Sunday, January 29, 2006

Abu Dhabi

Last weekend (Thursday) I went to Abu Dhabi with Ruth to visit some of her family friends. We hopped the bus from downtown (cheap!) and were picked up at the Abu Dhabi bus station by a wonderful Indian family. The object of the day was to see the sights of the city. They took us out to a world traveling bookstore ship called "The Doulos" which was currently docked at the port (also the oldest ship on the seas--commissioned in 1914). Next we went for some amazing Indian food at a local resteraunt and drove around the city to see the various sights (Like the king's residence and the royal hotel.) The town was littered with sheikh's palaces. Abu Dhabi is oozing with money. After a thorough drive, we were all pretty brain dead from all of the food we ate. The day ended while we lounged on the couches at their house for a few hours before they drove us home to Dubai.


(L) The Doulos (R) city view from the ship


(L) on board bookstore (R) the tallest flagpole in the world


(L) Ruth and the kids [and giant penguin] (R) snow scene in the mall


(L) an arab enjoying the water (R) coastal road

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

What kinds of books were they selling on this ship?? Was it just one level of book or were they all over the ship.

Anonymous said...

they sold all kinds. The books were only on the top level. It was wierd, they were all generically priced and at each destination they posted conversion tables into the local currency. (ie. 100 units=7 dirhams) the books were pretty cheap!

Anonymous said...

That is so odd! I suppose it is pretty cheap to cruise around the world with a ship that is 92 year old, but I wonder where they came up with books?? Why not just make it a big floating flee market.

Anonymous said...

Ah my favorite words, travel+ bookstore. And cheap+books. I think I should work on this ship. Did they have a big variety of books?

Anonymous said...

I'm intrigued with the indoor snow place. Just how big is that? Do people really get skis on and fly down a slope? Hard to imagine, that's for sure!

Anonymous said...

Yeah, there's even a cafe at the top where you can get a cup of coffee before your next run. I've been told the government financed the whole thing and that it's never expected to make money.

Anonymous said...

The floating book store made the papers the other yesterday.

http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticle.asp?xfile=data/theuae/2006/February/theuae_February128.xml§ion=theuae&col=

The Doulos sounds like a fascinating cultural communication project. Too bad it will probably be burned now.