The Onion of the Middle East

I've been duped.  When a friend shared the article about the Gold Class Lane, I totally believed it, as did everyone else I know in Dubai.  But don't fret; the Middle East just got a little bit cooler because The Pan-Arabia Enquirer is an Onion-esque news magazine aimed at poking fun of the excess of this region.  I think the best part about this is that we all believed this story... because it's not too far off of where they are now.

Shut. Up.

For every extraordinary accomplishment the UAE has had in 40 short years, something like this happens...

Gold Class Driving Lane

a VIP lane from Dubai to Abu Dhabi for  "top-end car owners" from a soon-to-be-released list.

Two of my favorite quotes from the article:

"And we’ll be installing manned vehicles along the route – almost like club bouncers – to ensure someone in a dusty Lancer or Corolla doesn’t try to take advantage of the lane and ruin the experience for our members."

and

"It just concerns me that they might be putting, say, a Corvette in the same category as my vastly more expensive vehicle. Perhaps there should be a VVIP or Platinum Class lane as well."

Umm...

Nerdy Teacher Alert

We had good ol' Parent Night tonight... a dreaded day for all teachers because we end up working 13 glorious hours and usually only about 1/3 of the parents show up.  I definitely think it's worth it, but I think ours could have been planned a bit better.  If only I were in charge...

Anyhoo, I had just finished my second presentation of the night and was already wishing I was at home eating Just Falafel in my pjs.  It was that moment when you're staring at the clock, hoping everyone goes home soon so you can, too.  On his way out the door, a little boy named Rayan came up to me and politely asked if he could show his mom his composition books.  He ran over to the drawers and pulled out his science book and reading book and writing book and started telling his mom about everything we've done this year.  It sounded something like this... "And this was when we blew bubbles and described them with fancy words, and this is when Mrs. Elder pretended (looks up at me and grins) she didn't remember what real reading is so we had to teach her, and this is when we made inferences with funny pictures, and this was our GUMMY BEAR EXPERIMENT, and this was when I wrote about all the things that bug me,  and..."  

Umm, how cute is that?  If that doesn't fill your teacher heart with happiness, I don't know what will.  This was definitely one of those moments I want to remember for days when I'm questioning why I'm a teacher at all.