Mediterranean Cruise-Rome, Pisa & Lucca

Our next stops on our cruise included the cities of Rome, Pisa and Lucca.

Rome is a glorious city; hot, chaotic, vibrant and chock full of amazing buildings and structures around every corner. We had booked a private driver to take us around to notable sights of the city. I'm heartbroken that I no longer remember the name of the first cathedral we visited, but it was spectacular!

Continuing our tour around Rome:

The Pantheon

Inside St. Peter's Basillica

Next we visited Pisa. Below see the infamous Tower, the lesser known but gorgeous Duomo and a cafe we ate at with a peek-a-boo view of the Tower!

I end with Lucca, an ancient Medievel walled city with the quaintest winding streets. It was a gorgeous day for shopping and eating gelato. Oddly enough, surrounded by the most beautiful culture, my son decided this was the souvenir he needed most:

I can't lie, the Backstreet Boys were appearing there in concert the next day, and if we didn't have to leave, that ticket stub would've been my favorite souvenir!

All in all, amazing sights, and waaay too many pics to post here! :)

Television Programming in Saudi

And now for one of my favorite subjects: television! I grew up in a strictly religious household, and for much of my childhood, tv viewing was either closely regulated or cut out altogether. I'm sure I have that to blame for why I'm such a viewing fanatic now. Here in the kingdom, and more specifically on the compound, one has three different options for television programming. 

First, everyone on the compound gets free "cable", a selection of AFN (Armed Forces Network) channels mixed with well known American basic cable channels and a smattering of international news, sports and music channels. Following are just some of the available channels:

Nat Geo

Animal Planet

Discovery

Travel 

History

Itv

BBC Lifestyle

Fox movies

TCM

E! 

Disney

Cartoon Network

Boomerang

MTV

VH1

And as mentioned, a small selection of British, French and Filipino programming are also available. The downside is the reception on several of the channels, (often including the AFN channel that airs football) is poor, filled with static and often cutting out every few seconds.

Second option: Pay for expanded cable packages through an actual cable company. We use OSN based out of Dubai, reception is perfect (always) and we have something like over 200 channels. Now, half are Arabic, but we get a selection of channels most like what we are used to in the states, although it doesn't (of course) include local channels (ie., ABC, NBC) or the premium movie channels like HBO. You do have channels that play popular programming like Scandal, the Ellen show, SNL and the Tonight Show, though they are jumbled together and not a whole channel's regular lineup. We pay $80 (US) a month for this service and I enjoy it for it's three Disney channels (for my pre-schooler), the expanded Discovery and Nat Geo channels, and the included DVR that let's me schedule and auto record our shows. This company also regularly airs seasonal programming containing Christmas, Halloween and other holiday themes beloved by Anericans.

The third option is to use a VPN service (which if you haven't heard of this, it's faster for you to Google it than for me to try to explain it) and download the shows you want from the internet. (We do not do this.) Virtually every show, with the exception of the very obscure can be found on the internet and downloaded for free. (Again, we do not do this.) By using a VPN service (like Golden Frog) you bypass Saudi-blocked websites and connect to servers in other countries that do not ban illegal downloading like the US or Saudi. You can get a package through GF for $15-$20. (We do NOT have one or more VPN packages.) For those that do, they are often only one day behind the US in watching any newly run episode, including shows on HBO, Showtime and STARZ, as well as seasonal events like the Academy Awards, Super Bowl, Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade or Victoria's Secret Fashion Show! (Lol)

I would say we utilize all three options, but of course we ONLY do the first two! There are NO shows we miss out on by being here, even those exclusive to Netflix and other streaming sites that require a membership. All shows downloaded from the net (so I'm told:) are uploaded without commercials, so in 10 months of television watching I've never had to fast forward through commercials like I did back home. (Don't miss that!)

In short, I'm up on all my shows more so than even in the States, and there's nothing I miss. Whatever option(s) you choose, you can rest assured there will be plenty of beloved theme songs and familiar faces of the small screen coming your way:)

Mediterranean Cruise 2014-Athens, Kusadasi & Santorini

In keeping with the theme of the last post, I wanted to try to show highlights of our trip without dedicating a whole post to each day of the trip (like I did for our Paris trip, which was exhausting and time-consuming).  Instead, I'll post a few pictures for each place, perhaps even combining ports.  With that said, on to the trip!  We embarked on our adventure from Venice, and having visited before, we chose to stay outside the city in a cute hotel, and so took no pictures of the main sites in Venice.  After our sail away, we had two days at sea and on the third day, visited Athens, Greece. We had hired a private guide (Hi Takis!) who spent a few hours driving us around to see the sights.  We did not tour the Acropolis as we had done that in 2009 on our honeymoon.  He did take us to see the changing of the guard however, which we all found to be one of the most mesmerizing things we had ever seen. The pictures don’t do the ceremony justice, but it was amazing! We also toured some ruins and spent a few hours shopping in one of the oldest shopping districts in the world, the Plaka!

A Greek Orthodox Cathedral we visited

 

 

Our next stop was Kusadasi, Turkey.  We chose to spend the day touring the very large Bazaar.  It made for some very good shopping!

From our stateroom window

In the bazaar

 

Our third stop was Santorini, Greece.  We toured around by charter bus, visited a winery, saw the breathtaking scenery from the cliff tops and had an Opa style greek lunch complete with dancing and the breaking of plates.  Awesome!

One of Santorini's many cafes

Our Greek lunch, Opa!

Posing with my new bag at the winery!

Our ship the Jade, from atop a cliff





 

 

Lago di Garda, Italy

As you all probably noticed, there was a large gap, between May and Sep when I wasn't posting to my blog. I actually spent a couple of months preparing for, planning for and packing for our Mediterranean Voyage in early July. Not only was the two week cruise amazing, but we decided last minute (and believe me, the $850 airplane change fees hurt!) to tack an extra week on in Northern Italy to avoid the final week of Ramadan here in Saudi. We docked in Venice when the cruise was over and took the train about 1 1/2 hrs to the city of Peschiera del Garda, on the banks of Lake Garda, the largest lake of the lakes area that includes its more famous neighbor Lake Como. The views from our hotel were stunning! 

This was our chance to really find things more for Kellan to enjoy, though we had worked hard to avoid dragging him to boring historical sites or museums at our cruise ports. So we took him to Gardaland, Italy's largest amusement park. We also took him to Medieval Times, which is a very different experience when one is hearing it half in Italian! One block from our hotel was an amazing playground up on a hill with an outdoor bar for the parents! (Way to go Italy! You really got it right! It's not enough you have brilliant food, amazing wine, fantastic fashion sense, and some of the best architecture and landmarks in the world, but you also know what parents want!)  At the foot of the hill was a carrousel that Kel rode daily. Our hotel was on one side literally on the edge of the "old town" with its tiny winding streets full of shops, outdoor cafés and gelaterias and was bordered on the other side by a picturesque canal leading to the lake. We had a fantastic corner room with two balconies, one facing Lake Garda, the other facing the canal. It was breathtaking standing on our balconies in the morning, watching the day get started as the sun shone on the water. 

It was definitely our favorite place we visited on the trip. But we've been back for a while now, the afterglow is fading and it's back to the blog for me. I'll try to avoid such long stretches without posting:) Ciao for now:)

1st balcony view-Lake Garda

2nd balcony view-Canal

Kel's carousel

The back of our hotel

Our fave indoor/outdoor cafe

Sun setting on Peschiera del Garda

Cheap Drugs

A few weeks ago I visited our local hospital to see about some pretty severe, recurring pain I was having in both my shoulders. First, I saw the Orthopedic Specialist and he prescribed x-rays, as well as a blood test to rule out arthritis. (I was a little nonplussed as I didn't think I was THAT old, but headed off the lab nonetheless.) I've addresses medical standards here in an earlier post, but I will say that while the lab was nowhere as nice or clean as any in the US, it was decent enough to not make me wrinkle my nose in disgust. The tech was very friendly--until she saw my tattoo. Her eyes widened as she asked what it was in a mildly disapproving tone. I explained what it was and informed her that my country was very different, that the girls there are free to make choices about getting things like tattoos. She still seemed hesitant about it but treated me very professionally. 

Next, I got my X-rays done. I still find it hard to be X-rayed naked or in my bra. They do not have hospital gowns or paper gowns, at least not that I've seen the two times in two different facilities that I've been. After waiting an hour for results, the diagnosis was Bursitis, as near as I can tell inflammation of some part of my shoulder (Dr. Oz I am not! Lol). I was prescribed an anti-inflammatory and a muscle relaxant. The doctor wrote my name and the name of the meds on a sticky note and that was what I took to the pharmacy. The charge? 5 SAR, or $1.33. 

When I traveled out of the country in July, we dropped by a pharmacy first to pick up Cipro, a widely used, all encompassing antibiotic often used by travelers that pick up the "wrong" kind of souvenir. No prescription needed, it cost me 15 SAR, or $4 over the counter. Though we are provided pretty spectacular insurance, (the entire visit plus tests cost us 24 SAR or $6.40) the meds cost very little even without it. I can't help but think every time about the drug manufacters that sell their products for peanuts here and charge 10-20 times more in the States. Perhaps there's something I'm missing about the Px drug game, but I haven't been able to figure it out...

You Snooze...

Saudi has more sales than I've ever seen in my life! Everything is always on sale! At any given moment half the stores (or more) in the mall will have big, splashy sales. Only problem-you can't wait for an item to go on sale. Trust me, that item will be gone long before it makes it onto a sale rack. As soon as you see something you like here--buy it! They'll be out of your size or out completely the next time you look for it. I've had many a "dammit" moment wishing I'd bought something when I first saw it. Same goes for food. So the next time you're at the grocery store and you see the 50 pack of chocolate-covered Oreos in the decorative tin, you'd better buy it. 'Cause guess who just put 14 containers in their basket? That's right, THIS girl. Your loss:)