Oman

I had the chance to head to Oman last weekend to see some family friends from Saudi Arabia.

The weekend was great, the place is just so pretty. To be quite honest, I didn’t expect it, but Fahim Uncle said it best “Oman is well kept secret”

The architecture is all very similar in Muscat, and I was told that the Sultan does not want any high rises in the city. He would like to keep it all looking cultural. On my sightseeing tour, we went and drove into the mountains and drove around all those roads. Considering I had re-learnt all my 1B rock mineralogy and earth engineering during my work term, the rocks meant something! Ahaha I also saw the lagoons, and the Muscat souks which were just built for tourism. It was nice, however I felt like the prices were obviously high.

Unfortunately, I had high fever when I was in Muscat, but all the hot tea I drank definitely helped!

I was there for two nights and then made my way back to Dubai. As soon as I got to the airport I was informed of plans to go out for one of my last night’s out in Dubai. We went to that pyramid club again hehe.

The next day we headed to ski dubai! O gosh was that an adventure.

When I walked into the cold, it was like.. I was home, it was -6 degrees!! Haha

Basically, I’ve never been skiing, and I’m quite aware this is very bad considering I’ve been in Canada for so long. Dancy and I refused to take the lessons and just went right into it. So I started off on this slope which I’m sure is tiny, but o man I was scared! I just went for it, all the way down the slope.. I didn’t even fall. So I kept going for a couple more times, scared every single time.. and then it happened my horrible fall! Haha I scratched up my chin, but it went away after a couple of days.  After the 2 hours in the cold I was ready to leave.. I got my fill of winter I would say. I heard Canada is not warm right now anyways.. BOOO.

The last couple of days of school were so hectic, just getting everything wrapped up. We also went out for dinner with a  few of the profs to try camel… everyone ordered steaks and burgers of camel meat, I stuck to my chicken club sandwich. I tried it though, it tasted like beef. Not something I would try again though.

My last day in Dubai (before leaving for Pakistan) I proctored 2 exams in the morning, then we went to chili’s for lunch. I got birthday cake as a goodbye, so I turned 22 already, pretty much. It was a great way to end the school term, molten lava cake. Hahaha.

The flight to Pakistan was good! I got my window seat, and an empty seat next to me. I watched tangled, such a cuteeeee movie. I like my cartoon movies okay haha.

So now I’m sitting here in Pakistan. It’s so hot and humid, but I’m trying to enjoy it before I’m back in the cold haha. I am thoroughly enjoying all the home cooked food, chaat,  and jaam mmm. I’m getting really spoilt though, by my aunts and grandparents, haha I have no complaints =)

I’ll be home soon!

<3 Misha

Running out of time!!

Since our trip to the Palm, things have been moving at supersonic speed.

We’ve had to wrap things up with the professors that are leaving, trying to get the grades finalized and all. We have officially decided we don’t need sleep, and are running on a couple of hours a night, just so we can work and go out! Hahaha

The weekend that just passed was great and outdoorsy, I got my tan on! (not that I need to do any such thing). Thursday night was a birthday of one of the students on residence, we went to an Italian restaurant, and then made our way to the movies. We decided to watch.. LOL I can’t even remember the name of the movie.. PAUL! That’s what it was.. it was about some alien trying to get back into space. It was funny at parts, but they censor a lot of the movies here, so sometimes they seem really choppy.

Birthday Party

Friday we woke up early and went to this corporate event. Waterloo and Bax Consulting was one team and we met a lot of Canadian teachers and engineers that work in Al Ain (we went there .. see posts below haha).  It was nice to meet people from home! Anyways a lot of us had no idea how to dragon boat race, so we had a quick tutorial and..off we went. It was so fun; we did 200 m I think, and it should take like a minute to do. It was an intense workout though because you have to row so fast!

That night I founded the suburbia of Dubai.. Arabian Ranches. It’s a lovely place but it’s like a mini city.. everything is there, you never even need to leave the compound. I got to have lovely home cooked meal at my aunt’s house and I began my goodbyes for the trip.. sadly.

Saturday was our day with our Dubai Dad (Barry). We went over to the Rotana hotel and hung out at the pool then walked to the Satwaa souks later at night, I’m pretty sure we walked like 5 km EASILY. It was very tiring, but we got our shopping done. These “souks” were the places I hated going to as a kid in Saudi; it’s strange that here I am 10 years later, willingly going there for a whole day (sorry for all the tantrums mom, love you!).

At night we went with some of the professors to Jamie Oliver’s restaurant at Dubai Festival City. The food was good, but nothing extraordinary, the service was not good, they didn’t have lemon mint juice, and they didn’t allow takeout!  They didn’t allow takeout was the major problem.. if you didn’t finish your food you basically pay 100 aed for a third of your meal. They said that it’s for safety .. chances of food poisoning when you reheat food and stuff.. BLAH BLAH. I want my food to take home.!!!! Overall, I wouldn’t go back, but it was a good experience.

Sunday was boring!!!!!!!!  I just did work till sooo soo late, 4 am, see I do work sometimes.

Monday I got some more of my shopping done for mom and dad! Tuesday I went back to Arabian Ranches to another family friends’ house. I forgot how funny they were.. good company. After that I headed to Barasti, which is this bar/pub by the beach, they have couches and tables at the beach, so we hung out there enjoyed the light drizzle and headed home.

Yesterday we also said our goodbyes to Professor Knight. It was really sad; he is the first one of us to head back. He had taken so much care of us when we were here, buying us liquid milk instead of the powdered one for our tea and coffee, taking us to Abu Dhabi, driving us to dinner, giving us all his travel books, and giving me the mini coffee maker haaha. I think we were very lucky to have such a great group of people here, and we really took advantage of it with all our social events at work.

Today.. I am flying to Oman, I’m very excited! Going to stay with some family friends for the Oman weekend (thurs, Friday). Then I have a couple more days in Dubai till my trip to Pakistan. I’ll be home so soon!

<3

Good food, good friends, and good company

Hello Hello!

Time is just flying by.. and I’m really coming home super soon.. 22 days!

Because time is running short, I decided I better get a little bit more serious about my tourist list of things I need to do.

So, what did I do? I booked tickets to go take a tour of the tallest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa. I went with one of the co-op students (nagma) and one of the math professors, barry. Now, I don’t think they were as excited as I was about the whole trip. I wanted to see all the civil engineering structural and foundation things.. but I couldn’t spend all day in there. We got through security, then got into an elevator which took us to the 124^th floor. We booked tickets in the morning to get a good view of the place. It was amazing; we could see most of Dubai. I know it may sound a little exaggerated, but the building makes the skyline at night, and it’s always got these lights going that make it look like it’s sparkling. It’s really a beautiful sight.

After checking off the biggest thing on my to do list, we headed to lunch at this organic restaurant at the Dubai Mall. It was the healthiest meal I’ve eaten, but it was actually surprisingly good. They had a buffet that was all gluten free. We then made our way back to the Rotana Hotel (where the professors are staying) and basically took over Barry’s kitchen. We made dinner and brownies! Dancy pretty much was the brownie chef, I was the dinner chef. The brownies were these zucchini brownies.. I have never ever heard of that! Either way they were so good. I’m craving some right now.

Last week was pretty much the last week of classes, so everything is pretty hectic. I can’t believe it’s over! We are just getting review sessions together, scheduling last minute things, trying to get our work reports sorted and our evaluations done.

This weekend I met a lot of old friends completely unplanned. I got to meet a family friend from Saudi Arabia, they had driven up from Oman. We spent the evening together roaming around. The kids have all grown up, that just means we’re getting old. Sigh. It was great meeting them after 7/8 years. 

I didn’t forget about my list of things to do that easily.. so we missioned out to Palm Island on Friday. It took us a long time to get there, but we made it. We saw the Atlantis hotel, walked and walked and walked. The hotel is very good looking, however to do anything in the hotel, costs a lot of money!

We then took a cab to Dubai Marina. Dubai Marina.. water.. boats.. mall. That kind of sums  it up . haha I was expecting a lot more, since everything has been so over the top, but it was nice and simple. We were lucky that a street festival was going on, so that kept us amused for a long while.

Just as we were leaving the mall, a friend from Saudi gave me a call and asked what I was up to. Surprisingly, he was at the hotel attached to the mall I was at. Such a coincidence.

The whole lot of us went out that night to the hotel that’s shaped like a pyramid .. the raffles dubai I think it’s called. Right at the tip of the pyramid, it’s all glass and inside there’s a lounge. It was the best night spot I’ve been to so far. Good music and good company, made a good night.

This week some of the final quizzes are happening, before the pre-exam break. That means our work hours get very flexible.. so we made our sightseeing and gift shopping plan ahahaha. I will get my work done to .. promise.

<3

"A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving"

This blog post may not be a picture book, depends on if my internet likes me enough to corporate.

You know what is very ironic, we live in the residences owned by Etisalat academy which a huge phone / internet service provider here (like Rogers), yet the internet here is just so horrible. Therefore picture uploads just don’t happen. That’s why I write all my blogs at work HAHA, don’t tell anyone I work with please.  (Note: i waited till i got to work to put this blog up.)

Happy Saint Patrick’s Day! So I think this is the first year I actually celebrated Saint Patrick’s day, in a place where a lot of people had no idea what Saint Patrick’s Day was. Thursday, we decided to go to no other place than Irish village. Irish village is gated complex which has outdoor restaurants and bars. So they had a concert going on with a band playing U2 songs. We listened to a couple of songs then went and grabbed some Italian food and hung around the village. We then bumped into some of the students and headed to the bar where there was a live band for the occasion and they played a lot of rock music. Overall and eventful night and a great way to celebrate I would say.

Italian Food mmm..

Rock Bottom Cafe (Saint Patty's Day)

Irish Village

Friday, we went to this place called Al Ain.  I provided aleena with a Wikipedia link which I invite everyone to go look up, because I sure did. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Ain

It is the garden city, but unfortunately I wasn’t convinced. It just looked like lots of sand and rocks to me, minus the oasis we went to. The oasis was this old one with lots of palm trees and canals built to transfer the water. The spring wasn’t doing its thing while we were there but we understood the basics of how the system works

We then went to the Jebel Hafeet Mountain. The mountain is just this huge rock mountain that you drive to the top of, and then there is constructed platform where you can take pictures and have a good view of Abu Dhabi. You can also see Oman (which is a trip I will hopefully be able to make).

Jebel Hafeet Mountain

Jabel Hafeet Mountain

Oasis

We went to this Lebanese restaurant for lunch and had some food. I realized that lamb is so popular here, every Arabic restaurant along with a lot of food that they serve at the restaurant on residence and in the cafeteria and school has a lamb option. I’m not a big fan, I think I’ll stick to my beef and chicken.

The last attraction we went to was the 5 star hotel at the top of the mountains to, there was an outdoor pool overlooking the city as well.

We saw this huge huge house at the top of the mountain owned by someone (private property). There were windows all around the house, so a 360 degree view, now that’d be something nice to own.

Nice House

Dancy, Sean and I got a chance to visit Madinat Jumeriah yesterday. It's about a 1 hour metro/taxi ride from our place. It was really pretty, the place is a resort area, with hotels and spas. There are private beaches attached to the hotels. The middle area between the hotels are these souks (fancy ones) where everything is way way way to over priced. We had lunch at a fancy bar and then had to head back home for office hours.

Left Bank - Madinat Jumeirah

Madinat Jumeriah

Madinat Jumeriah

The other good news, I am not longer hostage, and will be returning home. ¾ of us have our passports now, so we can now plan our trip to Oman during exam time when all the students are studying. Ahaha.

We had a staff potluck last weekend with all the professors and their families (those who came along with us for the four months) we made nachos, salad and meatballs. There was so much food! It was a buffet, seriously. We got all the leftovers, but no complaints, the food was really good. Everyone tried to bring food according to their culture I guess so there was Greek food, Arabic food, Indian food, Thai food, and Italian food. By far the best part of the meal was the dessert. Let me tell  you, our professors can bake up some great cakes .. I was pleasantly surprised. =)

Prof Mark Knights Cake

Potlcuck , co-op group photo!

That’s it from me, for now.

Goodmorning!!

Reading Week

 

Hello!!

I am still here, and  trying to keep up with the blog world. February was pretty eventful, We have all become a lot closer to the students on residence so we are going to places with them a lot.

Unfortunately, we still don't have our passports back from the government. They are holding us hostage, I think majority of us are probably illegal by now. Its not like they can kick us out, because where would we go? We have no passports!!!

We have been making a lot of midnight beach trips to Jumeirah Beach Residences, Its this really pretty walk along the beach with all these cafes, restaurants, and fancy hotels. Other than that we've been making our mall and sheesha trips as well.

We were planning on going to Turkey for Reading Week. I was very happy to find out that I had reading week off. The professors were all on vacation or back in Canada, so the TA's just had to be available for  office hours on residence here and there, it worked out well.

I kept my self busy though. We organized residence trips to the beach, to Global Village, TGIFs for dinner, to the gold and perfume souks, we went bowling,  and we all participated in the Terry Fox Run 2010 in Dubai. The terry fox run was great, we met more Canadians, some that went to Laurier. The turn out was 8000 people. The run/walk was 8.4 km long. It was amazingly hot though. I think we are approaching the 30's easily here now.

Terry Fox Run, Dubai 2011

beach day!

TGIFS

Dubai Mall

Bowling

The last couple of days of reading week we went to Abu Dhabi and saw Sheikh Zayed Mosque, now that is something to see. One of civil engineering professors took us on a road trip. It painted all white, with marble floors, and handmade carpets. The lighting  consists of these huge chandeliers made of Swarovski crystals. I also visited Dubai Marina Mall and Heritage Village there. We wanted to go check out Emirates Palace, but both Sean and Prof. Knight were wearing shorts and that is not allowed so we couldn't go in… that’s okay.. Just means I have a reason to go back.

Mosque

Mosque

Heritage Village

I think our next event is a trip to Burj Khalifa, a lot of the students haven't gone to the top of the building. I definitely am planning on going before I come back. 

Midterms are finally over, that means work is going to calm down again !!!.. Hopefully :).

I can admit I'm missing home now hahah.

<3

Desert Safari

The last couple of weeks have been occupied by work, so really the only exciting things have been happening on the weekends. See , I am working, for all of you nonbelievers

Last weekend was rainy so our beach plans got cancelled. We ended up going to emirates mall, we ate the best pizza ever from California Pizza Kitchen or something. I’m getting hungry thinking about it.  We also stared into the Ski Dubai area.  It was like Canada in a box. Hahaha. The funny thing about Ski Dubai is that they provide you with winter clothes once you purchase tickets. So you walk around in your summer gear at the mall and then decide to go skiing and they give you a winter jacket and boots. You have to buy gloves. If I had known that I needed my winter gloves I would have bought dollar store ones to come here. You can just imagine how much of a rip off they are here.

During the week we had some bonding time with the Waterloo students at res you could say.  Dancy and I were convinced into piercing two guys’ ears on the boy’s floor. It was so freaky! No one had a fruit, to put at the back of the ear. It was like that scene from the parent trap and we were Lindsay Lohan. The guys numbed their own ears and we sterilized everything in aftershave. Everything worked out! I am now experienced in piercing ears. Okay actually, I just held the ear; Dancy was strangely calm stabbing their ears with needles.  A week and a half later everyone is safe and healthy, so no unsafe piercing techniques haha.

Residence

This weekend we went to Fujairah, which is about a 2 hour drive from where I live and it is on the way to Hatta, Oman. We went to a public beach, it was very pretty. The director’s wife at waterloo UAE campus took us out. So we had a mini picnic and just chilled at the beach for a bit. We left just before it started pouring… see I am experiencing winter.

WINTERR

Beach

Beach

We went to the airport at 5 am the next day to pick up Dancy’s parents from the airport and then I woke up at 8 am for office hours which lasted 5 hours!!  We then got ready for desert safari!!!!!

It was amazing; we got picked up and then drove towards Sharjah. We then met up with a fleet of cars just like ours and the driver people checked the tires for air pressure and everything. We then went on a crazy car ride with the huge fleet of cars.. I thought we were going to topple over so many times, no joke. We were sliding down the dunes and everything. We then drove to this really high point to take pictures with the sunset. After that we drove out of sharjah to the camp. Sharjah is a dry emirate, so they took us back to Dubai so that the camp could serve alcohol have belly dancers etc. So we went back to the camp where I went camel riding, sand boarding, and I held a falcon!  There were also henna artists, sheesha and a few mini shops.

Safari Night

Crazy Driving

Man who spun in circles forever

There were a couple of shows, first there was a man who spun around in circles for 15 minutes or something and his outfit was lighting up and changing, it was pretty crazy. Then the belly dancer came on stage, she was pretty good!  The shows were quite impressive. 

After that we ate dinner, did more of the activities there.. it’s definitely an experience I recommend for anyone travelling here.

We may be off for reading week and we are deciding where to go..Our plans were to go to Egypt. Clearly   that is out of question now. Any suggestions?

Hopefully you guys will be able to enjoy a snow day!

<3

Dubai Museum

I find that work is definitely the best time to update my blog..  To avoid doing actual work. I swear I'm doing work though.  Surprisingly things have gotten very busy at work, I guess everyone was in the same boat when I got here and no one really knew what to do.

We are kind of involved in everything, recruitment, events, being residence spies ha-ha. The students are actually really nice and friendly, so its pretty good.

Last week was pretty quiet, we didn't do much considering we had been going out every single day the week before. Now we are well rested and trying to do more things again. We are planning on going to an "Arabian Adventure" sometime this weekend.

This weekend we went and checked out a couple of bars/clubs. The first night we went out, we were suggested this place called elegante which was pretty nice. The only funny thing was it was "Indian" night so they had all this brown clubbing music. It was decent we just got super excited when they played an English song ha-ha. The cab driver that drove us home was pretty nice he was asking me what we were doing in Dubai and about my husband HAHAH, and I'm like o gosh I don’t have one. He then continued to give me blessings for my marriage and hopefully after schooling my marriage would happen fast, I just didn’t have the heart to tell him otherwise. I Just agreed hahahaha.  I found out he has a son in medical school etc. The things you learn in a fifteen minute cab ride home.

We went to the Dubai museum on the Friday and the place looks pretty small, but it was quite spacious, because it goes underground. We saw old school houses, and traditional wear, and old shops and stuff.

After we left the museum ,at around 7 pm, the area where we were was so insanely busy! Its like everyone woke up all of a sudden at night. So we checked out some place for a phone for me :).. Which I still haven’t got.

Creepy Girl Statues at the Museum

More fake people at the museum

Dubai Museum and Seans Model Shot

Right outside Res

Weapons of Mass Destruction

Getting water from the well

We got home only using transit, and not cabs, which was a huge accomplishment! I can now teach people how to reach me.. Once they get to Dubai :P.  That night, we got convinced to go out again with some guys from Hult university.

This part is best said by dancy :

"On our way back from the gym, we encountered these 2 black men, Blue and Ola,  waiting for a taxi outside of our building. So we decided to have a little chat with them. Turned out they are nigerian grad students who live in a different building from us. AND, they are going clubbing. 

I guess we were desperate for a non-indian clubbing experience, and we were attracted by the idea of sharing a taxi bill, so we said, we'll be ready in half and hour! (what's there to worry about, we have Sean, at least hes half black)

Okay, half an hour later, Misha, Sean, and I are on our way to this York club. 

Pasted from <http://dancyli.blogspot.com/> "

The bar we went to was pretty weird so we decided to leave then we went to this arabic-english club.  When we got in all the guys there were doing a traditional dance, then they had 20 mins rnb and hip hop and back to Arabic music.  The cab driver that drove us home that day was like in his 40s I would say, but man he was playing these crazy beats and driving to the beat (sometimes).. Which may not have been the best thing , but it was fun. He was playing old school Sean Paul and he had a good system in his car. One of the best cab rides !

We did office hours Saturday night (equivalent to a Canadian Sunday night) on residence and then this week has been busy because all the students have been asking us stuff. Every thing is due this week . We are heading to our Waterloo mom's house on wed for dinner. She's a really nice person that works in the office with us working for international recruitment, she always brings us fruits and chocolates  and biscuits for us at work :).

Now I got to work some more.. Boo.