radio silence

The short version of our story since March is we got to edmonton fine after only one minor car repair and 5 days in Denver visiting Michael's brother and his wife. We ended up in Edmonton much longer than we thought we would due to the difficulty of getting basic things like driver licences and other paperwork done, and finally left for the UAE on June 1. Since we got here, we have encountered many delays and frustrations, though the kinds of things we are facing are not unusual to new UAE residents. We still don't have our residence visas, but we are FINALLY going to be able to move out of our hotel and into our apartment tomorrow, which makes us very happy!

One of the reasons I haven't been posting here is becuase my internet time is limited (no home computer yet of course) and Michael and I have been maintaining our joint blog, Inshallah with our experiences here. Since more of our family members and friends have been checking that one, it's taken precedent for updates. So if you'd like a more detailed version of what has happened and is happening in our lives, surf over there.

last day

So, today is my last day at work. Which feels very strange. This is the first time in my life that I have left a job with the prospect of not working for a long time after, and had that be okay instead of a source of stress. Even if and when I find a job in Abu Dhabi, I still won't be working for months. There's so much to do in that time and yet still I feel kind of cast adrift.

I've been trying to figure out how to bring my car into Canada, which has honestly been a huge nightmare. Check out the list of things to do here and tell me if you believe in free trade anymore!

We haven't even really started packing yet--so it's good that I will have a couple of weeks before we leave. On top of the regular work we also have to have an itemized list of everything we move with us to declare at the border, so that will require some extra work as well.

So I'm sometimes excited, sometimes freaking out, sometimes not even believing the whole thing is happening!

Since today is my last day with regular access to a computer, I won't be online to write here or answer email as much anymore. I'll try to check it a few times before we leave at least, but may not have access on the road, and after we leave Edmonton in early May it's going to be a while before we can get our own computer and get it all set up. So I hope you will excuse me if my posts are even more sporadic than usual this next little while. I'll write when I can, I promise!

big news

We got the official word today

MICHAEL GOT THE JOB!!

WE ARE MOVING TO THE UAE!

Needless to say I am excited and anxious and scared and worried and full of anticipation all at the same time. So much to think about...so much to assimilate...so much to learn...so much to do.

I already handed in my resignation letter though. Boy was that fun!

After being in limbo with no word for so long everything seems to be coming up much too fast. I will be leaving work mid March. Then we will drive from Florida back up to Canada at the end of March. Then, hopefully, we will have a decent amount of time to store our things and visit family and friends before departing to Abu Dhabi.

Life feels more than a little surreal right now....

Johari Windows

Johari windows are something I stumbled across recently on a message board. The whole concept sounds kind of intriguing. So, if you'd like to contribute to mine, point yourself here: Darcy's Johari window

turca to hard rock and beyond

Well, Turca Groove went pretty well all told. Sorry I didn't post an update in a more timely fashion! There is a set-by-set description of the night in my Tribe blog if you'd like to read it. There are photos posted in this album as well. I finished my tribal bra--and my tribal-influenced solo!--in time, and we also managed to have our "zill solo" ready. Strange to dance to no music but us... but I think it worked.

A friend videotaped it for us, though so of course I had to endure the indignity of watching it afterwards. Funny how the mistakes that I thought we had covered up were hugely visible, and the ones that I thought were glaringly obvious were hardly noticed! I also saw quite a few...er...areas for improvement in my dancing. It's always hard to watch yourself and see how you really did, as opposed to how you felt things went. So I was a little less happy with the performance after that.

But, the house was packed with our family and friends and everyone who came said they loved it and had a good time, so I'm trying to forget all the glaring ugly flaws and consider it well done.

I also had my first professional dance photo shoot at the Broward Bellydance Meetup's January meeting, which was a lot of fun. I ended up ordering about 8 of them from the proofs, and I'll be getting digital images with them, so I'll post some of them when I can.

Michael has not had any official word from Abu Dhabi yet, but we think he is going to get offered the job. He's had a couple of unofficial email exchanges with some of the people there, and while they are not coming out and saying directly that he was selected, the inference is clear. There are multiple reasons for the delay...all typical of the culture in that area of the world...so we are settling in to "hurry up and wait" on the issue.

I am performing at the Seminole Hard Rock Casino this weekend...with Diana again. Guesting for my teacher Myriam. It will be great to dance to live music again! We are outside, and I'm assuming we'll be there more for "ambiance" than anything else. Doesn't meand I'm not nervous though! I'm working on a new costume that will hopefully do for some cane dancing, which I haven't been able to do for some time. See a sample photo here .

Counting down to Turca Groove

Well, tomorrow night I have my first public bellydance performance in close to a year. My friend Diana and I are performing at a la Turca restaurant for their monthly Turca Groove.

We have three sets planned, each with a duet and two solos. We are going to dance the choreography we learned at the Aziza workshop in November, a karsilama (9/8) we created ourselves to the Turkish standard Rompi Rompi, and a "zill solo" we just finished last week! That one will have no muscial accompaniament....just us on finger cymbals. Which means, of course....no room for error. Diana has showed it (on paper) to to her and Michael's drum teacher, Joe Zeytoonian, and he said he thought it looked good, so hopefully it will be received well. For my solos, I am going to dance to the Hossam Ramzy drum solo I used to use for my gig at the Sawadee (Naima's hip from Sabla Tolo), the first track from Light Rain's Valentine to Eden, and Inanna by the tea party. That last will be my first tribal style dance...I choreographed most of it, but parts of it, and all of the others, will be improvised.

Naturally, things were going pretty smoothly until our rehearsal last night, in which I rediscovered mistakes I thought I had fixed weeks ago, thought up a bunch of new mistakes to add in, and totally lost control of my veil. Argh! Better now than Tuesday I guess.

As for the rest of life....

Michael has been selected for interview at the Petroleum Institute in the United Arab Emirates. He's been posting about it regularly on his blog, so I won't recap too many of the details here, but he has been told informally he's a strong candidate for the position and I think there's a good chance he will get it. Moving there would be quite an experience...sometimes I'm more excited, and sometimes I'm more scared, but either way it would be too interesting an opportunity to pass up. We have been reading up on the area as much as we can, but there is not a lot of UAE-specific info out there as far as travel and etiquette guides go...most focus on places like Saudi Arabia. The UAE is more liberal than a lot of the Middle East...but of course "more liberal" would be a relative term and we're not really sure what to expect. Michael will find out more when he goes, I guess (they're not flying me out with him).

We had a pretty good Christmas and New Years all things considered...about as good as a Christmas in Florida can be. Hung out at home, read our new books, listened to our new CDs, and ate good food mostly.

And that's the highlights of the past couple weeks :)