And So the Day Begins

Take 4 Bahrainis, 5 Americans, and a Indian bus driver, mix them together and add 18 hours...what do you get? A very interesting road trip. We woke at 4am to get ready for our 7am flight to the UAE (United Arab Emirates). Arriving at the airport we were all still barely awake. It was a 1 hour flight to Dubai. We got there and everything went very smoothly...passport control, customs, ... soon we are out of the airport and into the Dubai heat. Met by one of our friends we loaded the bus (all the males) and the car (all the females) that we would be driving and headed to Salalah, Oman. And so the day begins...

Before I go any further let me set the scene of our little drama we are traveling to Salalah in the very south of Oman, almost to the boarder of Yemen. And let me introduce the players. First we have my supervisor Keith and his family(wife Carrie, Jared 9,and Megan 12). Next there is 2 Bahraini shabab (that is Arabic for young men in there twenties, not married) and a Bahraini man with his son (also 9). There was of course the Indian bus driver. And finally, the main character in our story, Me.

It only took about an hour to get to the Omani boared. Again it went smooth...passport control, customs and off we go. The first few hours Carrie and I entertained ourselves singing, trying to figure out the words to Bennie and the Jets, and watching camels take joy rides in Toyotas. [By the way on a side note, the camel got really upset that we were taking pictures and tried to stand up. Which is never a good idea when riding in the back of a Toyota.]

About hour 3 we noticed that we were passing a lot of mosques, so started counting them with a reward of cookies when we got to 100. (Didn't take that long.) About hour 4 Carrie and I looked at the map and decided that we were going the wrong way, but.... we were not leading this little trip and the one who was said that we going the right way and not to worry. [at this point in the drama you would hear the Omanis music letting you know that something wasn't right, dun dun dunaaa]

When we got to Muscat (to the east coast of Oman) the driver in the lead finally admitted that maybe we didn't go the best way. So we finally started on the long trek south. There is a fact that not everyone knows about Oman, it is a desert. We continued with our fun...singing, 21 questions, going on a picnic, any other car game we could think of. About hour 15 we were stopping at another gas station to fill up for the remainder of our trip. We girls ventured into yet another Arab style (squatty) gas station bathroom and decided that we could wait. (To be quit honest with you by this point my bowls were on strike and refused to use any restroom. But maybe that is to much information.) Upon returning to the car we discovered that the station was out of gas and we were going to have to try and make it another 100km to the next station. I wasn't worried at all, but there was more then a few courses of give my gas in my ford keep me truckin for the Lord sung. Needless to say with much prayer and no air conditioning to save gas, we made it and praised the Lord.

I bet you are wondering when this little drama ends. Well, 18 hours later we arrived in Salalah and were met my the wonderful men who would lead us to our home for the next week. We got to the houses at 4:30am and got ready to sleep. And so the day begins...