After 6 days of silence, here I am :)

Hi... It's been almost one week since I last posted a message on the blog. It's true that I've been very busy in the last period. I started working at the center last Wednesday and tried to find some basis for my project. As I wrote in the last messages, I need to find a "direction" for the Franco-Saudi Center and to think of a new way of communicating outside. To rely on a "self-made" reputation is definitely not enough. What is required is to give a new, fresh skin to our image. And it's not easy at all, you can believe me. I admit that sometimes, I've been too lazy to face the problems directly : I did face them, but I took my time to do that, postponing always postponing the tasks to the next day, until the deadline. Now I have to reconsider my way of regarding things. Efficient reactivity is needed, and once again, I have to admit that I am not that good for this. I'm not used to making decisions that are both "fast" and reasonable. When I hurry up to make a decision, it's sometimes very imperfect, and when it's reasonable, it means that it needed time. Now, I have to make those two qualities match : that's my personal purpose.
For example, let's talk about courses for Women. As you might guess, in Saudi Arabia it's not possible to have men and women in the same class. If it was the only "problem", still it would be ok... but I was told that it's not even possible for men and women to be in the center at the same time. I thought about having Men courses in one room, and Women courses in another room, independently. Unfortunately, this is not something we are allowed to do here. This would have been more practical, but it doesn't fit with Saudian traditions and moral rules. It would be very risky for me to show any sign of anger about this. It would cost much... I would lose my job, if not worse.. Today women called me to discuss this. Actually, for the reasons I've just given, they have to go somewhere else to attend the lectures. And this 'somewhere' is inside a compound (A secured residence), whose director lends us a classroom for free...provided that the French-Saudi center is in charge of the cleaning. It had been 3 months since the last teaching session, which means that the room hadn't been cleaned since then. One student woman called me to complain, because the place was dirty and too small to welcome 10 students. As I was new, as I didn't know about this before, how could I react? Actually I felt ashamed. I was ashamed, because if it had happened to me, I would have called the director to complain and I wouldn't have been very nice on the phone, thinking that I would be "right" to do this. When you pay for a service, particularly language lectures, the minimum is that you attend them in acceptable conditions. Dust, Dirt is not what I call an acceptable condition for studying. She was right to complain, and I didn't have the good role. I understood that the responsibility of a captain (it's not very humble of me to use such a metaphor...) is not just to lead his ship towards the direction he wishes. Sometimes, there are contrary streams, storms. He can do nothing about it, but try to find solutions to keep it over the surface. That is my role : to react rapidly and efficiently. Today, I hired a cleaner to tidy up the woman classroom. Otherwise, I would prefer to give their money back, rather than provide them a service in such conditions. The center needs a new image : image is strengthened by credibility, and if you provide a service in bad conditions, you're going backwards. I don't want to harm our image. Men and women attend the class separately, all right : but in the same conditions, that's my word.
The positive aspect is that despite the world cup (that explains some kind of absenteism), registrations for the classes are going quite well, particularly registrations for women. We are going to hire a new teacher (not to replace the previous one) because the classroom is too small to welcome more than 10 people... And we have 14 registrations. Today I received a c.V. and a letter of motivation from a french-speaking woman from Canada. She speaks Arabic, English and according to the secretary, has a very good level in French : besides, she has already taught this language and already knows our teaching method. (Méthode Panorama 1 and 2). The funny thing is that she doesn't have any literary carrier, she's rather a scientist (She has a PhD in physics). What matters is that she speaks well and teaches well. I will receive her soon at the office, probably next week. That is another part of my job, to be responsible of human resources. The center is not that big but still, if people keep on talking about the center to their relatives, we should gain some importance and consider hiring new teachers. I like this "coordinating" aspect.

About the courses I've been teaching, today was my third day. On Saturday, I started teaching 2 different levels : from 5.30 to 7.30, I have a class of beginners who are already able to introduce themselves correctly, with a good pronounciation, after 6 hours. I'm happy about it : they are very interested in their learning process, and always talk with me after the session, around a cup of coffee or tea. Then, from 7.40 to 9.40, I have a group of good speakers. I don't need to use english for the teaching, I just speak French and they understand quite correctly. However, I still need to speak slowly. Their level is "6", which corresponds to the studying of the Unit number 6 of the method that counts 12 units all in all. Their level is very good, I would say, considering that they reached the middle of the "learning process". Of course, it doesn't mean that when they pass level 12, they have the same level as native speakers, not at all. Still, they can do many things with their knowledge and competences... to ntroduce themselves, talk about many topics, construct a skilled argumentation, or even apply for a job. I didn't imagine that teaching your native language to people could be such a satisfactory experience, when you realize that they do well and that they constantly want to improve themselves. So far, I have spent 6 hours with each group, so 12 hours all in all... there are 48 hours of teaching left before I reach the minimum amount of hours for the Master thesis. I have to make a paper about this experience... Something like 20 pages. I think that it's ok : I already know what I'm going to write in this mini-thesis. I won't have to invent anything, if you know what I mean... I just have to open wide my ears and my eyes to find something interesting to write about my first official teaching experience. I didn't want to have an internship in FR, although it can be very useful for foreign people who arrive in France to know some words. I would certainly have enjoyed to committ my internship into a social and human action, but I prefer travelling. To teach French is a good pretext for travelling, and for the moment I really don't regret the choice I made. Another aspect of my mission is to go to the companies' headquarters and propose them the services of the French-Saudi center. However, it requires that I have a car, and before having a car I need to convert my FR driving licence into a Saudian one, and this process requires that I get my residence permit.... The problem is that my passport is in Paris now (again...) at the Ministry. It will come back soon, I hope so.

I'm having my last 2 days at Eric's place, the teacher of Greek and Latin at the French school, I think I won't forget the way he has welcomed me here in Saudi. He completely shared his big house with me, shared his food (delicious diet meals from Carlton hotel ;) ) and his good mood. Today I made a present for him, a pair of jeans from his favourite brand (Replay) and he looked very happy. At the moment, I'm proud of myself in the sense that the presents that I made did provoke the effect I was silently hoping for, which is pleasure... and it makes me even happier afterwards. I'm hesitating about asking Eric if he would like to rent me the same room from September on... On the one hand, this place is very pleasant to live in, but on the other hand, I don't want anything bad to happen if we become room-mates, I experienced this in DK.. I want to keep on getting along with him, meeting him some time and go to Bahrain with him, as he promised me.

As soon as possible, i'll write about my new life downtown. It's going to be very different from life in the compound... but it's another interesting step to take.

See you soon and take care..

Errrr... I don't know which title to put on my message!!!

Well, after "hello", "heyhey", I think I will have used all the different manners of greeting you on this blog. I receive some comments about it sometimes, and I'm very glad about it. I know who they come from, it's better to have few messages from people you like than tons of posts from people you don't know. So, thank you very much for giving me reasons to continue... Today was a calm day, on the whole. My chief picked me up at the compound and drove me to the FR center, where I spent the whole morning. During this time, he went to the travel company to buy his ticket to go back to Riyadh. Today, French pupils who live abroad had their first exam at high school, and began with philosophy. His son is among those pupils, so it was normal that he goes back to Riyadh and encourage him. We spent 3 very interesting days, my chief and I, he gave me some instructions about how to run the center, about the objectives in terms of communication, partnerships with companies, advertisments in newspapers... There are a lot of things to do, above the mere act of "teaching" and this dimension gives a very interesting dimension to my job. I am free about taking initiatives, contacting companies, schools, educational institutions in FR.. This center will become what I want it to be, so on the one hand it raises a lot of excitment, and on the other, it supposes to develope a high sense of responsibility. It will help me to become more mature... I don't want to fail it. The responsible of Cultural office, in the FR embassy of Saudi Arabia, had been hesitating for a long time between closing the center and leaving him a last chance to survive. I think I want to take this chance and make this Center not only a language school, but a cultural center, a kind of tool for local schools and companies whose purposes are to cooperate with FR institutions. The demand for FR lectures is high, according to the phonecalls I receive, as far from the side of man as from the side of women. Saudi express a real motivation and interest for FR language and, furtherly, for higher education : it would be a shame to waste this demand... What do you think about this?
I'm very glad to talk with local people on the phone and to invite them at the office for a tea or coffee, it's the occasion to have a nice conversation about their expectations, linguistically speaking, and also culturally, by the way. In general, they are shy, they say 2 or 3 FR words, expressions in a sentence, to show you that they are interested in what you do, and that they would like to learn more. I spend nice moments at my office, sending some faxes to France, to Saudian companies to let them know about my new project. People are coming and going, I already have the impression that it's living, at least a little bit. What I would like, it is to leave a good and sincere impression to the visitors, so that they can talk around them. I would like to set a system of sponsorship, so that people thanks to whom new people come to register would be rewarded, I don't know yet the way I would do that, but not necessarily by doing a commercial special offer : rather by thinking about an intelligent way to catch their interest.. I keep this topic "under my elbow" ;) The main objective, of course, is to have as much people as possible in the courses.. But I don't want to favour the commercial aspect, i'm not interested in that. I want people to feel good by coming to the Center, both feeling at home and abroad. As the region is known for its very high production of Oil, it would be good to create some partnerships between the companies and the French Institute of Oil, for example, that proposes some very high education in this area... Everything is possible!

For the moment, I'm feeling good where I am. I visited the owners of the neighbour shops, as my office is inside a mall, and had some cool conversation with them. There are different types of shops, which is interesting : offices of educational information, restaurants, clothes shops, candy shops... They all greeted me very kindly. I admit that the position of the "white foreigner" makes me feel uneasy, although I can't get rid of it I need to show that I'm here to work "with" them, and not only "next to" them. Integration is important to me, even though I am quite realist about it, I don't have utopical expectations. At least, I have to try! The secretary who works in the office is really kind, he's going to help me to find a car. Today, I told him that I needed to leave the office because I was a bit hungry, he proposed me to call Mc Donald's... and finally went there for me, although I felt embarrassed. I don't want to command anyone, hierarchy is not something that will cross the door of "my" center.
At night, i'm living in the compound, where there are some important (quantitatively speaking) communities of people from France and Lebanon. The day before yesterday, we played Scrabble altogether and I was amazed by the deep knowledge of FR language that people from Lebanon have. To get back to my temporary living place, i'm very happy and quite sad at the same time. Eric, the Latin&greek professor who invites me, is really welcoming and helpful. I enjoy talking with him about anything, jobs, conditions of living abroad, our respective lives in FR. The sad thing is that soon, I will have to find a place to live in outside the compound.. not that I am afraid, it's true that the idea of living downtown is exciting, but still, the Fr community is nice here and I will miss the compound, for sure. I'm still thinking about a present for Eric.Tomorrow in the morning, I'll visit the French school, which has been proposed to me several times so far. This place is also a potential partner in the activity of the FR center : its director looks interested in the running of the center, we will probably soon talk about settling the female lectures inside the FR school. I'll also contact the teacher for women, we need to work together on the way we will communicate. My boss told me that she just "teaches", I think we'll reconsider her status and give her some little more tasks in terms of communication about the center.

Wow.. I thought I wouldn't have that many things to tell today, it seems that this post is longer than the previous ones. I can't promise that I will write so much everyday, but I'll do my best to update the blog as much as possible. Now i'm thinking of a picture to publish with this message. Oh, and one more thing, I admit that it's not easy to publish pictures, but anyway I managed to find a solution.. not the easiest one. Now, you can have a look at this URL, if you want to see some pictures : http://martiello.free.fr/web/index.htm I will also put this link as a permanent one, on the blog, above Google News. Try to look at them sometimes, if you wish !
Have a good night, feel free to leave messages and questions...

Hey Hey.....

I'm going to give the news for the 3 last days, for those I couldn't talk to since Friday. Many things happened, not bad one on the whole. First of all, I have to admit that it's not really easy to communicate the news on the internet, not that I don't have any access, on the contrary, but just that Saudian equipment is not as fast as the one I've known so far. I'm going back to the source, a 56k connection is the maximum I can have for the moment : I'm thinking very seriously of opening a private DSL line, but beforehand, I'd prefer to find an accomodation of my own, and the most important thing, the instrument we can do nothing without it : a car. But let's begin with a chronological summary of the last days.
On Friday, I was on my second day in Saudi Arabia. The sun rised over Riyadh very early in the morning, at around 4, 4.30 if I'm not wrong. It permits to wake up early, an habit that I've got familiar with since I've arrived, despite short time spent sleeping. I had my breakfast, then spent the morning listening to music, not daring go outside to see the landscape and take some pictureS. There is something in my mind that told me that there are risks about taking some pictures inside a diplomatic area, so I retained myself from doing that. At 1.20, I went to my chief's place to visit him, as he had invited me for lunch at this time. After posting Thursday's message on the blog, we had some drinks with a colleague of him, and another young man who has worked for the FR embassy since April, and who has the same status as mine. We had a very delicious lunch, some fish whose name I can't remember. As far as I know, i'll publish its name, it's worth tasting it but I doubt we might find some in Western Europe. The desert was a "Strawberry Charlotte" prepared by a cooker from Lebanon. I've been told several times that food from Lebanon is good. Well, at the end of lunch, everyone went back to his place, I had a nap until 6.. At this time, my colleague from Riyadh called at the door and we went to the Embassy together. He had some Faxes to send, while I would relax in the swimming pool. Of course, I can't give details about security inside the embassy, first because I know almost nothing about it and also because it's not an interesting topic to develope now, but the few that I saw about safety rules impressed me. After swimming, my colleague came to pick me up and we walked to our quarters. The "D.Q.", on the whole, seems to be a very safe place, we just have to look at the number of soldiers, overall near the American area, whose people were target of some attacks 2 years ago. Once again, no details.For dinner, I had some... pasta (looks like in DK, doesn't it?) and listen to music - Cyril's selection on my USB player - until tiredness close my eyes naturally. By the way, if there was a country where Sand Sellers wouldn't suffer from unemployment, it would certainly be Saudi. However I don't know if the joke of the "Sand Seller" is valid for everyone. No big deal...
For the beginning of the week - in other words, on Saturday 10th - it was planned that I would go to the embassy to register my presence here. First I went to the Consulate, which is a kind of Townhall and that is in charge of civil rights and duties, voting, stuff like these. Then I went to some more specific offices, to apply for the IQAMA, that is to say the Saudian ID. Without IQAMA, theoretically, you can buy no car and open no bank account. As strange as it may seem, I'd like to do those two things... I hope my papers will rapidly be available.Inside the embassy, I met some people among whom the head of the FR school in Khobar, "JF" (as he calls me "JMM"), he's someone who has a pleasant sense of humor. In the afternoon, we were supposed to have a flight to Dammam at 3PM but that was just "the plan". Once at the airport, we knew that the flight would be delayed, 30 minutes or so. Then, the flight was announced at 4... then 5... at 5.30, we finally took the bus until the plane. And things started to take a strange appearance. All the passengers were sitting calmly in the plane, reading the newspapers that had been offered some minutes earlier. Engines started spinning rapidly, then ... nothing. No light anymore in the cabin. OK, sometimes it happens that the pilot makes some tests on engines before taking off. 30 minutes later, still nothing. It was already 6.30. We saw some engineers getting into the plane, holding some corkscrews and toolboxes. Then I thought : "there is definitely something wrong with the plane". Suddenly the pilot announced that we had to take the bus again : the driver took us to the airport hall again, where we waited for some 40 minutes, and at 7.30, AT LAST (!!) we took off. It means that all our plans for the night were cancelled, as we were expected to land at Dammam at 4, 4.30. The last joke, that we call in FR "the little cherry on the top of the cake" happened when everyone stood up to get out of the plane, after landing. The pilot taxiied the aircraft until its full stop location but no stairs were there to let us get out. People nervously laughed, "and then finally" :) left the airport quite rapidly.I left with JF and 2 other people from Lebanon, among whom a music teacher (who works at the FR school) and a cardiologist whose fluency in French is almost perfect. After some 50 km sitting in a very comfortable American car, we reached our compound. There, I was welcomed by a French teacher with whom I got along very rapidly. He teaches Latin and Greek and also French at Middle school. His welcoming was warm and still is, I'm looking for an idea to show him my gratefulness, something else than a mere "thanks a lot". If you have any idea, please "post it"(©) as a comment. My first night in Khobar was calm, I rapidly fell asleep..
On Sunday morning, my chief picked me up at the entry of the compound, where some soldiers asked me what I was doing there. Showing them my temporary resident permit, they finally understood that I was waiting for someone. By car, we visited the main areas of the city; Some mosques by the sea are really interesting as far as their architecture is concerned, I'll try to take some pictures. (Sorry if you have the impression that I promise "more than I show pictures.. For the moment, it's a very long process, if not impossible to publish them on FTP servers).After visiting my workplace and talking about it with my chief, we went to the clothes-shop just below the Saudi-French Center. We found very interesting stuff, among those I found a leather pair of trousers which brand is Levi's. Quite surprizing.. The FR teacher who rents me a room told me that those items are genuine.For lunch, we went to a kind of asiatic restaurant in which many nationalities are present. I had some beef with a spicy sauce, and drank some "Saudian champaign" which is made of apple juice,sparkling water, pieces of oranges and apples and leaves of mint. It's very tasty. Then, we went back to the F-S center where I stayed some time and met the secretary of the place, someone very helpful and polite. He proposed me to give me a hand in the choice of a car and of a little apartment. I sent some faxes to Bahrain, in order to propose them a partnership if they had any cultural project. I did the design of my business card and made some modifications compared to the previous one.At night, after getting into the compound again (and walking in front of the soldiers who had recognized me), I brought a letter to JF who proposed me to play scrabble (Scrabble duplicate) with other FR-speaking people. And I can say that people from Lebanon are very good at Scrabbling :P That was a good idea to go there, I had the opportunity to have a talk with people I didn't know before.
Generally, I like the place, the country where I am and the job i'm going to fulfill. There will probably be darker sides in the next weeks, but i'm already trying to consider which things could be negative for me within a short or middle perspective. I'll let you know about this soon. Until then, take care and leave me some news when possible. SEE YOU..
P.S. : My best wishes to those who are starting High School exams from today.

Everything s going ok !!!!

Hi!!

Let's begin with a trial of answer to the question i'll be asked more than 30 times in the next days : Everything is going all right !!!! From the very beginning of the day, once we were at the station with my mother and Cyril, I had some very deep emotions, having on mind the idea that once again, after Denmark, I was going to leave family and friends. And now that's done.

What should I start with, to tell you my first "day" in Saudi, (let's say "night"). I will say that after quite a tiring journey by plane, I was very happy to walk on this land. Indeed : the plane took off from Paris at almost 12, then we arrived in Roma at 2, then we took off again 1 hour later, spent 4 hours aboard between Roma and Jeddah, then landed for another hour, and finally reached Riyadh at 10:30 (French time). Oh yes, for those who didn't ask me about this, there is one hour of difference between FR time and S.A. time. Now i'm on the same time as in Lithuania, by the way...

I tried to take some pictures during the flight, few of them are "acceptable" but i'm going to publish them anyway. My battery went low quite rapidly, it wasn't even a matter of space on my memory card :(
Well, I'll leave a comment for each picture.. Now that I found a technique to create galleries, It should be easier to publish them : the question is "when will I do it now?".. I hope i'll have time for this soon.

There is a paradoxical difference between FR and S.A. (and a lot of other ones, of course, but it's not a cultural judgement), in the sense that here, it's 1 hour later than in FR... But on the other hand, in S.A. the "weekend" is on Thursdays and Fridays.. as an equivalent for our Saturdays and Sundays.... which means that i'm already on weekend (sorry guys..)!

Another good news is that I met my chief tonight, Roland, with whom I got along quite rapidly. He picked me up at Riyadh airport, and I was lucky to get out rapidly from the Customs, otherwise he would have left without me : in the airport there was no flight announced from Paris, so he was worrying a little bit. The particular thing in Riyadh airport is that they control the content of your luggage (X-rays) even when you leave the airport. As I was a foreign person, I needed to fill in a form with my datas, name, surname, place of birth, date of delivery and expiration (for passport) and on the document it was written : "BEWARE ! DEATH FOR DRUGS TRAFFICKERS". I have no reproach to make to myself about this topic, of course.. But then I started thinking that if someone approached my handluggage during the flight, while I was in the bathroom, he could put something inside that didn't belong to me. So, before having my luggage checked at the Customs, I searched into my handluggage if there was anything "suspect" inside.. You'll probably think i'm silly, and why not paranoïd, but still, those written words on the immigration form were very impressive.

To deal with my chief again, he drove me to the diplomatic neighborhood of the city, where there are 2 amazing checkpoints at the entry. Then, he took me to my "temporary place", a little studio near his apartment. Before my arrival, he had the room cleaned and started the air-cooling system, which is really not a fancy thing here. at 10h30 (S.A. time), the temperature was still above 33°C. He put some bread, jam, mineral water in the fridge, so that I lack nothing at the very beginning, and I'm very thankful to him for this mark of attention. After letting me visit "my" place and drop my luggage and bags, he invited me for a Coca cola at his place, where we talked about our objectives for the running of the Saudian-French cultural center. We talked mainly about the region of the Gulf, the places where we could find some potential students (universities, companies, private schools). A very interesting conversation, all in all..

Now I've come back to my place, it's 1:10AM and i'll go to bed soon. My chief proposed me to use internet today (Friday) so I will save this message and try to publish it on the blog. Thanks for your reading, and feel free to leave some comments, questions or suggestions if you like.

Take care... and see you soon.

I GOT IT .....

Wow... it's been quite long to wait for those documents. This morning, at 9, the FedEx post(wo)man rang at the door (so... she woke me up but it's not too bad ;) ) to give my the missing papers.. Train ticket, flight ticket, and passport. Nowww everything seems to be ok, nothing can prevent me from leaving anymore. I still have to do some photographs with very strange dimensions, buy some clothes, pork and alcohol.. Actually to conform their law, I should get heavily drunk and eat a lot of ham to be disgusted at the end...

Sun is appearing today, it had been 5 days in a row that it was hiding, now that 6 days are remaining until my departure the weather's changing. Let's not complain : maybe it's a good thing that I have rain in Simandre, because this kind of climate should be more or less "absent" in Saudi. Let's forget about clouds.

I'm in a hurry now, I'll post another message later, 'cause some other news are expected for today.

C.U.