This whole week is dedicated to celebrating Eid, which pretty much just marks the end of Ramadan, the Muslim month of day-fasting. It's only supposed to be a three day celebration, which meant I would have had a five day weekend. But, the ministry of education changed their minds at the last minute and decided that schools should just take the whole week off instead, so now I'm in the midst of a nine day weekend. I'm pretty sure I'm getting paid for it. I hope.
So, aside from planning for this new Film Studies class I've been asked to head, I'm going to try and devote some time to catching you up on some stories and cool things that have happened in the past month, which was about as busy a month as I can handle.
The first story I'd like to tell you about is my road trip to Oman:
The visa you get when you come to Dubai is a 30-day visitor visa. I didn't have the proper papers at the time to apply for a working visa, and I was only a couple days away from going over the limit, so my school paid a driver to take me to the border and back. It only took about four hours, and was one of those experiences every traveler should have.
My driver was an Indian guy who'd been working at my school for four years or so. I'd brought along a bunch of papers to grade, but during the course of the drive, we got to talking about different things. I found out that he was a Christian, and that India is slowly leaving Hinduism behind and switching over to Christianity as people become more educated. I also found out that he's been living in Dubai since 1998. He'd come here to earn a living, and had started out as a janitor at a grocery store. He hadn't known any English, and had just picked it up along the way. In fact, he claimed to be able to speak in 6 different languages.
He told me about his wife and children. When I asked him if he'd met her here in Dubai, he told me that he'd gone back to India to get her because his parents had arranged his marriage for him. When I asked him how that felt, he told me that when he first saw his wife, he was very nervous, but he focused on how pretty her face was. They had a month or so to get to know each other before the wedding, and then after the wedding he brought her back to Dubai, and they've been living here ever since.
This led to a discussion about arranged marriages, and he asked me why Americans divorce so much. "Is it very easy to get a divorce?" he asked. I told him that it kinda depended on the situation. I honestly had no answer for him as to why Americans divorce so much.
The journey took us through the outskirts of Dubai, and through the sand dunes and tourist traps that followed. Most of the buildings were rundown, and centered around vehicle rentals for exploring the surrounding dunes. The border itself was a bit silly. We had to stop about 5 times, and get out for 3 of those times at different checkpoints. I wasn't technically supposed to be working without the proper visa, so Ranoor (that's the best thing I can come up with for what his name was...my memory's not what it used to be) told me to tell them that I was just paying him for the visa run and to hide the fact that I'm currently employed.
At the Oman office, a British couple were standing in front of us and accidentally left their Blackberry on the counter, so I returned it to them. Then they let their little 3 year old boy run around the whole building while they were occupied with filling out forms, so I watched to make sure that nobody bothered with him. A couple minutes later the father figured out that his son was missing and started walking around looking for him, and I pointed out where his son was. Imagine, being at the Oman border and just letting your kid run around while you fill out forms without having a clue where he's gone.
On the way back, Ranoor asked me if I'd like some tea, and he treated me to the best cup of tea I've ever had in my life. It was Indian style black tea with milk and sugar, and it cost about 25 cents, bought from a dilapidated roadside diner. It tasted amazing. He accidentally swallowed some of it down the wrong tube though, and asked me what the English word for that is. I told him "choke." Honestly, I'm still not sure if that's the right word for it. Perhaps I've been away for too long.
I got back to my grading, and occasionally looked up to spot the roaming camels. I pointed out to him that the landscape in Tucson is kinda similar to the hilly terrain at the Oman border, and he showed me how the sand changes colors along the way back home: first red, and then black.
At the end of the trip we chatted about God and local Indian restaurants, and then he dropped me off. I left my passport in his truck though, but I got it back the next day at work.
It was the second visa run I'd done in my life, and, as visa runs go, I think this one fared pretty well.
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