Teaching and Traveling: Day 1 in Lahore...First 12 hours really.

We moved to Pakistan.

We were hired to work at Lahore American School back in December and now we are here. We have done more in the past 12 hours than we did during the first week in Hanoi. We were picked up early this morning (3:30am) by our head of school and Sultan, who we have learned will be taking care of things like internet access(#1 priority) and all other settling in needs.

We arrived at our house in Swedish Flats and were greeted by Danny and Francis, who will be our house-hold staff and driver. We hired them over Skype with the help of a former principal, best decision we have made so far.

We had unpacked in an hour, set a few things out and then got our first taste of Star World programming in three weeks! Masterchef Australia! A nap later and Francis and Danny were back at noon to take us shopping.

It is because of their help that we are so settled in already. We didn't need to learn anything about the city on our own, we stopped by LAS to get our id badges started, changed some money and went shopping. El Fatid, the store, had everything and much more. There is a lot more on offer at the stores than in Hanoi, and we were not in a store that caters to expats only like some of the specialty places in Hanoi. We had carts full of food, cooking and kitchen supplies, towels and other things we needed. 4 guys manned the check out line and had everything bagged up with precision quickness. We had paid for dishes upstairs earlier and everything was delivered to the car. Yes, LAS set us up with a car. I would have been completely confused and not trusted the system that I didn't understand. Luckily I just had to follow Francis's directions and everything went smoothly.

In many other countries stores over employee people. This was the first time I've seen over-employment work to make everything more efficient.

The beauty of having good staff: We are exhausted and pushing to stay awake til 9ish. Lunch was made for us, Danny ran out to get hangers and a hamper and pin adapters, dinner is being prepared right now, so all of my old chores/duties of the house, are no longer mine. I get to blog and start working on a computer programming course for innovativepd.com (my film course is getting credited by HOL right now!)

So I have a few first impressions/thoughts so far.

1. Lots of mustaches, seriously, everyone has one.

2. Lots of guns (mossberg 500s, AKSUs, AK47s, MP5s, FNFALs) and with bullets which were missing in Hanoi. Security at school is heavy, at our housing complex as well and at the money changers and on the roads. Everyone seemed very comfortable with their guns, upholstered and looking well used.

3. Lots of big birds. I'll snap some pictures, they are everywhere.

4. Nice wide streets full of motorbikes and trees, no honking or driving against traffic so far.

5. Very long stares and friendly interactions.

TV here is great, lots of different news, Pakistani, Arabic and other things that I don't understand. Religious channels next to channels showing Lollywood (Lahore's Bollywood) music videos that are not too innocent, home shopping and cooking shows that must be live, they sure could use some editing (watched some one use a mixer for almost a minute this morning).

Power drops out about once an hour (or every other hour) for a minute or three, that will be giving my Raspberry and hard drive set up fits. The TV signal (cable) also drops every 30 to 84 minutes for a minute.

We were welcomed by one of our vice principals this afternoon and will head into school tomorrow with her to use the internet, and get a full tour...mostly to send home an email to let everyone know that we are fine.

I hear you " Where are all the pictures, you never type this much? "

I haven't taken any yet! (Except these: