Dubai Christmas

I thought that I should quickly post some photos of our Christmas Day. I woke up yesterday for work and there was a thick fog over the entire city. I thought that it may have just been around the marina where we live but I drove through it the entire way to work, which is quite a ways out in the desert. At some parts there was about 50 yards of visibility so it made driving on the freeway interesting; luckily there were no accidents. So I guess that this the Dubai version of a white Christmas. Of course I still had the A/C on as I drove, I think it got up to 80 degrees today.

The fog was back again this morning for my drive to work; yes, that's right, I had to work on Christmas Day, what a bummer. I left at noon so it wasn't too bad. I guess that I'd rather have the 6 days of holiday over here in December versus 1 back home so I can't complain. I was really surprised how many of the Muslims and Hindus at my work came in and wished me a Merry Christmas, in fact, no one over here even uses the stupid 'Happy Holidays' line. I had to laugh also because those same guys at my work convinced us the bosses to let us leave early for Christmas. I kept wanting to say, 'wait a minute, none of you even celebrate Christmas' but I wasn't complaining. So much for being offensive to other faiths.

O.K., here's a few of our photos. We are planning some big trips this year and we just bought a ton of stuff so we felt like a small Christmas was in order.

Here's our little tree.



Fancy Feast for Kitty!



A little cat nip always does the trick.



Very nice!



Hand lotion! Some people get everything.



So the only thing I wanted for Christmas was a set of these traditional Pakistan clothes (Paki pajamas). All of the Pakis wear them here and they look so comfortable. Camille was able to run them down for me so here is my best modeling work. I have to admit that they are more comfortable than I had imagined. These are worn by the Pakis to work, shopping, walks on the beach, and everywhere else. I hope to get plenty of use out of these but don't tell Camille.


There's even a pocket.... what more could you ask for.

Atlantis Fireworks

Thursday night was the grand opening for the Atlantis Hotel on the Palm Jumeirah. I got the day off because they shut the entire palm down for the day, nice!

So that evening, we walked down to the beach in front of the Jumeirah Beach Residences and waiting for the fireworks to go off with some other people we know that live nearby. Surprisingly enough, we weren't on the list of 2,00 people invited to the party even though I tried to explain that they mistakenly put 'Jordan' instead of 'Andrews'; maybe next time


Here is a night shot of JBR from the beach. There are a total of 38 towers in this development and holds the record for the largest single phase development in the world. Our building is just behind the 2 towers on the right.


This is a shot to the north, a few of the hotels along the beach and more JBR towers.


A shot to the south.


This was the best shot I could get that night of the Atlantis; it's about 4 miles from the beach. Can you see Oprah?


You get the idea.


More of the same.

We could actually hear the Kylie Minogue concert just before the fireworks went off.

So here is a little video of the fireworks (horrible quality of course). You'll be watching $4 million go up in smoke... literally. Needless to say, they were amazing. The fireworks were shot off from about 40 different locations along the other ring of the palm. We had a clear view of a small portion but you can see the others in the background. I'm sure we'll never see anything close to this again in our lives. 4th of July is going to be disappointing for a long time coming. CNN has some sweet aerial video of this on youtube.




Thanks for watching. We will have more coming soon.

Dubai Arrival

I have finally broken down and posted again so hopefully I remember how to do this. So we arrived here in Dubai on the 2nd of October and I had a couple of days to settle in before I started work on the 5th. Adjusting to the time difference was definitely something that both Camille and I struggled with, dosing off at work was a constant battle. As you can see, I tried to get an early start on adjusting my sleep schedule in the Phoenix airport but it didn't help much.

We have been temporarily staying in the company's apartment and hope to be out of there soon. The apartment search is very difficult here with most listings only staying on the market for one or two days, and don't even get me started about the prices. Here we are just arriving and Camille is sending out the confirmation email that we finally arrived safe and sound.


Let the unpacking begin.


The apartment is located in the Umm Hureir part of town, which is right in the middle of this map. We are fairly close to everything but also right in the middle of all of the traffic and confusion.


The beach has been our favorite spot on the weekends. The sand is great here and extends along the entire coast of the Gulf so there are plenty of beach areas. In this picture you can see a man-made island in the background but they haven't done anything with it yet; the world islands are just behind it. There were a few boats out fishing and there are always lots of wake/ski boats cruising around. It is strange to find that there are no waves along the beaches here. The water in the gulf is calmer than most of the lakes we have been to. Apparently there are waves in certain areas during January and February, which is the only time surfers can take advantage.


This didn't turn out well but in the background is the sand dredge that scoops up the sand on the ocean floor and shoots it out to create the man-made islands; they are working on the Palm Deira here.
Here we are staking out our spot for the day at Camille's favorite beach so far that they nickname Kite Surf Beach. To the left of Camille in the background, you can barely see the Burj Dubai. I have to get some better shots of that later, it's pretty impressive. This beach is located in an older, residential part of town so you can see some of the villas and mosques.


Here is one of the dhows, which were the traditional sea vessels used in this part of the world. These are a big tourist thing to go on.
I'm having issues getting this picture to stay rotated once I upload it but I'll post it anyways. Here is a shot of Camille and the Burj Al Arab, classic Dubai.
So here we have Kitty and I enjoying our favorite pastime; I'm watching TV and she is trying to convince me that she's abused and needs further pampering.


Here a couple of shots of the field office that I am currently working out of on the Palm Jumeirah. Eventually this will be torn down and the last group of condos will be built here.


In the background is a shot of the Dubai Marina area, which is about 10 mile south of downtown Dubai. We're hoping find an apartment in this area.
A shot looking up the left side of the Palm from my office. The other side is complete so I'll get some pics of that later. This is a good view of the condos in different stages of construction.


Here is the Dubawi Island project sign.


Shot of the island from the shore, no much to see yet. Ultimately there will be a resort with a hotel and villas.
This is one of the boats that moves people, equipment, and materials back and forth; the island in the background.
O.K., I'll try to be better about posting in the future. We are having a great time and we are grateful that we made the move over here. Take away the traffic, air pollution, and the housing prices and this place really would be paradise, of course with the help of endless money. Putting all of our affairs in order before coming over went very smooth and we both feel so blessed how everything worked out. We enjoyed visiting all of the family and getting one last good road trip of the U.S. in before coming over, unfortunately we didn't take many pictures of that trip. Plenty more to follow, stay tuned.

Saying goodbye, we're off to Dubai

The word is finally out that we are headed to Dubai so we thought that it was a significant enough event to actually write about. I talked them into delaying my first day until October 5th (much better than Sept. 21) so we should have enough time to make the rounds and see the family before we leave.

So why are we going? Well, my first answer is always that we have finally had enough of the Phoenix summer heat but the 3 degree cooler temperature there hasn't convinced anyone yet. Camille and I have always talked about moving out of the country and things just fell into place at this time to finally make the jump. We initially intended to go there just for the money but as we learned more about Dubai, we really felt drawn to it. Needless to say, things were put in motion and we are still trying to get our heads around what we are getting ourselves into.


I will be working for an engineering firm based in Australia but they have offices all over the world. The company is called GHD http://www.ghd.com.au/ and you can find out more on the office here http://www.ghd.com.au/aptrixpublishing.nsf/Content/UAE_off. They are going to have me work on the Al Barari project located in Dubailand. The Al Barari website http://www.albarari.com/ doesn't have much on it yet because it is under construction but there are a few other sites with some info http://www.unityestates.com/PropertyPages/Dubai/AlBarari/AlBarari-villas-Dubai.htm. The homes are pricey!! They have also insinuated that I will later be working on one of the palm islands that they are building in the gulf. I don't know which palm I'll be working on but this website is pretty cool and the videos are interesting http://www.palmsales.ca/. I will be a part of the transportation team so I will mainly be working on roads and utilities. These are both really high profile projects so I am really excited to get involved in it. Camille plans on looking for work once we get out there but from what we can see, she won't have any problems finding a job.

Dubai is a pretty incredible place. We could go on and on about it but I hate writing so that's not going to happen. The link below has some of the best pictures I have found of the city even though they are a little outdated. It is interesting to see how the city has grown over the years.

http://www.pbase.com/bmcmorrow/dubaiaerials&page=all

We are very excited and anxious to leave but we will definately miss so many things about the United States. There will be so many different things to adjust to when we get there. Possible none greater than not being able to find $4.00/gal gasoline, apparently no one over there will accept more than $1.20/gal. I think for the first few months I will have to just pump 10-15 gallons out onto the ground after a fill up until I adjust to the change. It's actually a toss up between the reasonable gas prices and no taxes, I still don't know which one will be the most difficult to accept. All jokes aside, we are going to miss our family and friends and we really don't know when we will be back in the country. We are going to take this big step in our life and see where it takes us. That's about as mushy as I'll get so anything worse will be from Camille.

A few other interesting tid bits. Dubai has an LDS ward, which, if I'm not mistaken, is the only one in the middle east. Dubai is also really big on racing so obviously I have confirmed that they have a motocross track. Camel racing is actually really big there so maybe I'll switch over....... or just get a paddle tire for the bike. Ginger sent me this picture the other day so I figured this is a good spot for it. I think that will wrap it up for me, I'm sure we'll have plenty to write about once we get there so stay in touch.


- Mike