MARCH 28, 2008 – SIX DAYS UPON THE SEA

Ed got dressed and went to exercise. I got ready and went to hear the first speaker of the day. We got a new crowd on in Dubai.
OPERA GOES TO THE MOVIES: This presentation was done by Thomson Smillie, Opera Impresario, Writer, and Stage Director. In the 20th century, movies replaced opera as the great popular art form – yet the two have much in common, including passion, grand spectacle, and a taste for high drama. He illustrated his remarks with wonderful movie clips including some from Pretty woman, Apocalypse Now and many other. Dick, Beverly, and Nancy would love this. I told Ed he simply mustn’t miss any of the future lectures and he has to watch this one on the TV when it’s broadcast on the ship’s channel. He will do a total of 6 lectures and I’ll be there for them all. Folks now I’m hardly an opera buff but these talks are fascinating.
PERFUME SALE: I’m running out of my two favorite perfumes and they don’t have them in the boutique on board. Today they were having a sale on perfumes so I went down to ask the young lady there to make some recommendations. Eventually, I bought a box of six small bottles to try out; she threw in a sample of Chance by Chanel to try as well.
RTW VIDEOS: There was a showing of the videos to date with the goal of selling more of course. You can watch them in your cabin and there are two places near the photo area where they are shown continuously. Ed has decided to purchase them (there are 4 DVDs in the set) but is waiting until the next credit card billing cycle to order them.
TRIVIA: We saw whales very close to the ship; one sounded and obviously turned upside down because we could see the white silhouette for a long while down in the water.
Some of the questions were tough. I wondered if Nancy knows: What is a pig’s snout called? The answer is “gruntle”. I don’t know if anyone got that and we had a plethora of possibilities. Eventually, we put down grunt but we had no rationale for it. There were some other tough ones. Eventually, we scored 15 and we, again, #2. The winners scored 16. Unlike other times, however, there was no one’s who had felt their suggested answer was absolutely the right one to have the group settle on a wrong answer. We were all equally confused about the correct answer. The prizes today were the reversible Princess tote bag, something I’d love to get before the cruise is over.
LUNCH: We sat with Father and some of the trivia folks. It was a friendly political split. It’s funny to see Father assert strong Republican views.
We also heard that a contingent of trivia players had gone to one of the staff (who clearly doesn’t like doing this—and I don’t blame them—and who doesn’t do as “good” a job as the others do) and given him some pointers on what we want in trivia: a full 20 questions, read them slowly and give us time to discuss and answer, and I’ve forgotten the rest. Hummm I can hardly wait for the quiz this afternoon.
BEAUTY SALON PECULIARITIES: One lady today remarked that you could not get a permanent in the Beauty Salon here. Other lacks include waxing of legs or eyebrows. And while many have gone there for hair cuts, they are clearly not what we get at home (or in some instances, off the ship in port). And we won’t even discuss the prices up there.
NEEDLEWORK: I’m keeping busy during the lectures with needlepoint—at least when they don’t keep us in the dark! My EZ slide ripped out a seam (this is the device I use to put my compression sleeves on properly), so I took two strands of the embroidery floss used in the needlepoint and did a quick repair. Let’s hope it holds at least until we get home where I have a back up. Each time I purchase one, the price has increased by $10! But I use it everyday and can’t position the sleeves without it.
THE HAZARDS OF 16TH CENTURY NAVIGATION AND INTRODUCING SIR FRANCIS DRAKE: Ed and I have gotten familiar with Drake, El Draco to the Spanish, and he was nothing more than a pirate with portfolio. He brought his booty back to England where supposedly judicial decisions were made about it’s disposition, and where he was knighted. He discussed the history of Magellan and why he legitimately is credited with the first circumnavigation of the globe even though he was killed in what is now the Phillipines. It turns out that he had reached the same destination(s) by traveling East from Europe; so he had indeed been around the world.
QUIZ TIME: We came in #2 again but when Elizabeth saw the prizes for today, can covers, she said we don’t want to win today. How prophetic. Some of the questions we missed were not because we didn’t have the answer among us, but because of some confusion about exactly what the question was looking for. When he didn’t have a clue about the answer and our guess is wrong, we really don’t care. It’s when we definitely had the correct answer but thought the question was looking for something else that is so frustrating. I won’t belabor today’s brain squeezer but we consoled our selves by knowing that we weren’t alone. And no whales graced the ocean so we could have a little break in the brain exercise.
DINNER: Dave and Twyla and us. Things were fine until Dave asserted that all female spies use sex to be successful. You can imagine how that went over with me. Still we left without any rancor. Aren’t you proud of me?
I’m sure there are more tidbits I meant to include in the blog but I’m brain dead at the moment. The entertainment for tonite is a banjo player. We met him last night after the comedian and he’s a nice enough guy but I’m not sure I care about banjo music tonite. He’s originally from New Orleans and left after Katrina. He now lives in Thailand.

MARCH 27, 2008 – DUBAI

We had an early wake up since we had to be in the Cabaret Lounge at 7:45 am for the tour. It was hard to wake up. As usual we had room service of a modest breakfast.
We were given a photocopy of our passport and a Dubai landing card to carry.
Our tour guide was from Sri Lanka; the driver from India. 80% of the population is workers from other countries. If you have a baby here, it cannot be a citizen. This makes sense given the amount of money available to citizens.
THEIR ECONOMIC FUTURE: They have oil until 2010, so they have built up their economy so that they don’t need to depend on oil. Right now the massive construction projects are probably what drives the economy. Tourism is building up (more about those plans later). Many citizens bring their families to hotels here for a weekend break (from the boredom of their mansions in the desert perhaps?) They currently sell natural gas which is also the source that generates their electricity. The flashy use of water and lights here is second perhaps only to Las Vegas and with many of the same problems. Drip irrigation is visible everywhere; we ought to use a lot more of that in the US.
This place gives “conspicuous consumption” a new meaning. Money is no object to any desire. There is no middle class.
CONSTRUCTION: 16% of the world’s cranes are here in Dubai. It rivals if not exceeds China in the look of construction. The massive numbers of apartments, villas and hotel rooms that are being built here boggles the mind.
THE PALMS: We were taken to a sales office for the apartments and villas of the first of 3 enormous projects where land is reclaimed from the sea to make these island neighborhoods. They stretch a long way out into the sea; I’d guess miles. This first one will have living places for 250,000 residents and a monorail to travel around the area including highways as well. There is easy access to boat slips for this form of transportation and then, with this amount of money, there’s always helicopters.
The models for the projects are beautifully done and help you to visualize what we later saw on the yacht ride. The building is very modern and you see folks in here dressed in the very hip clothing of Beverly Hills and Hollywood, to the stereotypical man in a white abaya (?) with the head covering. I’m always impressed with how white these clothes always are.
One man on our tour said they should have done everything in video to show us rather than the models. I disagree. Furthermore, they did have some computer simulations of certain future creations.
HIGH TEA AT THE AL BURQ HOTEL: This is a seven star hotel; I didn’t know there were any above five stars! Because we were 30 in the bus, they drove us up to the front door, just like the local Sheik Rashid. This place is sumptuous and gorgeous. This is the hotel where it will cost you $100 just to go in and look around. You MUST have reseervation for anything in this place and it must be secured with a credit card though Ed surmises that most people here use cash. Speaking of which, many if not most places accept USD. As it gets more devalued, this may change. Prices in many places are shown in USD and Dhirams, the Dubai currency. Luncheon begins at $120 USD. Since our high tea was included in the tour cost, we have no idea of the cost
The women who serve you are dressed in a gorgeous long dress of dark blue with gold; those who follow up delivering items have a shorter dress but of the same colors and general design.
We were seated in a special part of the hotel similar to a balcony that looked out toward the front of the hotel and into the atrium, which is purported to be one of the tallest in the world. When I get our photos reduced, I’ll try to post one of it. There was a four piece local quartet who played Arabic tunes throughout. There were four of us to each “table” which was actually a coffee table with a table cloth surrounded by couches and chairs. You were given your choice of tea or coffee. There wasn’t a selection other than this but the tea was very good. Sugar and Splenda were offered. Butter and strawberry and apricot jam, organge marmalade, a special honey and I think one other condiment were served in the little jars you often see on room service trays.
We were brought a three tiered serving plate with muesli with dates and nuts, yoghurt with a blackberry sauce on top, dragon fruit, pineapple, watermelon, and cantelope slices. The bottom layer had cherry tomatoes, a teeny sweet pickle, and something else squered (sp) on a long toothpick, along with two types of miniature (about silver dollar size in circumference), sandwiches, one with wheat bread, salmon and fillings, the other with turkey and mayonnaise. There were 4 servings of each so no fighting amongst us.
The folks who did the afternoon tour (same as our morning tour) said that the food at the tea was disappointing. Later, I talked with a couple who had gone privately to tea, were in a different area of the hotel and they had 7 courses. The cost for that alone was $107 plus $10 each way taxi costs.
I went to the ladies room and I took photos as well. It was gorgeous as you may imagine. The attendant had positioned the hand towels into a pyramid with a star lily in the center. There was a hose to the side of the commode (we’ve seen this in several of the better places in Asia) with which you can spray your perineum when you’re done. I warn you though: the water is usually cold and can be quite a shock. And you don’t have to pay for the bathroom here.
As an aside, one of the comedians was saying that he had helped an old fellow up some stairs and he had a pocket full of coins from various countries. Why? Because he had to go to restroom a lot and he wanted to have the right change to go in any country.
All of the rooms here are suites; the Arabs bring all their wives and children and there are connecting rooms in all the rooms so that the women never have to leave the suite. They are also two story! That way the various “households” can be separated. The doors are absolutely gorgeous with a dark blue mosaic with a sun burst type design in the center. As a result of all this the architectural divisions between floors are 2 story. The atrium joins at the 26th floor because there’s a huge ballroom on the 27th and the top floor is a restaurant and another ballroom.
We found out later that there is a tennis court that juts out the side of the building somewhere at the top, as well as a helicopter pad. Rooms here begin at $2,500 per night to $28,500 per night and that doesn’t include meals! The parking lot outside is full of later model MB, Lamborghini (I swear it was), and other top end cars, mostly black but now and then a white one. The old Sheik here drives a hummer with the license place No. 1. He drives alone and takes no body guards with him. His son who is the current recognized day to day leader, Sheik Rashid, arrives with a retinue and the usual bodyguards.
WANT TO BUY A VILLA? HOW ABOUT AN APARTMENT?
Villa: 4.5 million USD for a beginner; Apt: $450,000 USD for a studio.
YACHT RIDE AROUND THE PALMS: This took several hours and we got to see the real life construction of this monumental project.
SMALL SOUQ SHOPPING: As you enter the ship’s terminal, there are several small shops. Ed purchased a gift for someone, something he had been looking at in every port to find just the right one, and so he bought one in the shop here. The problem is the size of this damned thing: larger than a box of reams of paper at Costco! It isn’t so heavy but it’ll take up 75% of a suitcase. I am not a happy camper as you can imagine. I keep thinking of the couple who bought the enormous wooden ship on our last round the world cruise and had to hand carry it home; I have no idea what they did on the plane. Furthermore, there’s no room in our cabin for anything else!
I picked up a small pillow case with a desert scene on it; almost without exception, everything we’ve gotten to this point will lie flat for transport.
We also found some diet Cokes. They asked if we wanted a case and we said yes, but they were out in their back room, so we took all of them out of their cooler, ten in all I think. So we’re portioning them out again. There was also a little post office, probably a private provider because the cards cost as much to mail here as they do on the ship. Nonetheless, we purchased a few cute ones and mailed them out. I also found some free internet in their business center there. 30 min was free and they were gentle but clear that there were repercussions if you didn’t observe the limit on the honor system. WiFi connections required a credit card but were still cheaper than the ship. So I cleared out my roadrunner emails without worry about time and still had lots of time left in my 30 min. limit.
DUBAILAND: By 2017, they will have built the largest theme park in the world. Mike’s comment about the Taj, pyramids, and Eiffel Tower are on target. The plan is to build exact replicas of these two wonders of the world and more. One guy remarked that he was very happy with the Luxor hotel in Vegas.
SHOPPING MALL: There was a free shuttle to one of the local shopping malls. Clearly there weren’t going to be any bargains there. There was a gold souq there and Bill and Lea were seen there by Dave and Twyla and Bill was giving his credit card to the clerk for some bauble for Lea. Apparently the shuttle quit running at 4:30 but the ship didn’t leave the port until 8 pm. We didn’t get back from our tour until after 3 pm and we tried to settle things down and go out again but that wasn’t meant to be.
We did watch a part of the process of leaving the pier. Again the tight maneuverability of this ship (and the captain who drives it) are astonishing at times. The skyline in some ways reminded me of Hong Kong harbor. One day it will exceed that nighttime skyline I’m sure.
DINNER: Just Dave and Twyla and us. Dave should be able to take the bandage off his still-black and blue pinkie finger sometime in the next few days. He’s concerned about it hurting but it’s going to be uncomfortable simply because of the immobility so he’s got to get moving.
ENTERTAINMENT: We had an Irish Catholic comedian who had a terrible audience since there was only a handful of folks there, the rest having turned in early after this “strenuous” day. We visited with him afterward. He’s fun and we all felt sorry for him as the crowd was tough; the woman in front of us had a bobbing head the whole time: clearly she wasn’t able to stay awake.
Valerie Boorman is a singer with a duo here called digital hitch. She was moved to the Casino Lounge which is a better venue for their music. Her accompanist has won a grammy. She has a lovely voice and Ed is one of her greatest fans. I listened to some of it but I’m more easily bored when the singer begins to do irregular scales with some of the music so I came back to the room and read some more of Rashi’s dtrs.
YIPPEE (AGAIN): Turn back the clocks another hour. I’ve forgotten what town I’m using now for the time.