Dubai, the real scoop well what I know anyway

Well I have been asked a few questions about Dubai in the last year and my parents have asked that I send out a blog of things that you may or may not hear about if you wanted to come over. So this is what I can tell you, which may help or may not.

Dubai is a fantastic place to come visit, you can buy everything here. If you want a warranty then you can get it (whatever you want) at a mall, there are 9 now and 4-5 more on the way that of course will be the biggest in the world. But future projects is not what I want to write about. So if you came here tomorrow you would be able to find all kinds of accommodation from about $100 us a night up to I think the Royal suite in the Burj goes for about $20 000 a night. There is an enormous amount of accommodation though, I think the hardest part would be deciding where to stay. I have heard that Expedia has good rates for hotels in Dubai. There is every kind of dining experience you can imagine here, I have paid $2 US for a meal that I could not finish and I have paid $50 for one that left me hungry. It all depends on where you want to eat an how fancy of a place you choose, but again the possibilities are endless.

I have been asked a few times if Dubai is Handicapped accessible and I have say yes for the most part, the locals all take elevators or escalators everywhere so anywhere you want to go is accessible. There are cabs available for it too but they are few and far between that part maybe a bit more difficult but for about $100 a day you can hire a personal driver that will be on call for you for 10 hours.

Again there is a ton of things to do and if you go to any book store in a mall there are guides in books that can show you everything you ever could want to do. The beaches are amazing, they are large long beaches, even the free ones are really nice. If you decide to pay for a beach it is not very expensive and you usually can be more relaxed on them in terms of being conservative. There is also usually a chair service for a nominal fee available too.

the driving around the Emirate and even UAE is quite easy and very beautiful to go out into the desert on the highways. There are lots of camels that roam around and you can take some really interesting pictures of them too.

I hope this helps with some of the questions people have been asking. if you have more please feel free to e-mail me at cehegge@gmail.com and I will be happy to answer what I know about the Gulf.

The airport is a bear to come through FYI, passport control is fast but usually it is a 30min to an hour wait in line.

hope this helps.

oh by the way it is now over 40 degrees Celsius in the daytime (104 roughly for the Americans) and getting hotter. the better time to come to the Gulf is between October and April it is 30 and below for the most part between those times of the year.

Have a happy day all.

31 in Dubai

Well it is now offical, I am 31 and in Dubai. Could I have seen this happening 10 years ago...certainly not. 10 years ago I was in Red Deer, Alberta working at Turple Bros and working at a golf course. I was floating and made a decision, well my parents helped me to go to Olds College and get my Horticultural diploma and get an education. It was a good choice to go I had a great time and learned a lot that I still use today. My parents did tell me a gem that I hold very close to my heart; no matter what happens to you in life, no one can take your education away from you..... Good words to live by.

life is good, really good. I have a job that I really enjoy doing. (for the most part) I have some good friends here. This is the first time that it has been 39 degrees on my birthday...I was told it was 4 degrees today in Red Deer....that is a little chilly. there have been lots of firsts for me this year which i am very grateful for. I really have to thank my parents for being so supportive of me and helping me along my very interesting and varied life path so far.

So I have 5 weeks left...I recall having my blog title of being the first 5 weeks in...it has been an amazing ride this year. I have golfed in weather that is hotter then I ever thought I could exsist let alone excersize, I have skiied in a mall that is in the middle of the desert, I have gone to one of the best waterparks I have ever been to, sorry Sylvan lake, Dreamland is amazing. I have gone to Damascus, Kuwait, Thailand and traveled around the UAE fairly extensivly. I get upset sometimes that I have not saved a lot of money this year but looking back on all I have done I would have never had these opportunites back in Canada so for that I am very grateful.

anyway now that I have offically gone into my 30's I guess I have to count my life blessed. As a great song I have on my Ipod says I look forward to my next 30 years....could not have said it better myself...thanks Tim.

I have a ton of pictures to get up on here and picasa I will post some pictures and get up more on picasa and give the link here.

thanks all

Curtis

Kuwait.....

Hey, so if anyone is still checking this once and a while I have not posted in a while and have no real excuse for it. So here goes.

I was recently on a school trip to Kuwait, yea things are done differently overseas. In alberta you have to get waivers and permisson to go across town with students. We go to Kuwait with 20 students with 2 teachers and are not in charge of them the whole time. The students were hosted by families in Kuwait, Iwill get back to some of those stories in a bit. We fly to Kuwait at 7am on wednesday morning, we arrive at the visa issuing desk and start the process of buying entrance into the country. It is early morning and there are a lot of businessmen there as well so I knew this was going to take a while. when we get to the counter we find out there is a list of countries Kuwait will let into the country and many they will not without special visas. well as you can guess I have 5 students who are on the do not let into the country list. The once officer makes it clear that the girl from Venesuala will not be coming into his country...the Taiwanese girls (3 of them) have diplomatice passports or they would have been told the same thing. they have to get permission from the Chinese government because China still considers Tiwan part of China, it is crazy. Oh and the last girl is a South African...they are horrible people as well to the Kuwaities, I guess. A man with more Wasta comes over, (more power) and says he understands we are here for a school funcition and wants to help me get into the country with every student. he was a very nice guy and I did not ever get a chance to thank him for his work. So we have to contact the school that we are going to and they have to go and get visas for us so that we can come play badminton. this does get sorted out but it does take 5 hours in all. The plus side to all of this is that the students did not know each other all that well and they had ample opportunity to gel. That part was really good, the stressful part is that a Canadian teacher that has not gone with students to a different country has the hardest time getting into a country then all of the other teams that travelled comined this year. Good learning experience forsure.
Kuwait was amazing though. it is a very beautiful place but there is not a lot to do there. it is a dry country, kind of. you can smuggle beer and wine making kits into the country or you can buy blackmarket booze of the governement that is in charge of making sure it does not come into the country...ha ha got to love political corruption. It all depends on who you are... the black market booze is really expensive so most people do not bother with it anway. I did try my hosts beer, I think I could go without if that was what my choice was...it was not overly great. Labatt has nothing to worry about with competition. We got a chance to go to an amazing spa for a while, it was called the Palms...very nice place.

Three days of badminton started at 7:30 am and finished around 6 pm most nights, it was a lot of sitting around and watching but the students had a great time even with all the sore shoulders. The friendships they made were fantasic, the hosting was second to none. A few students got to stay at the Amir's home (he is the ruler of Kuwait) the got to ride around on a tank in the back yard, go for a drive in a farri and get rides to school in a bentley, it is a tough life. Some of the students said they stayed in a house big enough to need an elevator, absolutley rediculous.... the money that is over in the middle east is mind boggling. A story on that, the Kuwait goverment is disscussing paying off all local loans to help the kuwaitie people with debt. like they need this. the funny thing is that because it became public they are expecting it to happen now. (the local Kuwaitie people that is). Unfortunalty you can not become a Kuwaitie even if you live there the rest of your life, you have to be born into this world.

Back to the badminton, the students had a great time overall and were a bit tired when we had to come home, but most wanted to stay a little while longer to hang out with new friends. That i think is a great success. We got back into Dubai at 1:30 am when the airport is the busiest it possibly can be, crazy busy. there were 10 000 people waiting at passport control easliy. we did not wait long and got out of there in less then an hour I would say. all students got picked up from their parents and slept the next day for a long time.

well if you are still reading I thank you, I hear it is cold and lots of snow in Alberta right now. that is not great, it is staying warm here and the messed up thing is that below 30 degrees now I feel cold. I know I have no sypathy at all from those of you reading this but I will freeze my butt off when I get back in June I am sure.

7 more weeks, I am excited to come back, even more so to see everyone again and just be back with my family. it has been an amazing ride so far I am already looking forward to next year and see how it plays out. I may even stay a 3rd year, but I should probably finish the first before I think about the 3rd.

Take care, I will get pictures up of Kuwait soon!!

Curtis

Not a lot new

Well i thought it was about time to write a new blog, it is Sunday morning I am at school (the work week here is Sunday to Thursday) and I have lots to do so I thought a procrastiation was in order. As you may know I was in the Calgary Herald for an article they did on Globetroting Calgarians featuring yours truley and ofcourse Dubai. It was well written and a lot of people found it interesting. So I guess I am almost world famous now, well in my own mind I guess.

So little has changed in my life in the last few months so I thought I would rant a bit as that what blogs can be for too, not just an update on what is happening in my life. Everyone had said to me that you will save sooo much money if you go overseas to teach, think of the tax breaks and the housing is paid for you will have difficulty spending the cash.... THAT is if you do not want to experience anything of the place you live at, or are living with someone. The things that keep you busy outside of work are very expensive and a lot of cash goes to that, I mean a lot. Every weekend there is someones birthday or event going on that a guy like me can not miss. I like to be busy all the time and it all seams to cost a lot of money.

to go for a drink here in Dubai is not a cheap under taking, I rarley do it anymore now being that you pay close to $10 CND for one, so what that is like $5US now?? and being that we get paid in US dollars we as Canadians over here are not making as much as we did when we got here. Oh well, people coming to visit pay less now, that is good, well if anyone does come visit that is. So back to my rant, golf is one of my favorite sports, well it used to be. I played on thursday night and shot the worst score i ever have i think. I will not say but it was well over a century, I am sure glad i am taking lessons once a week for the last 6 weeks, wow have they helped. At one point I was willing to stop golfing altogether. it was not a great day for Curtis.

Anyway I will leave it at that for now, I could go on for a while this morning but I think I should start to get some work done today.

oh if you do have questions for me I can not respond to the comments you leave on my blog. so e-mail me if you do have questions for Dubai or me. I will forward the questions you have for Dubai to her e-mail. you know what i mean.

cehegge@gmail.com

14 weeks and I am back in Canada....not that i am counting...

Dubai Desert Classic...Tiger show...

Well over the weekend was the Desert Classic. I went on friday, got on TV and was in the local paper on the front page....not too bad I would say. We got there at 830ish in the morning and went on a trek to find Erine Els. He is not a hard man to miss as he is a large guy. I had no idea how big he actually is. we followed him for 8-9 holes and it was impressive to watch. He has such a nice swing, smooth and great attitude, nice and chilled out. he did hit a ball right over our heads on the 17th hole. He went for the green it is only 330 yards to cut the corner to get to the green. I would say most of the pros did this. it is unreal to see how much better they are then the regular masses (me). we watched Ernie finish up on 18 and went to go find Tiger. We went to were the crowd was growing, on the practice tee.

It must be a kick in the pants for every other golfer at these events, no one really claps or cheers for anyone else like Tiger. I have heard he is the most recognizable man on the planet, I can see it too. for him to walk on the range. the crowd went nuts, he waved and everyone settled down. The other guys on the tee box must have been rattled by this. Anyway it was amazing to watch is warm up and see how he gets ready for the day. We left the practice green early to get a seat on the first tee to watch the first few group before Tigers go out. So O'mera, Juimenez and Garcia were the three bigger names that went out before Tiger and it was great to see. They were not on form this weekend and did not come close to the leaderboard, although Garcia did go to -5 under on friday and Juminez played great, he is a fun guy to watch golf. Also Colin Montgomery was playing with Tiger on friday. They had some great banter for the day, it was a lot of fun to watch.

So on the second hole Tiger went for the green with a 3 wood, only 356 yard straight away...sick is all i can say. Luckily for me, he mishit and I got a chance to be 3 feet away from him to watch him stub a chip and do it again 10 feet in front of him. I guess ever great ones can make shots like me...ha ha. he still pared the hole though....I may not have done the same. the crowd was starting to get bigger and bigger so we had to start leap froging his shots, so that we could be close to see every second one. We did not get to see too many Tee shots from the tee as a lot of people camped out on the tee and watched all the golfers come through. On the 6th hole Tiger almost hit me with his tee shot so I was close again and to watch him hit a shot out of the trampled down rough, 180+ yards, up hill and within 3 feet of the pin is awe insipring. I am sure I would not even have made the green let alone attack the pin.

It was a lot of fun to be there for the day I do have to say by walk jogging around the golf course for 10 hours it makes for a tiring day. It was a lot of fun to watch Tiger and see the crowds go crazy for him. The one thing even tiger had said was the press photographers were getting annoying they would stand in front of him and take some weird pictures. The whole time I was watching the golf I did keep thinking though that I would much rather be actually golfing the course over watching people golfing the course. even professionals.

I do not do crowds overly well, especially tired so at the end of the day when we could not leave as there was only one way out that was 20 feet wide and 20 000 people were trying to leave at once. It was not a fun experice but again I was tired and kept my cool about the whole thing.

Overall it was an amazing experience and I look forward to going again next year for one day again.

I hope Tiger comes back..

Flooding in Dubai

Yes I am serious, in January we had rain that lasted for a few days and it came down hard enough that cars got stuck on the road and there was massive flooding everywhere. It started in the morning around 5 am and by the time we left for school roads were almost totally under water. It rained all day and being the fact there is no rain sewer lines there was no where for the rain to go. Students started a rumor that we would not have school the next day because of it, it was hard to believe that a bit of rain could shut a city down like Dubai...but sure enough. They were right. They gave us not one day but two days off because of rain...ha ha. the last day we had off was a nice sunny day so we hit the golf course.

I should mention that George Bush came to the city a few days before and gave us a day off as well because of the fact that the military closed the major roads for the whole day. so it was called a national holiday. too funny. there was a bit of concern that with Iran being so close that something may have happened but it was all good except for the fact we could not go anywhere. it was a good day to catch up on some sleep.


so that was the week, out of 5 days we were supposed to work, we worked 2....it is a hard life here in Dubai...

Christmas in Thailand

Well, I spent 2.5 amazing weeks in Thailand over Christmas. Sorry I have not gotten this out sooner but I am a procrastinator.....

We arrived in Thailand after a 7 hour flight from Dubai, fairly uneventful but nice and relaxing knowing we were going to a beautiful place. we got to Bangkok and immediatly hopped on a plane to Chang Mai. Chang Mai is an amazing beautiful place that I highly recomend going to and looking around. it is soo peacful and serene. there are temples everywhere and it is a very quiet place to go. We got to Chang Mai and wanted to go for a walk about and see some of the city. We stayed at a place called the Pun Pun guest house. it is a great place, very basic but for $7 a night we were very happy with the spot. John who is the owner of the place was very helpful and had some great tips for us. we went down to the night market that sells everything you could want i think for touristy stuff. along with every knock off watch, shirt, bag accessory that you can imagine. We ofcourse had to sample the local brew which by the end of the trip I enjoyed Chang the most, but we also had some Shinga, Tiger and Leo beer. Leo would best be described as the stuff that Drummond Brewrey sent over to Thailand because no one would drink in in Canada. but for 25 cents a can it is hard tom complain about it.

We got up early the next day and went to a elephant safari camp, it was a interesting experience. We first went to a Orchid and Butterfly farm thats only purpose is to pull dollars out of your pocket as the biggest thing about this area was the gift shop. There are some amazing Orchids over there. The Butterflies were great, they would land on you and people were enjoying how many were in the cage. So we left from there and went to the Elephant camp. when we got there they put us on a bamboo raft and we went down the river for a few hours. it was one of the highlights of the trip. it was so beautiful and peaceful. we floated down the river with two guides one on the front and one on the back. it was a great time. so from there we went to watch the elephant "perform". I can say I was not impressed to the point of walking out watching these animals get mistreated. There is about 15 animals preforming and they had to dance, and paint a picture, play soccer and do balancing acts on a log, all thing that they would normally do in the wild....It was tought to watch and they really pulled at people heart strings where by you can buy some banannas and sugar cane to feed these creatures. As the announcer said in broken english that the Elephants do not have money to buy these things for themselves. We then got on the back of one of the elephants for a ride through a river and then into an area where we could sit and each lunch. that part was interesting but again there were 3 spots we had to stop to see if we wanted to buy more banannas for the elephants. I am guessing most people buck up because the elephant would not leave till the person in the tower gave it some food. It was a very interesting experience to say the least. After lunch we went down to see the long neck people. they are burmese people that are allowed to live in Thailand but can not become residents, they have to pay 5000 bhat to live in the country each year so they need to sell more stuff to tourists to stay in the country. they do not really live in a village it is just a row of shacks that have there things that they make forsale on the side of the buildings. it is actually very sad to see as this is what they do all day everyday is put themselves on display for tourists. on the way back we stopped at a monkey show and it was interesting too. This time they at least showed how they trained the monkeys to collect coconuts and ride tricycles...jungle tricylces.

The next few days were exploring the city of Chang Mai, relaxing and having a few drinks here and there. we met some great people from Denmark and around there. there is a ton of Sandanvians that come down to Thailand to travel. We went to the Muai Tai boxing one night at it was amazing. the fights were hard, there were 2 knock outs and they can kick the crap out of each other. there were 12 fights during the night and it cost us around 12 dollars to go for 3 hours of fights. very much worth it. great times.

the next day we went on a atv ride into the mountains around the city. it was a two hour ride and the scenery was amazing. we saw several small villages and some houses that were back up in the mountains. some of the places were really tough for us to get there on our bikes let a lone walking or on a scooter. (which is the main transport in all of thailand) it was a great time they were a dune buggy kind of thing and we got wet, muddy and drove into traffic on a main highway on the way back. all in all a great time, maybe a little dangerous. I am sure the company had insurance...HA HA.

We left for bangkok the next day and spent 4 days there. The city is super polluted and there are 30 million people living in bangkok. suprizingly though the traffic is bad for a big city but i would honestly say that traffic in Dubai is worse. Bangkok traffic actually moves along when it is busy. we stayed on backpackers road and chilled out for a few days. we went to the grand palace and it is exactly what it says it is. it is huge, huge. we spent most of the day there. the pictures say way more then I can describe so check them out they are on the picasa site that i have set up. I will leave the web address again at the end of this blog. So the next few days were just by the pool at the top of our hotel and chilling out getting ready to hit Ko Phangan. I really enjoyed Bangkok, I was thinking of even trying to get a job in the city for my next stop, but not now, it is very poluted and I am sure the incidences of cancer are huge with all the smog that is in the city. I am glad I went once, but I would not spend much time in Bangkok again.

Ko Phangan was amazing, it is a very small island and it is a huge party. It was chilled out on the beach as well as a crazy party down on Haad Rin. we got to the island after a very long day of travel. It only took an hour to fly to the south but with the ferry ride that was 2.5 hours it was a fair journey. It all sorted it it self out as it does on vacation and we got to our place that we booked. It was a yoga resort that was an actual yoga resort, 4 unflexable men do not do well at a yoga resort. Plus it was not near any beach, but it was a beautiful resort. we luckly found a place down near the south of the beach at a place called great bay resort. it was a perfect place to go and the beach was amazing. we spent the majority of our time on the beach and chilling out reading books and gettting a good tan. I did learn how to throw an ultimate frizbee properly which is very cool. we did go down to the major party beach 2 times during our 6 day stay. It was insane, 37 000 people were on the beach for new years. it was unreal how many people were down there. also how many people tried to sell me extacy and tried to pick pocket me. I did not have cash in my pockets so they could dig all they wanted and would find nothing. It was an eye opener forsure. there were kids on the beach trying to sell everything from necklaces to glow in the dark sticks untill all hours of the night. I am very glad I did the beach but I have no interest in going back it was crazy. we then took a few nights to chill out and had some great food. We rented a Scooter and spent a day touring the island and looking at the water falls. they were underwhelming forsure but we were told that during the rainy season they are quite spectacular. That part was a great day. the last day of the trip I was up by 5am then onto the ferry for the long travel back to bangkok to relax for the night before the flight back to Dubai. I highly recomend going to thailand and doing it on a budget, it is a great time.

www.picasaweb.google.com/cehegge

more pictures are here.

e-mail me if you have more questions about the trip.

thanks for reading!

Curtis

It is Chistmas time in Dubai

well it has been a few weeks since I have posted and thought I would send another post before I am off to Thailand for the break.


I have done a lot in the last few weeks, it has been amazing. I went golfing just outside of dubai in Al Rhash Khaimah at a course called Tower links, it was a tough course but the best part at 5pm when the lights came on. we played the last holes under the lights. it was amazing. very cool experience for sure. you loose the ball when it goes above the lights, but is very easy to find when it comes back into the light. I will post pictures of them soon!. I played alright, but I found that not practicing a lot you loose your swing fast. the positive thing of that is we are now getting a discount at the course across the street from our school where we can go everyday.

It is getting cool around here, at night it dips to 22ish and then during the day it goes up to 27-30 degrees most days. it threatened rain a few days ago but nothing came of it. we have yet to see any kind of rain since I moved here. it is a very weird feeling not to have any change in the weather then humidity and heat.

last weekend I got to be involved in the Dubai Rugby 7s. it was an amazing experience. there were 30 000 people there and hundreds of players playing. there was an international tournament as well as a social side that included 3 divisions of mens games, ladies games and old boys, but the new political correct way of saying this is veterans now...
It was 3 days long and I reffed 29 games, I was exhausted afterward but it was such a fun time, if you know a rugby ref i highly recommend that they come to Dubai to help, they take refs from all over the world. we had 75 refs at this tournament.
we got there at 8am and left around 11pm most days. this was one of the first tournaments that beer was not an option at the end of the day, we were way too tired.

well that is the jist of what has gone on in the last few weeks, school is amazing, the kids are wired for break like anywhere else in the world. the biggest difference is that most of the students are traveling all over the world at break. I am excited to go to Thailand for break, there will be tons of pictures when i get back I am sure!

I will be missing Canada big time at Christmas but I think this is a must do experience. Funny enough that I am missing the cold and snow, it still feels like the summer and I am not sure my mind can get around the fact I will not see much snow for a while. good thing there is ski dubai so i can get my fill when I need it.

well all I hope everyone has a very happy holiday, I miss everyone and look forward to even a quick e-mail to say hi!!

chegge@gmail.com

Merry Christmas everyone!!

Curtis

3 weeks to winter break

Well it has been an amazing ride so far. thanks again for people e-mailing me to ask various questions, I really appreciate it. in 3 weeks I will be on a plane to Thailand. I can not believe all that I have experienced so far and I am only 4 months into this adventure. I have had some ups and downs, but luckily it has been mostly ups.

Since I blogged last I have been to Kuwait to referee a rugby tournament. it was unreal, a sand pitch that in the sun turned into a very hard packed surface that cut up a lot of the players legs and shoulders when they were making their tackles. I can say with confidence on that day I was happy I no longer play and just referee. It was an amazing experience and I found Kuwait to be very peaceful and very rich. There is a ton of money there, the homes that I got to see are Gigantic. Obviously we were only in the affluent areas but still very nice place. I felt very safe and there was an Erie calm about the place that a few people that I went with felt too. The driving is all crazy here in the middle east and Kuwait was no different. all of the traffic laws are more suggestion it seams, but it all flows well and I have not seen nearly the accidents that I thought I would.

So Kuwait was great, when I got back from Kuwait I had to go get my blood check done and chest x-ray. this is done for everyone who moves to Dubai but we for some reason got the opportunity to go to the hospital that all the immigrant workers get to go to. it took 11 hours for them to take my blood then give me a chest x-ray. it was so painfully boring, there was nothing to do but read a book and wait. there was black mold on the ceiling tiles in the HOSPITAL, it was eye opening. There were a lot of the Indians that were asking why us as white people were at this hospital. Apparently most companies just pay for the private clinics to do this, it costs a bit more but also gets done in days instead of weeks. it was wild. there were 1500 people that go pushed thought this hospital a day, so at $100 us dollars to get the work done there is a fair amount of cash being put into this system. they are obviously not spending it on the buildings up keep. HA HA. it was interesting to say the least.

Other then that there is not a lot going on, we are defiantly getting into a routine, the kids have a very different mind set here. I find if I do not yell at them to be quite they will keep talking till I get mad. I have tried a lot of different techniques and I am not sure what is the next step. I hear that this is just the way it is and to live with it. we will see, I am sure there will be a way we can sort this kids out. money can not robe them of respect....so I hope.

They school is getting better too, there seams to be great strides to fix the network problems we have been having. I am actually able to teach computers now and get on to the Internet for most of the day, instead of hoping every lesson I had that it would be working for the hour. Again, it has been an experience and I do not even bat and eye now when it happens there are always games we can play either on the computer or "heads up seven up" seams still to be a classic for students.

I will get some more pictures up soon too. If you have facebook you can add me there and I have a lot more up there too.

my e-mail again is cehegge@gmail.com

thanks for reading. have a great one!

Two months in now...

So it has now been two months....hard to believe. I have experienced so much and so much more to do. All I concerned about now is time and money...more the latter then the first, wish it did not cost so much to see all these amazing things to see. well good things come to those who wait...I can wait a bit. Anyway enough of the philosophy.
In the last few weeks I have experiences some amazing things. I have been on a road trip to sleep on a beach in Dibba, Oman. it was a great time, we drove out there almost by ourselves on the road. There were 5 cars that went and we had a blast leaving Dubai and driving into Oman. there are shops and markets on the side of road all the way there. They are selling anything from fruit, ceramics, water, blow up pool toys just to name a few things most of the shops around here, well the smaller ones all sell some of the weirdest stuff. It took about an hour and half to get there and it was an amazing sight to see, we pulled up to the beach, Joe (he had the only 4x4) let some air out of his tires and we packed all our camping gear in it and drove out on the beach and found a spot to set up camp. it was surreal, the fishermen were pulling nets onto the beach with huge 4x4s and we were sitting there having a beer watching them do their work. we spent the night and had a late night dip in the arabian ocean the phosphorescences in the water glowed when you moved to fast in the water. it was a very cool thing to see. 6am came very fast when it is 36 degrees in the tent after a beer or two, so we got up and had another dip in the ocean and packed up camp and came back to Dubai (it would have been way to hot to have stayed there the rest of the day.) (pictures are posted on the picasa site i have too...)

a few days later we went dune buggying in the desert. it was amazing, Dad well everyone would love to do this, it was a riot they even had big suspension so it was a very smooth ride out there. it was a 90 min ride and would have loved to have done another right after. it was crazy and a lot of fun.

I got a phone call from the local rugby Union and was asked i would be willing to go to Damascus, Syria to ref some rugby out there. I could not refuse a free trip so off i went a flew to Syria for a few days to hang out and ref some rugby. Beirut, Alexandria and Jordan were all the teams that came to the tournament and it was an amazing time. The old city is hard to explain it is super old. (1200yrs) and beautiful. there are markets everywhere that you can buy things very very cheap. I got a few Syrian things that i really liked, a rug and a very detailed and both hand made box. it was an amazing experience. I will post all of the pictures. if anyone has a chance to go to Syria i strongly recommend it. the people are very very nice, humble and giving. there was not a time where i did not feel completely safe, well in traffic I did not feel safe but as my friend Mohammad said to me inshalla.... (god willing) no one gets hurt.

I am really happy I have done this, I do miss everyone but this is experience that i could never have gotten by going on a few holidays here and there.

School is really good. we are now back from Eid, which is the fall break after Ramadan. The kids and teachers both needed it and it sure helps these students focus now till x-mas, so i am told. but find a student in grade 2 and 3 that stays focused for more then 2 min at a time and you will find a student who is older then their years. I still love the school but there are a few issues that would need to be rectified, but again this all comes in time and I have to realize that. I just want to put out a good product to the kids and myself.

well if you are still reading I do appreciate it. I will try to make an effort to do more blogging so that they do not get this long, there is a ton of information I left out about the trips i took, if you want to know more e-mail me and I would be happy to let you know more about the places I have been so far!!

well I will leave with the fact I booked my flight to Sri Lanka for Christmas....it will be amazing to do....and forsure will let everyone know all about it.

thanks for the e-mails everyone, keep them coming I do want to know what is going on back in Canada.

Cheers.

Curtis in Dubai!