Daddy does Dubai

 

Or did Dubai do Daddy? The jury is still out. Every time I say that “Dubai was hard on Shea,” he protests loudly that, no it WASN’T. And then tells me that I’m too hard on him.
But my observation is based upon him finding:
1) Dubai more expensive than he’d anticipated,
2) the city more sprawling than he’d planned for and
3) a tension between things to do and time to do them in.
Well, to be honest, I felt similarly. In retrospect, I may have caught a few more taxi’s to cover that sprawl, but that would have been exaggerating point number one. Instead we walked and took public transport for what felt like hours. We spent a lot of our short time in Dubai on public transport, covering big distances to get to sights that perhaps we could have done with missing. Like the giant inflatable water park that we paid a kings ransom to play on, but that Lox just crawled along with trepidation. His little legs couldn’t make the spans you were meant to run and bounce through so he was often just swimming around the challenges. We paid a lot of money for him to basically go for a swim in a PFD in the sea.
But we also found Dubai a fascinating place. The glittering malls, the skyscrapers and the water fountain show were over the top. The old Dubai, the history and Muslim culture were fascinating. We paid $18 for a hot dog then paid $1 for an evening ferry ride. We walked down an incense and flower-garland filled-alley by a Hindu temple. We saw so many ways to be separated from our money. We sat and listened to the call to prayer and watched a mosque slowly fill with worshippers. We talked a lot about different cultures and beliefs and choices.
And finally, Mountain Dad would like you to know (“put THAT in your blog” he has commanded), that I, while wandering around Dubai one day, asked if Muslims celebrate Christmas.
“Christ mas?” he crowed, “the day when we, as Christians celebrate Christ?!?!?”
He is pleased to share with you that I am not as perfect as I may like to paint myself in my blog.
But to be fair, I met a Muslim friend on a bus in Malaysia who told me she will be celebrating Christmas, but let’s not tell Mountain Dad that.

 The pool for our apartment building. That’s Mountain Dad and his Mountain Kids frolicking in there. In the rain.

 An apartment building wherein you drive your car into a car-elevator and take it to park on your own floor by your own apartment.