Finishing to the end

The year was amazing, but it was a wild ride!

Besides never having internet, a lens error on my camera, a lost cell phone, 2 fender benders on the car, and a roommate fleeing the country, the end of my time in Doha was certainly bitter sweet! The "American Girls", as we came to be known, bonded unbelievably well. Girls that I will miss having constant adventures with, miss "Doing the Doha" with, and girls that gave each other strength to make it through! (alright enough of being sappy...)

THE SCHOOL YEAR:

Not quite as I expected, yet what really was? The month of June started with one of my favorite days at school: Pajama Day! On Pajama day students and faculty were allowed to wear cozy clothes, bring stuffed animals to school and even a pillow and blanket. Each class had a turn reading a book in the library. My class sat back, relaxed (well sort of), and listened to Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs. My fifth graders were fascinated by the creativity and adventure in the story. I loved hearing their reactions.

Another fun project to finish the year was the End of Year Performance. The theme this year was Our Planet Earth so each class performed a song or dance for the parents and owners of our international school. My 5th grade class decided to do a Recycling Rap. This consisted of rhyming lyrics and a choreographed dance. It was certainly a highlight of my week when we were able to practice. We had a hip hop instructor, Mustafa, come into class to teach us the dance moves! We all had a blast! After hours of practicing, coaching, and persuasion, the end of the year performance ended... well... on a different foot. The grade 5 students truly pulled if off as the music cut out while on stage! We were all disappointed that we could not give performance its full show-biz effect, but the 5th grade students made me very proud by together completing the dance without the music. It was touching that the audience helped out and clapped to the beat. In the end the students were able to see that their hard work paid off, they created a wonderful accomplishment of performing the dance and rap, AND became strong individuals for performing the show despite the technical difficulty! What a life lesson to learn! All the students had smiles on their faces and were excited to be apart of the show!

The end of the school year turned out to be very anti-climatic. Not only did our class have an interesting end of the year performance, we also had no final school day. On the second to last day of school, the administration decided to surprise us and cancel the last day of school. That denied us of final good-byes with the students and parents. Without the "goodbyes" and "thank yous", the usual rewarding feeling at the end of the year was not there. Instead we were left preparing final test for students that did not pass our classes all year. I found it funny that parents essentially wanted to "buy" their failing students' final grades and suddenly decided to care about helping their child when they saw their end of the year grades. Against my teaching philosophy I had to prepare study guides and retests for students that were not going to pass their current grade. Due to my flight home I left the retests, grades and final decisions in the hands of the school. I am sure it is safe to assume those kids ended up moving on the next year.

We had a small end of the year party with the faculty at our school. This consisted of some fabulous food, music, some belly dancing, and even some henna drawings on our hands. A few other June highlights were:

- attending a Lebanese wedding, bride being the art teacher from our school

- hosting a toga party at our apartment

- watching World Cup on huge screens and seeing the whole city become engrossed in the games

- the headache of getting my plane tickets home

- saying our sad good byes!

What I'll miss:

- the daily adventure

- great friends both local and international

- dancing and "doing the Doha" on the dance floor

- the techno music

- the night skyline

- Sushi at Neo Sushi

- honking my horn for takeout service

- feeling exotic as a white American female

You know you are not in Doha any more when:

- you can eat bacon

- you can cut the grass

- you can enjoy cheap drinks

- you are not STARED at as a female

- you can feel safe while driving

- you can listen to music other than techno all the time

- you are not sweating at 7:30 in the morning

- you read a sign in the bathroom stall that reads:

"Please flush toilet paper down the toilet"

Recycling Rap Lyrics:

- Ryan Simonet

It's time for you to make the choice to choose

Otherwise the green will be singing the blues

What I’m about to say is not old news

It goes Recycle reduce reuse, no excuse

It ain’t drastic split paper from plastic

Find a space to place your recyclable waste

Let’s conserve what we have because some day it may be gone

The children of tomorrow can’t wait that long

If life is a play then we all have a part

Listen to the ocean inside of your heart

We mustn’t keep living like there’s no tomorrow

Otherwise the future may have nothing to borrow

It's time for you to make the choice to choose

Otherwise the green will be singing the blues

What I’m about to say is not old news

It goes Recycle reduce reuse, no excuse

Well its been a while!

Wow, it has quite a while since I have given any sort of update! I certainly apologize for that!

Just a few updates quickly:

March:

Celebrated St Patrick's Day of COURSE!! I organized a Shamrock Run on the Cornich here in Doha. We got a crowd of about 15 people to take a fun run along the bay. We went for about a 5 K. After the run we had to celebrate with a nice cold Guinness at the Irish Harp Pub. To fully celebrate the holiday Lauren, Ashley, Kate and I traveled to Dubai and hung out at the Irish Village. Unfortunately there was no parade, music or dancing. I certainly made me miss St Paul - almost more than Christmas time!

April:

For our spring break from school, Ashley and I visited Lebanon for 8 days! It was a wonderful trip visiting the beautiful sites, hanging out with friends and family, and finally loving the amazing food! We both could not get enough! Each night we stayed in Beirut, but then took day trips to Byblos, Jounieh, Jetta Grotto, Harrissa, Zahle, Sidon, and the Bekaa Valley in the Lebanese Mountains .

April also consisted of 2 fabulous friends coming to visit!! Nikki, Libbi and I had a great time seeing all we could see in Doha and then took another trip to Dubai! Our favorite thing was watching the fountain put to music in front of the Burj Dubai (Burj Khalifa)

(sorry they are sideways)

And finally April brought a new living arrangement. Us girls moved out of the villa and into flats. Between the 5 of us American girls, we have 2 flats. Lauren, Summer and I share one. Each of us have our own bedroom and share 2 and 1/2 baths, kitchen and living room. Kate and Ashley share a similar flat with our new addition Lindal from South Africa. It is a good time, homier and closer to life here in Doha.

May:
This month turned out to be full of interesting things in Doha. We visited the Pearl Exhibit at the Museum of Islamic Art, played some pick up basketball with a few guys on the National Team of Qatar, enjoyed a nice motor bike ride along the streets of Doha, and started the BEACH season! We enjoyed a few beach parties and BBQ's here. This month also marked the "one month left". It certainly is a bitter sweet feeling! I will be sure to write more later! I am missing the family and excited to be thinking about HOME!!

Festivities of February

February:
This nice short month started off with a school field trip to the beach! Our 3rd, 4th and 5th graders got on a few buses chaperoned by teachers and headed off to the beach! This trip was not about hanging out at the beach, having a picnic and enjoying the sun. NOPE, the students' job was to pick up trash on the beach! FUN! Well the kids saw it as a fun game of "who can fill the bag the highest and find the coolest trash!" I guess that works for a fun event to get out of school!

February keeps getting exciting as I finally passed my driving license test and now can legally drive in Qatar! The process of getting a license here is Doha is quite grueling! To make a long story short...

To get a license in Qatar, one needs to complete a ridiculous amount of paper work and then pass 3 tests! I have never been so nervous to take a test! First, I had to pass the test on all the road signs, and WAIT to see if I passed. Then take a parking test while driving in a car, and WAIT to see if I passed. And then finally, I had to take a driving test on the road with 2 police officers in the car, making sure I did every detail correctly, and of course.. WAIT to see if I passed! When all was finished 3 hours later, I got my license in hand and could drive that very day! This whole test started at 5:30 AM! I missed some of school, so my students were very excited for me once I came back with my license! :)
I am hoping the next post in a week or so will include a photo of our new rental! Enshalah... "God willing!" in Arabic.

Did they celebrate Valentines Day in Doha? Yes! I was quite shocked to see the hype at the malls and restaurants for the "holiday". Yet on the other hand, we were not allowed to say a word about it a school because of the religious connection to Saint Valentine. Rather than celebrating Valentines Day, us single ladies did some celebrating for Summer's birthday and even treated ourselves to some great meals. First, we went to a buffet at a 5 star hotel. This is a typical event for a hotel to offer a Friday buffet. WELL we certainly hit that up for all it was worth! Without trying to look like "those Americans", we enjoyed plate fulls of salads, lobster, fish, and even were surprisingly amazed with delicious duck liver (foie gras)! We saved a bit of room for the tables upon tables of desserts! Haha, we had to laugh at ourselves trying just about every single chocolate moose, strawberry tart, cheese cake, or freshly made crepe! We could hardly get ourselves out the door, but look forward to going back for another experience!



For Summer's 25th birthday we gathered our friends from school and other acquaintances to Spice Market at the W Hotel. We enjoyed the company and being out on the town!


I was lucky enough to meet up with some good friends in Dubai! A close friend from high school, Laura, and her husband, Glen, traveled to India and then stayed with Glen's sister in Dubai! His sister, Joy, and brother-in-law Gavin just had a baby boy- two months OLD! It was an amazing 3 day weekend! It was SO nice to have a ton of fun, catch up with a good old friend, to have some "family" time at the apartment, relax and do some sight seeing! What a nice way to end the month of February!

Catching up with life!

WOW! I did just what I imagined I would do-struggle keeping up with this blog! I will just give a few highlights from the past 3 months! My roommates put me to shame with how diligently they update their blogs! I, on the other hand, am going to refer you to Lauren's blog to read about my Christmas Vacation in depth! :) thanks Lauren!

Sweden

Denmark

Norway

City Streets in Oslo

Looking at the cute town of Stockholm

December:
The month of December went quickly as time just seemed to stay still in the "fall"-type weather. It was very difficult for me to get into the Christmas Spirit being in the desert, away from family and in a Muslim country. The four of us: Ashely, Kate, Lauren, and myself all thought some winter weather in Scandinavia would do the trick! Well wow! Did we get blasted with COLD weather, sites to see and some crazy traveling adventures. December 18th we left for Stockholm. Took a bus to Denmark. Spent Christmas there, met up with family, and then took a cruise from Copenhagen to Olso, Norway. We spent a few cold days in Norway and then traveled back home via Stockholm, Turkey, UAE and then finally DOHA! For me, the highlights were:


- Seeing my Aunt Elizabeth and cousin Paulina for a week. They traveled with us in Gotenburg, Copenhagen, and Olso.
- Meeting a friend, Amy, in Oslo and other roommate, Summer, in Copenhagen
- Enjoying the scenic winter sites with a warm cup of Hot Chocolate in hand
- Seeing Christmas lights on display in Copenhagen and Stockholm
- Going to Midnight Mass at the Cathedral in Copenhagen
- Viewing many museums but especially the Nobel Peace Museum in Oslo, Norway
- Snowboarding for the first time ever and did it in Norway!!
- Seeing the SUNSET while on the slopes in Norway!

The traveling adventures/mishaps kept us on our feet and certainly taught us a lesson or two about being in a foreign country, about each other, and about ourselves. It was great to be "home" and settled in Doha when all was said and done!


January:
New Years was spent in Dubai. Fireworks on the beach for New Years was a great way to ring in 2010! It pains me to say that only Lauren and I were able to go. We had flight complications and other issues with getting Ashley and Kate on the flight. This was all after a long 2 weeks of traveling in Scandinavia. So really we were at our whits end of mishaps in transportation! Still, the 28 hours that Lauren and I had in Dubai were a fantastic time! We met some of Kate's fun friends and saw just a few sites of a larger Arab city, Dubai. This just made us want to go back and spend more time there.

New Year's in Dubai with Mahdi and Jenny

A few other highlights in January took place during some weekend fun in Doha. We have to be creative to find new things to do here! Too easily we get into the same old routine of the work week and the weekend. To mix it up, we had Lauren's 25th birthday to celebrate! Then, my roommates and I enjoyed showing some fellow American visitors, Brady and his mom, around Doha. Brady is applying for a job with Qatar Airlines and wanted to check the city out for a weekend. We enjoyed showing him the sites of Doha. The best part was the BBQ on the beach with food, volleyball, music, and good people! Finally, we had an enjoyable time singing Karaoke at the apartment of another teacher. He works at the American School of Doha and gathers a large crowd of American workers to his apartment. We blasted out a variety of songs from Disney tunes to Lady Gaga!

BBQ in Doha

Thankfulness!

There is much to be thankful for!
- wonderful support from friends here in Doha
- incredible support from friends and family from back home
- passport and visa in my possession
- an amazing experience
- health and safety
- a trip to Nepal to enjoy some beautiful creation



I cannot believe the time has flown so FAST! It is already December and we are already finished with a quarter of the school year! I feel very far removed from the holiday atmosphere, but having a break from school was just the ticket we all needed to make it through the next few weeks! I certainly hope you all are enjoy the holidays and gearing up for a great December!

My roommates and I enjoyed an incredible trip to Nepal- aka Never Ending Peace And Love. We were overwhelmed by the beauty of the landscape and the kind hearted people! I have never been to a country quite as poor as this one, but on the other hand the beautiful people were so welcoming and rich with personality! It was a perfect change from DOHA. The trip turned out to be very exhausting. We trekked in the mountains (not snow covered mountains, but we got high up there!). We hiked for 3 full days! The first day by far was the most difficult- ALL UP HILL! By the time the sun went down and the moon light was our only guide, we were all wondering what we got ourselves into! We arrive at our Hostel in Chisopani ("cold water") and MY was it COLD! We warmed up with some Nepali tea, good food, and really fun card games! Put on our scarves and hats on and hit the slightly uncomfortable beds at about 9pm!




We unfortunately missed sun rise, but started our hike again at about 9am. The view from our hostel was breathtaking!! Layers upon layers of rolling hills and rocky mountains floating with the clouds! I truly do not think the pictures to it justice! This day was much easier. Less uphill and more flat roads!! My body thanks the guides for an easier day!! We enjoyed walking the roads that lead through little villages and passing by locals. Each person greeted us with "Namaste"! This hostel was a bit warmer. It was a trend that the electricity would go out each night. So we ate by candle like and listened to music around the campfire. Our two guides, Milan and Deep sang, played the guitar, and the drum for all of us :)




Our last day trekking brought us to two temples. One of which I do not know the name, but we received blessings from the priest, were anointed on the forehead, were decorated with marigold necklaces, and were fed holy food. The atmosphere was very peaceful. We finished our hike by ending at the Changu Narayan Temple. It is the most ancient pilgrimage site in Kathmandu Valley. We then took a city bus to the city. This bus was packed to the max and drove through a very congested city of small streets, honking, and people everywhere!




The following day challenged us to come up with a PLAN B! Our original plan was to take the day and go BUNGEE JUMPING!!! AHhhh! Much to our dismay, the one day we had available, the site was not opened! Dang, we were all gearing up for that THRILL!! Well anyway we decided on other adventures- I took a day to go rock climbing. Lauren, Kate, and Ashley went white water rafting, and Summer rested trying to get over her cold. It turned out to be a very fun experience. I had never rocked climbed before, so my legs, arms, and fingers got a workout! I went up 4 different pitches, as they say. Needless to say I maxed out my body's strength pretty early, but enjoyed the climbing I was able to do. I would say the repelling down on the rope is certainly the fun part!

Our final day consisted of rushing to the spa for a massage. And then good byes to the lovely hosts at Panda Trekking Company. We bonded more than we ever expected. They might have even talked us into returning to Nepal within 3 years :) Then finally we were off to the airport! Made the closing gate within 5 minutes! What clock work! The flight took off at sunset over the mountains- what a beautiful way to depart!





"Though we did not climb Mount Everest, we touched it with our hearts" :)