Expat Life: At the Car Workshop (August 11, 2020)

Went to the car workshop yesterday (August 11, 2020) to change my car's tire. (August 11, 2020)

Expat Life: Dental Clinic, Souk, Mall and Car Workshop - Sept. 1, 2, 3, 2018

This is a three day compilation of my activities from September 1-3, 2018:
Day 1 - Went to the dentist (Sept. 1).  Day 2 - Went to Shatee Souk (Sept.2).  Day 3 - Went to Yasmin Mall and to the car workshop to fix the tire of my car (Sept. 3).

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Our Alto Goes on Vacation (UPDATE)

Picture: Our Alto getting its rear tires changed early this year.

It's been exactly a week today since our car broke down...again. Last year was the first time it broke down. Our daily routine changes significantly without our car, I mean, it's hard, especially when you get used to it. We have to take the taxi now to go to work, although we could reimburse our transportation expenses from our company (through invoices),  it's still not the same as having our own car, and that's no brainer.

Also it's been a week since we informed our company office of our predicament so that somebody would take it to the mechanic, but to no avail. We understand that there's no one available just yet but really, sometimes the desperation and the stress of haggling with a taxi driver who at least does not carry a familiar (undesirable) scent almost took its toll on us. Now we are thinking of getting our own car, not a big or expensive car, but just a tiny city car that can adequately ferry us around Jeddah.

We're thinking of getting a Kia - Picanto God willing, or something similar to its stature (cheap and tiny). But we still have to wait for few more days to plan this out. We want to know how the situation goes whether it bodes well to the company by giving us a decent car or they being satisfied with astronomical reimbursements. Who knows they might provide us a new car (which is good) or send our majestically decrepit car to the mechanic which is fine also. 

Our car is a Suzuki - Alto, I think it's the cheapest car around. We've been using it for more than six years now since August of 2008. Thank you Lord Jesus for blessing us with this small and humble car. But hey Alto, you should be resurrecting your rear for my sake otherwise it's all about agony in the streets and reluctantly getting immune to the stress, sun, carbon monoxide, dust and familiar scent that is!

UPDATE - January 27, 2015

Our Alto is back from the dead. My company decided not to buy a new car after all and instead, just fixed it. When I saw the car this afternoon, it was so filthy, I hardly recognized it. I've already washed and cleaned it and ready for tomorrow. I thank you Lord Jesus Christ for bringing back Alto. Hallelujah!

My New Driver's License

It was 2 days ago when it dawned on me that my driver's license was expiring, and sure enough the subsequent panic spoiled my composure when it has only less than 24 hours to exist legally. Finding myself jumping out of bed so early in years was the next and most appropriate thing to do. This time I had to leave my larger-than-amoeba Suzuki Alto behind, as trooping to the place where to renew my license could be a hellish experience considering the never-ending excavations in Jeddah's major thoroughfares. I also kept telling myself not to meltdown when confronted with a Guiness-worthy bureaucracy (heard a lot of them and experienced quite a lot too). Sure enough, better be prepared to learn how to read in Arabic as English is not a known thing in that part of the world; yes you had to pay 20 rials minimum to hire someone else to fill out your form.

At first I went to Dallah office where I first got my license only to be told that the renewal is being done another 2 or 3 blocks away in their Muror office. When I went in, there's no queue, in fact, there were hardly any people inside. I thought it would be difficult to renew a driver's license, but it was actually very easy.

I first have to pay SR.200 (a little over $50) through a bank ATM which is located outside their office, then stand in a queue to submit all the necessary papers. They only require a photo copy of my iqama, a passport size photo and my expired driver's license. After giving them my papers, they told me to wait. Unfortunately, their system was down, so I have to comeback in the afternoon. When I returned, I simply asked the person behind the counter about my license and showed my iqama and he simply reached out and gave it to me, just like that.

And so, I've got another 5 years of driving to do around Saudi Arabia, God willing. I thank God for his help. First for reminding me of my license, for the ease of the process of renewing my license and for my friend who helped me through all of these. Thank you Lord Jesus!

My 'Bully' Neighbor

This morning while I was in the bathroom preparing myself to go to work, my mobile phone rang, I quickly ran to the room (where the phone was) to see who it was. It was 'Chupacabra' (not his real name of course), my neighbor, a Filipino, who I almost never see. He's like an urban legend to me now. You can almost call it a 'sighting' whenever you accidentally see him somewhere out there, and that's just one of the many reasons why I call him so. 

Anyway, I was perplexed why he wanted to call me (ehem! I mean, missed call me). He never calls me unless he needs help on something that would benefit himself alone. Then suddenly it struck me, that maybe there's something happened to my poor little car? I always position my car near the apartment's gate (if it's available) and he can easily see my car whenever he comes out of his apartment building which is just in front of mine.

And sure enough, that was exactly what I saw when I went out, but not as what I imagined it would be. Thank God! I saw the bumper of the white Toyota 4x4 truck of my Saudi neighbor who is living in the apartment building next to mine, stuck on the front of my poor helpless little Suzuki city car. I ran inside my car and backed the car a few feet so that I could see the severity of the damage. A small part of my car's bumper had folded inward which I immediately undid using just my bare hand. 

What had happened this morning bothered me a lot because I believe it was intentional. I think my neighbor is trying to bully me. This was not the first time it happened. Late last year, around 10 PM, while I was having a conversation with 'Chupacabra' near my car that was parked at my favorite spot, he came driving his white Toyota 4x4 truck and was looking for a space to park it. Instead of parking his car in front of mine, he backed a little bit to talk to me. He told me something in Arabic which I didn't understand. I can sense his anger. But then I realized he wanted me to transfer my car somewhere else and give the space to him. I didn't give him the space, but I moved my car  just a little bit. 

Since then, every time I see him in the morning or in the afternoon, he would often look at me with hate in his eyes. He is obviously jealous of the parking space which is in front of my apartment. I often come home a lot earlier than him everyday from work and that's the reason why most of the time I have the privilege of choosing my parking space. That space is supposed to be the parking space for the tenants of my apartment building. Why doesn't he park in front of his apartment building, that would make sense, right?

I bet he can't do that to his fellow Arabs. He's bullying me because he knows that I'm a Filipino, that he thinks he can easily intimidate me, and that my car is just a cheap little old running piece of shit to him (sorry for the word). I really have a lot of things to say right now, but I would rather not go on with it, I might just say something that is against my principle and against my Christian upbringing. 

Even though what he did was not right, I'll just have to be wise about it, shut up and understand what had transpired this morning.  I think it would be better that way. 

*The picture above (which I got from the net) is from Judith Caseley's book "BULLY"

A Good Samaritan in The Desert.

Yanbu Snapshots

We rented a car here in Jeddah and went to Yanbu yesterday afternoon to visit our shop there. This is our second trip to Yanbu with myself driving a car. At first I felt confident driving the car, everything seemed to be going great, that was until our trip back to Jeddah in the afternoon the next day. We decided to stop a while to heed the call of nature and to take a few snapshots from our camera, but I made a mistake taking the car too far from the side of the road, where the ground is too soft and so the wheel of our car got trapped from the sand, we couldn't get out, the more I tried to pump the gas thinking that we could get our wheel free from the deep soft sand, but the deeper our wheel sunk. I tried putting some pieces of woods that we found around the site but it was no use, the car was not going anywhere. Then I got scared, we've only got a small bottle of water and it was mid afternoon and was burning hot.

Then Nelson said we should get help from some passersby. A Pakistani guy stopped and tried to help us. He brought ropes to help our car be pulled from the sand but because it was made of some plastic-like material, it was too weak and snapped. He then get another rope from his delivery truck, but this time it looked like a seatbelt from some old cars and it was made of nylon. We tried to tie it up at the rear of our car and to the front of his delivery truck, then he begun to pull our car out of the sand and sure enough it worked. Thank God! We offered him water and a lot of thank yous after that, without him we wouldn't be able to get back to Jeddah this afternoon and we will still be there on that same spot at this moment. We asked his name and he replied "Mustaq".

Nelson and I want to say Thank You from the bottom of our hearts again to Mustaq. You really are a good Samaritan. God bless you.

*The small picture at the left above shows the exact spot where our car got trapped from the sand.

**The video above shows Mustaq driving his truck, the Pakistani man who helped us.

Link: Trip To yanbu (wordpress)