DUBAI... The second time around..

It was December 2014 when we first set foot in the now famous, cosmo city of Dubai.  We were there for a 4 day holiday/stop-over.  However, we did not  get to see anything at all as my son was sick.  He had fever and colds (it was winter in Europe).  We practically walked around the area where we stayed which has a strong community feel. We took the train and strolled along Dubai Mall. We spent time with my aunt and her family, who were very gracious and accommodating.  And that´s about it.  It was short and quick but it left us with the strong feeling of yearning, wanting to go back. 

This 2019, we are utterly blessed to have spent Holy Week in Dubai.  My mother and youngest sister also flew in to Dubai from the Philippines (it is much easier to secure a visa to visit Dubai than Spain).  We spent time with the family of my Aunt, one of my mom´s younger sisters.  It was a family affair and my heart is just so full of love and gratitude! 

From the little that I have seen last 2014, I can categorically say that Dubai is undergoing a boom in construction, real estate, migration and in the process providing amenities for its continuously growing expat population.  I have seen that there are more playgrounds, play areas in the public places.  There are more bookstores inside the malls!! Last 2014, when we went to the famous Dubai mall, we were fixated on the clothing, men and women accessories boutiques, but there was not a single bookstore.  New residential areas were also built to accommodate the increasing demand of the expat communities.  I suppose, Dubai is going to be a hub for some industries or businesses as there are massive constructions from their renowned construction companies (DAMAC and EMAAR).  It is very surprising how you see the bright, bold names of DAMAC  and EMAAR on the buildings that they have erected, taking pride in their buildings. 

This trip definitely makes it to my list of unforgettable ones!!  Here´s a list of the fun, kid-friendly and family oriented activities that we enjoyed.

• Family bonding of course!! As we were welcomed in the abode of my aunt and her family, we had an absolute fabulous time.  Priceless!! We have a view of the Dubai Marina Walk and we were close to the Jumeirah Beach.  We bonded over delicious Filipino food, good laughs and good and warm company. It was a delight to see my son exchange banters with them.  I miss my mom, my aunts, my sis, my cousin and my uncle so much!

• The Jumeirah Beach Residence and the Dubai Marina Walk are long avenues where one can enjoy a cool, soothing jog, a night out with friends as there is a long array of restaurants to choose from, family bonding time and the much needed me time.  Both areas have world famous names in the food and beverage business such as McDonald, Shake Shack, StarBucks, KFC, Laduree, The Cheesecake Factory, etc. There are also local based restaurants serving Arabic, Turkish, Egyptian dishes. The Dubai Marina Walk has a direct view to the Dubai Marina Yacht Club where you can see the privately owned yachts.  They are also providing a boat tour (for a fee) which includes a buffet meal (we did not try this, I only saw it while walking). 

• The Jumeirah Beach Residence has direct access to the Arabic Gulf beach.  During Fridays (their weekend), the beach is filled with families and visitors bathing under the sun or enjoying the festive mood.  This place has definitely a lot of vibe! In the center of the beach residence, there is an improvised theme park where the children and child at heart can voluntarily spend their money with the hope to win a prize.  My son and my husband were luck to have won a small and a big sized stuff toys!  Great job son and my love! 

• Public transports:  Tram and metro: Dubai is definitely not a place for a walking tour.  In order to move around, we either took a cab or the ever reliable tram(which they call metro) and metro(which they call train).  My son is a super duper fan of trams, metros and trains.  He was giddy during our metro rides.  Both metro and tram are convenient, well air conditioned, spacious.  A minimum fare is at 3 AED and will increase depending on the distance.  A tap card is necessary to move around in metro.  Card and cash are accepted as mode of payments when loading credits in your tap card. Just a friendly warning  The network in the metro lines seem slow when using your credit card for payments.  While inside the metro and the tram, look at the window and enjoy the sights of its skyscrapers. 
• Dubai Marina (DAMAC):  This is in the downtown part where you can see the Cayen tower (twisted building) and other skyscrapers.  At night time, it is a sight to behold especially with the building lights on.  They are like stars.

• Dubai Mall:  At night time, you can enjoy the famous Dancing Fountain.  And it is indeed a very expressive, dancing fountain!  During daytime, you can feast on the Dubai Aquarium, shopping (the possibilities are endless) hahaha. They have high end brands to all sorts of brands.  They have Borders and the Virgin Megastore where we splurged on books! Yehey!! Yehey!! The Dubai Marina also has access to the Burj Khalifa which is the tallest building in the world.

• Holding hands while walking and enjoying the skyscrapers, daytime and nighttime. Hehehe

• Legoland:  what is a family vacation without a kiddie treat to my son?  Legoland is reachable by a taxi (approximately 60 AED, one way).  There is also a taxi stand very near the entrance.  Entrance fee is at 249 AED per head (although you can get a 10% discount if you book online in advance).  They inspect your bags upon entrance and they are quite lenient if you are travelling with kids, meaning, they let you bring some food with you.  Legoland is a kiddie haven and a paradise.  It also has a waterpark where the kids and kids at heart can enjoy a dip in the pool or be more adventurous with spiral slides! We spent our time exploring the theme park, enjoying the rides, taking family photos, playing and walking and walking.  We particularly liked the Miniland (where you can see miniature images of known icons ALL made of lego), trip to the Lego Factory, where they oriented us on the process of making a Lego (from sorting, molding, coloring, developing and packaging), roller coaster ride, driving experience and A big water container will come in handy! In terms of souvenir items, they have caps, lots of lego toys including lego minifigures, shirts, name tags, key chains, etc. This was definitely a treat to my son!

• Dubai Miracle Garden: This place boasts of everything made of flowers.  You will see gigantic animals, Emirates plane, houses, cartoon characters (such as Minnie Mouse, Goofy, etc) all made of flowers.  This is a nice place to visit amidst the warm temperature because flowers radiate good vibes.  This place has an entrance fee of approx. 50 AED. 

• The Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi: When my aunt from New York flew in to Dubai, she drove us to Abu Dhabi.  It is approximately 130 km away from Dubai.  The trip was breezy.  In Abu Dhabi, we saw the Grand Mosque.  It boasts of its opulence and elegance as the materials used were marble and mosque.  It is a sacred place for worship.  All women were requested to wear the typical long dress and the veil to cover the hair.  It is a sparkling white place, solemn and quiet. 

Dubai is posh, is modern, is cosmo and expensive.  It is a beautiful place to visit, to unwind and spend quality family time together.  It was a short trip but definitely a memorable one.  I couldn’t thank enough my mother, my sister, my aunt for flying in to Dubai to spend time with us and also my aunt and her family in Dubai for welcoming us.  My heart is overflowing with gratitude.  There are beautiful memories that will forever live in my heart.

Let us build beautiful memories.  There will come a time that the only thing we have is our memories, so let us make the most of it. 

My Journey to raising a pampered child

I hope the title did not freak you out nor did it raise some eyebrows.  Most of the times, the word pamper connotes overindulge or spoil.  As a mother beaming with so much love in her heart, I can say that indeed, I am raising a pampered child as I am overindulging him with kindness, love and attention.  I am feeding my son with all the love in the world as the positive feeling that emanates from this motherly love will definitely accompany him in this journey called life. 

I am very gracious, generous and very giving to my son.  He is now 8 years old but he still sits on my lap, he still asks that I cuddle him, he asks that I embrace him a lot.  I still tuck him to the bed as requested, we still play and read together.  He demands that Mom and Dad spend time with him.  Is he overreacting?  Am I overindulging my 8 year old son?  I don’t think so.  I am just a mom willingly giving in to my son’s whims. 

And why I am willingly giving in to my son’s whims?  I believe that he is at a growing up stage where he must be confident and secured of himself.  And  parental love and attention is a sure approach in promoting a child’s security.  He must feel loved, sheltered, protected yet at the same time, he should feel that he is independent and that he will grow to be the person that he is meant to be, different from mom and dad. The challenging balance lies in showing him what love is, the goodness in life but not making him feel entitled at all. 

We are blessed as we have the opportunity to buy him the books and toys that he wants.  We are not materially wealthy.  But we are blessed with good jobs which are our partners in improving the quality of our lives.  Having said that, we always instill in our son the value and importance of hard work, mindful and smart spending.  I would always tell him stories on how different my childhood was (my father was the sole breadwinner.  Food, shelter and education were the priorities prior to toys.  It is a good think I have 5 brothers who I played with) so he will value all the books and toys that he has.  I also remind him that our material possessions are products of our time spent away from each other, as we work hard and thus, we should value them.  Nobody gave us anything for free. With the toys and books, comes the responsibility to take care of them, arrange them, put them in order and treat them with love and respect.  I am indulging in my son´s needs and whims yet at the same time, I am strict with his responsibility.  At a young age, I am already letting him know of the value of accountability. 

My son loves to be the center of my world.  I am there when he tells me to come over to his room or whenever he tells me that he wants me to carry him.  I lovingly do that because I know that when is bigger, his world, his priorities and his  outlook will change.  Maybe being around with mom will become too mushy and cheesy for him.  I spoil my son yet he understands and respects our personal space.  He perfectly recognizes and acknowledges that sometimes, after a day of hard work or after a challenging week, mom and dad just want to stare at a blank space. Hahahaha He respects when at times, I have to say no.  He also compromises.  On the nights that I would do my yoga/meditation, he would tell me to cuddle him after my meditation session.  That shows that my son albeit pampered is understanding as well.  

Raising a pampered, sheltered and too much loved child is never wrong.  But as loving parents, we can do ourselves and our children a big favor by encouraging pure love and not materialism.  After all, love and memories will linger.

Fostering multiculturalism in our household

Aside from being bilingual at Spanish and English and kicking off with his tagalog (my national language from the Philippines), my son is in touch and connected with our world. He understands how big and diverse our universe is.  That even if we come from different background and ethnic groups or origin, we are all the same and that respect is primordial in our dealings. School also plays an important role in promoting diversity and multiculturalism.  They have lectures about global and specific traditions.  

Travelling is indeed one of the best, if not the best form of immersion and understanding other cultures.  In my case, I do not have the luxury of time and resources to dedicate a lot of time travelling. In this post, I would like to share with you personal tips and experiences to  increase awareness on multiculturalism.  These can be applied directly in our household.  With these, I am very happy to say that I am raising a multicultural kid. :) 

1.  Take the time to address the inquisitive kid:  My son has been and continues to be curious about practices and traditions specific to certain countries.  He would ask why most Japanese sit during mealtime, why is it customary to remove your footwear when you are entering an Asian household, why is curry or spices core ingredients in the Indian cuisine, time differences, etc.  We take these questions as opportunities to sit down and talk about lifestyle, history or practices across the globe. Another easier approach is to start showing your child about Wikipedia :) which is a go to online "encyclopedia" :)  However, it is advisable that kids are accompanied whenever they navigate online.  

2.  We buy books about other countries/cultures and read them together:  We have books about Chinese, Japanese, Indian/Hindu, etc cultures and languages.  These books were selected by our child and we read them together so it is a learning experience for all of us.  We really invest on books.  We may have limitations travelling but a curious mind is limitless and books are great instruments in empowering a curious mind.  

3.  Museum and cultural trips:  My son is already 8 years old so we are able to go to museums and catch contemporary artists and their works.  The paintings or work of arts are most of the time reflection of the culture, mindset of the artist and his upbringing.  We also take the time to go to flea markets and events highlighting a specific tradition or holiday of a country, for example:  Chinese New Year, Thanksgiving, etc.  

4.  Watch movies or youtube videos in original version:  Even if we are fluent in Spanish, English and Tagalog, we prefer watching in original version.  My son has watched many kid friendly anime movies in Nihonggo (Ponyo, Kiki´s Delivery Express, Wolf Children Ame and Yuki, Totoro, Spirited Away, etc), in Italian, Portuguese and original movies in English such as Harry Potter series, Nanny McPhee series, etc.  Watching international movies increases our idea on other cultures and lifestyles.  My son has an idea of how agricultural some countries and some areas are and what type of lifestyle such entails. He also understands that weather and climate are different across the globe and the lifestyle involved in the different climates. Again, watching youtube videos should be supervised.

  

5.  Cook different cuisines and have your child as your sous chef:  My son recently asked me about Kaju Burfi which is a typical dessert/sweet in India.  He learned it from the school.  We would prepare food of other countries.  We are experts with our Spanish and Tagalog/Filipino dishes.  From time to time, we prepare tiramisu, pizza and pasta (Italian), arepas (Venezuelan), chinese cuisine, Indian curry, English fish and chips, etc.  As we go through the preparation process, we talk about the essence of the food on the culture.  I still remember how my son one time said that he felt that we were in Mexico because we had home made fajitas and tacos! Hahahaha  

6. DIne out and be adventurous with food:  This is an alternative to cooking.  Sometimes, when we dine out, the restaurant has the cultural vibe.  In cases that cooking a particular cuisine is difficult, we would dine out if our time and resources can afford.  We have our go to Vietnamese, Japanese, Korean, Italian, American, Spanish and Chinese restaurants. And my son is such a trooper!  

7.  Do artworks together:  This is a creative, sweet and fun bonding time together.  My son and I would write a story book about Italian characters, we would make cut out pieces of Indian accessories, we would draw our dream Japanese temple, etc.  This is a very stimulating activity.  

8.  Playgroups:  As Madrid is an international friendly community, I bonded with foreigner moms like me -  Latin American, Japanese, Taiwanese, Chinese, Italian, Spanish, French and my fellow Filipino/Pinoy mothers and we would from time to time organize playgroups with our kids.  We would meet up in parks and have potluck where we would have our local cuisine, snacks as contribution.  It is a very good bonding time for the kids and moms as well!  

*** photo not mine.  downloaded from the internet.  credit to the owner. 

I hope you will find these useful.  I would love to hear from you on how you encourage multiculturalism in your household.  

Thank you and take care!