Category Archives: Parenting

Chaperone wanted

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While flying from Dubai to London with the boys (and no DH) on Wednesday, it occurred to me that this is a task most mums of small children would dearly love to outsource.

Just imagine: if you hired a chaperone (and I think you can when they reach a certain age), you could come on a later flight by yourself, watch a whole movie, read, sit and think, drink wine and eat the meal, including the chocolate, in peace. Your clothes would remain stain-free, your sanity intact and you might even get some sleep. Remember those days of stress-free, champagne-swilling travel?

So without much further ado, here’s the advert:

Want to travel and get paid?


Position: Chaperone

Job description: Team leader needed for temporary work in a cramped environment. Candidates must enjoy travel and be willing to work long hours, sometimes nights, in pressurised conditions

Job requirements:
∙ Expert planning skills required, including the ability to pack for six weeks and two continents

∙ Must always be on time and have the ability to negotiate airports/airport toilets/fast food outlets with military precision. The candidate must also be able to speed walk, while dragging two small children along, to the furthest gate, without stopping at Duty Free

∙ Must always hope for the best but be prepared for the worst. Situations such as a sick child, delays or a lost favourite toy should be viewed in a positive way

∙ Ability to multi-task essential. Must be able to handle several difficult situations simultaneously, eg, consoling a distraught child who got stuck in the toilet, while stopping his brother waking sleeping passengers and balancing three meal trays

∙ Must be able to keep a smiling demeanour for fellow passengers while practising above-mentioned skills in conflict resolution. Must also be able to withstand withering looks from those seated nearby

∙ A basic aviation knowledge, so as to answer questions such as ‘What makes the wind move?’ and ‘What’s that noise?’, is a plus – as is the ability to tackle technical challenges such as operating the games

Airport hug: The smiles at the end make it all worthwhile and I wouldn’t miss this for anything

∙ Must be willing to be immobilised in a tight space for extensive periods of time, to dive for flying objects, to crawl on the floor for lost items and make multiple trips to a bathroom the size of a phone box (being double-jointed would help)

∙ Must possess the physical stamina of a pack mule and preferably have a third or even fourth arm to carry all the luggage at the end

Dressing/grooming: In addition to following the airline’s dress code, it is expected that, for the duration of the shift, the chaperone will have makeup applied, not wear elasticated clothing of any kind and not develop crazy eyes

Previous experience: None required. On-the-job training offered on an exhausting basis

Possibility for advancement: None. Your job is to remain in the same position for years without complaining so that those in your charge can ultimately surpass you

Overtime: Responsibilities also include rising at 5am the following morning with your jet-lagged, overexcited, overtired travellers

Benefits: Overseas travel and the joy of the airport reunion

The gender agenda

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“Mommy, how old were you when you knew who you wanted to marry?”

Not a question from my son, but from his adorable, blonde-haired, blue-eyed best friend and girl next door, who I posted about before when it became blindingly obvious to us that little boys are from Mars and little girls from Venus.

Childhood sweethearts: But while BB likes to dabble in toilet talk, his BF has more romantic thoughts

“I was about four or five when I knew,” she told her mother – referring to BB, despite the fact he’s incredibly messy and only talks about trains.

Later, she started asking her mom why they lived in the UAE, and not America.

“If BB moves to America, I have to go with him – just so you know,” she declared.

“Because we’re family – or we will be after we get married.”

“He thinks he’s going to marry a toilet,” (don’t ask, but if you really want to know, look here).

“But I know better and he’s in for a SURPRISE!” she giggled.

More proof, if ever it was needed, that male and female brains are hardwired so differently, it’s no wonder we can’t fathom our partners at times.

In need of a vacation

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“How many more days Mommy,” enquired BB this morning. “Is it one day or two?” he asked, his eyes shining with excitement at the prospect of the epic summer holiday ahead.

“Three days BB, three days to go,” I replied, with an equal measure of trepidation.

I don’t usually admit to feeling stressed on the blog, but if ever there’s a time to come clean it’s this week.

It’s the last week of term, the temperatures are in the 40s, we’ve all been ill due to being cooped up indoors, there’s the kindergarten graduation to attend, teachers’ presents to organise, we have a visitor, there are friends to see before they leave, and then there’s the thought of the 10-week summer holiday ahead of us. Yes, I’ll say that again, 10 weeks!

In fact, the mass exodus from the desert to cooler climes has already started. Yesterday, I parked right outside the supermarket and I’m convinced the roads are already quieter. School seems to be sliding into the holiday and every time I meet a friend, the conversation starts, “So when are you off?” and ends with a cheery, “See you in September!”

Crazy, never-to-be-repeated week

Some mums are leaving practically the moment the school gates clang shut, most of us are following within a week or so, and a few brave souls (and women with jobs) are staying in the sauna.

Aside from the good-byes, there’s the emotion of the school-year ending, lost library books, packing, and – of all the weeks we could have chosen to do this – the nightmarish task of potty training a boy who has a deep, deep mistrust of the toilet. Traumatised isn’t an exaggeration, and that’s both me and him – all witnessed by my visiting mother-in-law.

So, while I know I’ll feel like I’m in free fall once the structure of school is gone and DH jets off away from it all to Sydney, I’ll be so glad when this week is over, the farewells are said, the 10 tonnes of artwork filed and LB actually makes it to the toilet in time without screaming blue murder.

There are weeks when my office job feels like a walk in the park in comparison.

Photo from: The Brotherhood of the Stinky Underpants

Not-so-Silent Sunday: Drum roll

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Children’s birthday parties are practically a sport these days and here in Dubai you can host a party on a bus, on a boat, in a limo or at a waterpark. Alternatively, you can have a party at home and hire entertainers, magicians or, I’ll put money on it, even fire eaters or dwarfs.

Sensible parents get sucked in, too, and I did laugh this weekend when I walked out our front door and saw that our neighbours across the road were holding a party that had the potential to cause a right racket. Whether the most unbelievable din was created or not, I’ll never know as it was all over by the time we got home. Brave parents!

I did wonder if they’d given their next-door neighbours a heads-up…

Help! I need somebody

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I’m not sure whether to post this as it makes us sound terribly spoilt, but here goes.

In the Middle East it’s possible to outsource every task you could conceivably think of – from the ironing to banging a nail into a wall, changing a lightbulb and assembling Ikea furniture.

Even things I didn’t think were possible to avoid can be delegated. Had we wanted to, we could have valet parked at a children’s party this week, and already today I’ve politely declined having someone carry my groceries to the car and having the car washed while I shopped.

Expats tend to follow a typical pattern. They hire a cleaner, pay a teenager to babysit, then farm out the ironing. Before too long, they realise it’s cheaper to sponsor a live-in maid

Because the truth is, it’s really, really difficult not to have help in Dubai.

One of my favourite bloggers, Where’s my ruby slippers?, posted a wonderful and honest account about this aspect of Dubai life, and I found myself nodding in somewhat shame-faced agreement when she described how, that morning at the mall, a lady had taken her parking ticket at the exit and put it in the machine that operates the barrier. “Had she been able to shut my car window without cutting her arm off, I have no doubt she would have done that as well,” she wrote.

The drawback, of course, is how lazy it makes us. How it becomes too easy to throw money at a problem – and, the most concerning part, the effect it has on our children. I’m constantly reminding BB and LB that there are many things in Dubai that aren’t normal (“Where’s her nanny?” asked BB once in England, on meeting a little friend in a park filled with mums, not paid staff).

But, here’s the thing: apart from our trips home, this is the only existence my children know, and teaching them that life here can be a little too easy is a challenge.

This week, our doorbell rang and it was DH’s dry cleaner, dropping off his freshly laundered and pressed uniforms. We thought nothing more of it until we realised the impression it had made on BB.

I bought him some new school uniforms a couple of days ago, but one item was out of stock so I placed an order and left my phone number.

“They call when my shirt arrives?” BB asked, looking a little puzzled. “Won’t they deliver it, like Daddy’s work clothes?’

Sigh! Time to revisit real-life for a reality check, me thinks.

Technology infiltrates prayer time

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Have you ever watched a three-year-old play with an iPad? It’s actually quite shocking. The way those chubby fingers fly round the screen, leaving smeery fingerprints as they go, and the way the machine is handed back to you with 2% battery power.

While nobody was looking, something has happened to today’s tots. They’ve become ‘screen-agers’, who intuitively know that an iPad isn’t a toy, it’s a toy chest of apps and games.

Here at Circles, I’m continually nagged, harassed and cajoled until I give in and pass the iPad over to the children. LB can find and play a whole raft of kids’ apps (check iGameMom.com for some great ideas) and his six-year-old brother is just a click away from downloading hundreds more from the Apple Store.

“Books….nah! Mummy’s iPad is much more fun AND it can teach me to read”

And, I’m the first to admit, it’s the most wonderful electronic babysitter – especially during those times when you need to get things done, like make dinner, or drive.

I’d go so far as to suggest that iPads might even have been designed with young children in mind. They’re small and compact, with no power cords to trip on or chew, and they’re instantly on, cutting down on whinge time. What’s more, they’re made to be touched, with no keys to get jammed up with juice or bashed.

I worked out today that by the time my children reach middle school, they’ll have been using an iPad almost every day for eight years.

But just as noteworthy is the way modern technology has crept into every part of our children’s lives. Kids can learn to read and count on iPads, they can colour in virtual colouring books, bake electronic pies and video the ceiling. They can watch cartoons and movies on iPads and play games galore. And that’s not all: modern technology can even infiltrate prayer time.

My good friend and mother of BB’s girlfriend told me yesterday that after saying a prayer for her five-year-old daughter that evening, she was asked: “Mommy, say ‘send’.

So cute, it was worth a whole blog post!

The transition from work to mummydom

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I’ve come to the conclusion that never mind massages and spa treatments, what I really need after work and before going head first into a long weekend with two small boys is a decompression chamber.

It was nice and quiet down there! Anyone else feel like they get the bends when they transition from work to home?

Maybe it’s just me, but after being in an office where everyone sits still, the computer more or less does what it’s told and the noise levels are fairly muted, suddenly being reintroduced to the demands of two energetic boys is like surfacing too fast from relatively tranquil depths.

The decibels, the goading, the speed at which the boys fly round the house, the way they ricochet off the walls (summer temps mean we can’t exercise them outside), their neediness after my absence – whilst I’m overjoyed to be back home, it makes me feel quite giddy.

So, now it’s the weekend – and it’s a long one because Sunday, when we usually all go back to work and school, is a holiday for the ascension of Prophet Mohammad. And DH is out of the picture because he’s ‘in the Sim’ – airline lingo for training in the simulator, during which they practice fires, engine failures and other such scenarios.

My mind is thinking about something less terrifying but which has left me scratching my head nevertheless – BB’s homework.

It’s that time of term again when instead of doing the usual spellings and reading for homework, he has to complete a project – and present it – for his end-of term summative assessment. All very well, but he’s six. Some of his classmates are five. They’re in kindergarten!

Last week he had to design a ‘mode of transport’, this week he has to create it. There was the option of using Lego, but that would have been too easy. He’s opted to junk model a train, and so I’ve spent much of the week collecting boxes, buying art supplies and wondering how to turn cereal packets and toilet rolls into an express train.

As my working friend put it, there’s no way such young children can do these projects on their own. So when little Johnny comes home from school and says he has to create a solar system, it’s mum who ends up printing off stuff at work, coming up with ideas (styrofoam balls on sticks? genius!), and cajoling a child who can’t sit still for two minutes (heaven knows how mine gets through six hours of school) into completing the project. On time.

And, with all the tiger-mothering that goes on in Dubai (including presentations by seven-year-olds on iPads!), you really need to make sure your child takes it seriously. BB’s told me some of his classmates have brought their projects in early. On display already, there’s a rocket made out of bottles, a flying car and a train with wooden wheels.

By the end of this week, I’m fully expecting there to be 4by4s made from matchsticks, robotic trucks and remote-controlled airplanes.

I’d better get back to those loo rolls…

Where I appeared Wednesday

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No, not on TV or anything like that, but I was quite excited today because a guest post I wrote called Circles in the Sky was published this morning on a website in America and I thought I’d link to it here because it’s my first guest column, plus it actually makes me sound quite experienced at something!

Not experienced in anything useful or lucrative, but in flying with little hellions – something many expat mums will be thinking about as we prepare to head home to reintroduce our children to grass, grandparents and wellies.

Apologies to those who’ve read parts of this before – it’s adapted from a blog in my archives, and, yes, you might notice that I don’t mention I’m married to a pilot. I figured a more competent, all-round more together pilot’s wife wouldn’t lose a child on board, or nearly cause the take-off to be halted, so I decided to gloss over this piece of information while regaling some of my travel tales.

Without much further ado … here’s a teaser. Just click on the link for Airports Made Simple below to read more:

“Please…help….me….”


Waiting at the gate for a flight from Dubai to London last year, Son #1 came out with: “We’re going to go up, up, up and then we’re going to C.R.A.S.H!” – announced loudly, repeatedly, and with suitable sound effects. No amount of shushing would stop him and nearby passengers started looking really scared. Read more at Airports Made Simple

Doha’s darkest day

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There was a sombre mood among Dubai mums today. A sense of loss. As though the world had tipped on its axis.

Shockwaves were ricocheting through the Middle East as we learnt more about the Villaggio tragedy in the Qatari capital of Doha, in which 13 toddlers, four teachers and two brave firefighters lost their lives as a popular shopping centre was engulfed in flames.

We might not have been directly affected, but with the three degrees of separation that is expat life, nearly everyone in Dubai has connections with Doha. Most of us have searched for childcare in a country that is not our own and every Dubai mum knows exactly what it’s like to rely on malls during the hot months.

What is unimaginable is the pain that the families must be going through. When the little ones were dropped at the mall’s Gympanzee nursery, and the teachers went to work that morning, the idea that a couple of hours later the daycare centre would be ablaze – with firemen unable to access it because the staircase had collapsed – was unthinkable.

The firefighters reportedly had to break through the roof to get to the trapped children, but it was too late. They died from asphyxiation. One family, from New Zealand, lost their triplets, aged just two.

Here in Dubai, we also watched the tragedy unfolding on social media sites, hours before the news was officially reported. On Twitter, we witnessed the panic spreading among Doha mums who didn’t know if their children were safe. On Facebook, there were photos. It was indescribably awful. We prayed it was all rumours and scaremongering. It wasn’t. Nearly 12 hours after the fire broke out, the devastating news was finally released to the world’s media.

And today, as stories of a chaotic evacuation, defunct sprinklers, floor plans that didn’t have emergency exits correctly marked and inaudible fire alarms emerge, we’re asking our children’s nurseries and schools about their evacuation plans and fire drills.

Words simply aren’t enough. My thoughts are with all the families who lost loved ones in this tragedy – and with Doha’s expat mums, a small community, who are still in shock.

Midas touch for mothers

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I’ve mentioned before that Mother’s Day can get a little confusing when you’re a bi-national family living overseas – and when Sunday is the first day of the working week.

What’s more, last weekend, we managed to take this confusion to a whole new level.

The Body Analyser scales – your fat-ratio revealed, and not gold plated

On Sunday, last week, I rushed home from work, and was greeted with flowers, chocolates – and, drum-roll, a set of digital bathroom scales! (not only do they tell me my weight to the exact decimal place, they also give information that honestly should be censored, such as BMI, fat-ratio and water (wine?) content – needless to say, I never hop on after eating and sometimes don’t drink a drop of liquid for two hours beforehand).

I digress. Last Sunday, we gave chocolates to our nanny, and made a phone call to my American DH’s (surprised) mother in Lebanon. I even wished everyone a happy Mother’s Day on my blog. It was one of those ‘feel-good’ days and we just assumed we hadn’t heard much about it because we were in the UAE and the British expatriate contingent here is larger than the American.

Then, at bedtime, the penny dropped, when a friend I’d sent a greeting to told me it was next Sunday. We’d got the day totally wrong. We were a week early – how embarrassing!

So today, it’ll be a quiet Mother’s Day for us. I’m still feeling wonderfully spoilt by last weekend’s treats and can’t eat too much with *those* scales sitting upstairs. By chance, I have the day off work and BB’s school is also closed. I may see if he’ll join me at Starbucks before going to the supermarket, then I’ve promised I’ll take him swimming.

To all my American mom friends – Happy Mother’s day, again! And, to any US moms in the UAE reading this, I have a little idea for a glamourous Mother’s day gift you could suggest if you happen to walk past the Damas jewelers store at the Dubai mall.

Matching gold iPhones and BlackBerries are also available


Yes, it really is – the world’s first 24-carat gold iPad 3, launched in Dubai and so far only shown to VIPs. But you’d better be quick – there’s only 250 of them. Your DH just has to come up with a cool $5,499!