Up at 4:40am. Ugh. It wasn’t too bad though – I went to bed at a
reasonable hour and slept well. I was a
bit worried when no driver was there at 5:00, or 5:15, or 5:30, but the hotel
night manager got a private taxi to take me.
I half slept, half chatted with James, a Dar es Salam native. He was very curious about jobs in the US and
how much a car like his would cost there?
He also mentioned giving up driving (the government charges too much for
the licenses), buying a car wash and starting his own business. Good for him – nice entrepreneurial
spirit! He said Zanzibar is too
expensive – um yeah, then don’t think about moving to the US!
Got to the airport on time (well, two
hours early – which drives me crazy) – a long wait in a hot third world airport
with no air conditioning – never fun. On
the plane, I randomly sat next to a guy from Nepal that I met on New Year’s Eve
at the bar. He works for a non-profit
subsidiary of Tesla/SolarCity that does power projects in rural third world
countries.
Interesting guy and fun
chatting with him on the plane.
Landed in Dubai a little early. Easy breezy through customs and getting a
transit visa, then to the Metro to the Burj Khalifa / Dubai Mall stop. Amazing views of the world’s tallest building
which is a truly remarkable structure.
It took me forever to find the ticket window to get up to the viewing
level but it was sold out for the day – boo!
I found a scalped ticket online but for $100 at 8:00pm, well past
sunset, so I figured it wasn’t worth it.
Instead, I admired the views from the outside. I watched the fountain show (think of the Bellagio
in Las Vegas), then the unexpected LED light show on the entire building
exterior – wow! The display goes all the
way up 140 stories and is synched to music playing in the plaza below – quite
impressive! I walked around a bit then
had diner at Din Tai Fung – yes, there’s one in Dubai Mall! Unlike the one in L.A., there was no wait
here – at least at 7:00pm. Yummy.
After, I found a lounge at the Souk al
Bahar across the way and sat on the terrace with a view of the fountains. Watched the show a couple more times with a
cocktail in hand. An interesting place,
Dubai. Very modern but still with a
traditional style and ties to its roots.
Not much “old” here but the new keeps the feel of the old without a cheesy
fake feel, but rather in a way that tries to retain the genuine culture. At lease that’s my brief impression. Time to close the tab and hike back to the
train before I get too tipsy. Last Metro
leaves at 12:30am so I will still have several hours to kill in the DBX
airport. Hopefully I’ll find a comfy
place to sleep for a few hours…
Prologue: After a few more drinks at the bar in the
Dubai airport, I found a semi-comfortable bench to catch some zzz’s. Slept on and off for a few hours, then headed
to the departure gate to board my Emirates A380. I was in the back of the plane but had an
empty middle seat next to me – yay! It
was a pretty comfy 16 hour flight (if there is such a thing) back to LA. Slept a little and watched six movies! Landed safe and sound and got home in time to
unpack, throw in a load of laundry, check the mail and have a bite before
totally crashing at 8:00pm. Always
bitter sweet returning from these epic adventures. Nice to be home but sad the excitement and
novelty of travel is over. Well, I
shouldn’t complain – I’m off for a two-week snowboard trip in less than ten
days! Time to recoup for a bit.
2025-02-10