Thank you!

   Yesterday my blog had 364 views! What!? I have never had that many views since I started. I just wanted to say thank you for reading. When I first started this adventure I could barely find a blog on teaching in the UAE, not to mention a female blog by a BLACK female that is updated on a daily basis (I have found one). This is the reason behind Black Girl In Abu Dhabi. Who knew that I would have touched so many people as well as made a few friends on the way. I am always surprised (I shouldn't be it IS the internet) when I am stopped about my blog on the streets of Abu Dhabi or have a friend tell me their friend reads my blog and they did not know of its existence. Funny this is most teachers who are here don't know I have a blog, I don't really advertise.

      Once again thank you for reading, thank you for commenting and thank you for your interest. To the prospective ADEC teachers I was once in your shoes, keep the faith your ticket will come! 

     Nevertheless, I  curious as to the sudden readership increase  in the last few days. How did you find my blog? I am just curious to know, feel free to comment below.

Valentine's Day In Abu Dhabi

Hello Readers!

     Happy Valentine's Day! I have a friend here whose husband is in Afghanistan and cannot be here with her on Valentine's Day so he booked her a hotel room in Abu Dhabi and she asked me to come with her. Let me tell you he went all out! 

We were relaxing enjoying the room when the door rang. Two people came in with the following!

Thank you! 

Reader Question

Naa asked me the following question in the comments:

How do you deal with the homesickness and communicating with family and friends given the time difference? 

This is an excellent question. The UAE is 9 hours ahead of Montreal. I have to say first of all that I have made a great group of friends here that keep me occupied and keep my mind of my family and friends at home.  This really helps with the homesickness.  Making friends is essential when you teach/live abroad.  You must find a group of friends that you can laugh with, vent to and hang out with. This will be key to keeping your sanity especially when work is not going well.

   Next I will say that social media and technology are you best friends. Here is a small list of a few essential items I would suggest you possess if you are teaching/living abroad:

1. Email--stay in touch with everyone. I have an iPhone and all of the following things I talk about I can access all day from my phone, all you need is data.

2. Facebook-- I only joined Facebookin April when I knew I was moving out here, it is wonderful way I stay on touch with everyone at home as well as join groups that keep me up to date with events in and around the UAE.

3. Instagram-- I share amy pictures and my friends do the same .

4. Skype-- I have turned my 70 year old mother onto Skype and she loves it, she gets to see my cute little face (her words not mine) I can show her my apartment and it feels like we are together again.

5. Whatsapp-- THE BEST! I can voice message my friends here and at home and it feels like we re having a conversation for free!

6. Magic Jack: this is an app and you can also buy the device to connect to your computer. I paid 10$ to have a Montreal number (on top of the roughly 70$ for the device) and I can call Canada and US as much as I want. My friends and fam can also call me.

I must admit the 9 hour difference is a bit awkward but I mostly call my friends and family when I get home from work ( it is the morning in Canada) I make it work.

Ten years ago when I was in Japan I had none of this so I really feel connected to everyone, it is almost like I never left!

Hope that helps!  Feel free to leave any questions I love to answer them.

Great Day

    Guess who went to a baby shower on a yacht in Dubai? Me! Baby games, food and fun.

Going to the Doctor In The UAE

    I have to admit, there are a few things in the United Arab Emirates that are pretty sweet. For example, when you buy fresh shrimp at the grocery store they will clean them for you, for free! You can get your car washed while you shop at the mall for about 5$. But one of the best things in the UAE is visiting the doctor when you don't feel well. Remember I come from Canada, the land of free medical care, nevertheless, if you go to a walk in clinic in Montreal when you are sick will be there for a minimum of three hours and don't even talk about the emergency room! Ha! 

     I wasn't feeling well yesterday, I wasn't feeling well when I woke up this morning, so I called in sick. When you are sick and work for ADEC you have to produce a doctor's note if you want to get paid for the day off.  I took myself to a hospital located about 5 minutes away and registered my information since I have never been there before. I was in and out with a prescription and a lette for my school  in less than 45 minutes!!! Whaaaaaa! I love it! The appointment cost me about 15$ with our insurance and (this is the best part) my prescription was 0.35$! Yes, 35 cents! 

I am feeling much better and I am happy I took the day to rest.

Dropping Like Flies

   I am going to keep this short. People are leaving. Teaching in the UAE is not for everyone and it is not easy, my school is tough but I have goals (finacial and personal) that will keep me here no matter what until I meet them. The situation in Canada is not the greatest for teachers.  I am even toying with the idea of extending my two year contract for an extra year or two. Everyone has their own reasons for leaving and I cannot judge anyone's decision. But what you hear/read is real,the turnover here is crazy. 

One For The Books

   On December 14 my friend Kaitlin and I set off for our three week winter vacation. We were flying out of Dubai through Bahrain to Bangkok (reseeding this now I sound like a celebrity!). We would spend one night in Bangkok, then head down to Koh Samui for a few nights and hit up the Full Moon party on Koh Phangan.

     While in Bangkok we saw as many temples as we could fit in one day and ate some great food.  My favorite temple was Wat Arun ( Temple of the Dawn).

This temple had some crazy stairs to climb to reach the top. It was all worth it. 

Thailand is known for its fantastic food we sampled Pad Thai and mango with sticky rice once we got off the fairie.

I have to admit I have been to Bangkok before, twice, and it has really cleaned itself up. I am not sure if it is because of where I stayed, but the all around feeling I got was much better than I remember almost 10 years ago.

     We then headed to Koh Samui.  We got to hang out at the beach for a few days, but it wasn't enough for me. I love, love, love the beach and for my Spring Break I am planning a lot more beach time.

This is one of my favorite pictures of the whole trip. Because it was cloudy it gave this fluorescent effect. There are no filters on this pic! I love it! Simply stunning!

We took a 45 minute crazy,bumpy speed boat ride to the Full Moon party. Please add a Full Moon party to your bucket list if you have not been already.

The number of people was crazy, there were fire dancers and you could get fluorescent tattoos.

Fun times.

The Koh Samui airport is one of the most beautiful that I have ever seen. Most of the shops are located outdoors.

We headed from Koh Samui to Chaing Mai which is located in the north of Thailand.

    I have never been to Chaing Mai before and one of my goals was to spend the night with a hill tribe. We took a two day/one night trek.  The first part of our adventure involved an elephant ride. 

From their we did a 2.5 hour trek up a mountain to the hill tribe.  I felt as if I was climbing to heaven. The incline never let up.  This was the hardest part of the whole trip for me. I was so slow and at so many times during this trek I wanted to give up. Not to mention I slipped once or twice and almost plummeted to my death.  Nevertheless, I persevered and I did it. The view from the top was breathtaking.

We spent the night in a small cabin and since there was no electricity we went to bed by 8 pm with only the stars watching over us.

Even though we had blankets and two layers of clothes, this was one of the coldest nights I have ever spent. It reminded me of the Ice Storm of '98 when we lost power for 11 days in Quebec. I even had a hat and gloves on and I was still frozen to the core.  In terms of temperature it was probably 8-10 C but it felt much worse.

The next day we took the 2.5 hour trek down which was much easier for me than for others.  I must say that my legs were broken for about a week after. 

  

Since my friend and I cannot get enough adventure (and we were waiting to get paid) we took a 13 hour over night bus from Chaing Mai to Vientienne, Laos. We thought we were going to be on a big Voyageur type bus, but it turned out that we were in a packed 12 seater mini van. Since we are soooo lucky we were at the back next to the luggage. Yippee!  During the 13 hours of fun the luggage kept falling on Kaitlin and I was pressed up against the wet window behind a cigar smoking gentleman. 

The next morning we made it to Laos. I must admit I didn't know much about this country before the trip, but I love the French influence that it possesses and would definitely go back.

This is the Patuxai. The concrete for this structure was donated by the United States to build a runway for an airport, instead Laos build this wannabe Arc de Triomph. It is beautiful. Once you walk underneath this is what it looks like:

Reminds me of the Watch The Thrown cover. 

After Vientienne, we headed to Vieng Vien. We spent Christmas Eve at an Irish pub getting beat at pool and eating street banana pancakes.

The scenery here could not be matched :

Honestly, if God did not create this beauty who did?

Next post will discuss Vietnam and Cambodia.

Thanks for reading!

Love hearing your comments!