Dolly's Blog

Two Weeks in Sunny, Southern California (and 1 Weekend in NYC)

Okay, okay....I know it's been a long time and I think maybe my mom is the only person still checking to see if there are new entries, but I've finally gotten around to a new post.  The reason being is that I've been in LA for 2 weeks!  The first weekend was labor day weekend and actually I spent it in NYC with all my girlfriends and my sister, which was so fun and the perfect thing to come home to.  That week I was in the office in LA, which was also actually fun because I got to actually help on drawings for another project...a welcome change from my paperwork-heavy job here.  During the week I went to see James Brown at the Hollywood Bowl...so cool!  The next weekend I got to see my dad, step-mom and aunt in Ventura, then I went camping near Santa Barbara with some friends.  I was giddy just being able to be outside; Dubai sure makes you appreciate climates that allow you to be outside without becoming instantly soaking wet.  When we got back we went to see Willie Nelson at the Bowl!!!  The entire next week was vacation for me, so that I could participate in my capoeira group's festival and batizado, which is an annual event that allows students to move up in level.  I went to workshops all week hosted by different mestres (masters) that were visitng from Brazil and then on Saturday I was in the batizado and moved up to a yellow cord!!! yay!!  That weekened I got to see my mom and step-dad, so I got to see the whole family on this trip!  I left on Monday and as always it was very hard to say goodbye.  When I'm in Dubai, it's not so bad...I get into my routine, but going home is sooo great and it's saying goodbye that's always the
 hardest thing to do.

Ramadan

It started today and will end a few days before I come home for good, so my last experience here will be Ramadan.  I'm actually excited, because I sometimes complain about the lack of culture here, so it will be interesting to have something actually impact how I live my life.  So basically it's a time of year where Muslims kind of renew their faith...it makes me think of Lent.  They will pray a lot and the biggest thing is that they fast during daylight hours and out of respect everybody else must not be seen eating, drinking, smoking, chewing gum, listening to loud music, dancing, etc. in public.  I don't think it's very common, but you can actually be arrested if you're caught doing any of those things!  I think they would only do that if you were doing it on purpose, not just as a mistake.  Luckily I share an office with a non-Muslim girl, so we can just shut our door if we want to eat or drink anything.  My biggest worry is that I'll drink a big bottle of water in my car or something...I'm known for being forgetful, so cross your fingers that I don't end up in jail for drinking water!!

All the expats partied hard this weekend because they won't be able to for (gasp!) a whole month.  Since I don't really drink or go out here anyway, that won't really affect me.  I'm not sure yet how it will affect me...I'll keep you posted. 

Back to the Grindstone

I'm back to work.  The only good thing is that the project is moving along and I can actually see my work being built which is great.  The work is still the same...it's lots of paperwork and lots of crises that need immediate descisions and answers.  It's still effing hot.  They say it should cool down soon, but I've been hearing that for a while now.  It's still crazy humid too, which is the real killer.

Okay Ma, that's about it...I'll post pictures soon.  Love you!

I have been thinking about this entry and how I want to write something positive about Dubai, so I tried to make a list of things in my head of the positives and this is what I came up with: free valet parking almost everywhere you go, capoeria, SkiDubai (even though I have some environmental ethics issues with it), diversity, good shopping and cheap gas.  That's my list.  So here is my effort at finding something positive that is a little more substantial than those things:

This whole war between Lebanon and Isreal has made me realize that Dubai is a really tolerant, even liberal place....relatively speaking.  The Muslim culture here is conservative enough that women dress in abayas (black robe thingys) with headscarves and veils, but tolerant enough to allow other women (Arab, European, Asian) to wear the fashions of the West.  There is definitely a religious and cultural tolerance here, that many other places don't have, but that doesn't stop people from making sweeping generalizations.  For example, there is a new law going into effect that says companies have to hire a certain amount of Emeratis.  The first reaction that most people have is why? all Emeratis are loaded and don't need to work.  The second is that companies would much rather hire Indians or Filipinos because they work hard for less money and Arabs, especially Emeratis, have a reputation for being lazy.  Regardless of the generalizations, it doesn't prevent people from co-existing happily.  Granted, I haven't seen or met one Jewish person, so I can't quite make the comparison to Lebanon and Isreal, but I do find here, that there is a good deal of respect for Islam from the Westerners and the Muslims seem to accept the Christians. 

I was taken shopping by one of the secretaries in my building to shop for fabric in a cheap area, because she said I would get ripped off.  I met her and her sister and their daughters on a Friday.  Normally at work she wears colorful clothes but always all covered up with a headscarf, but on Fridays she wears black because it is the holy day.  So I go shopping with these four Muslim women all covered up and there's me in white pants and a Mexican shirt with flip flops, but they didn't seem to mind at all!  It was really fun.  It was interesting, because we were shopping for Indian tops and her daughter and I were looking at the same one.  Her daughter is 15 years old and about the same size as me, so my friend picked a large for her daughter and handed me a small.  I kind of looked at her and she said "for you, it's okay."  She wasn't rude or condescending about it at all, it was just very matter of fact; if you are a Westerner you wear tighter fitting clothes...period....no big deal.

Okay, so that positive thinking just ended because I just found out that Etisalat, the local phone monopoly, has blocked me from using Skype.  I'm so mad I could scream.  The censorship here is unbelievable!  I mean, it isn't even censorship....the problem is that the censorship is left up to Etisalat, not the government, so Etisalat can "censor" anything that may eat into their profits!  Now I have to buy a 12 dollar phone card to have a 15 minute call to the US.  The censorship issue has been a hot topic lately, because they just blocked YouTube.com and all PC to PC calling programs.  I thought I was in the clear because I live in a "free zone" which means I can still access myspace.com, while the rest of the city can't, but that didn't stop Etisalat from blocking Skype!  Argh!!!!  I'm sooo mad. 

One more thing....I just went to the grocery store this morning and I was in the cereal aisle and all the Special K boxes had a big white sticker covering half the box!  Apparently, there is some woman, no doubt, on there is a bikini or something.  It's totally ridiculous, especially when you look up from the box and see a woman in daisy dukes and a bikini top shopping for cereal!!! 

Sorry, I am really trying to find good things to say about Dubai...I'll keep looking.

Trip from Hell

 

Okay, so my company decided to dowgrade my travel business class to something called “premium economy”, but since I made the outrageous demand of being routed through New York so that I could spend my birthday with my friends, I was demoted even further to the dreaded coach.  Thus begins my trip from hell.  It started off okay, but got increasingly worse. 

 

I went to Portland this last weekend to visit Katie and Mike.  I wanted to maximize my time there, so I left Monday afternoon arriving in LA at 6:30.  I spent 5 hours in LA with a friend by the airport, which was great because it was perfect weather and we played Frisbee in the park before I had to get back on a plane at 11:30 for a red eye to New York.  I got dropped off at 10 or so and got to my gate with time to spare.  We boarded and everything seemed to be going fine, but we just kept sitting there waiting to pull away from the jetway.  After about 30 minutes of unexplained sitting, we were finally told that something was wrong with the plane and that we just have to wait until they fix it, but that it would be easier and more enjoyable (?!) to sit on the plane rather than in the terminal.  After another hour of sitting, they finally said that it would be easier to just bring out another plane and switch planes altogether.  So we all get off the plane only to wait another hour and a half for the new plane!  We finally left at about 2:30 AM which got me into New York at 11:30, the exact time of take-off of my flight to Dubai.  Needless to say, I missed that flight and had to get on the next one, which was at 11 PM.  Yay!! 12 hours to kill in JFK airport after getting maybe 2 hours of light sleep.  I thought about going into the city, but decided that I wouldn’t even know where to go and didn’t feel up to lugging my bags around.  I spent about an hour walking around the terminal looking for any square foot of carpet that I could lay on to take a nap.  The only carpet I found was in a cruelly visible, but inaccessible airport lounge.  I finally found a quiet area with an outlet to plug in my computer and tried curling up to take a nap.  I did sleep for about an hour, but the granite tiles ended up numbing the side of my body.  I tried to read, but was too tired, so the rest of the time I just chatted with people online and walked around.  The check in counter finally opened at 9, which is when I got dealt the worst of my blows…I was assigned a middle seat.  Nothing else was available, not even an upgrade!  When I boarded I thought for a second that I lucked out, because the row had four seats across so it was a large guy, then me, then and empty seat and then another guy.  I was really excited that I had an empty seat next to me!  I should have know it was too good to be true…the flight attendant asked the guy on the end to switch so that a mother and childe could sit next to each other.  So now I’m sandwiched between a large guy and a not so small mother and her 2 year old kid.  Yay, fat guys and screaming kids!  Then when I went to put me seat back, there was a kid behind me that kept kicking my chair, so finally I shoot the mother a dirty look and she was like “put you seat up, the tv screen is too close to his face”  Can you believe that!?!  So I said…” no. he’s a little kid!”

 

Okay, okay…I know I sound like the most yuppie spoiled brat in the world, but come on, once you go business, you never go back.  Plus it gives me something to write about

 

Portland

 

Portland was great.  I love it there minus the clouds.  We picked blueberries and rode bikes and went to a beer festival.  It was good to be with Kate.  We even got in our requisite fight/debate about nothing.  I went to the chiropractor!  I don’t know if I have mentioned it in my blog, but a couple of months ago I did a back handspring onto my head in capoeira thanks to my inability to put my hands on the ground and my spotters’ inabilities to spot.  I’ve had really limited motion in my neck since then, but never bothered to do anything about it.  So we were walking by the cutest little chiropractic office in Portland and the chiropractor was standing outside shootin the shit with his other little shop owner neighbor and it all looked so friendly and appealing that I went ahead and made an appointment.  The next day, he took some x-rays to make sure I hadn’t fractured anything and then adjusted my neck.  It all went fine and I didn’t really notice any difference right away, but I can tell you that today, even after all my neck tweaking half sleep on the airplane, it feels a lot better!  I can look up!  It’s amazing.

 

There is much more to be said about Portland, but a lot of it has to do with my indecision about moving there which leads to big life changing, career changing decisions, etc. so I’d rather not get into that now.

 

Back in Dubai

 

So I’m back.  I miss home.  I think I’ll go snowboarding.

First of all....my apologies for not having posted for a while, I'm sure you were all on the edge of your seats waiting for another fabulous musing by Dolly.  Well, your wait it over. 

I hadn't been writing because I was either too busy, too tired, or too boring...sometimes I really have nothing to write about.  I have been in LA for a week so I have some things to say, finally.  My trip here was pretty smooth.  A woman from the LA office came to Dubai to fill in for me while I'm at home, which has made my life sooo much easier.  I trust her and know she'll do a great job, so I won't have too much work piled up when I get back.  We had a little bit of overlap in Dubai, so my last night we had a nice dinner at the top of the Emirates towers and then I went home, grabbed my bags and took off for the airport.  All I have to say is that I love business class, and a tear comes to my eye as I say that because my company has decided to downgrade our travel to save money, so from here on out I'm coach all the way. 

I must have done something really bad to someone, because my karma was wreaking havoc on my life first 24 hours in LA.  A coworker picked me up from the airport and took me out to lunch.  I had been in the same clothes for over 24 hours, so I got some clean clothes and changed in the restaurant bathroom.  I sat back down with me coworker, had a nice lunch and left.  Only a day later did I finally figure out that I left not only my clothes at our table, but also my wallet.  I went back to the restaurant, but there was no sign of anything and nothing had been turned in.  The same day I realized my wallet had been taken, I also walked out of work only to discover that my beloved graphite grey, Trek hybrid bike that I loved had been stolen.  It was a sad, sad day, which also happened to be Monica's birthday!  It worked out beautifully though, because last year on her birthday I had misplaced my wallet and she ended up paying for me, so we decided that we would continue the tradition this year. Mon's birthday party was really fun.  We went to the Geisha House in Hollywood for a sushi dinner with Lindsey, Kristen and Anna and then went bar hopping for the rest of the night. 

Sunday was the real highlight of my trip...the Flaming Lips at the Hollywood Bowl!!  We had a little daytime shindig at our house before the bowl, but because of the heat all anybody wanted to drink was water...can you believe that!?  After a few hours of laying around in pools of sweat, we got up and walked ourselves to the bowl.  After the sun started to go down, it transformed into the perfect Bowl night.  We got there in time to see most of Theivery Corporation, who put on a good show, although I was disappointed that David Byrne didn't show up to sign his part of "The Heart's a Lonely Hunter", but I guess you can't have it all.  All I can say is that the Lips were amazing.  We were really far back, so we couldn't see everything, but we could hear, so we were perfectly satisfied.  Nights like that one make me love LA.

The rest of this week has been pretty laid back.  Since all of my work responsibility is in Dubai, I have a bit of a hard time trying to occupy myself in the LA office.  I have been trying to help on other projects and stuff, so it's been nice to do something different that the routine I have in Dubai.  It's been good to have a loose schedule especially since I'm bus dependent now.  I made it to capoeira only a couple of times, but I paid my batizado fee, so I'm looking forward to that in September! 

Tonight Mon and I take off to Portland for the weekend mainly to visit Kate, but also to scope out the living and working situation up there for a possible move in the future.  My life is so up in the air right now, that I have no idea where I will be in a year, but my plan at this moment is to be in Portland.  We'll see...

Okay, I'm off!

I've been counting down the days until my next visit home, which is now 13 days away...yay!  I'm really busy at work so the time is flying by, even if it's stressful and tiring.  They have moved all of the architect's team and me into two rooms on the first floor of the trailor.  I share the smaller room with two girls.  I used to have a window right over my desk and now we have one window with the blinds shut because the sun shines on one of the girls' computer.  So I have no sunlight and the girls like the AC at about 60 degrees and it blows towards my small little corner.  I have to wear a jacket at work and I'm still cold.  Work has been getting more and more demanding and I've had to stay late at the office more and more.  It's actually not so bad, because I actually get work done, when nobody's around, plus I can turn the AC off.  The only thing is the mice....they come out at night, once it's quiet.  I don't really mind them, but I have been reading this book called Stolen Lives: Twenty Years in a Desert Jail, and there are rats that attack people!  The book is a memoir by Malika Oufkir who was put in jail along with her mother, 2 sister, 1 brother and 2 maids for a crime her father committed.  It's a really good book...the writing isn't anything exceptional, but the story is pretty amazing.  I also keep laughing at myself for my choice, but I would recommend it.  It's an Oprah book.  Okay...enough Oprah book plugs.

My last entry was after I went skiing (or maybe after my first snowboarding lesson...I can't remember), which was fun, but got pretty boring pretty quickly, so I took a snowboarding lesson on Sunday and I have another one today.  My first lesson was a beginner lesson that never left the bunny hill, which was fine by me, but I'm excited for the lesson today, because it's Level 1!  alright!  I'm taking my camera this time, because I know I'm long overdue to post some pics. 

I can't wait to be home in 2 weeks!!!!!  whoohooo!! 

Coming home is all I'm thinking about right now, so I'm afraid I don't have much to write about.  I will let you all know how my snowboarding lesson goes.  Ciao!

Ski Dubai

I've been really, really busy with work lately, plus there are some other consultants in town from Los Angeles, so I've been hanging out with them a lot.  Somewhere in there, I did find time to finally get down to Ski Dubai!  I went with one of the consultants and a friend's boyfriend who was in town.  I had seen Ski Dubai plenty of times, because it's at the mall that is closest to my house, so it's pretty hard to miss, but I had yet to step inside.  From the mall there is a two story atrium with restaurants all around so that you can watch all the skiers.  Actually, from the mall you can really only see the snow park which is really cute because it's all the people who haven't ever seen snow, so you get to watch them feel cold and play in the snow.  Plus there is a little hill with innertubes for sledding.

The facility is really nice, you buy this card and it serves as your locker key, equipment checkout, entrance ticket and lift ticket...it's all very high tech.  After you pay, you go pick up your snow pants, jacket, diposable socks and boots.  You go into a locker room and get dressed and then pick up your skis.  After you have all your gear you walk through a turnstyle and go up an escalator, which was sooo scary!  Getting onto moving steps made of sharp blades of metal with slippery, clumsy, plastic boots doesn't sound like a good idea to me, but my only other option was stairs, which didn't look especially safe either.  Needless to say, I made it up and down the escalator without incident.

Then there is a revolving door to get to the slope!  Once I stepped through, I was immediately shocked at how cold it acutally is.  Now I know that sounds like a no-brainer, but you really can't imagine how cold it is, when you're looking at it through glass from a nice, climate controlled atmosphere.  The best part was that you could see your breath!  It's been so long since I've been anywhere that cold!

We headed for the lift where your little card scans and opens a turnstyle for you and you get on the lift.  You can get off the lift about halfway up, which is the beginner's slope, or you can keep going to the top.  If you go to the top you have two directions...one is like a green and the other is maybe a blue.  We went down the "green" side for our first run and quickly moved on to the "blue".  The runs were pretty easy, but I have to say that the snow and the surface is pretty good!

The cool thing about the turnstyles at the lift are that they tell you how much time you have left, so you can compare from one run to the next and figure out how long a run takes.  We averaged about 7 minutes and I think about 5 are spent on the lift, 1 at the top chatting and taking pictures and the probably 1 minute, if that,  going down.  After about 5 runs, it gets a little bit old.  That's why I've decided Dubai is the perfect place to learn to snowboard!  I've signed up for a lesson this Monday...I'll let you all know how it goes.

I wish that I could say that I have pictures, but I'm waiting to get them from the guy I went with...hopefully I'll get them soon.


Every once in a while I have a really great Dubai experience.  Yesterday I was driving home a little bit later than normal and my drive home is along the outermost road of Dubai, so it's really like a highway.  It was right around sunset and all the big trucks were pulled over on the shoulder and the drivers would be beside their truck on their pray mats praying.  It's really beautiful to watch them pray.

I promise to post pics as soon as I can.

Last night was a sad night for me.  My best Dubai friend left for good :(  I'm very excited for her though...she's flying back to Dublin to meet up with the man of her dreams and then move to his new home in London.  As much as I'm happy for her, I don't know what I'm gonna do now!  Who will I go out with?  Who will I talk shit about Dubai with?  Who will I practice my Irish dancing with?

Yesterday I met up with her and we did some last minute souvenir shopping in Karama (the el cheapo shopping district) and then we had some really cheap but really good Indian food.  Of course we didn't plan the night very well, so we had a mad dash to her apartment to close her suitcase, stuff it in my car and dash to the airport.  We had a quick goodbye at the airport and of course I got emotional and started crying.  But like I said, I'm really excited and happy for her.  So I got home at about 11:00 and decided that I shouldn't be sad and that I should go out, so I met up with some co-workers and my roommate who were at the same bar.  I'm glad I got out and I had fun, but I do have to say it woulda been a million times more fun with Janet.

Okay....enough sadness.  Let's see....today is Friday and I am going to meet up with a woman from my office and we are going to go to Bur Dubai (neighborhood with lots of gold/fabric/Indian stuff shopping) and she is going to take me to fabric stores so that I can pick out fabrics for her sister to make me Indian style tops.  She is Indian and she told me that if I go alone I will not get the right price for the fabric, so she is going to help me.  That should be fun:) 

It's freakin hot out and I'm getting cabin fever.

1.  All the locals have big white SUVs with totally blacked out windows, sometimes even including the windsheild!  I've found out that the car has to be registered to a woman for the windows to be completely blacked out...like an extension of the veil.  Either there is some way around that, or all the men register the cars in their wives names....probably both are true.

2.  In the Gulf News, every day or week, I’m not sure how often, the have a section on the second page called Crash of the Week.  It’s a photo of the worst accident in the city for that day or week.  Nest to the photo, there are stats like Number of Deaths, Number of Injuries, Traffic Impact, Cause of Accident, Cost of Damage, etc.   I haven’t decided how I feel about this yet…in one respect I think it’s really good for people to see the actually accident and see what horrific consequences can come from bad driving, but on the other hand I think the way it’s presented makes it look like a baseball card and you could collect them and see who has the most deaths and injuries…it’s more of a spectacle than a serious subject.

3.  Leave it to me to not realize there are traffic cameras all along the roads on which I regularly speed.  And the worst part is that since there are no mailing addresses you only find out if you have penalties when you go to register your car!  I want to know how it is supposed to curb speeding when you don’t get a penalty until a year later?  I’ve never seen the cameras flash, so I don’t know if I’ve ever bee caught.  I also don’t know how sensitive it is….I mean you could be going 1 kilometer over the speed limit or 30….I have no idea how much it takes to get a ticket.  So now I’m really worried that I owe thousands in fines…ugh.

4.  I have yet another driving related headache to look after.  Apparently if your rental car gets even a scratch or dent on it you have to call the police and file a report.  I did get a dent in my car like the third week here, but didn’t know about this rule.  I was parked, went to a movie came out and had a dent on my hood.  I know that there was a white monster of an SUV parallel parked facing my car, so I’m pretty sure he pulled forward, banged my car, didn’t think anything of  denting my little dinky Peugot and took off.  So I have to go  park somewhere and call the cops to report it...what a pain.

Wish me luck!

In order to get the trips home that I wanted, I have to do a 10 week stint here, of which I have 50 days left!  If you enter the UAE on a tourist visa, then you get 60 days and you can pay a fee for a 30 day extension, or you can leave the country and re-up your tourist visa for another 60 days.  I knew that I would have to do one of the options and I'd rather go to Oman than just pay a fee, so I seized the opportunity when Janet's parents and sister came to visit and wanted to go to Oman! 

The trip didn't go exactly as planned, but it wasn't really planned, so that's not saying much.  I have a halfday on Thursdays which Janet doesn't, but she was gonna leave early so that we could head out.  She ended up not being able to leave until about 4:30, so we didn't get on the road until 5 or 5:30.  We didn't really know what we were doing, we just followed the signs to Oman.It took about 2 hours to get to the border where you have to make several stops to get and exit visa, get Omani insurance, get an entry visit, save little scraps of paper to give men with guns later...you know, the usual.  It took a while, but we got through it and headed on to Muscat, until we realized that it was another 3 or so hours to get there (Janet and I didn't do much research before we left).  So we saw signs to a place called the Sohar Beach Resort, so we decided to head for it.  I knew we had chosen the right place when I picked up a matchbook with the town motto, "Sohar, So Good!" written on it. 

The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful, but I had a great time with Janet, her sister Laura and their parents. 

I will upload the pics on Saturday because I left them on my computer at work...sorry!

Weekend, for reals!

Great news everyone...in September the UAE is transitioning from a half Thursday/Friday weekend to a Friday/Saturday weekend!!  Now, I am getting a little ahead of myself, because I haven’t actually found out if this applies to me.  The change is for government entities and schools, and I work for a private development company so who knows.

Eureka!  

Did you know that almost anything grows in sand?  I didn’t.  When I moved into the villa, my roommates were attempting to grow a lawn in the backyard which was basically a large children’s sandbox.  Aside from my environmental beliefs that one should not try to grow grass and other water-guzzling flora in the middle of the desert, I just didn’t believe that the grass would grow.  But now, amazingly, we need a lawnmower!  It would actually be nice to lie in a soft field of grass on a scorching day, but our lawn does have its downfalls.  Yes we have grass, but the sand (and rocks) that were underneath did not just disappear, so when you walk with bare feet it’s very hard and rocky and not very comfortable at all!  I was looking forward to being able to practice capoeira out there, but I’m afraid I’ll land on a lump of hard sand and hurt myself.  I would’ve rather we pave the area so that we could at least utilize the space….no one even spends time back there except to water the grass.  

The grass experience made me realize that all the landscaping I see is done in sand!  I can’t believe it.  There are flowers, bushes, trees….everything.  I did see some workers lay a thin layer of soil once, but it’s sand right underneath!  I am impressed by the ability for plants to grow in sand, but I also thing that it probably creates a huge waste of water.  I just image the water running straight through the sand, instead of absorbing it, so they just overwater like crazy.  This is all just my hunch….no real knowledge about any such things…so I could be completely wrong and sand may be a very common and very good planting material!

Roundabout madness!

I used to think of roundabouts as a quirky little British export, but it turns out they are no-foolin around, cut-throat, intersection madness.  The roundabouts provide me with a much needed daily dose of adrenaline to liven up my day and I think I am rather adept at maneuvering my way through them. Once you get in the circle, it’s a no holds barred fight to get to where you want to go…no lanes, no signals, just the hope and determination to make it across.  I don’t know exactly know why the traffic light system was vetoed.  Again, I am just an observer and have absolutely no expertise in the subject of traffic management, but the roundabouts don’t seem to be helping at all!  The chance of an accident in those things is sooooo high! I go through three major, 4 lane roundabouts each way to work and I always see at least one accident.  They’re usually just fender benders but they totally stop traffic.  The roundabouts go hand in hand with the abundant use of the U-turn here…but that’s another blog.

Happy Birthday Amanda!  

For those of you who don’t know…it’s Manda’s birthday today!  I’m sending her a mental hologram of an Angel Food birthday cake with a little bit of homemade frosting and strawberries.  Mmmmm, it’s good.  Dig in!

Ciao for now!

I am in New York on a layover on my way back to Dubai after a wonderful 10 days in Los Angeles.  I was very good to be home, but made it very apparent that my life in LA is so much more enjoyable and fulfilling than my life in Dubai.  Don't worry though, that doesn't mean that my life there is bad it just means I live the good life in LA and am a little spoiled by it.  The night I got in my company had a little party at a swanky bar downtown, and although a lot of people couldn't make it, it was tons of fun.  I had almost no jet lag and so I went to work the next day and quickly fell into my usual routine (that's a good thing).  I did as much capoeira as I could while I was home and Mon and I got some 6 Feet Under watching in and of course some good nights out.

I am not totally excited to be back in Dubai, especially because work is getting tougher and the weather is heating up, but this is the long haul.  I just have to make it until July 20th, which is my next trip home, then I go back for August, then I'm home for 2 weeks in September and then I'll be home at the end of October!  So this will be my longest stint there and it just happens to be in the dead of summer....the absolute worse time to be in Dubai.  It's like Palm Springs with humidity....ugh!  Another great thing about being home was that in being away from Dubai, I gained more perspective on what the interesting things are about the place and what people want to hear about.  So hopefully my entries will get a little more interesting.

I will try to write again soon!

In my office and in most offices in Dubai, we employ what I call an office assistant, but what most people refer to as a "tea boy".  His job is basically to get tea or coffee for everybody, especially when there is a meeting.  Our assistant is named Raj; he's from Nepal and he's great.  Yesterday Raj decided that the office should all go out to celebrate this guy Eddie who got married about two weeks ago.  So he organized it and at 7:30 we all met up at a hotel and had dinner together.  It was very interesting.

Raj lives at one of the camps on site for the workers, so one of the guys from the office took him to his camp to drop him off to get ready and then picked him up later to go out.  Raj was so proud that he was going out with us that he had all his friends there to see him get picked up buy this Scottish guy in a nice car.  When I got to the restaraunt Raj was already a bit tipsy and he was soooo happy, or as he said "too much happy".  After dinner some of us went on to a pub to have some more drinks and I learned from a project manager that Raj only makes 800 dirhams/222 dollars a month and that he's saving up 20,000 dirhams/5,555 dollars which is what he needs to buy a house in Nepal.  We all just threw down like 2000 dirhams for dinner...I just can't imagine what Raj thinks of that.  Anyway, one of the guys said when this job is over he wants to get together a gift for him, so hopefully he can go back to Nepal, buy a house and go back to teaching school, which is what he's educated to do.

Stories like that make it really hard for me to like Dubai.  I know that these things happen in a lot of places, I can't change the world, etc., but Dubai is so advanced.  I mean, I guess even "developed nations" have these kinds of problems.  In Los Angeles I see illegal immigrants getting paid less than minimum wage all the time, not that I think it's okay, but I guess I'm just used to it.  It's all depressing.

On a happier note....I will be home in less than a week!!!!  I'm very excited.  Although, my work organized a night out at the Standard downtown, but they scheduled it for Thursday night and I won't be there until Friday!  I'm bummed about that, but c'est la vie.  I'm just excited to see everyone. 

Addendum: Per my mother's request I have now proofread this entry and have corrected my spelling errors.  At least I hope I did or I'll never hear the end of it.

I finally have a place to live!  I had a couple of options going, but I found a rommate situation with two other girls and just decided to take it.  My other options would have had a year lease and the places would have been totally unfurnished.  Unfurnished in Dubai means absolutely nothing....no stove, fridge or anything.  So it would have ended up being a lot more money.  My current situation is perfect because it's a 3 bedroom villa (townhouse) that is already furnished by the girl whose name is on the lease and it's month to month, so it's a huge money saver and it's not a huge commitment.  It's the perfect situation.  However, it is in a big housing development which I despise, but I'm begining to understand why people live in these places...because you never have to leave!  In fact, I don't want to leave.  I have everything right here and the thought of driving all the way back out to civilization sounds so daunting.  This could be a dangerous move for me...I might buy a marry an accountant, have 3 children and buy a minivan, oh my!

oh!  so I put up pictures from my desert safari!  That was fun.  Very touristy, but very fun.  You just drive like crazy over sand dunes, go to a camel farm, and then end up at a fake Bedouin (native tribe) village and have dinner.

Well, I've been really busy at work, which has been really nice.  The engineer from my company was out for several days, so I was busy going to meetings with him.  He was able to answer a lot of questions that I haven't been able to provide, so it was a relief to be able to finally get some questions answered.  Now it's back to normal...busy but pretty bored.

On Thursday I was invited to go with Janet to the Kinnarps Cup; a polo match/tournament sponsored by her company.  It was everything I expected it to be...and more!  Super snobby expats all over the place!  It was actually great fun.  I enjoyed watching the polo...the horses were beautiful and it was pretty exciting.  It was open bar (yessss!) and after the match there was an awesome buffet for everbody (double yessss!).  Aside from feeling like a total imposter, it was fun.

After that Janet and I went to a club with one of her clients and a friend of his.  We went to Trilogy, which is a hot shit nightclub here and there was a big name act called Deep Dish there so the lines were crazy!  I am not a line person, so I was ready to bolt, but Eric (Janet's client) just waved to a doorman, he handed him 4 tickets and we walked around to the side and were in in about 30 seconds.  I was totally impressed.  We walked in and immediately ran into our friend from Capoeira, Trad.  We had a great time dancing for hours...it was a nice change, although I'm not sure my ears can handle that all the time.  When we got home I really missed Monica, cause I wanted to go to Morrie's (our corner pizza place in LA) and get a slice and go home and watch 24 (our Saturday night ritual). 

Friday I went on a quest with Chris (my other rommate/capoeira teacher) to find the perfect croissant (he had a craving).  The problem is that nothing is open!  We went to about 5 places which were either closed or deemed unacceptable by Chris.  We finally found a place and he packed away 6 croissants for breakfast!  I stuck to my usual yogurt, banana and granola.  yummy...

In the afternoon we had the usual capoeira class in the park...which is my favorite time of the week.  Fridays here are spent with family and friends and a lot of people come to the park and spend the whole day there.  People set up tents and barbeques, eat, play games, smoke sheesha, fly kites and just hang out.  It's a really great vibe.  It reminds me of the summer in Monument Valley Park when the symphony would play.  Playing capoeira causes a bit of a crowd to gather; most people are just curious, but some people laugh or want to film us, but Chris is very good at telling them to buzz off.  I think the best part of the day is when the sun goes down and the mosques are calling people to prayer.  Some of the guys in capoeira will do their prayers in the park, and I just think it's so cool that they take it seriously and feel comfortable enough around us to do it. 

We're having a crazy sandstorm today...total white out...dust everywhere.

Pics to follow...

Not much has happened since the World Cup.  I'm quickly becoming bored with my job and feeling in over my head (Tom, forget you read that!).  Oh, let me explain...you see this is the problem with having friends at work.  You want them to read your blog because they are your friends, but then you realize there may be some conflicts of interest.  I've decided to be truthful though, and they can do what they will with the information.

That being said, I should also say that I like my job in LA, but in Dubai I work with different people (harsh and arrogant 50-60 year old men) and have different duties (write transmittals and deal with the worst buraucracy in the world!).  I'm trying to look at the bright side (great for the resume, living in a foreign country, meeting people from all over the world) and ignore the bad stuff (job, living in a more expensive place than LA, living in a country and industry that has a history of human rights violations, having a 1 day weekend, having to eat at the IKEA cafeteria everyday)...but it can be a bit daunting.

I am running again and doing capoeira (I miss my LA group!) so at least I'm keeping active.  Mon and I are trying to figure out a race to do so that we can train and then on one of my visits back, run a race.  We had been wanting to go to Alaska and do the Midnight Sun Run, but I think that'll have to wait until next year.  The Bay-to-Breakers was also top on our list, but I'm coming home in April, so I don't think I'll be able to come home in May. 

I'm really excited to come home in April, but not because I'll see my family and friends ...but because the last season of 6 Ft. Under is out!!!!!  I can't wait to see it.  I've been totally successful at remaining completely in the dark about what happens, so don't say anything!

I had a great photo-op the other day on my way to work and I pulled out my camera and my battery was dead.  I was driving in and I was behind this huge, grimy, gross 18 wheeler truck but on the back in the middle on this rubber flap thing, someone had spraypainted "Love Is Blind"...a little bit chessy, but I thought it was great.  I promise I'll get more pics up soon...as soon as I charge my battery, which is harder than you'd think, with converters and such.

 

Yesterday I got to go to the richest horse race in the world.  Of course there is no betting, just prize money.  I went with a coworker and his wife, but met some cool Brits that were my age, so ended up hanging out with them all night.  It was great because two of them are journalists, so they had press passes and we got into some VIP areas (free food and drink...yay!).  The horses were beautiful and exciting and all, but the real show was the fashion...I've never seen so many crazy, extravagent dresses and hats in my whole life.  They have competitions for best dressed people...it's crazy.  You are all going to hate me because I have like 3 pictures of the whole night.  It's horrible and I'm ashamed of myself.  It was very cool to be a part of such a major social event in Dubai, but it did kinda make my sick by the end of it all.  At midnight, when it was closing up, there were a tons of overly tanned blonde women sloppy drunk and dancing on tables in their fancy dresses...it was a little depressing, not that I have a problem with a good party. 

So today I'm really tired at work and can't wait until I can leave...but what's new.  Just kidding, it's not bad...just a little boring. 

Have I mentioned that I eat lunch every day at Ikea?  Ikea is the only thing that's open on site and they have a cafeteria so it where most people go.  We do have a company canteen, but the atmosphere is not quite up to the standard of Ikea.  I need to start bringing my own lunch...I've gained weight since being here, and that has to stop.

Okay...best be getting back to work....talk to y'all later!

Initially I started this thing not to be a blog really, but just a place to post pictures of what I'm doing so that I wouldn't have to do all this writing.  Turns out, that as technologically advanced as this country is, the internet is totally unreliable; some days it's fine, some days it's slow, some days you can get on that website, other days it's censored, etc.  So for the last two days, the mysterious Dubai internet has decided it doesn't want me to upload any photos, so I'll just have to wait until it comes around and warms up to me and write in the meantime.  Maybe I did something to make it mad...who knows!

Well, not much else has been happening with me.  I'm doing capoeira, Janet and I have been going to the tailor's to get a bunch of stuff made, I started running again (finally!) and work is work.  I do have to say that as little as that may sound, it ends up taking a lot of time!  By the time I do an errand after work, excersize and eat, it's already midnight!  I don't know how that happens.  In LA I am usually asleep by 11 or 11:30, but here it just seems impossible. 

The engineer for my company is coming and I'm really excited...haha, that just sounds ridiculous.  I'm just so excited to have someone from home around.  He's just a pleasant guy to be around, plus he really knows his shit so we can go to meetings and I can just sit back and let him handle everything.  He was supposed to come this week, but I think it's been pushed to next week.  Oh well. 

I'll get pics up as soon as Internet Explorer and I kiss and make-up.  So long!

My one day off is so precious, I try to jam pack as many things into as I possibly can.  Janet and I went out to breakfast, did a little grocery shopping, tried to lay out by the pool, but there was a sandstorm, so that didn't work out too well, went to the textile souk and a tailor, then finished up the night at the Irish Village. 

First the sandstorm...I'm staying in a 30 story building and the swimming pool is on the roof.  We went up there to lay out, but the moment we got up there, the wind picked up.  It was pretty amazing...I was sitting in a lounge chair and I could feel the wind trying to flip the chair.  Even just standing up, you could feel it push you off balance.  The view around was just a beige cloud.  They shouldn't really call it a sandstorm, it should be called a dust storm, because it is such fine particles in the air.  I remember being at the Sand Dunes in CO in a real sandstorm, where your skin was literally getting sandblasted...it was painful.  Here it's just strong wind + superfine sand = dustcloud.  This morning I came into my office and everything was covered in a very fine layer of dust from the "weekend".

The textile souk is awesome!  It's a Hindu Indian neighborhood full of costume jewelry, fabric shops, and tailors.  Janet and I went into a tailor shop and spent about 2 1/5 hours there looking at fabric, planning outfits and placing orders.  She brought in a picture of a dress she wants made to wear to her sister's wedding, so that will be a custom job.  Mostly what they do is Indian style clothes, so I ordered two tops and a pair of simple drawstring pants and I bought a shirt that they had, but had them alter it to fit me a bit better.  He were helped the whole time by an adorable Indian guy...he even took us to a notions shop a couple blocks away to pick out custom trim for our shirts.  It was so much fun just to hang out and look at all the fabrics and different styles of clothes.

After we were done there we walked over to the creek and got a water taxi (Abra) over to the other side and then got a cab to the Irish Village.  When we got there they wanted 70 dirhams (20 bucks) just to get in, that didn't even include any drinks or anything!  So went and had dinner at a tapas restaraunt next door.  At least I wore green, drank some Jameson and hung out with an Irish girl!  We sat outside on these cool bed type things with a table in the center until it started raining and we moved inside.  It's the first and probably last rain I'll see in Dubai! 

Back to housing....today I'm going to look at a villa to share with two other girls, one English, one German.  It's in a great location, it's a villa, I'll have my own bathroom and it's the cheapest option yet...so I'll let you know how it goes.  Actually that were I have to head right now...talk to you all later!

 

In a major turn of events that unfortunately resulted in my losing about a grand, we are no longer getting the villa that I was so excited about.  I'm really, really bummed and am a little depressed at the thought of looking for another place.   The girl that said she would sign the lease and then backed out after we put the deposit down.  I know everybody probably expected this and I should've been more careful, but the housing market here is such that it makes you do crazy things just for a good price.

Today was the first day that I really questioned being here, which is kinda pathetic given that is only been about 2 weeks since I left.  The search for housing is such a daunting task that it really makes me not like it here.  Plus I went into work and was overloaded with emails, hounded by a bitchy project manager that wants something that I don't know if I can deliver and had to stay late on my "weekend".  I don't know if everybody knows this but the weekend here is Thursday afternoon and Friday.  That's it.  I get to sleep in one day a week!!!!!  Actually I think that's the thing that makes me not like it here the most.  Especially because most other companies give Friday and Saturday off.  I definitely should've negotiated that before I came here, after all I am still employed by an American company.  While I'm at it, I'll complain about one more thing...it's sooo expensive here!  I came here thinking I might actually be able to save money....HA!

Okay...on another note...I had my first big Muslim experience.  It was in capoeira and we were doing partner excersizes and I was left with this local guy, but when I walked toward him he kinda started looking around and getting fidgety.  I knew what was going on, but didn't really know what to do about it, but then Chris (my capoeira teacher) nodded at a guy to go with him and the girl he was with went with me.  I wasn't really offended, but it was strange.  I wish I had a better understanding of what the "rules" were.

Well, with such a downer entry, here are a couple good things about Dubai:

1.  The natural Flamingo reserve I drive by everyday going to and from work.

2.  Prayer calls from the mosques; it makes this place seem a little more exotic.

3.  Dates....the fruit, not the kind with boys, unfortunately.

That's all I can think of today.

I'll write again soon and I promise pictures are coming, I just forgot the cord to download them today at work.

We did it!  Janet, Chris and I put a deposit down on a "villa".  A villa here is equivalent to a townhouse in the States, so you share walls on two sides.  It's great though, I'm spending less than I've been alotted by my company (the Marina apartment was quite a bit over budget) and I get the master bedroom, which has a balcony with a view of the Emirates towers and the port which has a gigantic UAE flag flying.  It's a three bedroom place and we each have our own bathrooms en suite!  There is even a maid's room with a bathroom as well.  We have a huge dining room and living room, a pretty big kitchen and a little back patio area.  Hopefully we'll be in by the end of the week, but it all depends on how fast we can get our money.  Anyone should feel free to visit...we have the space!

My bag did finally get to me, but only yesterday.  I got really freaked out because Emirates said they delivered it to my hotel already, but my hotel was saying they didn't have it!  I was livid.  After many phone calls and some effort by the concierge, we figured out that it was at the other Metropolitan Palace...who knew!  Anyway, they went and picked it up for me and everything is fine.  It was very exciting opening it, because I had forgetten what exactly was in there, so it was a surprise.

I did get my camera charger and it is juicin' up as I type...I promise to get pictures up ASAP.

I wanna give a shout out to my sistah, cause I left her off an email, so I have to redeem myself...now let's see if she reads this, eh?

And Grandpa...I'm so excited you're reading this!  I love you and can't wait to see you again!

Love you all,

Doll