Doha-Day 5

We arrived at our new home around 2 am last Sunday morning.  Sallie and Robert and I were sort of laughing..that the quick trip between AD and Doha is not quite so quick when the plane is delayed 2 hours. But, we arrived and Mike was waiting for us. He had taken an earlier flight and was able to get some air mattresses, sheets and towels for our time of camping until our container arrives and clears customs.  As of today we learned it is here. We still need Mike's Residence Permit for it to clear customs and we are unsure of that little detail. No matter how many times he goes to the office and faces the people in the know...well, he still doesn't know.

We did receive my car.  Mike tried something a little less orthodox. He shipped by cargo truck across the desert, thru Saudi Arabia.  It was all kind of mysterious but we do have my car. For some reason there are shoe prints all over the trunk and hood.  Wish it could talk. Mike got a call late Tuesday night to drive to a certain location and retrieve. Immediately. All righty then..off he went. He only found his way home because he took our new GPS with him. Glad we bought that in Abu Dhabi, by the way. Already we have used it A LOT. Doha is not built on a grid like we were used to in Abu Dhabi. Everything looks the same..And roundabouts are everywhere.  I find the driving and directions really challenging. Hope I get used to it. :)

Tomorrow we visit the church. Hoping to meet some fun people. We all miss our friends in Abu Dhabi but we know there will be great people here, too.  Still waiting on school news for Sallie. We hope to hear by Sunday on that. As that is the first day of school..hmmm.  Mostly right now we are very thankful to be done with the red tape from the UAE and slowly we are working thru the red tape in Qatar.

 Same, same but different. :)

Camping in our Compound

Looking out our front door.  

A bit battered but safe and sound.

 

Final Farewells

I thought it only fitting that I write one more blog before our friend, Barry, picks the kids and me up for the final ride to the Abu Dhabi airport.  Mike left earlier today and will pick us up this evening. Perhaps it is my need to tie things up, bring closure, whatever.  Mostly it is because one day I want to put these entries all in a book for my kids. And so, I must have an ending.  At least for our time in the UAE.

Mike arrived on Aug. 12 to begin his attempts in finalizing our departure paperwork.  The pressure was on. It was the last week of Ramadan. All eyes were focused on the 3 day holiday which often turns into 7 days or 10 days...  Go there, sign here, wait.  Wait, sign, go. No. Later. Come back. BUT at the end of the week we had everything..Cars de-registered.  Visas cancelled. And more. Except for Mike's.  His previous workplace, who needed to cancel the Residence visa and the Labor visa decided to start their Eid holiday early.  Ah yes. More waiting and praying.  Finally, this last Thurs. Mike received his passport..after he rode with the public relations officer to make sure the Labor stuff was completed. Didn't want him to leave his sight.  Whew. Done.

With all our driving around we spent lots of time reminiscing. The park where Ryan had his senior pictures taken by our friend Brad.  Shakespeares and the Souk, what we fondly called our back porch.  Our last Friday at ECC, our church home for 5 years. Church out to lunch at the mall. Wendys. Marina  Mall where we bought furniture and saw our first movie over here. Sallie, Robert and I came out so homesick after that movie..I think it was that Nancy Drew one with Emma Roberts. A birthday dinner at the Pages. The first family we met from here. Hugging on my kids's friends. So grown up now. Saying goodbye to our security guard who always brought us gifts from Egypt. And the little store across the street that was our lifesaver nearly everyday with milk, or bread, or m and m's. The barber who cut Robert's, Mike's, Russell's and Ryan's hair for 5 years. One last dinner at our favorite Vietnamese Restaurant. Lunch at Cafe Arabia.  Yes, it was hard to get thru the red tape but it did give us time to say goodbye to our home.

And we will be back. An hour flight. Lots of close friends who have become family to us. Yep. We will be back. It won't be the same.  New people will be here. Other friends will be gone. But ahh, the memories we take with us.  It is all good.

Now for the strength and energy to get settled in Doha. More memories to be made. More friends to meet. Oh yes..and more red tape. :)          

Let us Leave Please

Robert and I looked at each other last night at dinner and said..Hey today is our 5 year anniversary for arriving in Abu Dhabi. We were having dinner with the Pages and some good friends of Russell's from Kabul who were staying with us before heading back to their teaching jobs.  It was fun to think back on how the Pages were the first people we met from AD. They tried to prepare us for what was ahead of us, while we sat in the Hone's dining room that hot June day.   None of us really knew....

And now, in two days, Mike will be here from Doha. He will finish the exiting process. As hard as it was to enter the country, it is harder to exit. The mountain of red tape is exhausting, but finally we are close. Mike will deregister the cars for exporting them to Qatar. Then he will cancel the visas.  I have spent some of my time this summer completing the various other steps to leave.  As Mike is my sponsor I had to have all these permission letters from him to do anything.  I had a no objection letter to receive permission for the movers to enter our apt. and pack up our furniture.  I had a no objection letter to request the utilities to be cut off from the apt. as we cannot exit the country without a clearance letter from the power/water company. I had a no objection letter to cancel our internet service.  Allowing for more than one day on each of these processes..well, let's just say I played a lot of Angry Birds while waiting for my turn to get the right paperwork, fill it out, return it, check this off, check that off, talk to this person, go to the next person, and basically... eventually.... got it done. (Funny but playing Angry Birds helped release the tension..all those things blowing up!)  But, not to be all negative here. During this process I met several nice people who worked hard to help me get what I needed. One man at the utility company, in particular, would not give up. NO, madam has been here 4 hours, you must disconnect her.  And the next day..no madam has been here 2 more hours. What is the problem?? We became friends and when he finally handed me the clearance letter that we had been disconnected we were both smiling. And he kept saying how sorry he was. The security guard at the desk was also happy for me. Over the two+ days we had smiled and waved several times on my way back and forth to the parking meter.
 Next stop was the property company, our landlord.  This did not go as well initially as I was told we owed another 4000 dirhams because we were late checking out. Really?? I waited 5 days for this clearance letter in order to come over here. 5 days!!! And you are going to charge us???  Call this man. He will tell you how I sat there trying to get it. I am alone. My husband is in Doha. Do you know how hard it is to leave this country??  and you are going to take MORE money from us?? Shame on you! I have been without an oven for 3 months. No one came to fix it. You are stealiing from us. Ok, and then after a bit more of that I nearly started to cry. Yes, the thief card, the shame card, the wife alone card.. They all came out. But believe me, the tears were real.  In the end, after an hour or so, he did not charge us more. And we got our deposit back..which is not easily accomplished. I am thankful for the many friends I have had praying for me over the last month for all of these details. I know that is what got me through..      So in these areas we are cleared to leave. I think I left mostly a good impression.well, mostly. Maybe the landlord.....

With Sallie in Chicago and Ryan back in Lubbock and Mike in Doha, it has been pretty quiet. We were glad to have Brad and Kayla and her sister Bree with us for a couple of nights. We shared Russell stories and it made all of us miss him. They told me how they will really miss him back in Kabul.  They even named their cat Russell the Cat as they found it right after he had to leave last January.  Brad is also from Carrollton so we had several ties. It was a short visit but fun. I told them to come see us in Doha.

But Mike will be here on Sunday. Then we will hit it again.I pray the end is in sight.
Oh boy.
Do I.
And then we do the reverse on the other end. But that is for another day.