Thing 1 and Thing 2

So since I am here as a teacher, as of now, I think it’s appropriate I blog about some of my experiences teaching here in Abu Dhabi. I’m not sure why this hadn’t occurred to me until now.  Maybe it’s because internally, I feel as though, living here is not really about one’s work. That isn’t true for all ppl living here obviously, but for me luckily, I feel as though the totality of my living here is more of an amalgamation of all of my experiences. And my work, be it though the thing that brought me to this lovely place, probably makes up about 15 percent of my concerns. I am laughing out loud as I write this, because I realize how it may sound, and I swear I don’t mean it to sound disrespectful. I think fortunately, that I have been gifted a personality that is a bit free spirited. I don’t think I came to that realization until I got here. As I remember it, I was always worried about something or the other back home in America. I was always running from place to place, fretting over some nondescript issue. Of course, maybe I have just started to realize which things are important.

For example, now that I am here alone and my family is back home so far away, I find myself in two precarious situations. The first is that I seem to have a considerably large amount of time on my hands. I can fill these spaces of time with normal things that I like or don’t like to do like going to the gym, cooking and trying new recipes, lounging for tea and chatting time with a friend, or sleeping. The other thing I find myself doing is missing my family. A lot. I think about them mostly every day. The reason this is so precarious is because I have zero desire to leave this place, but I want to be with my family in the worst way! It’s certainly a quagmire with nothing to be done about it.  I’m not homesick, because I don’t miss America so much; just the people I left there.

At any rate, I came here to be a teacher. And I am. I teach. Sundays through Thurdays, I go to my school, which is here on the island of Abu Dhabi. I teach grade 4 boys. I am now in my second year of teaching here. I will type the next sentence with much chagrin, because my dad told me it would happen, and I now have to admit that it has. Stubbornly I have tried to resist, but I have grown to absolutely LOVE the students. Eck. There. I said it. I love them. The boys in my class are between the ages of 9 and 10. They have varying levels of English, and they all speak Arabic as their first language. They are smart, funny, and extremely sweet and kind. Before I came here, I would hear these horror stories about how you don’t want to end up at a boys school. (You don’t get to choose your school, what grade you teach, or whether you have boys or girls. It’s all decided for you.) People banged on and on about how awful and rude and unruly the boys were. So needless to say, when they told me I had been placed at a boys school my heart dropped and fear set in. When I met the boys and even better when I got to know them, I knew almost right away that we were a match made in teacher-student heaven. I find them to be quite easy going and laid back. They don’t make too big of a deal out of things. They don’t take themselves too seriously. They never cry. They never whine about things. They try their level best to make me laugh whether its doing the gangnam style dance throughout the hallway (gets me every time) or telling me a joke which has zero punch line, and then saying, “Get it miss?” Everyday it’s a riot. Their parents are a different story for another time, but the boys themselves are hilarious. And I dearly love to laugh.

I go to work at 7:15 every morning. I teach 3 periods for 40 minutes each in the morning. Then I have a break for 1 hour and 35 minutes. During this time, I do nothing. By nothing I mean hanging out with other teachers and making way too much noise in the teacher room. In the afternoon, I teach another 3 periods for 40 minutes each. When the whole circus is said and done, the time is 1:30. Home time.  First of all, I would have never dreamed of leaving the school-house rock in America prior to 3:30 or 4:00. Second of all, it’s magical how quickly the day flies by when you know you’re going home to a beautiful, beach-adjacent apartment on an island that you can view in your sitting room from your floor to ceiling windows. It’s a hard life sometimes. You gotta try to adjust.

My students. I could talk about them all day non-stop but I don’t for a couple of reasons. Number one. It’s annoying. I can listen to other teachers talk about their kids, but after about 10 minutes I’m visibly cringing with the desire to talk about something else. I just can’t talk shop too long and that’s the way it is with me. There are just too many other interesting things in the world. But for the sake of this blog, I will just discuss two students that I’ve had that are truly remarkable. And not remarkable in the ways you might be thinking.  These two boys are not really all that gifted or incredibly overly smart. They are not hard working or particularly studious. Both of them are lazy as all get out, actually. They might bring homework 50% of the time. Neither one of them is particularly adorable. But if I had my way, I would take either or both of them in every class I ever taught for the remainder of my teaching career. However long that career may be. Ironically enough, both of these boys have the same name. One of them was in my 4^th grade class last year, and he is now in 5^th grade. The other one is in my current class. For the sake of privacy and for the purpose of this blog, I will call them Hamad. Hamad #1 will be the boy who I taught last year, and Hamad #2 the one I currently have in my class this year.

Hamad #1 is in every sense possible, me. He acts like me. He thinks the way I think. He says some of the same rude, asshat things that I would say. If I were a nine year old boy who was born in the Emirates instead of America, I would be Hamad #1. Hes even a chubby kid! See? Same, same. Hamad #1 is just…well he’s me. That’s about as simple as I can put it. English is his second language, but he has a pretty good grasp of it. His mother is a teacher so he probably just has extra help at home. More than he understands English however, he understands sarcasm. I shouldn’t use sarcasm with the students, but because sarcasm is such a huge part of my personality, it sometimes just slips out. My wit is of course, lost on 99% of the boys. Who’s the 1% who understood it? Hamad #1.  He’s in his desk, with his chin tucked downwards into his fat neck, smiling like he’s got a secret no one else knows. I can never tell a little white lie to the other boys, or pretend like I’m interested in something they’re telling me when I’m truly not. Hamad #1 knows. I hate and love him for it.

Case and point. One day a darling little boy whom I shall call Abdullah, was telling me about his new twin baby brothers and how awesome they were. I did everything right. I said, “Wow!” I nodded my head in interest, and raised my eyebrows in mock excitement as he prattled on and on about the new babies. All the while I could feel a tiny pair of rude, beady eyes to my left trained on me. Hamad #1 had his secret smile on his little all-knowing face. He was on to me. When the kid was through telling me his story and he left the room, Hamad #1 walks straight over to me, with zero shame, and says, “Miss, you don’t like babies, yes?”  I feign shock and horror at his question, to which he doesn’t falter. I reply, “Why would you say that Hamad? I love babies.” He starts laughing then. The gig is glaringly up. “No miss, you don’t like them. You tell Abdullah the babies are nice, but you don’t like them,” he retorts. Then he spills over in laughter, spins his round little body around and waddles away. How dare he? I could only laugh. I had been caught, and by a bloody 9 year old. As if. He did it a million times over the course of the year. We were the snake and the mongoose. We had this love hate relationship all year! He would pretend to hate me in front of all the boys, but in the mornings when I got to my room, he would be the first one in the class sharpening pencils and cleaning my board. He would ask me in those moments, what it was like in America. What were the boys like? Were they the same as boys in Abu Dhabi? We would have nice conversations right up until the other boys came in and he had to be rude ass Hamad #1 again. He really was the highlight of my job. Up until this day, even though he’s in 5^th grade, he will stalk the fourth grade hallway and poke himself into my classroom, his round, protruding little stomach leading the rest of his body through the door.  He will then proceed to bully my poor little fourth graders who are really quite innocent and sweet. He tells them, “Miss Khadijah she don’t like you. She is only nice to you for fake. She don’t like any boys.” Then he laughs out loud. At himself. Lolol. Seriously. Laugh out loud. Then I have to say, through the attempt to muffle my own laughter, “Hamad, why do you come in here messing with the Grade 4’s? Is it because you think they are afraid of you?” And he says, “They are afraid, look at them. Very afraid. Because me I’m Grade 5 and I will beat them.” “Get out of here Hamad and go on and harass the Grade 5’s.” He laughs and slaps one of my kids on the head hard before he stalks out. What an ass! Why I love this kid, I couldn’t tell you.

Hamad #2 is a much simpler case. He just wants love and sandwiches. Hamad #2 is the kid who’s currently in my class. He’s just as hot of a mess as #1. But in a kinder, sweeter way.  I don’t know Hamad #2 too well, because it’s only been about 2 months into the year. But I already have a spot in my heart for him. If I had to diagnose him, just with the experience I’ve gained from being a teacher over the years, I would definitely say he was probably somewhere on the autism scale. He’s not the brightest crayon in the box, but he has a personality of a firework. He reminds me of a baby giraffe. He comes stumbling into the class, clumsy and all smiles, far too eager. He hasn’t lifted a pencil over the last 2 months and can’t really write his name without assistance. And for some reason, he has a weird affinity for sandwiches. But he’s kind. And sweet. He’s so kind in fact, that even though he’s obviously different than all the boys in the class, they are so enamored with him, that they all fight to sit next to him in class. They know he’s different, it’s really obvious, yet they adore him. What’s ironic about this is that this country doesn’t really raise kids who are too accepting of those who are different from themselves. These are kids who highly value their own nationality and openly make fun of other cultures and downright ostracize people who come from other countries. Even neighboring Arabic countries are not exempt from the taunting. All too often, I hear them teasing boys who have been rumoured to be from Oman, Kuwait, or Sudan. In the hallways they jeer, “Omani, Omani, Khaled is Omani! You are Sudani! You’re black like galaxy!” (Galaxy is a popular brand of chocolate here.) You have to experience it to understand it. And here is a boy, who is in every fundamental way, different than them. But they love him. And so do I. Hamad #2 is hard to explain. There’s something that I haven’t cracked yet. Something that starts with whatever home situation he has. He doesn’t have his mother at home, and he can tell me that, but his English is too limited for him to tell me where she is. He tried to explain it one day, and I just got the word, “sick.” Nothing more. He is also unspoiled by wealth the way the other boys are. I always usually tell the boys, “I am a teacher. Ana miskeena. ( I am poor.) You boys are rich, but Ms. Khadijah is poor.” Well, one day, Hamdan replies, “Me too miss, Ana miskeena. My dad maffi faloose.” (I’m poor too. My dad has no money.) It struck me as odd for a couple reasons. Firstly, one thing that my students (and local people here generally speaking) will never do, is tell you that they’re poor. They learn early, that money is important. They know already at the tender elementary age, that money makes power, and some of even them feel as though they wield it. Perhaps some of them do. I’ve been told by several local people that most Emirati people, well a good majority of them, are well off. This doesn’t mean that they are all loaded and stinking rich, but just that their government takes good care of them. There are a lot of variables involved in who gets what, and how much; variables that are not necessary to jump into for the intents and purposes of this blog. The point is, is that in the event that someone were not as well off as the average, you could sooner be led to go on believing that they were before they’d tell you they had nothing. As Hamad #2 did that day.  There was something completely refreshing to hear this boy tell me this.  Mind you, he said it in front of other boys, and he wasn’t even mildly ashamed. What was better, is that none of the boys laughed or even so much as snickered. They kind of protect him in this way. He’s a simple boy, and they take care of him. He’s the best kid ever, really. I just love him and all his little quirks. This brings me to his obsession with sandwiches. We could be doing anything in class. We could be doing fractions or writing a composition, and Hamad #2 will find a way to work sandwiches into the conversation. It's even funnier because he pronounces it, "sand-ahwich." 

Me: “Today, boys we are going to write about what we did on our Eid holiday vacation.”

Hamad #2:  “Miss I want write about the sandahwich.”

Me: “Alright, so which fraction is bigger? 2/4 or 3/5?”

Hamad #2: “Miss, can we make 3/5 sandahwich?”

I’m not kidding you. Everything is about sandwiches.

Me: “When we pollute our oceans, and bigger fish eat little fish, the big fish can die as well”

Hamad #2 “No Miss Khadijah. Big fish no eat little fish. Big fish like sandahwich.” His face is as serious as a statue.

I can’t make this up. This is how class goes. You can just try to imagine. You can see why it’s a complete and total riot. Sometimes if I’m really trying to drive home a point and make the kids understand a concept, Hamad #2 can drive me bananas with his antics, but I can’t ever get mad at him, because he’s just a simple boy, with maffi faloose, and an intense love of sandwiches. I can’t.

All in all, I think I’m lucky to be so entertained on the job. I can’t deny how grateful I am that my job isn’t boring or monotonous. No two days are ever the same. You have to love that, right?

I don’t know what the Emirates has in store for me. I know that I love it here. I know that I’m waiting patiently. I’m waiting to get tired of this place and grow a desire to move on. I don’t see it. I absolutely love waking up here.

Save The Date

Save The Date

Got a sweet tooth? Well, head on over to the Liwa desert oasis in Abu Dhabi’s western region for it’s Annual Date Festival. If you are in the city during the warm summer months, you can taste the sweetest fruit the desert has on offer. Liwa is located in Abu Dhabi’s western region, and has been hailed as a cultural and folkloric hub. If you’re heading to Liwa from Abu Dhabi, it will take you between 3 to 4 hours.  That is, if you can stop yourself from taking a million photos on the oh-so-scenic drive along the way. Colossal, camel-colored, sweeping sand dunes almost dare you to take your eyes off the road and stare longingly into their eternities. After miles of driving, they turn a deeper sandier color, red almost, and you’re truly captivated. Half the treat of getting to this oasis in the Liwa desert is this drive. You’ll also stop along the way to see lots of adorable smiling camels and their babies, for this is camel country and the landscape is dotted with camel farms. You will be lucky if you get to lay your eyes on a very special breed of black camels. Yes, they do exist! And they are gorgeous!

Pretty Liwa Dunes

Gorgeous Black Camels. These guys are cute!!!!! 

What are these guys laughing at? :) Camels are always smiling. 

You will know you’ve arrived when you see the massive tent, (which is air conditioned by the way, thank you very much!) On entrance to the grounds at the festival, you can smell two things. Camels and dates. In that order. You can entertain yourself with camel, horse, and car races. There is a falconry competition as well that will leave you in awe. Falconry is an ancient sport and pastime in Abu Dhabi, and the showing of this tamed and beautiful bird is just breathtaking.  This year there was also a local farmers mango tasting competition. The sweet flesh and the syrupy thick nectar of this prize-winning mango at the festival was truly something to write home about.

Mango Competition - Seriously some of the juiciest most delicious mangoes ever. In life. Like, ever. Omg.

Falconry Competition- These guys are serious.

Just chilling. Having some tea. Camel hanging out in the background.

The dates are the star of the show, however, and there are more varieties of this bejeweled fruit than you can imagine. There are over 300 varieties and you can taste all of them. Once their sweetness bursts onto your tongue, that will be the point you will come to understand why this place is called an oasis. How can it be? How can a place in the middle of a dry and barren desert produce such sweet delicacies? You will savor them with wonderment. Each type of date has slightly different notes and subtle flavor variances. If you think this festival is just for fun, think again! The farmers take the festival very seriously, and there is over 5million dirhams in prize money to be won amongst the farmers with the best produce. So you can guarantee that you will taste some heavenly bites.

Not a smile to be found. Dates are serious business. 

Youngsters sampling the fruit.

"Hmm, my friend. How will we ever decide which one?????"

This festival has everything, and it’s truly one of those local experiences and a place that you won’t find too many Westerners or expats.  If you’ve got little ones, don’t leave them at the hotel, for the festival has a kids’ tent with tons of kid activities. The kids at the festival seemed to be having a grand time running around, tasting the local fruits, and watching camels. Inside the kids tent they can learn about UAE heritage and play some traditional games for kids.  You can get your shopping fix because in the larger tents are local handmade crafts and woven goods.  Most of these goods are made with the date palm tree itself. We were lucky enough to see some of the local ladies weaving baskets, hats, and other crafts from the palm fibres and fronds. The best thing about the Liwa Date Festival is that you really get a feel for how the date is a hugely inextricable part of the region itself.

Local ladies making crafts with palm fibers. 

Baskets and hats and bowls made with palm fibers and fronds. 

Hard at work. 

A Shopper's Paradise... Coming To An Island Near You!

If you’ve been thinking of coming to Abu Dhabi for work or for play, you’ve probably done a little bit of research. If this is the case, you’ve most likely heard that shopping is kind of our thing.  We have our fair share of shopping havens, and the newest one on the horizon is looking pretty great.  I’m talking about one of Abu Dhabi’s latest projects, Maryah Island. Centrally located and adjacent to downtown, you’ll have no trouble at all finding Maryah, and if you visit now you can literally be one of the first people to grace it’s beautiful grounds.  Even in it’s infancy, one can already see that this place has gorgeous potential. Along with the monumental Galleria shopping center, the island is also buzzing with the new Rosewood Hotel, the latest concept residences, and innovative new office spaces. Add to that a host of popular dining options in several new international restaurants, and you can easily see how Maryah is being named Abu Dhabi’s new Central Business District.  

Some images of the new Maryah Island. The oblong rectangular building is the new Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi. 

The Rosewood Hotel is equipped with luxury penthouses, a state of the art wellness center, tranquil spas, and fine terrace-style restaurants and lounges. It’s a 5-star accommodation and it’s style and modernity won’t disappoint. In it’s opening stage, the Rosewood hotel offered up a sweet discounted deal on a Deluxe suite. A concierge greeted us on arrival to the hotel, and from that point on, he personally catered to our smallest needs.  Our room was plush, immaculate, and thoughtful in both design and detail. 

The Rosewood Hotel's sharp and edgy architecture. 

The pool and garden at the Rosewood Hotel. Relax much?

Terrace-style shisha lounge, "SMOKE" at the Rosewood Hotel. 

Opening in August 2013, the Galleria at Sowwah Square is both fresh and fashionable. It will feature some of the hottest global designers such as Prada, Bulgari, Christian Louboutin, and Alexander McQueen. You will be able to peruse top international brand stores like Balenciaga, Bottega Veneta, Tom Ford, and Jimmy Choo. Trust me, you will be completely spoiled for choice. After shopping, you can sip an espresso and unwind in The Great Room under the all-encompassing scalloped roof which has a new and cutting edge design that was constructed to simultaneously keep the inside of the building crisp and cool while filling the entire mall with Abu Dhabi’s famous natural sunlight. The roof’s structural design, which is made of sculpted glass and steel, sweeps across the central area of the mall. It’s quite the impressive architectural feat, and upon arrival you’ll take some time just to stare at it as it blends harmoniously into the Abu Dhabi skyline just beyond it. The Galleria roof was designed by none other than the architectural geniuses who built the inverted pyramid in front of the Louvre. Of course! 

Some image projections of the inside and outside of the soon-to-be-iconic Galleria at Sowwah Square. 

Maryah Island is definitely shaping up to be one Abu Dhabi’s destination islands. The thought and planning that have gone into every aspect of it guarantee a utopian experience. Spend the night at the Rosewood hotel. Treat yourself to a world-class spa experience and some shopping cardio, and I have no doubt that each time you come to Abu Dhabi, you’ll return to the very exclusive and the very unique Maryah Island.

My Island

I live on Reem Island. When I told my best friend back home I lived on an island, her response was, "Is it a real island, like with water around it?" :) She's cute. Yes, fool, it is a real island, with proper water on all sides. Reem is a relatively new property development in Abu Dhabi. It's a natural island. (We have lots of man-made ones in the Emirates because we're cool like that). Reem is located near the center of the city just off of the main Salaam Street. The location is close to the heart of the city, with really easy access to the highways. It's a great area and I'm really fortunate to live here. To think it was a lucky accident to that got me to this place.

See? Surrounded by water, as promised.  Can you see towards the bottom the tall buildings that are connected with the slab on top of them? Then behind those are two cylindrical buildings, one is tall and one is short. These are Sun and Sky Towers. Mine is the shorter one, the Sun Tower.

Reem is off to the side of Abu Dhabi. That reddish area next to it, is like a downtown-ish area. In there is the Tourist Club area, where the remarkable Beach Rotana Hotel is located. Fabulousness.

I like living on this island for a few reasons. Firstly, it's quite quiet here and there's not a ridiculous amount of traffic. We have our fair share of construction, but you honestly wouldn't be able to escape that no matter where you lived in the city...or emirate for that matter. Also, my building is attached to a mall that has everything I need in it, including a Waitrose grocery store. There's nothing like needing one clove of garlic and just going down the elevator to the store, as opposed to having to get in your car and drive to the store to get it. It's brilliant. There's also a pharmacy in the mall, hair salons, restaurants, an espresso bar, National Bank of Abu Dhabi, (my banking institution), and a nail salon.

It's really convenient, and I hope I never have to move again. Unless something else fabulous comes up. :)

My apartment is really nice. Everything in it is new and modern, right down to the key card access door entry. You use a card to open your door like you're in a hotel. Fanciness, I'm telling you. I'm up for it. I've done some decorating around the place. I get bored easily, and I like to change things, so don't be surprised at all, if you visit me and it looks different in here. 

This is my tea and breakfast nook. It's perfect for me! And maybe one friend. 

A persian rug. Of course.

Turkish lighting.

This is my bookshelf.. I know that it has a minimal amount books, yet it does have a fully functioning shisha pipe on the middle shelf. Haha! What? Don't do that, don't judge me. I have books in other places.... Seriously!

This is my living room and then the view from my living room window. 

Below is the podium and the pool area. I love the podium. There's also an amazing gym, whirpool, hottubs, and sauna. And there's a ladies only gym for when you wanna get your modesty on!!! Or for when you just don't have the patience to watch dummies flex their muscles in their tiny shirts in front of the mirror. Because let's be honest.  Ain't nobody got time for that.  

So, I mentioned there's always construction going on around the island as well as the city. The pictures below are the scene from outside of my bedroom window. They are building something that looks like a hotel with a little beach behind it. (Can't wait for that new beach!!! A beach behind my apartment? Yes, please.) Here in these pictures, you can see how quickly the construction happens. In the first photo, this is how it looked when I first moved in the flat, which was 9 months ago. The second is how it looks now. Amazing. 

This is laying of the foundation. Nothing there.... 

And then, nine months later... what's this I see? A hotel? A new apartment building? I don't  know... We'll see. Also notice the carving of the beach going to the right. They've carved out so much space for the water to go into. 

Anyway, this is my humble abode. I love it here. Come visit!!!

Actually, Alif is for Apple

So. What I haven't blogged about is my attempt to seize the opportunity for personal enrichment. Since I'm living in an Arabic country, I thought, "What better way to enhance this experience, than to speak the language of the country in which I am living?" So, I have been learning how to speak Arabic. Shway shway. (That's Arabic for slowly, slowly.) Perhaps the reason I haven't blogged about it is because I haven't felt very successful with it. Until now. I will touch on that success later.  Let me just take this opportunity to say, things have not exactly gone swimmingly. They've actually been harrowing at best. I've actually developed a couple migraines staring at the letter/characters, and I think I felt my eyes go teary a bit the first time I read a word. :)

Some random, good looking arabic script probably written by some know it all Arabic writing smarty pants... No, I cannot read it.... Yet...

Arabic is considered one of the top five hardest languages in the world to learn. The challenges are many.  For me, here's what has my hair falling out. Arabic of course, doesn't use the Greek alphabet. Arabic has it's own set of letters. At the first few glances they really look like characters, squiggly and extremely suspect. If I'm honest, when I first decided really and truly that I was going to do it, I was completely discouraged by the letters alone. How would I ever read anything, when I didn't know the letters or their sounds? I have to start from the beginning? Like a kindergartener?  Essentially yes.


My Arabic letters.

So in the first two weeks, I learned all the letters. I mean, I had them. I knew all 28 of them. I could identify them, point them out, and say their names. And if given four letters and asked to find a specific one, I could do it. (This took me 2 weeks, studying 2 hours each day.) The good thing is that most of the letters have an English transliteration. For example, Alif can be transliterated into "A" and Bah can be transliterated in "B".  Ra is "R" and Zay is "Z".  Great! So, now I should be able to read, right? Wrong. This brings me to the second thing that drives me mad about the Arabic language.  Of the 28 letters in the Arabic alphabet, each letter has 4 forms. What does this mean? Exactly what I've said. You can make each letter four different ways, depending on where the letter is in a word. First, there is the independent form which you will find if you just put the letter by itself and not inside of a word. Then there's the initial form, the medial or middle form, and the final positioning form. All of a sudden just when you thought you could master 28 little letters, you actually have over 100 letters to recognize.


This is my chart of the different forms of Arabic letters. Independent, initial, medial, and last.

 And this is an actual chart of the different forms of Arabic letters..... done by a professional.

Seriously? Yes, and now you're cooking with gas. But I'm not finished yet.

The third challenge, and possibly one of the biggest... is that there are vowels in the Arabic language...but you don't use them. You do, but you don't.... It's like they're there, but you don't really see them. Go ahead and laugh out loud here. I'm not kidding. And I don't know another way to explain that. Also, w makes a u sound sometimes... and sometimes y makes a long e sound. Which would explain why, when my Arabic teacher, Ms. Meerah asked us to practice writing our names, and she came to check my progress, the conversation went like this.

Ms. Meerah: "What is your name?"
Me: "Khadijah"
Ms. Meerah: "Why you don't make the Y?"
Me: (prolonged look of confusion) ".... oh there's no Y in my name..."
Ms. Meerah: "Yes, you have Y in your name."

At this point, I actually briefly try to think of the way my mother taught me to spell my name when I was 3 to see if I've been doing something wrong for the last 30 years, and when I realize the ridiculousness of that thought, I stutter softly..."No...No Y... really."

Ms. Meerah: (sigh and eyeroll) "Yes, Habibti. Ok, khallas, we will add a Y."

(Khallas means "enough." LOL!)

Turns out, because Khadijah has an "ee" sound in the middle, we have to add a Y when we write Khadijah in Arabic. No, I'm not kidding.


This is my name in Arabic script...

And below is my version of my name. I've put the letter sounds on top with arrows pointing to each Arabic letter. Look at the mine and then look at the one on top. Not too bad right?? Check out the random Y!!!  Lol.

What I have not found to be difficult, strangely enough, is that Arabic is read and written from right to left. For some strange reason, my brain clicks on and off into Arabic mode when it's time to read and write Arabic and I immediately go to the right side of the page to begin. Some English speakers have a little trouble getting used to this. My native Arabic-speaking students have a problem switching to English left-to-right. I'm surprised that I didn't.

   .now cringe can You  .way this sentence this reading be would you, Arabic were this if So

Isn't that just all sorts of madness and fun? Oh, I know. And I haven't even touched grammar, or singles and plurals...sun and moon words..whatever those are, etc.

But lets do talk about my success. So since I started two months ago, I can actually do these things successfully.

a. Write my first name in Arabic
b.  Recognize all letters in their independent form and most in their other four forms.
c. Read and sound out some small and non-complicated words.
d. Write those same words that I've read and break them down into their individual letters and sounds.



Words that I've made. pineapple=ananas     door=bab     bear=dab    wrote=kitabah

I think it's a big deal. My Arabic teacher is not convinced, nor is she impressed with me yet. She nods and smiles pitifully and gives me a look like I'm completely hopeless and I've disgraced the entire Muslim community.

Personally, I think I'm smarter than your average bear. Whatever.


When written by a competent person, Arabic is one of the most beautiful scripts I've ever seen.

Let's Try This Again...Ramadan...Take Two

Ramadan is here. It’s a wonder anything’s getting written at all. It’s hot. It’s very hot. Whatever you’re thinking about heat as you know it, forget about it. This is different. Abu Dhabi summers are thick and dense. The wind can’t be motivated to push around the steamy air so the atmosphere just sits as close to the concrete as it could ever possibly get in a thick gelatinous layer of steamy hatred.  The heat lazily oozes about you, encasing you, and pushing downwards on your lungs, making you feel like an asthmatic asshole for even leaving your apartment in the first place. Like you just had to have toilet paper.  Guess what? You didn’t. You thought you did, and now you’re going to pay the price.

Here’s the good news. It’s Ramadan. And while during Ramadan much is expected of you, on the very same ticket, so VERY little is expected of you. Allow me to explain. During Ramadan, Muslims fast during fasting hours. The fasting starts from the morning prayer which is at 4:18 am here, (it depends on your location in the world).  The fasting continues until about 7:18 which is when we hear the Maghrib, (evening) adhan, (call to prayer).  At this point we can break the fast. The breaking of the fast is called iftar. So what exactly do Muslims fast from? Kind of everything. We don’t eat or drink during these hours. We don’t listen to music and we don’t have sex. We do the five obligatory prayers but there are also extra prayers that Muslims can submit during Ramadan. These prayers are called Taraweh. Some people don’t understand Ramadan too well or the reasoning behind it, but basically the idea is that Ramadan is supposed to draw Muslim people closer to Allah, or God. You have 11 months during the year that belong to you, and this single month is for Allah.

I will be perfectly honest with you. Ramadan is not easy for a person who hasn’t been doing this their whole lives. It’s not easy for a person like me. I’ve spent my entire life as a born Muslim doing exactly what I’ve wanted to do. I’ve never done Ramadan before. I’ve tried it this year, and the first couple of days were rough. After the rough patch, I’ve been successful for the most part. I’ve done it, really. But it was not without some error, and it has not gone exactly perfectly. I have struggled to not drink water, to not pop things into my mouth, to remember to pray each time, to not blast Beenie Man in my car…. Yeah. Listen, it’s been rough. But. I have remembered when I have made mistakes, and I’ve corrected them.

So that’s what is asked of you during Ramadan. What’s not expected of you, is to go outside during daylight hours. Everything’s different when you live in a Muslim country. And by different, I mean better. Most people who have to show up for work during this time are given time to rest, and time to pray, and lots of breaks during the day. People are fasting, and labor laws here are empathetic to this.  Many businesses shut down completely for hours at a time during the heat of the day and people go home to rest and pray during the fasting hours. Many businesses don’t open at all until after iftar has been done. If you don’t have to work at all, (as I don’t) during Ramadan, it’s obvious that you will simply stay in your home until after iftar. Noone is really going to ask you outside. If they do, and you turn them down because of fasting it’s widely understood and accepted. So in other words, during Ramadan’s fasting hours, you can just sit still in one spot and think about Allah. Or you can watch Game of Thrones Seasons 1 through 3.  That’s what some people might be doing, I don’t know those people.

The really great thing about Ramadan is the spirit of people. People are relentlessly kind during this time of year. Sometimes in this country, I’ve noticed that men allow ladies to go ahead of them in a line if they happen to notice you back there. This is nice enough right? During Ramadan however, without fail, every line I’ve been in I’ve been ushered to the front of it if there were men ahead of me.  They do this for all ladies, of course, not just me. In my dreams it would be only me. If you’re in the bank, they stand up so you can sit. A gentleman at Starbucks paid for a friend’s coffee and mine yesterday, just because. Also, during this time of the year, the city is full of lights. The nights are quite bright with decorative and attractive lighting to celebrate the season. From tall buildings to the majestic waterway bridges to the shrubbery, everything gets a beautiful shroud of magical lights. I love it. I wish I had more pics, but I told you I don't go outside...I meant that. :) Here are some of the photos of the city these days. Beautiful.

Tis the season right? Even though I’m missing my family like mad right now, I’m really glad I decided to stay here during this season. The experience is priceless I think.