Summit

This week the GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) had a summit meeting. The GCC is a group of countries on the Arabian Peninsula and includes Saudi Arabia, Kuwaut, Bahrain, Qatar, the UAE, and Oman. Yemen, although on the peninsula too, doesn't get to play with the big kids. Surprisingly, the leaders of these oil-rich countries who attended this meeting were united on the topics of peace and stability.

What does this mean for me? With so many important politicians meeting at the Emirates Palace two miles from my apartment, it meant that traffic was a nightmare. Not knowing that this meeting was going on, my poor wife got stuck in traffic for a couple of hours on a drive that should have taken minutes. A number of my students were late or missed class completely because they got stuck in traffic. Sacrifices must be made in the name of peace and stability.

Dune Bashing

After our first night camping in the Empty Quarter, we wanted to try some desert driving for ourselves, but were a little timid after getting our trucks stuck initially. Neither my friend nor I had any experience driving in the desert. We saw another inexperienced driver get his car incredibly stuck which made us even more nervous. We looked along the main road for some beginner friendly driving and had a short drive in some sandy salt flats.

My son started getting bored so we found a secluded place and set up camp. I figured that there was no point in dune bashing myself if I was going to be too worried about getting stuck to do anything. Only my daughter was interested in going so we gave Gulab, the guy who helped get our cars out of the sand the day before, a call. We met him at his office at the base of the Moreeb Dune. He had given us his card and said that we could choose between having him drive our truck or his truck. He was vague about his pricing, but as it turned out, an hour in my truck was 150 dirhams (about $50) and an hour in his truck was 500 dirhams. Previously, I had decided that having him drive my truck only to be worried about him messing it up the whole time wouldn't be worth it. In the end, I wanted to see what my Chevy Trailblazer was capable of and asked him to drive my vehicle.

First he let some air out of the tires for traction in the sand. I wanted him to give me lessons, but he said that he would show me how to drive and the next time we come out he would instruct me. In the meantime, he was explaining what he was doing and why.

He took us around in some rolling hills before heading towards the sandier dunes. We stopped for a few minutes at a camel farm so my daughter could see the camels.
It was fairly exciting, especially since it was my truck at stake and not his, but he was careful and I could tell that he knew what he was doing.

After the ride, he stopped at a tire center to get the tires filled again. The most terrifying part of the ride was the drive back down curvy two-lane roads.He mentioned that he would take it easy because my daughter was in the truck and because it wasn't his vehicle. I would imagine that for 500 dirhams it would be a much wilder ride. I was glad to have him drive my truck to get an idea of how to drive it in the desert better. At some point, I wouldn't mind trying dune bashing in the desert with his instruction. However, the next time I go there I want to try it in his truck to see what he can do when he really tries.

Empty Quarter

We had a four-day weekend for National Day and the Muslim New Year so I went camping near Liwa in the Empty Quarter, one of the world's biggest deserts. If you have an aversion to getting sand in your tent, I would advise against camping in the Empty Quarter. Fortunately, I've conditioned my wife to not worry about it.We arranged to meet up with some friends that live in Ras Al Khaima that we knew from Fukuoka, Japan. We went to some forts in the area that we read about.
Afterward, we drove to the Moreeb Dune area and after got our trucks stuck. Within minutes, a guy came out to help us get out of the sand and gave us his card saying that he would take us out dune bashing if we wanted. We told him maybe later and decided that was a nice enough place to camp for the night. Looking back at Moreeb Dune (otherwise known as "Big Red"), we could see and hear trucks driving up and down it. It has a 50 degree incline and goes up about 120 meters. At certain times of the year there are organized drag races. (For some videos of that, click here.) In the photo below, the little dots on the dune are trucks driving up and down.We went hiking in the dunes and noticed that it was a popular place for people to drive 4x4 trucks and dune buggies. This lasted until late at night, so unfortunately, we didn't get to experience the quiet of the desert the first night.

We were hoping to do some dune sledding, but the sheets of cardboard didn't really work out. Next time, we might bring some sleds meant for sand sledding. We did have fun playing in the sand dunes. Seeing my kids in the photo below gives an idea of the scale of the dunes.I brought a shisha pipe and in the evening, smoked some shisha tobacco. You can see my brand of choice below.
It got fairly cold in the night and in the morning, everything was covered in dew. There was a blanket of fog that stuck around until about a half hour after sunrise.The first night was fun but we wanted a more serene place to camp the second night. Soon after sunrise, we packed up and moved on to the next place, hoping to get in some dune bashing sometime during the day. For information on how to get there, here is a map courtesy the Abu Dhabi Motors Club.

Tree Planting

Last week while we were walking on the Corniche, I saw this vehicle with a palm tree in it on its way to be planted. When we walked past it on the way home, it was already in the ground. There was a hole nearby waiting for another tree to be planted in it. I'm always impressed with the Emirati attitude towards landscaping: "If we want a tree there, we'll put one there.

Paid Parking

Well, it finally happened. The parking meter has been installed in front of our apartment building. As of this week, the curbs haven't been painted black and blue. As soon as they are, we'll have to either get a monthly parking pass or pay two dirhams an hour to park in front of our building.

We're still not entirely sure if the city is going to paint the curbs inside our apartment building's parking area. Even if they don't, we probably won't be able to park there very often. People don't seem to notice the sign that reads "Tenant Parking Only" and it seems a lot less likely that people will respect that if it's the only free parking around.

The good news is that we can still park our cars in the Higher Colleges of Technology central services parking lot next door. HCT is taking it more seriously as well. We can still park there, but we need to have a second parking sticker in addition to the Abu Dhabi Men's College sticker. It has a guard at the gate 24 hours a day so it's a nice safe place. As long as we can keep parking there, we'll be all right.

National Day Decorations

Today is National Day in the UAE. Last year, I celebrated it by going to Oman and this year we will be celebrating by getting the hell out of Abu Dhabi and going to the Empty Quarter. Emiratis celebrate it by decorating their cars and partying in the streets. I took a few photos of some decorations with my phone and here are a few of my favorites. Enjoy!

More Overtime

This week I was asked to teach more classes. One of the part time teachers who had been teaching for a few months finally had her employment application processed. It was rejected so she was let go. The class I'll be teaching is a lower level course that doesn't involve much teaching preparation but is difficult to manage. I was asked if I wanted to teach two of the four periods that it meets a week, but that would have meant a tricky coordination that would have been more difficult than teaching all four periods so I figured that I would take over the whole class. We'll see how it goes for the remaining 5 weeks of classes. I'll have 28 teaching periods a week with the standard teaching week being 20 periods. I'm interested to see if they'll just keep piling on classes if I let them.