Our purchases from the plant souks really brought our place to life. As did the items we brought from home
When Jordan and I arrived in the UAE, we spent 5 long weeks in a hotel. No personal space and no kitchen (not even a microwave). We were elated when we were told that we could finally check out of the hotel and move into our home.
Our apartment is in the Tawam neighborhood of Al Ain in a building with three other couples from our school. If we were given the opportunity to choose our own apartment we would have chosen the same area, so we were glad that our school picked it out. Tawam is on the east side of town near the road to Abu Dhabi. It is a quieter neighborhood with lots of other expats. Right near our place is a grocery store that sells American goods that you can’t find anywhere else. The store even has a section where people can buy pork products.
We got off of work, picked up our bags from the hotel and made our way to our apartment. We arrived to find that we had no washing machine, no internet, a broken AC in our living room, and no stove. Late that evening, men from our school arrived to deliver a washing machine and put up curtains. This was great, but not exactly the priority on our list of missing items.
Thankfully, after a couple weeks, we finally have all of these things that we were missing and more. We made trips to the Ikea in Abu Dhabi and got extra furniture such as a chair, a coffee table, and shelves. We also made trips to the Bawadi area of Al Ain to the souks to buy a rug and some plants. We enjoyed the experience of haggling our prices down in the souks.
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- I think over half the things we have on our walls have the word “Wyoming” in them
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- When we found this fun deer mount at the mall in Abu Dhabi, we had to have it
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- The little cacti we bought at the souks here go well with the blanket we brought from New Mexico
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- This tray/table we got mimics the Morrocan style
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- It is so nice having a bedroom where we aren’t stuck eating on the bed, like in the hotel!
We still have a few things we plan to buy such as more picture frames and a few more plants, but overall we have created a really great space that we are happy to spend our time in.
