Dubai & Muscat In The Blink Of An Eye

If you’ve been following me on Twitter, you’d have already known about my whirlwind trip to Dubai, United Arab Emirates and Muscat, Oman two weeks ago.

Dubai airport arrival hall

Dubai Airport Arrivals Hall

It was one of my most hectic business trips so far. To give you an idea of how tiring it was, we flew from KL 10.30pm on Saturday, arrived Muscat 1am (5am KL time), transit for 4 hours, connecting flight to Dubai at 5am (9am KL time), arrived Dubai 5.50am, collected visa, did iris scan, collected luggage, off to hotel for shower/change/breakfast, then off to Dubai World Trade Centre where I stayed until 7pm (11am KL time). And I only had about 4 hours sleep in the plane within that 24-hour period. Which ended up in me getting sick later on. Which is an entirely different story altogether.

Anyway, we were in Dubai for 2 nights, then flew to Muscat for a one-night visit, then flew back to KL. Madness, I tell you. Sheer madness!

Dubai World Trade Centre

Dubai World Trade Centre

Since I already knew how hectic the schedule would be, I deliberately left my beloved Nikon D90 at home and had to rely on my HTC Desire smartphone’s camera instead. So please forgive me if the images for this post are not up to the usual standards. There wasn’t much to shoot anyway, with all the rushing and running around.

My fave images from the trip? The food, of course, savoured over a leisurely afternoon in Muscat with long-time friends, one of whom was the beautiful creature whose wedding I wrote about in my post ‘An Omani Wedding’ not too long ago. She just gave birth to a baby girl last July. Talk about time flying!

Pomegranate from Jabal Akhdar (Green Mountain) of Oman, eaten by the bowlful:

pomegranate

Fresh peaches and figs:

Arabic coffee and loqmiyat drenched in date syrup (loqmiyat literally meaning ‘many mouthfuls’)

‘Til we meet again, Dubai and Muscat!

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Seeking Solace In My Desktop Wallpaper

The past few weeks have been hectic, frantic, frenzied, frenetic. Even my friends are finding difficulty keeping tabs of my whereabouts these days — last week Dubai and Muscat, this week Jakarta, back to KL last night, then in a few weeks’ time I’ll be off to Shanghai.

I’ve got tonnes of unfinished blog posts but given the dizzying schedule of my recent travels, I’ve been sleeping every chance I could get thereby leaving the drafts…well, drafts. Unfinished work at the office? I don’t even want to talk about it! *groan*

So for now, I seek solace in my desktop screensaver. And long for the day when I can be in serene Interlaken once again…

We’re at the halfway mark this week, people. The weekend’s not too far away… Hang in there with me!

Counting the days ’til the weekend,
Mimi

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UK 3-Pin Plug in UAE & Oman

image

One nice thing about traveling to United Arab Emirates and Oman — they use the standard UK 3-pin plug that we use in Malaysia, thereby rendering a plug adaptor redundant.

For someone like me who can’t live without my electronic gadgets, that’s one less thing to worry about packing in my bag!

Just a quick post to let y’all know I’m still alive :P

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*Not* Your Average Family

the twins making faces

The twins, making goofy faces :)

Snippets of conversations with my children:

Yesterday morning, in the car, on the way to the twins’ preschool.
Me: ‘Niece’ is the daughter of your brother or sister. ‘Nephew’ is the son of your brother or sister. Do you know how to spell niece?
(Silence)
Me: It’s N-I-E-C-E.
Twin1: (grinning impishly) Why isn’t it spelled with a K, like knees?
(The twins are 5 1/2 years old as of this writing.)

The other night, at home. MyEldest had to memorize a poem to recite in front of the school assembly. I told him to go to my room to memorize it while I help RoundBoy with his Science homework.
Me: Go upstairs to my room.
MyEldest: But what if I get trapped in the quicksand? [NB: It's an inside joke with my kids. We always refer to my bed as 'Quicksand' because it's so nice and soft that once you're on it, it's next to impossible to leave!]
Me: On second thought, go to your room.
MyEldest: Awww…

The same night, at home, as I was about to go upstairs and leave RoundBoy and OnlyGirl with their respective homework materials.
Me: BRB. (In netspeak, BRB usually means ‘Be Right Back’ or maybe even ‘Bath Room Break’)
RoundBoy & OnlyGirl: Okay, Mama.
Me: (Turning around) Big. Red. Battleship. Ah-ha-ha-ha! (Attempting to laugh like Disney’s Stitch, in reference to the movie “Leroy & Stitch”)
RoundBoy and OnlyGirl burst out laughing, mainly because my impersonation of Stitch is so bad :P

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The Disappointment That Was Stonehenge

I fell asleep during the drive from Warwick to Salisbury Plains (where Stonehenge is located) and when I finally opened my eyes, I woke up with a start. For there, finally, before me, was the world-famous formation of ancient boulders.

I’ve just always assumed Stonehenge to be HUGE and towering and imposing and awe-inspiring. Just like all classic desktop wallpapers and photos that we see of it everywhere…but it turned out to be waaaay smaller than I’ve always imagined it to be. I never thought of googling up some background information before going; somehow I just assumed.  In reality, it was disappointingly only about twice the height of an average man’s height. Just take a look at this pic of Stonehenge with two members of the staff standing right next to it.

Visitors are not even allowed get close to the rocks — they are roped off from the general public, a good 10 metres or so away. Only people who sign up for those expensive exclusive sunrise or sunset tours — ranging from £79 to £92 per person (adult price) — get to go inside the inner circle and see the rocks up close.

This pic should give you an idea of how far away we were from the famous circle of boulders:-

The black ‘line’ behind the baby stroller is the rope that cordons off the stone formation.

Take a closer look at the first photo that I posted at the beginning of this blog post and try to look for the people standing behind Stonehenge:-

The reason why these people look so tiny is because of their distance from the rocks and not so much from the actual height of the rocks.

We arrived in Stonehenge quite late — some 15 minutes before the 8pm closing time — but they allowed us to enter anyway even if it meant forgoing the complimentary audio guide. After all, we rationalized, it would be such a waste to drive all the way and not see the rocks as close as possible…and take proper pics of them, as well. The downside was that we had very little time to spend there — and get the most out of the £7.50 ticket fee! — but the plus side was that there were very few people around, allowing us to take pics without any unwanted stranger wandering into the frame.

Stonehenge is located in a grassy plain in Wiltshire near Salisbury, just a short drive away from Bath, hence it’s quite common for tour operators to offer both locations in the same tour.

It’s easily accessible by car — some 1 1/2 hours from London — and can also be reached by train (to Salisbury) then by bus. Mind you, train fares in the UK can be very expensive so if you plan to go by train, it’s best to book your tickets way in advance.

Stonehenge is in a vast, grassy plain surrounded by a perimeter of wire fence. So if you don’t feel like paying for the entrance ticket, you can gawk at the rocks from a distance through the chain link fence.

Stonehenge Visitor’s Info

Ticket Prices:
Members Free
Adult £7.50
Child £4.50
Concession £6.80
Family Ticket £19.50

Directions
Address:  Off A344 Road, Amesbury, Wiltshire – SP4 7DE
Bus Access: The Stonehenge Tour Bus is the public bus departing from Salisbury rail and bus stations. See www.thestonehengetour.info.
Road Access: 2 miles W of Amesbury on junction of A303 and A344/A360
Train Access: Salisbury 9 1/2 miles

Click here for more detailed information about opening times throughout the year.

If your trip to the UK allows you some time to visit other English Heritage properties, it would be definitely worth your while to invest £46 for an annual English Heritage membership, which would give you free access to all of their properties – castles, Roman sites, monuments and ruins — all over the UK.

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