Travels: UAE 2014/15 – Part 1
I’ve decided to divide my travel diary into 5 or so weeks for the time period that I was away. This would make reading so much more lighter as opposed to dividing it into “Day 1, Day 2, etc…” and also less lengthy.
My first week in UAE to me was like my first week in school. So much feelings happening in this heart of mine that it totally confused me. Its obviously my first time away from home for such a long time and to be totally honest I felt homesick (Who the heck feels homesick on a holiday?, I never quite understood my brain.) but the excitement of being in a new country, discovering new things and having that much needed break quickly simmered down that homesick feeling.
It felt like I needed 2 days to recover from an 8 hour flight. I slept until 5 that first day I was there because I landed at 1.30 am and being seated next to a germophobe with a stinky attitude and alcoholic like tendencies was just not fun. Obviously I didn’t get any shut eye on the plane. Damn you Emirates for seating me next to this woman!
I didn’t do much exploring or shopping for my first week in UAE but I did however dine out and went to the supermarket at 22.00. By supermarket I mean a Pick n Pay on steroids with whole cooked chickens costing R20 and apple juice R2. No exaggeration here.
There’s so much things that I learnt in my first week while I was there and also things that I had to get used to like their Friday being their Saturday and that their Sundays are their Mondays.
One thing that I didn’t like is that it got dark so quickly. At 5.30 the sun would be long gone. I guess that’s winter for you. Quite a different winter from what I’m used to. Some days I would stand on the balcony and watch the sun go down and all of a sudden see this “thing”, I have no idea what it is/was but it was like a trail of glitter descending from the sky. In my mind I was thinking is it a shooting star? A missile being shot? A bird? A plane? What? What? Nonetheless its safe to say that it freaked me out.
It seems like week 1 in the Arab Emirates just flew by without me even noticing. Well into my second week I’ve come to learn quite a few things and also learnt the ins and outs of the places.
In other related news, I have to say that the weather over there definitely did not agree with my skin. I had breakouts and dry skin on every other day. Its so weird because I never suffer from breakouts … EVER. I had to ditch most of my makeup and skincare products that I would normally use back home and number one being my Avon BB Cream. Even though the sun was not normal UAE temperatures, it somehow just couldn’t withstand the heat. I had to turn to the Emirati women to learn what their fave makeup products are.
My week 2 consisted of lazing around on beach and soaking up the sun. I visited Saadiyat Beach where I fell asleep on the beach for 2 hours and woke up with the most beautiful sunset. I have to say that the crime rate over there always seize to amaze me. I might have mentioned this before but I fell asleep with my handbag wide open, camera and phone lying next to me and woke up with everything as is.
