So the first few days have passed largely without incident...either due to our own lack of activity and overcoming jet lag and the time change, or perhaps due to the inherent lack of pace at which life moves here. The flight over was nice – Austrian airlines was excellent and they almost bumped us to business class. We were warned not to expect to have our luggage make it at the same time we did, and sure enough it didn’t. This may have frustrated us, but the customs guys were overjoyed at not having to look through anything..instead they went for a coffee.
We left the airport with Masa’s uncle Emir (yes, this is the “Happy Ending” uncle), and his business partner, who were nice enough to provide BMW transport from the airport to a huge party celebrating the end of Ramadan and the beginning of Eid. Hours and hours of wine and beer and food, some dancing and singing – it was quite a welcome.
The next morning our luggage was delivered to our apartment, as expected, and was even early. The guy who dropped it off apologized for coming early and waking us up, saying “I did not mean to be early but this other guy keeps calling me ‘where’s my luggage? Where’s my luggage?’ Stupid guy. So I had to come early, but now that you have your bags…and no I won’t carry them up the stairs for you…I think I’ll go for a coffee.”
Welcome to
We’ve begun to do our best to get settled, both in the apartment and in terms of getting registered with the police and for me with the University. Seems you need to have “official” (i.e., certified = pay a fee to have someone sign a photocopy) copies of your passport in order to get anything from a 3 month visa, to a cell phone, to a bank account, or anything else. The last two days we have run around from the police station to the bank to the phone office to the post office, back to the police station, the university – and oh, by the way no one is working for Eid. Come back tomorrow. Has been a wonderful way to learn my way around some though! And the staff at the university has been very helpful with everything.
Tomorrow we will go to the Canadian Embassy and register there. Apparently they can also certify the thirteen copies of my passport that I now have….We’ve also found a gym nearby, “Gym ATLANTIS!” Hopefully we’ll check it out and see if we can join up.
We spent some time in the old town today – I think that if we want to fit in we may have to adjust our sense of fashion somewhat. I for one am clearly not flashy enough in terms of my style. My hair is a bit conservative, and I need really really big sunglasses. And some gold. OK and maybe a tan, even if it’s fake. It is still over 20 degrees outside here both yesterday and today. You could almost wear shorts it is so hot.
Masa was the subject of quite a few “look downs” from some women today. I don’t think they thought she was wearing enough makeup, and her clothes were altogether too pedestrian, as in she did not have knee-high boots and a miniskirt on…..
We watched some evening television last night – was fun for me to find English tv, and even to find Lost and Desperate Housewives, although other than that there has been little N. American tv. CNN is in English, and Euronews is simply excellent. But there is a complete dirth of “reality tv”, which is wonderful. The reality tv that they do have consists of political debates and analysis amongst community experts that are both well-known and well-informed. Some family friends that had us over for dessert last night were watching a debate about
Overall the first few days have been fun, confusing, exciting, and very interesting. Many of the students from my program have emailed and we’ll likely get together this weekend in advance of school starting next week.
