I'm a Celebrity!!

I'm a celebrity.. I made the front page of the newspaper.. Ok, I didn't, but my car did!
Let's back it up a little.. I have been MIA from my blog... I had the best intentions of writing at least one post a week.. Eventually I got into a routine or just plain busy... Busy is an understatement of my last few weeks. I guess I will back this all the way up to moving into my apartment.

Moving into Al Rayyana took a lot of work and patience. I was to the point where every day I left school and waited on furniture and appliance deliveries, internet and cable guys, and gas and utility hookups. Not only that, the dust in the apartments had me very sick to where I had to invest in an air purifier. But finally, I was getting settled. I actually spent the weekend of September 28 and 29 in my apartment, finally able to cook, lay on the couch, and watch American TV.
 I went to work on Sunday, September 30 and came home and took a walk. The apartments we were moved into were essentially still a construction zone unfit for people to live, but we were moved there anyway. During my walk I had some thoughts running through my head about what a liability it was for us to be there. As I walked, I stepped over electrical wires on the ground, jumped over manholes that had no covers, and walked past buildings that were not completed, yet wide open to any adult, child or animal that would want to wander in. My logical brain thought "Man, this is not safe and I should not be walking here". My sarcastic brain said "Well, they say it's safe and they put me here and this is where I live, so I should be able to walk whereever I please". I finished my walk and went back in my apartment, excited to cook my meals for the week. I made a ton of healthy foods and preportioned them in containers for the week. I was sitting on my couch and got a text from Brad, who lived 5 floors above me.
Brad: "Does your internet work? I am trying to Facetime my brother, but can't connect"
Me: "Yep. Come on down."
Brad: "Be there in one minute"

As I sat on the couch, I heard a loud, long rumble, and felt my building shake.. With my laptop on my lap I posted on Facebook asking others if they felt it, and asking if I had just felt an earthquake.
Ten seconds later, Brad was at my door, and I asked him if he felt it. He said no, he was in the elevator, but as he got off the elevator on my floor he heard girls saying something about an explosion. He came in and put some beers in my fridge. After two or three minutes, we looked at each other and said "let's go be nosy".. We went to the ground floor and walked out the front door... as we walked out I grabbed Brad's arm and all I could say was "OH MY GOD!" Actually I am pretty sure I dropped the F-bomb in there too. The entire courtyard that our buildings were situated around was GONE. Underneath the courtyard, there was an underground parking garage that apparently had crumbled and our courtyard collapsed down into the ground.. After staring at the hole in the ground for a good 45 seconds to a minute, I finally realized something else was missing.. OUR CARS! We parked our cars around the perimeter of the courtyard. When the parking garage crumbled and the courtyard fell in, our cars went with it!

Here is the picture I took within minutes of the collapse. You can see the back of the parking spaces where our cars were..

Here are some pictures taken in the days following and used in the newspaper.. Coincedentially, I had to have the people at Hertz look at the pictures online to understand what I was telling them about their car. I tried to speak to them in their own language, broken English, by saying "Car you gave me, finished. You give me new car, inshallah." They still didn't get it.
My car is the white one standing on it's front bumper.

The night of the collapse we were immediately evacuated from the apartments and stood outside for about 3 hours.

We were not allowed to re-enter the apartments, so we were bussed to a hotel with only the clothes on our backs and whatever you had with you (for me, it was just my cell phone, which was almost dead, and my apartment key. Brad coincedently had his car key... to the car in the pit)...
On the plus side, we were bussed to the Yas Viceroy Hotel.. The five star hotel that has the Formula 1 track that runs through it.. I had even posted a picture of it on my first blog. Here are some pictures of my place.

 My hotel at night:

My room:

 

My tub:

View from my balcony: Great to watch cars go around...EXCEPT sometimes they race past midnight when I have to be up at 6am for work!!

Where I hang out as often as possible:

On Tuesday nights, they have "Train Yas" where you can walk or bike on the track, which is approximately 3.5 miles.

So as I write this, I have been living in this hotel for the past two weeks. I love it. We get 3 buffet meals a day (paid for by the developer of Al Rayanna), as well as 4 items laundered for free each day. We really don't know where we will be living and when we will be moving again. I can't even begin to think about moving again, nor returning to Al Rayyana - I had raw meat in my fridge.. The power hasn't been on in the building since the collapse.. I don't want to imagine what my apartment smells like at this point in 100 degree heat with no air conditioning. Uhhgg.. For now I will just enjoy the 5 star hotel life, and cross that bridge when I come to it.

As for my life at work, NO COMPLAINTS.. My school is awesome, my administration is awesome, and my girls are awesome. All smiles in Abu Dhabi!