Blue Cat

you get more for your money in Al Barsha and there are more schooling options, you won't get a school at the Ranches so you will have to drive everyday to one, the traffic out of the Ranches each morning is bad. Personally I would say no to that one.

Meow

I think the 'best' area for a first year depends in a number of factors. Being in the depths of parts of Barsha may not suit someone who is unused to travel or living abroad. You would both need to drive and have cars to get about as it can be hard to get a cab in many parts.

A compound such as the one BC lives on suits some people, but some of us would hate the reduced privacy and close proximity, although this can be better for families or the more sociable.

Have you visited these areas? You need to explore a bit before making any decisions and I presume your company is providing some temporary accommodation for a few weeks?

Kim67

As BC has said, you get more villa for your money in Al Barsha. The Ranches is lovely and we may have stayed could we get a decent rental and gotten the kids into JESS. We stayed with my husband's business partners at their homes and they both own beautiful houses, but one has kids that live in Australia and the other has a son who is basically brought up by the hired help and they barely see the kid in terms of having to take him to school or drive him to after school activities and thing. Whereas for me, driving back from the Jumeirah region a couple of nights a week after dance and cello and voice lessons in the Greens, school in Umm Suqeim, it was just a bit too tiring and too hard. I was spending approximately 6 hours a day driving.

My personal choice if you can afford a nice villa is in the Al Safa, Umm Suqeim, Jumeirah areas. The roads are established, it's less dusty and it just had a nicer "feel" for my personal taste.

MrBAH

Ok thanks - I've not considered Al Safa so I'll have a look!

Millhouse

How many extra lessons!?

Kim67

What do you mean? One singing, one cello and about six dance lessons between them per week. It's more now we're back in Australia, but everything's much easier to get to.

Millhouse

ah, more than one kid. I thought you were trying to remake the Bourne Identity.

Kim67

Three kids, that's not including the weekend footy for the boy child

Now we're back in Aus, the girls have 17 dance classes between them a week, fortunately four are at school as they are in a centre for excellence in dance at their school, voice lessons are outside of school hours but all three play instruments and lessons are in school time but ensembles are before school. Keeps them out of the malls I guess.

Debowing

Barsha is a beautiful part of the universe....Wish I was there again...Anyway I lived in the Barsha 1 area right behind MOE...The traffic and parking is a bit of a problem...I remember when i used to park in MOE and walk to my car. That was before they got clever, put parking metersin MOE and re-arranged all the roads...It used to be quite tricky to drive around there...I have very fond memories of the place though...

Meow

Blue Cat

Ronnie Biggs

I also live in Al Barsha 1. How many trips do I need to take to get to your higher state of conciousness, dude?

Debowing

Dude- you need to spend some time in the oil well camps in the sahara in libya...that will make you miss barsha to a point of being a universal location.

Curly33

Hi all,

I'm a journalist from the Independent newspaper in the UK and I wondered if anyone could help me with an article I'm writing about someone who lives in <snip>Villas.

Basically it's been reported in the UAE press that a British businessman called <snip> who lived in <snip> villas has been sentenced to life in prison in the Dubai courts this week for alleged drugs offences.

I'm trying to find anyone who might know him to find out if he has been unfairly treated by the courts. If anyone can shine a light on the case I'd be grateful if you could contact me before Saturday at [email protected].

Thanks in advance to anyone who can help.

Blue Cat

hiya Curly, not heard anything about this, poor guy, but there again I don't believe in drugs, just the sentancing here can be very harsh.