Sightseeing with Auntie Nikki

Auntie Nikki has come to visit, to join in with the festivities around Linnea’s Graduation.

She did have a few other things on her to-do list though, she wanted to go see the goldman, do a Saturday brunch, have her colours done with my colour lady and also come along to the museum for the latest exhibition. 

The day she came to the museum I didn’t have many tours, so I could walk around with her in both the Kalila wa Dimna and the general galleries. There had been some new additions since her last visit in 2020.

 

We also went up the Etihad Towers, somewhere she hadn’t visit before, to have an afternoon coffee and admire the views.

The last of the last

Today was a celebratory day, as it was the day of the last IB exam for Linnea. For the past three weeks, she has sat 15 exams, covering everything she has learned during her two years of the Diploma Program. Fifteen exams!

Now all there is left is Graduation, and everything that has to do with that! (And waiting for the grades of course... but we'll think about that later...!)

We got her a little present to celebrate finishing the exams, a building set of a 'Book Nook'. It's these little miniature worlds that are in the size of a book, to be placed in between all other books in your book shelf.
I thought it would test her patience a bit with all the fiddly bits, but Linnea got right into it. It took a fair few hours, and it turned out so pretty!

A mouse in the house

The spring cleaning I started last week continued with a BIG clean out of the kitchen the other day, as I discovered a little mouse in one of our kitchen cupboards. Yes, a mouse! Eeek.

We were totally baffled as to why he was in that particular one, as it was in a cupboard with only plates and bowls, and none of the cupboards next to it has food in them either. So strange.
It was Linnea who finally pointed out, that some of the upper shelves in that cupboard were shorter and there was actually a false back there, which created a HUGE 10 cm gap. Well... *duh*, that would explain how he got in. He probably just took a wrong turn somewhere and came down to have a look!

We caught the little rodent, and then I proceeded to clean out EVERYTHING.

Nathan and Will mounted an old shelf we had lying around upside down to block the gap, so now we hope we will get no more unwanted visitors.

Where the World's Tales Unfold

First time we went to the Book Fair was just a few months after we arrived, as Sweden was the Guest of Honour in 2014. It was really exciting, we met famous authors, joined a cook-a-long and did a lot of fun things in the Swedish booth.

The following year we returned again, because there was a huge celebration for Pippi Långstrump in 2015, on her 70th anniversary. And do we like Princess Cake.., oh yes!!

So it had been quite a few years since I was last at the Abu Dhabi International Book Fair, but this year I really wanted to go. For this the 33rd edition, the whole fair was centered around the theme of tales. Also they had chosen Kalila wa Dimna as the "Book of the World", the one book each year that has influenced the literary and cultural process around the world, and whose influence has spread across cultures and time.

I took my friend Michaela, and we went to have a wonder for a couple of hours on Saturday afternoon.

It was huge, lots to look at! Like a giant tree made up out of books, and a portrait of Sheikh Zayed made with falcon feathers:

The Louvre Abu Dhabi booth was beautiful!

I found out they were premiering a new publication called Pearls of Wisdom, a book I have been waiting for a long time. It is a book made up out of the quotes that you find on the windows all over the museum. So many of our visitors gets moved by them, and this is really the perfect souvenir from a visit at the museum.

We also found the Swedish publisher, with lots of titles we knew:

Love love love books!

This years spring... shift?

Usually this time of the year, I go through a bit of a metamorphosis process. I wrote about how this usually pans out last year.
I have to say, this year I'm not experiencing quite the same urge, as my focus is all together on Linnea at the moment. She is in the middle of her final IB exams (she has done 6 out of 13 exams so far) and it is - and has been for a while - a very stressful time for her, obviously. And for all of us.
The time I usually have trouble to fill as work slows down, is spent at home supporting her in all and every way possible during this time. Mostly by just being here, but that is important enough.

I have actually moved my trusty old best Covid-friend the treadmill into the guest room for a while and started doing some indoor walks. I never really got into to going to the gym here. It being placed in the basement with no windows give it such a "dungey" feeling. I like it better with the view of the sea!

We have also done some spring cleaning around the house. I guess its the old platitude, when the mind is messy - you clean!
We finally got around to clearing out the downstairs bathroom a bit. It had basically just become a dumping room, and was full of all sorts of things that didn't have a place anywhere else. Even though technically we don't need to be able to use it (as there are three other bathrooms in the apartment) we thought it could be nice when we have several sets of visitors at once, which has happened a few times already.
Here's Nathan about half way through the process... ha ha, just when steam tends to run out.

Well, we managed. Now there are still some things in there in one corner, but someone could still use it as a bathroom (as it is huge!), so mission accomplished. What's next..?

I Fablernas Värld

The Cartier exhibition which ran from November to March, proved a fantastic success when it came to visitors numbers. It had well over 250,000 visitors, a record-breaking figure for temporary exhibition visitation since museum opening.

I don't think though that this next exhibition will pull just as many visitors, nor that I will be delivering many tours in it. It is an exhibition which actually surprised me a lot in that I personally wasn't aware of the many different origins of our well-known fables, I have (again) learned so many new things, and I love that! Although it has proven popular to book for schools, otherwise I will probably not tour it much unfortunately.

The other day I delivered a tour in Swedish though, for my trusty SwedishLadies-group who always books a visit in each new exhibition.

All of them were old enough to remember this old children's tv show featuring anthropomorphic felt animal puppets, where each episode was based upon famous fables. It was made in the Netherlands, but was very popular in Sweden, where it was called 'In Fablernas Värld'.

We had a nice morning together, in the world of fabels!

Celebration at the Residence

After the visit of the delegation from the Swedish Embassy at the museum in March, I received a beautiful invitation to the Ambassadors residence and an evening to celebrate the 30th Anniversary of the Swedish Business Council here in the UAE.
We were a little bit worried this evening would be postponed due to the previous storms, but we were lucky and it was just a little bit windy, no rain.

I was in the company of Linda and her colleague Yoana:

The residence is a beautiful venue for a gathering, and this particular evening they had set up everything on the lawn. We had some Swedish themed nibbles, mingled and there was a few token speeches of course.

Since this year it's been 50 years since 'Waterloo' won the Eurovision Song Contest, we got entertained by an ABBA medley. These ladies always perform during SBC events, and they are great.

To end the evening and the celebration, Swedish Princess Cake! Served individually in plastic cups, such a great idea!

 Thank you for a lovely night and Happy Anniversary SBC!

Zzzzz

We furnished our first house all in one go when we arrived in Abu Dhabi those 10+ year ago. We had made a mood board in advance, discussed different options and made a shopping list for IKEA. Our first day here, we spent 7 hours in IKEA, and a few days later when everything turn up - it was like a pop-up house!
We got big 180x200 IKEA beds for everywhere, both in the guest room and in our room. (And in the kids' rooms, although we updated both their beds throughout our time in Haya Compound, as they grew out of their initial set-up).

Nathan had been complaining for quite a while that he didn't sleep well in our bed anymore. Our mattresses had probably done their job, and it was time to look for something else.
He refused an IKEA bed this time, so we spread our search a bit further. We went to Dalma Mall, where we had found there was a lot of different bed/mattress shops. Although buying a bed is really difficult! How are you going to know if a bed will be comfortable by just trying it for a few minutes..?!

Anyway, we ended up ordering a new bed in an even bigger size than the previous, 200x200. As Nathan was going on an overnight when it was going to be delivered, we decided to dismount the old frame and sleep on the mattresses to make sure the new one could be placed right away. Quite cosy actually, a bit like camping!

Ha ha, we ended up "camping" for over a week, as the bed delivery got delayed because of the storms. Finally though, it arrived! Behold our new blue dream!

I have to admit, I have not immediately started to sleep like a princess, it seems like my body needs to adjust to the new mattress? Or maybe I new new pillows too? Ah well, at least it's bigger..!
I am so pleased with the overall feel of this room now. We decided to go for a really big new rug, to cover most of the room. It took six people to roll it out and place it, but the end result is so cosy!

The old bed frame will be taken over by friends, but we decided to keep the mattresses as they will be useful for when having visitors. In the meantime, to store them, we made them into a daybed in one corner of the upstairs landing (the laundry/training space). So a bit of change both here and there in the house!

Record rainfall

This week the UAE was hit with another weather warning for severe weather coming up. This time, it was actually warranted - on Tuesday we got hit with the worst rainfall the country has ever recorded! And all in one day!

In less than 24 hours the top measurement for the rainfall here was over 250 mm!!! Abu Dhabi got ca 110 mm and Dubai around 155 mm. Do know, that the yearly rainfall in the UAE is normally less than 80 mm..!

Sure, you can joke about us living in a desert, but honestly, few countries in the world have an infrastructure that would have withstood this huge amount of rain. To compare, the average amount of rain per month in Sweden is 127mm - so the rain that fell here in ONE day is equivalent to two months of non-stop rain in Sweden!

The heavy rain, thunder and lightning caused absolute chaos and carnage as everything flooded. It honestly felt like Armageddon with the sky going first green, and then nearly black four times throughout the day, it was rather scary.

Some areas experienced power cuts, many homes and malls flooded. Trees and signs were ripped up by the wind, building facades got shattered, furniture was flying off balconies and flights were cancelled. The rain fell so heavily and quickly that many people got stuck in their cars on the road, and were forced to abandon them as the roads turned into floods and some vehicles got completely submerged.

Schools of course immediately switched to distance learning, and because of the damage caused it will not open until next week. After a three-week Spring Break not really what the kids needed. I'm extra sad for Linnea, as this was supposed to be her very last school week - ever. The Grade 12 Spirit Week went down the drain, literally.

But most importantly though, we are safe. Nathan was in the SIM in the afternoon, and Linnea and I hunkered down here at home. Since our apartment faces inwards towards the other buildings in the compound, we didn't suffer any damages, luckily.
What an experience! Not one I am eager to repeat any time soon..!

Cooking by numbers

While we have been here in Abu Dhabi we have tried meal boxes before, but they have never really been a complete success. Still, we have decided to try yet another type and so far, it seems to be a hit!
It is called Spring, and it is almost like cooking by numbers!

Twice a week, we get a cool box outside the door, with either 2 or 3 meals in each. Meals that we have picked out ourselves from their menu. I try to pick things that I would normally not cook myself, to try things and get some more recipes to add to my menu bank.

Each meal comes in a box with all the ingredients marked and ready to be cooked.

It really couldn't be easier, vegetables are washed and chopped, and all ingredients are measured and separated into vacuum sealed bags, each with a number that corresponds to a specific step in the recipe.

 

We have enjoyed all of the meals we have tried so far, some more than others sure, but they have all been tasty. Another thing I really like is the very little amount of wasted packaging. This has been a gripe of mine with other meal boxes, but here all the plastic is biodegradable, and the cardboard boxes by Spring. We just leave them in the cool boxes each time they gets picked up.

So the food is delicious, there is not a lot of waste, its easy to cook - and, it takes no time! What's not to like! Last night we had the Cajun Blackened Chicken with Avocado Dijonnaise Mayo, and vegetables.

Sure, it is not cheap. But. Apart from all the things mentioned above, I also do enjoy that I can adapt our order week by week, depending on how many days we want, and for how many people. This service does help us, as we have ended up going down the 4pm "hm... what are we going to have for dinner today... let's go to Waitrose and get something"-route too many times. Which is also not cheap, at all.
So, we will continue to "Spring" for a bit yet!

(If you would like to try yourself - let me know, and I will share my code with you for 50% off on your first 2 deliveries!)