Here in Iran: Day 1

So, while we’ve spent the past few days adjusting to the time difference there are a few things to recount.

Yesterday, Leila, Leila’s mother, and I were walking on the sidewalk, running errands, when this little boy ran out of nowhere holding a small book with a blue cover up to me.  He was trying to get me to buy it, but I didn’t want it.  He was very persistant, shoving it in my face again and again, jumping in my way as I tried to go around him, and finally stuffing it into my pant pocket.  This whole time I was trying to say, “no thank you,” but he wouldn’t take no for an answer – it must have been my bad accent.  After he put it in my pocket, I took it out and tried to give it back, but he wouldn’t take it.  I was not going to lose this game so I bent over and tossed it onto the ground in front of him, turned, and walked away.  As I looked back, the boy had a very angry look on his face.  This was when Leila’s mom told me that the book was actually a Koran!  There you have it.  My first day on the streets and I desecrated the Koran by throwing it onto the dirty ground.  I must be an American.

More to come soon!

~N

Ski Dubai

Neibaur and I have managed to take full advantage of our 10-hour layover in Dubai by hitting the slopes and the beach…

There have been no major culture shock moments in Dubai. Economic shocks however are aplenty as we concluded that Dubai = construction zone. There was one point during our drive back to the airport when we tried to count all the cranes we could see in just that one area.  We stopped at 50.

Some highlights during our quick jaunt: hotel al burj, mina a salam, a glimpse of one of the three “islands“–disclosure: not as spectacular when viewed at ground-level, and a pseudo-bazaar named Souk Madinat, aside, of course, from the Mall of the Emirates where the ski slopes were located.

We are now sitting (one of us tried as he might to stay awake in order to preempt jet lag but alas seems to be past the REM stage) in the Marhaba Lounge which Emirates kindly offers its guests with really long lay overs.

Boarding for our flight begins in 44 minutes.  We are due to land in Tehran at 9:15 Sunday evening, 11:45 Sunday morning Eastern time.  Click, click, snap, snap.

Shoes for refugees

As you probably know, we’re going to Iran for the next month to visit family. One of the things that L has done in the past is take shoes to give to the Afghan refugees which make up a large portion of the menial labor force in the country and usually have only tattered shoes to do their hard labor type jobs. This trip we’ve decided to do the same thing, and the response has been larger than we anticipated. We got more than enough contributions to fit our meager 2 extra pieces of luggage that we are going to fit the shoes in. Maybe one day we’ll be able to take more than 2 suitcases full of shoes. Thanks to all those who donated!

Graduations

This past week has been full of graduation fun.  Here are two videos of the important moments

 

Leila’s new obsess-, er, procrastination

Neibaur is…

my confidant, top friend, kisser, challenger, pal, pillow, advocate, love, fashion consultant, soulmate, humor-honer, vitamin-reminder, voice of reason, beau ideal, safe driver, protector, Freudian slip*, serenader, handyman, bff, critical thinker, idea tester, teammate, complimenter, moral compass, soother, shining star, my number one fan.

*Neibaur thinks this is not the best description since it sounds as if he is someone I am trying to hide but comes out accidentally; I think that it means that my subconscious led me to him, that there was no other person that would be the perfect match in every way for every conceivable reason, as determined since birth.

Life In Transition

All lives are in transition. And the looming question, “What’s next?” haunts us at every step. While an undergrad, all I could think of was getting a 9 to 5 job that was somewhat related to finance. It sucked and I learnt that I did not want to manage people’s money or work towards becoming a CFA. I wanted to do something deeply meaningful. So I applied to join Teach For America. While teaching, I realized that I missed the lifestyle of a student, so I applied to graduate school.

Now that we are both almost done with school, the question looms: what’s next?