Life here in Palm Meadows

Life here in Palm Meadows is pretty much picture perfect! The hotel is immaculate. The service is superb. They do make a good effort to provide American food choices, especially for the kids . They have chicken nuggets (chicken breast pieces with corn flake breading!), pasta with red sauce, grilled cheese and even hot dogs (served sliced up on a sub roll with lettuce, tomato and cucumbers!!!). Then it's mostly Indian and Asian food (very, very good here...not anything like our version of Chinese food in the U.S.)!!

I'd say that about 90 percent of the people I meet at the clubhouse are expats like us (expatriates are citizens of one country working on a work visa in another country). There is a huge influx right now of expats from Shell Oil... They are opening stations all over here. About half are US citizens and the other half a mix of Germany, UK, Singapore, Canada, Thailand, Italy just to name a few. Nearly everyone speaks English ( I feel so inept knowing only the one language... but at least I've got English nearly mastered), but you can imagine the sound of all the accents mixed together.

All the "new" expats are staying in the hotel, as we are, and searching for a house. The others already live here, in the community. Many have already been here for a year or two and still have a year or two left to go. Nearly everyone has kids the age of ours. These kids are all so used to meeting new people and making new friends, that it almost seems like we are all related. Within the first 15 minutes at the pool, a mom was offering Andrew a handful of Pringles and Taylor was with another family who ordered her a lunch with their lunch order. I think Lauren wishes she had some fake I.D., because she is acting like she is 12 years old...care taking for all the other toddlers (sound like someone else we know?). Taylor and Andrew are starting tennis lessons here next week. The get 36 hours of instruction per month for $40 US... yes, I am serious. Lauren will start swim class here as well. A few photos of the kids here at Palm Meadows...