Breaking my arm instead of growing old gracefully!!!!!

Not quite sure how I managed to forget this!!!

I've always been quite active person and played football regularly until I was about 35 but it got to the stage when waking up the morning after football with sore Achilles Tendons meant I couldn't play golf and every niggling injury would take 2 weeks to heal rather than 2 days so I decided to hang up my boots and start cycling.  When I got to back to Saudi their was an inter-company football tournament being organised so stupidly I volunteered!!!

We had a couple of training sessions which went well then on the 3rd one I strained my Quad muscle in my right leg, that should have set the warning bells ringing.  2 weeks later my niggling injury had healed however I'd missed the 1st game of the competition, which my team lost however I was in goal for the second game which went we won 2-0.  We followed up that with a 1-0 victory in appaling weather conditions, I honestly have never seen rain come down as hard, this meant we were well placed to qualify for the knockout stages of the competition.

The remaining match which we had to win to qualify was played on Tuesday 2nd December, I think the score was either 0-0 or 1-1 with about 10 minutes to play when a lose ball was heading towards me in the box so I ran out to collect the ball.  As I slid across the floor and put my hands of the ball the defender and attacker had a tangle of legs and subsequently one of their knees went into the back of my elbow completely dislocating the joint.  As described by one of my teammates I sounded like a wounded camel lying on the floor and at 1st they thought I was play acting as the other team seemed to be auditioning for a parts in a remake of Platoon, going down like they'd been shot every anyone got close to them.

Anyway, I laid on the floor for what seemed like an eternity waiting for an ambulance to cart me off to hospital with my arm bent the wrong.  2 nights in hospital, lots of drugs and x-rays and my elbow was finally put back into the right place under general anesthetic.  I remeber going for 1 x-ray and the nurse took an x-ray of 1 side of my arm and then told me to turn my arm over so they could get another angle, well I rotated my upper arm as instructed but my lower arm and hand didn't move!!!!!  that wasn't very pleasant so as i turned my upper arm one of my colleagues had to rotate my hand at the same time.

The match was abandoned that night however my team won the replay 5-0.  We got all the way to the final to be narrowly beaten 4-3 where I was presented with an award for the best injury of the competition.

Yes, that really is my arm!!!

8 weeks of my arm in a cast then led to some physio sessions 3 times a week to regain the movement however I couldn't straighten my arm without being in pain and a lump had developed on my forearm so off I went for another scan which resulted in surgery to remove said lump and shave the end of my bone off as that was causing the pain. a further 4 weeks bandaged up and more physio.

Thankfully I've regained all of the movement in my arm but there's still some work to do to rebuild the muscle but what I must say is that the treatment and speed of getting anything I needed done In Saudi was far better than anything the NHS could offer.  

Nearly 1 Year on, it's definitely had it's up sand downs!!

Well, it's been 18 months since i left the UK and nearly a year since the family joined me, it's also been 9 months since I updated my Blog so I suppose now is as a good a time as any. 

It is with a very different outlook on life that I write now, when I took this job it was trepidation and fear about uprooting and moving to the Middle East.  Now, if you can settle in Saudi Arabia, you could settle just about anywhere in the world.  There are things that still drive me mad, the driving in particular, and as we now have a car it's more evident.  My driving has become better and worse for living here, better in that I am far more aware of what is going around me, but worse because if you don't adopt some of the aggression used here you wouldn't get anywhere.  1 of the other things that gets to me is how bloody ignorant and filthy some of the people in Jubail are, most of the people here are from Asia (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka etc) and in great numbers (there are nearly as many expats in Saudi as there are Saudi nationals).  I don't know whether it's because of the way they were brought up or an attitude they adopt here but Old Jubail town is scruffy at best and like a waste disposal site at worst, why can't people just put stuff in the bin rather than throwing it on the ground and why do a lot them spit all the time, it's disgusting, do it in the bathroom not in public.  In typical British fashion I used stand in what looked like the queue when in shops but I quickly realised that queuing doesn't exist, if you just barge your way through and shout the loudest you get served 1st, it really is dog eat dog!!! 
The 2 stand out situations that have angered me the most involved Tilly while we were in a waiting room at the hospital and shopping in a local supermarket.  Girls don't have to wear an Abaya (the black dress) until they start to reach development age and Tilly is only 9 but she is quite tall and could pass for a 12 year old if you didn't know her.  I said when we arrived that I wouldn't force her to wear an Abaya until she had to as childhood is all too short and precious, however, on both occasions Tilly was wearing a dress with short sleeves that covered her knees.  The number of grown men who were staring at her and pointing her out to others so they could stare made my blood boil, I felt like grabbing each one of those men and punching them till they couldn't breathe, and that is totally against my nature.  It sickened me.  Needless to say Tilly never leaves the compound now without her Abaya on although she's got some Abayas that are hand made with nice coloured stitching and patterns n so she quite likes them.  If you plan to move to Saudi with a daughter around this age be prepared. 

I think I did Bahrain a disservice in my earlier Blogs as i wasn't very complimentary about the place but I've been several times now both with and without the family and there are some excellent places to go.  The Water Park, cinema, beach etc, in particular the Bahrain City Mall if you fancy a bit retail therapy, it's got everything and unlike Saudi it doesn't grind to a halt every couple of hours for Prayer.  You still get the call to Prayer in Bahrain but life just goes on, one of the nicer things about Bahrain is being able to go and do what you want, when you want rather than looking at your watch and planning your life around Prayer Time.  We've found a couple of restaurants\bars (Meat Company, Bennigans, Hard Rock Cafe) that welcome children during the day and it's a well deserved break when life in Saudi gets to you.  I would say the biggest negative about Bahrain is the causeway to get there, it can take 4-5 hours someday to drive the 40 kilometers across it.

Living on a compound was something new to us and there are definite negatives and positives.  We've met some really good people here and and from all nationalities that under different circumstances you wouldn't really have that much to do with, Linds has had some cooking lessons from Indian and Pakistani ladies which is a real bonus and Tilly loves the freedom she's got to play with her friends.  Like with any neighbourhood anywhere in the world you will get people you do and don't get on with which is just how life is.  What I don't understand about human beings (adults especially) is why some people just cannot make the most of the situation they're in and try to get on!!!!
Living on a compound is probably the hardest thing to get used to and Jubail Views just turned into a bit of a nightmare for us.  We got the opportunity to move to another compound in March that is more established, has more green space, better facilities and is twice the size so we jumped at the chance.  Our original plan of 8-10 years in Saudi was perhaps a bit ambitious, while we were in Jubail Views it was 'how quickly can we get out of this place'.  Now we can see ourselves here for the next few years, at least until Tilly goes into High School then we'll make a decision.  We'll probably stay in the Middle East for longer but doubtful it'll be in Saudi 

Something that was really easy to get used to up until April is the climate, 20c and sunny has been the daily forecast for most of the Winter.  March and into April it was in the 30's every day.  Having barbecues in February was quite strange and I remember being sat outside my neighbours complaining it was a bit chilly, we were both sat outside in February wearing shorts and flipflops so it can't have been that cold!!  It seemed like overnight that the temperature shot up into the 40's every day and although you do get used to it it's still quite oppressive at times.  
We've been out sand bashing in the desert a few times in our car and with some of the others here, it's great fun and very accessible, you literally drive along the motorway until you see a bit of desert that looks ok and off you go.  Life, generally is Ok, supermarkets are in abundance and well stocked with plenty imported stuff if the local produce doesn't measure up, restaurants and plentiful and if you look hard enough you can get anything you need in Jubail. 

We've made a conscious decision not to travel back to the UK this year for a couple of reasons.
1, Tilly is sick of flying, I wish I'd have had the opportunity to be sick of flying when I was 9 years old!!
2, I really need a holiday!! In the past 18 months I've covered close to 80,000 air miles and spent nearly 8 full days in airports and on planes and, we haven't had a family holiday for nearly 2 years so we're currently in Cyprus (only 3 hours direct Bahrain) for a few weeks to do nothing.   

Overall this has been a positive experience and knowing what I do now I'd still probably do it.  Yes, there are sacrifices that have been made, Lindsey can't drive, I can't play golf or cycle because of the heat but at the moment life is good and we are securing ours and Tillys future so we're just going to soldier on.