Riyadh dusts off winter, shows signs of early summer

I was merely a 10 day-old newbie in Riyadh when the desert city sampled us with this:

The above footage reminds me of the scene from the Brendan Fraser and Rachelle Weisz mummy movie where a sandstorm with Imhotep's face pursued a plane. Some people say this one on the 10th of March 2009 is one of the worst of its kind. It's quite cinematic how the Faisaliah Tower went out of sight as it got engulfed with fine sand. If this was how it looked like from above, it was a worse situation down on the streets where vehicles were forced to either stop or move at a speed way slower than the Riyadh drivers are accustomed to (if you've had the chance to drive on the city streets, you'll know what I mean).

This morning, when I stepped out and found a lightly dusted sky and felt my nose uncomfortably twitching, I knew what I was in for. I'm just thankful that at least the visibility is better than the previous days and it's nowhere near what we had 2 years ago. Sandstorms are usually an indication that the climate is changing. So I guess it's time to raid the closet and change wardrobes.

This is King Abdullah Road today on our way to the office.

   

Random bouts of nostalgia

My body clock recognized its cue; the unmistakable chatter of the Pakistani and Indian employees of a nearby bakery and the sound of service van engines revving up for its early morning drive meant it was past 3am, which also means I ought to be sleeping soon. This isn’t the first time this happened. Once again, they are already up while I, on the other hand, am still up.

I started tossing papers, booklets and other official-looking documents (stuff I was rummaging through) into a box and then, look at what I found:

     

I sort of bolted awake from my groggy-looking self as nostalgic thoughts washed over me. Had it really been three years??! It seemed only a few pushes of the rewind button and I should be back to my recruiting and writing days with this team.

Five months is a relatively short time to get to know people well, but then again, there are people I’ve known for more than ten years and they still manage to surprise me sometimes. So don’t jump at me if I try to claim that I feel like I’ve known these people for a long while. Blame it on the mostly happy memories I’ve had with them. This team fished me out of my comfort zone of being a call center employee to actually handling responsibilities that I loved and challenged me more. I still remember that day I woke up seeing a few missed calls from an unregistered number and upon dialing back, found out that it was from a software company? At that time, all I said to myself was “What could a software company possibly want with me?”. I was nowhere near being a computer whiz. All my questions were answered when I came for an interview and eventually accepted a job offer. And the rest would be half year’s worth of daily chronicles of HR fun, stress, and other exploits.

I am hopeful, that once my vacation details aren’t as unpredictable as the weather here in Riyadh, I’d be able to fly home and check one of the boxes on my to-do list while I’m there:  Meet-up with Lawson HR team!