It has been over three weeks since we arrived to Dubai. We have been working with our family visa process and the kids school places have been confirmed. There is still a lot to get used to, but I love that every day is a sunny day here. Sun gives me so much energy! And I haven’t seen any mosquitoes, which is great, because I really hated those little things in Finland.
Missing all the familiar things
We really love Dubai and we waited so much to get here! And this is so lovely place and the weather is just how I like it – sunny and warm. But some how I have been missing Finland for time to time. Well, actually I miss how easy everything was there (or at least it feels like everything was so much easier there). Maybe it is because all the processes in Finland are familiar. For example every kid will have a place in a school in Finland without the enrollment process. No need to send this and that documents to school or otherwise the kids place in school will be cancelled.
I also miss how I know where to go whatever I need and how to get to places. I miss that everything around me is familiar to me. Also every time when either one of the kids is saying they miss Finland that makes me miss Finland. Although they doesn’t seem to miss Finland so often, maybe told me so about 2 or 3 times during last three weeks. But I feel a sting in my heart every time they say that.
I think that this is all part of the process and will get easier after some time. I want to live here and get to know all the new things, but sometimes it feels so hard. But to get something new you have to give up something old, right? And nobody ever told me that this would be easy, change is never easy. I just need to give myself some time and let all the feelings come and go.
Starting to get the villa to look like our home
We moved to a furnished villa and that really was a smart move at this point. Now after few weeks we have started to made the villa look like us – our home.
Decorating and getting stuff of our own is also helping me to feel less and less home sick. Getting some own stuff here is helping to make the villa feel more and more like home. And of course a home needs plants and the first ones has just arrived. I found a really lovely plant store, guessing that there will be many visits for me there in the near future 🤭
The family visa process
Right at the first weekend of our arrival we went to Dubai government office. In here they have these centers that have every office that is needed to get the visa. So at least that is easy, you get everything under the same roof. But because the residence visa process is all new to us it felt like it took forever to get all documents right.
At the first time in the government office we were told that the birth certificates of kids and our marriage certificate needs to be attested by the Embassy of Finland. They were already attested by the Ministry of Foreign Matters in Finland, but that is not enough.
Well my husband then sent a message to Embassy of Finland here in UAE and received an answer that the Finnish Embassy in UAE cannot attest documents that are written in Finland, they need to be attested by the government of UAE.
In the UAE luckily the attestation can be ordered online, courier will pick up the documents and then when the government has attested them the courier brings them back to you. That only took one working day.
Going forward with the process
We went back to the government office to start the family visa process. Well, those documents weren’t enough, a salary certification from my husbands workplace is also needed. Then we went back home and when my husband received the salary certificate we again went to the government office. Now there were enough documents and the process was started.
After this we waited 4 days and received a message that some translations are missing. I went then again to the government office as told and then they scanned our marriage certificate in Arabic to the system again and told us that also the birth certificates needs to be translated in Arabic. So I then ordered the translations (so good that in the center they also have translation service) and then waited for the translations to get ready. Then there were again another visit at the center.
Finally the visa process is done!
After the birth certificates were translated to Arabic things moved fast! I got to do the medical (to receive a residence visa in UAE all adults need to go to a medical check) at the same day and the next day I went to give my fingerprints. And after the medical certificate was sent to us it was all done. The last visit to the office and now we are waiting the emirates id’s for me and our kids to arrive any day now. Yay!
We have received good service in the office, but it felt quite frustrating when it felt like things weren’t moving forward. And guess what, that of course got me so anxious! Because there is a deadline to send all needed documents (including the copies of our emirates id’s) in to the school and I was afraid that we cannot get all the documents on time. But now it looks like everything is going to be sent to school on time, phew!
So much lovely activities!
While we were working on the visa process we had also time to do things as a family. And there is a lot of places to go as a family!
First of all – a lot of swimming! There are a pool in every cluster here at the Damac Hills 2. Our clusters pool is under constructions at the moment but we are able to use the neighbor clusters pool. We have kind of made a habit to take an evening swim there almost every evening. And it is so nice to get to cool water after hot day and when you get out of the pool the weather is still really warm but the sun isn’t burning. So perfect time to swim this time a year!
We have also visited few times at the Malibu Beach here in Damac Hills 2, and it is the best! The lazy river there is just amazing. It is a pool but have been built to look and feel like a beach. They even make waves there. Can’t wait to get there again. It is open only by 6pm, so we have made it our Saturday activity to go there by day as a family.
Butterfly park
We also visited at the Dubai Butterfly Garden. There are thousands of butterflies and you also get to hold them on your hand! The butterflies there are so beautiful and some of them are also quite big.
First time for me to hold and see butterfly like this big. So beautiful!
Definitely going to visit again at the Butterfly Garden, it was so nice place with kids.
OliOli – experiential children’s play museum
One weekend we visited at the OliOli Dubai. It is a center, where are 8 different experiential zones. Kids can climb in Toshi’s nets, play with water, dig dinosaur bones, etc. It kind of reminds me of Heureka, a science center in Finland. So much nice things to do for the kids.
So – we love it here and I’m being too emotional and panicking that will we get everything in time 😅 That’s it about it now. Waiting for our emirates id’s to arrive and that we get to sent all needed documents early enough to kids school so that they won’t lose their places. Oh and of course started the plant shopping 😁
💡 Tip to everyone thinking about moving in Dubai: translate all the document straight to Arabic and get attestation to all the documents in the UAE embassy in your home country. This will save so much time and effort when you get here.
Read about our arrival in Dubai here!
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