round-up
so the week has been hellish but it did have a high note somewhere in there.
it started off with tim's family missing their 0230 flight on sunday because his wife didn't have her passport with her. who in this world would check if they have their passport 2 hours before their flight? who, huh? tell me? anyway, tim went to the office at midnight to look through the cabinets. as it would happen, he searched everywhere except the right place. not 4 days before i saw his wife's passport right there in the hanging folder where his personnel file was. on hindsight i should have brought it up and given it to him then. he sms'd everyone but me and so they missed their flight. the boys missed the first week of second term and had to have a list of course work sent by the headmaster.
most of wednesday and thursday was spent coordinating with tim and his wife about flights. the airline would only allow them to purchase new tickets rather than pay the £75 per person penalty for changing the flight dates. it's not the most pleasant thing talking to an airline customer service manager and being talked down for not understanding how the world of airline ticketing worked. i left early on thursday as i had to go to a parent-teacher day in school so i don't know if they managed to get flights for today.
i was almost afraid i was going to miss parent-teacher day. the kids and bernie went to the school ahead of me and i folowed them to collect report cards and also talk to their teachers about how they are doing in class. there were so much more people in shcool than i expected - they held the annual family fun day as well with games and prizes and pot luck dinner. we brought spaghetti. there was so much food! it was unbelievable. viel and joseph had awards and also placed among the top ten students in their respective classes. i was really pleased with that. eivy just missed it because her grades in maths and filipino were not up to her usual standard. i don't know what it was, but it could be that eivy is still adjusting from being in a new school. her teachers tell me that she is very distant, very quiet in class. and much too sensitive. i hope the talk we had with her would make her open up and join in class discussions. she admitted that she needs to do better from now on to get good grades. i'm mindful that we don't give undue pressure.
bernie and i left as soon as we tidied up our area after dinner. the kids and their nanny and my cousin jade stayed on just in case we won something from the door prizes. traffic was okay up until we hit that roundabout going into the dubai autodrome. the police stopped the cars coming in from jebel ali to let the cars in from dubai. we've been to the autodrome before and knew the parking area was at the back where they have dirt roads. it was still fairly vacant so we were able to park close to the gate. there were plenty of people already walking towards the regular standing area so we followed them. we learned that we had to walk further down as the first gate was actually for the seated ticketholders. it was still a fair bit of walk from there to the actual site. there were only a few people there so we got right up against the rail dividing regular standing from the chevrolet live pit section.
it was a bit early still so we sat down on what i assumed was the actual track used by the races that go on at the autodrome. needless to say that by 9pm my bum was asleep. phil was 30 minutes late but he more than made up for it with a fantastic drum solo intro. i mean it was electric! he almost didn't stop for a break. his voice was a bit raspy but it was strong.
he performed all the great hits (in the air tonight, do you remember, against all odds, two hearts, dance into the light, something happened on the way to heaven) and also showcased the talents of his band and back up singers. the stage was lit brilliantly, the entire back of the stage was rigged with lights that matched the mood of the songs. there were 5 huge sets of lights that could be tiltes and there was a set of lights in a big circle over the centre of the stage. streamers and confetti were released during the last bit of dance into the light, i think.
the show was wrapped up at a little after midnight. we almost didn't want to leave. it was such a great show. i hope the organisers in dubai would learn from this. my only complaint: there should be trash bins spread out across the audience. it was like walking on a gargabe dump area when we left for the parking lot. unbelievably messy!
my sister had to be taken to the hospital yesterday after she started bleeding. it wasn't much but with her history it was definitely a cause for concern. she was admitted to al wasl for observation. she's only on her 33rd week of pregnancy so delivering the baby now would not be the best course of action. she has to rest, stay off her feet and relax. the doctors will do an ultrasound scan again tomorrow to see if anything has changed. the baby's heart and movement are monitored reguarly. hopefully she will be discharged soon and she can get bedrest at home.
with too many downs in our family this year, we were hoping that the birth of my niece would be the high that we will end 2005 in.
it started off with tim's family missing their 0230 flight on sunday because his wife didn't have her passport with her. who in this world would check if they have their passport 2 hours before their flight? who, huh? tell me? anyway, tim went to the office at midnight to look through the cabinets. as it would happen, he searched everywhere except the right place. not 4 days before i saw his wife's passport right there in the hanging folder where his personnel file was. on hindsight i should have brought it up and given it to him then. he sms'd everyone but me and so they missed their flight. the boys missed the first week of second term and had to have a list of course work sent by the headmaster.
most of wednesday and thursday was spent coordinating with tim and his wife about flights. the airline would only allow them to purchase new tickets rather than pay the £75 per person penalty for changing the flight dates. it's not the most pleasant thing talking to an airline customer service manager and being talked down for not understanding how the world of airline ticketing worked. i left early on thursday as i had to go to a parent-teacher day in school so i don't know if they managed to get flights for today.
i was almost afraid i was going to miss parent-teacher day. the kids and bernie went to the school ahead of me and i folowed them to collect report cards and also talk to their teachers about how they are doing in class. there were so much more people in shcool than i expected - they held the annual family fun day as well with games and prizes and pot luck dinner. we brought spaghetti. there was so much food! it was unbelievable. viel and joseph had awards and also placed among the top ten students in their respective classes. i was really pleased with that. eivy just missed it because her grades in maths and filipino were not up to her usual standard. i don't know what it was, but it could be that eivy is still adjusting from being in a new school. her teachers tell me that she is very distant, very quiet in class. and much too sensitive. i hope the talk we had with her would make her open up and join in class discussions. she admitted that she needs to do better from now on to get good grades. i'm mindful that we don't give undue pressure.
bernie and i left as soon as we tidied up our area after dinner. the kids and their nanny and my cousin jade stayed on just in case we won something from the door prizes. traffic was okay up until we hit that roundabout going into the dubai autodrome. the police stopped the cars coming in from jebel ali to let the cars in from dubai. we've been to the autodrome before and knew the parking area was at the back where they have dirt roads. it was still fairly vacant so we were able to park close to the gate. there were plenty of people already walking towards the regular standing area so we followed them. we learned that we had to walk further down as the first gate was actually for the seated ticketholders. it was still a fair bit of walk from there to the actual site. there were only a few people there so we got right up against the rail dividing regular standing from the chevrolet live pit section.
it was a bit early still so we sat down on what i assumed was the actual track used by the races that go on at the autodrome. needless to say that by 9pm my bum was asleep. phil was 30 minutes late but he more than made up for it with a fantastic drum solo intro. i mean it was electric! he almost didn't stop for a break. his voice was a bit raspy but it was strong.
he performed all the great hits (in the air tonight, do you remember, against all odds, two hearts, dance into the light, something happened on the way to heaven) and also showcased the talents of his band and back up singers. the stage was lit brilliantly, the entire back of the stage was rigged with lights that matched the mood of the songs. there were 5 huge sets of lights that could be tiltes and there was a set of lights in a big circle over the centre of the stage. streamers and confetti were released during the last bit of dance into the light, i think.
the show was wrapped up at a little after midnight. we almost didn't want to leave. it was such a great show. i hope the organisers in dubai would learn from this. my only complaint: there should be trash bins spread out across the audience. it was like walking on a gargabe dump area when we left for the parking lot. unbelievably messy!
my sister had to be taken to the hospital yesterday after she started bleeding. it wasn't much but with her history it was definitely a cause for concern. she was admitted to al wasl for observation. she's only on her 33rd week of pregnancy so delivering the baby now would not be the best course of action. she has to rest, stay off her feet and relax. the doctors will do an ultrasound scan again tomorrow to see if anything has changed. the baby's heart and movement are monitored reguarly. hopefully she will be discharged soon and she can get bedrest at home.
with too many downs in our family this year, we were hoping that the birth of my niece would be the high that we will end 2005 in.