September 24, 2008
35 degrees in the evening feels like 47
This week went to a College organized Iftar. It was for faculty, families and students. We were very surprised to see that the students practically outnumbered the faculty and families. The food was traditional Arabic dishes. It was a great opportunity to try out food that we wouldn’t know how to order in a restaurant. The kids had a great time because they met up with some friends that we had met when we first arrived.
Friday morning we went exploring in Bur Dubai which is in the old part of Dubai along the creek. Much of the area is closed off to cars. The sidewalks are lined with tiny shops. Rick bought a belt for 5dhs – less than $2.00. We started with a long walk along the creek. A group of men from India asked if they could take a picture with the kids. They each had to pose for at least one photo. They even offered us money! The creek is lined with large ships unloading cargo shipped from nearby countries, dinner cruise boats, water taxis and expensive yachts. We decided to hire a boat for the trip back. Along the creek is the palace of the Sheik’s sister. The compound covers at least 4 blocks. We ended up in a traffic jam on the drive home. Apparently it was prayer time and the mosque parking lot was full – so several cars just parked on the street! Now, I am not talking about along the side of a small residential street. This was a major thoroughfare with 3 lanes in each direction. They didn’t just park in the curb lane, they parked on the inside lane!!
Just a few more days of Ramadan. I am not sure when it ends. It has something to do with the moon and some holy person has to say when it is over. He decides by watching the moon, so he only knows a day or two in advance. I don't get it because the phases of the moon are published in calendars months in advance. The upside is that after Ramadan is a national holiday -Eid Al Fitr. We found out last week that I will get all next week off, and not have to use any vacation days. There's a perk they didn't mention in the brochures!
We had our parent-teacher interviews at school yesterday. Both kids are doing great. Zoe's teacher did not even create any personal goal for her because she is doing so well and is so organized! Now that was a shock for us considering her lack of school tidiness over the last couple years. We were also surprised at the goals created by Chase's teacher - reading his "golden words", counting to 100 starting at numbers other than 1, skip counting forward and backward.
Our excitement for this week has been that we are finally connected to the internet!! Plus, we made the journey by ourselves to the Road and Traffic Authority and Rick got his UAE driver's license. Because it is Ramadan, the hours are shortened. We got there really early for 2 reasons. First we anticipated getting lost or stuck in traffic. And second, we had heard that they actually open earlier than they post and it is best to get there before the crowds. As we were walking in, we were greeted by an employee who told us they were closed. When we explained that we wanted to fill out a form before opening, he got one for us (even though the gentleman who gave it to him just refused to give one to us.) After completing the form, we noticed that people were beginning to line up, so we joined the line. One of the people monitoring the line suggested that we sit and wait until they were open. Rick explained that we wanted to stay in line rather than wait and end up at the back. The man was visibly upset and he went to speak to his manager. The next thing we knew, he asked us and 2 other Westerners to go with him. We went to the front of the line where our paperwork was reviewed and we were given our number ticket to wait for the first available licensing agent. This special treatment was because I was there. Women generally get separate and special treatment. That's another bonus they didn't mention in the brochures.
Bye for now
Wednesday, 24 September 2008
Wednesday, 17 September 2008
September 16
37° when I left for work at 8:30 this morning. It was so humid that the ground was wet in places.
We haven’t been doing too much since it is still Ramadan. It is forbidden to eat or drink in public in the day. Actually I read in the newspaper yesterday that 2 people were arrested for drinking juice in a gas station store during the day. They may be sentenced to 1 month in jail or a 2000 dirham fine! Restaurants are closed until sunset. Because it is so hot out, we can’t be outside for long without water. We have been spending our weekends driving around and trying to get to know the city – there is not much traffic early in the day. Ramadan lasts for the rest of the month, and we hear the weather will cool down then too.
Zoe was invited to a birthday party this past weekend. The birthday girl was a local Emirate girl and the party was something to behold. It started at 8 PM. I think that is because of Ramadan. The party was at the amusement park at the mall beside our house. We debated asking someone to watch Chase, but decided to bring him along, at least for a little while. We gathered at Toys R Us and the kids got their faces painted. We then moved over this crazy little shop that has jewelry, purses and kids activities. Each of the kids made a window clinger. Our plan was to get Zoe settled at the amusement park, and then take Chase to do a few rides on his own. Before we had a chance, the Dad of the birthday girl handed each of the kids, including Chase, a card to use on the games. They are like gift cards – you fill them with money and then they get swiped at each activity until the credits are gone. The kids all ran around in a frenzy going on the rides for a couple hours. At one point Chase ran out of credits and I thought he would be done for the evening. Not so, he told the father and he put more money on his card. Finally, at 11:00 we managed to gather all the kids together and leave the amusement park. Our plan was to go home, their plan was for food. They insisted that we eat and would not take no for an answer. Zoe asked for chicken nuggets and the store we were at didn’t have them for some reason. The birthday girl went to McDonald’s to get her some, even after we assured them that she would be happy with anything. Next, it was ice cream. Finally at almost 1 AM we gave the girl her gift and walked home. She was not allowed to open the gifts. And, when Zoe spoke to her on Sunday at school, she still had not been allowed to open them. I have asked around, and no one is able to explain why.
One day last week while Rick and the kids noticed the building swaying. They say that it felt like it moved several feet in each direction. Apparently it was an earthquake in Iran. We found out that all the buildings here are built to withstand earthquakes that are 9 on the Richter scale. Fortunately, earthquakes are rare in Dubai, but they do happen in region.
Bye for now,
RDZC
We haven’t been doing too much since it is still Ramadan. It is forbidden to eat or drink in public in the day. Actually I read in the newspaper yesterday that 2 people were arrested for drinking juice in a gas station store during the day. They may be sentenced to 1 month in jail or a 2000 dirham fine! Restaurants are closed until sunset. Because it is so hot out, we can’t be outside for long without water. We have been spending our weekends driving around and trying to get to know the city – there is not much traffic early in the day. Ramadan lasts for the rest of the month, and we hear the weather will cool down then too.
Zoe was invited to a birthday party this past weekend. The birthday girl was a local Emirate girl and the party was something to behold. It started at 8 PM. I think that is because of Ramadan. The party was at the amusement park at the mall beside our house. We debated asking someone to watch Chase, but decided to bring him along, at least for a little while. We gathered at Toys R Us and the kids got their faces painted. We then moved over this crazy little shop that has jewelry, purses and kids activities. Each of the kids made a window clinger. Our plan was to get Zoe settled at the amusement park, and then take Chase to do a few rides on his own. Before we had a chance, the Dad of the birthday girl handed each of the kids, including Chase, a card to use on the games. They are like gift cards – you fill them with money and then they get swiped at each activity until the credits are gone. The kids all ran around in a frenzy going on the rides for a couple hours. At one point Chase ran out of credits and I thought he would be done for the evening. Not so, he told the father and he put more money on his card. Finally, at 11:00 we managed to gather all the kids together and leave the amusement park. Our plan was to go home, their plan was for food. They insisted that we eat and would not take no for an answer. Zoe asked for chicken nuggets and the store we were at didn’t have them for some reason. The birthday girl went to McDonald’s to get her some, even after we assured them that she would be happy with anything. Next, it was ice cream. Finally at almost 1 AM we gave the girl her gift and walked home. She was not allowed to open the gifts. And, when Zoe spoke to her on Sunday at school, she still had not been allowed to open them. I have asked around, and no one is able to explain why.
One day last week while Rick and the kids noticed the building swaying. They say that it felt like it moved several feet in each direction. Apparently it was an earthquake in Iran. We found out that all the buildings here are built to withstand earthquakes that are 9 on the Richter scale. Fortunately, earthquakes are rare in Dubai, but they do happen in region.
Bye for now,
RDZC
Sunday, 7 September 2008
September 4
September 4, 2008
I started writing this last week, but didn’t have time to finish or send.
51 degrees at 11:00 am (still the same weather)
We have been in Dubai for just over 3 weeks now. Sometimes it feels like a lifetime and other times I can’t believe where the time has gone. Already things that seemed so foreign or peculiar when we arrived are becoming common place. So, while we still have the Canadian perspective, let me tell you about Dubai.
Okay, so the heat is obvious. In the evening, the temperature goes down to the low 30’s and that feels nice. We even open the windows of the car. Humidity seems to rise at night and we often wake up with fogged up windows – at least they aren’t frosted! We are actually getting accustomed to the heat.
When we first arrived, we were struck by the lack of colour. The sky was sand coloured. Apparently that is something that happens in the summer. Already the sky is getting more blue. 99% of the cars are white. Most of the rest are silver. We have learned that the reason is because of the heat - it is impossible to touch a dark coloured car.
Even in this incredible heat, long sleeved shirts and pants or ankle length skirts are customary. It appears that my work place has a very strict dress code and I have been told that I can’t even wear Capri pants. Rick needs to wear pants to drive into the parking lot to pick me up – even if he doesn’t get out of the car. Ramadan started on September 1 and we are needing to dress conservatively in respect to the Muslims. More about Ramadan later…
One of the very few downsides of Dubai that we heard about before leaving was the traffic. There is no way to comprehend or even imagine how bad it is until you actually see it. Apparently the roads were designed by the British and they certainly are very different from what we are used to. There are medians in the middle of all of the roads and you can not make a left turn. You need to drive to the next traffic light and make a U-turn. I can walk to work in about 10 minutes and if there is no traffic, it takes the same amount of time to drive because we need to go so far out of the way to turn around. Road design aside, the sheer volume of cars on the road is a huge adjustment for us. There is a rush hour in the morning, after work and at 8 pm. For those of us who complained about the “bridge traffic” and the delays during construction of the road to Kelowna – I am eating my words now. They are building an entire monorail system throughout the city, so you can imagine the construction delays and detours. They expect that it will be up and running by this time next year.
Our apartment is in a developing area of town. Every morning we look out our window to see a new road or a new building being put up. Rick counted 54 cranes from our apartment the other day. We are right next to a shopping mall, but it is in Sharjah, not Dubai. All that really means is that there is no road access from our side. We walk through a sand dune and a hole in the fence to get there. Shopping is the national pastime. Malls are open until midnight – even later now that it is Ramadan. Every mall has some sort of a play land for kids. The mall nearest to us has an amusement park – yes with 2 roller coasters, bumper cars, a log ride….There are activities for small children right through to arcades for teens. The kids’ favourite is the “castle.” It is similar to a McDonald’s play space, but 3 stories high.
Other than shopping and driving around (frequently lost) we have been having some fun. We have a pool and weight room on the roof of the apartment. The pool is chilled. We have been to the beach a few times. The kids’ love looking for crabs. Last time they went prepared with a container to bring them home in. So, for a short time, we had about 10 tiny crabs in a margarine size container. It was fascinating watching them. Unfortunately, they died. I guess we should research how to care for them before we try again.
My first day of work I was introduced to a lady from Ontario who has been here for 10 years with her husband. They have been fabulous about showing us around, giving us pointers and having us over for dinner. They took us to a camel souk (market). The camels are gone, but they still have little stores that make and sell blankets, halters, and earrings for the camels. Blankets can be bought before they put the holes in for the camels. We got one for each of the kids. Next door is a falconry (?) where they do have falcons for sale. We all got to hold one.
Last weekend we went to the Dubai Zoo. It is a few blocks right in the middle of downtown. It was quite amazing for the 2 dirham it cost each of us. That is about 65 cents!!! They have several lions, giraffes, emus, tigers, a bear, Arabian wolves, some type of deer, snakes, tortoises, and of course oryx and flamingoes, among other animals. While the kids were watching the lions, the male came up to the fence and peed! Chase got quite a direct hit, but Zoe wasn’t spared the experience either.
Our apartment is on the top floor of the building and it is huge. I think it has more square footage than our house did. The floors are all marble tiles. The walls seem to be some type of concrete, so we have been having some lovely echoes without any furniture, carpets or window coverings. The ceilings are about 10 feet. There are 3 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms. All the countertops are granite. When they say it is “unfurnished accommodation” they mean it completely empty. We had to buy all the appliances. There aren’t even curtain rods. We spent a few nights sleeping on air mattresses and even longer sitting on lawn chairs and using boxes for our table. We still have box bedside tables and coffee table. We have a view in 3 directions and can barely see one of the lagoons where the beach is. It is not really that far to the beach, but there are lots of high rises around.
One of the biggest stressors that we have endured is with school. We spent a long time choosing the perfect school and got the children enrolled in the spring. The apartment we were given is quite a distance from the school and we have no other options of places to live. The bigger problem is the traffic. The school is off the major highway and we were told that it would be a 2 hour commute each direction! Needless to say, we had to scramble for a better option. Since it was summer when we discovered this, it was hard to find anyone at the schools to talk to. All the schools near the college are full – one even had 65 kids on the waiting list for Chase’s grade! Finally we found a school on the beach that had spaces for both kids. It is an Australian school that has only been open for 1 year. The kids started school on August 31st. They are soooo adorable in their uniforms with Aussie hats! The grades appear to be different in Australia and so Chase has been placed in grade 1 and Zoe in grade 4. So far those seem to be the correct levels for their abilities. They bus to school because, even though it is close, it is across the major traffic route. The roundabout by the school gets closed in the morning, so only school staff and buses are allowed to get through. They get on the bus at 7:20 and start school at 8:00. They say they have time to play before school starts (20 minutes according to Zoe). The bus picks up/drops off right at our door. If we are not there waiting, the driver phones to let us know he is there. They have bus attendance, so I don’t think there is a chance that the kids can miss the bus after school either. I don’t know when school is supposed to end because they have shortened hours for Ramadan.
I don’t know much about Ramadan – except how it affects us. I only work for 6 hours a day. In my office someone needs to be there from 8:30 until 5:00. We are taking turns doing the early and late shift between 5 of us and then the rest of the time we start when we want and stay 6 hours. Because the Muslims fast from before sunrise until sunset, we are not allowed to eat in public during those hours – not even water in the car! They covered up the windows in one café at the college and we bring our lunches to eat in there. Kids don’t have to fast, but the school canteen is not open anyway. The kids don’t have any restrictions on their food at school. Restaurants are not open until sunset. Apparently you can buy take out though, and grocery stores are open and sell prepared foods. After sunset, it is iftar. That is a feast to end the fast. There are tents set up all around the city and anyone can go and eat, sometimes for free, sometimes for a small cost. The Muslims seem to stay up until well after midnight – some all night long, visiting, praying, watching tv… Ramadan is a time for generosity, so they give gifts of small appliances. That means that there are big sales on. Stores have crazy opening times and they are not posted. I think they open at 9 or 10 instead of 8. They close for a while in the afternoon and open again after 7 and stay open until 1 or 2 am. Government offices have Ramadan hours too. It is a bit of an inconvenience while we are still trying to get settled in and don’t know when we can get things done. At least with the flexibility of my hours at work I can accomplish some things.
The Muslims pray 5 times a day. The mosques and shopping malls have a “call to prayer” for each of the times when the praying is to begin. It sounds like a song being broadcast over the loudspeaker. The malls all have prayer rooms. The times to pray are about an hour before sunrise, midmorning, lunchtime, early evening and around 8 pm. We fortunately do not live near a mosque because the call to prayer can last about 10 minutes. The 4:30ish am time can really interfere with sleep! Apparently during Ramadan, the announcement can last 1 hour long at each time.
Prices here are all over the place compared to Canada. Appliances are much cheaper. Furniture is about the same. They have Ikea! Coffee is hard to find and hugely expensive. We have resorted to instant and have gotten used to it. Most food is considerably cheaper. One exception to that is Kraft Dinner which is about $2.25 a box! They don’t have cheese whiz, but have a cream cheese/cheddar cheese spread that is not bad. We can’t find some things that we are used to, but if we wanted we could try camel milk. The biggy is gas. We fill the Toyota for about 40 dirham (about $13) – not the $50 it cost for my Toyota in Penticton.
I am now a resident, so I can get internet set up at home. When we figure out how to do it, we can keep in touch better. No more writing at home and taking it to work to put on emails and the blog. We have taken lots of pictures and will post them soon.
Bye for now,
Rick, Daryl, Zoe and Chase
I started writing this last week, but didn’t have time to finish or send.
51 degrees at 11:00 am (still the same weather)
We have been in Dubai for just over 3 weeks now. Sometimes it feels like a lifetime and other times I can’t believe where the time has gone. Already things that seemed so foreign or peculiar when we arrived are becoming common place. So, while we still have the Canadian perspective, let me tell you about Dubai.
Okay, so the heat is obvious. In the evening, the temperature goes down to the low 30’s and that feels nice. We even open the windows of the car. Humidity seems to rise at night and we often wake up with fogged up windows – at least they aren’t frosted! We are actually getting accustomed to the heat.
When we first arrived, we were struck by the lack of colour. The sky was sand coloured. Apparently that is something that happens in the summer. Already the sky is getting more blue. 99% of the cars are white. Most of the rest are silver. We have learned that the reason is because of the heat - it is impossible to touch a dark coloured car.
Even in this incredible heat, long sleeved shirts and pants or ankle length skirts are customary. It appears that my work place has a very strict dress code and I have been told that I can’t even wear Capri pants. Rick needs to wear pants to drive into the parking lot to pick me up – even if he doesn’t get out of the car. Ramadan started on September 1 and we are needing to dress conservatively in respect to the Muslims. More about Ramadan later…
One of the very few downsides of Dubai that we heard about before leaving was the traffic. There is no way to comprehend or even imagine how bad it is until you actually see it. Apparently the roads were designed by the British and they certainly are very different from what we are used to. There are medians in the middle of all of the roads and you can not make a left turn. You need to drive to the next traffic light and make a U-turn. I can walk to work in about 10 minutes and if there is no traffic, it takes the same amount of time to drive because we need to go so far out of the way to turn around. Road design aside, the sheer volume of cars on the road is a huge adjustment for us. There is a rush hour in the morning, after work and at 8 pm. For those of us who complained about the “bridge traffic” and the delays during construction of the road to Kelowna – I am eating my words now. They are building an entire monorail system throughout the city, so you can imagine the construction delays and detours. They expect that it will be up and running by this time next year.
Our apartment is in a developing area of town. Every morning we look out our window to see a new road or a new building being put up. Rick counted 54 cranes from our apartment the other day. We are right next to a shopping mall, but it is in Sharjah, not Dubai. All that really means is that there is no road access from our side. We walk through a sand dune and a hole in the fence to get there. Shopping is the national pastime. Malls are open until midnight – even later now that it is Ramadan. Every mall has some sort of a play land for kids. The mall nearest to us has an amusement park – yes with 2 roller coasters, bumper cars, a log ride….There are activities for small children right through to arcades for teens. The kids’ favourite is the “castle.” It is similar to a McDonald’s play space, but 3 stories high.
Other than shopping and driving around (frequently lost) we have been having some fun. We have a pool and weight room on the roof of the apartment. The pool is chilled. We have been to the beach a few times. The kids’ love looking for crabs. Last time they went prepared with a container to bring them home in. So, for a short time, we had about 10 tiny crabs in a margarine size container. It was fascinating watching them. Unfortunately, they died. I guess we should research how to care for them before we try again.
My first day of work I was introduced to a lady from Ontario who has been here for 10 years with her husband. They have been fabulous about showing us around, giving us pointers and having us over for dinner. They took us to a camel souk (market). The camels are gone, but they still have little stores that make and sell blankets, halters, and earrings for the camels. Blankets can be bought before they put the holes in for the camels. We got one for each of the kids. Next door is a falconry (?) where they do have falcons for sale. We all got to hold one.
Last weekend we went to the Dubai Zoo. It is a few blocks right in the middle of downtown. It was quite amazing for the 2 dirham it cost each of us. That is about 65 cents!!! They have several lions, giraffes, emus, tigers, a bear, Arabian wolves, some type of deer, snakes, tortoises, and of course oryx and flamingoes, among other animals. While the kids were watching the lions, the male came up to the fence and peed! Chase got quite a direct hit, but Zoe wasn’t spared the experience either.
Our apartment is on the top floor of the building and it is huge. I think it has more square footage than our house did. The floors are all marble tiles. The walls seem to be some type of concrete, so we have been having some lovely echoes without any furniture, carpets or window coverings. The ceilings are about 10 feet. There are 3 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms. All the countertops are granite. When they say it is “unfurnished accommodation” they mean it completely empty. We had to buy all the appliances. There aren’t even curtain rods. We spent a few nights sleeping on air mattresses and even longer sitting on lawn chairs and using boxes for our table. We still have box bedside tables and coffee table. We have a view in 3 directions and can barely see one of the lagoons where the beach is. It is not really that far to the beach, but there are lots of high rises around.
One of the biggest stressors that we have endured is with school. We spent a long time choosing the perfect school and got the children enrolled in the spring. The apartment we were given is quite a distance from the school and we have no other options of places to live. The bigger problem is the traffic. The school is off the major highway and we were told that it would be a 2 hour commute each direction! Needless to say, we had to scramble for a better option. Since it was summer when we discovered this, it was hard to find anyone at the schools to talk to. All the schools near the college are full – one even had 65 kids on the waiting list for Chase’s grade! Finally we found a school on the beach that had spaces for both kids. It is an Australian school that has only been open for 1 year. The kids started school on August 31st. They are soooo adorable in their uniforms with Aussie hats! The grades appear to be different in Australia and so Chase has been placed in grade 1 and Zoe in grade 4. So far those seem to be the correct levels for their abilities. They bus to school because, even though it is close, it is across the major traffic route. The roundabout by the school gets closed in the morning, so only school staff and buses are allowed to get through. They get on the bus at 7:20 and start school at 8:00. They say they have time to play before school starts (20 minutes according to Zoe). The bus picks up/drops off right at our door. If we are not there waiting, the driver phones to let us know he is there. They have bus attendance, so I don’t think there is a chance that the kids can miss the bus after school either. I don’t know when school is supposed to end because they have shortened hours for Ramadan.
I don’t know much about Ramadan – except how it affects us. I only work for 6 hours a day. In my office someone needs to be there from 8:30 until 5:00. We are taking turns doing the early and late shift between 5 of us and then the rest of the time we start when we want and stay 6 hours. Because the Muslims fast from before sunrise until sunset, we are not allowed to eat in public during those hours – not even water in the car! They covered up the windows in one café at the college and we bring our lunches to eat in there. Kids don’t have to fast, but the school canteen is not open anyway. The kids don’t have any restrictions on their food at school. Restaurants are not open until sunset. Apparently you can buy take out though, and grocery stores are open and sell prepared foods. After sunset, it is iftar. That is a feast to end the fast. There are tents set up all around the city and anyone can go and eat, sometimes for free, sometimes for a small cost. The Muslims seem to stay up until well after midnight – some all night long, visiting, praying, watching tv… Ramadan is a time for generosity, so they give gifts of small appliances. That means that there are big sales on. Stores have crazy opening times and they are not posted. I think they open at 9 or 10 instead of 8. They close for a while in the afternoon and open again after 7 and stay open until 1 or 2 am. Government offices have Ramadan hours too. It is a bit of an inconvenience while we are still trying to get settled in and don’t know when we can get things done. At least with the flexibility of my hours at work I can accomplish some things.
The Muslims pray 5 times a day. The mosques and shopping malls have a “call to prayer” for each of the times when the praying is to begin. It sounds like a song being broadcast over the loudspeaker. The malls all have prayer rooms. The times to pray are about an hour before sunrise, midmorning, lunchtime, early evening and around 8 pm. We fortunately do not live near a mosque because the call to prayer can last about 10 minutes. The 4:30ish am time can really interfere with sleep! Apparently during Ramadan, the announcement can last 1 hour long at each time.
Prices here are all over the place compared to Canada. Appliances are much cheaper. Furniture is about the same. They have Ikea! Coffee is hard to find and hugely expensive. We have resorted to instant and have gotten used to it. Most food is considerably cheaper. One exception to that is Kraft Dinner which is about $2.25 a box! They don’t have cheese whiz, but have a cream cheese/cheddar cheese spread that is not bad. We can’t find some things that we are used to, but if we wanted we could try camel milk. The biggy is gas. We fill the Toyota for about 40 dirham (about $13) – not the $50 it cost for my Toyota in Penticton.
I am now a resident, so I can get internet set up at home. When we figure out how to do it, we can keep in touch better. No more writing at home and taking it to work to put on emails and the blog. We have taken lots of pictures and will post them soon.
Bye for now,
Rick, Daryl, Zoe and Chase
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