Do you guys want children? What a question to ask us in a car park

During a trip to the UAE to make a documentary, Charlotte Cripps is asked a rather abrupt question by the TV producer and must summon her best ‘casual’ face

(Illustration by Amara May)

When a friend who knew a sheik invited us to help him make a TV documentary in the United Arab Emirates, we jumped at the chance. Instantly I had visions of Lawrence of Arabia and Merchant Ivory films such as Heat and Dust – so I packed long silk scarves and flowing dresses. Alex was terribly excited and treated the trip to the UAE as if he was Napolean making a move on a new province to make himself richer.

The “green sheik” was an environmentalist, who organised food banks for the poor and chose to live a modest life even though he was connected to the ruling family in one of the lesser-known emirates. I wasn’t sure what to expect; it was a whole new world.

When he picked us up at the airport in his Lexus, Alex stuffed hundreds of his business cards into the back seats so they were bulging with details of his design and build company.

The sheik was a deep and spiritual figure – a bit like a guru – with plenty of buzzwords to help us open our hearts and embrace the present moment. It was like being in an around-the-clock therapy session as he began to empower us as we drove along the Dubai highway. Wow, this wasn’t what I was expecting. I was thinking shopping trips and snow skiing rather than a crash course in spiritualism. We joined in with some of the lingo we had picked up in 12-step meetings. “Feel the fear and do it anyway!” Absolutely!

That night we attended a wedding with the sheik. A wedding? I just wanted to curl up in bed with Alex and have a romantic night in our hotel.

When he told us gleefully that the men and the women at weddings are separated, I nearly fainted. “I don’t believe this,” I told the BBC producer. “We are only here for a week, that’s one night hijacked.” As I’m sitting at a table with his wife and about one hundred of her female friends, it feels like an extreme version of an all-girls night in without the chick flick.

Suddenly there is a long drum roll before the big reveal. The bride and groom appear on a stage together surrounded by smoke as everybody cheers. I desperately want to ask the groom to tell Alex where I am and to get me out of here. I can’t call Alex because he had lost his mobile phone by then – but before I knew it, the groom has vanished back through a curtain.

Alex is on a mission to convince the sheik to ditch the documentary and do a reality TV show in which badly behaved kids from the UK will be sent to a house in the UAE to live under a strict Islamic regime

We get home late. The next day our itinerary is a picnic in the desert with the sheik’s family, then a trip to see open graves to help us confront death, before we film the sheik at his residence.

“What about beach time,” I say to Alex. But he has run away with himself over the TV documentary. He’s on a mission to convince the sheik to ditch the documentary and do a reality TV show in which badly behaved kids from the UK will be sent to a house in the UAE to live under a strict Islamic regime. “What like a rehab?” I ask. “Yes!” says Alex, who already had another plan of opening up a boutique rehab centre in Morocco. I hadn’t seen us as a couple running a rehab – I was just hopeful that we’d never have to return to one.

Things started to get out of hand. Alex is now seeing himself as a film producer; he’s dressed to impress in a heavy suit and walking around with a clipboard talking at 90 miles an hour. I’m starting to wonder ‘Who is this person? Alex. Can you come back to planet earth?

At a lecture theatre the next day the sheik is talking to school children about how to have a meaningful way of life. We can’t understand Arabic, and so go outside into the scorching heat. The BBC producer catches me completely off guard and asks: “Do you guys want to have children?” As if it’s the most normal question to ask in the world.

How can she ask such a massive question in front of Alex? This is the very question I’m timing with absolute precision – and she blurts it out in the scorching heat of a car park.

“Yes, but I’m in no hurry,” I say lying through my teeth. That’s when she asks me my age. Oh god, I’m hitting 36. She’s really landing me in it. Now I’m going to have to lie about my age. But what if Alex sees my passport? I’ve knocked a few years off over the course of our romance, and I’m never quite sure how old I’m meant to be. If he knows how old I am, he will know the race is on to have kids. Alex shuffles off nervously – it’s a conversation we will have to have but not with a stranger.

We leave the UAE with healing water from a well and plenty of sticky dates gifted to us by the sheik. The sheik says he hopes the experience will have made Alex more spiritual and that the next time we meet, we are married. I smile sweetly. ‘If only,” I think. He assures me that his little talks with Alex will sink in to help him feel more grounded and spiritual – and interested in family matters.

We board the plane with the producer just as the gates are closing. I look at Alex, who now is obsessed with moving to the UAE. I want to get back to normality and stop talking about TV shows. It is detracting from what I need – him to be around. Not him fixated by emigrating. I call the psychic as soon as I land, but she’s on answer phone permanently for a week. Panic fills me. Has she had enough? I wouldn’t blame her. I need to talk to her about the mammoth next step. How on earth are we going to have kids?