Rain day in Dubai

What I really want to write is a raging post on gun control in a country I love – but although my husband and kids are American, I’m not, and perhaps I just don’t understand.

Yesterday, after hugging my children, I yelled at the iPad, my blood boiling – incensed by some of the comments left by absolute morons (who can’t even spell) on British journalist Piers Morgan’s blog. I’ve no doubt my outburst was futile.

So, I’ll spare you the rant about what to me is intuitive – and by way of distraction from a tragic topic that’s left me shocked, horrified and saddened to the core, I’ll be very British, and talk about the weather instead.

Here in Dubai, we don’t get much adverse weather. Some people would say it goes from boiling hot to hot, but this isn’t actually true: at 9am this morning, the outside temperature reading on the car told me it was a chilly, jumper-worthy 16 degrees.

The cars were making waves just outside my work

The cars were making waves just outside my work

But it wasn’t the ‘cold spell’ that was the talk of the town today: it was the rain. Lashings of it, pouring down from low-hanging granite clouds and forming small, muddy lakes on the city’s drenched roads.

Puddle-loving children always get excited due to the novelty factor (the lack of variety has led one school that actually has weather on the curriculum to lay on a field trip to Ski Dubai – the lucky kids).

And for the grown-ups – who hail from the UK at least – the dull, wet, languid weather transports us on a metaphorical journey across oceans, back to Blighty, easing a little of the homesickness that can set in as Christmas approaches.

But what starts out as a rare treat can quickly become a proverbial pain in the arse as you start worrying about flooding on water-logged highways, remember that the wipers on the SUV don’t work (they disintegrated, through lack of use), and realise you have no rain clothes. Not even a brolly.

“Look Mummy, those people have an umbrella,” squealed LB in delight, as I dragged him in the pelting rain across a soggy football field to his classroom this morning. “Why don’t we have one?”

The wettest ever Dubai school drop-off completed, I got back in the car to go to work, fully expecting the roads to be chaos and for it to take twice as long, when I realised something. The usual 10-15-minute bottleneck – leaving the community that hosts my youngest son’s school – was, to my surprise, only six or seven cars long.

Half of Dubai must be taking a rain day, I smiled to myself, imagining my fellow commuters curled up at home with hot cocoa and watching Jaws on telly. What a good and sensible idea.

The next time the heavens open over Dubai, I'm having a duvet day too

The next time the heavens open over Dubai, I’m having a duvet day too

Wildest Wales: We survived!

Five adults, four young children – all related – sharing a holiday home in a remote part of North Wales. What could possibly go wrong?

The adults sipping wine, watching on as the children play happily in a grassy field. Long walks through beautiful countryside and tired kids falling into bed at the end of the day.

Well, no. Not exactly.

But it was, mostly, lovely, and everyone enjoyed our time en masse.

I discovered, however, that being taken to deepest Wales at least 10 times while growing up in no way prepares you for going as a grown-up and having to think about things that never even cross our minds in Dubai, like wellies, water-proofs, fleeces and socks. Things that, in North Wales, stop your kids from getting hyperthermia. Things that my mum, thankfully, remembered every time I forgot.

Here are some more important lessons I learnt (and sorry to my friends on the blogosphere for some repetition here, it’s all still sinking in!):

>• The road trip there is short by American standards, but long when you factor in the whining from the back, Shaun the Sheep on a loop on the DVD and Electronic Eddie’s devious short cuts along winding mountain roads so narrow they only fit one car.

>• You’ll need to pack at least five bags for every outing to carry the necessary wet-weather gear, plus spares of everything – and, even then, your kids will end up in their swimming stuff (the only dry clothes left) for the ride home. Spare pairs of wellies are also a good idea because when water comes over the top, they take a week to dry.

That's MY bed! (but since you're both so cute and quiet when sleeping, I'll have to forgive you)

>• The kids (mine) will not happily settle into a routine of a set bedtime and 12 hours’ sleep. They’ll go to bed late, join you in bed and get up early with excitement. By the end of the week, you’ll be on your knees with sleep deprivation. The younger one will power nap in the car while everyone else holds onto their seats on those mountain passes, then he’ll wake up thinking it’s morning and keep going for hours. His delight at all the farmyard animals will go a long way towards making up for this, though.

>• You’ll marvel at your brother’s kids, who go to bed when told, get dressed when told, don’t snack, eat their meals and walk for ages without a whimper – both utterly lovable kids who are a joy to have around. But you’ll find you can no longer claim your own kids’ bad behaviour is a temporary blip when it lasts all week long (not to mention, end the holiday with a parenting crisis).

Child-proofing not a priority here then

>• Just when you think you can relax and enjoy a picnic, the two-year-old will find a stone wall to climb and walk along, a big stick to poke you with, or be irresistibly drawn to a pile of poo. Even in the house the kids will keep you on your toes by choosing the most dangerous area to play in – this really odd open attic, high above my bed, that became the games club.

>• Your knowledge of all things related to the countryside will let you down spectacularly because you’ll be stumped by oldest son’s questions, including: Why are there no trees on the mountains? Why are the cow pats so big? (is it because cows have two stomachs, or is that camels?) Did the chicken or the egg come first? Where’s the swimming pool?

Perfect trap for little feet

>• You’ll find that people with bigger feet have a much easier time at the cattle grid we had to lug the kids and 10 bags over every day to get to the car – parked a long way down a stony track because the access to our holiday home, over a teeny-tiny bridge that gave my brother’s car a flat tyre, was better suited to mountain bikes.

>• The alpha males of the group will attempt to keep the pack together, but find this increasingly difficult as the females are sidetracked by shops and the kids all run off in different directions.

>• You won’t enjoy having one bathroom for nine people (the horror!), the novelty of rain will wear off, and will really miss your husband (in Florida), who makes everything so much easier. But you’ll absolutely love the amazing scenery, seeing the kids enjoying the steam trains, the castles, the seaside, the cool air, the pies, the fudge and your own childhood memories it brings back.

Because North Wales was, without a doubt, the perfect antidote to summer in the desert.

Train driver-to-be: The hat stayed on all holiday

Trekking from the house to the car