The vacation continues...

...and as my friend in Ottawa reminded me, "you are not a travelling doctor". Although it feels like it a little bit, save for the administering medicine part. Being home for a couple of weeks is a weird experience, because I am trying to see all the people who are important to me here and soak up a little bit of each one. But how much soaking can you do, really? And the part I can't stand is when people make plans for later this fall, plans I know I can't be part of. You can't have it all, I guess.

One thing about becoming an expat that I have found particularly strange is the sensation that I am not sure where I belong any more, or who I belong to.

Also, in the various conversations I have, I can't properly explain how weird and wonderful living in Abu Dhabi has been for me. The tone is never right: to my ears, I sound as though I am complaining or bragging, and neither is really my style. Plus, no amount of anecdotes could ever properly illustrate it for others anyway (although I guess this is the point of the whole blog, isn't it??)

So I hang out with people I like for a bit, remember what my life used to be like, and at the same time look forward to getting back to what it has become.

One more thing: although sunny and beautiful here, it is brrrrrrrr as well.

Ahhh, international travel

It never ceases to amaze me how I can put on an eyemask, push in some earplugs, put my head on my purse and sleep for hours in airports. This is very useful on long layovers, for early departures and of course, when one did not get very much in the way of sleep the night before, for a variety of reasons.

I once woke up drooling in a packed departure lounge at the Orlando airport - one that had been empty 90 minutes before. People were staring. Last year I spent three hours sleeping on the floor at Pearson in Toronto when my Etihad flight was delayed. And last Thursday it was Frankfurt. Understandably, my pet peeve are those airports with loud television news playing (Toronto) and benches with metal armrests separating the seats to discourage sleeping (Toronto). My favourite are first-class lounges with special sleeping rooms (Istanbul).

It occurred to me on the Abu Dhabi-Frankfurt leg that I couldn't decide what was worse: sitting by someone loudly snoring on a plane, an excessive throat-clearer, an repeat sniffer, or an old man who smells, for lack of a better word, dusty. I am still not sure.

And although I am a big fan of the neck pillow, considering them essential for long flights, I wonder about people who wear them outside their seats. There was man with a gray neck pillow on one of my flights and he wore it even when he went to the bathroom.

I also wondered why Lufthansa would ask "movie questions?" and list a special email address lufthansa.movie@blahblah.com after each film. What could I possible ask them that they would answer? "Dear Lufthansa: I am not sure I completely understood what went down in Duplicity, can you walk me through it?" Maybe "could you have more than five movies in your rubbish selection for the flight home? I watched them all already"?

And as for the Internet machines in the (world's most expensive) Frankfurt airport, the ones that charge 16 Euros for an hour use: nice markup.

Overheard on the plane

Lufthansa flight, Frankfurt to Toronto, as the plane begins its final descent. Two young brothers:

Younger brother: Are you going to throw up again this time?

Older brother: Nope.

Younger brother: Why did you throw up last time?

Older brother: I had all those sandwiches...

Younger brother: Well, at least you held it until the end.

A few words about my shoulders

Here's the evolution. I arrived in the UAE almost 18 months ago armed with a series of sweaters, wraps and T-shirts. I would be culturally aware; sensitive to the religious differences here. I wore them, all through last summer's sweltering summer. If I was going to the gym, I'd put a T-shirt over my workout top. If I was wearing a nice halter dress out for dinner, I'd carry a wrap and put it on while in the street. I looked at the other girls in the malls, in Starbucks, wearing strapless dresses and bikini tops with flimsy halters over them and wondered what they were thinking.

Some time over the last year I became less diligent. Much less diligent. Part of it, I think, was chafing a bit at the way it is here. Why can't I just show my shoulders, I would think. It bred a certain defiance. And so I started to forgo the sweater, the T-shirt, the wrap, more so as the weather heated up. I'd nip to my gym a couple of minutes from my apartment, uncovered. I'd walk to work in a sundress, my sweater tucked into my handbag. I'd go out on a Thursday or Friday night, hailing a cab in a tank top and skirt. I'd notice the stares, but they didn't really bother me. Plus I swear I never have to wait long for a taxi that way. (And when a hoard of men would gawk at me at whatever hotel I got out at, I would just pretend I was famous)

But then one night a couple of weeks ago, I ducked out in the evening for an appointment in a sundress. Just a sundress. I was hot and tired and didn't feel like putting on my sweater, so I didn't.

As I got on the elevator at my destination, a building in the old fish market area, two men turned their backs and faced the rear of the elevator. Fine, I thought. A little bit weird.

I didn't immediately start covering my shoulders. But the memory of them having to turn round for reasons I still can't fully understand weighed heavily. So I am covering them again - mostly. It's pretty much always been the right thing to do, I just forgot that for a little while.

Typical Abu Dhabi telephone exchange over directions

Me: So you are on Delma Street?

Salon: Oh, no.

Me: Um, where are you then?

Salon: Across from Zayed University.

Me: So, on Delma Street then?

Salon: Yes.

A rooster, in the middle of my neighbourhood

I was walking to work early the other morning, as I normally do, taking shallow breaths and telling myself that since I can see the building, I definitely won't let myself pass out from the heat before getting there, when I heard "cock-a-doodle-do".

Cool, I thought, blinking fast to try and redirect the stinging beads of sweat on my eyelids. A rooster.

Needle scratching on record. Wha? A rooster? It takes something pretty big to stop my walk to work. Every second, you see, is a second closer to me lying on the ground, my bag lunch strewn to the right, my new Kenneth Cole bag spilling contents to the left, a Hummer H2 charging towards me as a group of Indian shopkeepers puzzle over what to do with the sweaty, comatose Westerner splayed out on the road in what is sure to be another new sundress.

A rooster, I have since learned, is one of those things.

That's not going to keep it very cold

I was stuck in traffic on Muroor Road yesterday, and when I looked to my right I spotted one of Abu Dhabi's brand-new air-conditioned bus shelters. One guy was sitting inside, and the door was just opening and closing, opening and closing, all on its own.