Wednesday, July 27, 2011

stretching out like rubber bands to kiss the cheeks and shake the hands

so i just got back from london and have decided that i am kind of sick of trying to write blogs that recap the summer. mainly because it seems like i never have time anymore and by the time i get to writing the post, so much has happened in between that it ends up sounding wooden and laundry list like. but because part of me feels like all of this should at least be mentioned somewhere, this post will be a quick recap of everything from the wedding to this point. starting tomorrow (because hopefully i'll get back to blogging daily again) i will not be doing any more summer recaps.

so anyway, after the wedding we spent to more nights in jeddah (my side of the country) before going over to dammam (his side of the country). a lot of his family was not able to come to the real wedding so they put together a dinner in my honor/second wedding. i had a hair dresser make up lady come to the hotel room to do my stuff for me, and it was a disaster. because it was not really a wedding wedding, i told her to do something simple with my hair. she said she had the perfect simple hairdo for my face shape so i said okay and let her do her thing. she had half of my hair hanging down in my face while she worked with the other half so i couldn't see what she was doing until the very end when she pulled the hair out of my face to design the bang part. it took all of my will not to start crying and the only thing that stopped me was that she had already done the makeup. she had put my hair up in a tower on the top of my head. a roll of hair, a braid, a roll of hair, a braid, and then a final poof of hair. it was really tall. i looked like a character from a dr. seuss book. i wish i took a picture of it but i was too busy freaking out to think of it. we were supposed to leave the house at eight:thirty and she finished eight:fifteen so i just let her go and then started freaking out when my husband came in. we ended up taking apart the tower and by the end i looked okay, but it was awful. and i was nervous about meeting his whole family which made it worse. but the dinner was fun. we talked and danced and ate and my dress turned black from the street and it was a struggle getting in and out of cars. but it was fun.

his side of the country was ridiculously hot, though. even in the middle of the night it was sweltering which didn't make sense because the sun was gone so it should cool down. it didn't. also, it was awkward doing the whole shaking hand-kissing cheek thing with his family. on my side of the country we do right-left-left or however many lefts you want. his side does all right. i didn't realize this until ten or so awkward times when our heads would get confused and almost hit into each other. i picked it up though at the end.

after spending a week in his side of the country, we went back to mine for two days, and then we came back to america. there were a couple of days spent in exhaustion and then we were on a plane again to london. and oh my god i loved london. it was beautiful and the people were awesome and there was so much to see and do and i need to go back. as soon as possible. it was kind of expensive, especially since the dollar is worthless compared to the pound, but it was still awesome. when we got there, though, we found ourselves cut off from all forms of communication. this meant that i couldn't meet up with a friend, i couldn't contact my family, i couldn't check my email, or basically do anything. though this just gave us less things to distract us from the city. we did the main attraction tour (big ben, westminster abbey, buckingham palace, etc.), we saw stonehenge, went on the london eye, a river cruise, a harry potter tour (of course) and had a picnic in hyde park. we also went to a few museums, and oh my god are their museums cool. the science museum was mini compared to most smithsonian museums over here, but it was the coolest thing since the printing press. the museum of natural history was really cool, too, but i think all natural history museums are cool on principle. we also went to disneyland in paris for a day which was awesome. there is still so much i want to see and do there though, and i am planning my next trip from now.

so that's pretty much what i've been doing lately instead of blogging. i've been busy and things have been hectic. things should calm down a bit now, though. we just need to go shopping for a zillion things for the apartment and i need to get a temporary number since my phone is off until my parents get back and i need to get ready for school and apply to the phd program, but besides all of that, my days should go back to being pretty much pointless. yay.

*Rain Delays - Crash Parallel 

10 comments:

  1. Amazing and beautiful with amazing people??? Hmmmm... again, not the London I know :p But then again, different places, different views. There is so much to do there - I haven't even seen most of London to be honest... and I only live up the road :p

    Glad you enjoyed it. Sounds like you did, and maybe next time, you can see some other beautiful parts of our country :)

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  2. anonymous hippopotamusJuly 27, 2011 at 3:18 PM

    Sarah i am SOOOOO happy that you are happy and that you had fun :)

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  3. Hannah... but every single one of the buildings there looks like it should be in a museum! and to be honest, i was circling in groups of tourists more than actual londoners most of the time, but i asked this ice cream lady if she knew where the hotel we were staying at was (most of the time we were wandering around mapless) and even though she didn't know she was super helpful. about half an hour later we went back to buy ice cream for her and she asked if we found the hotel and was basically just super nice.

    sometimes i feel like tourists see more of a place than the people actually living there. a lot of the places i've seen here i only saw because we were escorting visiting friends and family members around the area.

    anon hippo... ew since when are we happy for each other? i think tokyo's radiation has gotten to you.

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  4. hmmm. you'll have to show me aroundwhen you're next in london ;p

    and shoppy people are nice - can always ask for directions but the only people who know are taxi drivers... too much of london for anyone else. london taxi drivers have a special course and test called "the knowledge" so they know all of london

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  5. haha yeah whenever we asked anyone anything they told us to ask the taxi drivers. i dunno if taxi drivers here have to take a course, but that's super smart.

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  6. ahh, I'm glad you had fun in London. you're making me all the more excited to, eventually, go there at one point in my life.

    my god, you're married. i can't- i'm sorry. but you're married, ok i'm leaving.

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  7. yeah, i kept getting choked up at the 'my husband' parts.

    im really happy for you :)

    a harry potter picture would be nice?

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  8. mahoney... omg yes you have to go. they're opening up leavesdon studio next year as like a harry potter museum thing and i really want to go and i think you should go too. and don't worry, it still shocks me and i was actually there for the wedding.

    r... :) and i am going to do a picture post soon. i just need to find my camera cord.

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  9. i went to the Harry Potter exhibition in new york about two weeks ago. it was so much fun. every single prop and detail used in the movie is beautiful. you should check it out before it ends!
    and you can drag me to london if you're going next year, haha.

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  10. another one of my friends went there too and said it was awesome. i really wanna go see it, but seeing as i haven't been to new york since i was like six, i want to go and really enjoy it (ie eat at some of the awesome places there) which i can't exactly do in ramadan. do you know how long the exhibit is going to stay for? and i will definitely drag you to london with me.

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