I'm moving to Saudi Arabia today!!!

New place, new blog, new name. I'll be looking for a red and white striped ski hat because that is just the thing to bring to Saudi Arabia! Perhaps, I can get my brother in law to photoshop me wearing one. (For those of you with no kids it's a Where's Waldo reference.)

So I am moving to Saudi Arabia for approximately 2 years. We will be living on a western compound in the capital city of Riyadh which is dead center Saudi Arabia. From what I hear, it is the most strict area of Saudi. (Goody!) Here is what I know for sure. When I am on the compound, I can pretty much do and wear whatever I want. When I am off of the compound I have to wear something called an abaya. It's basically just a long black robe that goes on over the clothes. It comes all the way to the floor but even with my shoes off at least it doesn't drag. That would bug me. It is made of polyester so it is rather hot. Basically, when I am off the compound I will really have no need for the little sweaters that I love so much. But who am I kidding? Even on the compound I am probably not going to need them so much, but there is always air conditioning!! That makes me think of my Grandma because when I was pregnant with Nicole, she was very busy knitting sweaters and blankets of all kinds! (Remember, Nicole was born in So Cal in July!) Miss you Grandma! Every day.

Other rules that I am aware of include but are not limited to (because I am pretty sure that I will find out a whole new list of rules once I get there):

1. Women can not drive. (This one seems pretty harsh but in all reality, I really don't care. It's not like I love driving, and the entire time that I lived in Macau, I never drove once and didn't miss it a bit. I have no desire to drive there so this rule is not a problem!)

2. A woman can only be with a man that she is related to such as her husband, father, or brother. It is against the law to even talk to another man and you can get arrested for that. (and I have the feeling Saudi Arabian jail is not like Taipa Ferry jail, (previous blog reference) so I am not going to test that one.)

3. Women can only leave the country with their husband's permission. (Not too worried about that one ;)

4. No movies and no alcohol. (That last one might be tough!)

Anyway, there are more but that is enough for now because I am starting to make myself a little nervous and I haven't even left yet so I will pick that up again later.

I am currently at my mom's house and spent the better part of yesterday packing up my stuff into two very average sized suitcases. I probably should have bought new bigger suitcases but shoulda, woulda, coulda, I didn't! Anyway, since I am traveling by myself, its my job to drag the darn things all over the place, but next time I am getting spinners! (Note the picture... not that much stuff!)

A town car will be coming to pick me up (thanks Greg and Mom!) around 1:00 for a flight that is leaving at 4:45. I will be flying Emirates to Dubai and then Dubai to Saudi Arabia. It looks as though I will have a rather long layover in the Dubai airport but that is OK because I really kind of like airports. Well, nice ones anyway, and I hear the Dubai airport is very nice. Also, it seems that I will be arriving right at the beginning of Ramadan. A month long cleansing holiday of which I know very little about. To say that I am a little nervous about all this is quite the understatement, but I am also extremely excited!! I believe that I fly into Saudi at something like 4:00 AM but since it is Ramadan, it is actually a good time to get in because it sounds like they pretty much sleep all day and eat all night. I will let you know! Should make for an interesting recovery from jet lag though.

I really wanted to make sure that I got this up and running before I left because I remember that when I was in China and logged on the whole darn thing automatically came up in Chinese and it took me forever to try and remember where the dashboard was so that I could change the language to English. It's been so long since I have blogged that I knew this wasn't something that I wanted to attempt in Arabic. Just for the record, foreign languages are not my thing. They go in one ear and out the other and never seem to stick.

I can't believe that I am moving to Saudi Arabia today!!!!!!