Etihad Airways UM (Unaccompanied Minors) Service

WHAT I TRIED A miraculous service whereby you can send your children across the world alone to stay with unsuspecting relatives. I sent my two daughters, aged 10 and eight, to Milan from Abu Dhabi. WHAT I EXPECTED A lot of hassle, frankly. In my experience getting rid of one's children is never trouble-free. I was expecting a palaver once we got to the airport. I thought I would probably be sent back home with them because I hadn't filled in some bit of paper or other.

WHAT I EXPERIENCED Amazing. As we checked in, a charming young woman called Sharika materialised by our side. "I will be looking after your girls," she said smiling. "Please could you stay at the airport until they have boarded though in case of any problems." Sharika helped us fill in the UM form, where you list the details of who is meeting them on the other end along with all your contact numbers. Then she took us through to the business-class waiting area, where we waited for 15 minutes until it was time for the girls to board. We dutifully waited at the airport. I figured I might never get a chance to sit in the business class bit again. Fifteen minutes later I got a text message. "Your lovely girls have boarded the plane and been handed over to the cabin manager. Sharika."

THE FINAL VERDICT This is a great service. The girls had a lovely flight; they were extremely well looked after and I am hoping next time we fly somewhere Sharika will look after us. Worth knowing: Although there is no charge for the UM service, tickets are charged at adult ticket fare. I booked several months in advance and paid Dh1,900 for one return flight. Etihad is planning a dedicated UM lounge with toys, activity packs, games and so on. It is due to be open towards the end of the summer. They will also have trained nannies on hand to look after your children. The UM service is available to children aged between five and 12; children between the ages of 12 and 15 are entitled to the UM service if their parents request it. At the moment you cannot book UM online: for more information, call Etihad at 800 2277.

Temperature: 39C Time: 15 minutes For part three of our monthly, yet-to-be-successful egg-frying investigation, we compared the frying efficiency of a metal sheet with that of the tarmac on a particularly humid day in Abu Dhabi. The metal sheet took the lead from the start, with its egg immediately drying out around the edges, framed by a clear halo of egg white. As time ticked by, the yolk began to solidify on top, and after a full 15 minutes, it formed a relatively hard layer that could be tapped without breaking. The egg on the pavement did its best, but failed to match up: after a quarter of an hour, the only change in its appearance was a slight congealing of the white and an overall shrunken size. It remains to be seen whether this was an indication of it's being cooked or simply evaporation in action. We checked one last time after 30 minutes, and both yolks had dried out on top; but both the whites were still clear and sticky. The results of our experiment this month are similar to June's, and therefore somewhat disheartening; we might not be able to say we're "fried" in this summer heat after all.

www.twitterfall.com Call us Luddites, but we can't keep up with all of our networking websites: it's hard enough just keeping our status updated. But we can't tear our eyes away from Twitterfall, which displays tweets as they happen in a constantly moving cascade. You can choose to see all tweets, pick a trend or search a topic of your own. It's like watching a news ticker only way more random and entertaining.

One-stop shop Every mall in Abu Dhabi has something different that we need. We pay our Etisilat bills at the Virgin Megastore in Abu Dhabi Mall. We pay our utility bills, get our nails done and do some of our grocery shopping at Carrefour in Marina Mall. And if we can't find something at Carrefour, we go to LuLu in Al Wahda Mall. So we started drawing up our "to do" lists by mall, just to make sure that when we hit one place, we get everything on our list.