PICTURES :)

We have pictures. :) Ok, it is not the prettiest presentation but what do you expect???? In order of appearance...Our first visit to the beach during our first week here. Our living room when we first moved in. Our trip to Lulu Island when we swam in water the temp. of a hot tub. ugh. Nassar..our building guy who always smiles like that and has been such a wonderful help to us. And finally, Ryan in front of the American school here. Sitting by the gated entrance, on a barricade...hmmm..... Ok, so now we will do better about getting pictures to you all. Sallie, by the way, figured it out by herself. :) What a gal!

Ryan's Home

Ryan is home from Kuwait. The team came in second in the Volleyball tournament. He gave me the details and then crashed on the couch. Each player stayed with families from the school. Ryan said his family was very nice. I am so glad he had this experience. He was kind of surprised at the country itself. Very polluted, dirt streets...not what I picture . He said the driving is really crazy. Wow. It's all in your perspective but to come from here and say it's crazy there...well, it must be wild.

Robert's Awana Club had Heroes of the Faith last nite. The kids all came dressed up in Biblical characters. Robert and I both forgot. My favorite was a little 4 year old girl who came dressed up as Martha...had the head covering and the dress, and carried in a play teapot and wore rubber gloves. Just so cute. Her brother was Luke...had a stethoscope around his neck. Robert's good buddy Ben Miller(from Colorado) was the OT Benjamin....all he did was throw a pillowcase on his back and put a sign on it that said "gold cup inside". Check your Old Testament....pretty creative.

Still trying to buy a car. Still trying to get a phone set up. Things are happening. It just takes awhile.

Love,
Mattie

The Movies

We thought it was a bad idea...like going to see Jaws before going to the beach...but wanting to get out of the house tonight we decided to go see a movie. We went to see The Kingdom, which many of you have already seen. But let me tell you....it was pretty weird seeing it from our side of the world. :) First of all...most of it is filmed in Abu Dhabi. Yep. We drive those streets and see those buildings. The Saudi Palace is actually the Emirates Palace Hotel which Mary Hone and I toured last week. Cool, huh? A couple of things....the availablilty of parking spaces...total Hollywood fiction....the actual driving scenes...not so much. Anyway, nice to get out but not exactly a relaxing evening. :)

By the way, the funky skyline is not Abu Dhabi..that is actually Riyadh...with the funny shaped building.
G'Night.
Mattie

Dr. Michael Youssef

Saturday evening Mike and I went to the Abu Dhabi National Theater to hear Dr. Michael Yousseff speak. That may not sound like big news to you but over here it was actually a historical event. This was the first time ever that an evangelist has been allowed to speak in this type of forum. We had to smile as we thought of the special week Bent Tree was having and here there we were...having our own type of "festival" but on the other end of the spectrum. We sang many familiar songs in English, led by a Filipino worship team...and then another musician came up. He led the congregation in Arabic worship music. I cannot tell you how cool that was...we were standing there and all around us praises were being lifted up. It was really neat.

Friday nite we were also busy. About 800 people gathered at Ryan's school for Picnic in the Park. It's a fundraiser for the school trip to Bangladesh in November. We had lots of fun...the picnic food was middle eastern :) and there were several music acts from the school for entertainment. We sat on camping chairs and matts and visited with people. It was relaxing... for us anyway....Ryan worked like a dog. :)

Our busy week has started....Will keep you posted.
Mattie

Our First Visitors

It's Friday afternoon here and we are getting ready to head to Ryan's school for an all school picnic. It is a fundraiser for the team going to Bangladesh with Habitat for Humanity in November. Ryan is working it, as he is on the team that is going.

Mary and Laurel Hone left last nite after their whirlwind visit to see us. We spent 4 days laughing, crying, and zipping around town to see the sights. We had a desert picnic, visited a camel farm, toured Emirates Palace...a hotel with a lobby the size of 3 football fields, had Moroccan tea, swam at the beach, ate at some fun restaurants...including Lebanese Flower and McDonalds...:) and generally had a ball. I think the best part was knowing that although we are so far away we are still connected with our friends and family back in the States. And now Mary and Laurel will both know what we are talking about when we share things. It just made all of us feel less isolated from life back there. They really blessed us with lots of fun movies to watch and some good books to read as well. Woo Hoo!

Fun fact we learned from Jeff Kinney the other nite while Mary, Mike and I went over there so she could meet them. Mike was talking about the process to buy a used car and all that it takes....(going on 3and1/2 weeks) when Jeff asked him if he noticed the separate door for the women to get their driver's licenses...Mike said yes. Jeff kind of chuckled and said...The Local ladies,( all wearing black veils that cover everything but their eyes) who go back there to get their picture for the license don't have to take off their face veils for their picture....

'Nough said. We just laugh and move on.

Love you all,
Mattie, Mike, and the Kids

Island Living

group of us gathered on Thurs. nite at the beach for a picnic. Many of us there were newcomers and it was fun to meet several other new families. The water is finally cooling off so Sallie and Robert enjoyed swimming. Our friend Peter brought his guitar and we sang thru the evening. It was so peaceful and relaxing.

The night before our picnic I found out that one of my old friends from Aruba was living in Qatar. Her brother and his wife just moved here and she and I were talking when we realized that I had been in Aruba at the same time as her husband's family. I couldn't believe it. Joni was in town this weekend , and we spent Sat. morning talking until we were almost hoarse. She has kept up with several other friends from our Aruba years and it was so fun to catch up.

We christened our new grill last nite with Snapper and shrimp. The grill takes up our entire balcony...and not because it is a big grill. Mike and Ryan went to the fish market and brought home dinner. It was delicious. I've never been a big fish eater(that's an understatement) but I decided I need to broaden my horizons. Ryan made the cocktail sauce and we dined on a delicious meal. And I didn't have to cook....:)

From Mike:

The fish market was a bit of an experience itself. It is housed in a building at the port just around the corner from the Iranian souk (another story). You smell it about 50 yards before you get there, when you coax yourself inside there are about 100 booths and 300 Indian and Arab fishermen selling everthing slimy, slippery, and smelly fresh from the Arabian Gulf ! Yards of stainless steel tables laiden with crushed ice and fish. Shark, tuna, squid, lobster, snapper, red fish you name it, much of it still wriggling around a little bit on the table. We're talking fresh! Ryan and I chose the prawns (shrimp). Not Texas shrimp, more like miniture lobster, these were about six inches long, four of them made a meal for about 3 bucks. They grilled them up right at there at the market (key item here...keep the smell and the mess out of Momma's kitchen). We brought the snapper (cleaned and fileted by the fisherman...ref:note about momma's kitchen) home to cook it up ourselves on the new grill. Even food critics Robert and Sallie were transformed into seafood lovers...well sort of. The Baskin Robbins ice cream for dessert was probably the bigger hit.

Mike and Mattie
for the Seafood lovers in you!

Desert Detour

On Tuesday the kids and I joined a couple of other homeschooling families and headed out to a newly built area right by Abu Dhabi...Khalifa City. Mike actually looked in this area for places to live when he got here but decided it was too far out for us. This was my first visit there. My new friends Krista and Jean drove the one car and I followed them. We actually got a bit turned around and we saw more of the desert than planned. :) Somehow we ended up in Khalifa City B when we needed to be in part A. So, we stopped at a gas station...to ask directions...(we women do that, you know...) All of us had a good laugh when Jean came out sort of shaking her head. I asked her, "Were they able to help?" She laughed and said "I don't know...we go 5 kilometers and take a left right. " Oh boy. Well, we did finally reach Michelle's villa in Khalifa City A and had a good visit.

Mike and I are enjoying the cooler mornings these days. We go down to the Corniche(seawall) and walk in the mornings. We usually stop about halfway thru and find a bench where we take some time to pray about our life and for our friends. It's been a sweet time for us.

We are all excited about the upcoming week. First of all, Ramadan will be over today or tomorrow and secondly our friends Mary and Lolo Hone are coming on Saturday!!! They aren't staying long but we are so excited to have them here!

So that's the news from here. We love you and miss you.
Mattie

Wednesday Dinner

One way that our church here gets people from all the different cultures to interact with one another is by hosting dinners. People offer their home to a family from another culture and they share a meal together. These evenings are called Adventures in Fellowship. We got to share a meal with two Filipino gals..Amy(real name Imelda..named after the Presidents wife when she was born) and Trish..who has lived here in Abu Dhabi for 18 years. Amy did all the cooking...Trish said she was there for moral support because she doesn't cook. :)

When we arrived at the apt. Amy greeted us with a beautiful smile and promptly asked us to sit on the floor so we could play a game and get to know each other better. I love the men in my family....neither Ryan nor Mike can easily sit on the floor..as their long legs make it difficult, but both guys just smiled and plopped right down.(They aren't exactly big on icebreakers either, but didn't bat an eye):)... We shared about ourselves and then had to share about the person next to us. It was fun and I wish you could have seen the wonderful smiles on these girls faces. So warm and friendly.

Amy served some wonderful Filipino dishes and talked about them as we ate. We had a chicken dish, and rice, and a wonderful oriental type vegetable chicken dish as well. She laid low on spicy stuff...which I appreciated, and so did Robert and Sallie. :)

Before we left that nite, I asked Amy if she would close in prayer..in her own language. So she prayed in Tagalog. It was such a wonderful nite. Our own little m. festival.

Speaking of the Festival that Bent Tree will be having next week, I hope those of you in Carrollton are planning to attend. Wish we could be there. We'll be downloading the messages. I will probably cry but then I will be fine. :)

We love you all.
Mattie and The Gang

ps. Ramadan ends this week. Woo Hoo!!!! Shops will open and there will be food during the day...and we can drink water in public again. Please continue to pray for everyone who is truly seeking God during this time...that they find Him and follow Him. And that His love would shine thru believers everywhere.... Amen? Amen!

pss. we are trying to buy a car. pray we find one and then that the paperwork, etc. goes smoothly...just buying a toaster can be frustrating....:)

Crockpots at Carrefour

I managed to avoid shopping at the mall for a whole month. So, having recovered from mall overload from the first few weeks, I returned yesterday with Sallie and Robert. We needed to buy a regular phone in hopes that soon we will be able to use it. The kids and I hopped in the car and headed to Marina Mall(which you can see on the internet if you'd like).
Here's what we saw when we drove up....it took a minute to process what we were looking at...The entire front wall of glass, which is two stories high was covered in a wallpaper that looked like lattice work, with mosque type windows cut out across the top. Yes, you guessed it...the mall is decorated for Ramadan...I couldn't tell if it was to resemble a mosque or a palace. The doors all had arches placed in front of them as did the escalators, which also had the lattice paper decorating their glass sides. It was actually quite pretty, but again, very surprising when one isn't expecting it. :)

We did find a phone, but even better than that...I found a crockpot! Big deal, you say??? Well, let me tell you, it is!! My friend Mary has searched for one here for two years! I called her and she was headed over to get one. I also called my new friend Debbie who was also very excited and she wants to get one, too. What can I say? Little things make us happy. :) By the way, this is not just any crockpot with a silly little knob and two heat settings...nope, it is double sided so you can cook two different items at once and it is electronic with a time setting for how many hours and has an automatic warmer on it for when you are done cooking. Hah! Bet you are all jealous now.....:) Oh, yeah. and we got a normal old toaster.

One last interesting thing about the malls here and many of the stores...they have flat escalators. Sort of like airport walkways but they incline. This is so you can put your grocery carts on them when you change levels. The carts have ridged wheels to stick in the runners on the escalators....I tell you..it's a different world here. :)

Sallie wants to go to buy a jewelry for her phone so we are heading out. She converted the $$ she saved to Dirhams so now we need to go spend it. :) Jewelry for her phone..good grief..is she my child???? ( We'll do school when we get home...lest you are worried about SandylandISD, Mr. Pearce.)

Shop till you drop,
Mattie, Sallie and the guys....
ps. sorry about the pix, we'll figure it out...sometime.