Just another weekend in the UAE

This past weekend we were fortunate enough to visit Dubai. It's about an hour away from Abu Dhabi along the coastline. We began our weekend at a place called, Bikers Cafe where I got an American-style breakfast, which if you know me, you know that I really needed it.

We then went to Dubai Mall, which is one of the biggest in the WORLD! Wow, it was huge and filled with extremely expensive stores. Inside the mall itself had two souks. (Souks are outdoor market places in the Middle East)

Just outside the mall is the Burj Kalifa building. It is the tallest building in the world with 160 stories!! It is located right on the coast of D

 

We also went to the Dubai Museum which originally was an old fort built in the late 1700's. We were very lucky to be given a tour of the place from one of our host family's friends. There were people from all over the world that visited. We learned about not only the history of Dubai but also about all seven emirates in the United Arab Emirates. After the museum, we went over to the Old Souk behind the Museum. Wow- what an experience. I learned how to barter with the shop owners, which is very different from how we shop in the US.

This is picture of one of the wall surrounding the courtyard of the fort. You can see shells and other materials that are stuck inside the walls from when it was built.



You might not be able to tell, but it was around 95-100 degrees that day...and the top of the museum is in the open.

On Saturday we went shopping in Abu Dhabi with Liz's cooperating teacher. She took us to yet another mall (Abu Dhabi is filled with just huge malls all over the place). Then we went to the Sheikh Zayed Mosque.

 

 

The mosque was on my list of the top 3 things that I wanted to do/see while I was here, and let me say that it was all that I hoped it would be. IT WAS AMAZING!! Not only because of my interest in art history and the Arab culture, but it is something that needs to be seen in person. I will say it was breath taking.