A Year Later...

Since we've just finished up a year of living as Expats I thought I'd list my top 10 of what I love and hate right now about Dubai.

Positives first...

1. The roundabout is completed! Construction has been going on since we moved into the Ranches.
2. Busy social life! Bunco, dinner club, Friday brunches, evenings with friends
3. Some of our dream destinations are super close. (My Athens post is coming I swear!) Seychelles next spring, then hopefully Venice :)
4. We'll have nice weather until December when it will get a bit 'cool'! By the way, it's still pretty hot and humid.
5. I have time to cook dinner every night if I choose.
6. Taxis are cheap.
7. I am learning a lot about Muslims.
8. I feel safer here than in Houston.
9. Sandstorms make it look overcast.
10.I have a gas stove that is so awesome to cook on!


Now for what I am hating (maybe that word is a little strong)...

1. Self entitled idiots thinking they can drive in the middle of two lanes, cut me off so close that I have to slam on my brakes, ride my ass and flash high beams even though there is someone right in front of me, and basically drive like shit.
2. Sand - it's everywhere
3. Body Odor - it can be rank here
4. Time difference makes it difficult to watch UT football (thank goodness for the slingbox though)! This Saturday night we'll be up late watching TX/OU even though it's a weeknight!
5. Missing all my friends and family! 9 days people and I will be on that miserable flight to Houston! I haven't been home in TEN months! Watch out Taco Bell.
6. TV here sucks! I get to choose between The Nanny, Coach, and Married With Children
7. It's nearly impossible to get anything fixed right here. I'm sure if you scroll through the archives you'll see a few examples.
8. You can't look anywhere without seeing construction.
9. No rain.
10.No piercing blue skies. The amount of sand in the air fades the blue of the sky.

I'm Not Stuck on the Roundabout

Yes, my friends, it's finally finished! The Ranches roundabout is G..O..N..E! We now have a proper interchange to get out of our neighborhood. For those of you not in Dubai, let me give you a little background. In order to get to our neighborhood from anywhere in Dubai you previously had to travel around the Ranches roundabout. Maybe I need to back up a bit further and explain a roundabout. Houstonians, there are roundabouts in Houston behind the Memorial City Hospital on I10. But, they're little cutesie ones in a residential neighborhood. Sorry, I digress.

A roundabout is a way to navigate crossing roads without a stoplight. It's a giant circle with four (typically) roads sprouting off of it. So, you get onto the roundabout and if you want to turn right, you take the first road sprout. Straight, the second. Left, the third. You get it right?

Now, the Ranches roundabout was a crossing of a major highway and a minor highway. There were three lanes in the roundabout and all kinds of crazy rules about who could turn from which lane. The worst thing about it was the traffic buildup. In order to make the roundabout safer, the RTA installed traffic lights so that you could only get on the roundabout when your light was green. The cycle was FIVE full minutes. I rarely made it through on the first cycle. There are two ways (see DDDD #3) out of the neighborhood. Basically, getting somewhere that was 15 minutes away would take at least 45 because of the freakin roundabout. And, there was no way to know how bad it was going to be. I've sat in the line for 30 minutes before on a Wednesday at 10am.

On a Thursday afternoon a few weeks ago it was announced that the interchange would be open the next morning! I was beyond excited and found something to do Friday morning! It was awesome driving over Emirates Road and not having to stop!

NO more stoplights.
NO more queueing.
NO more endless waiting.

Here are the before pictures...

Approaching the Roundabout from Mall of the Emirates on 63 (Umm Suqueim)

Scaffolding for the flyovers (these pics were taken Nov of last year)

Near the Emirates Road Jebel Ali side
Near the back entrance of the Ranches

And here are the after pictures...

Leaving the Ranches and heading toward Jebel AliOn the overpass that crosses Emirates Road
Umm Suqueim Road that takes you to Mall of the Emirates and the back entrance of the Ranches (the Ranches is back left out of the picture)

This is the way that you get on Emirates Road from Umm Suqueim (63) and head toward Jebel Ali

Taking Emirates Road to Jebel Ali from the back entrance of the Ranches

Perks of being an Expat

Our humble bar when we moved in.

Our bar now.

We've been deemed the "good home" for alcohol when their parents move back to the states. Kel's scotch collection is on the right hand side and I believe it's approaching 9 bottles.

As you can see, the left side contains the more "unique" and less desirables - Disaronno on the rocks? Mmmmm. Cognac? We just recently killed a bottle of Pimms. Not sure how that ended up in our collection, but I'm glad it's gone. Any drink mixed with cucumbers does not fall high on my list of "anxious to try" cocktails.

"And, the Mother of the Year is..."

I was craving good Mexican (maybe had something to do with a few drinks the night before), so we headed down to El Chico, the only good Tex-Mex place in Dubai, for an early dinner. The addition of a toddler to our little family has put a bit of a crimp in our eating out dynamic.


1. 7:30 has turned into 5:30 (which helps since lunch is now 10:30 or 11)
2. I say "I'm sorry" more than "thank you" basically because of all the crap that ends up on the floor under D's highchair - including stuff he swipes from others' tables.
3. We ask for the check when our entrees our served.
4. We take turns eating while the other chases D around.


Despite how fun eating out with Little Man is, the fabulous "at your table guacamole" makes chasing that kid around worth it! D loves the guac and has been known to eat it with a spoon. He also likes chips and as of late, likes to feed others (including the cat). Great entertainment for D AND keeps him occupied.I placed my order for the "top shelf guacamole" and you guessed it, no ripe avocados! What?? I was wallowing in my guacamole lacking pity when the manager came over to say hello to me - I'm not there all the time I swear. I told him I was devastated (I know the connotation really doesn't seem to fit with guacamole, but until you've tried it, no comments) about the avocado situation and he said he ordered new avocados and they should be here by dinnertime (he was referring to all the normal folks who are eating at 7:30 of course) and literally, at that moment, the door opened and the delivery guys came in with cases of new avocados balanced on their shoulders. Woo hoo! The manager himself ran up to check the ripeness of those babies and sure enough, our waittress came down with a tray of halved (completely mashable) avocados, lime juice, red onions, salt/pepper, tomatoes, and jalapenos. It's mixed right at your table and is so fresh! I will take a picture the next time I'm there, soooo should be up by next week.

I am not typically lucky, so I guess I should have known that I would have to pay in some other way for my ripe avocados.

Before I dug in, I got a little bite for Dylan. He ate it, then started screaming, and scraping his tongue with his hand. It has NEVER been spicy before! The jalapenos are always seeded and he's eaten it multiple times. I broke the cardinal rule and didn't taste it first! I know, I know, what kind of mother am I? This puts me in the same boat as those other cavalier mothers who don't test the bath water or look both ways before crossing the street.

Kel just gave me the disappointed head shake. D wouldn't touch any other food or drink the rest of the night. I tried to give him DEFINITELY NOT spicy chicken and he slapped my hand away. I handed him his sippy cup of milk (the best thing to remedy spicy mouth) and he knocked it to the floor. And, as further punishment, he no longer tolerated (he commenced screaming and kicking) the high chair and we had to take turns letting him run around outside and I was punished yet again as I felt my hair completely frizz and somehow gain 4 inches of height.

Picasso at Emirates Palace

Dylan and I got ourselves a little culture and checked out the Picasso exhibit (which is FREE) in Abu Dhabi at Emirates Palace with a few friends. Brief side note on Emirates Palace...it's comparable to Burj Al Arab in decadence, but unlike the Burj, it's completely modest. You can drive right up and valet. At the Burj, you have to have a reservation to even get through the gate.

It was actually pretty cool because the exhibit had little "walkmans" that you could walk around with and hear the history of a painting. Before the exhibit, I hadn't been much of a fan of his cubism period, but after hearing the work that went into it, I had much more respect. Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take pictures in the gallery otherwise I'd have more than me with some cake!

The best part was the cake and tea at the litte cafe outside the exhibit. I'm guessing that's supposed to be Picasso on the cake! It was absolutely divine!

D Dog Picasso'd out on the drive back to Dubai!

Seasonal Affective Disorder in Dubai

Since the beginning of January, there has NOT been one drop of rain. Every day this is it...

Sunny days - idyllic right? Not after 5 1/2 months and counting. I am desperate for a cloud, for a good old Texas thunderstorm in the late afternoon, for anything that appears overcast (except a sand storm). So, you can imagine my excitement when I checked weather.com and there was a 60% chance of rain on Wednesday (before then, I haven't seen anything higher than 10%)! I was thrilled, elated, on cloud 9 (hee hee). I started planning what I would do during my morning of rain - a book, a movie, (actually I was planning on swim suiting it up with D and doing a little dance outside, but the first two sound much more sane).

I've been checking weather.com every hour since last night and giggling like a drunken sorority girl. This morning I pulled up the website again hoping for a spot of cheer, since I woke up to yet another sunny, impossibly hot day.

TueJul 29
Partly Cloudy
102°94°
0%

WedJul 30
AM Clouds / PM Sun
100°90°
10%

ThuJul 31
Partly Cloudy
102°90°
0%

FriAug 1
Mostly Sunny
104°90°
0%

SatAug 2
Partly Cloudy
107°90°
0%

SunAug 3
Partly Cloudy
105°91°
0%

MonAug 4
Partly Cloudy
106°91°
0%

TueAug 5
Sunny
108°91°
0%

Yep, it went from 60% to 10%. Great. Guess it's another day at the pool. 2 1/2 months until the blissfuly unpredictable weather of Hoston.

The Suspense is Over..Here are the Balls

I know you've been waiting forever, but I've been busy! After bunco and cooking for 12, I had to take a few days off! Could have had something to do with the wine, but I'm using the cooking excuse.


Ok, grab a box of cake mix and a bottle of wine and let's make some balls.

Here's what you need:
1 box of cake mix (whatever flavor you fancy - in this demonstration I used a french vanilla cake mix)
1 tub of frosting (again, whatever flavor you'd like - I used strawberry)
Roll of wax paper
Chocolate bars (I used Lindt 70% and I mixed in some semi-sweet chocolate chips as well)
Decorator icing tubes or the rest of the tub of frosting

1. Make the box cake mix according to directions in a 13x9 pan.

2. Mash it all up (with a fork or your hands).

3. Put the crumbled cake in a bowl and make sure there are no big lumps.

4. Put HALF of the tub of frosting in the bowl with the crumbled up cake. Mix it into a dough with your hands. Mayonnaise is an optional ingredient - just kidding! Don't know how that got into the picture.

5. Roll the dough into balls that are about an inch in diameter. The smoother they are, the better (hee hee). Put them on a cookie sheet lined with wax paper.

6. Melt the chocolate in a double boiler (put a heat safe bowl on top of a pot of gently boiling water). If you melt the chocolate directly on the stove in a pot it will separate and not be pretty. I have a stainless steel bowl on top of my pot.

7. Drop the balls (a couple at a time) into the melted chocolate. Using two spoons, roll them around until they are completely covered in the chocolate.

8. Let some of the excess chocolate drip off and then place the balls back on the wax paper covered cookie sheet.

9. Put the balls in the fridge until the outer shell is hardened.

10. Decorate with the tube icing or melt the remaining tub of frosting in the microwave and drizzle over the balls. After it's melted, I would put it in a plastic baggie and cut a tiny hole in the bottom corner and drizzle that way, so the lines are really small. I decorated mine like dice for bunco night.

You can break off some of the excess chocolate once it's hardened, but be careful. One cake mix makes around 40 - 50 balls depending on their size. Obviously, these need to stay in the fridge. They taste great the next day! My friends have also used coconut, nuts, and sprinkles to decorate the tops.