Homeward bound with 14 hours of movies

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Today we woke with a sense of sadness. Not only was our stay in Dubai at an end but our entire trip was now only 14 hours from being over!

So with a heavy heart I packed all our bags whilst contemplating the last three days. Dubai is a very unusual city in that it’s trying to create an identity but it’s not really sure who it is. It seems to have taken bits and pieces of other cities and put them all in the one place. It’s kind of like a real-life Disneyland where things don’t quite seem real! I can understand the attraction for ex-pats, there’s lots of sun, some sand, lots of other foreigners and tax free income! It even had me thinking that maybe it’s somewhere we could live. But there’s also a sense of one-up-manship. If Mr A builds an 80 storey building, then Mr B has to build a 90 storey building until all of a sudden there are 160 storeys sitting half full. There’s so much construction going on but also just as many empty buildings, some half finished. It seems ludicrous the amounts of money being spent on creating buildings for no-one to move into, when there are starving children in Africa. God, what a soap box I’m on, but honestly, I just don’t get it! And I leave having seen the city but I don’t know the city! I guess I’ll just have to come back for a better introduction.

Unlike our trip to Heathrow airport, our trip to Dubai airport was relaxing and quick. We checked in easily but not happily. Whilst packing this morning, I had realised that on the previous flight, the enthusiastic baggage handlers at Emirates had ripped a wheel totally off my brand new bag. The bag was less than three weeks old and now was rendered useless. I was so angry and even more so when they told me that they don’t cover wheels because they get damaged from wear and tear! A few expletives later and I vowed that Emirates would be hearing more from me.

Still, the flight home was better than expected especially since I always get myself so worked up about it. The flight is direct from Dubai to Brisbane, 14 hours including part of the day and all of the night on the flight so we settled in for a movie marathon and a barrage of food! Mykenzie was great. She was just so excited that she finally got to watch several hours of uninterrupted Angelina Ballerina without being told “5 more minutes”, that we didn’t hear a word from her! Edyn was also great. I was worried that she would be really wiggly having recently learnt the art of walking, but she was happy to sit in the bassinet and be cute. When required, the girls slept reasonably well but it was already ¾ of the way into the flight and the lights came on not long after they had fallen asleep. Jas and I didn’t sleep at all. Whether this was a product of the 200 channels or lack of horizontal sleeping space, I’m not sure but it meant that we were going to have to stay awake for a while longer.

Arriving into Brisbane with an hour’s drive home still looming, the thought of Gran waiting outside for us was enough to get us moving. Although we made it through customs without incident I was secretly hoping the girls may have forgotten a banana which a cute little beagle could’ve smelt out. It may have been enough to get us a spot on “Border Security” which was being filmed as we arrived!

It wasn't to be and out we walked into the stinking, hot Brisbane morning, Gran's big cuddles and Australia Day celebrations. By the time I actually got a decent night's sleep, I had been awake for close to 48 hours.

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