Orientation Day 1

It is 4 am on the dot and my body feels like to has slept for 12 hours when in reality….it was 5. There wasn’t much I could do about it except make the most of it. I read my book and checked emails. Then at around 5:30 I heard a noise outside my window. I open it up and step out onto my balcony – oh by the way…i have a balcony on my third floor room. jealous? – In the distance I hear the call for prayer from a local mosque that was close by to the hotel – after asking around I discovered that it is called “Adhan”. Ya’ll should definitely take the time to listen to it; it has this sort of haunting beauty to it. After a short while it was over and I went back inside to get ready for my first day of orientation but not before I noticed pigeons flying around the hotel. This made sound ridiculous, but I thought the Middle East was exempt from the presence of those pesky birds. It was actually kind of comforting to see something that I am so used to seeing in America. Those silly, rather insignificant bids make the Middle East not so scary and different as I thought. Also a took a picture of the view from my window….

At around 7:45 am I make my way down to the lobby to see where the bus is that will shuttle all us trainees to the training center. Thankfully, I bummed into an American man and fellow trainee who had already scoped it out and pointed the bus out to me. On the bus I had the chance to talk to the American and also met a man from England. With each minute talking to them, my anxiety that had been sitting in the pit of my stomach slowly began to ease. I mean of course I was going to make friends. I don’t know why I thought it would be different in this situation. I just needed evidence and essentially be reminded of that fact. Because once that happened, I had no qualms meeting other people and connecting with them. At the end of the day I had met about a fifth of the class – there are about 60 of us new trainees.
The classes were nothing too special. Much of it was common sense or something I had learned through my internship a year before. That being said it was just so nice to finally start using my brain again. Over the summer I didn’t really use that many brain cells while I was relaxing.
After class, I hung out with 2 out of the 6 other girls that are in the class while waiting for the bus to take us back to the hotel. One is from France and the other from Saudi Arabia. In just a short while, I learned so much about both their areas and its cultures; it was really quite fun. We took a break from our conversation though to watch the sunset over the horizon. It was so beautiful. I had never seen anything like it. The sun had this blood red orange color to it and you could actually look directly at it without your eyes hurting. It was like something I had seen in a dozen movies that were set in the Middle East. It is one thing to see it in a movie and quite another to see it in real life. Unfortunately I completely goofed and didn’t take a photo….so be patient with me; I should get another opportunity soon.
I finally finished my long first day with a nice dinner in the company of other trainees and with some fun Skype conversations with my parents and boyfriend.