It's the little things...

Joy upon joy! I have my sexy red mixer. Hooyah.

I saw it a couple of weeks ago and, as is my way, um-ed and ah-ed over it for a week before deciding that I actually really do want it, that I’m not a student any more, that I am earning money, that I can actually spend it on things I want rather than things I need and it’s on sale anyway so I can feel that little bit less guilty.

So I dragged O along last week to be my muscle when it came to carrying it to the car. But! Woe upon woe – they were out of stock. My world was rocked to its very core and all my weekend baking plans promptly flew out of the window. A sad day for all, I think you’ll agree.

So, wiping a tear from my eye, I wrote my name and number in the sales assistants little book with the promise that he’d call me when they got more stock in, and that it would still be on sale.

I waited. As patiently as I could (not very), whinging as little as I could (at least once a day) about how I wanted my mixer and wanted it NOW! I trawled through websites and cookbooks listing all the things I wanted to make. I bought bundt pans and mini-muffin tins. All because I didn’t have my mixer. It was starting to become a bit of a problem.

Then yesterday! My phone rang and a lovely man told me that my mixer was in stock and that they’d hold it for me until I got there after work.

Since O is away this week I made my own way to Marina Mall, having been assured when I popped in to the shop last week that I’d be able to carry the mixer on my own. Once there however, the sales assistant had other ideas. Having persuaded him that I didn’t need one of the shop men to carry it to the taxi rank for me, we then attempted to get the thing in a bag. The biggest bag they had ripped. I tried to explain that I’d like to wrap the box up using the ripped bag and some tape and that I’d carry it by the handles in the box, but the sales assistant did not approve and insisted on someone helping me. The fella turned up with a flat bed on wheels for heaven’s sake! All for a little mixer! I felt very silly walking behind him as he weaved his way through the mall and we both had a laugh about it – I think he felt a little silly too.

I managed to wrestle it out of the cab and into the flat where I unpacked it with all the excitement of a four year old at Christmas. After oo-ing and ah-ing for a little while, I put all the removable gubbins in the dishwasher, read the instructions and spent the rest of the evening trying to decide what to make first.

So here it is, my sexy red mixer. Standing proud up on the counter and waiting patiently to be christened with some batter-delight or other. I’m thinking chocolate chip cookies.


I noticed, as I was putting it all together, that our kitchen has inadvertently become a Kenwood kitchen. Completely by accident we have a Kenwood food processor, hand blender, deep-fryer (not my purchase choice!), rice cooker and now mixer! No one would believe that we aren’t a Kenwood-loving couple and that it is completely accidental – but it is! Truly and honestly… now where was that Kenwood catalogue again?

The Kenwood Krew all lined up

On Kitchens

I've been thinking a lot about kitchens lately.

The kitchen always played a large factor in my childhood, our dining table was always in our kitchen (at least as far back as I can properly remember anyway) and was where my parents would feed guests as well as the family - unless it was a big event and not everyone would fit, in which case the big table in the living room would be brought in to play.

On holidays visiting family the kitchen was always the hub of everything, good food cooked especially for the visitors, unusual tastes, laughs, drama... kitchens are important places and I've been neglecting mine lately. I've been leaving O to do all the cooking and haven't baked anything (my real cooking love) in forever.

I had lost my inspiration and couldn't find anything that I actually wanted to make until I came across this recipe by Joy (check out her blog, it's all about baking with this being one of her few savoury concoctions) in which she uses the magic words "cheesy polenta" and "fennel". I did a little substituting - beef for beans and coriander for oregano - and the result was fabulous. I am also waiting for the re-stocking of a sexy red mixer I want to buy as part of my back-to-the-kitchen programme.

So in preparation for loads of time spent there, and because I'm off work sick today, I thought I'd take you on a little tour of my kitchen if you don't mind...


There are four doors leading away from the kitchen, I'm standing in front of door number one which leads to the bedrooms and you can see door number two which leads to the laundry room. Can you spy our basil plant by the window? Keep your fingers crossed that this one survives.


There you see door number three which leads out to the back stairs and rubbish shoot for our building, and our lovely cooker (more on that in a mo). There is also my shisha pipe there on the counter on the right.


Door number four on the left which leads to the front door and door number one there on the right. The fridge needs no introduction.

Now I'd like to take a second to point out a couple of my favourite features in this kitchen.


Let me introduce you to my oven - electric oven, gas hob, 90x60cm, 5 spider burners with one double burner in the middle. Oh and also the cute green-piggy tea towel that my mum gave me. This is a beauty and bakes nice and evenly, the only compliant is that the gas burners are a little too powerful for my liking. It's pretty easy to burn stuff.


My cook books and delicious. magazines, plus up on the counter - the remnants of a cheese pie I baked.

Mmmmmm, cheese pie.

Speaking of pie...

This is my baking cupboard. Pitifully bare right now because I'm not baking in earnest but we have measuring cups and spoons, baking powder and bicarb of soda, baking beans, two kinds of flour, two kinds of sugar, orange blossom water, cooking chocolate, minced dates and cocoa.


This is the tea cupboard. I'm not sure exactly how many kinds of tea I have any more, but I counted before we moved and there were over 20 so... yeah, not going to be counting - or buying tea - for a little while.


And to drink that tea we need mugs and cups and tea pots and saucers and a sugar bowl!


Last, but not least, our spice cupboard. Looking decidedly messy but I'd like to think that it shows how much it's used.

Thank you for indulging me in my little kitchen tour. I'm appreciating it at the moment and thought I'd share.

The art of delivery - part II

In April I was talking about how easy it is to get stuff delivered out here... the one thing I was lamenting not being able to have whisked to my door after a moment on the phone was sushi.

Well, lo and behold! My life is now complete (apart from the needing a new job bit) and I have some delicious delicacies speeding their way to me as I write.

O and I went to a Japanese restaurant called Samurai two nights ago. It was most fun. They do sushi, sashimi, teppanyaki - the usual fare - but the best bit was the Yakiniku! I'd never even heard of it before, and for anyone else who is similarly at a loss - allow me to explain.

Our table had a hole in the middle of it and that hole turned out to be our very own personal table-top barbeque! You turn it on under the table and there is a gas grill that heats up super quick. We ordered a mixed Yakiniku and got three different kinds of red meat (two different cuts of beef and one of lamb I'm sure) and some veggies all marinaded in a soy sauce based marinade which we threw on the grill and barbequed exactly to our liking!

We ate too much, but it was delicious and I will definitely be going back for more.

Oh! There's the door bell.

In Fond Remembrance of Solitude

I have a little grump on, which might explain the nature of this blog entry.


Having recently started working full time, after more than 8 years solidly spent at university, there are a number of changes and adjustments I have had to make in my life and the lifestyle to which I was accustomed. Most of these changes and adjustments are not quite as bad as I make them out to be at 6am when I’m struggling to remember how to work the shower, bleary-eyed with sleep and still a bit confused as to whether there really is a Nutella-monster that wants to turn me into a piece of toast.

One of these changes is having a routine. Nowt wrong with that. It’s nice to know where I’m meant to be and when, for a set time of the day. The fact that I wish my routine started a couple of hours later than it currently does is inconsequential in the grand scheme of things.

In my previous life as a PhD student, I had no routine whatsoever (and yes, this was indeed part of the problem and definitely one of the reasons why it took so bloody long to finally finish the damn thing), everything was up to me. When I got up, when I went to bed, when I sat at my desk, when I watched Frasier re-runs, when I went for a look around the shops… It was just too much freedom for a champion procrastinator such as myself. That being said – I was a master of my own time, which I loved, although I didn’t have any money to do anything with that time, which I loved somewhat less.

Now that I’m gainfully employed I have much, much less free time. But I do have cash to blow on meaningless frivolities (like getting my nails done and buying coffee) which make that precious free time more enjoyable. I relish my free time now, rather than being burdened by it. Plus it is guilt free, which is something that your average, right-minded person (and by that I mean everyone who has not done a PhD) takes absolutely for granted. For 8 years I felt guilty when I was doing anything other than work. What is surprising is how the weight of that guilt didn’t a) crush me because I so often did so little work in my free time or b) inspire me to do more work. I refer you to my above statement about being a champion procrastinator. I could have won awards for my procrastination, except they’d never hold an award ceremony for it because everyone would leave making their travel plans to the last minute and end up not being able to go. Sigh.

What with now being able to relish my free time, one would think that make the most of it by embarking on adventures (mind you, look at what happened on my last adventure), expanding my horizons, exploring new avenues of all sorts… but I don’t. I tend to spend my free time sleeping, eating and vegged out in front of the TV with my laptop open, surfing various not-especially-enlightening websites (apart from a couple of special mentions such as this one, this one and, oh yeah!, this one) thus giving neither my full attention and gleaning far little from either than I would have if I had bothered! That and going shopping, which is always fun… especially when you actually have money.

Which all brings me to the final change that I want to talk about. Being alone. When I was doing the PhD (and living away from my home university) I spent cascading vast quantities of time alone. All day in fact. O would get up at stupid o’clock in the morning to go to work and then come home at some point in the late afternoon/evening, leaving me all that time by myself. I am fairly solitary by nature, I need alone time or I get even more grumpy than usual, but this was too much even for me. There were tools at my disposal to somewhat alleviate that feeling of being ALONE but really there isn’t much of a substitute for real human company – which is why I had a tendency to bounce up and down like a little Terrier puppy whenever O came home, demanding attention and to be taken out for a walk and then getting all downhearted and dejected if the cruel, mean-hearted, villain dared to even grumble that he was “too tired” after working for maybe 12 hours that day. Tsk.

So yeah, alone. Now I didn’t enjoy being alone, as I said. However I am now in the position when I look back fondly at certain aspects of that time and wish to be whisked back in a time machine for just a few precious hours of sweet, silent solitude.

I was not prepared for what it would be like to work full time in office in many ways, but definitely the aspect that is grating the most right now is that I am never, ever, alone! From the moment I arrive in the morning until the moment I leave there is always someone there. And even then that’s not the start or the end because O and I work in the same building and so drive to and from work together (but that doesn’t really count because I picked him to be the person who is always around and, frankly, I’d much rather he was there than wasn’t). So, yeah. Even on those merciful occasions when everyone else (all three of them) is out of the office and I have it to myself, the phone is ringing and people are stopping by to see the people who aren’t there.

There. is. no. escape…!

I go for a cigarette break and there is someone there, someone I’ve nodded to twice before and who now wants to have meaningless chit-chat about the same old stuff that I’ve had meaningless chit-chats about before because I’m the new one. Some days this is fine, and some of the people are very nice, but some days I just want to smoke my cigarette and play Sudoku on my phone without having to explain that I’ve been here X months, yes I like Abu Dhabi very much, I live in Y, yes it is getting hot now, blah blah AAARRRRGGGHHHH!

There is one place where one can pretty much always expect to be alone, no matter where you are (unless you have little children of the type that I was who are less sentient being and more semi-permanently attached tail) and that is the loo. Surely, surely, one can reasonably expect to be able to go to the loo in some semblance of isolation, right? WRONG! Ok, it’s not like anyone actually comes into the little cubicle with me and stands there watching, but both of the bathrooms that are within walking distance of my office regularly have the cleaning ladies in them – all the time! Chatting on the phone or with each other if there’s more than one. I can understand it, I really can. If there isn’t much work going on it’s not like they have an office to sit in like I do, but still! It means that you have to engage in even more perfunctory small talk just to have empty your bladder for heaven’s sake! Granted it’s little more than a “hello, how are you?” and a “goodbye” when leaving, but in a day when I have already had 100 other meaningless conversations that absolutely do not need to happen and when I’m at GRUMPCON 3 and rising, that is one more nothing interaction that makes me want to scream and long for the days when I would sit in desolate slump for hours on end, staring at the fake company on the TV screen and wishing with all my might for one little meaningless conversation or unnecessary, nothing interaction.

Finally A Bank Account

At the start of the month I opened my bank account.

Not terribly exciting, one might think, but everything is kind of exciting here because it more often than not opens up whole new, hitherto unimagined, worlds of red tape, complications, form filling, pencil pushing, first born promising and frustration of the sort that makes you want to rip the skin off your face with your fingernails.

First I have to mention the unusual quirk they have here of wanting you to keep a substantial sum in your bank account at all times, lest they charge you for going under that amount. This sum varies from bank to bank and from account to account. I have noted a low of AED200 for a very basic account which is essentially keeping your cash under your mattress but without the convenience of having it so easily accessible, and a high of AED10,000 which, presumably, entitles you to bank statements printed on gold-leaf and having a unicorn nuzzle your neck to ease your tension whenever you grace the branch with your presence. This practice doesn’t make any sense to me, because surely, if you thought you were going to drop below the standing amount, the logical thing to do would be to take all your money out and close the account, rather than sit immobile while you get charged for daring to use your own money! You should be ashamed!!!!

Then, there are the women’s accounts.* Aside from getting to choose which pretty picture you want on your debit card, there are benefits to women only accounts – but it’s a shame the benefits are only for women. The premise is that a woman will either not be earning her own money, and instead be provided for by the significant male in her life at that point (father/husband), will be a secondary earner in the household and probably not earning as much as the significant male in her life and that the account holder may not have a regular amount entering the account on a regular schedule. In this country, all quite reasonable assumptions. What this means for the account holder is that there is often a much reduced standing amount (if any) though quite probably a reduced interest rate to go along with it.

There is no stipulation about who may open one of these women’s accounts, apart from that you are a woman. And so, due to my somewhat unstable employee status I opened one myself!

I picked a bank that seemed to be the least sneaky with hidden charges (some will charge you every time you use your bank card, either at an ATM or in a shop, they will charge you for using the counter service, they will charge you for having a cheque book and for using a cheque, they will charge you for daring to want to dirty up their nice clean bank by keeping all your filthy money in it and for merely existing… ok I exaggerate, but only about the bank being clean), but this came with a price. They are only open between 8am and 2pm. Bit of an inconvenience since I start work at 8am but hey ho, they are open on Saturdays so not too much of andrama as long as I don’t have any urgent banking matters that cannot wait until the weekend.

I digress. Never one to be daunted in the face of needing to make a little extra effort (stop sniggering in the back – I can hear you!) I tootled along on a Saturday morning with passport in hand to become a proper grown up person who can take charge of her own money! Woohoo!

It all started smoothly enough, although the nice woman who would ultimately open my account for me was adamant that she describe – in a not altogether descriptive manner – the different kinds of current accounts that the bank provides, even though I’d done my research and picked the kind of account that I want. She was most successful in confusing me and sending my little brain round in circles. That over and done with I filled in my forms, handed over my passport for photocopying, got myself a pay slip and handed AED150 in cash to the teller. AED100 as a minimum deposit to open the account and AED50 for my debit card… well you can’t expect something for nothing now, can you?! So simple, so quick. I was delighted.

With that all nicely sorted, I was a little surprised to get a call the next day from the woman who opened my account. Apparently there were some things that were neglected (I’d be raising an eyebrow now if I could) when I initially opened the account. Some extra information about me was needed and though she could take that information over the phone I needed to sign the form to authorize the amendments. Sigh. Also, for some reason I’m not wholly convinced about (she said something about her boss and audits), I had to provide a salary certificate. Oh boy.

It takes a couple of days but I get my salary certificate through from Dubai, and despite it having my title as “Miss” it refers to me using the masculine 3rd person singular throughout. It also is missing a rather essential decimal point resulting in my salary certificate certificating that I earn an absolute mint! Ha. I wish. Hoping for the best (and already regretting not using a little biro magic to address that decimal point issue) I take it to the bank as soon as the place opens the next day.

After more palaver involving trying to explain there aren’t “departments” in my four person office, pleading that the salary certificate be accepted even though it reads like it’s been written by a baboon that had a school-leavers diploma waved in it’s general direction, providing a full UK address and phone number (even though I DON’T LIVE THERE ANY MORE!) and my bra size I was told that, Insha’allah, my bank card would be ready for me by the weekend.

Ee gads. Luckily the card was ready by the weekend and I had my May wage paid into my account so I can now spend virtual money to my heart’s content. Whoop!


In case any one was wondering what has been happening to my salary before this momentous occasion… I had it paid into O’s account, which meant that I regularly felt like the little woman saying something very much like “Darling, I need to buy some frivolous women’s things like kittens and parasols – hand over the ATM card!”

Adventures in banking this certainly was not. But I was very, very excited to have that little text telling me I’ve been paid.



*Don’t even ask about the accounts that conform to the Islamic code of interest/profit earning. I just cannot get my head around them at all – but they do exist and indeed entire banks operate based on it.

Foreigner's Adventures This Weekend

Cast your mind back a wee while, if you will, and recall our last adventures at sea.

Ah it seems so long ago now that we traipsed across the sea bed like some ancient mariners walking forth into the unknown after the tide betrayed us leaving our trusty vessel sand-banked, avoiding the urchins and me trying not to lose my flip-flops. All fun and games.


This past weekend saw us on another adventure, only this time it was more… prolonged.


It started innocently enough (as these things so often do *sigh*). It was proposed that a bunch of people get together and camp overnight on one of the islands surrounding Abu Dhabi. Nothing is ever really far away in Abu Dhabi so if the worst came to the worst we could always just hop on the boat and be safely back on terra-firma within half an hour, max. Mmmmhmmmmmm.

O, being the BBQ king that he is, was persuaded to deal with the food so our weekend began with four hours in the kitchen preparing and marinating 8kgs of meat and sundries (the sundries were my job – salads basically). All well and good, there were to be 16 of us after all! Plus the destination island comes complete with a public grill. Sorted.

We were a little late in leaving the dock in the first place, but it wasn’t too much of a problem in the grand scheme of things since we were spending the night. Anyhoo – we arrive at the island-with-grill only to find it is overrun with jet-skiers! This will not do since we wanted to swim and it is hazardous to ones health to be swimming where there are jet-skiers about. So we push on and find ourselves a nice little deserted island (I say deserted but there was a permanent camp a little way down the beach, lights, air-con, satellite!) and proceed to unload our stuff. A minor problem arises when it dawns upon the group that there is no grill on this beach, but “not to worry!” cries our captain – we have disposable BBQ thingies a-plenty. A-ha! Disaster narrowly averted.

While the captain went back to fetch some other soon-to-be-islanders, the rest of us proceeded to make camp. Having selected an area that was out of the wind, flat enough for our stuff to stay where we put it and far enough away from the apparent tide mark we happy few set out tables and chairs and some beach mats, constructed a tent or four, laid out the food, opened a bottle of sparkling grape-juice (ahem) and began the chilling out process.

When the captain finally came back (complete with one islander who brought a suitcase with wheels in which he had packed a shaving kit, cologne, pillows and a duvet – yes, there was much sniggering behind hands as we watched him dragging his case across the sand) it was getting dark so it seemed wise to get on with the BBQ. Two small disposable BBQs materialised. Allow me to remind you that we had a hella lot of meat to cook. O gamely gave it a shot but we realized after about an hour that it really wasn’t going to work. Added to the distinct lack of decent heat source was the issue of there being no light source! There were a couple of lanterns, but no wicks. There were some of those tiki torches, but not enough lighter fluid to keep them alight. While a giant search light was charging on the boat we had to make do with a little torch with dying batteries being shared between the BBQ and the camp-fire construction.

In the end it all got to be too much of a faff so we wrapped the meat in foil and threw it on the camp-fire to what it would. Turns out that you can cook alright food using this technique, but it doesn’t rival a good grilling.


After eating, the captain had to disappear again as there were a number of people not spending the night. I’d say, ooooh, maybe an hour after he left is when we noticed that the tide was coming in. And I’d give it maybe five minutes more before we realized that we were going to get flooded. Yup, flooded. The tide was coming in at a ridiculous rate and because we were on a flat there was no question of what the inevitable outcome would be if we didn’t act quickly.

I would not recommend having only two people while trying to shift the camping gear of seven people up a sand-dune* with the tide biting at your heels. I would suggest having at least twelve people to do that job. Sadly there were only five of us on the island at that stage and three weren’t at camp when the tide arrived. So O and I shleped as much as we could up the beach before the other three raced back and we all got it up the dune just. in. time! The camp-fire was gone, but the night was warm and we five waded out into the – now much nearer – water to wash the sweat off and play with the phosphorous. (My theory is that it is water angels and I do not want to be told any different thankyouverymuch.)

Four hours after leaving us, the captain and two other islanders got back and I promptly went to bed.


The next morning was early. At about 6am I awoke to find myself a sleeping bag wrapped dim sum in a tent-shaped bamboo steamer. Luckily there was a flask of coffee (vanilla and hazelnut flavoured!) and water that wasn’t yet at an undrinkable temperature. I was looking forward to a quick swim and then packing up to go home. Surely no one would really want to hang around after the farce of the night before.

From our vantage point on top of the sand dune the boat was clearly visible. As was the water. The boat. And the water. Or should I say:

The boat <-----------------------------------------------> And the water.

With the boat moored in sand and the sea somewhat further away from the boat than would be useful to facilitate us going home there could be only one conclusion. We were beached. Again. Only this time in a slightly less than fun manner since we couldn’t walk across the sea bed and we’d spent a night on the island and wanted to go home. Plus it was getting hot and it was only 6:30/7am.

Fret not however, for I am writing this to you from a lovely comfortable air-conditioned room and not using smoke signals to get the message to someone who can post it for me. At about 8:30am one of the fishermen from down the beach wondered over to tell us that the tide probably wouldn’t be back in until 3 o’clock that afternoon. We elected to have breakfast then call the coast guard to rescue us.

Perhaps inevitably, breakfast didn’t happen (I can now firmly attest that you cannot cook scrambled egg in a tin-foil tray over a butane burner) and neither did the coast guard. The local fishermen from down the beach did, however, and they sped us back home with all our stuff while leaving the captain and his loyal wife with their ship – or more accurately in the air-conditioned tent of the fishermen where they got to play with some puppies for a few hours, by recent accounts.

We made it home by midday which was nice as we got to sleep a lot and still have a bit of the day left to eat, shower and unwind our nerves which were like corkscrews by that stage.

Sadly, it was a less than happy ending for the captain. The previous nights tide was a “spring” tide which only occurs once a month when there is either a full moon or new moon – we had the new moon one – and is unusually high for only one night. Even though he anchored the boat quite far out from the beach, it was dark when he did so and was not quite far out enough. The kindly fishermen told him to go away for the night since the tide wouldn’t be coming back in for a looooong while, after dark they called some of their friends out and they dragged and floated the boat while the tide was just about high enough. The next day after work they called the captain to say his boat was in the water, cooked him supper when he arrived to pick it up and sent him on his way again.


I may complain on occasion about this place and the distinctly odd way in which things are often done. One thing I will never be able to praise enough, however, is the incredible generosity and hospitality of the Emiratis. Especially when it comes to stranded strangers.




*I use the term “dune” loosely, it was more like a sand-shelf but it was high and difficult to climb while pulling a tent so “’dune” will suffice.

The art of delivery

One thing they do really well here in Abu Dhabi (apart from hummous and manicures) is lazy.

There was once a suggestion that they should introduce self-service petrol stations, but a poll revealed that no one would use them even if it was a little quicker. It is the expected and the standard that someone will come to your house and put your Ikea furniture together for you, no matter what it is. No one seems to wash their own car, but will stand by watching the man they are paying to do it, to make sure he is doing it properly.

So now, indulge me for a moment - if you will - and make a quick mental list of the things that you have delivered, but not posted!, to your home... it's ok, I'll wait...

...

Goodness me but I need to get my nails done again...

...

Got it? Ok. I think this sort of list will vary depending on where you live so I'm going to go by where I used to live, the UK. I'll hazard a guess that most of the things on the list will be food related:
Pizza
Indian food
Chinese food

Sushi - if you live in that sort of town
Erm.... well I'm out. I think that's pretty much all I ever had delivered to me while I still lived in the UK.

Here? Well, there's most of the above, although I've not seen a sushi place that delivers yet, and we can also get every type of fast food you can think of (KFC, Maccy Ds, Subway), but it doesn't stop there - oh no!

Forgot to get some coriander for that curry or ran out of limes? Call the greengrocers round the corner and he'll send a guy.
Need some cigarettes and some mobile phone credit? The shop under your building will speed it over.
Bread, milk, water, chocolate bar, shampoo? See above.
There are people who knock on your door with sacks full of fake DVDs.
Dry cleaning? Ironing? Not only will they bring it to you when you ring, but they'll pick up the stuff that needs doing as well!

The only thing I wish I could have brought to my door, that isn't, is the post. For that they make me go to the post office and open my post office box.

Really, once you step inside your door there is precious little to force you out again. It's a good thing the weather is nice.