happy birthday uae

thursday night we went down to the corniche to partake in the celebrations for the uae's 40th birthday. there was a fly-over by fighter jets that spewed red and green jetstream; another flyover by helicopters toting the uae flag; a dancing, colored fountain show in the gulf and fireworks. my brand new ultra-mini camera doesn't take great pics at night, so none of those came out. but the ones below should give an idea of what the corniche is like. i'm thinking the bottom of their abayas must be filthy and caked with sand after a day at the beach.

yesterday was the actual 'national day' so jeff and i ventured out to the new jumeirah-etihad hotel to hang by the pool at the 'nahaan' restaurant, then we went up to ray's bar on the 62nd floor to get a good view of the heavily-advertised fireworks (which never happened).

the traffic was insane with solid gridlock for over 8 hours. the streets were filled with cars bedecked with the president's and sheikh's pictures, uae flags, streamers, and green and red fake fur. at about 10:00 we decided to ditch the bar and try to head back the 3 miles to the house. unfortunately, there were no cabs to be found at jumeirah so we hiked about a mile (in the sand, in heels, uphill, both ways) to the intercon hotel to see if we had a better chance hailing a taxi. no luck; we ended up staying at the intercon for the night listening to the sounds of carousing muslims honking, tire screeching, engine-revving and yelling into the wee hours of today. 

jeff's boss, nick (my favorite irishman) is in town, so we're off to the beach rotana to see how many bottles of wine we can make disappear.

ttfn,

tricia