It was most exciting. We went all the way over to Wafi City ( a shopping mall in Dubai) last night to look at handbags and discovered that they have opened a whole new retail area there. And it was totally fantastic. All of Wafi City is based on an Egyptian theme and there is gong to be a new raffles hotel there, in the shape of a pyramid (I actually use it as a landmark when I am driving around). And the inside of the mall has a whole lot of mini pyramids inside of it. The best part is [View Full Entry]

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We have finally managed to get a photo of Jeremy's favourite little worker man on the way to work. For some reason this car has fabricated a huge cardboard box hat that he wears on his head as he sweeps the road outside of the hotel. Go figure. And I also managed to snap one of the more common cars that you see around the place. [View Full Entry]

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We tried out another water park on the weekend. This water park is up in the emirate of Umm Al Quaim ( That doesn't look right so I must have spelled it wrong). Dreamland is 1/2 the price of wild wadi but because it is an hours drive out of Dubai it doesn't get any tourists go to it, only local families. There were some pretty fun rides, and we took our friends Rod and Jess up with us to experience the park. One of the pools that they have is a dead sea pool which is very very salty. [View Full Entry]

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The lovely bunch of flowers that I was surprised with at work yesterday, from my lovely boyfriend. It certainly cheered up my day as I had just had to spend AED1245 at the doctors (approx NZ$450) On another note, I finally managed to get a snap of some of the workers lining up for their bus at the end of their work day outside Burj Dubai. Sometimes there are in excess of 1000 of them lining up waiting. It looks amazing. I also managed to find an artists impression of what the Burj Dubai area is going to look like when [View Full Entry]

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Some may remember from a few blogs ago that I talked about a little yellow spring like fellow, called Modhesh, who is the mascot for the school holidays here in dubai (yes that is correct, they actually have a mascot for the school holidays - goodness only knows why). Anyway this little yellow guy is EVERYWHERE at the moment. Like totally everywhere. You can hardly move anywhere in the city without seeing him. And the malls are just crazy. Jeremy and I went to Times Square the other day and while we were there there was this enormous cacophony of noise. [View Full Entry]

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Well after our first attempt at this Wadi ended, in a dead end at the border, we figured that we would give it another try. So we gathered up another couple of kiwi couples and headed on out there on Friday morning. This time we were clever and took the Emirates Road up to Ras Al Khaimah instead of trying to fight our way through Sharjah and Ajman (getting lost in the process - see the wadi bashing entry). A smooth hour later ( in comparison to the 2.5 hours of the last attempt) we arrived at the border crossing and [View Full Entry]

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Well today was the big three zero............... 30...............hmmmmmmmmmmm Anyway, the operator of the project that we are working on at the moment also operates Wild Wadi (a water theme park) and they had been after us to go and visit for a little while. My boss John said to go ahead and set it up, so since Monday is the only day during the week that we don't have meetings, and since it was also my 30th birthday, I figured that I would go ahead and set it up for Monday July 2nd. So at about 2pm in the afternoon we [View Full Entry]

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Well the big day had nearly arrived and it was therefore time to gather together friends and family and celebrate the end of a decade. Luckily this celebration was going to involve a lot of sparkling wine and chocolate so the blow would not be too great. Al Qasr, in the Madinat Jumeriah Resort put on a stunning welcome for us. The entry into the hotel is really quite special with 12 golden dancing horses escorting you into the site. From there you get to traverse the main lobby and descend the grand staircase, under the frightfully expensive swavorski chandelier, to [View Full Entry]

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I have found some more photos of what the project that I am working on is going to look like. The entire development is driven around the focal point of the Desert Pearl ship hotel. This ship hotel is in fact a cruise ship, currently moored in the desert that was built at the start of the golden age of travel by a man named Rakaan. Rakaan was a young Bedouin boy who dreamt of a life on the high seas. Though he was born and raised at his family’s oasis in the desert of Dubai, the sea tugged at his [View Full Entry]

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What an experience. We have a friend (Simon from Carson Group) over from NZ at the moment. So for that reason, as well as the fact that we have a virgin Jeep Wrangler, we decided to try a bit of wadi bashing. We picked an easy route out of the off road guide, which is also apparently the most spectacular Wadi in the UAE to visit. Its byline is " The Grand Canyon of the Middle East". However we wouldn't know. The route goes into Oman so you have to take your passports, however my cousin James didn't have his with [View Full Entry]

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