Tints

Each morning I have a conversation with Sayeed.

“Allo?”
“Hello Sayeed, good morning, this is Rachel, how are you?”
“Werri fine”
“Can you come to my house at 8am?”
“Ahh. ……. Yiiiz”
“Thank you, see you at 8, Good bye”
“Ahh” ……… Click.

Sayeed drives a taxi. And speaks English. Sayeed also has a band of mates to call on who also drive taxis. He’s their main agent.

Taxis are the only cars with gears, they are the same model of Japanese something, all white and yellow with no tinted windows. Thus the people who are effectively on the road all the time even in the hottest parts of the day are not allowed sun deflecting tints. This is not to make taxi drivers’ lives more difficult and uncomfortable by whim, but so that anyone can see who is inside and what is going on. To ‘protect’ the women. Most people drive cars that are blacked out to the extent that it’s impossible to see the driver. This protects them from the police seeing that they are driving with their mobiles on (usually detectable nevertheless by a driving style that suddenly swerves and swings and slows and speeds more than the norm). This irrespective of the fact that such deep tints are also illegal.

I like it when Sayeed picks me up. His air conditioning is fit to fight the sun’s rays and his seats are spotless and covered in net curtains (because he’s not allowed to hang nets in the windows presumably). But more often than not he sends his first or second deputies. Sayeed’s First Deputy is also a Pakistani, as normal (as also normal in Sheffield and Nottingham by the way). He’s an ever smiling bloke who usually turns up outside the house half an hour early and promptly has a kip. Sayeed’s Second Deputy is less tranquil and arrives on the dot, beeping his horn and then proceeds to drive at 90 miles an hour (swerving and swinging and slowing and speeding and phoning) bibbing everything in sight and staring out the competition in the other two lanes with his beedy reddened eyes.

Sometimes I am picked up by Sayeed’s Third Deputy. He comes so infrequently that he’s no idea where I want to go and so we engage in the mobile phone tennis of me ringing Sayeed to explain where I want to go and Sayeed ringing the Third Deputy back and me ringing Sayeed to say everything’s OK.

I also pay them all about 4 times as much as the due fare. I do this to all poorly paid people, like waiters and petrol station attendants. It’s quicker than setting up an international aid programme to help families in the sub continent. Any spare penny is sent home, not spent. Even the Sri Lankan office cleaner on 27 pence an hour manages to save enough to put her two sons through school in Colombo.

And there I am about to splash out on and take possession of an expensive Gulf Spec Jeep (with legal 30% tints on the windows). It’s a contradictory world.

Incidentally Gulf Spec Jeeps are called ‘Jeep Sahara’. Surely this is the wrong desert?

US of A

It’s enough that I have to learn about the US University System. And now that this guy has joined us, my work is directed in the style and aims of the University of California and all its component bits. Like Berkley.

I’m still trying to work out why a class that happens twice a week, for 75 minutes each day outside of Ramadan and 70 minutes inside of Ramadan, for 16 weeks entitles the students to 3 Credit Hours. How long is a Credit Hour in minutes?

Why are percentages converted to letter grades that are then numerically weighted in to a Grade Point Average?

Why did everyone look at me oddly when I said that in the UK a ‘First Class’ degree is awarded at 70% ? They looked at me because 90% is a frequent award to a student here, and also simply because First, Second and Third Class sounds like the Colonial Train Service in India.

Why do they call evaluation, ‘assessment’? Isn’t assessment taking a test – as opposed to filling in a student questionnaire?

If we’re in a melting pot of nationalities, languages, civilisations and cultures, why is the ‘international’ standard American?

I’m sure I’ll cope. Just having a Humpfh.

Differential Labour

H and I are about to be paid. The cleaner at work is also about to be paid. She’s Sri Lankan and works at the College where I have my office. Her hours are 6am to 9.30pm with an hour for lunch. That’s 14 and a half hours work, 6 days a week. She’s paid 800 Drh each month. That’s 27 pence an hour. H and I take home substantially more than this – about 60 times more her monthly salary for many less hours. A local will be paid infinitesimally more than H and I for the same work, and may well also have other positions or concerns to attend to within the hours of the day. And thus the oil wealth is distributed.

Just call me Gappy

The tooth is out. Kindly extracted by a British trained and registered dental surgeon who is Hungarian and has a Greek surname. My dentists in UK were from Spain, Colombia and Poland (all women called Christina but distinguishable by body shape). My last tooth was taken out by a Bolivian. Hey, I’m on the international circuit for real now.

Overland Underwater

Last night H and R went out with these two for desert driving. The man on the left is D the Jeep salesman. The man in the middle is S, an Emirati who can desert drive Jeeps as if it’s an Olympic sport and can strip and reassemble a Jeep in 5 minutes. They had offered to take H and R out into the nearby dunes for a sand driving lesson. During the lesson it became apparent that H & R have much to learn if they are going to be able to achieve the vertical ascents/descents and velodrome style horizontal-but-at-90-degrees-to-the-Earth stretches over sinky sand. H left the house at 5.30pm and returned 4 hours later looking like a sandman and smelling of neat adrenalin. My excuse was a sudden attraction to ironing. (Incidentally, our cleaner has sacked us).

Jeeps and Nissan Xterras are each other’s main competition. H’s car is an Xterra. D and S (Jeep owners) were very interested in poking about under the bonnet of their competition. They also told H that if he cut his front bumper short he’d be able to do more tricks in the sand and more stunts off-road. This week I will pick up my new car. It’s a Jeep. It’s not H’s second car. It will remain tarmac-bound, thanks.

Today H’s Xterra has been taken to the Xterra Clinic (for a service – not to have its bumper cut off). So we’re both sitting around on sofas reading, being couch vegetables and trying to work out how tomorrow’s logistics of work in 7 places and a double date with our dentist will be managed in the absence of any car at all. Yes dentist: my tooth has a date with its maker. H’s teeth are just getting a service. A bit like his car. Let’s hope my Jeep doesn’t need an extraction at any point soon.

In 5 days time I have 10 days off. Eid begins (and Ramadan ends) on 29th. We’ve been given the 28th off because it’s a Sunday and reality most people wouldn’t have turned up to work anyhow, preferring to start their weekend on the 25th in anticipation of 10 days of yet-more-eating and family visiting. The down side is that I have to work on Saturday 11th to compensate for the Sunday off. It’s all detailed in something I got in the email this last week. From the VC . It makes me smile, for some reason.

You may have noticed that I’ve been silent on the outcomes of our recent trip to the East Coast of the UAE for PADI Open Water diving training. Well this appears to be one of the outcomes. On the first of four dives I was so nervous I myself became a sea creature. A limpet. Attached to E our Dive Master and then transferred with a ’suck’ into H’s grip. We were 9 metres down and I had, at the time, reached my ‘I can think of other things to do with my life’ limit. The next time I went down to 18 metres. At the end of the fourth dive I was to be found volunteering to go down again with no one else but M the support Dive Master in order to get a fair swim with the fishes. H and R appear to use up a lot of oxygen because they dart about like sharks so have to leave the water early.

However I’m more of a whale and am most likely to be found floating in suspension, staring at my favourite fish. Hence I can stay down for longer because I’ve still got air in my tank when H and R are ascending. Even Chickie enjoyed himself, taking to diving like um, err, a duck to water. He came along in my pocket equipped with tank of air (lip salve), regulator (a drinking straw) and a mask (a glasses lens).

And so it transpires that during this coming Eid I find myself booked into an Advanced Open Water PADI course. This involved underwater navigation, a dive to a wreck, a dive at night and, erm, a dive to 30 metres. At this depth they make you do mental reasoning exercises to measure the effects of pressure on the body. One of these is nitrogen narcosis. Apparently its effect is similar to that of marajuana. Hence the mental reasoning exercises. Lets just hope I don’t start floating around aimlessly staring at the pretty fishes and talking bollocks.

Apparently Jeeps are quite good amphibians too.

Teeth

All those that remember this: will have an idea of what I’m about to say. He was my Bolivian dentist and was about to extract a molar. My teeth don’t travel.

So yet again, I’m out of the UK and I need serious dental treatment. I have the face of the Elephant Man and have been prescribed painkillers and antibiotics by my Hungarian dentist. Yes, Hungarian.

She’s going to extract another molar at 5.30pm on Sunday.

Yikes.

I had to cancel my classes yesterday. My email box is full of kind greetings from my students. Bless.

Wheels

Last night H and I whiled away the hours until 8.30pm (Ramadan opening hours) by getting some financial advice from a man from Kerela who’d driven from Abu Dhabi just to meet us. After talking from 6.30pm for two hours about savings and investments we promptly sped to Vehicle World and by 9pm we had bought a new car. Woops.

Well at least we began the paperwork that buys a car.

I need:
A To Whom It May Concern Letter from the University confirming salary
Bank Statements
Passport copy
Visa copy
My UAE licence (see previous post).

And I’ve not even begun to talk about insurance yet. But I’m sure D the Lebanese salesman will help us out. Ramadan in the evening is quite swinging. Coffee and victuals and smoking muslims abound. Shops are open until 2am. There was quite a party atmosphere in the showroom. There was even a tent with sofas to recline on. D showed us photos and videos of his car and driving, H took the car for a spin and D even offered to take H off-roading on the sand on Friday and teach him the skills. D’s in the Jeep club of Al Ain.

So yes. That’s my new car. A 4 door Jeep Wrangler.

Hee hee

Forms

Yesterday I received my UK driving licence back from the University. It had taken some time because the University had been debating with the translator that DVLA was not a place of issue. The translator rang me up as if I was the complainant to tell me in no uncertain annoyed terms that he knew DVLA was not a place and yet if that’s what is written on the card it is that which he will translate. No matter that it can’t be inputted into a system because it isn’t a place and there isn’t a box for ‘organisation’. He can’t lie to the traffic police and he’s translated 1000s of driving licences and he knows that there will be no problem. Madam. I calmed him down and said I had no idea what he was talking about and that he was right, DVLA is not a place. He cheered up. So this time when the driving licence was returned to the University everyone there was in a huff and no one let me know that it was ready.

Which is no matter because there are other things bearing on my ability to drive. I’ve just established the following in the following order:

I need another letter to obtain my UAE driving licence in addition to the translation of my DVLA card
It’s called a To Whom It May Concern Letter
I already have lots of To Whom It May Concern Letters
They’re all in Arabic
I therefore didn’t know that they are out of date because I now have my Residence Visa and this isn’t reflected in the To Whom It May Concern Letters.
To obtain accurate To Whom It May Concern Letters a I need my Contract with the University and a copy of the invalid To Whom It May Concern Letter.
The University still has my copy of the Contract.
I rang the University.
Amazingly it’s suddenly ready for collection.
Which means that I can start the process of getting a University ID card.
No, first I’m going to tackle the driving thing.

I’ve just filled in two forms.
One is a request to the University for a To Whom It May Concern Letter for the Traffic Police saying that the University has no objection to me driving.
The second is a request for a To Whom It May Concern Letter from the University to confirm my appointment and salary to the Bank.
They’ve been sent off in to the faceless ether of HR’s general email address.

I also need 4 passport photos, a copy of my residence visa, a copy of my passport page, the originals of both the latter, an eye examination, a $60 fee and a copy of the application form. I don’t have this. It’s at the traffic police office. I’ll call a taxi to go down there next.

Actually, first I might have a cup of tea.

Time

Friday is approaching and I’m excited. We’re taking Thursday afternoon off and driving to the coast a day early in order to enjoy the sand and sea and snorkelling, in advance of the next day’s dicing-with-death diving.

I’m listening to The Today Programme on Radio 4. I started at 8am with The World Service, but then came The Shipping Forecast and after that, Mr Humphreys. It’s odd to hear weather reports that don’t reflect what’s happening outside my window, it’s odd to hear news about issues that don’t bear on my life at all, and it’s odd to hear about morning things when, as now, it’s almost lunchtime. I keep having to remind myself that it’s not rush hour but nearly time for midday prayers.

It’s also odd to have a different weekend. Having Friday off always makes it seem like I’m working a 4 day week. Obviously I have to go to work on a Sunday, which at first negates the benefit of having Friday free, and Radio 4 is broadcasting very inappropriate and disconcerting Church Things, but the day passes quickly. In my head Monday is still the first working day of the week and so when I wake up on a Monday there’s no Monday morning feeling because there are only 4 days left in the week.

Food

Last week I asked my students to write their names and draw a picture of something that I could associate to them. I said I was more likely to remember their names this way. It was 3.30 in the afternoon. They all drew pictures of their favourite food. And there I was trying to avoid the subject.

Since the 1st September my tea-wallah at work has been having an easy time of it. The kitchen is locked for Ramadan. It’s not forbidden to eat and drink for non-Muslims, it’s just highly offensive for them to see you consuming victuals in the day time. On Sunday I dropped in on my Sudanese friend again to pick up our newly attested marriage licence. After he’d joked, “Good news, it’s real” we fell in to discussion about Ramadan. He claimed that it was a very healthy time during which no one had digestive problems. I reflected how hard it would be to observe the fast in Scotland in the summer. He asked me why. I told him that in June the day lasted about 21 hours. He nearly fell off his chair.

Menstruating women are exempt from fasting.

There is a serious diabetes problem in the UAE. It has the second highest incidence of diabetes in the world with 25% of the population affected and a suspected 10% who are unaware they have the disease. Over 50% of people over 50 have impaired glucose tolerance. The reason is said to be that the once simple and scarce Arab diet has, in the last 40 years, transformed into a feast of junk food. There are a lot of over weight people driving around in their cars to restaurants and fast food outlets. A favoured food is sugar, in all its forms and in large quantities. In Ramadan bodies that have struggled to adapt themselves to high blood sugar suffer serious problems with a sudden absence. Hospitals witness a sharp increase in cases of hypoglycemia.

However I don’t think I’d make a good Muslim. Not eating at work means that by 3pm in the afternoon my blood sugar is so low I’m almost asleep. Which isn’t great when I have to teach from 2.30 – 5.30. So, yesterday I gave up attempting to avoid all danger of disrespecting the fasting peoples by effectively joining in the fast, and made myself a packed lunch. I shut my office door. Therefore even for my second class at 4pm (I’d been at work since 7.30am) I had a spring in my step, prepared to teach the 45 girls in the class, and ready to swing them into active learning, small group work and participative tasks, determined to counter the passive rote learning culture. However one look at the students was enough to make me realise that the effects of their not having had even a sip of water all day, having spent much of the previous night not sleeping but eating, and now having not eaten for 16 hours meant that they were all wan, drawn and practically supine. Poor loves. I cut a bargain with them that if they did one group task I’d close the lesson at half time. It was a popular move.

People are very cheerful in their discomfort. As well as marking the fast that Mohammed made, the discomfort is the spur to cause each person to remember to focus on the principles of Islam. There are also the rewards that come in the evening. It’s lovely to drive about at night (most people are not on the roads) because all the house gates are left open for the unexpected visitor and for symbolic value. Families and friends and strangers alike are visiting each other, acting charitably and generously and offering open-house hospitality.

Because the gates are left open it’s possible to see inside the grounds of the huge villas. This is my reward. It satisfies my curiosity.