krisheath.com

Since October 14th, Louise and I have doubtless been through every emotion in the human psychi, too many to list, but I’m fairly confident the majority of them have been splayed across my previous scribblings on these blogs.

To begin where I left off, Christmas came and went without a murmour, New Year, however, was a different story.
A unique experience indeed, Louise and I stood shoulder to shoulder with 4998 other people from all corners of the Earth, with no concern of creed or colour, on the beach at Barasti, with one united aim for the evening coursing through our minds; to get hammered and see in 2010 in, arguably, the most ellaborate way possible, the Dubai way. Louise and I wore white as directed, apparently not everyone had read the tickets…
In typical Dubai fashion, the DJ at the beach bar still had two minutes left on his countdown clock of 2009 when the spectacle that is Atlantis, the hotel at the peak of the Palm Jumeirah, possibly the biggest acheivement of modern man, literally burst into life.
‘A firework show’ would be an understatement, completely unfazed by the DJ somewhat missing the mark, I counted 12 minutes from beginning to end for the event and believe me an event it was. I have seen some fireworks displays in my time, (apologies for the geriatric reference there) but this was by far the biggest and most awe-inspiring use of pyrotechics experienced by Louise and myself.
There are people starving in the world, people losing jobs and having to cut back on life’s little luxuries, but not Dubai, estimates upwards of GBP 2Mil please, Recession? What Recession…

A brilliant night followed by an enjoyable week starting on the 1st Jan 2010, all fired up by a trip to the airport at 7am to pick up my Mom and Dad, a struggle, I’m sure you’ll all feel our pain.
My folks spent 6 nights with us that Louise and I relished, it was our first opportunity to attempt to show what Dubai has to offer and we couldn’t have asked for more fitting guinea pigs. I’m not sure if it felt much like a holiday to them, but we did our damndest to fit in as much as we could, a tour of the whole city, a desert safari, fast food on the beach, rightly topped off by possibly the biggest positive event the world will see for a while, the opening of the Burj Khalifa.

I’m not going to bore you with the detail, as this post has already gone on long enough, but I would urge you to check out my youtube post of the event to get a feel for the whole experience. We were sat about 200m the foot of the building at lake fountain and had a cracking view of the proceedings, we thought the New Year display was amazing, this mother took not only ‘the biscuit’ but the whole pack of biscuits, from the cupboard!

It was obviously sad to see the folks go but hope that they left with the same warm feeling about Dubai as Louise and I get everytime the sun rises in the morning. The only downside to this is that they will no doubt have had the same thoughts as us, how difficult is it going to be to leave here?

In an effort to finish on an upbeat moment, Louise is now a week into a new job at the most renowned Law Firm in Dubai, maybe the whole of the UAE, as an International Credit Controller. She has a huge task ahead of her, collecting AED 8M, thats GBP 1.3M of 18-month old debt, in 3 months, please charge your glasses for the Kiwi of the hour, god knows she’ll be drinking a few of them by the end of it.

We’ve made it through the first 3 months of our new life; things are eventually starting to settle down as we have a place to live, food in the cupboards, we have found our way around (painfully, I might add), work is good for me and Louise is now up and running, and working for that matter. More importantly, no more ‘Visa Runs!’

Next on our visit list is a good friend Matt Green, speaking of which I better go and push the Vac round. I feel it only right to steal his email sign-off….

Safe, Sound, Touch the Ground
(obviously a personal sign-off, not on his professional HSBC emails, honest)

I’m not sure where to start this entry…..

As I write this post sat on the balcony, with a beer to my left, staring out across the abundance of roads and half built ‘investments’ surrounding our building, I can’t help but wonder where the last 2 and a half months have gone.

I dont think I have ever had the feeling that time has flown so fast at the same time feeling that I have been in a place for so long as I have in Dubai. I expect that this paradox is the product of the initial frustrations of moving out here, coupled with missing friends and family and leaving the UK thinking ‘Christmas is still a few months away, plenty of time to get the shopping done’ to me waking up this morning with the realisation that it is now 4 days since, I still haven’t bought any presents and 2010 is rapping on the door.
Fortunately I am able to hide behind the fact that I’m not coming back the UK until April and that will be the perfect opportunity to dish out the ‘belated’ gifts.

To bring you all up to speed from the last post here, as expected, behind the bullish facade, the ‘Visa Run’ was about as much of a success Tiger Woods’ attempt to hide his ‘real’ private life from his wife.
Long and short it took us 4 hours to get there and back, which was not so far away from our optimistic time of 3 hours, but far enough to give us ‘room for improvement’, not unlike my last performance on the Golf Course.

The gym at our apartment has finally been completed and we have both hit it hard to try and get that impossible ‘perfect body’, it is no doubt only a matter of time before the novelty wears off and we are back to square one, or block 10 in chocolate terms.

Christmas came and went without too much of an ‘ado’, with Christmas Eve being spent on yet another road trip across Emirates on the hunt for the ellusive amber nectar.
As with all previous attempts at driving outside of the comfort of the 7 lane motorway that is the bloodline of Dubai, we were again destined to spend as much time outside of Dubai as we have in it, taking a princely 3 and half hours for a trip that should have taken 2.
Fortunately, we have more than a measely stamp in a passport to show for our efforts, the fridge is now stocked with beer and wine, with a couple of bottles of Vodka for when times get tough.

Christmas day was spent briefly opening the gifts Louise and I had brought each other, excuse the plurel, I meant gift. 30 Seconds later we were ready to face the day as though it was like any other weekend, so off we headed to Ikea and a ‘Christmas Meal’ that consisted of a Pasta concoction from a Italian not 50 metres from the Swedish ‘homemakers’.
I am thankful the fesitive period fell on the weekend, as I would have been working Christmas day had it not, due to the inconvenience of Christ not being born in the Islamic calender, ergo not deserving of a day off work.

As we approach the New Year Louise and I are looking forward to the challenges of 2010, the biggest one of those being the entertainment of our guests as people begin to trickle over here to see Dubai, using our offer of free accommodation as the necessity to visit us while they are ‘in the neighbourhood’

Obviously that is a joke, we really appreciate people coming to see us over here and are looking forward to attempting to show you what Dubai has to offer, trying to convince you that the bad press about Dubai’s financial position is a drop in the ocean of the UK’s sea of uncertainty and disdain of the inhabitants.
Whilst there is little in the way of History here, there are plenty of things to see and do.

We will be seeing in the New Year with a couple of friends and a lot of drinks at one of the events in Dubai, a winterland ‘white only’ party at Barasti Beach Bar, the reference to colour being based on apparel, just to clear that up.
I’m not sure how they are going to carry off the ‘winterland’ idea, where I would expect that most people will arrive in shirts and shorts as opposed to woolly jumpers and scarves, but we’ll see, this is Dubai after all!

We hope you all had a great Christmas and are going to have a fantastic New Year in whatever you are doing, dont be afraid to drop us a line at any point, we are awaiting the love you have to offer….