Check Out My New Berka

Above - After rampant displays of flesh and thread-bare clothing, the UAE ministry for Fashion, has insisted FS wear her 'Berka' at all times.

Above - Too Cute, first day of school (nursery) for B3.

Above - B3 and B4 getting ready for the first day apart from each other. Note B3 school uniform includes sandals.

Above - Night out dancing; who wants to be the centre of attention on the dance floor?

Above - Give NS a bit more hair on top, and you're transported back to 1991, and still in lurrrv.

Above - I'm a Leo, love long walks on the beach, socialising with friends...oops, sorry, thought this was the 'singles' pages.

Above - Question: What do you get when you put an Aussie in charge of an Iraqi, 2 x Lebanese, 3 x Filipinos, 5 x Indians and 500X Bangladeshi, Pakistan and Sudanese? Answer: Lots of badly pronounced G'day's.

Above - Children's City Dubai.

Above - B1 and B2 on dowh boat at night.

Above - Dinner on Dubai Creek restaurant.

Above - Watch out Shirvo, B3 makes us run races every night.

Above - FS browsing the shops in Oman.

Above - NS asking for directions in Oman desert township, answers roughly translated as, "check out the dickhead in his singlet and funny boardies, ha ha ha, we love it when lost tourists come to town".

Above - Night time soccer and dinner at the Muzzabarah.

Above - FS with a wooden camel and Arab.

Once again friends and fans, we apologise for the delay between posts. Such is life here, "en shala", it'll happen one day and when God "wills it". Lots of photos attached to this blog, just to give you a taste of things over the last month. They say a picture tells a thousand words, so i guess i need write little here.

Quick summary though starts with a great trip to Dubai a few weeks back. We went to Children's City, which is pretty much exactly the same as the 'Questacon' in Canberra. An interactive Museum of sorts, all hands-on, which we all enjoyed and learned lots through. I should add that this was preceded by a trip to Ikea (a must for any westerners looking for something to decorate their homes with more familiar items, and guaranteed to last maybe 3 months. We even had a breakfast bowl come in a pack with a 'screw and nut', just to confuse us!), and a trip to Toys R Us (the fluffy toys are life size polar bears and elephants, no kidding, such is the scale of everything in this crazy city). After CC, we went down to the wharfs and caught a dowh (small traditional wooden boat, powered by a spluttering diesel engine, has no sides or railings and negotiates the Dubai creek amongst another 200 dowhs and other water traffic, you ca imagine FS was very relaxed with B3 and B4 on board??), jumped off on the other side of the creek and wandered through the souks looking at and bartering with the local sellers. The smells and noises and heat here are amazing, they're not good, they're not bad, just so varied that you really know you are along way from home, experiencing something so different. After a few purchases, we went to dinner, caught another dowh back and eventually drove home late that night. Great day!

We made another trip into Oman, and whilst our Arabic is getting better we were trying to read the road signs to take us the 90km to Sohar, we ended up on the road to Salala, only 1300km away!(obviously we know just enough to get us lost or in trouble). None the less we got to see miles and miles and miles and miles of flat desert; the boys were riveted as you can imagine, not. We ended up puling over, collecting some Oman desert sand in an Arabic Coca Cola bottle, and turning around to head back to Al Ain. Family bonding inside the car when it is 55c outside and you're lost...give it a go!

The month of August also saw FS and i have our birthdays and i was stoked with a new carver skateboard; I remember unwrapping it, then it was wisked away by the boys to go riding, they tell me it is very good. FS got a lovely new 'Berka' with a peacock design. I think for xmas she is hoping for the brass face plate as the matching accessory often worn by other local women.

We are so lucky where we live, we really have a good network of new friends over here and the facilities in the village are great. The summer was made only bearable for FS and the boys (13 weeks of school holidays), because of this. Of course, we've had some good laughs with each other and our shared "experiences" of adapting to the UAE life, and there is also a very good networked community of expats through out the whole region. One of the best nights so far has been the launch of the new Al Ain Rugby Club. Donated by one of the Sheiks to the club, the new club house is simply spectacular and the opening night was a great night with plenty of dancing and drinking and laughs for the grown-ups. If they didn't know us before hand, everyone new FS and NS after our dancing to the Grease Mega Mix and plenty of solo encores also.

School has finally gone back and B3 could not have been more excited about waking every morning, jumping in the shower, changing to his 'school uniform' and strapping his backpack on. After 13 weeks of cabin fever, FS has never been so excited eitherfor school to return. B3 has started nursery (kindy equivalent), but they have to wear the uniforms, and of course he loves the idea of going to school with his big brothers. Whilst a little less excited (i think we managed a grunt from one of them), B1 and B2 are back and enjoying seeing their friends and playing again.

B1 and B2 are starting their international rugby careers, (they are telling people they have been recruited from Australia to play here) this week, after FS finally conceded to let them play.

Ramadan starts this week, this is the period of fasting for the Muslims. During day time they are not to consume water or food as well as some other sacrifices. Come night time, they feast and socialise. This period sees all shops and most activity come to a complete halt during daylight hours, with all businesses working reduced hours and most people at home sleeping. The wealthy people often supply tents and stalls of food supplies to the less fortunate during this period also, as a way of giving. Prayers are still conducted 5 times a day, with all Muslims attending the mosques for these. Even as non-Muslims, people are required to adhere by the rules of Ramadan, so this is going to be an interesting experience.

Whilst we still never really know if we'll be here for only another 5 minutes or a year or more, this is part of the 'bobbing process' of being here and we are becoming more relaxed with this part of living here, although it makes any planning harder to do, there are still plenty more experiences we want to live and see, so for the time being it's all zen yeni, alsalam habibi's, shukra jazeelan.

WARNING...Do Not try This At Home!!

Above - The 'men' of the house, attending to some 'manly' stuff involving a ladder. All these sons, i really am a good Arab.

Above - Meanwhile the lady of the house relaxes in a Bedawin styled room, waiting for Nick to finish the house work, child minding, make her a traditional coffee and then give her a massage.

Above - Site seeing at the Palace Museum. This was the actual palace where Sh. Zayed grew up as a boy before going on to shape his nation years later. Unfortunatly Sh, Zayed passed away a couple of years ago, but his sons now preside over the country.

Above - B1 hurtling down the slopes of Ski Dubai.

Above - B1, B2, B3 required helmets to complete the teams event of the downhill tobogan at ski Dubai, otherwise known as 'the skeleton'.

Above - Experiment - take one fry pan.

Above - Experiment - place on the searing hot sands in your back yard.

Above - Experiment - take one fresh egg.

Above - Experiment - Crack the egg into solar heated pan, ensure you do not splat any egg onto your dish dash or sandels.

Above - Experiment - See if the pan and outside tempretures are hot enough to fry an egg.

Above - Results - the critics decide this egg was not good enough to eat!!

Above - Dates after harvesting are dried for 7 to 10 days before being bagged and sold.

Above - A wedding, singing, dancing, chanting, a lot of blokes...but where is the bride?

Above - the 'lady of the house' enjoying her cooked breakfast includng bacon!!

The hot sun, long days and let's be honest, monoteny of the desert has been known to drive a few people batty and lead them to strange mumblings and doings. Not us though, we're completely sad, i mean sane. Take our desire to see if it was hot enough outside to heat a frying pan in the back yard sand, crack and egg and cook it successfully enough to eat it.

Before we get into the werid world of science though, lets have a look at what's been going on over the last couple of weeks.

Most recently, we went to Ski Dubai, the indoor ski feild perched high above the Emirates Mall. Essentially this place is the worlds largets refrigerator, but credit to the genius's responsible for this wonderland, it really is good fun and has catered to most of the family. The drive to Dubai was spent by the boys recounting all of their worldly skiing expeirances and how knarly they are. The first glimpse of the outside of ski dubai and the slope reaching skywards, heard the bragging drop to low whispers of "oh my god...well we were only 5 last time we went so i'm not that good really".

Somehow, we were able to convinece all that B4 was infact a 3 year old, "he just has a growth and speech impediment"; with the ski slopes being seperated from the snow park, we would have to split the team. All in all, we had a great time with B1 having a good comand of the skis, whilst B2-4, led the charge on the half pipe for tubing, tobogans and sleigh racing. The ski run is about 450metres, and two hours allows plenty of runs as there was absolutly no queues. It won't beat the real thing, but it 's a very good substitue.

A few weeks ago i was fortunate enough to have been invited to the wedding of a one of my clients. A young Palastinian guy, he has lived in Al Ain his whole life and we have had many discussions about his upcoming nuptials and the best place to Honeymoon, of course i did my bit for the Australian tourism commission. The invite was more a verbal kind, and i had no details as to the dress code, gifts, was the family invited? etc. With details being a bit sketchy, FS decided she would pass, so off i went for a 7pm wedding. Upon arrival i was met at the function room by about 250 other blokes, no women... good decsion FS, i thought. Anyhows we sat around for about 3 hours, drinking coffee and chewing on the occasional date. I was the only westerner there, the only one wearing a tie (most others were in their Dish Dash(emirates only) or less formally attired), and probably the only one who wasn't smoking either. All the time i'm looking for the Groom, but of course after 3 hours the chanting and singing began, hearlding the arrival of the guest of honour and his family (dad and brothers). We danced and chanted (the beauty of chantng is that even an outsider like myself can join in because someone leads every chant start), for about 20 minutes, before forming a single line to say hello, kiss the groom(left, right, left, right), and then everyone sat at the tables outside. A traditional feast of whole lamb, rice, and assortments and desserts, eaten by grabbing handfuls from the centre setting, rolling into a ball and down the hatch. This was an exerise of eating as much as humanly possible in 20 minutes. no talking, no speeches, no bride, just eat. When your finsh, stand-up and leave. The Groom had already gone, the evening's celebrations were over, thankyou.

Intrigued by the events of the previous night, i did a little reserch the next day. Arab weddings are all slightly different depending on region, culture etc. The Palastinian wedding is usually broken into 4 stages; 1. al zaffeh, where we all chant at how lucky and great this guy is. This is usually broken into 4 stanzas, the second of which i found was my favourite, 'Areesna Antar Abs, Antar Abs Areenssa', meaning, 'Antar abs is the tribal hero of the Arab folklore love story, who falls madly in love with his maiden Lala and saves her from the brink of disaster when she is kipnapped from her desert tent palace by a raiding enemy party'.

stage 2. of the wedding is the Mansaf or feast, again, the sexes are kept seperate. stage 3. is the Coming of the bride on horse back adored in gold coins and stage 4. is the Dabrek, or Arab dance.

Now speaking of feasts, we chanced upon a store in Al Ain, that sells the 'P' product. Being a Muslim nation, pork is not readily sold or avaliable, but upon finding some bacon, it was hot breakfast galore at our villa the next morning. Snags, bacon, toast, eggs, tomato, and fresh coffee. B3 came downstairs for breakfast annoucing, "MMmmm, smells like Stralia (he drops the A). It's been over 6 months without any bacon, so yes, it tasted good.

Now back to our myth-buster experiment. Take a fry pan, place it on the searing sands in your back yard, let it sit in the hot sun (try to wait for a >48C day for best results), crack a fresh egg into the pan, and allow enough time to cook. Yes..Taubans paints have been doing this for years, i hear you! Unfortunately my critics didn't give me much of a chance and were calling the results before a four burner BBQ could have had time to cook an egg. My assessment; if you like runny eggs a little on the clear side, then this was a pearla. Next week's experiment, if NS angles his head correctly, can the reflection be as annoying as someone reflecting a watch into your eyes? Stay tuned.

It's Gettin Hot Here...so take off all your clothes...

Above - F, B3, N and B2 take respite from the heat in the lounge of the Presidential Palace, Abu Dhabi.

Above - Hot days and searing rays means that 'playing toy army's in the garden' is a nocturnal activity.

Above - Our summer house in Abu Dhabi...the Presidential Palace.

Above - Local UAE song and dance, essentially lots of repetitive drumming and humming.

Above - With a cappuccino going for 54dhs in the palace bar, i was happy to order a round of waters for the troupes.

Above - B4 loves watering his own little garden.

Another month has passed, and i have been even slacker than usual in keeping the world posted about our little adventure in the middle East. My sincere apologies, just don't let the local police here know i have committed such an offence. The local paper published a story about an English fella who gave another driver the 'bird'. He was sighted by a passing police car, arrested, given 60 lashings (not tongue lashings) and will be deported after serving another 30 days in jail. To put this into perspective, it certainly reduces any incidents of road-rage, but the way these people drive is just unbelievably dangerous, and although i don't give people the bird, if they could hear what i am yelling at them, I'd be buried up to my head and stoned to death and left for the ants to clean up the mess. (that's too graphic isn't it?, sorry...again)

All going well here though. Fran and the boys are 2 and half weeks into the 12 week school holiday period and all are still on speaking terms despite being inside together most of the time. Fran is doing an hour or so of home schooling each day which includes some reading, writing exercises, projects on the local area or any other topic the boys choose, music and games of scrabble. B3 and B4 pretend to be doing their work also, with B4 now able to fit 2 pens in each nostril.

By 9am or so, they normally go swimming and hang out in the games room for a couple of hours or until it is just too hot. The days are getting up to about 46-49C each day now, and even though Al Ain is meant to be very dry, the humidity of late has been about 60%, and very muggy.

The hotter weather is making my work a little more difficult also, so i am trying to spend about 5 hours each morning on the sites doing lots of training and benchmarking etc, and then seeking respite in the office thereafter putting together reports etc. The labour obviously get slowed down and with a recent introduction of decree meaning labourers are not to be on site during the hours of 12.30 to 4pm, the starting hours are now 4.30am, although thankfully i have handed over the project management roles now, so i can start at a more reasonable hour.

Last week we went to Abu Dhabi (capital of UAE) for the day. Being a coastal area, the temperatures are lower (40C), but the humidity is really high. We stumbled across the Presidential Palace, a truly magnificent building and grounds of mammoth proportions. It was originally built to hold a conference of all the sheiks, and is today used to house any visiting rulers and parliamentary sessions are also held there. One of the wings is now a well disguised, highly exclusive hotel to the absurdly rich and famous. So when the 6 of us rocked up in our boardies and thongs, we coped a few strange stares, but were warmly welcomed none the less. Fran found a lovely part of the hotel serving high tea and is now excited about taking any visiting friends / family to 'high tea' at the Presidential Palace.

We also went ten pin bowling recently. You've probably heard of disco bowling or being bowling while they play music loudly to raise the atmosphere level....right? Well, the UAE is no different, we got some great video footage of the boys bowling alongside all these fellas in their long traditional dresses, with colourful polished bowling shoes instead of their usual sandal, and the loudest Arabic music in town. Again, we were the odd ones out, but had a great time and the local guys really enjoyed watching B3 and B4 try to bowl. FS was a real standout...not for a great bowling ability but as the only female in the whole place. For the record the winners list read B1 first then NS, B3 and B2, with B4 and FS failing to register.

With every single one of our neighbours having gone away for the summer months (July and August), we are doing alot of plant and pet minding. but the greatest things is my Sth African neighbour has left us his key and said we could use his TV if we wanted. the guys is a 'sports nut', and so has every possible cable Chanel and sports channel available. He has a wide screen plasma the size of a trampoline, so the recent Wallabies games, WQS and PGA events etc have been awesome to watch live.

Cheers for now, as usual we look forward to receiving your emails and letters and hero faxes.

and you SHEIK it all about...

Above - Cottage Gardens in Moreton. The English country side has so many desirable places.

Above - Obligatory photo at the gates to Buckingham Palace.

Above - Hyde Park, London, Rose garden.


Above - Harrods - Before leaving for the UK, FS gave me a very clear instruction, "enjoy yourself, but make sure you get me something from Harrods". I couldn't understand why she was upset with the 'underwater seadoo' i got in the sports section?

Above - Bath, a truly beautiful place.

Above - Arlington Row, 15th Century homes, still lived in today. The doors are tiny, about 5 foot high only.

Above - Sheik 'Abdul Zach.

Above - Sheik Mohamed Ozzy, unlike the other boys who really only 'dress-up' in the Dish Dash, B2 loves it and wears it everywhere, all the time.

Sheik 'Bad Ass' Archie, don't tick this Sheik off.

Above - Sheik of all things cute.

Above - A meeting of the higher rulers in Al Ain, to discuss unfair bedtimes, reduced pocket money and excessive vegetables at dinner. They hope to pass a decree abolishing the above mentioned.

Above - 3 wise men????

Hello and welcome back to our little blog detailing some of our adventures and experiences. We are still without Internet at home so you need to persevere with nick (me) writing these little accounts for at least another week or two, plus, when we have access from home, we hope to keep the blogs a little more regular, plus the added advantage that you'll hear more about the family adventures and less of my dribble.

All well over here, we have had a few interesting weeks of late including a quick trip to the UK, Oman and the boys deciding to convert to Islam, (not really, they just enjoy wearing the Dish Dash).

Regarding the Arabic dress; B2 had been desperate to get himself some of the local traditional clothing since arriving. Of all of us, he has really taken to the language and loves responding in Arabic. FS took the boys down to get fitted for their 'dresses' (never thought I'd write that so comfortably), the man fitting them made sure they had the Al Ain / Oman styled cloth and head wear, as each tribe / region has it's own variation on the style. The head wear is important as it signifies age and standing in the community. For example, B1 got the black rope with 4 x tassels on the back, whilst B4 just got the little head warmer. Anyway, they all looked very cute and handsome, but B2 refuses to wear anything else now. As soon as he is back from school, he jumps straight into the dress and head wear, very funny. He has even objected to wearing his usual Havianna thongs and wants to get the trendy Arabian styled sandal to compliment his traditional wears.

I had to exit the country a couple of weeks back because my visit Visa had expired again, so i took the opportunity to head to the UK for a week. I was lucky to hook up with and old mate, Anthony Druitt and stay at his place in the countryside of England, a lovely little village called Corsham. Ant and his family have been living and working in the UK for a couple of years now and are doing really well. He also makes a great tour guide, having particular interest in the interior design of small village pubs and the ales they serve.

I was so lucky to be able to stay with Ant and see a lot of the country side including Bath, Chipping Camden, Corsham, Bourton on the Water, Moreton, Stonehenge, to name but a few. After 4 or so days of drinking and eating our way through the English country side (not really too much drinking,but it sounds blokey) with Ant, I had to wrap up our tour, and caught the train to London. I stayed in a modest little place in Paddington which was perfect for accessing the tube and buses and also being able to walk to many of the tourist spots such as Hyde Park, Buckingham Palace, Kensington Palace and the Australian War memorial. Whilst i only had a couple of days i manage to get to see lots including the Eye of London, Big Ben and Parliament, St Paul's Cathedral, Piccadilly Circus (great for a night out), the Art Gallery, The Royal Mews and of course Harrods. I was disappointed to run out of time and missed going to Lords. All in all, a great trip, i just know how much FS would fall in love with the place, so i can't wait to get us all back one day.

FS has been looking forward to a white Xmas for as long as i can remember and with the boys this'll be a great experience. Being the tight-arse i am, i suggested we could simply drive to Dubai for the day and watch the Ski slope at the local shopping centre...this idea didn't take off strangely enough. So far, all going well, we're planning on Austria. I've been told very strictly that my week in the UK gives FS unlimited time on the slopes!! My response was that i sacrificed going to the Maldives so i could do a 'reconnaissance mission' for her. The look i received said enough, and i quickly got back to washing the dishes and folding the clothes as i was told. In any case, we have a long , hot summer to get through first, fingers crossed.

We've posted a large detailed map of the world on the living room wall, and we've started to place pins to all the places we want to travel over the coming months. It's very exciting, and having the UAE as a launch pad, we hope we are able to do a really good trip this time next year, but we still play everything here month by month in practical terms.

The boys are about to finish school for the year and will have 10 weeks off during the summer!! Unfortunately for them, most of their mates here will be heading OS for the summer. FS has a number of activities planned, including a bit of school work to make up for all the time they've missed this year with the travelling and difference in school term dates.

I want to make a special mention of a new addition to our family. Little Mia Rose, well done to M and A, and how special is the first little girl on the Courtney side, going to be for all of us. We can't wait to meet her!

Anyway, hope all our mates and families are well, keep the emails coming, we love reading about what you're up to. Cheers.

May Update

Above - Wild Wadi - even the local women, fully dressed in the berka, got into the swing of things. Gotta love the vests on the full dress for a swim, heh!

Above - N and B3 on his new bike

Above - B1 takes on the wave pool at Wild Wadi.

Above - We might be living in the desert, but i was able to sniff out this little gem at Wild Wadi. Fully pitted in the barrel for 12 seconds!!

Above - Family ride at Wild Wadi.

Above - Look out!! Here come the Griswold's to Wild Wadi.

Above - Local kids attract B4 to swim in the springs at Green Muzzabarah.

Above - Boys will be boys, wrestling at the base of Jebel Hafeet.

Hi there sports fans...it's been a jammed packed couple of weeks for the tourists in the UAE. We've tackled the traffic and construction of Dubai to get to Wild Wadi and spend the day pitted in deep barrels and sliding down thrilling rides (most of which jet you upwards with high propulsion jets while sitting in a rubber-tube). we travelled there in convoy with our neighbours and their kids, so we basically didn't see B1 and 2 until the end of the day or they wanted something to eat. The kids had a great time and the queues were very small by comparison to other theme parks. FS seeked out the thrill rides, NS chased the barrels of the wave pool (thought he was surfing Southy on a low tide March weekend), although the rules prohibited standing up, it was so good! B3 loved the pirate maze and water park area with cannons and slides and B4 enjoyed the wave pool beach area and family ride slides.

The boys all finally got some new bikes, so now they can keep up with the other village kids and if the heat isn't wearing them out, the racing around the village is certainly causing some red faces and heat exhaustion.

Weather is getting hotter, so indoor activities are taking over although in the early morning and evening it is very pleasant. It's funny to see FS discovering some of the frustrating and convoluted ways of the UAE. Funny, because i went through the same thing.

We'll keep you posted over the coming weeks.

Hi to all and sundry. We miss you all, feel like we've been gone for years already, but all having a good time of it.