The "morning" is really 4pm.
First, please take note of the awesome sauce that is my icon. *points*
leigh57 made it and it is AMAZING!!!!
So another week bites the dust. Not much has changed, but I did get a chance to go downtown into the actual city that I'm supposedly occupying for the next four months. And the culture here is absolutely amazing. If I were to compare it to a US city, I would say its like Downtown LA or NYC. There are places you probably don't want to be recognized as an American in, but the majority of the city is beautiful. The people are so nice, the food is DELICIOUS, and the shops are perfectly stereotypical.
We started out at a very westernized mall. I swear, the guy who designed it must have visited Vegas for inspiration. It was a Middle Eastern replica of The Venetian, complete with gondola rides through the bottom floor and an amusement park in the far corner. It was huge and housed all the BIG NAME stores you would find at any high end mall or the kind of shops you see on 5th Avenue. I think you needed to have a credit check done before you walk over to the "nicer" stores like Prada and Channel.
After departing that place, we went down to the New Suqs (pronounced "suckes). This place was perfect. All the shops were grouped into districts (the animal district, the clothing district, the spices district). I got 9g of Saffron for like pennies in comparison to what it costs in the states. I'm willing to buy it for anybody that wants/needs it and ship it to you. Might be a weird offer since I don't really "know" any of you in the personal sense, but seriously...it's like pennies on the dollar out here and it's EXCELLENT quality. Of course, there are shops that sell tourist trinkets and I'll probably go back and buy something for the family members who aren't getting real presents. I have learned the art of haggelling and...I definitely need practice. I'm just used to paying what the price tag says, and that's not the way things are run down here. It's...new for me. If you have any tips, I'm more than willing to try them.
Anyway, stuff on base hasn't changed. The circle of life (as described to me buy a veteran deployer): Eat, Sleep, Poop. That is my life in a nutshell.
But how are you guys? How is Christmas Time in the states going? We have a tree lighting ceremony tonight over here. And I thought I wasn't going to get any touch of the holidays. :)
leigh57 made it and it is AMAZING!!!!
So another week bites the dust. Not much has changed, but I did get a chance to go downtown into the actual city that I'm supposedly occupying for the next four months. And the culture here is absolutely amazing. If I were to compare it to a US city, I would say its like Downtown LA or NYC. There are places you probably don't want to be recognized as an American in, but the majority of the city is beautiful. The people are so nice, the food is DELICIOUS, and the shops are perfectly stereotypical.
We started out at a very westernized mall. I swear, the guy who designed it must have visited Vegas for inspiration. It was a Middle Eastern replica of The Venetian, complete with gondola rides through the bottom floor and an amusement park in the far corner. It was huge and housed all the BIG NAME stores you would find at any high end mall or the kind of shops you see on 5th Avenue. I think you needed to have a credit check done before you walk over to the "nicer" stores like Prada and Channel.
After departing that place, we went down to the New Suqs (pronounced "suckes). This place was perfect. All the shops were grouped into districts (the animal district, the clothing district, the spices district). I got 9g of Saffron for like pennies in comparison to what it costs in the states. I'm willing to buy it for anybody that wants/needs it and ship it to you. Might be a weird offer since I don't really "know" any of you in the personal sense, but seriously...it's like pennies on the dollar out here and it's EXCELLENT quality. Of course, there are shops that sell tourist trinkets and I'll probably go back and buy something for the family members who aren't getting real presents. I have learned the art of haggelling and...I definitely need practice. I'm just used to paying what the price tag says, and that's not the way things are run down here. It's...new for me. If you have any tips, I'm more than willing to try them.
Anyway, stuff on base hasn't changed. The circle of life (as described to me buy a veteran deployer): Eat, Sleep, Poop. That is my life in a nutshell.
But how are you guys? How is Christmas Time in the states going? We have a tree lighting ceremony tonight over here. And I thought I wasn't going to get any touch of the holidays. :)