Well, I’ve had a pretty busy first week of July.
I was in Dubai from the first ’til the sixth, which was really fun! I’m really glad we went because it beats sticking around in Qatar ’til the sixteenth. We did a bunch of stuff, like going on a boat ride and driving to Abu Dhabi to see a Picasso art exhibition. We also ate at several amazing restaurants–from Western steak houses to Japanese food. One of the Japanese restaurants had the option of having the chef cook in front of you. That was really great–so the dude who did our food was a funny guy named Enrico. He would juggle lemons and catch them in his hat. Even though I was really hungry and half my food was already cooked, I still wanted to watch instead of distracting myself by eating. I had experienced seeing something like this two or three times before, when I was much younger and living in Saudi Arabia…but it was good to see it again as an older person. You get to appreciate it more 
The Picasso exhibition was awesome! There were three large rooms of his paintings and sculptures. Heck, I didn’t even know Picasso even made sculptures. They had divided the exhibition according to different periods of his art, and they even gave us little headsets where you could punch in the number of a painting or sculpture and a recording will tell you the history of the painting and who the subjects were and everything. It was neat! Even the super-abstract stuff that I couldn’t make heads or tails of was intriguing. There was a lot to see and I wish we were able to snap photos so I could show you. However, we were being closely monitored and so we couldn’t. Mom managed to snap three or four pictures with her iPhone, but then a security guard made her delete one of them. (He didn’t see her snapping more than one, and my mom didn’t tell him—-haha!)
We celebrated Lana’s 25th birthday there too! That was awesome—-that’s when we went on the boat ride. At first we were going to go with a tourist group of people, but when we drove ourselves to the corniche (area near the sea) we decided to rent another two-decker boat and we went on our own. (Well, not completely on our own, we had a couple of guys controlling the boat). We rode on the upper level and it was amazing…the heat wasn’t even that bad. We snapped tons of pictures and enjoyed the scenery. He didn’t take us out to the open sea because the ride was only supposed to last an hour. Still, it was great! I’ll try (I hardly ever freaking keep these promises, but I’ll TRY) to post pictures as soon as I can.
Oooh…*Sees something shiny. Wanders off.*
July 11, 2008 at 3:55 pm
Hehe! You keep changing your layout!
Sounds like a great vacation! It’d be fun to watch a chef make something — I’ve always found it interesting. Though, I think I would be too uncomfortable to eat
I can’t believe he made her delete the picture! That is bizarre; I wonder why you weren’t allowed to take pictures? Were they afraid people would finally see what Picasso’s art looks like? I mean, I know it is super top-secret and, if you follow conspiracy theorists, the art-equivalent of mind-and-body altering drugs, creating demented, anarchistic, polygonal people bent on sucking the world’s jam reserves dry, but come on! Gosh!
July 11, 2008 at 3:58 pm
Ack! In my indignation, I forgot to comment on Lana’s b-day! Sounds fun — going out on a boat is so relaxing. It gives you this very serene feeling, I find; it makes you really appreciate the scenery (even though there is only a hunk of metal between you and watery death…).
Posssst the pictures. Possssssst them *Hypnotises*
July 12, 2008 at 11:36 pm
Hehehehe, man, I love your comments.
Yeah, I changed the layout. Can’t freaking help it, there’s a lot to choose from and I guess I’ll keep jumping around until I feel like I can settle on something worthy. I might even learn CSS, whatever the hell that is, so I can customize stuff I like my own way.
Yeah, go figure art exhibition security. They were watching us like hawks. I don’t get why pictures were not allowed, but there you go. It was annoying, but my mom did manage to get about three or four shots, if I’m not mistaken.
However, I do believe those conspiracy theorists have a point. After spending a few hours there I had a rather uncontrollable urge to raid every grocery store in the country and steal every jar of jam they had. If we had stayed there a simple minute longer than we did, I may have wreaked some irreparable havoc, Lebne. Indeed, it would have been frightful. Jam ripped off the shelves by a crazed, tall, long-haired maniac. What would people have for breakfast, Lebne? WHAT?! It would have been obscene. You may have even seen me on the international breaking news segment on TV! But, thankfully, we were out in time and I was able to regain control on whatever was left of my senses. That Picasso will do THINGS to you, Lebne. THINGS…
*Coughs* Moving on.
What’s funny about your boat comment was that there was no metal at all separating us from a watery death. Ever seen those double-decker buses in London? This boat was like that…open air on the top level, where we were sitting. All we had separating us from a watery death was a very klutzy accidental dive over the edge. Mmmm…exciting!
