h1

Palm Island

February 20, 2010

A few weeks ago we had the opportunity to go to a party at a villa on the Jumeirah Palm Island. Our friends Lara and Terry are on a one year adventure they are calling GranTourismo. They’ve combined their career as travel writers with HomeAway Holiday Rentals and are traveling around the world this year spending two weeks in each destination. Their first stop was in Dubai on the Palm, then to London, then to Marrakesh, then ???? If you like good pictures, good food, and good travel advice, you should follow their blog.

First let me say, our twitter friend Grace did a better job of documenting this party on her blog (than I am about to do). So, I recommend that you click here and read what she said and check out her pictures. Also, there is an entry by Terry detailing the food served and you can click here to read that. Extra points for those of you find us in the pictures on both the blogs.

Here are my pictures:

villa on the Palm IslandThis is the villa on Frond E. It is a five bedroom home with a lovely kitchen, dining room, living room and den. (Five and a half bathrooms, by the way.)

beachThis is the view toward the stem of the Palm.

beach

beachThis is the view toward the end of the fronds. It was atypically stormy. It didn’t actually rain, but was cool, cloudy and breezy.

cell tower disquised as a palm treeThere was a nearby cell phone tower disguised as a palm tree. Notice the fake dates hanging in the fake tree.

close up of fake palmIt was a beautiful evening with (in our opinion) perfect weather, good friends, and good food. We may never have another reason to go out onto the Palm, but at least we can say we’ve been there.

h1

One More Picture

February 19, 2010

birthday partyI tried to stand far enough back to get everyone in the picture.

[In DaddyBird’s defense, we started out sitting together, but as the group grew, he mingled. We ended up sitting next to each other. As for my birthday, I don’t know what we will do, yet.]

h1

DaddyBird’s Birthday Party

February 17, 2010

Posted by DaddyBird

Last night, to celebrate my birthday, we had a dinner at my favorite restaurant, Aroos Damascus, with a number of our Dubai friends, most of whom we have gotten to know through Twitter. We had a great turnout, including ourselves 30 people showed up over the course of the evening, and it was a really wonderful time. Aroos Damascus serves very delicious Syrian-style Arabic food, and has a large menu, so there’s plenty of choice. The staff there is always very helpful and kind. I like getting people to visit this restaurant with us, but it can be difficult coaxing some to our part of town since the traffic can be very heavy coming this direction in the evenings. So last night, it was a particular thrill to have so many of many favorite people together at one of my favorite places.

Aroos Damascus has a large outdoor seating area which is very popular, and always full in the evenings when the weather is nice. We managed to monopolize several tables for our large group. It was a lovely way to spend a birthday evening!

Here are a few pictures taken by our friends at the party:

Our friend Mahdi took this picture of me, along with (part of) Muhammed Ali, Wajiha and Money:

Micheline had several picture to contribute, capturing much of our group:

Here’s Micheline herself flanked by Muhammed Ali and Ritesh:

h1

DSF Carnival

February 17, 2010

We are currently in the midst of the annual Dubai Shopping Festival. Last Saturday night, we were at a “tweet up” dinner at Al Mallah on Al Diyafah Street and this is the carnival (parade) that came by.

Yes, those are walking shopping bags and a drill team with shopping bags instead of pom-poms.

h1

KL Flora pt2

February 10, 2010

pink bloom

tree

closeup of tree trunk

lavendar blooms on a vine

closeup of lavendar bloom

white bloom with multiple petals and a yellow star shaped center

small white bloom

yellow iris-like bloom

h1

KL Flora

February 9, 2010

First, let me correct a slight faux pas in the previous post. DaddyBird did go to France, since he landed in Nice in order to get to Monaco, but Monaco is a separate country and not IN France. Some of you may remember that Grace Kelly was the Princess of Monaco. Silly me, I should have remembered.

Now, back to Kuala Lumpur for the flora. I’ll let them speak for themselves.

banana plant

blue flower

bougainvillea

purple clover-like blooms

pink flower

vibrant green leaves

red hibiscus

red hibiscus

orange blooms with striped leaves

red stemmed palm bushes

h1

DaddyBird goes to France

February 7, 2010

two cats in a suitcase As you can see, the cats are being very helpful getting DaddyBird packed. Where is he going you ask? To Monaco, where else? And, yes, Oliver, Bert and I are left behind, green with envy. Okay, I’m the only one who is envious. Oliver and Bert are just freaked out.

This is a business trip. DaddyBird is representing Shufflegazine at a trade conference. Hopefully, he will have a little time to get out and about and take a few pictures for us.

I haven’t quite finished posting the pictures from KL, so there may be a mishmash of posts in the next week or so.

h1

KL Signs Two

February 2, 2010

purse snatching warning signSo, some ask if it was safe in KL. There are warnings about purse snatchers and pickpockets, but we did not see or experience any theft. DaddyBird walked through the neighborhood late at night and felt safe. pick pocket warning signI was concentrating on taking this picture and DaddyBird was wondering where I had wondered off to. I didn’t see him in the photo until later.
Air Asia advertisement about DubaiApparently, Dubai is everywhere and you can’t escape it. This is an AirAsia advertisement in the central train station.
McDonalds advertisement for the double prosperity burgerWe were tempted to break our “no McDonalds” rule and have the double prosperity burger, but we ran out of time and were eating a lot of other food, as you have seen previously.
burger advertisement indicating it is 90% pure meatThis is the banner ad for the messy burger (in Day 3 post). Notice that it is 90% pure meat. Not sure what the other 10% might be and I’m not asking.
restaurant sign with Mickey Mouse on itHere we have an unauthorized use of Mickey. I’m not sure why he has green gloves on, but it is probably best not to think too hard about it.
bathroom sign asking people not to squat on top of the toilet seatNow, we get to a cultural difference item. There were normal public toilets with the bowl, tank, seat, etc., and there were squat toilets, basically a small basin in the floor that flushes over which one squats. The public toilets on the street were kind enough to have both and signage so you would know what you were getting. However, apparently some who are used to squatting attempt to do this with standard toilets — hence the need for this warning sign. (And, yes, this particular toilet had footprints on the seat.)sign on stairs in airport stating "no entry for authorized personnel only"Our last sign was in the airport. I think there was supposed to be a comma or break in there somewhere. Ah, the importance of punctuation!

h1

KL Signs

February 1, 2010

restaurant sign with emblem of a chefLet’s start with obligatory restaurant chef image. This one is giving a big thumbs up, which is fine if that is a good thing in your culture.
Nafertetty store signNext, we have a version of Nefertiti. In Dubai, we’ve seen many spelling variations of this, too. Considering that Eqyptians of that period wrote in pictures/hieroglyphs, spelling is all arbitrary anyway.
Mr. Paint Man signHe’s not just Mr. Paint, he’s Mr. Paint Man!
Hypershoe shoe storeWhen you don’t want just any ol’ shoe, you want a hypershoe.
Fun N Cheer restaurantEat at the Fun N Cheer restaurant. Always a good time!
Seven eleven store and K K super martThere were 7Elevens everywhere. In Dubai, our running joke is “look! a mosque!” In KL, it was “hey, a 7Eleven!” We are also glad that the K K Super Mart, stopped at just two K’s.
Reject Shop signReject Shop, that’s appealing, isn’t it?

With that I will take a break. More pictures of signs to come.

h1

KL Day Six

January 27, 2010

Our last day in Kuala Lumpur we had to check out of the hotel by 10 am, but our flight was not until 7:30 pm, so we put our bags in storage and had some more fun. We still had 37% of the money we budgeted for the trip, so I went shopping! It was nearly impossible to find clothes our size, so we went into Gulati’s Silk House and bought 35 meters of various material (cotton, linen, satin, chiffon). I have my year’s worth of sewing cut out for me.
Then we took the train to the Central Market area. There was some amazing graffiti along the river. graffiti along the river in Kuala Lumpur
In the China Town area we came upon Petaling Street.
Kuala Lumpur China Town area, Petaling Street
It is lined with stalls selling cheap handbags, sun glasses, and illegal DVDs. We did not buy any of the above.
booths lining the street selling cheap handbags and sunglasses
We met up with Adrianna and Andrew for beef noodles.
bowl of beef, rice noodles and egg noodles
We each had a bowl of beef with rice noodles and egg noodles and a bowl of soup for a whopping 8RM each. (approx. $3.00)
bowl of broth and several types of beef meatIt was very tasty. I really like Cantonese cooking, because it is very savory without being spicy. Very yummy!

By this time it was afternoon and we needed to head to the train station to retrieve our luggage and get on the express train to the airport.