You Know you Live in Saudi....

Recently I had an interaction at the grocery store that made me stop and think, "wow, I've lived here too long".  I thought this because there is no way I would have done what I did a year or two ago.  This  made me start thinking "You know you've lived in Saudi too long when...."  I decided to poll my Saudi friends to compile a list to one day look back on and be able to laugh.  The responses were fabulous but I've decided to break them up into two different lists.  The first one is "You know you live in Saudi when..." and the second one "You know you've lived in Saudi TOO LONG when..."  Here's a personal example: You know you live in Saudi when you constantly get cut in line because no one here understands the concept of waiting your turn.  You know you've lived in Saudi too long when you are willing to let the girls trying to push past you while your placing your order that "You can wait till I'm done".  Haha. I NEVER would have done that two years ago. Ooops. 

You know you live in Saudi when:

1. When you go shopping and rush around trying to beat prayer- Sarah Poulter

2. You go to certain stores only to use their restroom.... this turns in to a too long statement when you know EXACTLY what stores you want to use the restroom at- Lindsey Perry

3. You text your friends that the grocery store has cottage cheese, rotel, sour cream, tostitos- Kerri Snyder

4. The opening of a grocery store is all anyone can talk about- Heather Feimster

5. When you walk out of the store looking for your driver and Sequioa instead of walking to your car- Heather Feimster

6. You buy 35 cans of rotel because you don't know when you will find it again- Cherie Ford

7. You pay $13 for a package of hot dogs- Mark Pyle

8. You rush into your safe-room only to find out an hour later it was fireworks- Lindsey Perry

9. You have a "safe-room"- Me

10. You plan an emergency escape route off the compound- Inez Fasold

11.  You save your napkins while eating out so that you have toilet paper- Debbie Blessing

12. When you get told that a store won't carry a product anymore because it sells too fast and they can't keep it on the shelf- Deborah Richter

13. You plan vacation around Ramadan and Eid instead of Christmas and Thanksgiving- Binky Watkins

You know you've lived in Saudi too long when:

1. You think the first day of the week is Saturday not Monday- Laura Railey

 (Saudi weekends are Thursday & Friday making Saturday like Monday)

2. You convert dollars to Riyals - Laura Railey

3. When you are in the US and you tell the person working "Shukran" instead of "Thank you"- Laura Railey

4. When you give the Shwarma delivery guy a 20 riyal tip and your daughter thinks it wasn't much- Zalinda  (First of all, it's funny that we have Shwarma and that they deliver, Secondly, this shows how kids view of money changes here)

5. You are in the USA and you want to wear your Abaya- Jeanne Renee Singleton

6. You start saying "Inshalah" to everyone who wants something done- Elizabeth Kyle (Inshalah means "God willing" but too often here it means "if I feel like it"

7. You stop saying Sunday school and start calling it Friday school- Leti Lancaster

8. When an 8 hour flight is "short"- Me

9. You comfortably nap in the car on the highway instead of noticing the crazies around you- Heather Feimster

10. You can convert money, kilos, and centigrade pretty accurately in your head- Heather Feimster

11. You don't go anywhere after 6 pm because of the crowds- Cherie Ford

12.  Your fear of driving fast changes to a fear of driving too slow- Mark Pyle

13. You no longer notice prayer calls- Brent Railey

14. You are in the USA and your kid asks you "wheres the driver?"- Susanne Jennings

15. A car races by you on the shoulder of the highway and you no longer flinch- Debbie Blessing

16. You hear loud noises outside and you start to run to your safe room but then think about all the junk you would have to throw out in order to get in so you decide to wait to see if it's really necessary- Susanne Jennings

17. You believe that kleenex belong on the dinning table- Steve Fasold

18. You start making left hand turns from the right hand lane- Steve Fasold

19. You own more abayas than dresses- Cynthia Rudder

20. You walk into a gold souk after 12 years and the worker says "Oh Madam, where have you been".- Deborah Richter

And possibly my favorite:

21. You walk into a hotel room in San Antonio and exclaim way too excitedly "ooh, they have US plugs!!" - Kerri Snyder