Now we are up to August 2015, I started at my new school, which is lovely. I only teach girls and I only teach one subject. The downside is I have to teach middle school (I don't mind, I just really enjoyed the high schoolers). My coworkers are great, but I try to stay to myself most of the time, too many women in one place, if you know what I mean. Meanwhile, Brian is was still looking for a teaching job and we have to enroll our children into a new school. Just before the summer ended Brian and I were both offered teaching positions in China. The pay was great, the school we would send our children to was awesome, we would be teaching no more than 5 students in an IB (International Baccalaureate) program, but something just wasn't right. After much prayer, listing pros and cons, and talking to everyone we could get our hands on about it we declined the position. Keep in mind, Brian still didn't have a job, but we knew we had to trust God. HE has kept us in every step of our journey through life and we weren't going to discredit HIM now (keep this in mind as I continue this post). Within 2 months Brian had more than 10 interviews in several different countries, including; Qatar, Bahrain, China, Kuwait and the UAE. But every time he was offered a position he declined because we knew God wasn't ready for us to leave this place.
Before the 2015 school year ended we had our children take entrance exams to the top 3 schools we wanted them to go to in Al Ain. After being accepted to all 3 we chose one (the most expensive and BEST) school. Knowing that Brian didn't have a job we weren't quite sure how this was going to work, but again, we had to trust God. School for the kids were due to start in a week and we knew that if things hadn't changed we could not afford for them to go to this elite school. Brian spoke to one of his friends (who's children were also due to go to the school) and suggest that we go talk to the headmaster and explain our situation. After talking to the school administration they suggested that we enroll the kids (as she made very clear that their education is most important) and if Brian finds a job that would not pay enough to afford the school the kids would have just gotten a free education for a couple weeks. To hear that the school administration would prefer to give our kids a free education for a couple weeks instead of refusing them to enter helped us to realize that this was in fact the place we wanted them to be.
During this same time he was offered a position in the western region of the UAE which would require a move for us, but I was OK with that. The pay was more, kids would go to school for free (although not as good as the one we prefer) and I could be transferred with ADEC to the west. After accepting the job we found out the they gave the position away. This happened at another campus as well. We started to lose hope, but continued to pray and seek God. Well, mid September Brian receives an email that asks him to interview for a position and he would have a chose to teach in Al Ain, Abu Dhabi, or Dubai. He was offered the position and chose Al Ain. The pay was a bit less than what he left, but this position would also include tuition assistance for the kids (did I mention the school we chose is the most expensive school in Al Ain?) The school is and iPad initiative school (like the county we came from in US) so he would have access to all the latest Apple technology and training (BUT GOD!!). We figured he would be teaching boys again, since the schools here are gender segregated and he could possibly get bad boys again. Low and behold, when the contract came in, not only was he offered enough tuition assistance to cover 95% of the children's tuition, but he would also teach girls!!! OMG, my God, my God. Brian is now the ONLY male in his department (he often complains about how catty women are) and really enjoys his school. After about a month teaching everyone received and email that stated they would have to move someone to the male campus and we both just assumed it would be him (last one hired and the only male). We resolved to accept it, but when the final decision was made, he was not chosen, another female teacher was chosen.
Brian was due to start 2 days before my mother was due to arrive, but we knew that everything was going to work out, and it did.
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