Hallelujah - our shippment has arrived!

We went without our stuff for over three and a half months. Last Tuesday that all changed as our Marco Polo came riding back into Venice! It seems that our shipment took longer then most to arrive. We are the last of the large batch of teachers hired over the summer to get our stuff. We were also one of the last of that group to actually arrive here in August. The feeling of anticipation of having our stuff back after so long in the days leading up to the delivery was torture. But when the day finally came and the 5 truck loads of crates pulled up it turned out to be all quite overwhelming.

The Aramco furniture that we have been borrowing (and despising) was picked up first thing in the morning. Anna kept a watchful eye over the workers as they moved the furniture out onto the truck. She also introduced some of them to Dora the Explorer.

Before the Aramco truck could pull out of the driveway the shipping company trucks started to pull up. In the end there were four short trucks and one trailor truck. Of course in true Saudi style one of the trucks was held up at a police checkpoint outside the gate and I had to go and schmooze the local police officer to let the truck through. Over the past months I have gotten pretty good at this and I had the truck through in no time. This is when things really got interesting. You see, in our move to Saudi we downsized a bit. We are living in a townhouse here in Saudi. There is quite a bit less space then we had at our palatial mansion in Collegeville. As the 16 crates arrived and were opened Marie and I quickly had that "oh crap" realization that we were going to have trouble fitting all this into the house.

Here is the before and after picture: (yes that is Anna laying on the floor watching Dora)

In the end it was a long day but we had our stuff. It's like your birthday and Christmas all wrapped in one. And everything made it through customs. Even our Christmas tree, which the Saudi customs officials are notorious for confiscating due to the Christian nature of the holiday, made it through. If you know Marie you know that a mere six days removed from the day it all arrived our house has officially become our home. There is still a lot of work to do but she has made a huge dent in making the house comfortable. We have slept in our beds for the first time in three months. Our couch is as comfy here as it was in the states. It is going to take some time to unload all the boxes and arrange and rearrange things to make everything fit but boy does it feel good to have all our stuff again. We have all our stuff again!!!