Category Archives: Dubai

Roll up! Roll up! To the Grand Tombola

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“You don’t know what a tombola is, do you?” I was perhaps being a little unfair when I told DH about the crazily popular stall I’d been assigned to for the school’s Spring Fair. DH is American, and a tombola is a type of raffle well known in the UK.

“A Stromboli?” He raised an eyebrow at me.

I shook my head and raised an eyebrow back. His computer screen was reflected in the window behind him and I could see he was googling it.

“Ah, a tombola!” he said, cracking an even wider smile as he stopped thinking about pizza turnovers and started imagining glamour girls drawing tickets from a revolving drum. Even the boys were suddenly interested, if only because it dawned on them that if mummy was helping on the stall, they might actually win something.

Our stall reminded me of the conveyor belt of prizes in The Generation Game

Our stall reminded me of the conveyor belt of prizes in The Generation Game

As it turned out, everyone who bought a ticket won a prize. Not that I can remember exactly what the gifts were – they were literally flying from the shelves behind us, into the braying crowd of parents and kids waving cash at us and literally clamouring for a turn.

And it’s amazing how funny people can be when there are decent prizes like power tools, cameras and household goods up for grabs. Among the sea of expectant faces was the woman who looked me in the eye and said in a hushed tone, “I really don’t want that prize – can I draw again?” And the boy who asked for a refund when I handed him a Costa Coffee mug (poor kid, his face did drop; it was his fourth go and there were some great toys).

My frenetic but fun stint on the Grand Tombola was passing, quite literally, in a blur of money and prize exchanges, when suddenly I looked up and my own sons were eagerly proffering 20 dirham notes DH had given them. I feared they’d win the pink pencil case. Or cry if they didn’t get the helicopter, robot, or bow and arrow set.

First go … a voucher for a cup of coffee.

Second go … another white envelope. I gave it to DH to open. I knew there was a voucher of some kind inside.

I could feel the suspense mounting.

“Vitamins!” announced DH. “A hundred dirhams of vitamins!”

Better luck next time, boys! All for a good cause.

The childless 20-something with no clue about motherhood

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We all know her (and many of us, including myself, used to be a bit like her). I came across her last week, sitting at a table right by me in a small café.

I was doing some work. She was chatting to her friend, leaning towards her like a flower bent by a breeze. She was lovely: Jasper Conran top, satin skirt and soft leather boots. She had clear, peachy skin, glossy auburn hair and thin, crescent-shaped eyebrows.

When, just say, she discovers that having a baby is like starting a demanding new job, beginning a passionate love affair and suddenly mixing with people who speak a different language – all at the same time – she might change her tune!

When, just say, she discovers that having a baby is like starting a demanding new job, beginning a passionate love affair and suddenly mixing with people who speak a different language – all at the same time – she might change her tune!

As she talked, she lifted her coffee up with a freshly manicured hand; she had red nails and I could imagine her in a bar, tapping a cigarette over an ashtray, then pursing her pouty lips around it.

I really didn’t want to hear their conversation, but they had a lot to say to each other, loudly. They’d barely finished one sentence before they were tumbling over the next.

They were talking about mothers.

“If you have children, you should look after them yourself,” she said. Fair dues. They’d covered trips to Sri Lanka, plans for the weekend, a new line of makeup; and after exhausting these topics were conspiratorially discussing a mother they’d met who had hired help.

It was the tone that caught my attention: a little bit sneering. I could see the word LAZY captured in a bubble above her head. Why can’t mothers do it ALL themselves?

I was tempted to give her a look (and maybe I did!), but realised that in her childless state, she’d have no clue what it’s like to find yourself far from home, with a new baby barnacled to your boob, a job to go back to, 20km school runs, half as much sleep as you used to get, a household to manage and someone judging whether it’s right or wrong to hire a nanny.

One day, she’ll find out!

Get on yer bike – and feed the ducks! Who knew?

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Screen Shot 2015-01-18 at 16.33.34The UAE is not a place you’d associate with cycle paths and Boris Bikes. After all, it’s scary enough on the roads in a great big car, let alone on a bicycle (other than the odd suicidal cyclist, you don’t see people biking to work).

But there’s a cycling community here in Dubai that’s alive and … pedaling furiously, their muscly legs pumping, saddles fitted to their bums, backs arched like a bridge and pointy heads thrust forward as they sail along the emirate’s fantastic car-free cycle tracks (Click here for locations).

Last weekend the Circles family joined them – and when I say join them, we had the boys in tow, so our ride was more about taking in the scenery on a gorgeous Friday afternoon, rather than eating up the miles at speed like the finely-honed biking aficionados do.

(Counting one or two of these fitness fanatics among my friends, I can tell you that they go out at 6 in the morning during the hotter months, when apparently there’s a breeze that makes cycling in summer possible.)

Cycle Safe organises rides on Friday mornings for beginners and advanced cyclists. There's also the popular Bab Al Shams coffee run on Saturday mornings

Cycle Safe organises rides on Friday mornings for beginners and advanced cyclists. There’s also the popular Bab Al Shams coffee run on Saturday mornings

The backstory behind the Al Qudra cycle path is that the Sheikh one day drove past a pack of cycling enthusiasts making their way up Al Qudra road – riding in a peloton to slipstream each other and, I should imagine, keep safe from the crazy motorists. Within a few weeks, work had started on two purpose-built, cycle paths.

Entered under a huge bicycle-themed circular structure, the first track stretches 18km, and the second is a loop of about 50km, passing through sand dunes and by the Bab Al Shams Hotel, where you can always stop for a coffee. If you’re lucky you’ll spot the Arabian Oryx now brave enough to get close to the track.

I’d been wanting to go for a ride for ages, but kept falling at the first hurdle: getting the kids’ bikes in the car. Then, with DH home last weekend, I tentatively suggested he do all the heavy lifting, and off we went, hiring bikes for ourselves at the Trek store, about 20 minutes beyond Arabian Ranches (calling to book is advised).

As I said, we weren’t in it for the long-distance training, so we just pootled along happily. Well, mostly. There was whining (what would a cycle ride with the kids be without it?); and Son1 grumpily announced ‘mission quit’ on the way back, preferring to walk. But it’s really enjoyable out there – the track is smooth, the shifting dunes are beautiful, and, above all, the expansive desert is incredibly tranquil.

Just beware if you take children along. You could almost liken the track to the cycling world’s version of Germany’s autobahn: a cleverly engineered surface; highly efficient, streamlined carbon-light bikes; and no speed limit. I must have yelled myself hoarse telling my zig-zagging youngest to keep to the right.

Near the bike store, you’ll also find this … a duck pond! Filled with all kinds of bird life, from mallards to black swans. Perhaps the UAE desert’s best-kept and most surprising secret. Rumour has it that it’s the start of a safari park.

How, or why, I have no idea, but I love this spot!

How, or why, I have no idea, but I love this spot!

Rain scrooge – yep, that’s me!

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I’m well aware there are lots of people in Dubai who love it when it rains – and I really do hope they enjoy the annual downpour. But I’m beginning to wonder if these people have actually been out in the rain – or afterwards, when the floods are knee deep.

Given that rain is a fairly rare event in our patch of desert (maybe a few times a year), I can’t resist doing a quick pictorial on the blog, of the almost biblical event that is a decent rain-shower and the apocalyptic aftermath of a blustery and thundery night.

While we slept … ET phone home!

Lightning sliced the sky, and thunder rolled. Pic courtesy of futureofdubai.com

Lightning sliced the sky, and thunder rolled. Pic courtesy of futureofdubai.com

If I’d looked on Facebook before leaving the house, I might have seen this photo, forewarning of what lay ahead at the roundabout on the school run … (rain, meh!)

Up to the doors in places - and even posh cars get stuck. This is a Rolls-Royce! Pic courtesy of Dubai 92, Catboy & Geordiebird

Up to the doors in places – and even posh cars get stranded. This is a Rolls-Royce! Pic courtesy of Dubai 92, Catboy & Geordiebird

Left: But at least while stuck for an hour-and-a-half on the way to school, there was lots to look at. Right: And a cautionary tale for anyone thinking about attempting to skip the backed-up patient traffic!

Left: But at least while stuck for an hour-and-a-half on the way to school, there’s lots to look at. Right: And a cautionary tale for anyone thinking about attempting to skip the backed-up patient traffic!

Finally through the traffic, we find ourselves on the road to school, which looks like a canal in places …

Might look like a canal, but it is a road (I begin to wonder if we'll make it)

I begin to wonder if we’ll make it

Left: The ampitheatre at school: “Look Mummy! It’s a duck pond!” Right: Vacuuming starts all around the city-with-no-drains

Left: The ampitheatre at school: “Look Mummy! It’s a duck pond!” Right: Vacuuming starts all around the city-with-no-drains

And the final hurdle … waves outside work! If I’d known, I’d have borrowed a yacht.

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But just to prove I’m not a complete rain scrooge, and that there is a silver lining in every cloud … this was the view outside my office window for all of two minutes:

Where's the gold? (I believe it's in a vending machine at the Madinat)

Where’s the gold? (I believe it’s in a vending machine at the Madinat)

So how was your weekend?

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It’s something you don’t expect to hear when you ask someone about their weekend. But with my son attending a school where at least 60 per cent of the students come from airline families (who get super cheap tickets), I’ve learned not to bat an eyelid when mothers tell me about what they’ve been up to.

“Did you have a good weekend?” I asked a fellow mum.

“Yes … Actually we went to Johannesburg.”

Anyone else want to tell me about their Christmas in Lapland?

Anyone else want to tell me about their Christmas in Lapland?

“Really, just for the weekend?” I have to admit I was impressed – the South African city is a good 8 hours’ flying time from here, and that doesn’t include all the getting to and from the airport shenanigans.

“We had 24 hours there. Yesterday morning, we were in the lion park! The children loved it, especially as they’re doing Africa in class at the moment.”

“An amazing field trip!” I agreed. I’d just been looking at all the photos of big animals and African plains on the classroom wall.

“It was really last minute – my husband was flying there, and I woke up and thought ‘Why aren’t we going too?’ Half an hour later, we were on our way to the airport.”

“It’s not like me at all,” she added. “I usually plan everything far in advance.”

“Well good for you,” I said, as we were spat out the school gates – and I really meant it.

Sometimes you just have to grab life by the horns.

Silent Sunday: The January sales

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You know the Dubai Shopping Festival has started when … you come across a gold Lamborghini in the window of a clothes shop!

You know the Dubai Shopping Festival has started when … you come across a gold Lamborghini in the window of a clothes store!

Why dress-up days should be outlawed

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First, let me just say that Son2 loves to dress up, and finds it a big thrill to go to school in anything other than his navy-blue shorts and pinstriped, button-up shirt. In his closet, you’ll find plenty of costumes depicting numerous genres, from spiderboy to alien, vampire and terrorist. Yes, you read that correctly: he came downstairs this weekend looking like this:

Erm, DH: What was Santa thinking?

Erm, DH: What was Santa thinking?

But every time the school announces a special theme day, I have to admit my heart sinks a little bit. I can’t sew; if you handed me a piece of fabric I’d have no idea what to do with it; and the prop that would accessorise an outfit perfectly is never just lying around the house. It’s usually buried at the bottom of a cupboard, lost, broken or still in the shop.

And I’ve come to realise that this is a universal problem: there’s my good friend in London who had to come up with “a simple homemade fez” – with a tassel. (“We want the tassels to swirl when the children dance,” the teacher said.) Then there’s the kind commenters on my blog who’ve dressed their child up as a triangle and seriously considered crocheting a pilot’s hat after trawling the mall and finding nothing.

Oh yes, we mums do try when faced with these challenges – because you just know that there will be crafty mothers who got straight onto Pinterest. Not to mention that on, say, Book Character Day, school will be invaded by a mini fictional force made up of Harry Potter, Dr. Seuss, Angelina Ballerina and other favourite storybook characters. The look on your child’s face if their outfit is a laughing stock is enough to make any otherwise sane mum start cutting up the curtains.

I’ve even heard of dads having to get in on the act too, in some cases taking over as costume-deviser extraordinaire, and sewing! Another friend tells me her DH is the go-to person for dress-up days; for an Easter Bonnet parade, he constructed a spring hat with a giant carrot protruding from the top, which we were all still talking about the next year – a pilot by profession, creative genius in his spare time.

In the Circles household, given enough notice, I’m able to dispatch DH to a costume shop in New York on one of his trips here (yes, we cheat, big time!); and he came up trumps last term, with a ghoulish-grey Area 51 costume and mask for the day aliens landed on the playing field at Son2’s school.

The news that today would be African Explorer Day came a week ago, just as the reality of getting back to the grind was hitting, and saw me arguing vehemently with Son2 at 7 this morning over why he couldn’t take that stonking big nerf gun pictured above into class (huntsman, explorer, it was all the same to him).

As we got out of the car, Son2 – donned in hurriedly assembled safari-type garb and wearing binoculars round his neck – got cold feet. No-one was in costume! Mum must have got it wrong! (I hadn’t, it was only for his year). I did wonder for a moment – until, at the gate, we saw a stressed-looking mum with a teary, uniform-clad child, being asked by a teacher if they had anything at home resembling the mishmash my son was wearing. As she headed off (upset boy in tow) to figure it out, I ’m sure she must have wished dress-up days could be outlawed too.

Work-to-rule Santa

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Where would Christmas be without a repeat? Here’s a rerun from 2011 … apologies if you’ve heard it all before.

At the Wafi mall this morning there was a long line of harassed-looking parents, with kids orbiting round a giant Christmas tree two houses high and decorated with baubles the size of small planets.

"C'mon Santa! You can do it!"

“C’mon Santa! You can do it!”

Barely concealing the fact they wished they were spending the morning sleeping in and reading the paper rather than queuing for Santa, the Christmas-weary parents were doing their best to keep their overexcited offspring under control as the queue inched forwards painfully slowly.

Some of them must have been waiting for up to two hours, but most remained resolute – the promise of seeing Dubai’s most authentic-looking Santa, followed by a free cup of tea and entrance to the play area, proving to be a crowd puller.

Santa’s top-security grotto was heavily guarded by toy soldiers and you couldn’t even peep at the man in red – we tried, but just found ourselves face-to-face with animatronics.

Then, at about a quarter to one, a Filipino lady appears and walks over to the queue. There’s a pause as she surveys the expectant little faces and restlessness among the ranks.

“Santa’s taking a break at 1,” she announces. No apology.

“For 30 minutes,” she continues, deadpan.

You’d think, wouldn’t you, that since he only works for a couple of weeks a year, Santa might be able to plough on through?