Wednesday, August 28, 2013

I'm here!!!

For starters... I'm in Abu Dhabi! The past 6 days have been a whirlwind. So much has happened! Lets start with the flight...

The school had booked my ticket on Etihad airlines, which flew a direct 14 hour flight from Chicago to Abu Dhabi. We left around 9PM and arrived in Abu Dhabi around 8PM the next day. They served great food and it was a very comfortable flight! The best part is that they had tons of free TV shows and movies to choose from to keep us busy when we weren't sleeping! After we got off the plane, we had to get an eye scan, go through passport control, then collect our bags. The school was waiting for us to take us to our accommodation. There were 10 other teachers from my school on my flight so it was great to meet people right away!!

Our apartment is on Reem Island, which is an island right off the main Abu Dhabi city. It is an amazing (and new!) building and the island is just starting to be developed. It will be very neat to see how the island changes over the next two years! The school furnished our apartments before arriving so we had bedroom furniture (including sheets!), kitchen table, living room furniture, and kitchen supplies. We also had a fridge, oven, and washer/dryer combo machine delivered a few days ago. Now all I need to do is add some cute and decorative items to personalize it. More pictures will come once it looks a little more out together but here are a few...






This week was our first week of New Teacher workdays at our school. The school is amazing. It is big and beautiful and the staff/administration seem fantastic. I think it will be a great two years working there! We got to see our classrooms, learn about the school, and start setting up. We also had our medical exams today where they drew blood and did a chest X-ray. The exam is part of the process to get our residency visas. Tomorrow is First Aid/CPR training then it's the weekend!!!!

So far, everything is going great. I really like it here and have had a great time getting to know the other teachers! Now that I have Internet set up, I will be able to blog more frequently so check back soon for another update and pictures! 

Love,
RLD

2 comments:

  1. I am going to love following your blog-Cathy C

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  2. Looks fantastic!!! Love your Carolina Tumbler on your bedside table. Keep posting!

    ReplyDelete