Home is Where the Heat Is...

I know, I’ve been so quiet since I’ve been back from the U of K – not like me at all. I promise to try harder this month!

We’re right in the middle of vacay season here which has meant that the desert family has been missing key individuals throughout August – most disconcerting. Anyway, we’re all back now, and missed one another so much that we have a new rule: one goes, we all go! I.e if we’re off on holiday we go together, and if we’re going back to the UK, we all go at the same time. It’s just easier that way.

Everyone was champing at the bit to get back home for their annual visits, After a year without seeing home, catching up with friends and family, putting up with retards on a daily basis, you yearn for some sensible attitudes, good customer service, and a real , actual breath of fresh air. But as Dubai can be such a transient place, if the truth be told, everyone’s eagerness to get home was niggling at me a little bit. E had been homesick and dying to get back to see her girlfriends. F couldn’t wait to get back to the states and was even talking about moving to London. M was missing her mum and L was looking forward to trips to Paris, Manchester and Liverpool. And everyone else was just, well, keen to get out of Dubai. We kept in touch, of course, as the family left, and began their exciting jaunts around their home countries. We commented on the photos of drunken nights out, reunions, and watched as everyone generally had a riot back home. And then we waited for them to return.

And then an interesting thing happened. They all came home, one by one, and bar none, declared that they ‘couldn’t wait to be back home in Dubai.” Home wasn’t the UK any more. Home was Dubai. It was a refreshing revelation, and interesting that each and every one of us reached that conclusion at pretty much the same time. All talk of ‘where next’ and ‘how much longer’ has completely dissipated.

Let’s be clear, it’s not that we hate the UK, and we’re all feeling torn about leaving friends and family behind – that’s a given. It’s just that there’s so much to love about Dubai, and after two years, we’ve all put down roots here. Roots that go deeper than I think any of us had realized. We’re already back into the old routines: wine after work, pool and beach at the weekend, and just as soon as Ramadan is over, we’ll be storming a dancefloor near you. Dubai, we missed you. And there really is no place like home.