Moving In

After 10 days in the Shangri La and loads and loads of shopping trips we have finally moved in to the flat.

It is all a bit echo-ey with the lack of furniture but it is very nice to be in at last.

We moved in on Saturday and luckily our mattress arrived promptly along with a nice screen and our balcony furniture. We went to Marina mall to buy a few bits from Ikea and do a supermarket shop - as well as getting me a pay-as-you-go sim card for my new, local, phone. The supermarket visit was cut rather short due to the ridiculous queues at the tills and O needing to get back so he could go paintballing, so essential essentials were bought and then we rushed back. With O paintballing I got my exercise while I cleaned our bathroom (not a small task I might add) and unpacked the toiletries delivered in the air freight in preparation for the next morning’s showers.

On our first night we went to the Sheraton Khaldiya for food and to watch the football so not having done a big shop was not such a biggie. The next morning I went across the road to a French café (La Brioche) for breakfast and got myself a Subway for lunch while I waited for some more furniture to arrive, after which I cleaned the rest of the kitchen and unpacked the kitchen stuff that had also arrived in the air freight.

A brief aside: On the day we left Derby movers came and packed up our flat. It was incredible to watch, they were like a whirlwind and since we found ourselves mostly in the way we went out for lunch and a last wonder around the shopping centre. I’m so SO glad we didn’t have to do it ourselves because we would have made a terrible job of it, however upon unpacking the kitchen stuff I noticed a couple of little amusing results. We have mugs, glasses and cutlery but no crockery. We have some of our pots and pans but only one lid, and not the pot that that lid is for. Much amusement and only mild frustration at having to buy new crockery since we were going to do that anyway but were trying to decide which ones to get. Anyway! Cracking on…

We actually managed a proper shop on Sunday, after another Ikea trip – yay!, and it was quite an experience. I’d already gone for a stroll around this Carrefour so knew pretty much what to expect but it was still rather fun. The fruit and veg section is huge with the origin of the products displayed clearly above the crates and punnets piled up. The fish section is also huge and beautiful with the fish carefully and lovingly displayed on giant ice-filled stands that stretch way back. The whole supermarket is immense, it not only sells food and the standard UK supermarket sort of fare, but also household goods, furniture, garden furniture, computers, white goods, TVs, hi-fi equipment, shoes and clothes. It would be easy to lose a few hours in there, but once again we had to get a move on because the man with the gas canister was coming to hook us up between 8.30 and 9. We were set up but I was exhausted so we went across the road to the Arabic restaurant/shisha café that we can see from our balcony and is, luckily, pretty good.

Yesterday I tackled the balcony. It is glorious, giving a panoramic view of the Corniche (the rather pretty road running along the coast) all the way from the harbour up to Marina mall but it was dusty. Really dusty. It is also rather large so I knew it was going to be a big job. Doing the railing and wall-bits around the balcony was the worst, the wall bits especially because they are almost pebble-dashed only without the pebbles. So a lot of dabbing with a damp sponge was required to get all the dust off. Then it was the turn of the floor of the balcony and I filled a bucket with water, got my squeedgie-broom that O bought on our first trip to Carrefour and began at one end. I threw a couple of buckets of water on the first trip across the balcony, squeedgieing and sweeping the water along till I reached the drain on the far side of the balcony, which I then discovered was very slow in draining so I pushed the water back again. Then I did the whole thing again starting from the slow draining end finishing with coaxing what was left of the water down the working drain. I left it to dry while I had a spot of lunch and then positioned the plastic sofa, chairs and coffee table we had bought for sitting out in the air and relaxed for a bit. It looks infinitely better and is a real joy to sit on now.

Our first home-cooked meal in Abu Dhabi was delicious, grilled mackerel with rice and stir-fried veggies, followed by dates and Super Mario Galaxy on the Wii. I didn’t even mind the washing up this morning.

A.