An open letter….

Dear (insert name here),

I realise it’s been a while since we spoke and there’s a few reasons for this.

• VOIP calls are banned in Abu Dhabi (including Skype, Facebook Messenger, Whatsapp, Viber – trust us, we’ve tried).

• Whilst it’s been 3 months since we left NL, we’ve only been here 5 weeks. 2 of those weeks were in a hotel, where we spent every day going back and forth between the realtor, the new house, the hotel, getting a rental car, swapping the rental over because it ran out of rego, going to get our Emirate ID, but first the medical, then getting our driving licences, health insurances, the school and Dave’s work.

• Then we moved into our house (in a day – we are masters at this thing) at which point the kids now had 2 weeks school holiday (KILL ME NOW!). The kids were still unsettled after moving 5 times in 5 weeks, so they proved to be challenging. We did some theme parks, swam in the pool, re-discovered old toys and tantrums.

• We don’t have a post box here and to post items I have to go into town to the main post office, get a number, line up, get a stamp and then go outside to the red box and put the post in. Should you want to send us something – you can send it via Dave’s work (PM me for address).

• I started a Teachers Assistant course (3 weeks after we got here). In itself this isn’t super taxing however navigating childcare, AD traffic, parking and finding a place to do 250 hours prac is a bit curly. I’ve had to get a copy of my HSC ‘attested’. Which means I have to get a new copy of it as I threw it out thinking “when will I ever need this”. To get it attested I need to get it sent to DFAT in Canberra and then the UAE Embassy in Canberra and then back here – to Dave’s work. What could go wrong….. oh but first to request the certificate I need a certified copy of my passport. So I’ve had to go to the Australian Embassy in AD and pay 160dhs (whilst dragging a super reluctant Asher through 40 degree heat by his collar… he’s going through a tantrum phase)

As of today the kids have been back at school for 2 weeks where Miss Elsie is ‘Star of the Week’ for the 2nd week in a row (apparently unheard of) and Ash is walking around daycare like he owns the joint. Miss A is settling well into Year 2 and coming along leaps and bounds after a rocky start.

Gotta run, off to the beach.