Airport Angsts

Hi All,

I have just come back from a visit to the UK where I saw my family and friends. It was a jolly good week off actually and it was great to see the family especially, as I hadn't seen them for 7 months or so. I also attended a job interview at a travel company I had applied to work for. Sadly, I didn't get offered the job and so I'm continuing the search. We shall see what happens later this year or next year.

On a separate note, I made the mistake of putting liquids of more than 100mls in my hand luggage when at the airport. How this is meant to prevent terrorism is beyond me, but anyways, the bag went through the X-ray machine and then was magically transfered to a separate 'check' conveyor belt, alarms started sounding and I was expecting a group of armed men to appear, luckily, that didn't happen, but I did get asked to wait while my hand luggage was thoroughly searched. Thankfully, I didn't have to undergo a cavity search of any kind. The bag was swabbed for drugs within an inch of its life and then I was allowed to go.

To be honest, it wasn't so bad and I took it a lot better than the guy to my left who had also been stopped. He started screaming and yelling at the person doing the search, after all it's only a security precaution and at the end of the day if it does prevent another accident then it can only be a good thing.

Until next time...

An Update from the UAE

Hi All,

This is a quick update on what's been happening recently in my life in the UAE. Just one of the odd things that happens to me on an almost daily basis.

I work at a place called the Armed Forces Officers Club twice a week at the moment, teaching a bunch of young ladies from the Emirates College, who are training to be English Teachers.

In order to get to the Armed Forces place I need to take a taxi. It takes about 30 minutes and is quite difficult to find. This wouldn't usually be a problem, however, some of the people that drive cabs here suffer from rather dubious English ability (admittedly my Arabic isn't great).

I got in a cab the other day and I asked to go to the Armed Forces Club and the guy responded with what sounded like 'nnnngggg'. I tried again to confirm that he knew where it was, and he replied again with a variation on the above(nnggggghhhgghhh). I assumed that, that meant he knew where he was going. I managed to get there in one piece in any case.

I should mention that like most important locations in the UAE it's all marble, and absolutely massive, maybe 3 football pitches in length and 1 in height. It has about 30 different conference rooms available for hire and an attached hotel. It was probably built in the 1980's sometime, but still looks stunning. I'd love to be able to take some photos but it's a military place, so that's probably a no-no.

Until next time...