parental visit part 1: Dubai

Quite the delay with blogging, with good reason: my parents came to visit!

It was their first ever 2-week holiday(poor Americans and their crappy holiday allowance), and they decided to visit me in the middle east! what cool folks! the first few days we had here in Dubai were spent at the Souks, meeting friends, desert safari's, beaching, shopping, and everything else you do on a trip like this. We then took a trip to Jordan ( the three of us ) and visited the Dead Sea, Petra, among other places. We finished off with a final day in Dubai, and then they hopped onto a 22 hr journey back to Iowa. Whew!

Here's some fotos of our Desert Safari




If you've never been on a desert safari, here's the layout: a 4x4 pickup at the house, strait into the desert for a wild ride on all the sand dunes... this really freaked out ma... she wasn't encouraged much by dad's camera either during this time... it's always more fun doing this with someone in the car screaming every few seconds.


After the initial up and downs of the dunes, they drop you off for some fotos, and a sand-boarding opportunity... here's pops:


We then pop into a makeshift bedouin tent, with seesha/camel riding/belly dancing/henna boby art and moonlit dinner. Since it was Ramadan, they cut off all Belly Dancing, but that didn't slow us down much. Here's the 'rents on their first camel ride.


We spent the next couple of days visiting some friends in Abu Dhabi for a real Iftar dinner. Umar and Sana welcomed all of us to their home for dinner and company with 1-year old Zayneb. My parents loved the Indian food! Have yet to discover a sufficient way to repay them for a great night...

My folks and I had to say goodbye to Liz for a week, as she was stuck in Dubai working while we took our Jordan trip. Details and fotos of this trip to follow tomorrow Inshallah.

Here are further pictures from the Dubai portion of the journey.