Life in Abu Dhabi?

[gotelltheoldmandowntheroad]

Have any of you lived here or in Dubai? What's it like for women/children?

if ur gay maybe think twice. horrible homophobic laws

I'm not gay, and I do not want to go there for many reasons. But I do want to know what life is like from someone who has lived there.

I cannot stand Dubai, but I love Abu Dhabi…

I’ve been lucky to stay in a few places in the Middle East (SA not being one of them), as a mother with young children it’s very well catered for and I’ve always felt extremely safe.

really lovely people, culture, lifestyle, I love it!

As an expat woman you will have a little more freedom than native women and a lot more freedom than ‘guest’ workers, that is until you fall foul of one of their arcane laws. I’ve never seen the attraction myself.

Have you lived there?

Both are fine. Lovely in fact.
No real restrictions for women, on a day to day basis.
Both cities are a thousand times safer than the UK.

I lived in Dubai.

It's very pleasant, areas like reem Island and Yas island are very expat so mostly wealthy. Much nicer to live in that Dubai and if you have a good salary you can have a very pleasant life. Its very safe, you can leave your handbag sitting and no one would touch it. Its incredibly clean and all malls/public toilets are very well maintained. It's a pleasant place to raise children as there is very little public drinking/drug taking/beggars etc etc. The underside is much more hidden.

However it is very difficult to move past the racism and the wealth divide and while I'm having a lovely time heading to waitrose and starbucks and sitting by the pool many many people are being exploited. Also you have to be incredibly careful as if it all goes wrong you have very little rights and sometimes you just have to do what you can to get home.

As an expat woman you will have a little more freedom than native women and a lot more freedom than ‘guest’ workers, that is until you fall foul of one of their arcane laws. I’ve never seen the attraction myself.

This is what would worry me and put me off going to the UAE, even just for a holiday. You need to be well versed in the law and even then, what if you make an innocent mistake or are falsely accused of something? Prison sentences for seemingly small offences are long.
There was a story not long ago about someone from the UK who got sentenced to 25 years in jail in Dubai for having CBD vape oil in the glove box in his car.

Have friends living out there in some Dubai itself and Abu Dhabi, and they seem to love it, wouldn't be for me personally but you can see the pros, namely the very favourable salaries and tax regimes for expats plus the 365 days a year of sun. Most expats seem to live a very nice lifestyle out there (obviously as with any relocation check the details of your package, company contributions to healthcare and private education seem standard). Even those in what would be average-good professions in UK (teachers etc) seem to do much better out there. There are excellent international schools, most kids seem to be members of various sports clubs and there's a big expat social scene. Drinking is a little challenging, expats are 'allowed' but taxes make it prohibitively expensive, I think there are workarounds. And obviously getting hold of pork products and shellfish is difficult. Otherwise as an outsider it all seems like a hotter drier Surrey or Tunbridge Wells to me, overwhelmingly white and middle class . The cons to me aside from it being like a stockbrocker belt are having to drive everywhere, the relentless heat, the lack of any kind of history or diversity of architecture and the general human rights record but I'm sure you'll get plenty of people on to tell you about that, this in MN

On a serious note do pay careful attention to the legalities of what would happen to custody of the children in the event of a relationship breakdown. It's quite likely you wouldn't be allowed to remove them from the country unless their father consented (that would be the case anywhere unless it was a very clearly documented and agreed temporary move only) and it's quite possible the father might be awarded full custody in a contested hearing under UAE law... Also of course the implications to being out of the UK system if you intend to return, pensions/NI/re-entering UK school system etc...

Never lived there myself but spent a lot of time in both Dubai and Abu Dhabi as family were based there.

Great place to live and bring up kids. They are a very child focussed society - nothing too much trouble. For me if I had small kids I would prefer Abu Dhabi. So much to do. My family member's husband worked nights and she kept the same hours as him so would go out walking/jogging in the early hours of the morning before he came home. Extremely safe place for women.

I have lived with children in both locations. Mumsnet hates Dubai. Both locations are great for families with children. Abu Dhabi is the 'powerhouse', slightly more conservative and richer, but my preference. Dubai is glitzier (is that a word). You need a good salary to live in either. Everything is expensive and there are no public services available to you as an expat. Make sure of the package being offered. My one piece of advice is to make a plan, whatever that plan may be, and stick to it. Going to save for your future, save. Going to travel, travel. Going to party, party. The biggest problems I have seen is where one partner wants to save and one wants to party. There is a huge expat community in both locations.

Yeah this is why I asked, because I wanted people who have actually lived there. I agree with you though, and suspect the same. End of the day it's a country run by religious laws, and I think anyone who doesn't agree with those laws would be made and hypocritical to go there, not that hypocrisy is rare or within us all to some degree.

I actually like the UK. I wouldn't want to live anywhere else and not fussed on leaving again either.

Family members live there and lived here so compared a lot (not native to either of these).
In basics, they absolutely did talk about the difference in crime and feeling of safety. Loved it. Lots of buzzing about the quality of life, less buzzing about lack if easy access to alcohol like here.😁
Negative was expensive schooling so you have to make sure you have good salary.

None of the women was worried when I asked. The rules are changing, it's developing and the fact that it is somewhere on paper apparently doesn't mean it's put to practice. Honetsly, sounds tempting nowadays.

There is absolutely no problem getting pork or alcohol, but drinking in hotels is eyewateringly expensive. Buying from an off licence is just slightly more expensive than the uk. Shellfish is everywhere.

So...you live in the UK, and you have no intention of leaving. What was the point of your thread then?

Okay, just for fun what would say about this, we're all vegan. I love a drink too, at home and out. But ultimately I'm at that stage where I just want to stay put.

It wouldn’t be my kind of place. Too sexist, homophobic and too much wealth disparity. I wouldn’t want to prop up a system like that any more than I’d move to Israel. Mind you, is the U.K. one of the good guys? So I’m probably being a hypocrite.

Both locations are great for families with children.

unless they are a same-sex family

I think it's different for exapts from certain countries and expats from others from what I was told

Look, OP if you don't want to go, you don't want to go🤷🏻

My advice is be prepared to spend most of the daylight hours between June-August inside as it’s too hot to function outside. If you thought that heatwave we had on 18-19 July here was bad, thats nothing. In fact the temperatures we had last month are slightly below average temp for the Middle Eastern countries where it regularly gets up to 45c+ in the summer.

The good news is that you can go from your airconditioned home into your airconditioned car to get to the airconditioned shops without hardly having to put a foot outside. Or do what a lot of the expats do and come back to the UK for July/August….

I don't think there are any good guys but this is "my" country as in I'm native and I feel I belong here and like it here actually, it's free, and I enjoy my life.

I lived in Abu for almost all of my life. Parents went in ‘76, and I returned to live and work after going to school and University in the U.K.
I will be honest, it’s not the place it used to be. Was a fantastic place, good fun and good times. We left a couple of years ago. Everything had become so expensive. The only decent place where you might get value for money was The Club. When I put my eldest into BSAK it was 18,000 a year. She’s now 24. When my youngest left BSAK it was 74,000 a year. Quite a leap in 17 years. Flights are expensive, electricity is expensive, housing is expensive. You’re going to need a large whack of money. Oh yeah, and every time you go to the supermarket, that’s really expensive too. I haven’t moved back to the U.K., because that looks like a shit show too, but I can honestly say there is NOTHING I miss about Abu after living there for 44 years. There are better places to be.

I lived in the ME many many many years ago - we used to get a 'ration book' that was index linked to your salary to spend in the liquor store when you ran out that was it apart from black market and the hotels. Is that still the case?