Just another day in Dubai – a guy pushing a cart down a major thoroughfare and jay walkers to boot. (We had just jay walked ourselves on our way to the wrestling.)
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Just another day in Dubai
November 7, 2009Kushti Wrestling
November 6, 2009We went to the Kushti wrestling again this afternoon (actually it happens just before sundown). 
The master of ceremonies/referee gets things started.
The wrestlers are volunteers from the audience. There are no dressing rooms, so they change clothes right on the spot.
They wrestle. We don’t know what the rules are, but were told after that it is decided by pinning the opponents back to the ground. (no three second count)
Someone wins (although the third match was a draw)
The winner makes the rounds of crowd who give him money. This is the only “prize” they receive.
We drew a bit of a crowd ourselves afterward. One of our friends knew enough of the language to ask a few questions.
Daddybird, the influencer
November 5, 2009According to Steve Vaile on his Social Media Middle East blog, Daddybird is #10 of the 15 most influential Dubai Twitterers. [Although, if this blog (Living the Travel Channel) is a factor, I have to take some of the credit for that, since of the 300 posts so far, Daddybird has authored around 5. (I didn’t go back and do an exact count.)]
He tweets about tea, our cats, Kushti wrestling, T-shirts gone wrong, great food, bad phone service, and whatever else occurs to him. He meets people who say “hey, we’ve been tweeting about your cats!” He’s leading an expedition this Friday to the wrestling. He’s advising Wildpeeta on the fine tuning of their brownies and jam. He’s a mover and a shaker. When I meet people, they say “you don’t tweet much.” I just say, “I’m with Daddybird.”
If only he could influence Oliver, we’d have it made.
Signs ‘n Stuff
October 31, 2009
My office has two doors. One leads out into the periodicals room and this is the door that is most frequently used. The other leads to a stairwell that is also the emergency exit. This door is always open, but posted on the back of it is the above sign.
Yes, it is actually called Safestway and it’s logo is below. (For those not in the U.S., there is an American grocery chain called Safeway and their logo is a big red S in a white square.)
All People Coffee and Cafeteria Shop
Konfidential Cuisine Restaurant
We’d tell you what’s on the menu, but it’s hush, hush.
More Manga Sushi
October 27, 2009Here are two news articles about Manga Sushi (five days apart and in the same newspaper – what’s that about? Slow news day?)
Sushi You – Khaleejtimes August 7, 2009
Emirati Serves Up a Taste of Japan – Khaleejtimes August 2, 2009
In a world of foreign franchises, it is nice to see a locally owned restaurant with a unique flavor. (Actually, if you’ve been reading this blog for very long, you know that prefer to eat at locally owned restaurants with unique flavor, as a rule. I didn’t mean to imply this was the only one. Sushi is unique in the locally owned realm, however. Some restaurants seem new to us, but they are just franchises from other countries. )
Bu Qtair
October 26, 2009Last week we met up with friends and completely new people we’ve never met before at Bu Qtair Cafeteria for lovely fried fish. There were about 18 people in our group. Tom Gara and Rami were having some kind of private hat contest. Tom is sporting a red fez these days. Rami wore a Russian army cap. Rami won the contest. Daddybird could have blown them both out of the water with his Viking hat, had he known. 
Rami is collecting money to pay for the meal, but it looks more like a Russian black market deal going down.
You might remember Bu Qtair from a post last June – https://livingthetravelchannel.wordpress.com/2009/06/11/buqtair/
Bookstore
October 25, 2009One thing that has been rare, until recently, in Dubai is good book stores. There are a few used bookstores, small Arabic book stores here and there, and one chain of stores that have new English books as well as some Arabic. But, when Dubai Mall opened so did Book World by Kinokuniya. It is HUGE. They have books on everything. I was able to get a couple of books on embroidery and beading. They have loads of English books, but also French, German, Japanese, etc. They have a large section of comic books & manga. I ventured into the language section and found a book on beginning Cherokee. How thorough is that?
Beginning Cherokee
Scary
October 24, 2009
When I first walked into the restroom, these sinks scared me. For a brief moment, I thought they were some strange urinals or toilets. Later, I asked Daddybird what he thought of the sinks and he had the same reaction.
Oliver-in-the-Box
October 24, 2009We recently received two of our boxes shipped from the States. (Christmas decorations, yeah! I had the Peanuts Christmas song in my head the whole time I was unpacking.) The kittens went crazy “helping” and smelling all the exotic smells on and in the boxes.
Once the boxes are emptied, they become the bestest toys.
Manga Sushi
October 23, 2009[Warning! Rachel, if you are reading this make sure you are sitting down and wearing flame retardant clothing. You might even want to have a fire extinguisher nearby. You might just burst into flame from pure envy.]
Manga Sushi
I stumbled upon an article in the online newspaper about a restaurant called Manga Sushi. We had to go check it out.
Manga Sushi chefs
Dragon Ball Z was playing on the big screen behind the sushi chefs.
The Menu
The menu included manga (Japanese comics, for the uninitiated) on each page. They also had a collection of manga novels on shelves and invited customers to read.
Green Tea Milkshake
This is Daddybird’s green tea milkshake dessert. Yummy! (I had a sip just to make sure.)
Stuffed Pear dessert
This is my stuffed pear dessert – Asian pear with blue berries, raspberries and black berries with a scoop of strawberry ice cream. Yummy, also, and you can even eat the dish, sort of.
The sushi was very tasty, too, but I did not take a picture. I was too busy eating it. (It took us a while to find the restaurant, so it was past dinner time and I was hungry!)
The Best Part – they play what seems to be their theme song and all the staff, including the chefs stop to dance. See for yourself:
Living the Travel Channel 