The Dubai Diaries
My life as a flight attendant in the Middle East!

Ladies Who Lunch!

I finally managed to get a rare day off with the girls, so we decided to go out for lunch and try somewhere new. On a recommendation of a friend we headed out to The Farm, in Al Barari. Once we finally managed to get there (making a few u-turns along the way and with a big help from google maps!) we were greeted by lots of luscious greenery, trees and plants everywhere. The restaurant itself is located pretty much in the middle of the desert, but they’ve planted so much that it looks like you’re in an oasis or on a tropical island somewhere. Image

We ordered our food and got very excited at the prospect of sweet potato fries, however the service was extremely slow, so we ended up waiting over 45 minutes for our food to arrive. Once it finally did, it was delicious. We did have to ask for a couple of things and each time it took them a long time to bring it, even though there were a lot of waiters hanging around! On the other hand, when we went to pay our bill, they were there in about 30 seconds!

ImageImageI went for the smoked chicken panini which had avocado, tomato, lettuce and some other stuff inside, with sweet potato fries on the side! ImageImageImageImageAfter lunch, feeling rather full, we went for a little stroll around the garden area and of course had to take a few pictures for the blog! 🙂ImageImage

We discovered some small but extremely comfy hammocks and lay in those for a while letting our lunch digest!

ImageAll in all I had a really lovely afternoon catching up with the girls and trying out a new restaurant. It was so nice to be able to sit outside and enjoy the breeze as well! 

 

P.s. If you want more regular day to day updates of what is happening in my life, follow me on Twitter and Instagram @rachelwwilson!

Starting Medical Training

This Sunday we started GMT, also known as Group Medical Training. The second day is over, and we have been crammed with information.

My lovely neighbour has given us the password to her wifi until we can get our own sorted out sometime this week, so I’m finally blogging from my laptop! Another exciting thing happening this week, tomorrow in fact….we are collecting our uniforms!
I cannot wait to finally try everything on, and once we finish GMT and start Security and Service training we will be wearing them to college as well. Very exciting! Of course I will upload some pictures on here as well 😉

Back to GMT. So far it has been alright, I can’t decide yet whether I prefer SEP; a fair bit of what we have learnt so far I have already covered in a first aid course I had to do for my driving license back in Austria which means that I am not finding the general first aid things too hard.

However we have to know all about the different types of medical equipment that is located on board the aircraft, what is in each different bag/pouch/box, and all of the uses for each type of medicine/tablets. I have a feeling that it’s going to take me a while to memorise all of that! We have the final exam on Thursday, and continual practical assessments every day. 

Yesterday was spent in part learning how to do CPR, and we were assessed on that today. We decided to name our resuscitation doll “Big Tony” (no idea who came up with that or why!) but we all managed to bring him back to life! Here’s two of my batchmates practicing with the pocket mask.
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Today we learnt a whole range of things, from choking, to burns, fractures, bandaging wounds, etc.

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Now I’m looking forward to getting our uniform, and we only have just over 3 weeks left! We will also be getting our first rosters on the 26th, which I cannot wait for! I’m hoping to get a nice layover somewhere hot by the beach! At the moment the weather in Dubai is slightly chilly (average of about 20-22 degrees during the day, ha ha!) and very windy. As I don’t live right in the centre there is a lot of sand everywhere, so any time you go out of the apartment block you do get a face full of sand if it’s windy!

One last exiting thing that is happening – 2 of my best friends Maria and Simone from Austria are coming to visit me! They just booked their tickets today for a week at the beginning of April, so let’s hope the rostering gods are nice to me and give me some quick turnarounds or maybe even a couple of days off! I’m hoping to be able to spend as much time with them as possible!