THE VERY STIFF GINGERBREAD MAN

Trust me, when I say that I have nothing against gingerbread men or their related associates but my distaste arises from the very real bitter taste that the last one left in my mouth. Are you wondering what I am talking about or have you also had the misfortunate of bumping into the very stiff gingerbread man with a sickly sweet voice, and sugar coated web of fabrications?

You see, this one corrupt, internally corroded gingerbread man sold me dreams that I was naively swept up in- if you're under the impression that we were star crossed lovers who fell under a magical spell, then you're thoroughly mistaken because this is by far a love story. This is the story of a gingerbread man whose arrogance, deceit and false promises bring me to this particular moment; urging me to pour my thoughts and feelings into this tale of possible self pity and anger. Like most normal people we did not meet in person, we were two worlds apart- me in the civilised United Kingdom and him in the Middle East. I guess this divide between two continents and cultures would have stopped someone else but not me- I leaped in, blindly. Looking back, I can see the loop holes in his reassurances, yet I can't shake off the feeling that I should have known it was way too good to be true. Especially, when the gingerbread man never paid me a visit.

On a cold, wintry December morning last year the phone insisted on ringing- I finally gave up and answered. And that is the point where my life changed and I ended up where I did. I packed my bags, waved a tearful goodbye to my family and boarded a plane to Sharjah four weeks later. Little did I know that the gingerbread man had fed me a pack of sugar coated lies? So here I was, in a world that was superficially similar to the one I knew but the stark subtleties only became apparent once I took off the rose coloured glasses. A week had barely passed before I began to realise that this was not the dream he had sold to me. It was just plain, simple and outright deception. It was probably a silent game of cat and mouse, which he had designed and only he knew that it had started. I bet he thought he was the wise, clever one in this. The master, perhaps?

All lies- that's all it was. In my naivety I handed over my passport before I saw the reality. So with little money, know knowledge about the Emirates, no contacts- I was left to suffer alone in a room, which represented a prison cell. It definitely was not the

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