Zyng in the House of Ming

Poetic licence with that title really, but we love eating at Zyng in the China Court of the Ibn Battuta Mall. Lots of healthy options – and lots of crunchy vegetables – if you’re into that type of thing! Sometimes we just crave fresh veges!

Dubai Marina Market

Every Friday until April 28th, there's an open air market along the Dubai Marina Walk. It’s happening now as I post, and already the place is starting to fill up.

It’s a fun atmosphere, especially later in the afternoon and into the evening. The place gets so crowded that it’s sometimes hard to move.

All sorts of products are for sale – ornaments, clothing, jewellery, painting, photographs.

If shopping isn’t your thing, then sitting on one of the benches or at one of the restaurants and watching the crowds is also great entertainment.

The kids love the fountain!

It’s so good to see the marina complex filled with life.

Disney buys Pixar

Disney bought Pixar from Apples’s guru Steve Jobs for an obscene amount of $$$s. Steve personally cashed in about US$3 billion on the deal, and asked for a seat on the board of Disney.

I can confidentially tell you that this will be the first joint product that will be released from Apple and Disney – the Mouskapod!

Don’t you love it?!

Ok – it’s a joke, people – don’t be emailing the Apple/Disney hotlines asking for details!

It comes courtesy of my friend Chris, who lives and breathes in the fresh tropical air of the Turks and Caicos Islands in the Caribbean. Check out his blog and the company website – it’ll make you green with envy at the beautiful sandy beaches, the turquoise water, the sunny days – ugh!!

Thanks Chris!

Toothless Twilight

M had a tooth removed this evening, and she’s feeling not too bad. It was over in less than 15 minutes, and there was absolutely no pain – even from the injections.

Mind you, the injections haven’t worn off yet!

We can thoroughly recommend our dentists Drs. Nicholas and Asp on the Jumeirah Beach Road – the whole team is fantastic.

Almost makes going to the dentist a fun experience.

Almost!

Digging Deeper

Our trip down SZR to the Ibn Battuta Mall this evening was the usual dance with the crazies – avoiding buses, trucks and especially the 4WDs who really should not be allowed to leave the Emirate of origin that is displayed on their registration plates.

Our reason for risking our lives was to go to the movies to see The Constant Gardener.

It’s about an English diplomat and his wife who are sent to Kenya, where she works with some others to uncover a drug company’s misuse of the African people as guinea pigs for their drug testing. She’s murdered, and her husband then goes on a self-destructive mission to find out why and who is behind it.

The movie is an extremely powerful drama with top quality actors. The cinematography is styled like a documentary which lends well to the investigative nature of the plot.

Above all, there is the sense of futility at the level of corruption that comes to light. No one really knows the full story – all of them are bit players who do what they think is right, but the info they give to others results in tragedy that comes back to haunt them.

It would take a lot of momentum to stop what is happening in Africa, but who could possibly be powerful enough and stay incorruptible to change it? How many people at the top of African politics would need to be removed? And how many other people just as corrupt as those there now would be there to take their places?

My heart goes out to the aid workers, the medical teams and the relief agencies that work in these areas and try to make a difference. It takes special people to endure the politics, the constant danger and the appalling conditions – just to have someone unravel all their good work so they have to start again.

Relief work is certainly at the mercy of big business. Those relief workers on the ground are at the mercy of their bosses and organizations whose motives would have to be questioned – if anyone could stay alive long enough to blow the whistle.

Towering thoughts

So, J had coffee with a friend of hers the other day, and invariably the subject got around to all the Dubai construction, and who was going to live in all these tower blocks that are beanstalking out of the ground.

Her friend, who always knows the latest local scandals and gossip in the property arena, had this theory which had been told to him – and it sounds quite plausible.

Before the latest Gulf War in Iraq started, there was a huge building boom in Jordan with lots of residences being built. Local Jordanians wondered who would live there too.

Then the US invaded Iraq.

All the wealthy and able Iraqis fled their country to Jordan – snapping up homes and apartments.

Rumour has it that a lot of gulf countries would not loudly oppose an intervention in Iran, and if this happens, then more than a few Iranians would also be leaving home.

What could be better than a short flight across the ditch to Dubai? On a clear day, you would swear that you could see the homeland from your 50th floor apartment.

I still reckon that they’ll only fill up 5 towers at the most.

Image Inspiration

On her blog, Kaya reckons that I inspired her to post her images that bring back memories of good times had.

I think that it's the other way around - she has inspired me to start some random image placement in our blog inbetween the articles. So on some days, there'll just be images posted that we've taken in the UAE and other parts of the world.

Like Kaya, our images also carry memories of good times, fun places and great company. Although a lot of you won't know the backgrounds to these shots, we hope that you enjoy them all the same.

The first one is a panorama of the Jumeirah Beach Hotel and the Burj Al Arab, taken from the rooftop of the Marina Seafood Restaurant.

If you want to see it as a larger image, click onto it and it will open up in your browser on a separate page.

Marina Progress

Every month, we take a photo of the progress that’s happening on the construction sites that we can see from our balcony.

The following 3 images were all taken in 2005: January, July and November.

There was furious pace in the first 7 months of the year, but we reckon that progress has slowed down somewhat over the last 5 months.

You can judge for yourself. Click on the image to open it as a larger one in your browser, and then once it has opened, you should be able to magnify it again.

Back in San Francisco

We’ve been back in San Francisco this week to visit the US office, and to hold meetings, including a very successful User Group Meeting.

There hasn’t been much time to play or to take photos, and it’s cold – although not as cold as we expected.

Yesterday we spent the day in Denver, Colorado to meet with a partner. Denver looks to be an interesting city and M would like to spend more time there. We felt like aliens on another planet – flying from SF to Denver to arrive at 9:30 at night; sleeping; spending most of the next day ensconced in a board room talking; back out to the airport that afternoon; fly back to San Francisco. All that in less than 24 hours!

Ironic observation: when eating, most Americans cut up their food, then abandon their knives and transfer their forks to their right hands to eat. They have more in common with Muslims than they think! We wonder how this American way of eating came to be.

We leave SF tonight – M back to Dubai and J to our head office in Berlin for a few days. The images are from various trips here over the past 15 months. There are 2 that have been taken on this trip - the early morning views of the streets from the hotel window.

UPDATE: Upon reading my above ponderings on the American eating etiquette, one of our blog fans in the USA emailed me with a link to an article that explains a theory. (How big a fan is he? He has our blog listed in his RSS feeder so that he's instantly notified of any updates!) Unfortunately, the link he provided isn't available to unregistered readers of the Chicago Tribune, although I could access it in the US but not in the UAE. So I went hunting (googling, actually) for a new link. I found 2 links to share - one factual - Cut and Switch, and the other is a humourous quiz - Don't Gross out the World.

Enjoy - and thanks Mike for emailing the link!

We can see clearly now...

...the smog has gone.

Over the past few days, Dubai and the UAE have been in mourning due to the death of its beloved Sheikh Maktoum Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, who upon his death, held the posts of Ruler of the Dubai emirate, and was also Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE.

Sheikh Maktoum was an instrumental force in the forming of the UAE in the early 70s, and was witness to his father Sheikh Rashid, and the ruler of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Zayed, signing the agreement that was the catalyst to the 7 emirates coming together as the UAE.

You can read more about these inspirational men from the links in the sidebar of this blog.

As a result of Sheikh Maktoum’s death, in the UAE, a 3 day mourning period was declared for the private business sector, a 7 day mourning period for the public sector and government, and an official 40 day mourning period for the country. During this time, there are no parties, no loud music, flags are flown at half-mast, and all celebrations have been cancelled or postponed – even the Dubai Shopping Festival and the marathon.

This has also meant that there has been no work since Wednesday – and in particular, there is no construction taking place on any of the numerous building sites that are dotted around Dubai. No red, blue, green or yellow overalled men to be seen anywhere.

As a result, there is also no construction traffic: cement mixers; cement pumps; water trucks; cranes; trucks carrying sand, gravel, iron, building panels, rocks or glass – and no buses carrying the workers. In fact, there has been very little traffic of any kind.

For 2 days now, the air has been pollution-free and crystalline. So much so, that today from our 21th floor (this is what it says on the sign!) office, we have been able to clearly see the Emirates Road to the east, and over that, the jagged Hajjar mountains that border the UAE and Oman. Out west to sea, we spotted the oilrigs – and the horizon - the latter is usually cloaked in a layer of smog that obliterates the setting sun, and rarely allows for a decent sunset.

This clear air is fabulous! It gives us hope that, one day, when most of new Dubai has been built and the construction traffic is reduced, the clear skies and superb visibility will once again reign supreme.

Bring it on!

The images of the Grosvenor House Hotel and the Dubai Marina were taken tonight just after sunset.

Christmastime

This post and the 2 after it are in descending chronological order - because I didn't get to post them as the events happened - so here they are, all together!

We finally made it out of Berlin and took the train to Gottingen – a city almost in the very center of Germany. Another train-ride then took us to the town where J’s parents live, and where she grew up.

Christmas Day was spent with her entire family, and it was a great day. We ate and ate….and ate and ate! It was like that for the entire visit – J’s mother ran on clockwork for the meals. If we were late for breakfast, then breakfast was quickly followed by lunch which was always served at the same time – no matter what!

On Boxing Day, we escaped out of the house by borrowing a car and heading off into the countryside. The roads were really icy – black ice everywhere and J had to be extremely cautious. We drove through the Hessian district which is famous for the Brothers Grimm who lived in this area. All around we could see “reminders” of this fact – there were murals and statues of the various characters about whom the brothers had written.

M will never be able to tease or complain about her father again. Whenever we went anywhere in NZ with Dad, we always had to stop to see whatever hydroelectric power scheme was in the area – now we visit forts in Oman and castles in Germany with the same intensity!

Sababurg Castle is special – half of it is still in ruins and the other half has been converted into a hotel. We walked around the ruin area and up the South Tower before noticing that the weather was getting bleaker by the minute. We decided to head home before the snow came – but not before stirring up a lot of memories for J as we drove past her old school and she reminisced about her youth!

We made it home just in time. Within 30 mins it was snowing, and within 3 hours the garden turned from green to white.
Snow is a novelty for M – as she grew up in the tropics and in NZ, and to see snow in NZ meant that you had to make the effort to travel up some high mountains to the ski-field areas. It actually gets warmer when it snows – strange but true!

The next day, we went swimming! The town sits on a natural hot saltwater spring, and the council has built an amazing indoor complex for the people to enjoy. There are 3 different large pools of varying temperatures and salinity. 2 of the pools have outdoor swimming areas – and it was fun to swim outside for a while, surrounded by snow, with our bodies warm underwater and our heads freezing!

There are also fantastic sauna and steam rooms of varying temperatures and aromas, and a quiet meditation crystal room. We had great fun before going home...to yet another meal.

The 29th came quickly, and we said our goodbyes to J’s parents at the train station before heading for Stuttgart and our New Year’s Eve adventure.

The ICE trains

Arriving back in Göttingen on the rural train, we changed over to the ICE train to travel to Stuttgart.

These trains are awesome, and travel at speeds of up to 250kph. On one stage of the journey, we sat in the carriage directly behind the driver, and we were able to sit behind him to watch him drive the train, and see what he could see. It was like being at the movies, with the camera mounted behind the head of a starfighter pilot as he dodges and weaves through space!

I managed a couple of photos of the snow-covered countryside, but it was hard to get decent images with the speed of the train and the reflections in the windows.

We arrived in Stuttgart, and missed our city train connection by 10 seconds – mainly due to M’s inability to push through crowds as skillfully as J can do it! So, instead of waiting an hour for the next train, we decided to try the suburban trains.

We were in luck – 10 mins on the platform and the train to Herrenberg came along. We hopped on, and in less than an hour, we were greeting our friends, P&M at the Herrenberg train station.

The Black Forest & New Year

We had met our friends P&M in 2004 when we were all holidaying on the same island in Greece. After meeting us at the train station, they took us through more snow than M had seen in her life.

Overnight, it snowed again and we woke to a brilliant blue sky with the landscape sporting a crisp new coating of snow. We wolfed down breakfast, as we were keen to get out into the Black Forest area for a bit of sight-seeing. It was -12°C, and the first time that M has ever gotten into a car where the moisture inside has frozen: the car seats were covered in white patches of frost, and the windows were iced on the inside, as well as outside!

We travelled through beautiful snow-covered everything, along roads that had been well-cleared of snow but were still a little icy due to the freezing conditions.

M experienced a surreal moment when, as we drove along, she decided that life couldn’t get better than this. Here we were, 4 friends: travelling in amazing scenery; laughing our heads off; singing out of tune; enjoying the ride and each other’s company – it was one of those defining moments that she will remember for the rest of her life – the feel-good feeling that comes when you wouldn’t choose to be anywhere else at that very moment. Your mind, heart and soul speak with one voice – it doesn’t get any better than that!

We visited castles, palaces, small towns – and walked until our toes felt as if they would break off from the cold. The temperature never rose above -6°C the whole day.

A highlight of the day was our last stop in the town of Kinzigtal. A small river ran through the middle of the town, and a few brave ducks were still swimming in the near-freezing water. We walked through the maze of old typical German-style houses which were built many centuries before. To our relief, we found a café that was open and serving hot drinks and cakes, and we were quick to take advantage of that!

It got dark around 4pm, so we bundled into the car and headed home to Herrenberg, where we stopped for dinner at a wonderful German restaurant in the basement of a house. The original house and basement were built in the 1400s, but the top of the house had been rebuilt a couple of times over the centuries due to fires. The food was delicious and washed down by a beautiful bottle of the local red wine. An interesting feature of the wine bottle was that it didn’t have a traditional cork – nor did it have a screwcap which is becoming more common. Instead, it had a Perspex stopper, and it is a great idea, as it looks classy and still allows for the bottle to be sealed – just in case all the wine is not drunk during the one sitting!

The next day – New Year’s Eve - J was eager to catch up on some business emails (work never stops even on vacation), so we left her at home and went into Herrenberg, where we visited the cathedral that dominates the skyline. We climbed the countless stairs to the top of the belltower, only to be thwarted by a locked door at the very top which meant that we couldn’t get out onto the viewing platform! At this stage, P&M realized that it was almost mid-day, and the bells would soon start to chime. There were a lot of them – and we were in deafening touching distance of them! So it was a mad dash down all the stairs. We were on the last flight when the bells started their 10min sequence – we were very relieved.

Heading home again after coffee in a café, we prepared for our big night out for New Year’s Eve. 2 more new friends joined us – S&U – and we headed out the door at about 7pm to walk to the train station to catch the train to the town of Tübingen, where we had tickets to a dinner dance at one of the local clubs.

First mistake – never trust a friend to read the train timetable! We found that we were 40mins early for the train, so we stamped our feet and tried not to get cold before the train arrived. We were entertained by some of the local youths setting off fireworks – so we were still in a good mood.

Upon arriving at Tübingen, we had some confusion as to where the venue was, but once we found it, all was ok. We headed up the stairs and had a delicious dinner. After dinner, it was back down to the dancefloor, where we all cut loose for a few songs. Unfortunately the DJs had NO IDEA about what to play – as soon as the dancefloor was crowded, they’d play some obscure song that no-one knew, and the floor would empty again!

About 5 mins to midnight, the place just emptied out, as people were making their way outside to stand in the snow. This had M puzzled – she had no idea what was going on – why were people leaving the party before midnight?

It all became clear. On the stroke of midnight, from the surrounding neighbourhood and all over Germany, a barrage of skyrockets was launched into the sky, and the sounds of bangers and crackers reverberated through the air for the next 40 mins. It was like a warzone – there were even crackers that sounded like the ack-ack of machine guns. It was a surreal experience – being in Germany and surrounded by buildings that you see in war movies, and hearing the ack-ack of machine gun fire!

After the fireworks, we decided to go home as the party was not great.

Mistake #2: don’t try getting cabs in the hours after midnight at New Year. We entertained ourselves by scooping snow off the parked cars, making snowballs and lobbing them at street signs to pass the time. This quickly deteriorated into a very lopsided snowball fight, where the 5 Germans took on the 1 Kiwi! Luckily, 2 of the Germans took M’s side, and what followed was a battle royale! We were having a ball – and if anyone had seen us, they would have smiled at the sight of 6 30-40 something women battling it out in a Tübingen sidestreet!

Taxis were finally acquired and we headed home to play charades until 4:30am.

We woke at mid-day, showered and packed – and we were taken to the train station to catch the train to Munich, and then the plane back to Dubai.

Our Christmas and New Year vacation was over, and we have a ton of memories and good times to laugh about and reminisce over. Plus the images too, of course!