Settling In

Day 1: Friday, September 9, 2011

I woke up around 11:30. I putzed around my apartment unpacking and trying to figure out what I had and what I needed. There were a few supplies in my apartment: bread, water, some fruit, milk, juice and cereal. Of course, it had all been there for 2 weeks. The bread was moldy. Thank god I wasn’t hungry! Too much had gone on in the past 4 days for me to think about food. Before Chris had left, he mentioned that Erin would be stopping by my apartment today. She’s the co-chair of the English Department. She and her boyfriend Dan took me to the Lulu Hypermarket. It’s a grocery store and then some! It’s 3 floors, and they’re all huge. In order to get your carts to other floors there’s a flat escalator that you ride up and down. It must be magnetic, because you really don’t have to worry about holding your cart up on the way up, or losing it having it ram into someone on the way down (yes, I did let go to see what would happen). I bought some food, a shower curtain, bath mat, extension cords with extra plugs in them (more on these genius inventions later!), a drying rack for my clothes (no dryers here), a coffee maker and a toaster.

Needless to say, I wasn’t completely coherent, so I had bread, tomatoes, cheese (holy expensive!) yogurt, pasta noodles, Ragu (!!!) spaghetti sauce and coffee. It was a decent start anyways!

Erin and Dan invited me over for supper that night. They also invited Chelsea. She’s the other co-chair in the English Department. She’s very nice. Dan’s apartment is on the sea side in the singles building (more on the buildings later). They made homemade sweet potato fries, salmon and green beans. I did try the salmon (I KNOW!), but ate mostly green beans and sweet potato fries. They were wonderful. I also had wine.

Here’s the deal with alcohol in Kuwait. It is illegal to bring it into the country, but it is not illegal to own it. Apparently this is something that wasn’t passed until the 1980s. Many people make their own wine and beer. I have met mostly wine-makers. Apparently, there are kits you can order from England that have all of the ingredients in them, and then you just bring it home and brew it up. Maybe once I get paid… There is also something called Date Rum that you can buy. I’m not sure exactly how that one works yet, but I believe its black market. One of the teachers ‘has a guy’ that can get it.
After dinner I came back to my apartment and I think I was in bed before 10.

Interesting Event #1: Showering without a shower curtain when you have no bathmat is a bit stressful. I survived, my towel survived, and the floor mostly survived.


Day 2: September 10, 2011

I wanted to go to the school on Saturday, because I was going to start teaching on Sunday and really needed to see the school and my classroom. Chelsea had arranged for Chris and Paul to give me a ride at 10 am on Saturday morning. I was up at 5 am. I was cursing my jet lag until I realized that I’d need to get up around 4 am every day for school.

Hard Lesson #1: American appliances don’t always translate to the Kuwaiti electrical system, even with an adapter. I had my computer and my iPad plugged in on the same adapter and have had no problems. I turned on my blow-dryer (which was on a different adapter) and immediately blew the damned thing up.

I had the choice of subbing on Sunday, or taking over my class. I decided to start the week with my students. They had read a short story and were going to be working on the vocabulary the next day. I figured I could handle that! I read the story, then prepared the vocabulary and an introductory activity.

Erin gave me a tour of the school once I got there.

Chris and Paul took me out to lunch with them at the boat mall. I don’t know what else to call it. The thing is shaped like a boat! Apparently it’s a mall that is used mostly by Kuwaiti citizen. I think we were the only Americans (and Canadians) in there. We had lunch at a pasta place, then headed back to school.

Erin and Dan gave me a ride back to the apartments after 4. I was in bed by 8.