Change

Many events have transpired within the last few days, not all developments are encouraging and I don't want to appear as a whiner so I won't elaborate and embellish... or maybe I will. It all depends. I've heard that phrase often here. It all depends on when the moon appears as to when the three day Eid holiday begins, marking the end of Ramadan.

I received a wonderful email from my employer encouraging me to relax and to enjoy the holiday weekend. It informed me that I would not be kicked out from my hotel and that my stay has been extended for another ten days. That was good news. Also, I was told my housing paperwork was all in the right hands, more good news. Of course, nothing will be determined until after the holiday.

Many of us, myself included were, well, basically freaking out with our western ways when we noticed out the check out date on our key folder said our stay terminated on the 10th. Well, it was the 8th and I was beginning to wonder if I was going to be sleeping in my rented car, and if the AC would work well in a parking ramp. What I forgot to remind myself was that it was only the 8th. Not the 10th. I still had until the 10th. Why worry on the 8th when I still had two more days? Inshallah. I trust my employers, I know they want us to be happy and they want to make us feel safe, and that they want to take care of us.

On a more interesting note, a few nights ago, a friendly group of us trouped on down the road to a neighboring hotel that hosted a Mexican chain restaurant. Yay! And, to our joy we even found out the restaurant served all you can eat ribs, as in pork ribs. More cause for celebration. Yay! We even found baked potatoes. Yahoo! Life was looking good and our cause for celebration and merriment increased as the evening wore on.

Looking to carry on with pleasant chit chat, I asked my neighbor lady across the table about her hoped for living accommodations. As it turned out she was seeking a spot in the same complex as myself and my friend, Michelle. Now, Michelle and I have formed a loose allegiance to each other. She's my neighbor at the hotel, and we seem to end up as partners in many of our endeavors. We even were assigned living space across the street from each other at our, inshallah, future complex. Way cool.

Thinking we could be neighbors, I further inquired just exactly where in the complex the lady across the table from me might be living? She went on to explain in a very excited voice all about what a wonderful location it was, and how conveniently located close to the entrance it was, and how easy it was to find, and then I asked if she remembered the lot number? Of course she did and she pulled out a piece of paper with a map of the complex and pointed to it. It turns out she was indeed my neighbor. Her lot was exactly the same lot as Michelle's! Oh dear. The friendly tone at the table suddenly took a turn to awkward as Michelle sitting next to me whipped out her iphone and began to feverishly text our realtor.

Many texts and emails later, we still have unresolved ownership and rental agreements, as, you see, many things here "depends" on which realtor is the most savvy, and on whose paperwork is most accurate and on many factors of which we are just totally unaware. And so we wait. We wait for Eid to be over. We wait for businesses to resume work. We wait for teaching assignments. We just wait. We wait for the sun to go down a little bit so we can go to the pool.

The pool has become quite the place. It's the place to gather, to hang out, to catch up on the day's activities and events. We all migrate there around the same time. We shed our outer skins of long sleeves and long skirts, we don our swimsuits and either plunge, or tiptoe, into the cooled water. The pools are actually cooled here as opposed to heated back home.

We wade and stand on tiptoe or tread water, or some more vertically challenged (whom shall remain un-named) clutch children's styrofoam noodles to remain afloat. And our heads bob above water like turtles in a pond. We gather in groups and let the fears and frustrations of the day slough away as we cool off and either listen with empathy or interest. We talk about the day and logistics, we talk about home, we talk about work and families and what brings us here to this place.

Sometimes our floating circle changes as members drift off to hang onto the vertical wall that faces the Arabian Gulf. The wall is like a waterfall. The pool water flows over and down the wall into a channel and swimmers and watchers cling to the wall and sometimes pull themselves up onto the edge, again reminding me of turtles sunning on a warm rock at the edge of a pond.

And so, at times I drift away from the group. I cling to the wall and I watch. I watch the construction going on across the Gulf water upon an island. One of my friends told me about a woman she met at the pool. The woman apparently visits our hotel every year. Just last year, she said, that island that I watch was just desert. Desert with sand and camels on it. Now the island is occupied with many giraffe like cranes. Tall and long and bent cranes lifting large construction things into place. Steel rebar sticks poke into the air like bristols on a hedgehog's back. Concrete walls emerge daily, and glass walls continually climb the sides of buildings . I am amazed at the work that is done across the water from me. It goes on all the time.

In the evening, it seems the place comes to life, or perhaps we just notice it more then. The cranes begin to move in slow arcs. The lights come on and twinkle and shine, and muffled sounds creep across the water towards us. Modernization continues in Abu Dhabi and often I think, I would have liked to see that desert island with camels.