My New Palace in DUBAI

Quicky post: I just post some photos of my Apartment in Dubai.... Al Owais, Deira Dubai.... :o)

Dubai here i come..... 1st week in Dubai.

- 6 June10- (Sunday)

After lunch with "the linaje" I booked the hotel where close to the airport to day on Monday night. Me and Raul decided to stay the night before my departure because it was the best way to do; my flight is in the morning on Tuesday, so If i stayed in my house, Tarragona, 1) Raul cannot drive me to Barcelona because he would need to drive to Barcelona and hurry drive back for his work…. 2) then I need to take a train myself to be at the airport at 09h45 which would require me to leave tarragona 2.30hrs before( 6 o'clock in the morning!) and moreover, you cannot trust the train time table! So we decided just go one night

ahead and I just go direct to airport myself with hotel's shuttle bus. And Raul just drove back to Tarragona for his work. So we could spend the most value time together.

- 7 June 10 - (Monday)

I have prepared everything ready during the day, pick up laundry and packed everything to be done. I just got a problem is " my bags weight 60KGS!!" and that was not yet included my Wii. So I needed to leave my Wii home and took whatever is necessary at that moment. I was quite stressed about my luggage's weight. But well, when I think twice; I needed them so I would just pay more for excess charge baggage, if any. (Emirates

allows all the new cabin crew's luggage weight on joining date for 50kgs.) In the afternoon after Raul came back home, we just had some siesta then drove to Barcelona, had dinner there and spent our last night together. Got some problem about hotel's shutter bus, but hotel managed for me to get to the airport on time. (That's good to stay 4stars hotel, so they have to provide the service! )

- 8 June 10 - (Tuesday)

We woke up since 06h30, had some breakfast together and Raul left. After he left, I felt a bit strange, the feeling like; you are missing something in you, sad? no… because he will be always for me but still strange. However,I tried not to focus too much on that, because there is no point to be sad, we talked over this many times that it is the good decision for both of us. So I just focus on what I am going to do next…. tried to think ahead what is going to happen next and what and how I am going to deal with it, kept my mind busy. 09h30 took a bus to airport. I called my friend; Oscar, he works at the airport and he knows someone there. I hoped that he could help me about my luggages weight. At least not to pay the whole excess, out of 50kgs, 5 or something, I would be

happy already. It was quite frustrated and stressed there. Oscar asked his close friend who is a boss in his office, to ask some help from the check-in counter Supervisor for my flight. Once the supervisor saw my luggage, he was surprised. One was 32kgs and one was 26kgs. Then he asked me to transfer some stuffs for 2kgs from 32kgs bag to 26kgs because the maximum has to be 28kgs. And 30kgs bag could be negotiated. As the result, he told me that today flight is not busy, so he helped me with that, no to pay any excess!!!!!! OMG, I was soooooo happy about it. As you may know that the last frustrating for me is about baggage (as everyone who comes to join Emirates for the first day), after all I didn't need to pay and everything went fine. EVEN MORE, in fact, I actually WOULD HAVE TO claim my baggage at Nice airport, France and go to Emirates check-in counter to do another check-in again. But because of Oscar's friend's help, that supervisor gave me a great favor to check my bag through to Dubai!!! It was such a great relief!! From there, everything went fine. Only once the plane was taking off from Barcelona…. I just couldn't help but cry that I was actually leaving from Spain, leaving my love and don't know when I'm going to meet him again, what kind of life awaits for me in Dubai, Was I going to be okay without him, would I be okay to stand on my legs in whatever happens situation. Anyway, once plane as in the sky, grab a can of beer….. felt better! (couldn't get drunk though, as I had to show up myself at Emirates counter check-in as a staff). I arrived in Nice, France, nothing bad. Took a Emirates plane to Dubai, I kept myself busy the whole flight. Had a very short nap, got Martini to drink. And I had a meal with white wine which happened to be Spanish wine, Torres, My Favourite!! Crew said Emirates just changed the type of white wine to be this one. GREAT!

I arrived in Dubai safely, met another guys who arrived in the same time from London, Paris, London, Rome, Milan. Apparently, all boy was sent to the same building. Those boys got to share a van together, and for some reason I got BWM myself~whoooouuuu….. lol At the airport, we were escorted to Mahaba office, met someone from HR, she took our passport, photos for making out Residence visa. (So anyone reading my blog who wonders what do you need to prepare once you arrive here….. You will be needing to prepare photos, and photocopies of your passport, etc. BUT NOT medical ones because you will have to hand it to company on the first day you go to Emirates.) And they gave me the programme details, time table plan, so I would know what I am going to go through the whole first week, and some little details and time table of my training course. I arrived the new apartment. It is very nice. My flatmate hadn't arrived yet though. I got to the room, got change and went out walking around, got something to eat with those guys and went to sleep. And we made an appointment for the next day to go to Carrefour, to buy some stuffs if we need.

- 9 June 10 - (Wednesday)

11h00 we met at the lobby. However, we met some more new friends, 9 of us together. We had different ideas to go for shopping, to do stuffs. So we waited one and anthers to do things, wait, wait…. Now I decided not to go with them, It had been an hour to wait ppl. I should have been only 3 of us, now turned to be 9. more ppl, difficult to make a move. So I decided to leave them, to go to meet Palo, a friend of my that I met randomly in Bangkok 2yrs ago and we kept in touch on Facebook and didn't think that we would really meet in Dubai! So i rang him and met him for lunch. He drove, took me around to see the city. It was really nice of him. I came back home in the evening and prepared for tomorrow, first day of Emirates. I spent myself dinner at KFC and went to internet shop to chat with Raul, and went to sleep.

- 10 June 10 - (Thursday)

06h30 was the pick up time. At the lobby, everyone was dress up nicely(business attire) waiting for the bus for picking us up. We already got lost for the first day!! Too many know-it-all ppl, arguing about where we would be and eventually we were sent to the wrong building. I have said that we should be sent to the Building C where was the right location, unfortunately no one listened. So I just remained silence and let's them proved themselves if they were right. At the end we had to walk to another building, building C! However, we were not late yet, still on time. First thing when we arrived there, we were asked to gather all requirement medical documents and gave to them. And went into the Auditorium, sitting separated by batches. That day, we were introduced to Emirates, welcome by Cabin crew managers, introduced about what are we doing here exactly, and did some activities to know each other in each batch. There was introduction and some more details about accommodation, Safety of living in Dubai, HR, And we received the RED uniform with Advanced salary. Then we returned back to our apartment in the evening. In the evening I recored some videos, took some photos of my apartment which I am going to show it here. However, I didn't have time yet to edit the video(still). And now, I have changed the location of my bed, table, So the photos you see here, it is the original location as once i arrived. Since I changed the location of my stuff in my bed room. I feel so much better, feel like this is my real bed room, MY! After the whole big day for me, in the evening I went out with all thai friends to Dubai mall, to wandering around and watch Dancing water fountain. It was so beautiful. We were lucky that we went to the FYI Friday restaurant, we were sitting at the balcony, where we can see the dancing water fountain easily. At night I went out with Palo and his friends to Jumierah Medinat, Roofbar. But It was too hot that night so the roof floor was closed, it was only indoor disco. I didn't stay that long, I left in the same time with Palo and some friends. Drinks there is quite pricy because I didn't have a "Face card" yet, Emirates cabin crew card for discount. It was around 40-50dhrs it is normal price here.

-11 June 10 - (Friday)

Since I have received the money from Emirates, now it's time for spending it!! I went to Carrefour myself to buy stuffs for my apartment. I bought a lot for my kitchen basically, daily survival. And some other stuffs for living for now. It was about 230Euros I spent!! (960Dhrs) Believe me My supermarket cart was over fueled!! 230Euros in Spain, I wouldn't get much as now.

- 12 June 10 - (Saturday)

Today is actually a day off in Dubai. However, today schedule is "Field trip". Today you are not required to wear business attire but something nice. I got up at 6 o'clock!!! Damn!! the alarm didn't go off, and thank god that I got up myself in time! So I didn't have time to think what to wear, I just grab anything. So I just dress with business attire!! We went to Building C again, and we were split into 2 buses. We stopped only 2 places, The 2nd biggest mosque and the dubai's museum. And the whole time is in the bus. They took us passing everywhere interesting, to the palm island, Al burj arab, etc. And we had a tour guide who explain EVERYTHING about dubai. She kind of spoke non-stop, and all the information was so interesting. (I felt asleep a bit tho.) At the end of the day, we were sent to a government clinic where is sooooo far away from the city, to check up our blood test, etc.

- 13 June 10 - (Sunday) Official first day with the RED trainee uniform!! … - the end of first week (19 June 10)

Everyday the pick up bus is 06h30. First day was about introduction of training program, then HR came to talk again before lunch, then we transferred to Head quarter to Receive the Manual books(A380 we got 2 manuals, one service only and one for SEP+First aids) then Employee assistance talk and Health talk.

Second day: Uniform fitting, Doing some self E-learning(a lot, it took the whole afternoon).

Third day: We got 06h00 pick up, with dress on Business attire. Because today I spent all day in the clinic, to recheck the medical and get another 2nd boost vaccination, take photo for ID, more and more medical. (technically, it took long because there was many of us queuing for 4doctors!)

Fourth day: Today we learned about IT system of the organization, which is the most important issue that you can keep in touch with company. And in the afternoon section we got Corporate induction; about company-cultures-dubai-etc.

And the Fifth day: The whole day about Team-building interpersonal skills customer class. It was all about activities, working team. It was quite fun.

........And today, after everyone got to know each other since past days….. So everyone wanted to do party!! It was a party in my building with boys however, I didn't know much details so I decided to go out with my lovely friends, Danni and Danny and Kesh to Boudoir. Kesh, she lived her already over 2 years, so she knows stuff. After the night, I came back to my apartment, there was still some party going on. So I went to join them a bit at the end. And on Friday, we had a little bit more, just little bit. And on Saturday we went to the Jumairah beach park. Unfortunately, at that beach we were not allowed to take any photos!…. :o(

----- End of my first week in Dubai. I will come to write more, however, the week later was "Training already, so technically not much stuff interesting to write. But I will try to make it interesting for you! :o) Please leave the comment :o) THANK YOU .... mxaahhh