Summer's End

The summer is officially over for me :(  We decided to go home (US) for the summer even though we've only been here for 5 months.  Brian and I booked a trip to Jamaica to celebrate our 12 year anniversary so even if we wanted to change our minds we couldn't get a refund on our trip, so, why not?  Ive never been to Jamaica and have always wanted to go.  I HAD THE BEST TIME!!! The resort was beautiful, the weather awesome and the company of my husband was much needed.  Also, we decided that if we want to be financially free that we need help so we hired a financial counselor.  Our first appointment is next week so we needed to get all our frivolous spending and extravagant vacations out the way. lol.

We had my daughter's birthday party in Hinesville.  She shared her party with my godson.  That too was pretty awesome.  My friend, godson's mother, did an awesome job.  All I really did was send her money (that's my kind of party planning- lol).  I felt bad for my son though.  We left to go to the UAE two days after his birthday and I really didn't have the time (or energy) to give him a birthday party.  We do parties every other year and the way it has turned out we do 2 every other year (one per child), but it looks like we may now change that to 1 every year (one per child) since my son did have one this year.  It should be a little cheaper this way, we will see.

We decided to take another detour through London on our way home.  We didn't realize that we had to take ALL of our luggage off the plane in London.  Apparently there is a new rule that if your layover is more than 8 hours you have to take all your luggage off and check them back in at the connecting flight.  We had 9 checked bags and 3 carryons.  This proved to be a very difficult task.  The terminal for our connecting flight required us to take 2 trains and trolleys are not allowed on the train.  Brian and I had to carry all 9 bags between the two trolleys.   We had the kids holding the doors open and screaming for us to hurry up.  Im laughing now, but I was one hot lady.  When we got to the counter our flight wasn't even available to check our bags through self check in because we were 16 hrs early.  Our connecting flight was very gracious and did not charge us another over baggage fee because I explained that I didn't know I had to take our bags off the plane.  After finally doing an early check with our bags we check our carryon bags at a place in the airport that "watches" your bags, for up to 24 hrs., for a small fee.  This time we had a 16 hr lay over and decided to catch the big bus tour to get a quick glimpse of London.  Even though it rained it was well worth the trip.  

I start teaching one week before most teachers here in the UAE go back because I am a new teacher and my school has a separate orientation geared especially for new teachers.  I hope it is worth it!  Hopefully this will give me more time to get over jet lag and decorate my classroom.

Jet lag is a beast. 

Our home

Below is a quick video of our home in Greenland Compound.  We were originally assigned to Hili, which is a beautiful compound, but Brian said he felt like he was on the set of "Good Times" going into the compound.  The buildings are 5+ stories high and it is brick city.  There is no green space and no pool.  He asked to be reassigned but at the time the only thing available was a 2 bedroom apt. (flat) in Greenland so we took it.  We were told at the end of the current school year we can request a transfer since there will be a lot of people ending their contracts.  We really like Greenland, there is a huge green space in front of the pool that the kids play soccer in, the pool is shaded most of the day and the living room is huge, and the ceilings are at least 15 ft. high.  I hope we can get a 3 bedroom here, if not, we may just keep the 2.

Greenland kiddie pool

Greenland adult pool

Weight room in Greenland

Available activities in Greenland

View from upstairs hallway

Play area and green space for soccer outside pool area

Hili

Hili playground

Week 1 and DONE!

I've actually been in school for 3 weeks, but this is the first week with students.  All new teachers started school the week before returning teachers came.  I was presently surprised to see that I was 1 of 2 African American teachers hired this year.  There are about 20 new teachers (not too unusual for an international school), but only 2 blacks?  The other teacher is from Houston, Texas.  I swear I think people only recruit from Atlanta and Houston. lol.  We had almost no time to work in our classrooms as we were in training just about every day.  The school I teach at is an IB (International Baccalaureate) School and they just received full accreditation for their DP (diploma program- grades 11 and 12).  This year they will focus on MYP (middle years program- grades 6-10) and I have the honor of teaching both 8th grade science and 10th grade biology.  The school is divided into 4 buildings on one campus.  The campus is HUGE.  There is a KG school, primary years school, boys school, and girls school.  The KG school and PYP (primary years program) are both mixed gender, so both boys and girls are in the same class, but once students reach grade 5 they are separated (this is a cultural thing here).  Once girls reach a certain age (around 5th grade) they need to be separated.  Fifth grade is still considered elementary (PYP) and still fall under PYP guidelines, but they are just "housed" in the other building and have their own "wing" to keep them separate from the older kids.

There are several administrators at my school and as someone has said, it's a bit top heavy, that at times you're not sure who to go to or who to listen to, but I'm sure I'll figure it out in time.  Unlike my classes in the US, I have to teach several subjects and in both the boys and girls school, so at times I find myself driving (did I say my campus is HUGE) from one building to the next to catch my class before it starts (none of the buildings are connected).  My son goes to the primary school and my daughter goes to KG school so I literally find myself in all 4 buildings almost on a daily basis.

Teaching in the UAE is definitely something to get use to.  Because the school has a newly accredited diploma program there has been several schedule changes, almost daily, to accommodate the new requirements for graduation.  I thought this was crazy, but apparently this is nothing new here.  Most of my classes have been easy to adjust to, but one class (my my my) is extremely difficult (please pray for my students).  They haven't realized that I can be that cray crazy black girl from America who refuses to let her students get away with foolishness, but as Kevin Hart has said, "They gone learn today!".

On another note, (yes I digress).  You may know that I decided to go the private school route since my work visa had not gotten processed, but if you didn't, now you do.  Why is it that on the 7th day of my first official week of school I get an email from my recruiter stating that i have cleared security and that if I still want to teach in the government school I should be able to report next week.  REALLY?  I have already registered my children for school, paid fees, purchased uniforms, decorated my classroom (well, ok, the nannies helped too) and now you tell me that I can come work with you.  Honestly, after thinking about my most difficult class I seriously thought about calling them, but I'm not quitter (at least not behind a difficult class). So... I'll give it a couple more weeks and see how things go.

Below is our week one dress attire.  Because I work in the boys school most of the time I have to have long skirts or pants, shirts that pass my elbow and my neck line should be covered.  Those of you that know me know that I am NOT a skirt/dress person, but with the heat here a skirt is much cooler than pants.

Those of you that know my daughter know that she LOVES to wear dresses, so she is in heaven.