So much in a YEAR Part 2

So after the long ordeal with fighting my previous school for 30000aed we now faced a new challenge.  I was rehired with ADEC (yeah), but with this came a new challenge, would I have to wait for a visa again, would i be called to join group 1 (usually July start date) or group 7 or 8 (Nov./Dec. start), would we have enough money to make it to either group?  All questions I would not have answers to and could get answers.

About one month left to the school year Brian gets a letter stating that would be terminated from ADEC (the same organization i will start with in Aug.).  WHAT THE WHAT?  I was actually very happy when he came home on that Thursday evening, because he was miserable at his job.  He taught 10th grade boys (did I mention the boys here are be terrible?).  He came home miserable EVERYDAY, but unlike me, he had signed a 2 year contract and was only 1.5 years in so resigning was not an option.  Being fired was the best think that happened to us.  He still received all his pay AND received his end of contract gratuity (2 months pay).  Now the only question was, will either of us be working in the UAE come August?

OH, did I mention we had plans to go to the Philippines in the summer and my mother was coming to visit in October?  I am a NATZI when it comes to saving, so we saved for more than 8 months for the Philippines and my moms visit and had about 6 months of savings in our account which could support us if neither of us had jobs at the beginning of the school year.  We contemplated on whether or not we needed to go to Philippines, although the flights were booked and nonrefundable the money we would save outweighed the cost of the flights (we got one way tickets for 1aed).  We decided to YOLO (You Only Live Once) and go, but stick to a very stringent budget.  I am so glad we did.  That was one of the best vacations we had every been on (with our kids- Jamaica still beats it).  We stayed for 10 days and after about 7, my kids were so ready to go home, they were vacationed out. lol.

Three weeks before our Philippines vacation I received an email that I would be in group 1 for ADEC (yeah) and would need to report to the hotel for training the day before I was due back from vacation.  After negotiating with the travel agency they agreed to let me arrive a day late so we went straight from the airport to the hotel in Abu Dhabi.  We stayed at the hotel for a week (although Brian and kids could have just went home, but free breakfast and unlimited pool access, why not?). After being in Abu Dhabi for a week with a couple trips home to get clean clothes and food (remember we are on a strict budget) we are moved to a hotel in the region I will be teaching in which is were we already live.  I mentioned earlier that Brian was fired and his job paid for our housing, but his end date overlapped my start date (BUT GOD!!) so we didn't have to move out of our housing, we just transferred it to me.  Again, we got free hotel room for another week with breakfast and unlimited pool access.  When we finally come home for good we realized that the kids swam for 46 out of 50 days.