What's not to worry about?

FROWN LINES: I promise I won't go this far. Although someone
tried to sell me on laser hair removal the other day, which looked
pretty fab.

Worrying is something I have always been rather good at. Well, I’m being modest. I’m awesome at it. I could worry for Australia.

So, I have embraced a few new things to worry about now that I live in Dubai. Isn’t it wonderful the opportunities that travel brings? 

I have even graduated to the state where I have permanent little worry lines etched onto my forehead, between my eyebrows, like a cartoon character. Now I look worried even when I'm not worried. Great.

Here’s a few of my new concerns, off the top of my head. There are more, but I don’t want to worry my family and friends back home…

1. The water contains terrible chemicals. The water is desalinated so it contains no useful trace elements. All the local bottled water is bereft of minerals, but you can’t drink the tap water. If I buy (expensive) imported mineral water with actual minerals in it, I’m contributing to global warming (food miles, unnecessary packaging, etc. Also, no one here bothers to recycle. The tip outside of town is the size of several football fields. I reckon half of it would be water bottles.). If I don’t, my children will not get the necessary minerals. Also, there is no way for them to get extra fluoride because, unlike Australia, they don’t put fluoride in either the tap or bottled water. Hence, their teeth will fall out.

Solution: there is none.

2. The food mostly comes from overseas. That means that fresh fruit and vegetables are not really fresh and have probably been sitting in a truck, ship or plane for far too long and no longer have any vitamins and minerals. This is bad for me and my family (see water section above). It is also bad for the environment (food miles etc as above). It is also all highly packaged. Ditto all of the above for eggs, grains, etc. And I have no proof that local animals were raised or slaughtered humanely, or that live imports of cattle and sheep are handled properly. And I can’t grow much in my garden because the trees that shade my house also prevent vegetables growing on the ground. And it would be costly in terms of water.

Solution: there is none.

3. People drive like maniacs, and if I drive to keep up with them I might hit an Emirati or a pedestrian, in which case the accident is automatically my fault. If someone dies, I could get deported, go to jail, or have to pay blood money (yes, you read that right. Blood money). If I drive too slowly, I will cause an accident, someone will hit me and we could all die. There is little to no public transport. And nothing in my life is within walking distance.

Solution: there is none.

4. Labour is incredibly cheap. People come from all over the world to work as shop assistants, builders, street sweepers, gardeners, nannies and cleaners. If I hire a gardener and a cleaner, which we can afford because they ask only a pittance, I am supporting an inequitable and sometimes corrupt system. If I don’t, I am preventing someone from making a living and sending money home to their family in the Philippines or Pakistan. And I am also a hypocrite, because I am supporting the system anyway every time I do the groceries, drive through a security gate, get a massage or need a home handyman.

Solution: there is none.

This is just a selection of new conundrums I face in Dubai. Any tips or advice? And what are the conundrums you face in yours?

In the right

So, over here in Dubai they drive on the right. Before we left Australia, this was practically my biggest concern. Forget leaving everything I love and know and re-settling my family in a foreign land. No, I was worried about driving on the wrong side of the road.

But apart from a few sudden swerves away from oncoming cars in the beginning (it’s all right, Mum, we’re okay), it’s not actually being on the other side of the road that has proved the problem. It’s all the little unexpected things that come along with it.

Did you realize how much of what you do when you’re driving is completely unconscious? That glance of the eyes up to the rear view mirror, the hand on the gear stick, the flicking on of the indicator.

When you have to reverse all these actions, it makes your brain hurt. It’s like being Alice in Wonderland, post-fall, and everything about driving is made strange.

You have to re-think every single thing. To see behind me, I dart my eyes up to the left, looking for the mirror. Uh oh, that’s the window now. I have fallen into the habit of using my driver’s side mirror instead of my rear view mirror because it seems more natural to look in that direction. That’s actually worked out okay, because it matters more whose beside you here, really, as it’s all about changing lanes, or else dodging the crazies changing lanes around you.

Even walking to the car is complicated. I have actually unlocked the car and climbed into the passenger seat before I realized there was no steering wheel in front of me. That was only last week. And I’ve been here three and a half months. Sad. Mostly, though, I twig to it just as I’m about to pull the door open. Then I pretend I was just putting my handbag on the seat and slam the door, walk casually around to the other side, and climb in.

But that’s not where the problem ends. Even with uncompromising visual evidence that I am in a left-hand drive car, I reach my right hand up into empty space, looking to pull the seatbelt down. After negotiating that, I still smash my left hand into the side door, in search of the gear stick to put the car into reverse.

I know I’m not the smartest person in the world, and I do tend to rely more than others on habit (given that I am just slightly absent-minded) but I understand I’m not the only one going through this. Even my husband admits to some of it.

But the worst (in terms of the outcome, so far) is my conflicted spatial awareness. I am just not used to having so much car sticking out to the right. Let’s just say this has led me into a couple of scrapes.

But wait, there’s more. Even footpaths are a minefield, since the expectation here is that people will move to the right as they walk past each other. Even if you adapt to this fairly quickly, there will inevitably be tourists, or Dubaians (is that a word?) from other parts of the world, who insist on walking on the left. Disaster. Then there’s escalators. We regularly approach the ‘up’ side when we want to go down, and vice versa.

The only place I haven’t had to compromise is the pool. The lap lanes are usually empty, so I can still swim on the left. (I have no idea why this is so. Australians seem to be the only ones who swim for exercise. The others by the pool are drinking juice and looking at Facebook on their phones.)

In some ways, the whole left-right thing is a symbol of adapting to a new land. Everything is different. You have to think through each action, from where to go shopping to how to find a doctor. This makes your brain hurt. It’s also stressful and tiring. Which explains why I feel like I need to sleep all the time. Wake me when it’s time to pick up the kids – I’m having a nap.

Let's go shopping...

I’ve had a bit of a whinge about what I can’t find in Dubai. Now it’s time to be a little grateful and focus on what I can.

And I don’t mean the Louis Vuitton clothing or the child-size Mercedes Benz toy cars. You can take all that as a given.

What I mean is the little everyday items that I may not be able to buy at home, but that quickly became part of my weekly shopping list here. As is often the case, I’m talking about food.

 

1. Pomegranates

I hardly ever bought these in Australia, unless I needed them for a special salad. I can’t think why - now I buy them every week. We put them through the juicer with a pineapple (also super-cheap, super-sweet and always available. I’d have added them to the list, but that would have made six, and everyone knows that five is the correct number for a blog list) and a couple of apples – mmm, delicious. They go in cous cous salads, fruit salads, and on top of hommous. Which leads me to my next point.

2. Hommous

Yes, I know you can buy this in every supermarket in Australia. Or you can make your own, which I did, all the time. But it was not as awesome as this hommous, I’m telling you. Every single self-respecting supermarket in Dubai (even the little ones) sells cheap, fresh, home-made hommous at the salad counter and it’s killer good. I think they slap in a heap more tahini than I used to, which makes it taste extra-rich and scrumptious. I’m still clinging to the idea that it’s sort of healthy (allowing me to eat it by the spoonful – no, really), and I even use it on the kids’ sandwiches like butter (with ham and salad, not with Vegemite, because that would be gross).

3. Arabic bread

Put the idea of that dried out supermarket Arabic bread right out of your head. You know the kind that cracks when you fold it? Yuk. This stuff is fresh daily, comes in every shape and size and smells like heaven. Unless you live in Greenacre with your own Arabic bakery down the road, you are probably not eating Arabic bread this good in Australia. So, yay for Dubai!

4. Carrots

But these are not just carrots. They are peeled, baby carrots. In a bag. From the supermarket. Because who would want to peel their own carrots? I know it’s ridiculous, but the fact is our carrot consumption has gone through the roof. You can’t beat the convenience.

5. Pomegranate syrup

This is sort of cheating, because I’ve already done pomegranates, but I’m loving myself sick for finding this and I have to share it. And once again, I know you can buy this in Australia, but it’s not easy to track down and it’s not cheap. Or maybe that’s just because I lived in Nowra. Anyhoo, it’s my new favourite salad dressing ingredient and it’s wonderful. Drink it by the bottleful.

One other good thing is that when you put all these fresh, cheap and easy to find things together, what have you got? Lunch. Which I am going to make, right now.

What food have you loved when overseas?