended was part of some U.S. nation wide database of schools, thought not all the schools are in that database. Unfortunately, Eileen’s visa will be processed after our scheduled departure date of the 22nd of August. I will have to leave without her which is a real bummer but at least she will be able to join me. There was a time we thought she may not able to & that was quickly dismissed when ISG stated that they wanted her there one way or another. So attached is a photo of my visa. Eileen’s will look the same but she is far better looking. Soon I’ll be taking off for a very, very long trip to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia with Eileen not to far behind. Write more later.

Ohana in Hawaii

Well, after a long flight we made to my sister's family in Oahu. We spent a wet 4th of July watching the fireworks out of Schofield Barracks, I worked on some of my sister's house project like changing toilet seats, played with my almost 3 year old grand-niece as well as my niece before we headed to the mainland to spend time with my father & Eileen's good friend in Southern California. It was nice to breath clean air & enjoy the things of home! In the mean time we took care of the paper work for our new visas to teach in Saudi Arabia & spent time with "ohana" which is Hawaiian for family.

Ready to go, almost

Well, we're almost ready to go. Last Thursday, the 22nd of June, the students left to begin summer holiday & we teachers left for ours the following day. As I headed back to pack up the apartment for the movers I dropped off my staff identification card into the trash can as symbolic gesture of moving on. What a freeing feeling. This past two weeks we've been saying good-bye so much that it has been tiresome. As you can see from the two photos our apartment looks like a warehouse but by Monday the 25th the shippers will pack up the rest & our place will be really empty. Then we jet out on Wednesday the 27th & live with what we carry for about the next 3 months. Our house hold goods should arrive in Saudi about the end of September. Write more later.

Ending our 4th & final year.

Ah! We're almost done with our 4th & final school year here in Shenzhen, China. We are looking forward to moving on but first a nice time with family & friends state side this summer before our next adventure in the city of Dhahran of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. There we will join our teaching friends we met here & I will be a 5th grade teacher & Eileen a 3rd grade teacher. We are so excited & happy to be part of the International Schools Groups. The photos are some of the field trips we took this past week. One more work week to go.

Malaysia 28 April to 4 May, 2012

For the May Holiday we decided to visit Malaysia as it was relatively close & came highly regarding by others. The only problem when visiting another country is where to go especially with Malaysia due to its size & various islands. Since we didn’t want to spend a whole day getting somewhere we picked the capital Kula Lumpur & down the coast to the ancient city of Melakka. We left smoggy Shenzhen via its airport & arrived 4 hours later. The KL airport is at least 50 minutes from the city itself. The lines at the customs are fast but long & getting a cab is a different set up. You can get a bus-van-taxi ticket & that cost more than a typical metered taxi. We didn’t know that until we took the ticketed cab, which is very nice & about 105 RM (ringget or 40 USD) as to 70 RM for a metered taxi. Our driver wasn’t sure how to get to the Shangri-La Hotel as the roads were blocked. Why? Well, he did know the right word so he said it was due to a meeting. I figured VIPS were in town & when we got to downtown KL is was pretty empty. As we checked into the very nice hotel we found out the city was in a semi lock down mode due to political demonstration, which we found out the next day turn ugly & violent. No bother to us as we & other tourist-locals had the place to our selves with a great sense of peace & quiet. So after settling in we grabbed dinner & went to the famous Petronas Towers & the KLCC shopping mall. The next day we slept in & headed out to climb 272 steps to the top Batu Caves Hindu Temple (trying not to get mugged by brazen monkeys), the National Monument to the fallen military members (designed by an American sculptor), Butterfly Park, & the Islamic Arts Museum, which was nicely air conditioned as the others are not. The museum held my interest as we’re heading to Saudi Arabia in August to teach there for at least the next 2 years. On Monday the 30th we took the bus down toward Melaka or Malacca. It use to be a big seaport trading center & then under the Europeans, starting in the mid 17th Century, the place has dried up economically with Singapore & Penang taking over as the main trading centers for the area. It is now slowly rebounding as a tourist center with 3 mega malls, nice hotels, many mini museums, as it is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site. To get to the very nice, huge, & modern bus station of KL you have to take a 20 minute 40 ringget cab ride out of downtown KL to purchase a 10 ringget express one way two hour ride down to Melaka. As you can see cabs are expensive. The highway was one of the best I’ve been on & it was nothing but green vegetation as far as the eye can see on rolling terrain. It has also been really hot with temperatures just around a humid 38 degree centigrade. Get around is easy as English is the second language & the people are so kind & helpful. We bought traditional Malaysian outfits & we look really regal. Eileen purchased a Muslim ladies outfit with headdress. She had to have one of the young Muslim female clerks help her put it on & today she bought a baju kurung or sarong. She looks stunning. I purchased a baju melayu, think of a nice pajama set, with a sarong (kain pelekat) wrap to go with it. The head gear (a tanjak) was the hardest thing to purchase. The tanjak is more Malay & the other is called a songkok (Malay Muslim version of a fez). I finally found a tanjak at a bridal shop that took pity on my sad search story & sold me a used one for 50 ringget, God bless that woman as I combed all these shops in the heat. Now Malaysia is round 65% Muslim. So a lot of the restaurants, including the Holiday Inn where we are staying, are “halal” or prepared by Muslim law; so no pork for me. The prices in Melaka are so much more reasonable than KL. Despite some of the bad press Muslims may get in the press back home, I found the Muslims of Malaysia quite friendly & helpful. I’m not certain but I wonder due to their influence that this tourist center is more family friendly in that I see less people smoking or racy advertisements & certainly the dress is more modest. I’m just hoping to sleep better tonight as we’re close to a place where the music is rather loud until 2am, which is my only complaint. Oh, we went into the older part of town & enjoyed a Nyonya restaurant. This is a mix of Chinese & Malaysian cuisine. It is very cheap & quite tasty. We did ask to tone down the hot spices just to be safe. Tomorrow it is off to the former Portugese section of town. So yesterday we walked to the Portugese section of town. After a long hike we made it to the “settlement” which is a bunch of homes & at the end is a nice hotel (The Lisbon), & a bunch of closed up near the beach eateries. It is absolutely nothing to speak of, really. All that way for what I thought was nothing. Ah! That’s not the whole story. Well one restaurant was open & we order a lunch to be soon joined by Signor Georgas. He is an 81 year old man & the local historian who gave us a free lecture while we were having lunch on Portugese involvement in Melaka. Where he learned his English, I’m not sure but he is at least tri-lingual. Than we were joined by a Brazilian young lady who is on break working for an NGO in Timor, where they speak Portugese. It turned out to be a nice time learning more about the place. Then we went to the “floating Mosque” which is on a man made island in what will be called Islam Town. We couldn’t go in, though we were told we could at our hotel. So we took off our shoes, wore a “graduation robe” to cover ourselves; I was wearing shorts & Eileen a sleeveless blouse; & took a quick walk around the mosque. Nothing really. For dinner we went to the hotel across from the Holiday Inn that had a really nice buffet. Yum but again, halal foods, no bother as everything was really tasty. You know you’re enjoying yourself when you loose track of time. It’s Thursday already & we have to head back to KL to spend the night in a B&B called Rumah Patih. A Brit by the name of James & his Malay wife Jo run the proprietors but Ashby the chilled out Siamese is the boss. One last day before flying back to smog central, Shenzhen & 7 more weeks of school. Our trip back was a bit confusing as there are two airports & our airlines (Air Asia) was at the other older & smaller airport called LCC. LCC is not only old it is an odd way to check in the transit system to KLIAA is smooth & easy but the LCC is in the dark ages & to get from KLIA to LCC is an expensive taxi ride of 20 minutes or the cheaper 30 minute bus ride. All this was not explained to us before but we left quite early & had the cash so it worked out. Still we made it. Overall, we enjoyed Malaysia, as it is pretty easy to get around due to the English, people are so friendly, & the pace of life slow. The heat is rather tough to get use to but thank God for AC. Well, gotta get going.

Houngzhou: 23-25 March, 2012

After the winter holidays we had a long stretch of school that ended with student lead conferences; by which time the students were sick of me & all my writing assignments. Well, awhile back, one of Eileen’s good friends, Jennifer, who grew up in Houngzhou, suggested we head up there some day & that was this past weekend.

Houngzhou has an ancient heritage & near by is Wen County, the “Venice of China.” So we, Eileen, Jennifer, Titi (Jennifer’s 7 year old son), & I boarded a plane for a two hour trip up north. Jennifer arranged it all. We we’re met by Jennifer’s new friend Maggie, who she met over the Internet. Man, it was wet & cold but we braved the elements & toured the famous West Lake with Jennifer’s father’s good friend, “Uncle Ping.” Uncle Ping is a 73-year-old man, full of vigor. He was kinda like our tour guide. For me, Tom, the things that impressed me most about that section of town were:
For a city of 2 million it was slower & cleaner (air quality & trash).
Not as many smokers but I did get my fair share of 2nd hand smoke.
Better since of history
Lots of money, some very expensive Western brands sold there.

Thank God, it didn’t rain while we toured the area!
Our hotel was rather unique. We arrived at this rather impressive twin tower building but the entire build is not a hotel, only certain floors. So on the 7th floor is a small office where your get your key and then your off to a certain floor in one of the towers.

The next day we went to Wen County, courtesy of Maggie’s driver & their very nice BMW. Yes, lots of money here. This area we went to has been rebuilt with the old city feel with canals running through it but without too much commercialism. You got a good sense of what it must have been like, say 100 years ago. It was a beautiful day & we really enjoyed the slow pace & not being crowded. That is one of the difficulties of going anywhere in China, the crowd.

The last day Uncle Ping took us to another part of Houngzhou where we toured a museum and another neighborhood that had the old buildings but full of modern day shops. With one last tour of West Lake we were off to the airport to head back to the hustle & smoke of Shenzhen.

In the Philippines

We took holiday in Cebu, Philippines to avoid the Chinese New Year madness of Shenzhen. It was been a fine break with Eileen spending most of the time recovering from her terrible sinus infection & me getting sun burned to a crisp. I like my meat well done thank you. We took the ultra red eye flight out here as it was the only direct one available & checked into our very out of the way resort called Costabella Resort. To get here you drive about 20 minutes from the airport & see how most people live in the area & it is sobering. Our 1st room was not the best w/ ants hiking around the place & the toilet backing up. Also, it was missing some simple amenities so the management up graded us w/o cost when I brought it up to their attention. We took two trips out of our "compound" & realized, again, how spoiled we are. So tomorrow it is back to China & grind out the work & smog of the area. Oh, that last photo is NOT the plane on fire but the air conditioning prior to take off.

Off to Saudi Arabia, School Year 2012-13

Sorry for the late posting but Eileen & I were offered a gracious contract to teach with the International Schools Group in Saudi Arabia at the Dhahran Elementary/Middle School, while we attended the Bangkok job fair. The main reason we even got an interview, let alone the offer was due in part with knowing two great sets of teachers there, Eric & Jamie Brown & Jack & Coree Rundell. They paved the way for us & it came down to our interviewers asking Eric's opinion about us in which he gave his emphatic approval. So we're done with our China tour of duty & happy to moving on to a quality school. Eileen will be teaching 3rd grade & I'll be teaching 5th. We will join many from this school who have moved to that region of the world, some nearby. We consider ourselves greatly blessed. After our return we had two weeks of school where many teachers became sick with one thing or another, including Eileen, but now we have a week off for Chinese New Year. We're off to relax now that our future has been settled.

Happy New Year 2012

I'm writing from the Kingdom of Thailand. Sounds impressive eh? It's been an okay place, Chiang Mai that is. Our hotel is out there & so we awake to the sounds of roosters, dogs, & cats that inform us all through the night & early in the day the local news. We also must be close to a local hang out as we hear live music until 1am. We forgot that the traditional beds are hard so my hips are sore. Oh, our bathroom to our suite doesn't have a roof! Yep, it is an outdoor bathroom equipped w/ a shower & jacuzzi tub, sink, etc. You go out there & see the stars. It really is odd. The tough part is bugs & leaves that collect there. Eileen filled up the tub to have a nice relaxing evening & when she turned on the jets out came all this dirt & ants that held up in there. Yuck! She took it well & now we stick w/ showers. The bugs haven't been too bad but I cover myself w/ bug spray often. Boy, don't I smell different! During the day it has been mid 80s & at night a nice chilly mid 60s. You have to drive hours to get any where. We did a day trip & spent 6.5 hours in the van to see only 90 minutes worth of sights. Whoa. So we saw the White Temple w/ modern art inside, actual entered the country of Laos, & visited the Karen tribe famous for the long neck ladies. They emigrated from Burma & settled in No. Thailand. The hard part for me was all the poverty, especially the children. That bothered me greatly. The food is good & the people have been very sweet & kind, at least outside the city. In the city the civility drops a bit w/ so many tourists running around. Last night we try to walk down "walking street" in the center of Chiang Mai. We never made it to the next block. It was packed! It is this way every Sunday & I’m guessing because it was the 1st of the year it was especially crowded. We went back the next day & it was empty. A lot of expats make Chiang Mai home, about 40 thousand. Most are into small business & charity organization or NGOs. It is the next largest city in the country or so I’m told & close to the famous Golden Triangle & beautiful mountain country. I believe the highest peak in Thailand is nearby at almost 2,600 meters. The land is very Buddhist & loyal to their king. I’ve added some quotes from his New Year address. I found them interesting & worth noting. Okay, write more from the job fair in Bangkok, about the 6th or 7th.

…live with consciousness, be mindful and brace for unwanted events in the future.

Suffering, threats and hindrances will come to our lives from time to time. Nobody always stays happy.

Remain mindful by being aware of what you think and do all the time.

Happy BD Pop!

Hi Pop! Just wishing you a happy birthday w/ this video. Love Tom & Eileen

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to you all. We ended our semester at school & everyone was relieved. A flood of teachers left that Friday evening to head out of China to enjoy the holidays. We, for once, are sticking around & will leave on the morning of the 26th for Chiang Mai, Thailand for about a week & then head to Bangkok for the teacher's job fair or the shark frenzy. While I'm typing this out the apartment management to playing Christmas music & it is religious to boot; or real Christmas music. I don't know who recommended this to them but it sure is nice. We just finished visiting a friend from the church who just had a new addition to their family. Little Joel was a premature baby & things were not looking so good at first but thanks be to God everyone is okay. Back to the last days of school. Mentally, everyone was checked out so I dressed as Santa to celebrate the last day of school. I stuffed my backpack w/ a pillow & wore it front of me. I was sweating up a storm. It was fun. The photo of us in front of the tree is by Shekou Sea World Square. It was party time over there! People were just buzzing about. Our church just finished a series of Christmas concerts around town. Yup, here on the mainland the worship team put on 4 concerts. One of them was an out door concert at a popular shopping mall. Tomorrow we will have services & then people from our small group will gather at our small apartment for a catered turkey & dressing lunch. Yum! Oh, that photo of Eileen next to the student dressed as a soldier is some school we walked by & the school was putting on a play, cute huh? Well, love & peace to all. May Jesus bless you all greatly.