[This is part of the series: A List of Things I Remember About Living In Saudi Arabia.]

When I lived in Saudi Arabia, I remember being evacuated during the first Gulf War.

Thankfully, I never saw the war itself.

We were on vacation in the U.S. the summer after I finished the third grade.

The summer was coming to a close, and the time had come to head back to Saudi for another school year to start.

It was August of 1990.

We boarded the international flight back to Jeddah, after a ridiculously long layover somewhere in Europe.

Customs in Saudi took a long time as usual and we looked for my dad on the other side of the gate.

When we finally found him he said: “Welcome to the war zone.”

It turns out, Kuwait was invaded by Iraq at some point while we were in the air.

One week later, finally coming off jet-lag, the company my dad worked for evacuated all women and children out of the country.

I remember the flight out from Jeddah to Frankfurt, Germany.

It seemed like half the compound was on the same flight, like a giant field-trip.

I remember listening to New Kids On The Block on my walkman.

We arrived in Germany sometime in the middle of the night.

If I remember right, it was raining outside.

Our layover was so long we got a hotel room and caught our flight to Atlanta, Georgia the next day.