The Best Laid Plans of Me and Men

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Oh dear.

I announced that I wanted to go to Riyadh, because I'm bored with this small town, bored with the hot muggy weather combined with bad air conditioning, and bored with sitting in a classroom for six hours a day waiting for one or two students to turn up.

I'm bored with everything from doors to electrical switches to mobile phones being "Made in China" and none of them working properly, I'm bored with the rancid smells that come through the vents at four in the morning, when all the local industry pours its waste products down the street drains, and I'm bored with all restauants having the same dozen dishes - all of which turn out to be chicken with rice.

So I tell the boss that I want to move to Riyadh. And he tells me that because of the idiotic bureaucracy of this country, I'm legally only allowed to work for him, because he's my sponsor.

And the next day, there are mysteriously four schools and a hospital who all need an english teacher. So I can no longer say I have nothing to do. Oh, and all those unpaid bills that have been mounting up over the last six months...are now paid. Odd that.

Of course, the real reason to move was to be with B. Who has become afraid that anyone in his family who learns that he's good friends with a british man who lives in the same city...might put two and two together, and make seventeen, which just happens to be the truth.

So he wants to spend time apart for a while, so we can get our feelings in order, and allay any possible suspicion, and chat on skype from time to time, and concentrate on our careers, etc. and so on and so forth.

I'm no good at relationships or subtexts, but I don't think I've been dumped - just put on the back burner.

Either way, I'll be okay.

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