from the sands of the desert

It is Monday morning in Dubai. 10 am precisely and I have woken up a short while ago to witness a drama in my flat. Went into Miquel’s bedroom to take a look at his plant (he is on holidays and I am responsible for watering his plants) and felt the carpet slightly wet. Than heard dripping noises in the bathroom and once I took a peak inside the bathroom my heart froze! It was flooded! And the carpet in the bedroom was soggy and wet! There was a crack in a pipe while he was away and slowly but surely water took over the whole bedroom! Now I am waiting for the cleaners to come over and start trying to dry the carpet… And we just had the whole carpet in the flat changed a week ago!!!

Anyway, once more I cannot sleep properly. Guess that my bio-rhythm is messed up ever since I came from Prague. I had very little sleep during the last day of the trip. Had to stay on a boatel (a hotel on a boat) in Bratislava. At first is sounded really cool to sleep on a boat on the Danube River but during the night there were so many mosquitoes and the rocking of the boat drove me mad!


At least I made it to Vienna Airport in one piece, had a nice flight back to Dubai and did not spend too much time re-organizing my room after the carpet change. I needed to sleep because the next day I had a flight to London Heathrow, which is a tough one, and I needed to be well rested.

London was great, but extremely short. I met an old friend from Brazil and we had brunch in Green Park, visited the National Gallery and had a walk in Covent Garden. It was all I had time for since the layovers in Europe are always very short. I managed to get some sleep at the hotel before the flight back but it is never enough, specially sleeping in the middle of the afternoon, when the whole world is alive and kicking!

It was only on Sep 30th that I was mentally and physically back to Dubai. It was quite a shock! Because I was the whole month running from place to place both on layovers and holidays I had not time to go around Dubai, not even to the supermarket. So when I finally go out to Carrefour and see Dubai again it made me realize where I live and all of a sudden I got excited again. Ever since I have had a few days off, have met my colleagues, been to the gym and so on. It is nice to get into a routine, even if it for a few days only.

September started really on a rush. My roster (schedule of flights) for this month is quite simple:

03 SEP: Dubai – Mauritius (done)
04 SEP: Mauritius – Dubai (done)
07 SEP: Dubai – Bombay – Dubai (tomorrow)
10 SEP: Dubai – Mauritius
11 SEP: Mauritius – Dubai
13 SEP: Dubai – Melbourne
15 SEP: Melbourne – Christchurch
16 SEP: Christchurch – Melbourne
17 SEP: Melbourne – Dubai
and from the 19 SEP to 03 OCT: holidays!!!

To be in Mauritius for a few hours only is quite a surreal experience. One leaves the desert, the Middle East, burkas and mosques and after a 6-hour flight straight south one lands in paradise. Sugar cane plantations, blue water, green forests, bikinis! And all of that for 5 hours!!! The rest of the time there I need to sleep to be able to operate the flight back!!!

The last days in Dubai I have seen 3 movies:

The Village: liked it but saw it at the movies and going to the movies in Dubai is the most stressful experience as the locals don’t give a damn about the others and talk endlessly with each other and on their mobile phones. They stand up, laugh at weird moments, film the screen with their mobile phone cameras and simply don’t stop making noise!!!

The Terminal: quite interesting and entertaining!

Farenheit 9/11: interesting but sometimes it felt like a talk show where they make people cry in front of the cameras only to boost the audience. Plus the DVD I had was a bad pirate copy from Dhaka, where they film from the screen in the cinemas so you could see when somebody from the audience went to pee!

And now I am reading a book called: La Sombra del Viento, by Carlos Ruiz Zafón. So far it is fantastic. It was the best selling book in Spain in 2003, has been translated in several languages and keeps on selling like mineral water on a hot day! Highly recommended.

Will stop here for today. Have to keep an eye on the cleaners. And also sit down and decide where to go on my holidays!!! :)