It’s time for another episode of weird toys. Interest Chicken, who ends up being not very interesting, and a lion with a bunny in his mouth.
Archive for November, 2009
Dubai Tour 4
November 28, 2009
From the Deira side of the Creek we took an abra (small boat taxi) to the Dubai Heritage Village which is near the mouth of the Creek in an area of Dubai known as Shindhaga. This was a residential area and pearl diving area. By the time we arrived, most of the village was closed for the evening, but this one woman was still making traditional foods. She made a traditional flat bread and dessert balls that are simlar to plain donuts that are served with sesame seeds and a syrup. We enjoyed watching the technique and enjoyed tasting the breads.
Dubai Tour 3
November 27, 2009
Welcome to the Gold Souk. This is the old gold souk. There is a new gold souk across the Creek in Bur Dubai.
Jewelry of every kind is to be had, for a price.
Golden bracelets galore.
The stores stretch for a significant distance. Next up – abra ride to Dubai Heritage Village.
Dubai Tour 2
November 27, 2009
Once we climbed down out of the bus, we crossed the street to the spice souk. As you can see, the students dressed all in black look very similar, so I made a point of noticing what the handbag of my assigned guide looked like, so I wouldn’t get lost.
The seller was happy to show us his wares. The smell was heavenly. Wish I could capture that digitally for you.
Not all the shops have spices. The wares vary. This is a textile shop with lovely fabric and clothes. From here we proceeded to the gold souk, so that will be in the next post.
Dubai Tour 1
November 26, 2009Last Monday evening we went on a tour of Dubai that was organized and conducted by some of the college students for the “newbie” staff. Not all the newbies opted to go, so there were openings for others and we jumped at the chance. Our first stop was along the Creek. A crowd of 14 Emirati women and about that many staff members drew a bit of attention. These boatmen were staring at us, so I figured I could take a picture of them. So there!
Henna
November 26, 2009
I got my first henna designs. These are temporary and will fade in about 2 weeks. Islam forbids permanent changes to the body, like permanent tatoos, but temporary decoration is very common and popular. Women do this for special occasions – holidays and weddings. Wedding preparations usually include a “henna day” about three days before the wedding in which the women gather at the bride’s house and have henna designs applied. Comparable to a bachelorette party without the stupid, humiliating games. Anyway, I am not attending any weddings. This was part of the National Day celebrations at the college. National Day isn’t until Dec 2nd, but we had celebrations because college will be closed until after National Day. 
Palm tree?
November 22, 2009Take a good look at this palm tree. Anything unusual about it?
This tree is not only far taller than any other tree in town. It’s trunk is perfectly even and tapered. This is an artificial palm tree, probably disguising a cell phone tower. There are cell phone towers and antennas all over the place, none of which have been disguised or hidden, so why this one?
In The News Again, Again
November 22, 2009Posted by DaddyBird
Our friends at Wild Peeta Fusion Shawarma Restaurant are helping to promote men’s health and fight prostate cancer by participating in the annual “Movember” event. They started a team called “Bu Shanab”, which basically means “the daddy of all mustaches”. They arranged for an interview about the subject with one of the local newspaper, so we went to lend our support. (I’m glad we did, especially since not a lot of other members of the team could make it that evening.)
As usual we had a great time at Wild Peeta with Mohammad and Peyman, the brothers who founded it, and several other friends on the team, all of whom we’ve met through Twitter.
There are other Movember teams and activities going on in Dubai this month, both for raising awareness as well as funds. As the article states, unfortunately there aren’t any men’s health organizations here in the UAE, so the funds raised will have to go to groups that support the cause elsewhere.
Read the article from the Gulf News here:
http://gulfnews.com/news/gulf/uae/general/tache-the-way-to-highlight-causes-1.530166
Find out more about the Movember event here: http://www.movember.com/
Christmas is coming
November 21, 2009First, let me apologize for the crappy, blurry quality of this photo. Most stores don’t want people taking pictures in their store (you might be a retail spy), so I try to do it on the sly and usually end up with a blurry mess.
We went to Ace (they don’t bother calling it Ace Hardware here) and Christmas decorations were out in full force. There were some of the usual colors – red, gold, silver, etc., but there were also large amounts of black and brown ornaments. Not only that, there were brown and black artificial trees.
The one on the right is a light brown, the exact color an evergreen tree turns when it dies. Why would anyone want that?
Stationery
November 18, 2009
Near our apartment there is a stationery store. There, unfortunately, aren’t any lovely little sets of paper designed for writing letters with matching envelopes. There are however, scads of blank books. This entire aisle is nothing but blank books AND there is another aisle next to it full of blank books. These books seem to be used heavily in schools. I rarely see the loose leaf, three ring binder paper that is used in American schools.
Anyway, these blank books call to me and I want to buy them, but I know that my brain will draw a blank about what to write in them. I am not driven to write and am not a poet. The fact that I’ve written as much as I have on this blog is astonishing, because I have never been a diary keeping type of person or driven to publicize my life.
If only I could buy a blank book and write the great American novel.
Living the Travel Channel 