Would You like a feature Interview?
All Interviews are 100% FREE of Charge
This told essay is based on a conversation with a 25-year-old tutor and academic governor in Dubai. They were given anonymity to speak freely about their experiences. This essay has been edited for length and clarity. The child’s name has been removed to protect his identity.
I moved to Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE) in 2020 to work for an international tutoring company.
Since then, I have taught some of Dubai’s most elite families – the children of millionaires and billionaires who made their money in oil investments, technology startups and other entrepreneurial ventures.
View of Dubai skyline from Maiden Shanghai restaurant.
Catherine Boudreau/Business Insider
One of the families I taught lived in one of the most expensive apartments in Dubai, complete with an art room, massage room, gym, and movie theater. It had five floors, a private elevator and a guard dog on the door.
Such families often had dozens of staff: guards, maids, drivers, cooks, nannies, and, of course, tutors.
My parents were often not around, but the ones I met were almost always friendly to me.
The people I had the most contact with were the nannies who took care of my children’s needs.
They made me dinner, brought me drinks, and I felt like I was part of the family, like an older brother.
One of my young students had his own custom classroom in his parents’ home. It was better equipped than I had seen in a regular school.
After finishing an art class with him once, I mentioned that I needed to clean up the mess.
“Absolutely not,” he said. “I’m not paying you to clean her. I’m paying her to clean her,” he said, pointing to her nanny.
We were studying bird biology with another child, who was about 7 years old at the time, and he requested that we buy an owl so he could observe owls.
The next time I went to the house, there was an owl perched on the kitchen counter.
Another student said that his older brother told him, “Dad will take care of it,” and “You don’t have to work.” Then he paid me his $3,000 to do homework.
However, this was normal behavior in Dubai, as the children were used to extreme wealth.
my family gave me a present
Such financial “incentives” were not uncommon.
Sometimes parents would go to great lengths to start bidding wars against each other.
If they knew I would be at a customer’s home at a time they wanted, they could offer to pay double, triple, or more for me to come in their place. Sho.
And every time I think I’ve seen it all, this job will find a new way to surprise me.
One day, my car broke down and I was late for my usual lesson with one of my students. I told her mother the reason for being late. The next time she took a class with the child, she gave him $7,000 in cash for repairs.
The same family gave me a huge tip of over $20,000 at the end of the year.
I spent the summer sailing the coast of Italy on a yacht
Last summer, I was hired to care for two siblings, ages 4 and 6. Their family planned a trip on a private yacht and was considering sailing along the coast of Italy for two months.
A few weeks after signing the contract, I was on a speedboat across the Mediterranean, heading to a superyacht the size of a ferry.
When I met my new employer on deck, a uniformed staff member offered me a glass of champagne (although drinking on duty was prohibited). The next few months were spent jet-skiing, paddleboarding, touring vineyards, and eating expensive food.
This family is from Russia and there was a noticeable difference in their treatment of me, often trying to keep me out of their sight.
I was told to stay below deck while they were partying upstairs.
They hired me to be a kind of glorified babysitter for the kids, entertaining them while playing with them and talking to them in English.
For Russia’s elite, having someone who speaks English with a native accent is a matter of great pride.
Perhaps one of the funniest moments was when they returned to their villa on the south coast of France. On either side of the front door were his two stone busts of his father’s face.