DUBAI: No one likes to be told “no”, but as the age-old phrase “if you don’t ask, you don’t get,” suggests, sometimes it’s worth giving it a try.
And for seven-year-old British expat, Archie Appleyard, that has never been more true.
He has been away from his mother for 52 nights after she traveled back to the UK, only to be stranded there when the coronavirus pandemic forced a global lockdown.
So young Archie penned a letter to Sheikh Saud bin Saqr Al-Qasimi, ruler of the UAE’s Ras Al Khaimah (RAK), asking if the royal could help reunite the mother and son.
“It has been 52 sleeps now that I have been apart from my mother," the boy said in his letter.
“I feel so sad because we have never been apart for this long and all I dream and wish for is my mummy's return,” he wrote.
Much to Archie’s surprise he received a handwritten reply from Al-Qasimi, saying that his wish would indeed soon come true.
“I was pleased today to respond to a letter from Archie, the British boy whose mother was prevented from returning from the UK to Ras Al Khaimah due to the current circumstances,” the ruler said in a statement.
Al-Qasimi said on Instagram RAK authorities “worked to help reunite him with his mother at the earliest opportunity.”
