Come fly with me..

According to Wikipedia (never wrong..), the first fixed wing airline was formed in 1916 by a chap called George Holt Thomas.  He modified military aircraft so they could carry two - yes, two - passengers between Folkestone and Ghent, in Belgium.  It goes on to say that these were 'relief' flights but doesn't clarify who was relieved, the pilots who were responsible, the passengers or maybe both?  It wasn't until 1919 that passengers started paying for a service, £21 to go from Hendon to Paris.  Either way you look at it, it's less than 100 years since people have had the choice to complete their journeys by air and I don't think any of those pioneers would recognise the industry now.

'First class Madam?  You get to sit inside..'.

There are a plethora of little vignettes in any flight, from check in to collecting your suitcase on the carousel, but if you take the time to do some people watching and keep a smile on your face in the mini adversities that it presents, it can be entertaining.

With so many to choose from, which scenario do I write about today:  having to re-pack your suitcase at check-in as it's 2kg overweight when the guy behind is clearly heavier than you by at least 20kg (don't ask me to re-pack, ask him to run round the airport perimeter..), people rushing the gate when they've already been told it's not their time to board, the Herculean efforts to lift a carry on bag in to the overhead locker when it weighs more than a Volkswagen Beetle, people still texting when the plane is taking off even though they've been told 3 times to switch their phones off, the list goes on.  What makes me chuckle is the in-flight meal.

When you're on a plane for longer than maybe 3 hours, I fully appreciate that you may get a bit peckish and the airlines (non-budget types) are keen to show you how well they cater at 35,000 feet.  The trouble is that in an effort to outdo the competition they maybe try a little too hard.  I need to add at this juncture that we tend to fly economy class, like most people probably, so space is at a wee bit of a premium.  The airline would like to cram in as many people as possible to maximise their efficiency and profit, the public would like enough space for luxuries like breathing, moving your toes a bit, not having to link arms Auld Lang Syne style just to open a packet of pretzels.  Certainly if you are fond of your personal space, economy is not for you.

Economy, everybody inhale, now exhale, easier if we do it at the same time.

So it comes to lunch/dinner/breakfast time.  You've read the menu, decided what you'd like and the smell of freshly warmed up ready meals comes wafting down the aisle, where the flight attendants are passing out the trays.  Their trolley is completely blocking the pathway of course, which means they have the usual queue of passengers either side of them trying to get to/from the toilet.  They reach the row of seats in front of you, you're now pretty hungry and eager to see what your fare looks like but wait, the person in front ordered a vegan nut and squash roly-poly and the crew are trying to serve them a vegetarian tofu and lettuce mélange, it's tantamount to Armageddon.  Some bloke in 12B is already half way through the nut and squash offering and is now considering eating the cardboard lid instead, so it's too late to change.  I can read the steward's mind 'really, is it that different?  What do you want me to do, pop out and get another?  Serves you right for having a fussy diet..'.  But he remains calm and professional and the problem is solved with some cream crackers and a yoghurt.  It's your turn.

First class, a bit awkward if you drool or talk in your sleep, 'of course I'll respect you in the morning Brad..'.

You drop down the little table attached to the seat in front of you, which is probably in the reclined position, restricting your elbow room even more (is it not good etiquette to ask before reclining your seat?  Just asking..) and it's then you realise the food tray is the same size as the little table, so whatever you do everything has to stay on the platter unless you're fortunate and have no-one sitting next to you.  It's an impressive array of dishes, a veritable feast, a marvel of culinary expertise and spacial design as everything is arranged like a edible jigsaw with not a micron of space to spare.  

Therein lies a problem because the food is packed in containers with lids and once you've uncovered your lunch all this packaging has to be put somewhere.  So you commence the game I call 'Aircraft Eating Jenga' (pat and trademark pending) and start to skill fully move items around so that you can get at the meal one bit at a time without causing a catastrophic collapse of the pile.  Smoked salmon salad to start, followed by chicken with potatoes and veg, then a chocolate dessert, then cheese and biscuits, then bread (should I have eaten that first?  Too late.), a drink, a cup for your tea, a tiny chocolate, cutlery, a napkin, a refreshing hand wipe (lemon scented), a cuddly toy, a Teasmaid. The list goes on and I finally realise that with this mental ability and hand eye dexterity I would be quite good at doing a Rubrics Cube if I applied myself to the task. Then when something falls on the floor it's like playing Kim's Game by yourself and in an extraordinarily confined space.

Bon appétit, elbows in please.

Often it's when you're mid way through this trauma that the person sitting next to you asks if you could move so they can get out to use the facilities.  'Move?' you ask, 'I've suspended my heart beat while I do this as it was taking up too much room..'.  The relief when the attendant comes along to take away the remains is wonderful, like the feeling when you have the inset of your shoe scrunched up under the sole of your foot all day and then you finally get to sort it out.  You can now relax to watch the movie, on a screen which is closer to your eye ball that your eye lid, with the headset kindly provided by the airline (has this really been sterilised?) because for an unknown reason it is the only place on the planet where you need twin plugs on your ear wear?

Suffice to say I'm saving up my airline loyalty points for an upgrade to first class, by my reckoning I should achieve this goal in about 20 years, it's good to have a dream.

Call me Lawrence..

Peter O'Toole, the most widely known image for T.E. Lawrence - Lawrence of Arabia, my role model for our time in the Middle East.  Well you have to aim high..

I recently had the opportunity to experience flying out of our local airport using a regional low cost airline.  Nothing dramatic there, thousand of people do that every day. However it did provide an unexpected insight in to an aspect of life here.

Airport check in queues, often so long.  Why are the airlines not prepared for the number of passengers?  Do they not know how many tickets they sold or do they just think 'ah, no-one is going to turn up..'.  Or is it they know you have no choice?  You decide.. 

It's well documented that there are a lot of expatriates here, or expats as the shortened version goes. You often hear the figure of 80% when it comes to Dubai, that's right, 80% of the people that live there are expats.  Up here in the north it's considered that around 70% of the population are local and us strangers only make up the remaining 30%.  

But what or rather who do you think of as an expat? Pictures spring to mind of bloated land owners during the last days of the Raj, sipping a G & T before riding an elephant around the tea plantation to make sure the locals are putting in a full days work for their tuppence pay.  Or do you have a more up to date vision of the comfortably off businessman in Dubai, sipping G & T before touring the building sites where impoverished workers are putting the finishing touches to the latest additions to his portfolio of building investments, hang on, meet the new boss, same as the old boss?

They were probably caricatures that I used to have in mind, but not any more.  There is a huge expat community here who are not from the western Hemisphere or eastern Europe, they are from the Indian sub-continent, the Philippines and smaller countries like Nepal. They do a whole range of jobs including IT, teaching, construction, engineering, shop work, cleaning, you name it.  They are the crucial links that keep the place running and they are economic migrants, but then maybe we're all economic migrants in some respects?  The difference is that some of us could have stayed at home and still had a pretty comfortable life style, not a choice that everyone has.

Most of this cohort is male and they've left their families at home, normally for two year stints, in order to provide for them and often an extended collection of relatives.  Ironic isn't it, in order to support your family you have to move away from them?  For many from the ISC (Indian Sub Continent) there are fewer options. Work at home for them is sporadic and very poorly paid or non-existent and if they don't work, they don't eat let alone find a comfortable place to live.

So they look for work abroad, many working outdoors for long periods in the summer heat.  These men often travel en-masse sponsored by a single employer.  They share the same accommodation, eat together - it's cheaper that way, play cricket, send money home, repeat for two years.  When you see them out and about they don't have the demeanour of an under class, quite the contrary, they have the posture of quiet confidence, emitting the air of someone is getting on with a job and earning money which is making a real difference to people thousands of miles away.  This is not a single gender effort, there are countless women doing the same thing.

This is what I've observed since we moved here, but it was bought to front and centre by what I saw at the airport.  I hadn't realised it was a hub for men arriving from Bangladesh before they take connecting flights all over the region.  On my outward journey I saw a large group, some of whom were clearly excited about their journey, others more reflective but all with a palpable sense of expectation.

On the return it was a different story.  Most were pushing trolleys laden with their belongings and packages which contained everything they had accumulated over their working stay.  Unfortunately virtually everybody had more than the one item of hold baggage and they all looked heavier than 20kg.  This is partly what was causing the traffic jam at check in and therefore the huge queues that were building up behind us.  Every time one of the passengers arrived at the check in desk there ensued an animated discussion with the staff, which I can only guess was centred around the amazing amount of packages they were trying to force across the scales.  These contained, amongst other things, gifts for the loved ones at home;  sunglasses, mobile phones and perfume seemed to be popular.  'Forget gold, frankincense and myrrh, they're so anno domini.  Bring us Ray Bans, Samsung and Chanel, real or fake we don't care, no-one can tell the difference these days'..  Some were being turned away to re-pack their loads or get rid of some weighty items, which they were trying to give to their friends who were already loaded to the gunwales themselves thus moving the problem further down the queue rather than away from it altogether.

As I wasn't in a rush - I couldn't go anywhere after all - I was just an interested observer in all this, all be it one that stood out like a sore thumb.  Apart from a dozen or so Emiratis trying to get on to the flight there was me and then the entire working male population of Dakar, although that may be an exaggeration.  It was one of my fairly regular Lawrence of Arabia moments where I definitely am not blending in with my surroundings no matter how hard I try.  Just as well I wasn't rushing, because the second reason behind the painfully long check in process was becoming apparent.  Whilst there was a semblance of a queue in the lead up to the desks, it disintegrated in to a melee at the head.  Other than the amount of luggage quandary, this was also partly due to people's enthusiasm to check in with their friends, particularly when their mate had made it to the front and they were still #32 in the other line. However the handling agent's staff were made of stern stuff and promptly sent them away, but place #32 had now been taken by someone else so they had to go to the back of the line again, consternation ensued.

When driving in England I was always surprised by the ill manners of the Company Representative, often in an Audi, who would skip down a line of cars who patiently queuing for roadworks or whatever, then try and cut in with an air of innocence that didn't quite whitewash what was clearly part of a premeditated 'I'm more important than you' endeavour.  I often mused as to what would happen if people did the same thing in a supermarket queue?  You know, walk down the side of it then edge in without making eye contact.  Now I know what happens, they get told to go away.  But with my co-travellers at the airport it wasn't bad manners, it was just the way they rolled.  There was no 'my journey is more important than yours' attitude, it was just 'ooh you've left a centimetre between you and the person in front, that's just enough space for me and my luggage'..

Then again, how many other nationalities are as obsessed with a queue as the British? Have you ever been in the line for a ski lift in France or Italy or at a bus stop in Holland? It's all elbows and survival of the fittest rather than 'after you madam'.  I'm sure some Brits would rather miss the train than throw themselves in to a wall of humanity and squeeze in to such close proximity with strangers.

Since when have Polaroid made TV's anyway?  Is it actually a television or just an enormous camera where the photos come out immediately on A3 paper, imagine the disappointment..

I say 'some' because I've just seen footage from the black Friday events in the UK.  I've never seen such a collective lack of dignity or decorum, all for a cut price big TV to watch the EastEnders Christmas special on, really??  How do people allow themselves to be slavishly influenced by big store marketing and the desire for pointless upgrading of something that I'm sure they already have?  Then to top it all, you have some of the customers filming their escapades on Go Pro's or mobile phones.  I'd like to see Go Pro use that in their marketing.  Normally their posters have surfers catching a perfect ride through the blue-green tube of a huge wave.  If instead it was a bloke in a puffa jacket falling as he leaps over four stumbling, avarice motivated sale seekers to get to a pile of boxed up electrical goods I'm not sure they would be so cool?

At least the men I was observing in the airport had a good excuse for their behaviour, it's just the way it is where they're from.  What are your excuses Black Friday shoppers or I guess you don't need one, perhaps it's just your view of society these days?  As Blur once commented 'Modern Life is Rubbish', I'd rather hoped that we still followed Sting's advice ' an Englishman should walk and never run', obviously not.

Maybe that's one reason why I like living in the Emirates?  In government offices ladies don't need to queue, that's just for men, women can go straight to the front of the line and if they need to wait they do so in their own, more comfortable area.  How civilised. If you want a big TV, a man from the shop will carry it out to the car for you, no need for any Kung Fu.  If it costs £20 more so what, it's not a deal breaker and your stress levels remain at Antarctic rather than volcanic, a heart attack would definitely be more expensive.

Chill out people, 'tis the season to be jolly, you don't need a new kitchen to cook a turkey (a food you don't eat any of the other 364 days of a year..), you will be able to buy a cheap sofa in January, the Vicar of Dibley looks the same on a 42" screen than it does on a 50" whopper.  This doesn't have to be 'the best Christmas ever' it can just be a really nice Christmas, much the same as last year and probably similar to the next one.

A whiter shade of pale.

Like most blokes these days, I'm a sucker for creams and lotions that promise to keep me from cracking up under the strain of the sun and other natural phenomenon, collectively determined to reduce my body to the appearance of dried corn flakes stuck to a an over-weight skeleton.  Don't get me wrong I've not gone down the whole 'Metro-sexual' route, I can still get in and out of the bathroom in fifteen minutes, but if you look at the shelf in there it does look like a research centre for the Laboratoires Garnier.

Naturally you have the shaving gel (not foam, it has to be gel), face cream, hand lotion, foot softener, hair gel (not really a cream), after shave (again, not really a cream..), sun cream (x2, winter and summer) and toothpaste.  Not too indulgent really?  I put it down to living in the middle east and the Baz Luhrmann song from 1999 Everybody's free (to wear sunscreen).  There is no doubt that sun + wind = dryness, hence the desert, so I feel obliged to protect myself at every opportunity.

Seeing I was running low on the face cream recently, my wife kindly offered to pick some up during a shopping trip.  I'm no slave to a brand, unless the brand is called 'Special offer' or 'Buy one get one free', I'm not even convinced that these various lotions are any different to each other, so she had free reign with regard to choice.

Upon her return I was initially confused as to why she had bought a diminutive tube of toothpaste?  Not wishing to complain, as let's be honest, if someone does you favour and buys something for you, saying 'it's not the right thing?' is a quick way of wearing the entire contents on your head, with immediate effect.  So I took a closer look, '10x whitening effect', must be toothpaste?  But no, it is face cream, designed to protect and lighten the skin, an entirely new concept to me.  

It does exactly what it says on the tin..

I should mention that when I'm filling out a form and I get to the bit at the end which asks 'This is not a compulsory question, but where are you from and what colour are you?', I tick 'White European'.  Becoming whiter was not on my to do list, in fact I'm aiming for the opposite.  Let me give you an example.  When we first got here we had to produce a bundle of passport style photos for various I.D. cards.  My wife was called in to the office and asked if she could get more photos of me looking 'a bit darker', as my white face was blending in with the white background?  You see my problem?

Moreover, we visit the beach most weekends and every time we see a host of tourists trying their hardest to change their white skin to brown, it had never occurred to me that some people may want to go the other way?  I always thought that whole Michael Jackson thing was a modern myth?  I appreciate that there is a host of products available to change the colour of your hair, but your face??

But fair (get it?!) enough, whatever floats your boat, but now a moral dilemma, do I use it, throw it away or give it to someone else?  It has been said that I am careful with money, I'm paraphrasing, I think the actual words were 'tighter than a duck's chuff', so throwing it away is not an option.  Difficult to give it to someone else without seeing the sub-text of 'he thinks I'm too brown, what a racist'..  So I'm using it, which explains my current translucent state.  A friend (you know who you are JK..) suggested that I use it on only one half of my face, so we can see a before and after effect, I say friend..

Besides, I'm not in possession of a colour chart showing me the different shades of white?   How would I know if I was 10x lighter, how does anyone know?  I've been using toothpaste which promises to make my teeth whiter in 15 days, but I've never checked to see if it's worked.  So I think I'm going to have to take it on the chin (oh there's another!) and buy some ordinary cream, or soon I'm going to be rocking the Elizabeth I look.  

Besides my skin is getting confused, 'whitening during the week, sunning himself at the weekend?  Make your mind up mate!'.

In search of the elusive unicorn..

We've just got back from a visit to a zoo, which is quite a common occurrence in our household.  Our five year old is animal crazy, so a visit to see some in a zoo is always high on her 'to do' list, which leaves me with a dilemma.  I've always been a bit of a conservationist so zoos give me a conundrum.  Having said that I can't claim to have any detailed knowledge of conservation.  For example it's beyond me how a country (no names, no pack drill) can have a whole fleet of ships for whaling, purely for scientific research?  What are they researching?  Other than '101 uses for blubber' it's difficult for an ignoramus like me to comprehend the scope of their studies?  If they want to find out how whales communicate or navigate the oceans with such accuracy I would have thought it best to do that while they're alive?  Ah, my naivety..

Giraffes, nature's way of pruning the top half of a tree.

Most zoos these days will have part of their website dedicated to telling you how much of a conscience they have, how they are the guardians of the world's species and the fact that the public is admitted to have a peek at the animals under their protection is a positive educational side effect on their conservation.  I see their point, there is no doubt that since mankind came to dominate the globe its ceaseless persecution of every other species has been shocking.  So much so that the only way to preserve some animals is to take them in to protective custody as such.  We have visited some zoos that do this very well and create an environment that is as near as realistically possible to the breed's natural habitat.  I say 'as near as possible' because there is only so much you can do to twin Cheshire with the jungles of Borneo.

However we have also visited some which fell more toward the cash cow option rather than towards the preservation aspect.  Rows of small cages containing primates that would far rather be swinging from tree to tree and terrariums that are devoid of any greenery, and in fact are of lesser length than the snake they contain, are not an edifying sight.  It's more reminiscent of Stalag Luft III from The Great Escape rather than the plains of the Serengeti from Born Free.  From the point of view of the customer, I can appreciate that if you've paid to see animals it's animals you want to see, not areas of greenery with rustling leaves where they move around freely out of your line of sight.  But small cages and the absence of any aspect of a habitat that facilitates natural behaviour seems so, well I guess Victorian.  Showing us a cheetah and saying how it can run at speeds up to 75mph is great, but they forget to add that in its compound, which is 20 meters square, it can only get to 15mph.  I would far rather they built it a home in the shape of a greyhound track and feed it by attaching lunch to the electric hare, now that would pull in a crowd. Ah, there speaks the Victorian in me.

Steve McQueen escaping from Stalag Luft III circa 1945, dressed as a resident from Malibu beach and riding a bike that wasn't built until 16 years after the event.  Still, accuracy isn't everything.  (I'm being sarcastic, obviously it is..)

But there are other dilemmas that visits to the zoo bring.  Our daughter's favourite animal is a unicorn, so we get the inevitable question while we are walking round, 'where are the unicorns'?  Naturally we do what any good parent does when confronted with a tricky question, we work out which lie is going to give us the least amount of grief later (after all good parenting is all about sincerity, if you can fake that you've got it made).  For example if we respond 'they have the day off',  then she'll suggest we come back tomorrow.  So rather than tell the truth and rain on her parade, we just explain that they don't like living in zoos.  She looks at the other animals and you can tell she's thinking 'I don't blame them'..

Eid mubarak.

I was going to write a light hearted piece about shopping, but events in the news made this seem very light-hearted and trivial, so I'm changing tack.

We are fortunate to live in a very interesting place among people from a variety of nations and with an indigenous population who seem happy to share their space with the world.  I understand that there is a quid pro quo, but on the whole it seems to work, a win-win situation.  

However if an alien were to land and read the paper or watch the news they may think that the majority of the world is not like that.  They could think that most people are doing their utmost to ruin the lives of anybody who doesn't see things the same way as them and that it is the norm to act with great savagery and prejudice.  But to go away with that impression would be shame, as I believe the opposite is true.

I'm currently struggling to come up with one word to describe a group of people who are smaller than the smallest of minorities, is microcosm sufficient?  A group whose actions push them to the forefront of the news ahead of any features which concern work which is for the general good of mankind or encourages bonhomie, two areas that encapsulate the vast majority of human endeavour.

So my good news report is about a day of joy, as today is one of the Eid celebrations.  I'm not going to explain in detail the origins of the festival, mainly because I don't know much about it and I'm not about to re-cycle a load of information from Wikipedia, that you can look up yourself if you feel so inclined.  All I'm going to do is outline what I've gleaned from discussing it with people who celebrate the occasion.

In that respect it seems the same format as special days throughout the world, including time spent with family, special food and a day off work/school.  More recently it would appear that consumerism has begun to creep in but that is inevitable I guess?  If the big loser at Christmas time is the humble turkey, an animal that is left alone by the majority of people for the rest of the year yet eaten with abandon for one day only, the beast of choice over Eid is the sheep or goat, depending on who you ask.  As we live in a rural area, many local families still raise and despatch their own animals so there is still a direct connection with the source of their meal.

The turkey, in the wrong place at the wrong time.  Big, slow and tasty, it's never forgiven the Founding Fathers or whoever it was who first sought out a regular supply of meat for a celebration in North America.

A great deal of emphasis is placed on looking good at the family gathering so new clothes are an important part of the preparation.  Elaborate collections of sweets are prepared by the local stores, sometimes to be given as gifts but always it seems shared with family and friends. Street decorations are evident but subtle and there are no noisy outdoor manifestations of celebration like we see on National Day.

It seems like an understated day of private gathering, sharing and of goodwill, messages which in my opinion should be on the front page of every newspaper and on every TV station.

I finish with a profound reflection from one of my students who is of the wise old age of 12 years:

Me:  'What do you think of Eid'?

Him:  'I don't like it, lots of old ladies come round the house and talk all day.  I have no-where to sit as they take all the chairs'.

Me:  'Who are these old ladies'?

Him:  'I have no idea'..

Well everyone is entitled to their opinion.

Picking up my boots, it's all about my roots, yeah..

We've recently returned from our first trip back in a year to the countries from whence we came, France and England.  For me in particular, who had never lived outside of the UK before, it was an event that I couldn't mentally prepare myself for, it being the first time and all.

When we first came to the Middle East I had quite a strong idea of where I was moving from, a small village in West Sussex, and how I felt about the project of living abroad.  It was a sojourn, a temporary move all be it for some years perhaps, but there was not much doubt that before I knew it we would be back.  When you are doing something completely new and unknown you can only guess as to how it's going to make you feel or act.  Time spent playing out your new life can quickly change your point of view.

East Preston, a jolly nice place.

The first thought provoking moments about my roots came when we met new people out here, who invariably were from different parts of the world and all four corners of the UK, or if you're reading this after the Scottish referendum, perhaps all three corners.  I found myself explaining where our previous home was as no-one has ever heard of the village, then describing life there in a nutshell.  However it soon dawned on me that I wasn't satisfied with that answer.  It was where I was from most recently but I wasn't born there.  I didn't consider myself an adopted son of the county nor an outsider, it just happened to be where I had ended up living and a very pleasant place it is too.

It dawned on me that when you consider where you're from the only thing you have absolutely no choice in is where you are born, although there are probably not many five year olds who get to choose either.  So my answer changed to the city where it all started for me, 'I'm from London', if pushed I could list the places where I've lived since leaving there, but that's the essential truth.  It's also an answer that needs less explanation as to its' geographical location.  If further detail was required, I could reveal that I'd lived in the cheapest place on a Monopoly board, thanks Parker Bros., still traumatised by that.

Luv a duck, it's Laaandon, cor blimey guv'nor.  As Dick Van Dyke may have said..

The next epiphany (are you allowed more than one?) was when we were back in England and people would ask 'how does it feel to be back home'?  My first thought was 'I'll need to let you know when I'm back there'.  Sub-consciously our life and existence here has become more than just a base for a couple of years, it's actually where we call 'home'.  Strange to think when you consider that people of my age are often beginning to plan for their retirement and create an environment that they hope to settle in to ad infinitum. But this affinity to what will always be a non-permanent place to live doesn't make me feel insecure.  I'm happy that I still feel comfortable in East Preston as well as a small village in France where my in-law family live.  Instead of feeling isolated my thoughts are more of how lucky we are to have the opportunity of spending our time in several places, although obviously not at the same time.

Ultimately what this has re-enforced in me is a belief that life is not so much about the place where you reside at a given time but more about the people you're spending your time with, at work or on holiday.  If you're fortunate to have support from people who care about you and who you care about, location is just a formality.  I would never have really appreciated that without experiencing the adventure we've enjoyed for the last year.

Vive la difference..

School's out...

for summer, as the song goes, and with it also goes our first year (ten months to be precise, I'm nothing if not a pedant..)  of working and living in the UAE.  It has been a wonderful experience and I'm going to try and summarise how I feel about the whole thing.

I guess the best place to start is at the beginning and that would be the weeks we had in between being offered the job and leaving the UK.  It was hectic, what with making sure all of our affairs in England were sorted out and with the preparations we had to make for our arrival here.  Virtually every logistical task was a first for us so the learning curve was incredible, we had to keep reminding ourselves that we were choosing to do this, we weren't being deported.

There were three standout events during that period:  1.  Our farewell party where many of our friends and family came to say their goodbyes.  2.  The day we say the 21 boxes containing our shipped goods get swallowed up in to a van and drive off.  3.  The trip to the airport, not quite the same feeling as going on holiday! Then the arrival at Dubai airport, 2am and hot as a rattlesnake's bum, as the saying goes.  However we soon met our group and they all seemed to be on their first visit to RAK too so we felt in good company.

Then came the acclimatisation both  to the environment and the culture.  Our collection of cards started:  health card, I.D. card, driving licence, car registration card, hospital number card, health insurance card, Carrefour loyalty card, bank cards, I'm still not sure we have a full set?  As the primary person in this adventure it fell upon my wife to get her admin first before she could facilitate mine.  Her joy at signing the letter allowing/authorising me to have a driving licence will never diminish.

So what have been the highlights?  Firstly the people we have met, they are an amazing bunch and we have learned so much about their backgrounds and home countries, interesting information that you can only get by spending time with indigenous people.  The fact seems to be that whilst people's experiences and up-bringing is so different, their hopes and expectations tend to be the same.

Our wish list of things to see and do in the first year has been pretty much met.  Dolphin watching, dune bashing, going up the Burj Khalifa, marveling at the Sheikh Zayed Mosque, picnics in the mountains, visiting deserted ghost-towns, camel riding, jet-skiing, the list goes on.  And there is more we hope to do or re-visit next year!

What are the downsides?  It's not nice living far away from your family and close friends, but modern communication takes the sting out of it and we've been fortunate in having some visitors, with hopefully more in the future.

I guess that doing this sort of thing is not for everyone, there is not a lot of job security in this line of work as the contracts tend to be for two years.  so if you're looking for work that takes you up to your pension in yen years time this probably isn't for you.  However it does tick the box that says 'have an adventure' along with those that read 'experience a different culture' and 'push out the envelope of your comfort zone', and that seems to suit us.

Life in a warm climate.

This entry is aimed at my Expat Blog readers or anyone else thinking of making the move to work out here, where it can get warm from time to time.

I know from my own experience the conversations that you'll be having with your partner about whether it's a good idea to try expat life and if so, where do you want to go?  The Middle East is very tempting as it has quite a few opportunities for work, is sufficiently far away to make it intriguing and has a whole different culture to northern Europe.  But the question will arise about how you feel about living in a place where it is often 40C and higher for extended periods of time, especially if you have young children?  Certainly the first thing a lot of people said to us when we told them we were moving here was 'how are you going to cope with the heat?!'.

Most teachers who come to work here tend to arrive at the end of August, a warm time of year.  I can still remember leaving the airport having been in air-conditioned environments for all of that day (airport - aircraft - airport) and walking in to the sultry night air.  It was hot and humid and we were tired, not quite an in at the deep end experience but certainly enough of a difference to make you think!

The next day we wanted to go to the supermarket, a tempting three hundred meters away.  Not worth taking a taxi for that sort of trip, so as advised by the school we put on our hats & sun cream, took some water (overkill we thought - at the time) and off we went.  It is a cliché but opening the doors from the lobby to the outside can only be described as opening the doors to a very hot (very..) oven.  However instead of getting the heated draft on your arms you got it everywhere, and all at once.  Putting our best foot forward we walked round the building to head off for the mall.  So now someone had switched the fan on in the oven..  There was a wind which made the heat even more intense, no wind chill factor here, just a wind heat effect.  Suddenly the three hundred meters looked like three miles.  I had images of the three of us crawling up a sand dune in a Beau Geste moment to be confronted with a mirage depicting an oasis, or at least the refrigerated section of the supermarket.

At last, the shopping mall, but will they have Marmite...?

So you learn from your mistakes.  People have been living in this environment since time immemorial so clearly you can adapt, but if you've been bought up in a colder climate it takes a bit longer.  Suffice to say whoever invented air conditioning becomes your favourite inventor of all time, for me replacing the man/woman who invented the Bounty bar, now that was genius.  You become an a/c expert overnight, likewise you seek shade wherever you can, especially when parking the car.  Once you leave the vehicle you move like an enthusiastic frog, leaping from shady area to shady area until you can find the next artificially cooled environment.

There is an urban myth at work that someone once left some sunglasses in the specially designed cubby hole in her car, which unfortunately was above the interior mirror.  Upon returning after a day of graft, she found they had melted.  True or false no-one knows, but you'd easily believe it could happen.  You wouldn't believe how quickly cars get incredibly hot once the air conditioning is turned off, hence the habit of leaving the engine running while the vehicle is getting fueled up.  It's a bit unnerving the first time you see it happening but you get used to it and besides, the driver is on the phone so he could easily hang up and call the fire brigade if necessary..

'So how did they survive before electricity?' I hear you ask?  Well a visit to the Ras al Khaimah museum gives you all the answers you need (AED5 entry, open every day except Friday, I love museums..)  

See how the buildings have towers on the roof, which is in effect a big chimney, designed to catch the wind and circulate it in to the living quarters.  They use words like circulate and cool but trust me, there is not always much air to circulate and it ain't cool.  I'm sure these towers were better than nothing and I guess that's enough if it's all that's available.  The walls were also incredibly thick, a type of early cavity insulation, but without the cavity.


You do get used to the temperature and it does have it's benefits.  You don't have to worry about planning a trip to the beach next weekend and then see your plans ruined by inclement weather.  We've been here for nine months and I've only once worn a jumper or any other form of second layer, and that instance was in an evening on the golf course.  And there is virtually no danger of getting rickets.

So I think it's fair to say that the weather is not as big an issue as we maybe feared and the positives definitely outweigh the negatives.  Having written my blog for the week, we are now off to the pool, as if to prove the point..

'Hey Johnny, what are you rebelling against?', 'Whadda you got?' - Marlon Brando, The Wild One, 1953

One of the things I realised while growing up in England was that every generation needs to rebel against something, normally the status quo, as represented by their parents and elders.  Although that may be a relatively recent phenomenon, starting perhaps after the second world war?  Certainly the iconic images of rebellious youngsters seem to be from that era,  Marlon Brando and James Dean from the silver screen and musicians such as Bill Hayley, Elvis and Cliff Richard (yes, he was considered dangerous at the time..) from the music scene. I put it down to the youth of the day wanting to make their own mark, maybe prove that they are individuals and not just replicas of their parents.  I'm not a social historian so can only apologise if this trait was going on before the 1950s.  It's just that I associate teenage rebellion with Marlon Brando and not someone from the Victorian or any other earlier age, although maybe there was a cohort of youngsters going out without top hats on to 'stick it to the man.'?

Marlon Brando, this was in his later bus driving days judging by the hat..



The obvious manifestation of independence for teenagers is in their clothing.  In my day they would wear anything but the same clothes as their parents, often influenced by the fashion in popular musicians at the time.  For my generation it was the like of David Bowie and Marc Bolan, followed by punk I guess.  I still remember when an older lad came to school with a Bowie-esque lightening strike across his face and another drawn in chalk across the back of his blazer.  You knew he was going to get in a lot of bother for these statements but you also had to acknowledge his chutzpah in expressing his rebelliousness.

No such demonstrations here.  We had a 'dress down' day last week in support of the #bringbackourgirls campaign, a worthy cause if there ever was one.  As always with these special days, some students throw themselves in to the theme, which is to wear red in this case, while others prefer not to participate, as is their right.  But there is a also a large contingent who take the opportunity to wear the clothes of their choice, neither school uniform nor the advised dress down alternative.  For boys it is the traditional white kandora (also available in other colours, notably cream and grey) and maybe a keffiya on their head to finish off the traditional attire.  For girls it's the abaya black robe and shayla on their head, again very traditional.  

As you're gathering, they like to dress the same as their parents, so to the untrained eye it looks like a crowd of diminutive adults coming in to school rather than teenagers.  Being a positive sort of bloke I put this down to them respecting their elders and wanting to carry on the traditions of the past, but can you imagine the same thing happening in the UK on Comic Relief day, 'dress down for £1'?  You'd have the boys rocking up sporting jeans from M&S and a nice comfortable cardigan, the girls in some leggings from Peacocks and an ill fitting fleece with a border collie motif.  Please note these images are from the last time I was in the UK and had time to observe fellow Brits, maybe the parental fashion has changed in the last year?

The closest I came to having an image of any sort was when my friends and I rode motorbikes.  We were all leather jackets and black leather boots on machines with exhaust systems that would make windows fall out at a hundred yards, no consideration for anyone else, just the desire to make your bike sound quicker than it was.  During the late 70's early 80's there was a mod revival, no doubt encouraged by The Jam and other two tone bands.  They were mods and where you have mods you have to have rockers, it's a yin & yang thing.  By default we were rockers, only because we rode motorbikes and not scooters and wore leather rather than parkas.  I couldn't have picked Gene Vincent out of a police line up if my leather jacket had depended on it.

For future reference, this is Gene Vincent.
In those days we went to the cinema a lot, there was no multi channel TV or internet, so you went out with your mates instead, everyone under the age of thirty is now confused, 'what do you mean, no internet.?!'.  I think I'm right in saying the three screen cinema in Worthing, The Odeon,  was knocked down to make way for Laura Ashley, not the Laura Ashley you understand but one of her shops.  We were left with the Dome Picturedrome, a fabulous building dating back to the dawn of moving pictures.  So one weekend my mate and I went to see the film of the week, apparently all about mods and rockers, Quadrophenia.  We arrived late so the Pearl and Dean adverts had already started, the place was dark, we took our seats and removed our leather jackets.

It transpires the film was all about the mods, the only time rockers made an appearance was in a mass fight on Brighton beach.  After it finished the lights went up and we prepared to leave.  However it now appeared that we were the only 'rockers' in the place, everyone else was wearing Fred Perry attire and a parka, oh dear..  We sensibly stayed seated until everyone else had left then put on our leather jackets and left, as inconspicuously as we could.

Mods, looking well moody as they say in London.

Whilst writing this my attention has been drawn to the mini-heatwave that the UK is about to experience, with, and I quote 'a sweltering 24C'.  I have no wish to be a pedant, and I do not want to upset my journalist niece, but I do think the press are once again using hyperbole to exaggerate a modest rise in temperature.  In the Cambridge Dictionary swelter is: 'to feel very hot'.  Now I'm not sure 24C is that hot?!  I guess the headline 'Britain to get a bit warmer for a short time' is simply not eye catching enough, but out here nothing under 50C gets a mention and even then it would need to be a slow news day.  So good luck everyone with your mini heatwave, don't forget your suncream, and it's probably OK to take off the cardigans and border collie motif fleeces, at least around mid-day.

Hit the road Jack.

Once again I doff my cap to Tim Berners-Lee, thanks to whom we can read the abridged internet version of what was our local paper in the UK, the Littlehampton Gazette.  Amongst the usual headlines of 'multiple electric shopper cart pile up in high street' and 'cat found in take away freezer', it was refreshing to see that local politicians are once again lobbying the government to find a solution to the A27 between Worthing and Arundel.  Whilst I admit that at first glance this will be of no interest to anyone who doesn't live or pass through West Sussex, bear with me, I have more international offerings later and I do believe that the traffic problems there are the same as those everywhere else, it's the solutions that change.

So look at the map.  Worthing hugs the South-East coast of England twixt Brighton and Portsmouth, but not quite making it on to this cartography.  Motorways in that region tend to service the needs of London and everywhere else has to put up with it.  So you arrive at Dover and want to get to Brighton.  Head along the coast hugging A259 obviously, past Hastings, Eastbourne and on to Brighton.  That's a good plan, just so long as you have a couple of days to do the 80 miles or so, due to the mix of single and dual carriageway.  Plan B is to take the motorways, the first heading towards London, the second heading away from it towards Brighton, a longer but ultimately quicker route.  Having arrived through one circuitous route, you now want to continue West to Portsmouth, bonne chance.

Again no motorway connects Brighton and all points West.  So you have a mixture of dual and single carriageway, which works like a series of bottlenecks, speed up, slow down, speed up, slow down.  Then in rush hours, Saturdays, bank holidays, summer time periods, speed up, stop, repeat until exasperated.  When we first moved to Worthing in '72, that's 1972 not 1872 they were talking about building bypasses to make the whole route dual carriageway, and they are still talking, and talking, and talking...

As always there are two options, the route through the town and the route through the countryside.  The former means compulsory purchase of properties and re-routing of urban throughways, the countryside route involves digging up the green and pleasant land, including voles, butterflies, rabid and tuberculosis ridden Badgers etc.  Naturally there are people who object to one or the other, or both.  A mantra and truism of the anti countryside route campaign is that once a by-pass is built, the green bit in-between the new road and the town is then infilled by houses and supermarkets.  This does give the impression that planners do a squiggle then colour in the gaps in Tesco blue or Asda green, which is what children used to consider entertaining before the ipad came along.  See, I told you four years of doing a degree in planning was unnecessary.

The last plans for the A27 were ditched following a government review of road projects, but rest assured millions, in fact many millions of pounds had been spent over the forty years or so of thinking about it, probably enough to build a few miles of road.  But it seems that the scheme is being resurrected, and I am sure it will be thoroughly researched, then consigned to the file marked 'bin'.  In the meantime the traffic queues, fuel is burned, tempers fray and the environment suffers.  But even now I hear locals saying 'but if you sort out Worthing and Arundel, what happens when you get to Chichester', you get stuck again is the answer..

No such problem in the Middle East, where the space vs people ratio favours a speedy decision.  Take a ruler (the drawing type, not a monarch), draw a line, build the road.  Need three lanes?  Not a problem, build seven so we have some spare capacity.  Which is why when you drive to Abu Dhabi from Dubai on the 611 you are often the only car on the road, for mile, after mile, after mile, and that's during the day.  Sure there is congestion down town but forty years ago, when the A27 was being considered for expansion, Dubai was a small town, 'Baby take a look at me now'..  Is our problem at home caused by politicians who make every decision with an eye on the ballot box?  If so there is not much danger in one being made before the next election, methinks?

I have a new addition to my list of 'Things I wished I'd been told beforehand as it would have avoided me getting stressed', I must think of a punchier title..  We needed to send a passport to the UK for renewal however the old one had a residence visa in it.  Now, losing official paperwork like that is a real headache so suffice to say I was on tenterhooks for the whole time it was in transit lest it got lost.  We also put in a special request saying we needed the old one back as it contained the visa, surely a common situation?

Six nail biting weeks later, the new one arrives, all on it's lonesome, where is the old one with the visa?!  Naturally we both looked at each other and sighed, envisioning numerous phone calls.  You see calling a local rate number from the UK is not a big deal, doing it from a mobile out here is slightly more expensive, especially when you're on hold for long periods.  Then we were told by numerous people 'oh don't worry, they always send them back separately, it'll turn up', and it did, woo hoo!  But why don't the Passport Office tell you that on their website?  I searched it again today and there is no reference to the practice at all?  So you heard it here first, 'don't panic Captain Manwaring'..

Footnote:  although when the roads are empty, it does encourage 'creative' driving...

Moi, je ne regrette rien..

We are now in our third and final term of the academic year so there is a lot of planning going on for the next one, and reflection of what we newbies have been through in the 8 months since we arrived.  When we first announced our intentions of working abroad, my brother said I should write a blog for two reasons:  so we could reflect on what we had been through - you forget so much, and to help other people going through the same experience.  I know the first aspect has been very valuable, other people need to decide on the second.

I recently went back to Dubai airport for the first time since last August and it was a strange feeling, deja vue in a way.  I have memories of coming through to the arrival 'meet and greet' area after our eleven hour journey, during which the whole experience seemed surreal.  We had rented our house out, got rid of the majority of our worldly goods, given up our jobs, sold our cars, burnt a lot of bridges, but on the flight you are in limbo.  If you turned back you had a huge headache of what to do next, but by carrying on you had a job offer and the opportunity of a real adventure.  We know of only one couple who went with the first option.  They arrived and within 24 hours they were on their way back.

If you're thinking of working abroad in the education sector, there are certain concepts that you have to get used to.  When you're buying a home or changing job in your own country you have time to research the market, check out locations, see what the schools are like, make an informed decision.  This can take months or years.  But when you decide to come overseas you often don't have the opportunity to do that level of investigation.  A lot of international job offers give you only 24 hours to decide on acceptance or refusal and if you're looking in a general area i.e. the Middle East, you probably haven't visited every country or city.  If you go to a recruitment fair it's the same, you could be interviewed by three schools in three different parts of the world, and if they offer you a position you have to let them know the following day.

So thank you Tim Berners-Lee, the modest and unassuming inventor of the internet!  You get an offer, spend about 12 hours through the night researching the place, then make a decision, that's it!  Before you know it you're on a flight thinking:  what's the flat going to be like? Am I going to get on with my colleagues?  Can I cope with the change of lifestyle?  If you have a child you're multiplying these questions by a factor of 10!  We had never visited the Middle East at all so the unknown was far greater than the known for us.  But thems the breaks, if you want to make the omelet, you have to break the eggs.

I started to think about a pro & pro list, things that I like about here and things that I miss about England/France. 

1.  If you shop here when you shopped at home the supermarkets and malls are virtually empty.  

This picture was taken at our local Spinneys (think Waitrose) at mid-day on a Friday, our equivalent of a European Saturday.  The shop was similarly empty as was Marks & Spencer, where we were the only customers in the entire shop.  Compare and contrast with 10pm on a Friday night when these places are absolutely heaving, comparable to the last weekend before Christmas at home, when you can't get in the car park!  I'm also pretty used to having someone put fuel in the car for me and pack my bags at the supermarket.

2.  We miss being able to easily buy things off the internet, especially Tesco direct! 

We were used to having our friendly Tesco delivery team rock up at the door with our groceries, having to go and get them each week is a chore!  That's the price you pay for not having an address!

3.  Come to the UAE, meet the world!

In my opinion, when you travel you meet amazing people from all over the world.  When you live and work amongst a wide variety of people it definitely broadens your horizons and gives you an insight in to how the other half live, without all the negativity you see on the news.  I also think this is a marvelous opportunity for our daughter to grow up with an understanding and appreciation of different cultures rather than with preconceptions and mistrust.

4.  Home thoughts from abroad.

Naturally there are times when you miss the family and friends that you've left behind, but Skype is a fantastic thing!  We've been fortunate to have several visitors since we've been here and our return tickets are booked for a trip in the summer break.

5.  If you don't like the scenery, change it..

One of the reasons we came here was for the adventure, to see new places and try different things.  The desert is a magical place, quiet and mystical with camels and scrub trees dotted on an otherwise featureless landscape.  The mountains are magnificent, rugged and stratified, telling the story of how they were formed.  But we do miss the greenery of home!  You end up watching Downton Abbey just to remind you what the countryside looks like!

6.  You are what you eat..

Let's face it supermarkets are pretty much the same the world over and most food is available anywhere.  However I do miss:  fish and chips, a good roast and a hand drawn pint of beer, not all at the same time though..