School time!

Well, we're happy to say that we've survived our first two days of teaching! Our work week runs from Sunday to Thursday here and Friday is the Holy day. Both of our classrooms look great - and we'll post some pictures soon to show you where we'll be spending all of our time! Chris' grade 4 class consists of 21 students and Lori's 4 grade 9 science classes all have about 15 students, while her grade 12 class has only 7!!!

Since our school year kicked off at the same time as Ramadan (religious observance in which Muslims don't eat or drink anything from dawn until sunset) our school days have been shortened! So for the month of September we start at 8:45am and finish at 1:45am - we could definitely get used to this! Because most of the population is fasting during the day, we are not allowed to be seen eating or drinking ANYTHING! We can eat our lunches in the staff room...but walking to school with a coffee, or working out at the gym with a water bottle is not allowed! After the sun goes down, Muslims all gather to break their fast together and eat lots of food and spend quality time with their families and friends - this meal is called Iftar. Although we didn't take part in the fasting, we still wanted to have an Iftar of our own with some traditional Middle Eastern foods - such as Saudi Arabian Khala dates, tabouleh, sambousas, hummus and pitas, stuffed grape leaves, rice and muhalabiya for dessert (which tastes like rice pudding!).

Off to plan our lessons - we'll post some pictures again soon! Lots of love back home from the two of us!

Chris and Lori :)