Tuesday-Thursday, 30-2 Sept/Oct 2008

Life has been very boring since I got back from Oman. Campus is very deserted as most people went home for the ten day break. Since I had to sign back into the dorms when I returned from Oman and there is a rule that a student can only sign out once during a break, I have not been able to travel anywhere since I have to be back in the dorms every night. They also changed the curfew from 2 AM to midnight during week nights and 1 AM on weekends. Of course, no one told me about this, so I got an undertaking on Tuesday night, which basically just means that I was late for curfew. The official rule I have heard is three undertakings and the student will be kicked out of the dorms but I know several students who have a lot more than three. I also missed curfew on Wednesday night but didn't get an undertaking because I wasn't very late.

It is hard to be back on campus during midnight when Dubai is at least twenty minutes away, and we have no reliable means of transportation. On Wednesday, we went to Festival City Mall which had a bunch of Eid celebration stuff going on and when we left to go back to campus, the line for taxis was a good two hours long. We had no chance of getting back by curfew at that point and ended up walking to a highway and flagging down a taxi that way. All the students here seem amazed that the exchange students have to abide by the curfew, and we hope we can get it changed so we don't have to, but I'm not sure how easy that will be.

Since we've been back, we haven't done too much. On Wednesday, we went to Festival City to see a firework show for Eid. It was the saddest excuse for a fireworks show I have ever seen. We waited around for half an hour after the fireworks were supposed to begin and when they finally did, it lasted about two minutes. The set the fireworks off over a harbor and had a small laser light show going on, both of which were interesting, but the fireworks were just sad. Afterwards, we walked around Festival City mall for awhile, which was filled with people doing Eid shopping. Children were running rampant everywhere. Its hard to tell if these children are extremely ill-mannered or if there's just so many of them they can't help being rude because they run all of the place, cut people off, and are just in general out of control. But, like I said, this mall was extremely packed with little kids, and it could be there was just so many of them.

Anyway, yesterday we went to Al-Mamzar Park to go to the beach. We were there for four hours in the bright sun without sunscreen and didn't get burned. I don't know if the sun is weaker here or if it can't get through all the smog of Dubai, but it defintely does not burn quickly. The beach, which has been pretty deserted during Ramadan, was packed with people and considerably more dirty (garbage) than it was during Ramadan. We played football for a bit and went in the water, which was warm and not refreshing. This park is very close to the Palm Deira (the last palm to be constructed), and one can hear the construction of the palm if one goes under water and listens. After the beach, we had no consensus on where to go, so we got on a bus to see where it would take us. We ended up somewhere in Dubai where we walked around for a bit. It is finally getting just cool enough to walk around and not feel disgustingly sweaty.

Eventually, I went back to campus and then to bed, since I was surprisingly tired. There are two more days left for break, and I have no particular plans for them. On Wednesday, I went to an Eid lunch in the Faculty Housing and met a professor whose daughter rides horses. She offered to take me and Kendal to an upcoming horse show next weeked (Kendal also rides horses). I am very excited about this and being able to see horses again. I think the show is at the Sharjah Equestrian Center which is where I want to go riding since it is about five minutes from campus and reasonably priced. Well, I'll see next weekend what it's like.