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.

Some news about...... Passport!!

UUUHHH... What a pain, this "passport-story"... At last I have some news, and not bad ones.. Still, I haven't won the game yet. Yesterday, I called the ministry, to take some news about this bloody piece of paper (which I hope is not bloody for real...) and they merely replied "No Sir, still no news from consulate.." Well, then I decided to write an email to my chief there, in Saudi, who replied me "don't worry, I'll try to control the situation".
Then he called the consul himself, to ask him what was going on, and the latter told him that I could call by myself, if I needed some information... which I did. Now, it seems that everything (... almost everything) is ready for me to go... except the flight tickets. It would be good if I left from here on the 6th or 7th, which would leave me some time to finish.... errr.... start packing everything up.
This morning I called a former colleague that was in Ryiadh, to ask him some questions, but it seems that Ryiadh and Khobar are 2 worlds apart. (please no joke about "worlds apart") First about religion, it's much more strict in Ryiadh whereas it's much more cool in Khobar. As well as for the climate... I'm expecting hot-damp weather..
Now.. I still have to buy a little container to put my stuff inside, I haven't done this yet, and an "emergency box" with a big pot of sun-cream (why not buy a brush to spread it...?), and a lot of things that could be very useful. I'll try to leave stress at home, because if I decide to take it with me, then there won't be enough space anymore for clothes and books.
It's not easy to find something really special to report on this blog, during this "waiting" period... Not that I have nothing to tell, but days look like each other, even though i'm often outside doing some activity.

I'll go back to my "pre-packing" activity... See you later..

it's been a long time!

After almost one month away from "home" because of exams, I'm back to my lands.. Exams were generally nooot thaaaat bad, but the best way to confirm this is to wait for exams : until then, I prefer not to give any firm opinion..

On Tuesday, everything was ready to leave St Pryvé.. 4 big boxes contained books, the printer, clothes.... in other words, my mess :P . Today, I realized I didn't turn back towards the house, to see it a last time before a long one. Despite little misunderstandings that have no more meaning to me, I'm sure I will miss this place. Everyday, to have dinner there , to study, to sleep until the next day... and sometimes not sleeping.. It's there that I discovered my "student profile", or a "student philosophy (which is definitely not wise at all, according to some colleagues) : for almost each assignmen, I waited for the eve of the deadline before efficiently working on the topic. On the other hand, from the very day when the professor gives the topic, I start thinking about it... I read some articles, look at some websites, and sometimes, take some notes but not too much ! : otherwise it would mean that I work in advance, and that's definitely contrary to my methods.

It's true that the level of stress kept increasing, along this academic year : this method was still working but at the end, the results didn't exactly correspond to my expectations. Sometimes it was much higher than expected (in this case, why complain?) but sometimes, it was lower.. Well, it seems that I didn't master that well the fiability of the method. Luckily, I've never had to face a tragedy...

Now, about my departure, I still have no news from the ministry. They are waiting (so am I, by the way...) for my VISA, and only then, they'll be able to book my flight. The big question mark now follows the word "WHEN"... Actually, I'm not worrying that much and I don't think there is a reason to feel very concerned : when it's time to go, i'll go ! :) However I had some news from the FR school in the city where i'll settle : its director sent me an email and proposed to provide me a temporary accomodation, leaving me the time to find my own roof. I have some chances to find it in the FR compound, but I'm still thinking about the advantages and defects of such a choice... This topic will be dealt with later..

That's it for today.. Tomorrow, a family meeting is planned, from the Italian side, to celebrate Mother's day with the grandparents. We should be 32, all in all, it will be one of the last meetings until a long time from now.

Take care, and see you soon