Ski Dubai

Since Geoff mentions it below, here are some pics of the ski area in the Mall of the Emirates that I took yesterday from the outside viewing area:

Madinat Jumeira

On Saturday we went to go attend the Singaporean Chili Crab and Beer Festival at the Madinat Jumeira (Madinat just means town in arabic and the complex is basically a mall). Unfortunately when we got there we found out it was actually just a couple of beer stalls, a buffett and some dancers. No worries though since Mercato has a lot going for it.


The entire mall is built in the style of an anceint arabic city or castle with stone coloured turrets, a winding river and high surrounding walls. The mall itself houses various restaurants and shops selling the typical cheesy dubai tourist stuff. If you're looking for a mini statue of the Burj or a stuffed toy camel with sunglasses then this is the place.

We had dinner at a lovely persian restaurant by the waterside with a gorgeous view of the Burj Al Arab. (PS have looked into the Burj Al Arab but since non hotel guests can only attend high tea there and high tea is 450zar per person i don't expect to be sending you photos of the inside anytime soon). Shown below are some typical arabis dessert sweets:

OK I have no idea what this camel was for but it looked funny!

I am a huge nerd

A casual comment to Helen this weekend got me thinking. We were driving past the fabled Mall of the Emirates, home of the little ski slope that got lost in the desert. I said, 'Sweety, don't you think the Mall of the Emirates looks like the Starship Enterprise?' Now, we could spend an hour less commercials with Dr Phil examining what this says about me, but let's not and say we did.

Instead, let us ponder the striking truth of this statement and its wider application as a metaphor. Bear with me here. The thing is, in several important ways, not all of them amusing, the whole of Dubai is like a season of Startrek, viz:

• We seem to be on a five year mission to go where no man has gone before, to build buildings no-one ever thought would be worth the money, or to get to work through Sheikh Zayed Road traffic.
• All the culture I know and understand is foreign to this place, because I am the alien.
• I nonetheless think I own the place.
• Everything seems to run poorly until the Captain fixes it.
• Communications with my home planet are difficult and expensive, with lots of special effects static on the line.
• The communications officer doesn't really do anything, but still gets to sit on the bridge.
• All the little anonymous guys running around doing all the work are expendable extras.

On the other hand, I get danger pay and I get to see the universe unfold before my eyes. So who's complaining?

Marina Walk

Marina Walk is - coincidently- the walkway that skirts the Dubai Marina.

Basically a small, upscale yacht club, it houses a mish-mash of restaurants from the rather suave Blues to the more low key Johnny Rockets (one of our favourites I might add.) Restaurants spill out to al fresco outside seating where patrons enjoy their shisha and the usual market stalls selling jewellery, dodgy clothes, art and UAE memorabilia hug the railings.

The weather was a bit bleh when we went and started to rain as we were leaving but it is conceivably a lovely place to sit and sip virgin (not a hotel means no alcohol) cocktails as you watch the wealthy navigate their yachts. Most surprising was the clientel which was almost entirely WASP. No idea what the boat below is used for - probably evening cruise with dinner etc but it looked nice so I took a photo!

Spicy Food

On Thursday night we went to one of Dubai's "Hidden Gems", Coconut Grove (this is according to the restaurant guide I gave Geoff for Christmas). CG is an Indian restaurant with the usual Bukhara type foods, an extensive cocktail list and a very reasonable wine list.

NB. In Dubai, they do not f&*k around with hot food. We ordered the Devilled Beef but the waiter very kindly pointed out to us that this dish was quite "spicy". OK. So what does he suggest? The Erachi something or other apparently which is quite "mild". Great we'll give it a whirl.

Possibly the fact that they have a box of tissues on the table should have been a warning. Holy Cow. Mild? MILD?? are you out of your skull? This dish had been sauteed in chilli's. Nevertheless, at wine under 100dhs per bottle we will be biting the bullet and heading off there again soon!

Bob the Builder

AHHA!! Proof ladies! Years of subversive hypnosis mind control and interrogation techniques have finally proved successful!

(we're still dealing with the bird-flu type mask don't worry)

Home Time!

Yay back home in sunny Dubai - er no sorry, pouring with rain and only 22 degrees. I tell you, move to a desert and I STILL can't sunbathe! I foresee I will end up getting a job before I can crack a tan at this rate.

C'est la vie the show must go on. We hit Carrefour (think huge Pick 'n Pay hypermarket) this evening in Mall of the Emirates to supply ourselves with the necessary drill, sander and other male type machiney. Imagine our surprise during dinner when the following show came on in the centre court!!!

Back to the Mothership

Decidedly the best way to relocate overseas is to plan a trip back to your home country less than a month after you leave it. This allows you to essentially get a trailer of the next few years of your life.

Anyway on Jan 3rd we travelled to PE for Geoff to be best man and MC for Marc and Julie's, wedding. After 4 days of harried admin the wedding was held on the Saturday afternoon under a rather stormy looking sky at a place called Apron Strings.

Anyway, Julie looked gorgeous, it didn't rain and all in all went off without hitch - despite Geoff sneaking two pieces of the (chocolate) wedding cake...

And then it was off to sunny CT. Or for me it was anyway - Geoff headed back to Kimberley to see his folks and we would meet up in JHB the following Sat.

CT was great. I got to see the gang for drinks at the Radisson...

Eat chocolate brownies at Rhodes Mem with Fi...

Have a take-out girl's night with the Barra girls...

And visit Kalk Bay Harbour with my dad (just down from Kilimanjaro I might add - go dad) for much needed cocktails...

New Years in Dubai

On New Years Eve we went to the Irish Village for dinner buffet, a few drinks and some live music.

The Irish Village is essentially and big Irish Pub. Think OHagans but more classy. There's also a large cobbled outside area (the cobbles apparently are imported from Ireland) and there a big grassy bank that rolls down into a small lake (precarious for drunken revellers as you can imagine.)

Anyway the band was fun - they did covers of the standand sing-along stuff that you'd expect and then let off big fancy fireworks afterwards.

Aside from the prices (250ZAR) for the cheapest bottle of red wine!!!

Searching - an exposé

I'm sitting in the airport lounge in Johannesburg using the public computer to check mail and generally waste time while I wait for my flight to Kimberley. I just stumbled upon the Internet Explorer cache of google search requests. Here are a couple I found interesting:

air conditioners cape town
jugs
big jugs
cape town gay scene
bBENTLEY
BENTLE
MERSEDES
CELSE
CESEA
CESEA FOOFBALL
conferences in venezuela
famous uncut men
Spanking tools

I especially like the physically disabled person with the type a personality and an interest in cars and "foofball", but I have questions about some of the others too. Why is someone desperately researching airconditioning in Cape Town from the airport? Heard it's exceptionally hot there? Same goes for conferences in Venezuela - buddy, you're booked on the plane already! If you don't know where or when the conference is, you're in trouble. And hey, porn dog, the results on jugs not gibbous enough for you? A second search? And when you found the epic boobs you were looking for, did you bring them up in technicolour in the middle of the business lounge? People! Get it together!

Who's evolved?

Here's a thing. Yesterday we went to see a movie at the Mall of the Emirates, better known as the mall with the ski slope in it. Night at the Museum to be exact. They have pretty large two tier theatres, and, atypically for Dubai, there was assigned seating. A small hurdle, but it was enough to identify that the shallow section of the gene pool had set up a primitive fort against the assault of civilisation on the left side of the theatre. They seemed to be predominantly Grunt speaking, and they seemed to want 'Ug!' often and urgently. Now in the ten minutes before the movie started, this was fine, and stood as an interesting study of our anthropomorphic ancestry.

However, as the movie started it became clear that we had landed ourselves in the middle of a war. On the one side were the aforementioned Ugs, and on the other, a scattered but strong contingent of Shhhs. The Shhhs' battle plan is less than perfect, resulting in plenty of escalating friendly fire until at one point an apogee of Shhh settles into an uneasy peace. This process takes around 5 minutes, and it reoccurs regularly.

Hero suffers the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune? The Ugs awww. The Shhhs shhh.
Hero takes arms against a sea of troubles and by opposing ends them? Everyone erupts into rapturous applause. I did not see that coming. And the coup de grâce: at the emotional catharsis of the film, about 5 minutes before the credits, the Ugs take noisy leave, cheering and raising their arms in victory! V I C... V I C... V I C T Oh my god!

Friday Brunch

Friday Brunch is a long standing expat tradition in this country. Basically every non-muslim indivual is too hung over on a Friday morning (remember our weekend is Friday Saturday not Saturday Sunday) to wake up in time to make breakfast hours. This allows all hotels to basically put on extravagently expensive buffets with just the most ridiculous amount of food imaginable.

And I mean ridiculous.

Think shushi, salads, pasta, lasagne, pizza, shellsfish, fish, steaks, kebab, roast lamb, chicken wings, cheese fondues, naan breads and all the accoutrements possible that your gluttonous little tummy could possibly desire. And this on only 1 of the three restaurants that are included in the price.

They give you a wrist band when you enter. That's right. A WRIST BAND. Like you're entering a carnival or something.

And the desert table. Don't even get me started. Crepes, Pancakes, cakes, mousses, fruit and best of all ... a chocolate fountain!





















Downside... above mentioned wrist band is valid from 12 noon to 12 midnight so they expect you to return for dinner... BURP!

Global Village 2006-2007

So every year Dubai host what is called "Global Village" which is basically a collection of about 50 country specific stores that sell everything native to that country. So i.e. Romania you are surrounded by weird glass works and in Yemen you can buy every type of honey under the sun.
Each stall is then of course duly decorated with as much kitsch country paraphenalia as possible. Case in point - see the UK below.

















In fact the only countries not represented were Israel (no surprise there) and the USA (more surprising. Maybe they felt adequately represented by the 40-off baskin robins, hardees and applebees). South Africa made a stand - albeit lumped together with the rest of the sub-saharan region.

















The best part of Global Village is however definitely the (fekking expensive) rides. Being a woes I only went on the ferris wheel, the boat and some small speedy roller coaster thing. Given how high it was this picture seriously understates the fact that I was clinging onto the centre pole for dear life.































All in all my final comment is.... don't be a moron and wear heels. :(

Jingle all the way

As expected on Christmas I woke Geoff at sparrow's fart and demanded my presents. Since he had already given me the camera the night before pickings were slim. (Latest Marianne Keyes and some Perfume). After devouring half the Marianne Keyes we packed up a picnic basket and headed out for Al Safa Park. Obviously I made Geoff carried said picnic goodies :D






Al Safa is a HUGE park in the middle of Dubai (technically in the area of Al Wasl). It's circumference is 3.5km (there's a running track around it) so anyone feeling bored feel free to do the math to work out the area. Anyway it's basically a public open space with green lawns in some areas, big luscious forests in others and a very twee waterfall and lake with ducks and seagulls. (it's close to the beach.)

















All in all it was a great lazy way to spend the day - plus we still have tonnes of left over goodies for me to nosh while Geoff is at work! The highlight of the day has to be Geoff expression when I surprised him with his very own Daim bar. You must understand - the Daim bar is practically impossible to find either in SA or the UAE but is a chocolate that rivals all others... especially since the cadbury's here tastes like beacon. PTOO PTOO.



Hope you all had a great Christmas too!
xx

For her ladyship. Happy Chanukah :D

Score!

Woohoo, I got a spanky new Sony CyberShot DSC-S600 (that's a digital camerafor those not in the know!) for Christmas! And it does swanky videos! Plus it's tiny and silver and super cute :D

Unfortunately now I have no excuse for not uploading photos .... damn!












Merry Christmas everyone!

Yuletide - the washing powder of wisdom

So, Christmas shopping is complete, and I feel a lot poorer. The shopping in Dubai will tend to make you overspend. The thing about Christmas presents for a woman is that you need to design them like a mall.

1. There has to be variety. Not just one present - many presents. This is because women don't scale points for big presents - 1 present = 1 point. And no-one shops at a mall that only has one department store.
2. There has to be an anchor present. Like Woolworths, or Pick 'n Pay, or Walmart, you've gotta get a good anchor in to provide the substance.
3. There should be bling. If your loved one cannot show off the gifts to her friends, it's not as cool. Names you can brag about - Armani, Vera Wang, Jimmy Choo - put you in the bonus round.
4. Finally, you must have pamper. Something to relax, to take the weight off after a long day of shopping. Bath salts or chocolate - the theme is spoil yourself.

Well, that's my 2 cents' worth. I'm pretty sure Helen will let you know how it works out.

The show that must go on

"Everybody say Cypress Hill, you fucked up!"

Ok, so I'm not Cypress Hill, but I did fuck up. Sorry if you've been trying to comment for the last day or two, since I accidentally excluded everyone but myself. Talk about a captive audience. Thanks to Gareth for pointing and laughing.

So, what is the purpose of the obscure non sequitur to introduce this post? Well it's a quote from Henry Rollins. If you don't know him, he's big and scary, but in a good way. He does spoken word tours around the world, and I have tickets to see him live on December 29th. So rare I get to see a show I'm really amped for. Dubai scores its first big points with Geoff.

Oh Lord, won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz?
My friends all drive Porsches,
I must make amends.
Worked hard all my lifetime, no help from my friends,
So Lord, won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz?

Photos of Flat and City

Sunday we walked across the construction zone to visit Geoff's colleague Maseeh before they left for a holiday to Malaysia and Singapore.

Anyway - I managed to get some photos of our complex entrance:

















Our tower's the one in the middle. There's a pic below. We're on the 14th floor and our bedroom window overlooks the pool area.





















And here's a photo of Burj Dubai which is to the left of our apartment about 250m away. It's going to be the tallest building in the world and will have the largest mall in the world attached to it. Currently it is 90-odd stories but is expected to top 170 by 2009/10.





















And lastly, here's a skyline of Dubai. The two towers on the left in the distance are the Emirates Towers which always shown in the Dubai City Skyline pictures.











The other one you'll usually see is the 6 start Hotel Burj Al Arab which looks like a ship's sail and is an an island just off the coast of Dubai. It very expensive though and you can only enter it if you're staying there or eating there so don't expect any photos of that anytime soon!!