So it's back to work once again. And back to travel blogging once more. Funny that I travel blog when I work, but when I travel for fun I'm usually too busy having fun to have time to write about it. But now I've got more than enough time to kill, being landed in the land of our Muslim brothers. Who strangely enough believe that a beer is so evil that it warrants being banned from an entire country. Right now I'm resident in the tiny little country of Kuwait, which is pretty much nothing more than a dustbowl sitting on [View Full Entry]

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Hello Everyone! I've been up all night too excited to sleep here in my last night in Abu Dhabi. The 2nd largest mosque in the world is across the water. I have my screen door open and I can hear the morning prayers on loud speaker. It's a hauntingly beautiful sound. [View Full Entry]

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This picture was taken the first morning of the ADIPEC 2008 conference. This is the largest oil and gas conference in the Middle East. With 30,000 people attending it's probably the largest in the world. I didn't get into Abu Dhabi this morning until 3:00 am so understandably I didn't have the wherewithal to take any pictures on my arrival to the hotel. My flight into London was late which meant I had to miss my flight into Abu Dhabi. Subsequently, I had to fly into Dubai. I had no idea how I was going to get to Abu Dhabi from [View Full Entry]

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Yesterday afternoon on the way home from work I saw this Peugot balanced on the curb on the first roundabout from my office. Bear in mind that the curbs around Musaffah are all 10" to 12" high, about 6" higher that the front end of your average car. I've got a fairly furtive imagination, but I still can't see what he was doing, or trying to do to get his vehicle in that situation, other than being a total cockwit. Speaking of cockwittage, on Monday night, some bloke was so keen to get in the parking space I was about to [View Full Entry]

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Back in the U.A.E. after a few months at home...and the first thing I come across is this most excellent watering hole. It's in the alley behind our office and I can't believe I never noticed it. I saw men carrying jugs and filling them up here. [View Full Entry]

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Last night I went to the grocery store and discovered something quite interesting…corn in a cup! In the store there was a kiosk that sold corn, cooked with butter and salt and put in a Styrofoam cup. People were lining up for this stuff like it was cotton candy! I had to see what the fuss was about, so I paid my 7 dirhams ($1.91) and it was, as promised, buttered and salted corn in a Styrofoam cup. It was pretty good, I’ll admit, but I don’t really understand the attention it was drawing. I had no idea people would stand [View Full Entry]

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Just to prove I don't make this stuff up. Everything you read on this blog is 100% fact, I deal only in one thing, fact, well two things, fact and science, and maths, I've always said that. For example did you know that Colonel Sanders was never a real Colonel? I wouldn't be surprised if Ronald MacDonald isn't a real clown. Come to think of it, the pizzas at Pizza Express don't seem to arrive any quicker than in other restaurants. Since Krispy Kreme is 9.1% owned by a Kuwait based company it has some legitimacy in the region. [View Full Entry]

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I flew into Dubai on the overnight flight from Zurich. As usual, I was fairly tired after I arrived with bloodshot eyes and didn’t want to put up with the touts to whom I had become accustomed outside airports and train stations. Surprisingly, or more like unsurprisingly for those that have visited or live in the UAE, there were none, and in fact, the Dubai Airport was one of the nicest I’ve visited so far. That didn’t change the fact that I was still tired and wanted to get some rest, but at least I didn’t need to be on my [View Full Entry]

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I now know why they closed a big section of Al Raha beach a while ago - they are building a Death Star. To be honest, I thought it would be a bit bigger. Apologies for the quality of the photos, but I was driving at the time. I've seen another Ramadan promotion, Krispy Kreem doughnuts. The slogan is "Get your Ramadan Dozen" They should have gone with "Ramadan Krispy Kareem" [View Full Entry]

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As I shunted to and fro to squeeze my car out of it's space this morning, I certainly was not feeling the joy of the blessed month. I had to deliver a technical and commercial bid to a national oil company's office. We were quite specifically told that the bids had to be delivered before 9 am on the 14th to a certain person on the 19th floor, or the bids will not be taken. So, at 08:00 I am at reception trying to get a visitors pass. Me: Good morning, I need to drop these bids off to Mr. Saleem [View Full Entry]

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