Before moving to the UAE we lived in France. I didn’t make many friends, French women are notoriously difficult to make friends with, but those friends I did have spent most of the summer talking about just one thing: la rentrée. La rentrée is the French word for going back to school, and it is almost as important as Christmas or a major birthday.
I remember one of my friends telling me she had decided to retrain as a photographer. I thought it sounded like a great idea. “But I can’t do anything until after la rentrée,” she added. This conversation took place in June.
I of course was always hopelessly unprepared for the whole back to school thing. In part because there always seemed to be so much time. Rather like we do here, in France you get two months off, and at the beginning of July, the beginning of September seemed a lifetime away. Then at some point mid-August I would go into denial that it was all going so quickly, and before I knew it, the time had come.
This year we have the prospect of new uniforms to deal with, but actually uniforms are one of the reasons I moved my children from the French system to the British one (the other main ones being that I didn’t want them growing up thinking Napoleon was a good bloke and I also found the homework utterly incomprehensible, even when they were only five years old). In France there are no uniforms. Can you imagine the arguments we used to have when the girls both wanted to wear the same pair of pink leggings? Hideous.
The children are now happily settled into the British way of things. This year will be their second year at their school in Abu Dhabi. I wonder how many of their friends will not be there, but are instead preparing for la rentrée somewhere else in the world, and how different they will find life wherever they have ended up. I know one of the girls’ friends is off to Hong Kong, another to Australia and another to London. I dread to think how long a French woman would need to prepare for la rentrée on the other side of the world.
And of course September is not only a back to school time for the children. Here in the UAE where so many people take off for the summer, it can be just the same for us. We go back to work, to the gym, back to our routines after a summer away. Sometimes it can be quite painful, especially the gym. And we have to get used to the heat again. But I always find that as soon as the kids are back at school I feel a sense of relief. The summer is great fun, but there is the issue of what to do with the children day in and day out, especially if you’re stuck in the UAE where the summer really does limit your options. I think the children slightly miss the structure school brings to their lives as well. It makes them feel secure. And even if a lot of familiar faces are not there any more, most of the teachers are, as well as the old school routine and habits.
Lots of my friends talk about coming back after the summer rather like you would New Year. “When I get back,” they say, “I’m going to hit the gym.” Or “as soon as the kids are back at school, I’m going to write my book.” I find this a dangerous habit. If there is something you need to do, then do it, today.
My French friend never did retrain as a photographer, she is still preparing for la rentrée.