Merry Christmas Everyone!

Merry Christmas to all who read my blog. I got a laptop for Christmas and although I like it, its very confusing since its operating system is Linux Fedora. Now my Dad who is a computer programmer absolutely raves about Linux since apparently you can do quite a lot on it and its free to download from the company who makes it but my problem is that I dont know how to do things on it. I'm familiar with many Mac operating systems and Windows as well but I've never used Linux before. So this is going to take some getting used to. But the battery life so far has been wonderful so thats a plus. Eventually when I get the money I am probably also going to install Windows XP or Vista on here but that will be a while off when I actually have money plus I have more important needs in mind for when I do get money so I'll set that thought on the back burner.

Anyways I got back from Bahrain yesterday which was wonderful and if you ever get a chance to visit Bahrain guys I highly recommend you go. One of these days I'll post pictures from there on here but it could be a while. They have very friendly people and theres a lot to do there. Helped set up our Christmas tree that we got from there went to bed that night and this morning when I got up "Santa" had been here and left me some presents including this laptop. Thank you Santa now I dont need to worry about buying a computer for college. My Christmas hasnt been bad although I wish I had friends (Kelly, Melissa, Ryan...) and other family members (Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, Grandparents...) here to enjoy it with.

So I thought I'd tell you a bit about my vacation in Bahrain. We rented a car here in Saudi Arabia and we left on the 21st. Now from Riyadh to Dammam/Dharan area (where you need to go to get to the causeway bridge) its a 3-4 or more hour drive depending on traffic, how fast you drive, ect... It took us about 4 hours and I got to drive for part of the journey though for safety reasons not in the citys. For rental cars you have to get a police report and a letter from the company that sponsors you to live in Saudi that states that you are going to be taking a car across the border for use on your vacation. Once you get to the causeway you have to take the police report to the police station there before customs and immigration to get the paper stamped and they give you a customs form which you give to the people at customs. Then after passing through Saudi Customs and Immigration where Saudi stamps in your passport that you have exited the country (you do need to have an exit visa to leave the country so they check for this) and then you pass through Bahranian Customs and Immigration which is a bit faster than Saudis since they are a more free country in a way. Whats funny is occasionally you will see right after Saudi Customs and Immigration is Cars stopping and men and women getting out, women taking off their abayas (the long "coat" they have to wear in Saudi) and the women getting into the drivers seat (women are not allowed to drive in Saudi) and the men getting into the passenger seat and then speeding off towards Bahrin. Anyways after you pass through Bahrainian customs and immigration you get on a highway which will take you into Manama the Capitol City. So we found out that you could rent apartments at a much cheaper rate per day than hotels so we ended up renting a 2 bedroom apartment which was within walking distance of a lot of restaurants and whatnot. We saw the movie "Bolt" while there which was not bad, went around the city, saw a really cool Pirate show at the City Center Mall, and had a lot of fun. Then we left on the 24th and got back to Riyadh in a few hours and now I'm writing about this the next day.