Iceberg!

Good day all! Sorry I missed a week posting- I was sicker than I thought and spent a lot of time on the couch nursing a head cold. But I'm back and ready to blog! I got a very early start today; there was a family dinner at my mom's for my sisters birthday. Because I am 9 hours ahead of Bamaland I had to get up a little before 4 am in order to Skype and see everyone. I got to see my mom and the rest of the family for the first time since March. I wept. Everyone looked great- my nephews, Jeremy and Jacob, are getting so big! Pam looked fabulous and Amy's smile brightened my whole day. Pam's husband, Jay, is wearing glasses now and he is still as good looking as ever- he wears the glasses, they don't wear him if you know what I mean (more of my left brained thinking!). Mom is more beautiful than ever. Ashley & Dara, my girls, were there, too and that was so cool. I was heart broken to be missing yet another family event; I feel like I'm missing so much, but I am grateful to be able to Skype and blog and still keep in touch with my family and friends. A very special thanks to my Angel, Dara, for bringing her iPad and making it possible. Because of your thoughtfulness, for a brief time the miles melted away and I was home.

Speaking of melting- So here I am in the apartment just minding my own business and I look out the window and much to my shock I see an iceberg floating in the Arabian Gulf- in June no less!! Jimmy  seriously thought I had finally gone off the deep end when he called and I told him. No, honey, really- there is an iceberg out there! OK, so it's its not a real iceberg- it's a huge pontoon like boat made to look like an iceberg. By the second day I was very curious what the heck this is all about! The community where I live, JBR, is on Facebook (who isn't!) so I got online and asked why there is an iceberg floating in the Arabian Gulf. Turns out it is part of the Coca Cola Brrr! campaign. Pepsi products are everywhere but Coke doesn't have that big a presence here. There are commercials and billboards with Omar Shariff and other local celebrities as part of the Brrr Coke is cold and refreshing campaign as well. You just never know what you will see next in Dubai! See for yourself-

First day of the iceberg. Zoomed from the balcony. No indication of what the heck this is!

Still first day. Zoomed from the balcony. Wouldn't you wonder?!

It's lit up at night! What is this all about!

Finally! Coca Cola Brrr! campaign! Pretty darn impressive! I took this from the balcony and zoomed for the pic but in person you can see it clearly and it is much larger.

I went down to the beach so I could get a pic showing the detail. It is floating within swimming distance of the beach but no one goes near it or bothers it. It is yet another example of how you just never know what may be next on The Walk!

Remember my post about the window washers? Well, they were working on the tower next to mine and I snapped a few pics.From this vantage point you get a better idea of how REALLY up high they are-



This is zoomed in big time. The Hilton is across the street.

This is still zoomed but not so much. They are on the way back to the top.The top part of the tower is a bit narrower so they are dangling about 30 feet away from the building and about 25 stories up with 20 more stories to go! That is the Hilton on the left. Like I said- I don't know how much they get paid for this but it's not enough for me!

We went to a co workers apartment for dinner Friday night. He lives on the marina side across the street so we could just walk to his apartment. I brought a homemade peach crisp- not my best effort but judging by the nearly empty dish it must have been pretty good.  Another co worker who lives in Abu Dhabi (1.5 hours away) came as well and stayed with us. We cooked out and got to socialize for a while and it was great. He had all the ingredients for Cosmo's so I played bartender all evening. We had a great time. Saturday morning the first co worker came over to our apartment and I got to make breakfast for the 3 guys while they talked business. My biscuits and gravy were a major hit! It was very cool to cook for a group again. I miss that, too.

Because I was under the weather this past week we didn't go anywhere except the grocery store so I don't have a lot to post this week. I want to thank the folks who have emailed and commented and supported my blog. Because I don't get a lot of comments I sometimes wonder if there is anyone out there in the blogashere. Turns out I have more people reading and keeping up than I thought. I am especially excited that I have a few international readers! So I'll keep posting and hope it stays fresh and entertaining enough to hold your interest and keep you checking in. Please feel free to let me know if anyone has anything in particular they want to know about.

Life in Dubai is still wonderful and beautiful. I really love it here and the lifestyle suits me. If I could just wiggle my nose and see my family and hug my beautiful girls it would be perfect. Thank you again, Angel, for making it possible to see everyone again. I miss you all very much and wish you all peace, love and happiness! J&M 

Off Day :(

Good day all! I'm a little under the weather so I will post the next exciting episode of Here Today, Dubai Tomorrow later this week (haha!). I want to give a quick shout out to Tammy- so cool to hear from you! And Crystal & Carole. So glad you lovely ladies are following! And Happy Fathers Day to all the dad's out there- you are all unsung hero's. I love you all- M&J

Getting High in Dubai!

There is only one way to get really high in Dubai and that is to visit the Burj Khalifa. Burj Khalifa is far and away the tallest building in the world. I won't bore you with a lot facts and figures- you can Google that yourself. But I will tell you that the Empire State Building is 443 meters tall; the Eiffel Tower is 324 meters tall; the Burj Khalifa is 828 meters tall. So you could put the Empire State Building on top of the Eiffel Tower and still have 61 meters to spare. For my American readers -there are 91 meters in a football field. Burj Khalifa is located in the heart of downtown Dubai and is connected to the Dubai Mall and The Fountains. There are numerous malls in Dubai- I have been to the Marina Mall, Mall of The Emirates, the Mercato Mall and the Dubai Mall. Lets just say these people LOVE their malls! Huntsville has two malls that are a small fraction of the size of the ones here. Also, I have never been to a mall here that isn't busy and full of people. It's almost like Christmas shopping traffic all the time but because they are so huge there is plenty of room to roam. Because this post is about the Burj Khalifa I will only write about the Dubai Mall which is the largest I've seen yet (Larger than the Mall of The Emirates!) and nothing short of spectacular. It boasts 1,200 shops to include  MAJOR fashion stores, trendy boutiques, access to Burj Khalifa, an aquarium- yup, a huge aquarium you can pay to tour however there is a magnificent two story viewing panel to see the sharks, stingrays and thousands of other marine life. And did I mention the olympic sized ice skating rink and Gold Souk? Jimmy and I were at Dubai Mall for several hours and saw maybe 25% of it. We went through the Gold Souk and Fashion Avenue. The entrance fee to Burj Khalifa is $100 AED if you buy your ticket for a later tour i.e. buy your ticket in the morning and tour later that day or the next day. If you want immediate entry the fee is $400 AED! As usual we had no specific plan and just showed up at the counter. We told the gentleman we wanted $100 AED tickets and would come back tomorrow if necessary. He must have liked us because we got immediate entry right then! It's good to be blonde! It is a self guided tour and you can take as much or as little time as your schedule allows.

 

Burj Khalifa pic taken from the car as we approached the structure.

Inside the elevator at the 114th floor. The observation deck is on the 124th floor but the inside of the elevator had all kinds of flashing lights when you got to 124 so the pic didn't take.

After you get off the elevator you step onto a moving sidewalk through a dark tunnel. You see and hear a lot of the history of Dubai and the creation of Burj Khalifa along the way. Very cool!

The observation deck! The deck itself was beautiful- wood floors and glass panels top to bottom. This is the main observation deck however it is designed so you can walk the entire perimeter of the building

and get an amazing, unobstructed 360 degree view of beautiful Dubai.

View- Holy Cow!

View!

The highway below. I zoomed in for this pic.

Buildings- I zoomed this pic hoping to show the unusual buildings. No two buildings look alike and every one is architecturally unique. I'm going to have to do a future post dedicated the buildings here.

Looking down on The Fountains. The Fountains is 275 meters long and contains over 22,000 gallons of water and was designed by the same creators of the Bellagio fountain in Las Vegas- but bigger! The Fountain "performs" at scheduled times and we missed that unfortunately. However I can tell you that it has hundreds of various sized nozzles to include large ones that shoot water as high as a 50 story building. It is all set to music and has over 6,000 different colored lights to add to the drama. The main spotlight in the center can be seen from 20 miles away. Jimmy & I plan to go there for dinner one evening. I'll be certain to post on that, too!

You can purchase a gold bar out of a vending machine! There are different sizes and emblems to choose from. The smallest one was about $650 AED. We actually considered it for a minute but ultimately decided not to indulge in such an extravagant momento!

Crystal replica of the Burj Khalifa in the gift shop.

View of The Foutain and surrounding park area from the ground floor.

So we finished the Burj Khalifa tour and strolled into the Duabai Mall. You can't see the thousands of dove-like figurines floating from the center of the sky light but the suspended sculpture was very impressive. This is the entrance directly into Fashion Avenue.

Dolce & Gabbana

Versace

Fendi



Armani

Louis Vuitton

Gucci

Chanel

Dior. All of the store fronts were very elegant but the Dior was my favorite. Those are individual lights made to shine like diamonds. Very sparkly and eye catching but not at all glitzy. All of these stores are next door to each other in a circle around the aforementioned center sky light and dove like hanging sculpture.

We left Fashion Avenue and randomly strolled the mall. The pic is blurry but it shows all the people, multiple LCD screens advertising events, etc. and the escaltors to the four levels. I didn't get a pic but in one of the center areas we came across a young girl performing a piano recital. There was a sizeable crowd to support the many students performing that day. How cool is that! 

Entrance to the Gold Souk. The Gold Souk consists of a maze of meandering corridors all lined with jewelry stores and other similar shops and themed courtyards. It was a mall in itself! In all honesty there were many empty stores and it lacked the bustle of the main mall but it was still very interesting and you see many unique items.

Jimmy's princess on a mosaic throne. This is in the main entrance of the Gold Souk. I can't even fathom how many tiles were used to construct this throne but I sure did feel like a queen! 

One of the many courtyards within the Gold Souk and a couple of shops.

Watch shop in the Gold Souk. I don't know if the stones are real but this watch was COMPLTELY encrusted in diamonds (?) to include the band.

Another courtyard within the Gold Souk.

18K $100 USD.

Exit from the Gold Souk into the main mall.

This is the viewing panel of the aquarium in the Dubai Mall. It is the largest viewing panel in the world. We didn't tour the aqauarium (we were exhausted by this time!) but you can walk through a viewing tunnel, take a glass bottom boat ride, snorkel and even shark dive!

Like I said, we were there for several hours and this post reflects only maybe 25% of what the Dubai Mall has to offer. I can't wait to share all of this with my girls when I can finally get them over for a visit. My Baby, my Angel and my Princess- I think of you every day and miss you so much my heart aches. My mom and my sisters and nephews and many friends- I love you and miss you. Take care of each other.

Peace, love and happiness- M&J

Inside Outside Upside Down!

Good morning all! It's been another week and we are still here living the dream! We didn't do much this week or go anywhere this weekend. Sometimes you just need a weekend of nothing to decompress.  It's getting hotter everyday so outside time has been dratically reduced but we did go to the beach Friday. We didn't bring the umbrella or the chairs; just the mats and a towel because we knew we wouldn't last very long. We could only sit for a few minutes before seeking refuge from the relentless heat in the water. The water is warm and not very refreshing but it is better than melting into the sand. The water is very shallow so you have to wade quite a ways out before you are shoulder deep. The good part of that is that you can sit or lay out in the shallows and relax in the gentle waves. We normally have been staying for about 2 hours; Friday we lasted an hour and we were done. Thankfully we live across the street so we don't have to load beach gear into the car and drive. We had also enjoyed dining outside and people watching- forget it! The tourist season is over so there are not nearly as many people as even just a week ago. And, again, the heat and humidity drives everyone indoors.  We have barely gotten into June and it is pretty oppresive- I can't imagine what July and August will be like.

A few oddities I don't know if I have mentioned-

The light switches are opposite- up is off / down is on. I'm still getting used to it but I don't turn "off" the light as often when I enter a room.

My kitchen faucet is single handled- the one in Bama is single handled as well. No big deal, right? Wrong- so wrong! In Bama up & down controls the water flow and left & right controls the temperature. Here up & down contols the temperature and left & right controls the water flow. I can't tell you how many times I have nearly scalded myself and been "baptised"!

In Bama, more often than not, you pull the door to enter a building and push to exit. Yup- just the opposite here. I have been nearly knocked unconscience and left my face print on more than one door much to the amusement of Jimmy and people nearby. Not so much anymore but when we first got here I was a walking calamity!

In Bama the television program times are accurate and the program scheduled is what you will see. We were going to watch Batman Begins last night. Per the guide it was to begin at 7 pm. It started a 6:40- twenty minutes early. Occasionally the program on the channel is not the program scheduled per the guide.  It's not always that far off but enough that you have to be aware if there is a particular show you want to watch.

The days of the week are different here. The names are the same but the what you do has been changed. Thursday is Friday. Friday is the Holy day so it is Sunday. Saturday is Saturday but Sunday is Monday. Clear as mud?!

Anyone who knows me knows I am a goofball. That coupled with the fact that I am also a bit of a clutz has made the differences here a challenge for me. I'm not stupid; my brain is just wired a little differently than most "normal" people. Sometimes I'm so deep in the forest I don't see a single tree. The advantage is that I see and notice things that others may miss. I process my environment and experiences in my own unique way. I am hopelessly hopeful and ever optimistic. I believe there is goodness in every heart and always look for the light at the end of the tunnel no matter how dark and long it may be. I wouldn't trade that for "normal" even if I could.

My sweet Tara Belle is leaving for Panama on Sunday to continue her education overseas. She is traveling with some fellow college students to a town there to study the water system and supply. We are so proud of her but she is still my little Princess and I worry. Sometimes being a mom can be so damn hard!

And a shout out to my newest follower in PA! So glad to see you are checking in on us. Send an email one day so we can keep up with you!

Much love to all. I miss you so very much- M&J