ACL and Arab Money

We've moved in! By the end of tonight, time and energy allowing, this flat ought to officially feel like home. A late-night cleaning session and first attempt at home cooking leaves us, at almost 9pm, simultaneously shattered and elated. Tomorrow is the first day we won't have to get up for anything so the hope is once again to rise at about 2, Arab-style.

Supplies of all forms have been found at the enormous Carrefour supermarket around fifteen minutes' drive away, by the shopping centre. We have already accepted the fact that is impossible to do such a shop again without at least a spare three hours, the patience of a saint and probably a map. The supermarket is effectively four normal Tescos (or what have you) crammed into one; while the market offers fresh food at a comparatively low price, it seems most locals come here to do their shopping for more or less everything, stretching from five-kilo sacks of rice (the lift groaned under our combined weight on the journey back up) to homeware and school supplies. I've no doubt that the entire home decor of many Arabs is dictated by what they can find in boxed sets at Carrefour. They even have shisha pipes, a snip at £7. We get chatting to some Egyptian men in the checkout queue who offer to step in when it looks like we don't have enough money; neon washing baskets, hazelnut KitKats and the closest thing to Tabasco really were necessities. Thankfully the shopping centre doesn't close until 12 (that includes the H&M, Starbucks etc!) so if you need a power nap midway on one of the faux-leather beanbags there is plenty of time to do so.

Below: our disarmingly healthy first shop

We also visited the ACL Institute today, where we will be studying for the next year. Magda, who runs the establishment alongside her large part-Italian family, is not as formidable as we had been led to believe but certainly a firm and businesslike figure, understandably proud of what has been achieved especially in the last year (the construction of all-new accomodation is almost complete, and an on-site mosque). It is no longer located in the centre of town but a little outside, past what can only be described as a desert wasteland mostly taken up by oil refineries on either side. Other new additions to the only 'modern' building in the area include comfy seating areas, tiled bathrooms and a pretty garden mostly characterised by a cluster of giant stone mushrooms. As it turns out it will just be the 23 Leeds students studying here this year, which is strangely comforting.

Below: we cross the new garden where barbecues will apparently be held later in the year, and the dining room (the rest of the photos ate themselves).

On to a few pictures of our flat itself. It's beautifully furnished, as with a number of the flats we looked at, with polished dark wood dining area and marble surfaces in a number of the other rooms. Chandeliers just on the right side of tacky illuminate Japanese wall hangings, ornate vases and yes, the occasional bit of gold leaf. There are even two apparently antique rocking chairs in front of the back window which will probably come in handy when we are reduced to pallid, gibbering wrecks by exam stress. At present most people are sprawled on the sofa watching a film on Dubai One.

Above: the sitting/dining room

Below: the, er, second dining room. Home to a collection of upset-looking plants I have made it my mission to look after, and also, the fridge. Then the kitchen and its floral gas canisters.

The back window offers a strange and intriguing view - the rooftop of what the security guard outside can only tell us is an 'American house', apparently from a long, long time ago. It's home now only to a mother cat and four roly-poly kittens and carpets of tangled, climbing foliage.