Monday, June 28, 2010

On our Way - First Stop....Dubai

Well I have finally decided to post my first blog entry ever. I normally would not have considered creating a blog, but I figured this would be a great way to document our trip to Africa and to share pictures with family and friends while we are overseas. Wiley and I left Birmingham on Friday, June 25th to head for Bomet, Kenya so that Wiley can work at Tenwek hospital for 8 weeks this summer. I have to admit that I was nervous about the trip. I am not one for flying and I also find that I am irrationally fearful of things/places that I know nothing about. But I decided I would just have to get over any of my fears because 1) my reason for not doing something cannot be because I am afraid and 2) I have always wanted to go to Africa. We decided to fly to Kenya on Emirates airline. I have to say that it is the nicest airplane that I have ever been on. I had always heard great things about it, but it definitely exceeded my expectations. As I mentioned before, I am not the best flyer. Thanks to everyone for their prayers because I was not nervous at all on this flight. We had our own personal TVs in front of us with a wide variety of TV shows and movies to chose from on the flight which helped to pass the time. Wiley and I stayed up all night in JFK airport (which is a whole other story in itself!) in hopes that we would sleep a majority of the 13 hr plane ride to Dubai. Our plan failed because I only got about 5 or 6 hours on the flight. I kept waking up because of turbulence. I wasn't scared, it just kept waking me up....and that bascially equated to Wiley waking up - which he was not happy about!





JFK airport....trying to stay awake.


Pictures of our plane.

Anyway, we finally made it to Dubai around 8am and went through baggage claim, passport/visa control and customs rather quickly. Wiley was trying to push me along because I just kept staring at people expecting there to be more for us to have to do, but it was a fairly simple process. We got a taxi and headed to our hotel. First observations of Dubai - 1) it is hot! I thought that it would not be humid here, but I was wrong. You definitely want to stay inside during the day because of the heat. 2) There is a rather thick haze that covers the city. I asked the cab driver on the way to our hotel if it was fog, but he said it was the sand. He said that it only occurs in the summer months. Since we have been here, I have not seen blue sky or even clouds.....just a yellowish haze. 3) all of the facilities are top of the line. Every hotel, mall, public area that we have been to has been pristine. Even the overpasses are beatifully decorated. While there is a lot of construction going on, the buildings that are complete are beautiful 4) the people here are incredibly friendly. I am not sure what I expected, but I have been overwhelmed by hospitality of the people here - especially the hotel staff. 5) While everyone is nice, I have noticed that the taxi drivers do not like to make conversation. I have made this observation and yet, I keep attempting to ask them questions every time - where are you from?, how long have you lived here?, etc... I need to learn to get used to akward silences.
The first day we did not do a whole lot. We went to the Dubai Mall which is located across the street from our hotel. We walked around for a little while. All of the malls are extravagant. This particular one had an aquarium, an ice skating rink, a Sega world, and any and every shop that you can imagine. We didn't last long there because we were so exhausted. Because we wanted to go to bed early, we decided that we would just eat dinner at our hotel. Like I mentioned before, the hotel staff is extremely helpful and nice. We probably had 6 different people come up to us during dinner to ask us how we were enjoying our stay and to see if we needed anything. When we arrived, they allowed us to check in early and gave us a room with a balcony. I had not reserved a room that nice, but they upgraded us since it was our first time to be in Dubai. We have the best view of the Burj Kalifa - the tallest building in the world. I have included pictures of our view from our hotel balcony below.








2 comments:

  1. Curt and I are sitting here as I read your blog aloud and we love it. Rach, I knew you would do great flying. I am so proud of you! Curt wanted to say from one nervous flyer to the other congratulation! Please keep the posts coming I love living through these posts. Love you guys and we miss you already.

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  2. This is amazing! I laughed about the Wiley not sleeping on the plane part (sorry Wiley), because that is so something that would happen to Brian Collins! Also, Rachel, I am so glad that my airplane prayers equated to your whole flight having personal tvs :) We are so excited for you guys and will keep the prayers coming!

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