I'm starting work tomorrow. After almost five months of being a full time couch potato I couldn't be more excited for the gruelling twelve hour days to begin as we get ready to launch. I can't say much about what I'm working on yet aside from the fact that it's going to be super amazing and the first of its kind in Dubai. As soon as we're close to opening, I'll be able to share all the details.

I was met by my PRO who is essentially in charge of all visa/HR applications in the company I'm working for, and taken to my new flat. I'm in a shared apartment in Silicon Oasis, an area of Dubai set back in the desert where a lot of expat staff live. Our block is a gated community, and there are thousands of people from hundreds of different countries all living here together. People are not wrong when they describe this Emirate as a cultural melting pot.

Living here has made me realise how big Dubai actually is. My ideas of wandering down to the marina, or running along Jumeirah beach were swiftly crushed when I realised it would take in excess of two hours to get there on foot. And in 35 degree heat? I think I'll pass. But my block has a gym, communal internet lounge and a ladies only rooftop pool, the perfect destination for my first afternoon of desert living.


This two tiered restaurant and bar is one of the more established haunts in Downtown Dubai, and mirrors a Novikov vibe with its clientele as well as decor. It's all dark panelled walls, high ceilings and amber lighting, the perfect setting for our long overdue catch up. It's more intimate during the week, or so I'm told, but the bar was abuzz with people the night we went, and the 360 degree bar was three or four people deep most of the evening. We sipped our way through several vodkas, reminiscing about our lives in London, cultural red tape and Aimee's most recent adventures before heading on to the penthouse club at Dubai's Shangri-La hotel, The Act.


Famed as Dubai's answer to sordid London club, The Box, set us up for a slight disappointment. Although we missed the dinner show, the later performances mainly revolved around a collective of girls performing a stage routine. Not quite the racy-but-borders-on-vulgar shows put on by the box. But this is the Middle East. Undeterred, and feeling slightly underdressed for the Halloween theme, we spent our night drinking, dancing, and trying on everyone else's Halloween costumes instead.



The next morning was a little hazy. But polishing off last night's leftovers, hello McDonalds spring rolls where have you been all my life? left me with just enough energy to take in some sightseeing… from the comfort of Aimee's balcony.

She lives in Abraj al Mamzar, on the border of Dubai and its conservative neighbour Sharjah. It's Dubai's stricter, slightly cheaper counterpart but equally striking with it's architecture and I left for home satisfied with my new cultural musings.

 So I've finally done it.

After months of delays and endless ups and downs later, everything came together in the last 48 hours in a bit of a blur. 30kg heavier, and armed with a handful of monopoly money (or Dirham as it's formally known) for a new life in the desert, I set off for the airport. Typically I'm terrible with goodbyes, the usually emotionless ice queen melts into a blubbering little pool when it comes to closing a chapter of my life. But not this time.


Maybe it's because I've had so much time to prepare. Maybe it's because I've said my goodbyes to friends countless times, only to turn up with the promise of cocktails and dancing that same weekend. Maybe it's because I've looked at every blog/website/video imaginable on being an expat in Dubai, to the point that I feel like I already know my way around. Or maybe it's because this is too exciting to be feared. Of course I'm going to miss days with my mum and dad, home cooked meals, Box Friday's, brunch Saturday's and hungover Sunday's that religiously plagued my London and Cheshire weekends. Not to mention my closest girlfriends to comfort, reassure and mislead me on a daily basis. But life is too short to spend it in one place.


So with martini in hand I say goodbye for now. In 12 hours time, I'll see you on the other side.

It's been almost three months to the exact day since my scheduled flight to Dubai. I should be twelve weeks into my new role in luxury hospitality, to my new shared apartment, to my new life in the sandpit.

But as I *apologetically* restart writing the blog I began over five months ago, I do it from my cosy suburban bedroom in the house I spent the first eighteen years of life, still yet to begin my adventures in Dubai. It is safe to say this summer did not go to plan.

The reasons are long and complicated, wrapped mostly around the arduous process that surrounds UAE laws. Add a side of visa difficulties and a major lack of communication and you've got the perfect recipe for a fourteen week delay. It's left me in a total state of limbo, caused endless hours of frustration and even left me questioning whether I even wanted to go. After all, why would a recently graduated, Western, twenty something want to move to the Middle East, or more importantly, to Dubai?

In a recently published article in The Telegraph a middle class, middle age journalist coined an article asking who in their right mind would want to visit Dubai? According to said journalist, a man who it is worth noting has never visited Dubai in his life, the climate is unbearable nine months of the year, the area is drained of culture and the people are superficial and self absorbed.

I happen to disagree on all accounts.

Yes, the weather can be insufferably hot, for the summer months, but I'd take insufferably hot over being insufferably wet and cold every time. While yes, much of Dubai was built in the last twenty years, it did exist long before that and both old and new town Dubai are rich in their own cultures and identities. And while I can't yet vouch for the people, anywhere where 200+ nationalities live calmly in a state only twice the size of London must be doing something right.

So I'm now less than 24 hours away from leaving for my new life. Unexpectedly, I'm really thankful to have had these last few months at home. I've been able to make memories with friends I'd not have had the opportunity to had I left in July, and we've had a summer full of long nights, lazy days, zipping around the country, relationships ending, new friendships starting and spontaneous trips that I'll never forget.

And now I'm more ready than ever for tomorrow.

I love control. Planning, organisation and control are as much hobbies to me as they are personality traits. If things are unplanned, unprepared or even worse, disorganised, I'm usually found in a corner, hyperventilating. And to avoid this as much as possible when I land in forty degree heat in five weeks time, I've started my research.