check out the entrance to our new place. i love all the greenery and the complex itself is just nice. it seems like a relatively new building and ended up being literally just a few blocks down from our old place.
one week i got a call from my school asking if i could come in to work extra as they were recruiting for one of our partner airlines. i said sure since it would give me a good idea of what my students go through during the interview/screening process. it was eye-opening to say the least. we were recruiting for Air Emirates and i guess they are like the best airline with a good reputation. first i spent the afternoon calling applicants to do like a pre-screening Eng test over the phone. it tested my Arabic skills for sure and was interesting to learn better phone etiquette. so, after deciding if the applicant's Eng skills were good enough i would either invite or no invite them to the screening/interview stage that would be held at our school. the picture above shows what the room would look like for the first round of the screening process. applicants wore numbers and would come into the room and sit down. they then had to stand up and introduce themselves one by one. this was all done in Eng. the panel would have the list of applicants as shown on the desk above to take notes about their appearance, their Eng level, experience, etc. i felt like i was on American Idol! it was very interesting to say the least. we say loads and loads of applicants...at least a couple hundred over the three days of screening.
then if the applicant made it to the second round they would come back in and would be put into groups to discuss a topic we would give them...again all was in English. from that stage, they went on to take an Eng exam and had a writing test. from there they were widdled down to then do a one-on-one interview. from there, applicants were either asked to go onto Air Emirates' screening down in another city or would be asked to apply again another time.
i was amazed at how much the applicants' looks had a factor in the process. it was hard to see good Eng speakers excused from the process because the didn't have "the look/profile" while seeing those with "the look/profile" advance without great English. i guess i was a lot like the Paula of our panel.
i have to say it really helped me though in figuring out how i could help my students learn better and more of what they needed to know.
so, the picture above is one shot of the city i live in and the city across the river. this pic was taken from our new roof! it has an incredible view to say the least. you can see all over the city and it is just breath-taking. we also hang our laundry out up there, which has been nice for it to dry quickly with full-on sun, but when it rains, there is no cover for the clothes.
in the midst of the move i had a friend come to visit! we managed to see the sites of the city and just enjoyed sharing about our experiences in the Arab world. she is also an Eng teacher, so that was great to talk about as well. she was such a trooper to even help us pack up and move from our old place to the new one!
we ended up doing a majority of our packing the night before the move, which worked since we got it all down and had a huge truck to move everything the next day. fun, fun, fun!
check out my new room and below is a pic of our salon in process. of course, now we are all settled in pretty well to the new place. it is really nice with three bedrooms and two baths. our kitchen is pretty sweet with loads of storage space as well! it has been an interesting transition for sure with a new roommate and then also just being a few blocks from the old place. even though it is close, it is like a whole other world since we have all new people to meet and interact with on a daily basis.
a friend, A, and i went fabric shopping in the city across the river (since it is loads cheaper at times) and i wasn't planning to buy fabric to have a jellaba made but i found this blue/green fabric and fell in love! so, i had one made. i had picked up our jellabas from the tailor and when my friend came back in town she was able to pick them up. we of course had to get a photo-shoot in with one of our local friends!
later we were invited to a wedding by our local friend and somehow i got deemed to be the make-up artist. i had fun and laughed cause i know some of you back home would be suprised!
A and i at the wedding. we ended up getting there hours early so we could get a ride from the family whose son was getting married. we passed the time by taking loads of photos and talking around the table. it was a really nice wedding for sure!
not too long after we arrived we began to get antsy just sitting there, so we went outside to check out what was going on out there. group shot of the ladies!
at about 11pm the bride showed up! this grand entrance is very traditional and loads of fun to watch as the men carrying her have like this whole routine they do in bringing her in. she just holds on and waves to all the folks in the room! turns out the RSVPs didn't total out and they were having to add chairs all over the place. it was a par-tay!
the bride and groom! they looked so happy! they were sorta young, with her being maybe 19 and he was like 23. it was fun to watch them though. sweet!
no wedding is complete without dancing!! S and i enjoyed dancing the night away on the dance floor for sure!
one day i went to my lang school and was stoked to find my teacher wearing his AR shirt! i had to grab a photo with him wearing it since, i hadn't gotten a chance to before. go Arkansas!
and of course our trick or treating tradition continued this year. i was the karate kid! we visited four homes and was able to hand out candy from the lovely jack-o-lantern (thanks Hannah and Christina!) it was a lot of fun for sure!
in preparation for our desert trip us girls got all dolled up in sahara-style head scarves. oh, and meet my new roomie in the middle: Christy! we were getting a bit silly at this point with it being close to midnight and we were still packing to leave the next day for our desert trip.
thanks to Lisa for the fannypacks that we were able to wear on our trip down south. turns out that we weren't meant to go to the desert that weekend with loads of sickness going around. stayed tuned as we did eventually make it!
above and below are pics from our fannypack fotoshoot. Lisa offered us the opp to be in her Fannypack Calendar, so we had fun getting some shots! both were taken from our roof.
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