Another high pressure, stressful day in Dubai ;-)

It began with a Shuffle-gazine business lunch at a Mexican restaurant (Americanized Mexican food – rare here). Yummy!
The restaurant was located along the beach.
The red arrow above points to the Atlantis Hotel which opened a few months ago with the enormous fireworks display and was apparently all over the US news considering how many of you asked about it.
Here is the view looking away from the beach.

There is an inlet that serves as a marina.
Here is Paul working — slaving away — at, yes, Starbucks. [a contrite hanging down of the head] They have a free wireless hot spot, so what can we say?

Then it was off to the Madinat Jumeirah. [See previous post from September 9, 2008 for first mention of this place] We had dinner amidst all the tourists.
Here’s Paul in his new black shirt enjoying a nice meal outside. We try to sit outside whenever possible now to appreciate it while we can. Some places actually have heat on inside which is really unpleasant and doesn’t make sense because they air condition to a much lower temperature in the summer.

Beard question

Question:
“Is Paul’s beard an eye catcher here?” Yes, but not in the way you might have thought.

Before we came and we were pondering what it might be like here, Paul wondered what might happen if he dressed in native apparel. I told him they would think he was an albino with his fair skin and blue eyes. Little did we know that he wouldn’t even have to change his dress to be noticed.

He began to notice that construction workers would look surprised/confused and then say “Salaam aleykum” to him. He also noticed that taxi drivers often asked if he was muslim or where he was from. At one point, he began to get more “ogles” than I. He asked our friend, Amed, about this and Amed was nodding his head “yes” before Paul even finished describing the situation. It seems that there is a wealthy Pakistani family that are known for their red beards. They dress in western clothes and are of fair complexion. So, these construction workers see Paul walking down the street looking like a wealthy Pakistani and they are confused to see him “out of context.”

As for beards, some Arabs have beards, although they are usually neatly trimmed. The Sikhs have bushy beards, so Paul’s is not that unusual here.