Category Archives: Daily Life

We don’t always cook

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Last night Jeff and I didn’t feel like cooking. On our walk back from the grocery store we decided to call and order Indian to get delivered to our apartment. Normally we don’t like eating out because it’s expensive and we can usually cook something better at home. Luckily in Kuwait there are lots of small, cheap, quality restaurants! After we got home we waited a few minutes and the call came that our food was in the lobby. When we got the food up to our apartment we realized there was a miscommunication on the phone…we’re not really sure everything that we got but we do know it was all tasty! And it was only 4kd with tip for all of it! We had enough food for dinner for 2, lunch for 3 AND there were leftovers!

Indian dinner

Our cab driver has a degree.

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Have we mentioned our favorite cab driver before? His name is Mohamed and he’s awesome. Here are a few other fun facts about Mohamed;

* He has a college education in Religious Studies (rough translation) from a university in Egypt.
* He’s from Egypt.
* He primarily drives teachers from our school and makes so much money during the school year that he takes the summers off.
* During the school year he’s available 24/7, with the exception of Mosque.
* He taught himself English, and speaks it somewhat fluently.

And a short story;

Yesterday we were coming home from the vet and Mohamed stops outside of our apartment. Before we can pay him and get out, a police car with two officers stops next to us and they get out and start speaking with Mohamed. (It should be worth pointing out that all Arabic sounds angry, even if the topic being chatted about is fluffy bunnies or how much you love your mother). They ask for Mohamed’s civil ID and then they ask for ours. At this point, we’re getting a little freaked out because we have no idea what’s going on and they look like they’re taking our names down. They eventually give us our civil ID’s back and Mohamed, who has been speaking with the first officer, asks us “how much you want to give me?” in a way that makes us feel like our answer could very well determine whether or not he gets deported. We tell him “5KD” and he starts laughing along with the police officer. The officer gets back into the car, drives off and Mohamed comes back into the taxi and smiles. He tells us that the police officers wanted to make sure he wasn’t ripping us off and that everything was OK. What ended up actually happening was us being scared out of our wits.

Getting sick abroad

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(Not to be confused with “getting sick of abroad.” Sorry mom.)

Private school certainly has its perks.

For one, money gets spent on little stuff that makes life as a teacher that much easier; there’s always coffee brewing in multiple places around the campus, we have no limit on copying (color or black/white) and when you visit the nurse’s office she can shove all sorts of medication your way without any sort of payment.

As to who passed this particularly annoying ailment my way, I do not know. Several family members have apologized, but it’s more than likely the inordinate amount of time I spent outside geocaching when the temperature was single digits than some sort of airborne transmission by a loved one. Who knows.

Anyway, I’m on the way to feeling better thanks to a healthy dose of antihistamines,  cold & flu relief, cough syrup, and nasal spray – all provided by the school nurse. For free.

Perks, man. Perks.

A little extra

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We came to Kuwait with minimal expectations. Since arriving, we’ve learned a lot about living and teaching abroad (in general) and in Kuwait. Some people might think we make lots of money. We don’t really – we just don’t pay taxes.

We’ve learned that the real money comes from tutoring. Some people tutor just before big assessments, others tutor 10+ hours a week. The going rate is anywhere from 15 to 30 KD…an HOUR! That equates to $50 to $100+ an hour! Wow is all we had to say. And tutoring is extremely common. Lots of students ‘need’ it (elementary through high school), for a variety of subjects and skills. The tricky part of tutoring is making sure that you are indeed tutoring and not actually doing the students work for them. We’ve heard that many students just hire a tutor to complete his/her assignments. Not okay.

Although not many students are looking for tutors in Social Studies or French, Chemistry and Science is quite popular. So I’ve been sitting back waiting for the right time and the right student to come along. After communicating with the father of a grade 11 boy (from Kuwait), I had my first tutoring session on Tuesday. The student came with his driver to pick me up. We drove to their villa passing the Switzerland Embassy on the way. We entered through the garage into a gorgeous room that had a couple round tables and an area of couches for a social gathering (diwaniya?). A maid was just leaving and had left a tray for me with water, juice and a couple pieces of some cake/bread. For the next hour we talked Chemistry – what he was struggling with and where I could help him. He taught me, I taught him. He is an incredibly respectful, nice young man who seems like he actually wants to learn and understand. At one point his mom came down and I was able to meet her. She was nice and very grateful. (I’ve heard that many tutors rarely see the students parents.) After our allotted hour he walked me back to the car, getting his driver on the way out (he lives off the garage). Starting next week, his driver will be at our apartment every Monday and Wednesday at 7:45pm. We’ll work for an hour and I’ll be home by 9:15pm.

Life is crazy…good 🙂

Introducing…

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…Nijumi (نجومي)!

When we moved to Kuwait, we had NO intention of getting a cat (we still love Noel…and she’s going to live forever). But then one of our friends rescued an adorable baby kitten and we couldn’t say no. We’ve had Nemr for almost 3 months. He’s bored out of his mind and uses us as chew toys. As we started getting closer to Christmas break and leaving him alone for almost 2 weeks (not to mention nearly 3 months in the summer), we decided we needed to find him a friend. Fortunately we found Nijumi (originally Sundari) on Saturday. Her new name means my stars in Arabic. She is about 3 months old (Nemr is 4 months) and has been fostered since the beginning of September. We said we’d foster her to see if she got along with Nemr. We kept them separate for 24 hours and after 48 they were playing together. Now, they’re practically besties!

We hereby vow that under no circumstances are we getting another cat. Please hold us to this promise. We will not become those people. Cross our fingers, hope to die. We have 3 cats in 2 countries. They were all born in August, all have names that start with N and all three are bilingual. We’re done 🙂

Getting in the (school) spirit

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There were many exciting things going on at AIS this week! The high school has had dress up days. Tuesday was Twin Day! Jeff and I decided to participate…so we went though our closets on Monday night to see if we could find anything. We we able to throw a little something together 🙂

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The activities this week have been leading up to the Forensic tournament this weekend that AIS is hosting. It is very similar to the volleyball tournament, but with different ‘sports.’ I had no idea what happened at Forensic competitions, so I had to do some investigating. Here is a little more info and here are some of the events. Jeff and I will again be hosting a coach, this time from Amman, Jordan. Hopefully we’ll be able to go to a couple events!

The other incredibly awesome thing this week was the Arts U: An AIS Arts Gala that took place last night. When I stopped by on my way home from the gym and grocery shopping, I had no idea what I was in for. It was fabulous, amazing, incredible…I can’t even describe how great it was! When you first walked into the lobby there was art on display and FOUR artists doing live art. One high school teacher was painting on a huge canvas while another HS art teacher was painting her paint.

Image Credit to L. Marek

There was a student painting a LIVE still life.

Image Credit to C. Botbyl

(That’s a person under there…)

Image Credit to C. Botbyl

(What part of that is real and what is painted? 😉

In the auditorium they had short plays every 30 minutes. In the foyer and tennis courts they had drama, monologues, improv, choirs, bands…they had it all! There was a maze of walls with Elementary art. Students from all grades participated and were able to show off their amazing work. It was beautiful. The atmosphere was perfect too. I think the main goal was to give students the opportunity to perform before the competition this weekend, but it was so much more than that. I hope it becomes a long-standing tradition!

Another thing that has made this week perfect…we found out that Abby will be returning to Kuwait with us in January! We don’t know the specifics of what she’ll be doing, but at minimum she will be substitute teaching (there are several maternity leaves available). She’ll live with us for the semester, sub, tutor…and just have a great experience! I CANNOT WAIT! 🙂

We’ve got more fun news coming this weekend…see you then!

2 things I’m thankful for are…

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1. Learning Arabic. Tonight Jeff and I went to our a restaurant around the corner to pick up a chicken machine. We go there 2-3 times a week to pick one up and use it in a variety of recipes. We are quite familiar with the guys who work there. Tonight we were able to order in Arabic! We recently learned numbers and they taught us how to say chicken machine. So tonight we ordered one (واحد) chicken machine (شواية)! Exciting 🙂

2. Skype/FaceTime. Today we were able to FaceTime with both Jeff parents and Skype with my family at a family get together! While my family was coming and going during the hour we talked to them, I had one of those moments where I was like “Wow, technology is freakin’ awesome.” We were basically with our families today! Amazing 🙂

Happy Thanksgiving!

Beautiful People in Kuwait

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Last night Jeff and I decided to venture to our bank. Our branch is in Salmiya and we needed to go to our home branch to do paperwork for our account. We knew about where the bank was but not exactly and couldn’t find it on Google maps. We risked finding a taxi on the street instead of calling our normal guy. The first 2 taxis didn’t know where our bank was either. Finally the 3rd guy seemed to know so we got in. When we got to Salmiya, he started pointing at every bank…”Bank?” He realized he had no idea where we were going! Once we were somewhere we recognized, we quickly got out of the taxi. We figured a Starbucks might have the most English speakers in it, so we went in to ask. The cashier didn’t really have any idea, but there was a customer who was incredibly nice and helpful! His English was pretty decent too! He took us outside and showed us where we should walk. We were a little surprised and incredibly grateful! Unfortunately, it wasn’t the exact branch we needed but fortunately one of our friends answered the phone and directed us to just walk a little further down the road…and we found it 🙂

After we were done with business at the bank, we decided to walk home. The Kuwaiti customer service employee who helped us (طه) walked outside with us to show us the way. He said that if we wanted to wait 30 minutes, he would be done with work and could just drive us. SO nice! We really wanted to walk, but were (again) surprised at his offer and thankful. We love that when you are kind, respectful and not judgmental people respond to you positively and are willing to help you 🙂

In other news…I’m teaching again. I have taken back 2 of the 3 French classes that I was teaching earlier this year. They are once again looking for a teacher. This time the search is for a French teacher only…so if anyone knows anyone, PLEASE send them our way! It won’t be an easy job, but it’s a job 🙂 I’m currently telling myself that I’ll be in this position until the end of the year…and just going so the the flow!

UPDATE: they hired someone Thursday afternoon for the French position! I taught my last grade 9 class today (Sunday) and tomorrow I’ll teach my last grade 10. I met that new teacher today and she seems great! She’s from France even 🙂 A GREAT start to the week!

Winter is coming!

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When you live in Michigan, you are constantly checking the weather forecast. In Kuwait, we rarely usually look at the weather because it’s been almost the same since we arrived – sunny (with an occasional cloud) and hot (over 90 degrees).

Last week, I happened to check the 10-day forecast and saw it coming…winter! Yesterday it was slightly more cloudy than normal, but the high was still in the mid 90s. Last night it got windy and the temperature dropped (not out of the ordinary). BUT today it never went back up! It’s been in the 70s all day AND it’s been cloudy, windy and rainy. Did I mention the thunderstorms? We’ve been hearing gorgeous thunder on and off all day! The cool temperature and rain is refreshing and very welcome to stay. It was hard to imagine this weather when we got here in August, but it’s here and we are loving it 🙂

Here is a picture of one of the courtyards at school at 2:30pm this afternoon.

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