For the first time in weeks, I am posting from a different spot. Woot woot! Today was a lot of first for me. This is going to be fairly long (I think), so I will try to organize. You know me! Part 1 - Desert Dunes and Mountain Work Eric and I left the office a little after 8:30 this morning. He had managed to snag a fugro truck which I will provide a picture of tomorrow. Apparently, no one can buy a truck here unless they are a business or a native with a farm. Pretty cool! Very few souped up ghetto trucks or redneck vehicles here! I had noticed that before and also that all the work trucks tend to look alike, so this explained a lot. We stopped at a gas station too, ... read more

Last evening, I was a little restless, so I took a stroll around the neighborhood, wanting to get an idea of what was here. I only have one week left, and probably will be gone two nights of this week as well, but I was bored and the weather felt nice. Nothing like a dip in the pool to wake you up! I decided to grab some take away menus from various restaurants and found two that I immediately want to try: Chalet Grill Plus, which specializes in Arabai, Chinese, Indian, and Turkish cuisine, and a place called Green Chillies, which is Indian and Arabic, and well... I just love green chilies! As Silpa had told me, there were a lot of restaurants nearby; my hotel just is not facing any of the major streets, so ... read more

Even though it was only a 4-day work week, it was a long one. Especially the last two days. Today I went on my first site visit with Karim. We visited the site for the resort hotel they are making. We "only" have one of our rigs out there at that time (I've never worked with multiple!) and they had just begun work on the second hole. Mud drilling - I can't help it. I cringe everytime I see it! But I think it is mostly because we don't have it too often on my US projects; it's used in sandy materials below the water table which definitely describes one of the palm islands! The proposed hotel is located in the crescent of the giant palm that makes Dubai famous. I was interested to see any ... read more

Holy cracker in a hand basket. Today was busy and exciting! While I'm waiting on the lab data that I've asked for for the upteenth time (and the ONLY thing holding up the otherwise finished report), I will enlighten you on today's experience. I finally signed my contract - they had originally said they would pay for two roundtrip tickets to the US each year, but my contract says one; that's ok - I figure I will make one nice long trip and spend my other free days travelling the world. Sorry guys - blame fugro. :) Other than that, I can't really complain too much about the conditions, one of which is the potential to be relocated to other offices in the region (see below). I was asked to bring in my passport so that ... read more

Since I was unable to purchase my dress at the Dubai Mall yesterday (for whatever reason... there were about 100 stores to choose from and I tried on about 50 dresses - maybe there were just TOO many options!), I made myself go to the Mall of the Emirates and buy a dress within a specific timeframe. I won't say where I bought my dress, because it is so simple and so American... but hey - we were supposed to dress to represent our country anyway. I bought shoes to go with it as well as some jewelry because I just don't have that much jewelry (actually, I have a ton but I rarely wear any). I picked a royal blue strapless dress. I had to wear a sweater over it because you're supposed to cover ... read more