A night out....

This is what happens when one plans a night out with the hubby: In the afternoon while swimming, David was experimenting with doing backflips into the pool, as one does, and misjudged one of the flips. Sadly his head connected with the side of the pool and he was rather sore. We were a bit concerned about a head injury and wanted to take him to A&E - but had no idea where to go! I phoned the father of one of Alex’s girlfriends, who is a doctor here. He talked me through David’s symptoms and then said I had better take him into Sheik Khalifa medical centre to get checked out, to be on the safe side. This hospital is actually just for nationals, not expats, but they don’t turn away any A&E patient, especially kids. So I shot off to the hospital with a drowsy whimpering boy who couldn’t speak because of the pain.
I was expecting a nightmare of a time, since I can’t speak Arabic, and long queues and the unimaginable kind of red tape one discovers everywhere here. It was actually a pleasure. David was registered within about 5 minutes and examined by 3 different nurses. During the waiting periods we were in a ladies only waiting room - the men had their own waiting room across the corridor. We were the only Europeans in the place, and I was the only lady with shamefully uncovered hair. One of the ladies did her prayers on a prayer mat while we were there, totally unselfconsciously. At one stage a man wanted to get the attention of one of the women in the waiting room, and a large hand came through the curtain and waved about until someone noticed and went to ask what he wanted - there was no question of his entering or even showing his face in the ladies waiting room. It was actually quite nice and relaxing having no men cluttering up the place! Finally a (European) Doctor came to see David, decided he was in no immediate danger, and the whole thing took about an hour. Very impressive!
Sadly, not quite quick enough to rescue the romantic night out that Darrell and I had planned!