The beginning of this month is all terribly patriotic with the Union Jack flying alongside the UAE flag above the Tribe’s school, in celebration of the Queen’s Jubilee. An indoor street party is followed by an indoor garden party – it seems that the children are all inside for quite the opposite reason that they are back in the UK. The school is full of frightfully British fare with platters of iced fairy cakes (not cupcakes!), cucumber sandwiches, meringues and scones with clotted cream to name but a few. Probably not quite the same as the celebrations in Abbotts Ann, but it makes us feel terribly proud to be British nonetheless. This merriment is followed by the school’s own Euro football tournament (this is held outside) and for those of an Irish extraction, in this tournament, Ireland wins!

The eldest of the Tribe finds her Irish ancestry to play, as the only girl, in the winning team! School finishes towards the end of this month (for a holiday of just over two and a half months!) and I am amazed at the fact that the Tribe have finished their first school year in Dubai. Where has the time gone? It has not been easy joining the expat community of the world, particularly when there is no support network to help with anything. But the Tribe have taken everything in their stride and have made their mark on their not-quite-so-new school! I am very proud of them.

The long holiday begins and the first thing that we do is get everyone out of bed at the usual early time in order to be on a private beach under the imposing Burj Al Arab, to watch the first public release of rehabilitated turtles. When we visited Oman last month the hotel’s beach was also a turtle nesting site (they had their own Turtle Ranger!) – although no turtles were about during our short visit, there were several spots where eggs had already been laid. The chance to actually see turtles being released back into the wild seems a fantastic opportunity. Did you know that turtles were on earth before the dinosaurs came along? We didn’t! The earliest fossils of turtles are from the beginning of the age of dinosaurs. Man has eaten turtles for at least two million years, but today many sea turtles face extinction. The seven species of sea turtle are all listed as vulnerable to extinction, endangered or critically endangered. Their greatest threat is still man. Female turtles lay between 60 and 150 eggs, but out of these only one hatchling out of 1000 survive; basically, one hatchling out of every ten nests survives. It’s quite a depressing thought. These magnificent creatures have been estimated to live in excess of 150 years. We should do everything we can to prevent them disappearing forever.

The Dubai Turtle Rehabilitation Project was set up in 2004 as a collaboration between the Wildlife Protection Office and the Burj Al Arab Aquarium with support from Dubai Falcon Clinic and Central Veterinary Research Laboratory. Over 554 turtles have been released since 2009. 12 have been fitted with tracking devices. The two species of turtle that are found in this region and nest here, are the Hawksbill (one of the few creatures that feeds mostly on sea sponges) and the Green. So, on this, our first day of the holidays, we watch the release of two Hawksbills, two Green and two Loggerheads. These six awesome looking beasts (they are all big!) have been fitted with satellite tracking devices in order that their journeys can be monitored. Just to give you an idea, one of the Loggerhead turtles, named Storm, weighs 100kg and is 97cm long. It was rescued in February this year. The smallest is, JuZaSu, weighing 15kg and is 50cm long and was rescued in April this year. Three of the turtles have been recuperating from their illness/wounds since early 2011. With the public release, unbeknownst to the turtles they are setting out on a race that will finish at the end of October this year – who travels the furthest will win. I think that it’s a fantastic way of capturing the imagination and teaching us more about these extraordinary beings in a very fun way. The project’s most famous patient, an adult Green turtle named Dibba, was released in 2009 after being found with a big head wound, found to be a fractured skull. It took 18 months for the turtle to recover before being released back into the wild, from Dibba in Fujairah (hence the name). Dibba then embarked on an amazing journey across the Indian Ocean to Sri Lanka, along the East coast of India before the transmitter failed somewhere around Thailand. The turtle had covered 8,307km in 266 days. Now that is a story to put a smile on even the most cynical of people and surely this is the stuff that the fabulous children’s film, Nemo, was made of. So, at the start of this ‘race’ we watch these ancient creatures swim out into the depths – the clarity of the water means that we are able to see their dark shapes for some distance. Every so often an extended neck and head breaks the water’s surface to take a gulp of air before disappearing below – despite their bulk, in the water they are beautiful, graceful swimmers.

We will continue to follow their progress on their journeys, but just in case you’re interested, the latest news is that Storm was in Qatari waters at the weekend, but is now returning to waters off Iran, two Greens are hanging around Abu Dhabi while JuZaSu is contentedly spending time just off Dubai! As you can probably tell, we have all been quite taken by the sea turtles – we certainly never realised that they were indigenous to the area let alone still nesting here. I feel privileged to have seen some of them embarking on their next big adventure. There are also over 100 young Hawksbill turtles that are released by a few children who have won competitions locally – the Tribe are determined to take part in this next year! A fraction of the size of the race contestants, these young turtles are still a delight to watch as the chosen few carefully lift them out of boxes, before putting them gently on the sand at the water’s edge. As they are held, their flippers are waving wildly, obviously desperate and now very much ready, to return to their home in the oceans of the world. We watch for a while as the shadows gradually disappear. The sky is clear and blue, the sea, clear turquoise, the sand, soft and white. We have watched something quite unique. It is a perfect start to our summer.

Mother of the Tribe