The email from Barclaycard proclaimed that my balance is £0.00.
Woo hoo!
Never mind them recording conversations for training, I wished I could have recorded my card cancellation conversation for my edification.
We’re economic migrants in Qatar like our parents were/are in the UK. We’ve met many people who are here to save. We are too but before we do that we have debts to pay.
I like to say that our debts weren’t for Gucci boots and Prada bags and they weren’t. We still have a student loan to take care of which we know has been an investment but here’s the brutal honesty bit: some of the spending was living beyond our means in the UK.
Since Kofi got a job, we’ve been attacking our debt like a US drone on the Afghan/Pakistan border. We haven’t gone all sackcloth and ashes. I’ve always had and always will have champagne tastes. But I don’t want to always have mauby money so I had to become more disciplined.
This has been painful – pooling resources, making and sticking to a budget, tracking expenses, sacrificing planned expenditure when unexpected costs came up, saying no to socializing, refusing demands from my son and hiring a financial adviser.
It’s like being on Atkins and craving a plate of Jollof when I caress the Boori baby furniture and gaze at the Stokke prams. But until my Ronaldhino or this kicker in my tummy is signed up for Arsenal, it’s daily monitoring of the classifieds of DohaMums among others for pre-loved gear.
Talking about money can often be taboo. Like most taboos, I’ve discovered that by talking about it helps lift my burden and encourages others to share their secrets. As I have admitted to the reason for us declining brunches or rationing on classmates’ birthday presents, others have started sharing their reality.
What’s the sensitive subject that you’ve helped make less taboo?