FYI - This is kind of us...

1. You can curse convincingly in at least five different languages.

2. To everyone’s confusion, your accent changes depending on who you’re talking to.

3. And you often slip foreign slang into your English by mistake, which makes you unintelligible to most people.

4. You’re really good at calculating time differences, because you have to do it every time you call your parents.

5. But you also have your computer programmed to help you out when your math fails.

6. You start getting birthday wishes several hours before your birthday, from your friends farther east than you.

7. Your passport looks like it’s been through hell and back. Or, more likely, your passports*, in the plural.

8. You have a love-hate relationship with the question “Where are you from?” You have both a short and long answer ready, and you pick one depending on who’s asking.

9. You run into your elementary school friends in unlikely countries at unlikely times.

10. You’ve spent an absurd and probably unhealthy amount of time on airplanes.

11. And you definitely know your way around jet-lag recovery.

12. Your list of significant others’ nationalities reads like a soccer World Cup bracket.

13. And your circle of best friends is as politically, racially, and religiously diverse as the United Nations.

14. Which is great, except that you “hang out” more online than in real life.

15. So when you do see your best friends, you lose it a little.

16. You’ve had the most rigorous sensitivity training of all: real life. Always take your shoes off in a Thai household, but never show the soles of your feet to an Arab.

17. You get nervous whenever a form needs you to enter a “permanent address.”

18. You know that McDonald’s tastes drastically different from country to country.

19. You’re a food snob because you’ve sampled the best and most authentic of every possible cuisine.

20. You convert any price to two different currencies before making significant purchases.

21. You don’t call it “home.” You call it “passport country.”

22. You often find yourself singing along to songs in languages you don’t speak or understand.

23. You miss BBM, but Viber and WhatsApp will do for now.

24. You’re the token exotic friend in your non-Third Culture Kid crew.

25. Love it or hate it, you have a strong and well-informed opinion on the I.B. system.

26. The end of the school year was always bittersweet because so many people moved away.

27. And, no matter how many you say, good-byes never get easier.

28. But the constant flow of new friends more than made up for it.

29. Now you feel incredibly lucky to have loved ones and memories scattered all over the globe.

30. You know better than anyone else that “home” isn’t a place, it’s the people in it.

31. And you can’t wait to see where your life adventure takes you next.

Thoughts on Kuwait

For any friends who are reading this and have lived here...here are my random thoughts that I have collected over the last year or so on living in Kuwait.  It is my perspective on how we handle ourselves here and may not be true of you...

Thoughts on Kuwait: 

-I avoid eye contact with men in dish dashas unless they are fathers of friends of our children. Then I don't know what is the correct thing so I just go with American customs and shake their hand, look them in the eye and make conversation. 

-Anytime I see a female friend who is generally not American, we greet each other by pressing our right cheeks together and then our left cheeks together to kiss. I do not do this with American friends. 

-I drive on the highways with speeds in excess of 80mph and feel like I'm crawling at 55mph. 

-We've made more u-turns in these last 4+ years of life overseas than all of our driving years combined previously. 

-There are rarely left turns but there are copious u turns. We do them all the time. 

-We have our fridge STOCKED with beer because there's no where else to go for it. So we often host out of towners at our house.

-Our children have classmates say they are glad an American presidential candidate lost because if he was elected, he would have attacked nearby countries...and having your 5th grader ask you if that is true. 

-Having people brake and put their emergency lights on to signify that they are indeed slowing down...quickly! 

-At the mall in the parking lots there are sensors over each parking spot that have a red signal light to say someone is parked there and it turns green if it is empty so you can look down a long row and know immediately if there are empty spots.

-Wasta (loosely translated "who you know").  It is the stuff of any business transaction here in Kuwait.  It amounts to getting something through favoritism rather than through merit.  

-At the grocery store a guy loads my groceries onto the conveyor belt, packs them into bags and walks the shopping cart out to my car and loads it. For 1/4kd. 

-I never make eye contact w other drivers ever. Or people in cars. It's weird. Because of me trying to avoid eye contact with men.  It also means that I miss many "sights" in Kuwait because I don't take the time to "stop and look around". 

-There are separate sitting areas in waiting rooms at the doctor. One for men and one for women.  When I've had to take Jack to the doctors, I don't know where to sit.  He's too old to sit with the ladies, but too young to be by himself with the men.  We end up sitting some place random.  

- It takes the kids 45 min to get to school in morning.  At 3pm it normally takes me 7 minutes to drive the same route. 

-If Dan leaves at 7:30 for work, he gets there at 8:15. If he leaves at 8, he gets there at 8:15. 

-I do not have to pump my gas because I'm a lady. 

-It costs us 4kd to fill up our Sienna minivan. Approx $14.64USD. 

Last Day Off in Kuwait

Dan had a day to take off, so he took off this past Sunday!  We went to the pool in the morning and then wanted to do something fun in the afternoon.  We talked about Kidzania, which is supposed to be amazing, but decided against it...and instead decided to go to Infunity at 360 Mall.  We got there at 3pm even knowing it was still Ramadan - and not surprising, it didn't open until 7pm.  We went back home then came back at 7pm.  We had the place to ourselves, because 7pm is Iftar (when Muslims break their fast for the day) is taken.  Everyone else was home having a meal and celebration with their family so it was pretty quiet :)  

 Arrival at Infunity - super excited for it!  It has arcade games and some indoor amusement park rides...a roller coaster, go karts, etc.

 Our family!

 Jack and Dan getting ready to start the roller coaster!

I told the kids that if we went, we all had to go on the roller coaster - no fussing.  

Jack looked like he was going to be sick as we watched them go through...

 And the girls before I got in the car next to Kylie :)  

Kylie SCREAMED (not in a good fun way, but in a terrified blood curling screaming way) the whole time.  Megan looked like she was going to puke.  Seriously.  They did not like it one bit.  But they went on it. Dan has pics of us on his phone that I will have to post here shortly...they are funny, I'm sure.

 We all enjoyed playing games and trying to win tickets...Kylie wanted to ride on this horse :)

 Jack wanted to do the rock wall!

Getting his shoes on.

 Starting the climb.  He was so quick and made it look so easy!

 He got to the top in no time at all - it looked like he was climbing a ladder, then made it down.

 When he reached the bottom, the guy said he could go again...on a harder one. He finished that quickly and then went on a harder one.  That was a bit tougher, but he was super fast with all of them and had a great time!

 Then Dan, Megan, Jack and Kylie did bumper cars :)  We all went on go karts earlier (with Kylie riding with me) but I didn't get any pics.

 Megan

 Jack

 Dan and Jack

 All four of them!

 Getting gently (seriously, she would coast up to the kids or Dan and just lightly tap them) bumped by Kylie

 Then they went on the carousel!

Jack

 Kylie and Megan

 We got a family pic on the way out...before getting dinner...

 ...and Marble Slab milkshakes!  Dan got Birthday Cake, Megan got Red Velvet and Jack, Kylie and I got chocolate!  

And to top it all off...found Ramadan donuts from Dunkin Donuts!  In the shapes of Stars and Crescents...because you fast during the day of Ramadan and celebrate at night!

Last Date Night in Kuwait

 Dan and I got to sneak in one last date night in Kuwait!  Cinha came to watch the kids and we headed out to my favorite date night place - Stonegrill!  

We had a great night eating yummy steak, veggies and a baked potato...talking and enjoying our time out...then headed to the beach to sit and chat while Dan smoked a cigar!

Last Few Days

 These two girls came and swam with us one day...and then we got ice cream cones afterwards :)

 Dan has lead worship by himself the last few weeks (and we've loved it)!

 Fun cute pastel colors on my toes

 We shipped our van so we got to drive around in Dan's GMC Jimmy lately!  

 All three kids in the backseat

 The beach near our house has gotten new lamplights...they are so beautiful and look like they will make this beach a "promonade" instead of an afterthought from the 1970's!

And the girls asleep in the car :)

Another Birthday Party

 

 We celebrated this 3 year old's birthday this weekend, too!  

She had a Pink and Purple Carousel Party :)

 She got to open presents

 Megan and Kylie in their Pink and Purple outfits

 Mommy and Kylie

 Jack and Daddy

 Me, Amber, the Birthday Girl and Vicki

 Megan and Daddy

 Cutie

 Me and Amber

 And the Kiddos

Jack, Megan, Elliot, Kylie and Myriah

Friend's Birthday Party

 We went to a friend's birthday party last weekend - all 3 kids were invited and had a blast!  The kids have become good friends with 2 girls the last couple of months and it's a bummer that we're moving.  They are 2 nice girls.

The above picture is of these crazy party poppers everyone shot off after singing Happy Birthday to the Birthday Girl!  So fun!

 Yummy amazing cake

 Megan

 Jack

 Kiddos enjoying themselves

 Having fun

 The girls all ganged up on Jack and had him cornered, hitting him with inflatable guitars.  I'm not sure that he really minded...but one of the dad's jumped in and helped him and started beating the girls back..and the other two dad's there joined in to make it an even effort!  Dan was at work, so I really appreciated the solidarity of the dad's joining in with Jack...since he was the only boy at the party! :)

It was too cute!

 All the cute kids!

 Jack's fun take home prizes

 Ashley and Mikayla

Kylie, Caleb and Ashley