The past 24 hours have been chaotic for a number of reasons. We arrived in Riyadh yesterday evening and met our driver right at the arrivals exit. We spent a few days in Muscat, in Oman, and we then spent a couple of hours in Dubai International Airport, where we shopped around, ate a lot, got some coffee, and even got a quick glimpse of the Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest building from the distance. Instructions have been limited over the past week, the visa information came through very late, so did the flight details and the hotel arrangements. Muscat still remains one of my favourite cities in the Middle East and it felt so good returning after spending a few days there in 2017 where I met some locals and enjoyed a feast or two in the desert.

Our driver, more like a minder, had a paper with all our names on it when we arrived and it took him a while to locate everyone because some of us took longer to pass through emigration. The line stretched all the way back, so much that the emigration officials weren’t even in clear view at the earlier time. It took about an hour and a half to pass through and, at times, it felt like the line didn’t move at all, not even a single inch. We were taken to a hotel in the city, though we were still about a 20-minute drive from the Kingdom Tower, Riyadh’s most famous building, which we eventually passed in our taxi early this morning, though we didn’t manage to get a photo because we were on a strict schedule. I didn’t have any Rial at all when I arrived. We were strictly guided to our designated waiting area at the airport, so we weren’t really able to walk around to find a currency exchange. We’re a group of seven, six men and one female and we are more or less fully familiar with one another now. The hotel receptionist eventually changed currency for us later on last night and the rate was ok. He was forever welcoming and our driver, the same driver that patrolled us with extreme caution, even bought us all a McDonald’s later on in the night which went down well. 

I had a mini walk around Riyadh last night. I managed to locate a pharmacy and topped up on some much needed supplies and continued to walk for about an hour. I avoided the driver/minder. He was VERY pushy and tended to direct us to our designated areas whenever he saw us splitting apart, even if it was only by the tiniest of fractions. I avoided him for about an hour last night and enjoyed my mini walk around the streets of Riyadh for the first time and hopefully not the last. 

We woke up exceptionally early this morning and then took a trip through the desert, all the way to Hafar Al Batin, located about an hour and a half from Kuwait, the North Eastern part of Saudi Arabia. The trip was scenic and fun, but we only stopped off once to get some water and supplies, our driver is on a strict schedule and we also have a female teacher in our group and the Saudi law states that unmarried women aren’t allowed to travel with men, so he was worried all the way here. The normal police, along with the religious police patrol the streets and roads of Saudi Arabia, so it’s a tricky position to be in. We saw a lot of sand dunes and a couple of camels. We experienced a mini sand storm earlier, the cars stopped for a short while, but quickly resumed once the road became more passible and according to our driver, this is fairly normal in Saudi Arabia. 

Hafar Al Batin is a nice city, so far anyway. I had a walk around the main walking street today and located quite a few restaurants, some western and some traditional ones. I couldn’t find a Starbucks, nor could I see one in Riyadh yesterday, but I did manage to find other coffee shops, not as good as Starbucks though. I’m so used to seeing Starbucks everywhere, especially living in Guangzhou in China for so many years, where there seemed to be one on almost every corner. The weather was scorching earlier and we are all still exhausted, especially yesterday’s schedule when we were ferociously busy for most of the day. The supermarkets are well stocked with western products, the supermarkets here resemble Irish supermarkets which is a treat and one that I’m thankful for. I’ve been missing western products for far too long and the prices for dairy products, cheese and butter, are closer to Irish prices here. 

There’s a nice dessert breeze now. Today topped about 48 degrees celsius, now,at night, it’s a lot cooler and relaxing and more manageable to walk around without gasping for air. It definitely seemed hotter last night in Riyadh. I would love to return to Riyadh at some stage this year, or early next year. Jeddah is also on my list. I’ve heard so many positive things about Jeddah recently, especially with the Sharak visa, the new events visa where the Formula 1, WWE and other events have taken place. I’ll definitely have a more accurate plan in place within the next few months. Life will be different here, I’m willing to accept some changes, but I’m excited at the same time, excited that I can finally live in the Middle East at long last, something that had been on my list for years, ever since that earlier trip to Oman in 2017. I don’t have too much information yet about my new school, we have an orientation scheduled for tomorrow afternoon and we will meet our new boss and ask all of the relevant questions.  The day is almost finished, just one more hour of exploration awaits on the other side of the hotel, though I have no idea what’s in that direction. I wouldn’t mind another coffee, or another trip to the pharmacy for some more supplies.