Thoughts From A Day Off

A little standard I-haven’t-posted-in-a-while note… It’s nearly been 8 months since I’ve last shared some writing, but I’ve found myself busy with flights, going out, meeting new people, trying new things and simply enjoying life in Dubai. I wrote this post around early September last year and couldn’t really find the motivation to move forward and have it go public. I’ve stumbled back on it, reread it, and still feel the exact way. I promise myself to get back into writing so hopefully, all fingers crossed, you and I both will have something to look forward to.

I feel a headache coming through. I feel like I had worked a full day in a pressure controlled cabin, high up in the sky, catering to over a hundred passengers and landing late at night, early in the morning, past my bed time, whichever describes that fine line between sunset and sunrise. I feel like I rolled my luggage into my room, half asleep, half awake, half still in Sri Lanka but physically in Dubai. I feel like I’ve stayed asleep until half 2 in the afternoon, only getting up once to make a cup of coffee and instantly returning back to my fortress of blankets. I feel like the only exercise I’ve done is scrolling through my phone and messaging a hundred words a second from the office I call my bed.

I feel all this because… Well, this is my current state. To simplify this paragraph, I can summarize it all into a single sentence – I am exhausted.

To everyone else the life of a flight attendant is full of glamour, cat walking through the airport, our red lipstick on point, our hair slicked back and our scarf flowing delicately with the wind. We are seen pushing trolleys up and down the aisle, serving food, and balancing drinks on our magical silver trays. But the real challenge here is balancing our inner emotions with that smile you see on our face. It’s not easy.

It’s not easy flying from one time zone to another. It’s not easy waking up at 5 in the morning for a flight and then waking up at 5 pm for yet another. It’s not easy serving food and having to worry about the safety of the passengers and any medical situation that can arise at any moment of any flight at any time. It’s not easy working with different colleagues day in and day out, becoming temporary friends, disembarking and acting like you didn’t just spend the layover and the last 8 hours of the flight together. It’s not easy because the life of a flight attendant is far from normal.

Prior to joining, I was just like everyone else. I thought flight attendants had such a wicked job. They looked so flawless in the cabin and saw the world one flight at a time. Then once my rosters and hours started rolling in, I began losing motivation and positivity. I enjoyed my days in Dubai because on those measly days off, my life felt just a little bit normal again.

But, with every job come ups and downs. And with every job, you’ll always find something you will dislike. And with every person there’s a different level of tolerance of how much one can actually handle. I may have just listed and moaned about all the negatives of this line of work but, I truly cannot disregard the positives. Because… The positives are quite amazing.

In my last few months of flying, I’ve had the opportunity to spend (on average) a day all over the world. I’ve touch down on two new continents, visited well over a dozen new cities and rekindled my love for old ones. I’ve tried food I never thought twice of eating and met the most interesting people. I’ve experienced a UNESCO World Heritage site and cuddled with new animals. With all the downsides a job may come with, seeing it from the other side, where the grass is obviously greener, all my previous complaints sound petty.




Johannesburg, Brisbane, Beijing, Colombo, Aukland
And that is exactly how I’m coping and balancing my inner, much more true opinions and emotions with the very smile I put on my face each flight. It’s tough, exhausting, and far from normal but the perks are far from average. I may not be in love with the job but I am in love with where the job has taken me, for the memories I’ve made and for that I’m grateful.

Home?

“I can’t wait to go home,” I tell myself at the end of some layovers. I usually look forward to working the return sector back to Dubai, counting down the flight time, getting on the bus and rolling my luggage straight into my room. However, on my last flight – a long, 6-day, Brisbane-Auckland multi-sector – I found myself getting a little confused with the concept of where home actually is.

As we slowly approach the 5-month mark of moving to Dubai, I’ve become grateful for many things: the opportunity to work for such a well-known company, living in another country and the chance to see the world. Although grateful, these reasons can have their downsides. As I just finished my degree while working a part-time job, a real job can be hard to adjust to. This may not be your regular 9-5, but it certainly isn't your regular retail job either. Also living in another country, a different culture without the comfort of friends and family can be tough.


However, there’s something else, one thing I’ve opted out of the previous three advantages, because well… It deserves it’s own category and it’s the primary reason I’m adjusting so well.

My friends.



I’ve found the weirdest bunch of people here in Dubai and I couldn’t be more thankful (please note, I mean weird in the most loving way possible). We’ve bonded through training, waking up at 5 am, studying, and reciting memorized phrases over and over and over again. We’ve de-stressed and made the absolute most of our days off by going to the beach, taste-testing different restaurants and going to a few clubs… Okay, okay, many clubs. We spent every waking minute with each other, practically living in my friends’ apartment and only using my room to sleep.


All this was possible due to living in a temporary accommodation for 4 months. We were very lucky to stay in a hotel and have the luxury of walking just a few flights of stairs to knock on each other’s door. And when we’re not out taking over the city, we’re slumped on the couch, watching a movie or enjoying the likes of Instagram. There’s truly nothing better than doing nothing with your friends. But, as cliché as it sounds, all good things come to an end and now starts the reality of what was supposed to happen months ago. We’ve moved out of this lovely building, our temporary accommodation, our oasis of Dubai, and are now scattered throughout the city.


We were given about a week notice to pack all our stuff and end our suite life of Zack and Cody lifestyle. And as much as we didn’t want to think about it and take it as the end of the world, we did. All the girls were coordinated on their crying schedules and the boys had to bear with our emotional moments. Who would be our new flat mates? How would the place look? How far is it? When and how will we be able to see each other? A cloud of fear, anxiety and sadness took over and we didn’t want to leave. But it had to be done.

And now, I’m typing this long overdue blog post out on the balcony of my new flat, on Sheikh Zayed Road, high up on the 24th floor, with an amazing view of the city. Here I can finally begin to settle in, decorate and make it feel like home. But, as I was sitting on my jump seat during landing, this wasn’t what I imagined. My idea of ‘home’ was torn between life back in Mississauga and back with my friends in Dubai. Home is my sense of comfort, my security blanket, a place where I feel like I belong… A feeling I have yet to encounter at this new flat of mine, a feeling that’s never genuine at the club being offered bottles, and certainly not on layovers spent with temporary friends.

I know returning back to Toronto isn’t a feasible option right now, but the alternative I’ve got here is just as good. We moved to Dubai and met in a temporary accommodation; but even after training college, in-between our flights and the new distances between us, I know I’ve made some permanent friends. If it weren’t for them, my only comfort would be after a 14-hour flight up North. So now when I say, “I can’t wait to go home,” I know they’re just a few metro stops, bus rides or a cab ride away.

In The Middle

I learned in many of my University writing classes, the best place for any writer to start a story was in the middle. Before leaving Toronto, I was in the middle of growing up, in the middle of realizing how much I loved home, and in the middle of figuring out how good I had it.


I stepped into my backyard, to quickly wipe away a couple tears that were a result of talking to my uncle. I inhaled the cold Canadian air and looked back inside to all my aunts and uncles sitting around the kitchen. I often miss these family parties and the chance to see all my titas, titos and cousins due to work and school. Being an only child, I looked forward to these gatherings since these cousins were the closest I’d have to siblings. But as much as I always wanted a brother, a sister or a bigger family, I know my parents were more than enough of the immediate family I needed. I spent many moments taking for granted home cooked meals, family mall strolls, my mom’s fruit shakes and the roof above my head.


And under that roof, are all my things, scattered and waiting to be selected, folded and packed away into a suitcase. The suitcases remained empty until the last few days, because the rest of my time was spent hanging out wherever and whenever I could. I knew I had amazing friends, but I didn’t realize how amazing until I walked into a restaurant expecting a quiet dinner, to a table filled with all my girlfriends. Imagine still being close with someone you’ve known since kindergarten, your first, ever, best friend whom you played Barbies with all the time. Some I’ve known since the second and fifth grade and a few since the beginning of high school. Growing up is tough with gossip and fights and different schools with different schedules, but we always managed to remain friends and act as if the last time we saw each other was just yesterday. These were my girls since day 1. And there they were, with a cake saying bon voyage and this heartwarming surprise.


After a few glasses of wine, they made me think a spontaneous night was in order. They pretended to brainstorm places and came to a not-so-random conclusion of a nearby bar. I was excited for what reminded me of our high school days where we hopped into a car, going nowhere in particular and somehow still had fun. We arrived at Bier Markt, walked through the crowd and kept bumping into familiar face after familiar face. My favourite girls brought together all my favourite guys and there I was standing amongst all my favourite people.


The last few weeks made me realize how much I didn’t want to leave, in the middle of preparing to leave. This wasn't just your ordinary vacation/adventure, this was a new job in a new world, all on my own.

And in all that happened my last day at home, I was torn in the middle of what I want and what I need.

As much as I get home sick quite often, I need to put a bookmark in the middle of my favourite book titled home. A book filled with all these significant places and characters that hold so much importance. For now, I’ll experience this world a bit, return back soon and pick up right where we left off.

Here, There and Everywhere

It all started approaching my last days in University. Luckily for me, I only had 1 final exam to study for. Now as easy as that sounds, I knew once I handed that in, I had a whole life ahead of me to start worrying about.

I contemplated my years and years working in retail and knew I had so much more to offer than just bagging clothes, selling a TV or arguing with a customer about discounts. I dolled up my resume and applied for countless positions surrounding travel, social media, marketing, and some positions that brought all three together. Nothing was taking the bait. I wanted to finally work for something I was passionate about, and not some mindless, robot-like job, scanning barcodes one after the other. It just wasn’t me.

Then, there it was, an Emirates Cabin Crew posting appeared in my search and the open day was less than 2 weeks away. I thought, why not? It wouldn’t hurt to try. Becoming a flight attendant was always a thought but many of the Canadian airlines required a second language such as French, which I lacked and the idea was soon dismissed. However, getting paid to travel was pretty much the ultimate goal. So, I went for it.

I didn’t know what to expect as I walked into one of Sheraton’s conference rooms filled with over 300 people. I received plenty of helpful tips from current cabin crew members, all of which can be found all over the Internet. It was basically a ‘be on your best behaviour, look interested and dress sharp’ kind of day, as you were being analyzed and watched by the recruitment team. The red lipstick is also a nice touch as it could probably give the recruitment team a sneak peak at what you’d look with the Emirates face on. And like I said in my previous post, you had seconds to make a first impression. I literally walked to the table, handed over my resume and smiled somewhere in between. I tried to squeeze in a, “How are you?” but my nerves took over. That evening, I received a call (first of many forms of communication from them) to return for the second day.

The rest of that process is pretty much history and the same type of process you’ll read on many blogs who's goal is to help you become an Emirates Cabin Crew. I’m not here for that. I’m here to share my experience, my story, how I felt along the way and what new adventures I’ll come to face. Because so far, being here for less than 2 weeks, I have plenty to share. It's not just about Emirates and the pleasure of working for such an amazing company while travelling all over the world, it's about me, myself and I… Travelling here, there and everywhere.

So here begins the story of my life in Dubai.