Budapest Sledding Day

Terence (nearly 8 years old) and Mia (6 years old) have no school on Wednesdays at the French Lycee in Budapest. Since our dear friends, the McGann clan, have returned to Hungary for a visit we decided to have them over for a sleep over on Tuesday night. The 4 of them (oldest son stayed behind in Florida with his grandma) came Tuesday for dinner and lots of fun and laughter. On Wednesday, their daughter Keira and Mia and Ali went to a birthday party while Kerry and I took the boys (Terence and his best buddy, Liam) across the street from our home to the big sledding hill. A few friends of Liam's joined us around mid-day for a fun afternoon in the sunshine. After a few hours of sledding, we took them all for pizza. Here are a couple videos including Terence's sledding runs.


1st one coming down on sled is Liam; 2nd one is Terence.



This is T coming down and crashing. They would take turns waiting on the side (you can see the 4 of them) while one would go up and other 4 would throw snowballs at them while they passed. It must be a guy thing.

Dubai Photo

Thanks Aasta for sending this on to me today. There are several more that she sent that I will go through but I wanted to share this one of us in front of the Burj Hotel first. The photo was taken after we enjoyed a lovely Friday brunch (Friday and Saturday are their weekend and Sat is the big brunch day) at the Madinat Jumeirah Beach Hotel and Resort. We ate with Jay (with our company), Aasta and another couple residing in Dubai. The 6 of us had a lovely, long day enjoying the incredible cuisine. Afterwards we posed for some of these shots.

FYI - today I went sledding with Terence and a bunch of his friends in -4 degrees C!

Superman Curt

My husband seriously amazes me!! For 3 years now he has managed to ride his bike to work every morning and every evening back home. It's a serious feat in the best of weather but he manages to do it in a snow or even ice blizzard. His reason is simple and something we can all relate to, if he misses one day, it'll be that much harder to get back into it again. So, this morning, he put on his spiked tires and hit the road in the massive amounts of snow! I had to capture it on film to share with you as it's seriously unbelievable!!! It's not a flat ride and he has to go over a massive hill (worse on way home in the dark) but he manages to do it within a reasonable time frame.

Just so you can better understand his biking challenge twice each day, here is a link on Google Maps. It's just over 20 km and it takes him about 1 hour each way. I like that he exercises in this fashion better than going to the gym after work or on the weekends taking more time away from our family time.





Our little 3 year old Ali in her spring clothes (gifts from Dubai) that she had to put on first thing this am. I've kept her home from school while I unpack, catch up with laundry and work, exercise, organize, etc. It was good to spend time with her after 6 days away in Dubai without the kids. Love the picture above left in her Crocs (can you tell she put them on herself?) and her cold looking face standing in the snow watching Daddy ride off.

Our home. Makes me feel like putting our x-mas lights back on!

PS T and Mia had school today but none tomorrow. Then, they are back on Thursday and Friday then off for a 2 week break!!

PPS Our best friends, the McGanns, are now in town and coming tonight for a sleep over so we are very excited!

Home Sweet Home

We are back home in Budapest. Very happy to be back home with the kids again. We missed them so much. Lots of snow here so a big change after warm Dubai but it's perfect for our upcoming ski trip so it's okay.

More soon...

United Arab Emirates

We've had a very successful week (actually 5 full days) in Dubai, U.A.E. Our operations (including all 3 areas: cargo, moving and relocations) in Dubai are growing and expected to continue to grow in the near future. Not surprisingly, many of our friends and family are unfamiliar with Dubai's location on the map so I found two which will help.

It's location is in the Arabian Desert and it lies on the Persian Gulf Coast. Dubai is one of 7 emirates in the UAE. It became famous to foreign investment when the Jebel Ali free zone, comprising the Jebel Ali port (reputedly the world's largest man made port) was established in 1979, which provided foreign companies unrestricted import of labour and export capital.

Since 2002, the city has seen an increase in private real estate investment and has even gained the support of such famous investors as Donald Trump. The most famous projects are The Palm Islands, The World Islands, Burj Al Arab, the recently opened Atlantis Hotel and the almost complete Burj Dubai. The Burj Dubai is still under contruction and is currently standing at 688 m. The finished project will be the world's tallest building.


Above is a photo of one of the three Palms. These islands are finished and most of the construction on them is either complete or in progress. We looked at a few properties on Palm Jumeirah so we can better understand where some of our client's assignees choose to live. One location was a penthouse sharing a private beach, swimming pool and restaurant with the building and neighboring building. The 2 story unit was between 5000-6000 sqf and furnished with modern furniture. Each bedroom was built with an ensuite and built in closets. The annual rent was 400,000 Dubai dirhams (AED) which today equals just over 100,000USD.

We also viewed a large villa with 4 big bedrooms (again all with ensuites), lots of living space, a tiny front garden, small private pool, 2 car garage, private beach (yes, private beach!) located on a quiet street in a secure gated community. The sqaure footage was approximately just over 6,000 sqf with an annual rent of 425,000AED. Today this is just over 115,000USD / year. Both rents have drastically decreased in the last year by about 30%.

This group of islands that have just been created are meant to look like the world from above. The islands have been built (seems a bit of an odd thing to create) and the development is just starting to take way. If you are interested in buying property here you can check it out directly on their World site.

Most people recognize this very famous Burj Al Arab hotel which is meant to be the most expensive (or at least one of) hotels in the world. I don't know much about it other than it is beautiful. I've only known friends who have went in to have a drink or a coffee and even these are extraordinarily expensive!

Here is the newly complete Atlantis Hotel which we had the pleasure visiting last night. It is a very beautiful 5 star resort with an unbelievable water park, many incredible restaurants (including the delicious Nobu where we ate our Valentine's dinner last night) and many indoor fish tanks that are the home to 1000s of fish including sharks.


Here is a photo taken from space and posted by NASA where the Palms and the World islands can be seen. These and the Great Wall are still the only man-made creations that can be visibly seen from space.

As you can see, Dubai is an unbelievable place. It's fun but at the same time a bit odd and unrealistic. Other than our successful meetings and great food, the weather in February was my favorite. Today was almost in the mid - high 20s Celsius (80s F). A great experience when back home it is freezing cold and only about 0 degrees C! At least it'll be great for our skiing trip next weekend.

Cannot wait to get home to our babies tomorrow. We've spoken to them every day by telephone and miss them very much.

Happy Valentine's Day

For those of you that know me know that every year I send out Valentine's Day cards. I love doing it!

This year, however, I am sad to say that I've completed the design but didn't get them printed quickly enough to get them to you on time. So, instead you get a soft copy!

Happy Valentine's Day from
Curt, Erika, Terence, Emilia and Alexandra Clements

x o x o x o x o x

Curt and I are off tomorrow

We are heading to Dubai until Monday, Feb 16th to visit our office there. The kids will be here with Erika and trying to keep up with their busy schedules. We'll fly direct from Vienna after we drive and park our car in long term parking. Have a great week everyone. x o x o

Air Guitar Girl

While getting ready for our Sunday lunch (2 families were joining us), I walked past the family room and found Ali quietly playing alone. I had the music on and she must have loved the song so much that she picked up T's Wii Guitar and started playing air guitar. I thought it was so cute. I was trying not to shake too much while holding the camera. I just couldn't stop laughing at how adorable she was here... I was so happy to have captured it.

Let's get Physical

Yesterday evening, after school, I took both the girls for their annual wellness checks with our favorite Chicago-raised pediatrician Dr. Kinga. It was a funny experience and energetic, entertaining, dramatic Mia was in full form. While, Ali was a bit more curious, unsure and shy.

Mia passed with flying colors and surprised us all with her 20/10 vision. She could read all the numbers on the chart - including the bottom line (below the 20/20 line) which seriously had me, the pediatrician and the nurse in giggles. They both explained that it is very rare to have such vision. So, I told Mia that she better be a pilot like Papa with vision like that!!! She was flattered and happy with the compliments.

Other tests (blood pressure, urine, etc) showed that she was in great form. Her height is now 129 cm and her weight is 28 kg. We are waiting until she hits 140cm to go back to either Legoland or EuroDisney as this is usually the height requirement for the more serious rollercoasters that T was introduced to about a year ago.

Ali also did quite well with a height of exactly 100cm and weight 18kg. Dr. Kinga marked them both on the charts and we learned their heights were in the 95th percentile and weights in the 90th. So they are in good proportion.

Ali's heart showed a murmur which I remember Dr Kinga pointing out when she was a baby. Just to be safe we went over to the cardiologist to get a better look. It turns out she has a 3mm opening between 2 of her heart's chambers. The ultrasound machine was incredible and had Ali, Mia and I entranced. Her heart was so beautiful and we could see all the valves pumping, the chambers, the entire thing so clearly. The 3 mm gap is not something we should worry about is what the cardio explained. For extra measure they hooked little Ali up to an EKG machine which I wish I could have captured on film but I didn't have my camera. She looked so cute and was so good at holding still on the table while they got what they needed. Mia finished the appointment with 2 very opposite comments: 1. Ali is so lucky! I wish they could look at my heart too. 2. She then said to the doctor (a very nice older lady who sounded like ZsaZsa Gabor but spoke Hungarian to the girls), "Thank you for looking at my little sister's heart". We all smiled as it was very sweet, sincere and not rehearsed at all.

The only difficult parts of our appointment was getting a peek into Ali's ears. She loves when I clean her ears with qtips but hates having a doctor look in or even take her temperature with the ear thermometer. She just covers them up and shakes her head no. We had to hold her to have a peek and I tried to reassure her that it didn't hurt at all. She still cried. I do remember once when she had an ear infection the other pediatrician hurt her by poking around in there. It was a while ago but she obviously remembers it and is a bit scarred by it. In time, she'll recover.

Oh, she also passed with flying colors on the hand-eye coordination tests. Especially her skill for drawing circles, squares, plus signs, etc. Kinga was very impressed and explained that these were part of the 4 year old's test but she often gives it to the 3 year olds to see if they can do it. Ali loves her drawing so it was nice to see that all her scribbling has enhanced her skill.

Lastly, we finished with a few vaccinations. This ended in big, big tears but not for long. They both were lucky to get a biscuit, sticker and balloon at the end of the trauma.

Sorry for the boring details but had to record for myself. Otherwise, I'd forget by next week.

Shorter Hair

As you have seen from our blog that not a lot of photos get taken of me as I'm the one usually behind the camera. T was nice enough to take this one of me as I was getting ready to go out last night to meet up with some girlfriends for dinner. I thought I'd share it so you can see that I've had quite a few inches of locks chopped off (seems to be the topic of the month). I especially love having shorter hair as it is so much easier to wash, blow dry, style, etc!

My Little Rapunzel

One of my 2009 resolutions is to get Ali's hair cut. She is now 3 years old and never had a pair of scissors on even one piece of hair. The biggest challenge is that she's not crazy about having it done - braided, put in pigtails, etc. It is beautiful and everyone compliments the healthiness and waviness of it but it is time to shape it up before she is truly a little Rapunzel.

We hope to go next week and are now even thinking about going for the 8 inches required to donate it to Pantene so that it can be used to help someone (probably a child) going through cancer treatment with a wig.

The Girls' Favorite Books

Every evening at bedtime the kids get to chose books that they'd like read to them. Right now the girls are picking these three repeatedly. They love them and never seem to get tired of them.

The have several of the Fancy Nancy books

The have the first edition called Knuffle Bunny but here the little girl is older so I think they can relate a bit more to her.

This is about a girl learning about fire safety at school. They love the Stop, Drop and Roll.

They also both like Dr. Seuss books and a lot of the Disney classics but currently the above three are being requested most frequently.