Meeting Jenna {Snail Mail Collective}

Last month ago, I signed up for a blogger exchange called "The Snail Mail Collective."  This exchange was created by two great expat bloggers- Melyssa at The Nectar Collective and Chelsea over at Lost In Travels.  You can read more specifics about the exchange here.  But, the basics of the exchange are: you are paired with another participating blogger from a different part of the world, you spend a few weeks getting to know each other through emails and getting to know that person's blog, and then at the end of it, you exchange a $5 or under gift from your country that centers around the specified theme for that month. 

I was paired with Jenna from Hayya Bina (which is Arabic for "Let's Go!").  And I am SO glad that we were paired together and had the chance to get to know one another.  I really feel like I was able to learn a lot about her life and expat experience, and I'm happy to say that I really feel like I have a great new blogger friend :-)  Let me tell you a little bit about her! 

Jenna and her husband are from the US, but they moved to the United Arab Emirates about a year ago to work as teachers.  Right off the bat, I was so excited that I was paired with a fellow teacher.  Not to mention, that the UAE is a part of the world that has always intrigued me.  I loved learning more about the Emirati culture, people, and other aspects of Jenna's experiences there.  Take a look for yourself at some of my favorite posts of hers:

-I always love stalking other people's weddings, so I loved this little bit of wedding reminiscing on Jenna and her husband's third anniversary.  http://jennainabudhabi.wordpress.com/2013/07/20/three-wonderful-years/

-I found myself nodding my head in agreement during much of this post.  Jenna shares some great reflections on a favorite expat topic: the ever-elusive and changing concept of "home."
http://jennainabudhabi.wordpress.com/2013/07/07/going-home-and-leaving-home/

-While sometimes I feel like Australians do speak another language, I totally admire Jenna's experience with living in a non-English speaking country.  I'm super impressed by her efforts to learn as much Arabic as she can!  You can see a few funny language "mishaps" here:
http://jennainabudhabi.wordpress.com/2013/06/20/language-laughs/

-Jenna and her husband got to visit NEPAL!  So jealous!  Totally adding Nepal to my travel bucket list now.  Check out some of her awesome photos from their trip:
http://jennainabudhabi.wordpress.com/2013/01/18/kathmandu-my-final-post-on-nepal/

The final part of the Snail Mail Collective was to exchange small gifts from our respective countries.  Now, unfortunately, Jenna's package was a victim of how seriously SLOW the Australia Post can sometimes be.  Jenna sent her package on July 22, and I received it on August 16.  At the rate it takes mail (especially packages) to arrive sometimes, if I didn't know better I would really think that koalas were responsible for delivering mail.  No matter though, her package arrived and I was so excited when I opened it to find the sweetest letter from Jenna and the most beautiful scarf all the way from the UAE!

Jenna explained in her letter that the scarf is called a "shayla" and that it is something that women wear in the UAE to cover their hair and sometimes their face as well.  I loved that Jenna chose a black shayla to send since she mentioned that this particular color of shayla really identifies the gulf region. 

 


Love the details along the border!

I can't wait to continue to follow along with Jenna's adventures in the UAE, and I'm looking forward to wearing my beautiful shayla :-) 

*You can read about my snail mail gift to Jenna here!