After a year of workouts at the college, it was time to shell out the bucks for a fancy Dubai gym membership. It's not that I didn't give working out at the office a try. Our college gym, shared by the men's and women's campuses, does have a 50 meter pool (closed for repair since February) as well as a half dozen 1990's treadmills. But with my gym-junkie history, a facility with limited hours and dated equipment was just not doing it for me. My mental and physical fitness needs were not being met.
So I joined Fitness First, a gulf-wide chain of health clubs, with dozens of classes each week, the newest equipment, chilled outdoor pools, coffee bar, spinning studio and the perkiest fitness trainers from Egypt, India and the Phillipines. And as with many of our UAE adventures, the gym experience has been full of things that don't quite make sense.
In the ladies locker room are multilingual signs suggesting that we preserve our modesty, by changing behind curtains and covering our bodies with towels. But then there are the massive banks of TV monitors in exercise areas, where every fifth wide-screen is tuned into MTV World, where you're sure to see Madonna in crude gyration mode, or Shakira in flesh colored leotard, writhing as if having an exotic (erotic) dream.
Now I'm all for modesty and respecting the local norms, and I will admit that when the kids are not around, Billy and I tune into the old MTV to see how far behind we've fallen in our pop-culture hole. But I'd like to ask the gym managers if they don't think it's a little much to directly request our compliance with modesty code while showing the most immodest of offerings from satellite TV?
And if that's not enough, there's mid-day Friday - holy time for Muslims, when the route to the gym is clogged with mosque-goers rushing to make the holy hour and parking illegally all over the roads, roundabouts and medians. The gym is indeed a little quieter at this time. But what I just discovered is that if you do hop onto a treadmill, your TV options include not only the indecent videos of MTV, but also the Mosque TV channel, with bowing and praying traditionally-dressed Muslims in the mosque, directly next to the barely dressed dancers of MTV.
How funny and irreverent and religious and multicultural can the UAE manage to be?
I need only tear my eyes away from the the mosque TV and the MTV and direct them to the treadmill on my one side with a Muslim woman running with her hightech dry-fit headscarf, to the stinky German engineer on my other side with his hairy chest spilling out of a tank top. Maybe it's best to just stare out into space..
Friday, October 30, 2009
Thursday, October 22, 2009
"You are Naughty Madam"
Someone saw me moaning on Facebook last week about my fatigue, and our sick kids and Billy travelling for work, and they said to me, 'Don't you have a helper?'
The embarrassing thing is that yes, I do have a helper, a fantastic young smiley Sri Lankan helper who lives with us, packs lunch boxes, looks after our kids, does laundry, buys groceries, cooks our dinners and pulls the weeds from our tiny garden without being asked. She even said to me one recent Saturday morning, her day off, 'You are naughty madam', when she awoke to find I had washed the morning dishes. How dare me!
I honestly don't know what I'll do when I get back to America one day, where a nanny costs double-digits per hour, cleaning ladies are a true luxury and gardeners are deemed an indulgence. Seriously, the stress I feel at my college, which is basically an arm of the Islamic government, and the rage I often feel on the reckless and dangerous roads is real, warranted, and a veritable cause for lost sleep and many a new fine line on my face.
But the reality is, I do have good help and when it's time for bed-time stories with the kids, I can totally sink into the pillows with kids and books, and give myself completely to that coziest of parental tasks, knowing that the kitchen is being tidied and laundry getting put away. How totally lucky am I.
The embarrassing thing is that yes, I do have a helper, a fantastic young smiley Sri Lankan helper who lives with us, packs lunch boxes, looks after our kids, does laundry, buys groceries, cooks our dinners and pulls the weeds from our tiny garden without being asked. She even said to me one recent Saturday morning, her day off, 'You are naughty madam', when she awoke to find I had washed the morning dishes. How dare me!
I honestly don't know what I'll do when I get back to America one day, where a nanny costs double-digits per hour, cleaning ladies are a true luxury and gardeners are deemed an indulgence. Seriously, the stress I feel at my college, which is basically an arm of the Islamic government, and the rage I often feel on the reckless and dangerous roads is real, warranted, and a veritable cause for lost sleep and many a new fine line on my face.
But the reality is, I do have good help and when it's time for bed-time stories with the kids, I can totally sink into the pillows with kids and books, and give myself completely to that coziest of parental tasks, knowing that the kitchen is being tidied and laundry getting put away. How totally lucky am I.
Saturday, October 17, 2009
No One to Walk With
Health and wellness are hot topics here in the UAE, where obesity is out of control and the country's reputation is growing as the Gulf's Diabetes capital . For the Muslim population the situation is complicated, with the separation of the sexes and the women's need to cover, creating barriers to the pursuit of active lifestyles. And then there's the Lebanese pastry counter at the supermarket, with all form of pistachio and honeyed sweet to mess with any attachment you might have to whole-grain living.
At home we think we're doing ok with our kids, who eat cheese and fruit after school and take brown bread in their lunch boxes. But we get sabotaged by school-sanctioned birthday celebrations which include not only cakes in the school, but candy bags sent home to mess with our delicate hard-won snack regime. And then our neighbor's housekeeper seems to love giving Rosie chocolates. But what can you do? Fortunately 9-year-old Brady knows how to read labels for sugars and fats, and even 5-year-old Rosie knows that 100% juice is the good kind. Woohoo for Boulder-inspired parental badgering!!!
But public health initiatives are behind the times in the UAE, and local moms are often young and inexperieced in the ways of healthy living. This week in class we discussed the topic of transport, and walking was listed as one of the many methods of getting around. We discussed the pros and cons of cars, donkeys, subways, bicycles, and yes, walking as ways to get from place to place. But when the idea of walking was presented as an option, loads of excuses were given as to why it is simply not done here, including bad weather 6 months out of 12, non-existent sidewalks and reckless drivers.
But the crux of the problem is actually rather sad and culturally difficult to get around. One of my students says she loves to walk and every so often she convinces a brother to take her to the mall to walk a few laps, with him. But when I asked her why she doesn't simply take a walk in the neighborhood before school in the morning, or after dinner while it is still light outside, she said 'No Miss. It is not allowed for girls to be alone. I am not allowed to walk outside our house by myself, and no one will go with me'. So in a culture where even a most basic part of living healthy is not allowed, what are these women to do?
At home we think we're doing ok with our kids, who eat cheese and fruit after school and take brown bread in their lunch boxes. But we get sabotaged by school-sanctioned birthday celebrations which include not only cakes in the school, but candy bags sent home to mess with our delicate hard-won snack regime. And then our neighbor's housekeeper seems to love giving Rosie chocolates. But what can you do? Fortunately 9-year-old Brady knows how to read labels for sugars and fats, and even 5-year-old Rosie knows that 100% juice is the good kind. Woohoo for Boulder-inspired parental badgering!!!
But public health initiatives are behind the times in the UAE, and local moms are often young and inexperieced in the ways of healthy living. This week in class we discussed the topic of transport, and walking was listed as one of the many methods of getting around. We discussed the pros and cons of cars, donkeys, subways, bicycles, and yes, walking as ways to get from place to place. But when the idea of walking was presented as an option, loads of excuses were given as to why it is simply not done here, including bad weather 6 months out of 12, non-existent sidewalks and reckless drivers.
But the crux of the problem is actually rather sad and culturally difficult to get around. One of my students says she loves to walk and every so often she convinces a brother to take her to the mall to walk a few laps, with him. But when I asked her why she doesn't simply take a walk in the neighborhood before school in the morning, or after dinner while it is still light outside, she said 'No Miss. It is not allowed for girls to be alone. I am not allowed to walk outside our house by myself, and no one will go with me'. So in a culture where even a most basic part of living healthy is not allowed, what are these women to do?
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