Dessert Camping

Two weekend ago we were able to do some more camping in the Saudi dessert. The weather is still nice so we wanted to get one more camping trip in before the weather becomes unbearable haha! Here are some pictures of our adventure!

So the first thing we saw was a herd of goats. We were excited to see some animals in the desert.

Next, we started setting up camp in a wadi which is a dry river bed. After setting up camp we decided to go for a hike up to these plateaus. The view was absolutely beautiful!

We had a good time climbing up to the top!

  

Soon after the guys returned we had some unexpected visitors to our campsite!

The camels were actually quite friendly and quite smelly haha!

The guys with there newest friends

The camels came through a couple different times with their herder who rode on a donkey.

Here is a video of one of times the camels came through 

Camels in our camp from Brendon Hunt on Vimeo.

After the camel invasion we sat down by the campfire and had some delicious Kabsa (chicken and rice). When we had finished the Kabsa we busted out the S’mores!!! 

After some amazing food and great conversations we headed for bed – our sleeping bag under the stars!!! Yep, no tents! I have to say, I did have one worry……. I kept thinking about the camels and I was hoping we weren’t going to get trampled haha! Luckily they waited until the morning to return and we were able to move our stuff out of the way for them. 

The camping trip was so much fun but it wouldn’t have been the same without the amazing people we spent it with! We love our new friends here and the old friends who have now joined us!

Winter 2010-2011

Wow it has been awhile. We are doing great here and tons of stuff has happened. Sorry it has been so long but here is a big recap of the last 4 months. Enjoy!

Winter 2010-2011 from Brendon Hunt on Vimeo.

We'll try and post a bunch of pictures and stories soon too. Thanks for keeping up with us!

Eid al-Adha

A couple days ago was the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha. Brendon’s good friend asked if we would like to celebrate with him and his family. We were very excited for this experience and we arrived promptly at 8:00am at our friend’s house the next day. We were told that this holiday was in honor of when Abraham was obeying God and was about to sacrifice his son but instead God provided a lamb to take the sons place. Eid was a special holiday that praises God for the substitute of the lamb. So every Eid al-Adha families come together and slaughter a lamb and have meals together.

When Brendon and I arrived I was shown the ladies door and Brendon walked through the men’s door. After coming into the house I was greeted by all the women with sided kisses and assalam wa alaikum (Peace be upon you). The women of the home showed great hospitality to all their guests. I wasn’t even allowed to throw my own trash away because they didn’t want me to have to get up. They had amazing food! They had a gigantic chocolate platter, another platter of pastries, coffee, tea, and dates! I loved it all!!

            

Brendon’s friend had the honor of slaughtering the lamb this Eid and it was a great privilege for him. By the time we got there the lamb had been slaughtered and skinned and now they were cutting up the meat that was hung in the backyard. They brought in a bucket of blood and meat from the lamb and I was told that for breakfast we were going to have the liver of the lamb. So about an hour or two later they brought out breakfast that consisted of liver, lettuce, bread, and Foul. The liver was interesting and I couldn’t eat a lot of it because my taste buds were thrown for a loop haha! We all ate on the ground which was really fun.

After breakfast we had more chocolate and pastries and just hung out and talked. There were about seven women and four younger girls. They all spoke Arabic but three of them knew English so they would help interpret conversations or questions. The family was so sweet and they had a lot of questions for me and vice versa. We had music on in the background the whole time and then there was a song that every liked so we got up and danced. If you know me….I was loving this!! I don’t know exactly what style of music this was – maybe Egyptian hip-hop? We danced Saudi style which is swaying back and forth and moving your hands. It’s a very peaceful/elegant way of dancing.

They served lunch which consisted of a HUGE platter of rice with lamb meat on top. I was so full by this time that I couldn’t eat too much. Everyone was so polite and kept me in the conversation by interpreting Arabic to English. After lunch ended it was around one so I was trying to feel it out to see if we had over stayed our welcome and it was time to go. I asked one of the sisters and she said, “oh no not at all!” So we talked a lot more and had a lot of fun talking about American culture and Saudi culture. Around 3:30 I heard that the boys were ready to leave so I got my Abaya back on and walked out the door to meet Brendon. We were there for 7 ½ hours and had so much to catch up on. Brendon also enjoyed his time with the men. They talked and played video games haha! The family was so welcoming and Brendon and I felt very honored to be a part of their day!

Heading Back

Well believe it or not but the Hunt's are going back! I know you all had your doubts but it's official! We got our tickets two days ago and are heading out today. We leave this afternoon and should be there by about 9 pm on the 11th. Seems like it should be a nice and easy trip but we are going during the Hajj, which means a few extra million people traveling to Saudi! Either way we are headed back and looking forward to starting up again. Love you all and would love to keep in touch!

Sa-udis in Au-dis

Ok so this is pretty cheesy but we thought is was really funny. My Saudi friend alerted us to the new internet phenomena in Saudi. Enjoy!

A New Way to Contact Us

Hello all! We now have one more reason to love Google. If you look over on the right hand side of our page you can see an icon that says "Call Me." That is a product called Google Voice and is now a  super easy way for us to stay in contact with you all. Here is a video to explain more about it -



So to leave us a message it is as easy as entering in your phone # and leave us a message. We will get it in our email and we can text back. Get this - it's all for FREE! No international phone charges or anything! So easy and such a fun way to keep in contact. If you want to see more, here is a link with some fun videos: http://www.google.com/googlevoice/about.html# Enjoy and hope to chat soon!

Summer 2010

Here are a few highlights from our summer!

Summer 2010 from Brendon Hunt on Vimeo.