Morag from Manama

Reluctantly, this summer I have purchased yet another ‘device’ which now brings our household that step closer to owning our own orchard full of various Apple products!

Somehow, along the way our family members, one-by-one, have ditched their old favourite mobile phones for the ever popular and, in my opinion, overpriced iPhone which it seems we all can’t live without.

I now dread each child’s birthday, as I know all they will want is the latest model and no matter which outlet I queue at, when my number is finally called, I’m told ‘out of stock’! But to be honest, it’s the cost that really irks me or have I just turned into an out-of-touch moaning Minnie?

Like many families, we also have a drawer in our villa, a very large drawer that is full of defunct devices amidst a tangle of charger cables. I’m terrified to throw any of them out ‘just in case,’ it’s like I’m being held to ransom by a mound of iPods, iShuffles, iTouches and iPads!

Next to that drawer is my desk which is bestowed with a giant Apple screen for our iMac which I like to shout at most days when I’m scrambling around searching for the correct function key!

Only last year our son required a laptop for university, as did his sister when she decided to leave the sandpit for boarding school and I was told they had to be Apple, hmmmm.

So when our younger son’s school here in Bahrain announced that he would require to bring a ‘device’ to school, I was already visualising dinar signs and yet another visit to the store.

What I didn’t expect was a pleasant surprise. I learned that we were eligible in the UK for a student’s discount, offered a trade-up deal by handing back one of our old defunct laptops, and was given a tax refund claim form which simply needed to be stamped upon leaving Heathrow.

When the store assistant then handed over a free pair of wireless Beats headphones with the purchase of our latest device, I surreptitiously dropped them in to my handbag … before the husband could get his paws on them.

H’app’y Days!