14 days!

Last time I sort of glossed over a few details. In this installment of moving to the United Arab Emirates during a global pandemic I will try and fill one or two of those in. Again I am writing this in the interest of sainity so take it for what it is

Previously I implied a more seat of the pants expidition than was perhaps true. In reality we had been given some rather specific steps to take both in the airport and immediately afterwards. Some of these worked out and others not so much. The most obvious thing to go wrong was meeting HR representatives at the Covid test centre.

Several days before leaving the UK we had a Skype meeting with some of our new colleagues, our new HR representatives and the head of secondary at our new school. We got lots of information from this meeting again there were issues with some of it but for a moment I want to look at the Covid test centre and the process that we were supposed to follow. We were told that on leaving the airport in Dubai we should get a taxi and ask for Al Ain. Al Ain is a large city of around 1 million people in the Emirate of Abu Ahabi about an hour from Abu Ahabi itself. Part way through the journey we would need to stop at Covid test centre between the Emirates of Dubai and Abu Ahabi. Here we would be tested but also we would meet some representatives from our new school who among other things would tell the taxi driver where to take us. There could be any reason for this but ultimately we did not meet the reps at the test centre. Post test the taxi driver was off very quickly and asking where we wanted to be dropped. "Good question". Through a series of phone calls, where the driver took my phone and swerved violently across a major motorway in the process, it was eventually agreed that we would meet at a petrol station. This differed from our original plan which was to take the taxi all the way to our accomadation. After ten minutes waiting on a petrol station forecourt where we felt the imaginary breath of a grumpy taxi driver breathing down out necks the friendly faces of the school staff appeared in a small coach.

"Welcome to the UAE". "I though it would be nice for us to ride together so that we could talk and get to know each other". Perfect, this was actually a lovely idea and has turned out to be one of about three conversations we have had outside of each since arriving. However, at the time, sleep deprived and in a foreign country we knew little about it had been a little nerve wracking.

On the bus we met a few other new and existing members of staff. The HR guys tried to tell us about what we were looking at out of the window and gave us a food package which was quickly devoured. And here we come to the title of this post. Days eariler in the online meeting we had been told 7 days in quarantine. Miserary. The conversation on the bus turned that way again, only now it looked more like 14 days. Ever been on a two week holiday to an exotic location? Ever spent that entire vaction in a large apartment with more bathrooms than occupants with little to no opportunity to go outside? Me neither but this is pretty close to it. This is no one's fault but it turns out that a week with your own company is pretty tough going. At this point we are on the half way mark. We have cleaned the apartment twice, moved the furniture around. I have fettled my bike (yes I brought it on the plane) to within an inch of it's life. I have even done some ironing. Netflix and Amazon Prime have also taken a battering. These last two are more of a challenge than they sound as we do not have any internet. We have to pinch it from a neighbour which means camping out by the front door in order to get a signal strong enough.

Having just read this back it sounds like a series of complaints but it is not really. In the spirit of adventure before dementia, adventures need some hardship. It's not exactly the adventure that we had hoped for and it is miserable giving up two weeks of our summer holidays but these are the things that make this an adventure. An adventure that with some luck with start becoming a little more interesting in a few days time.

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