Finally Stephen's Turn At Typing

Being up at 5:30 am sort of sucks, but I'm sure we'll be on schedule for sleep and awake time within the next day.

Much of what Elizabeth said is exactly what I would say. The plane ride was long, though I think it was shorter than going to Japan. Still the children on the plane were total brats. If I didn't have any self-control, I'd turn around and introduce them to the seatbelt feature. Awesome entertainment, tons of movies, tv shows, and games. Indiana Jones 4, about ½ way thru Get Smart, a kung fu movie with both Jackie Chan and Jet Li, an episode of the Simpsons. I could never get the map feature to work, the one where it shows you the status of where you plane is. Food was pretty good, dinner of buttered rice with curry chicken or something, the snack sandwich was a little weird, vegetable with curry I think. Breakfast was apple and waffles, including a dessert of arabian coffee tiramisu. Real, metal silverware, free alcohol, epic…

Once we landed I was glad to get up and walk around. Even though we were both pretty wiped from the long journey, it was nice knowing we didn’t have a time constraint. We got in at 8am, just have to make our way to Dubai via free airline shuttle. Exchanged some money, $60 translated into 216 dirhams, which I guess works out to about 3.6 dirhams per dollar. The bus ride took 1.5 hours, we got to Dubai around 10am. Along the way we saw much of the landscape, and all I could think about was the amazing contrast of the region. As we flew into Abu Dhabi, we passed many beaches, waterfront, and amazingly blue waters. On the bus ride, it was a flat landscape, brown and hazy. Aside from all the foliage, trees, and plants that had no earthly reason to be there, it was fairly desolate. The contrasting part that I am talking about is that for as much barren land there is, there is some sort of construction or building going on. I swear, all the people must either be employed to work for the airlines, or in construction. I also thought it strange that much of the plants/trees looked like they were recently planted, workers were laying out the plants and irrigation hoses. Perhaps it’s a yearly thing they have to do, maybe it all dies after the summer?

Dubai is amazing. It’s different from a city such as New York in that there is nothing surrounding it’s downtown area. Approaching from the highway, we went directly into a multitude of high rise buildings, whereas New York you would travel through the outer suburbs first. Dubai, being much more on the forefront of new buildings, showcased many more futuristic style buildings than New York. Another amazing contrast is that within these high rises you’ll see some old arabian style buildings and mosques.

The Orient Guest House is where we stayed, hidden in the Bastikiya quarter along the Dubai Creek. It’s within walking distance of the Dubai museum, the waterfront, some open air shopping markets called souks. Of course, the first thing we did when we got checked into our room was take a nice 5-hour long nap. The Guesthouse is quite different from your standard Marriot hotel. I wouldn’t say “roughing” it, but it’s definitely a nice change of pace. The room was quite large and a number of rooms were located right off the main lobby area which served at the eating area. To experience a unique old-world feeling I highly recommend staying here. Once we did get up, we were off to find dinner and perhaps do a little sightseeing. The first restaurant we tried was Bastakiya Nights, described as arabic style food. The menu had the standard tabouli, kebobs, hommous, unfortunately the waiter said they were not open for another hour, so instead we went to the Basta Café right next to the Guesthouse. It was very nice, exactly what I had envisioned we’d be doing when on this trip. An open are courtyard with a number of tables, few people, soft lighting just as the sun began to set, and we sat and ate and drink under a very nice night. I had a drink of mint and lemonade, sort of interesting. It looked like one of those healthy seaweed drinks people get from a smoothie place, and when I first started sipping it I couldn’t help but think I was drinking liquified basil. But eventually I convinced myself that it was mint and lemonade. I ate a salad with cucumbers, tomatoes, mangoes, and barbeque-flavored chicken. Elizabeth ate what was essentially a baked potatoe smothered with honey-mustard chicken and a side salad. Both were very good. Of course as you may have guessed, our plan to go sightseeing was cut short when we got back to the room trying to figure out what to do next. We were too tired to go out again and just went to sleep.