Reminders of Home

The last 2 weeks, since I came back from my brother’s wedding, have been insane! Lots of parties, meeting tons of people, and having an amazing time. I actually met a ton of people who reminded me of things or friends back in the states, hence the title of this post.

The first weekend I was back, I went out to a lounge opening with my cousin and some of her friends. It was pretty cool, free booze, and I actually met an Indian girl who grew up in Dubai, but went to University of Illinois for undergrad. I said something sarcastic to her at the beginning of the night, and she basically ignored me, but at somepoint she overheard me talking about going to U of C, and she got all excited.

The next day, I went to my first drunk brunch, for a Turkish friend’s bday, at a hotel called Al Qasr. It was insanely expensive, about $115, but totally worth it. It was all you can eat and drink for 3.5 hours, with live music. The food was insane. It was all set up throughout a huge seating area, indoors/ outdoors, around a pool, etc. Each station had food from a different area of the world. I had lobster, shrimp, sushi, steak, burgers, kebabs, mojitos, chocolate, candy, etc. In the end, it is actually worth it because if you ordered these items a la carte anywhere in Dubai, the price would be way higher. After brunch, we all went back to the bday boy’s apartment and had a pool party. By 10 I was exhausted (I haven’t been day drinking in ages) but another friend picked me up and we went to a chill house party where a couple people played guitar and we all sang along to songs we knew. I kept requesting Don’t Stop Believing, but when they finally played it, I forgot the words!

This past weekend, I went to a couple beach parties. There’s a website called meetup.com, which is a great way to meet people when you are new to a place. There’s a group in Dubai called Dubai New in Town, and every week they have events for people to meet each other. This weekend they organized a meet up at the beach, and 80 people showed up! Everyone brought food, we BBQed, ate, played beach volleyball, went swimming, and even had an easter egg hunt! People from all over the world were there, Russians, Egyptians, Americans, even a Mexican. It was really cool meeting all these people, from all over the world. I am planning on attending many more of these events, and now it’s a whole new social scene that I am part of. After this beach excursion, many of us decided to go to a beach party at a bar called Nassimi Beach. The bar is on the beach, at the Atlantis Hotel (the same as the one in the Caribbean) in a part of Dubai called the Palm Jumeirah, which is a manmade island in the shape of a Palm tree. It is a really cool place, especially bc there is no dress code and I was able to wear a Hawaiian shirt! Tons of people were there, and I randomly ran into 2 people I know, which is the first time that has happened to me in Dubai. As most of you know, I love running into random people, and one of them was the cousin of my sister in law who I just met at Azeem’s wedding.

On Saturday, I went to a really cool sports bar and watched the Man U Chelsea match. It was the first time I was able to call people and organize an event on my own, which was very exciting, and now I finally know a place where I can watch American sports!

Overall, a very exciting 2 weeks and I met tons of people from all over the world, including a girl from Rockville, Maryland, a couple American students studying abroad in Dubai, a bunch of Indians, some people from Chicago, people that love NHL (Canadians, of course). I think I finally feel settled in Dubai now, especially that I have a good group of friends that I can always go out with.

The Wedding!!!

Azeem’s (my older brother) wedding in India was amazing but exhausting. I was there for about 2 weeks, and on 10 of those days, there were wedding functions, including multiple functions on many days. Tons of friends any family came in from all over the world, and it was a truly special occasion.

Our apartment in India was like a factory with tons of people running around, getting ready for events, friends and family visiting, gifts being dropped off, clothes being put together/ironed/fitted, etc. There were so many functions that we literally put up a schedule of events all over the apartment to remind everyone of what was going on each day.

Azeem and Simran were actually married in February, and even the actual ceremony was crazy. There was a Hindu ceremony, a Muslim ceremony, and the court ceremony, so technically, they had 3 weddings!

Here’s a quick recap of all the receptions and other functions:

Also, Vannu = Family Function

Saturday – Vannu (Family Function) Lunch thrown by Great Aunt (Father’s mother’s sister) and family

Saturday – Vannu Dinner thrown by Great, great Uncle (Father’s Father’s uncle) and family

Sunday – Afternoon sailing with friends and family

Sunday – Vannu Dinner, traditional Muslim dinner and religious function, thrown by father’s parents

Monday – Dinner hosted by the wife’s (Simran) family

Tuesday – Vanne Tanne (Fun function where you have a ceremony with 4 aunts who grind some spices, and then there is a big fight with silly string, shaving cream, glitter, water guns, etc. In the old days they would bring rats, eggs, cockroaches, etc. but now it has tamed down a bit. After the function was a dinner)

Tuesday - Kids party (We rented out a lounge and had drinks and dancing fora ll of Azeem and Simran's friends)

Wednesday – Vanne dinner by mom’s sister

Thursday – Mehndi (This is where the women get mehndi/ henna on their hands and feet. Both sides of the family had one. We hosted one during the day on an amazing terrace in the building we live, and there were literally 40 women getting mehndi, kids running around, and really good food being served. In the evening, Simran’s family hosted a Mehndi at a restaurant, and since her side of the family is Hindi, not Muslim, there was booze and dancing. Azeem and Simran’s friends prepared some dances and later everyone was dancing. Many friends and family came back to our place for more drinks and hanging out afterwards)

Friday – Simran’s family’s main function (This was the best function of the wedding. There were plenty of drinks, great food, and tons and tons of dancing. A couple groups of people choreographed dances, and Tameem and I, along with Simran’s sister, and Azeem’s friend Charlene did an amazing dance that got the party started, SASA style. I was dancing so much that I didn’t even have time to eat. Everyone had an amazing time)

Saturday – Our main reception (This was held at an outdoor venue in the navy compound in Bombay, so security was tight, and it was really humid out. Typical Muslim receptions are actually quite boring. The couple getting married literally stand for hours taking pictures with and greeting every guest that comes. A line of guests forms to do this, and the line was at least an hour long at certain points. I greeted people, passed out sweets at the door like Indians do at all functions, and hung out with family and friends. But by this point everyone was exhausted, and without drinks and music, it was not as fun as the night before)

However, after the ceremony, the real fun began! Another Muslim tradition (when I say Muslim tradition, I mean a Bohri tradition, and Bohri is my sect of Islam) is to decorate the bride/groom’s room. Instead of a hotel room, Azeem and Simran decided to stay in his room, so my brothers, cousins and I decorated his room during the day. The goal is to decorate with some dirty/ playful things, but also some really annoying things. So we decorated with bananas, blown up condoms, etc., and hid alarm clocks all over the room, taped on top of the fan, under the bed, etc. and set them to go off at odd hours of the night. Now, when the couple arrives home, all the friends and cousins are waiting in the room. These people have to demand certain things from the couple in order to leave. So for 2 hours, we asked Azeem and Simran for many things, like money, but also to sing, dance, etc. Finally, after 2 hours, we were all satisfied with our bribes, and left the room.

Sunday – The FINAL function. One of Simran’s uncles threw a final dinner party, and Azeem and Simran left straight from the party to their honeymoon.

There is still, however, Wedding Part 2 which moves to DC in June for a couple more functions.

The wedding was fantastic and it was incredible to see so many friends and family. By the end, we were all completely exhausted. By Sunday night pretty much everyone had left but me. Luckily, on Monday night, my dad got free tickets to a Mumbai Indians, IPL cricket match, which was amazing. At the match they served McDonalds veggie burgers, Indian style, and they were actually damn good. IPL is a cricket league in India, like a soccer league anywhere, that is incredibly successful in only its third season, using the Twenty20 format of cricket, and in just 2 years, teams have tripled their worth from around $100 million dollars to over $300 million. It as popular in India as baseball, but only 7 weeks long and a total of 20 matches.

PICTURES: There are way too many pictures to put up from the wedding, but as soon as we get the pictures back from the photographers, they will be put up online and I will put the link on the blog. In the meantime, if you are dying to see pictures, I have to admit, I did have some awesome outfits, look at my facebook pictures. From those pictures, you can see a couple people’s albums of the wedding. Some good ones are Ceyda’s, Anju’s, and Sarah Walzer’s albums.

Now I’m finally back in Dubai, and it feels a little strange to be almost alone after being with so many people for so long. Every lunch in India some family or friends would come over, so there were very few times when I was actually alone. I was even more spoiled in India than I was in Dubai, so I’ll see how I cope with that. My grandparents are coming back from India soon, so I’ll definitely have to deal with that, because at this point I have lived without them longer than with them.

In other news, I did get my driving license! So I can officially drive around Dubai, which is tough because there are an insane amount of ramps, roundabouts, and streets with no names, so you really have to know where you are going. But its nice not to have to take cabs everywhere, and when I go to the office, I can ask the transport guy to get it washed, fill gas, etc. It was actually funny how long it took me to get gas the first time, because I had to ask my grandfather what type of gas was used in the car, but he didn’t know, so I called the driver, but he was on vacation in India and his phone was not turned on, so finally I asked the transport guy just to do it for me, and luckily he knew what type of gas to use.

So now I’m getting re-settled in Dubai as the hot season approaches, already 95 and humid during the day. I’ll keep you updated on all my random happenings and craziness.

Istanbul!

Istanbul is an amazing city. It is vibrant, hustling, bustling, and full of history. I arrived Wednesday at midnight and Elif and I went to her friend’s place to stay (on the Asian side). Istanbul is split by the Bosphorus, so one side is Europe and the other side is Asia. All the old historical buildings and the old city of Constantinople are on the European side. In the morning, we took a ferry to the European side. The ferries are part of public transportation and cost only 1.5 Turkish Lira, which is the same as $1. It was pretty amazing to see the amount of people that take the ferry everyday, and the view is amazing. You can see many historical buildings, the old city walls, palaces, and mosques. On the European side, we met with Elif’s friend, Otkun, and went to Sultanahmet area, which is the historical area, literally named after Sultan Ahmet. We first went to the Blue Mosque, which was built by one of the Ottoman Emperors. It is a huge mosque with beautiful decorations and six minarets. We went during the midday prayer which was a relaxing and spiritual experience, even though we didn’t pray. It was incredible to watch hundreds of people lined up in prayer, moving exactly at the same time. After the Blue Mosque, we went to the Hagia Sophia. This was originally built as a church, then converted to a mosque and rebuilt a couple of times after fires. It is an incredible place, now a museum. In Islam, you can’t portray living creatures, so all the golden mosaics were covered with plaster and paint, but are now being restored. There are some beautiful mosaics made of gold and a great mix of Islamic architecture. Next, we headed to the old cisterns, which held drinking water for the ancient city. It was a beautiful and eerily lit underground space. One of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. Next, we stopped for lunch at a famous kofte kebab place. Kofte kebab is beef or lamb kebabs, not exactly sure, and you eat them with bread, parsley, and hot sauce. Delicious!

Next we headed to Topkapi palace which was the palace for most of the Ottoman emperors. You can see Ottoman architecture at its finest, and its built on a hill overlooking the see, so the view was gorgeous. We stopped at a café for a beer, and then headed to the Grand Bazaar. It was huge. Literally hundreds and hundreds of stalls in an enclosed space, with vendors selling jewelry, clothes, carpets, beads, etc. After wandering around for an hour, we walked down to the waterfront, checked out some local bazaars, and then headed to a small area under one of the bridges famous for its seafood restaurants. We got to pick a type of fish and how it was cooked, and the fish was served whole. Extremely fresh! With dinner, we had some Raki, which is like Ouzo, a liquorish tasting alcohol that you mix with water. It was already an extremely tiring day, but the fun was just beginning!

After dinner, we walked across the bridge and took the oldest metro in the world, which is literally only one stop, from the bridge to a neighborhood called Taksim. Taksim is an amazing area, along a street where no cars are allowed, full of shops, restaurants, and bars. We met up with a bunch of Elif’s friends at a Nargyla (hookah) place, had a couple drinks and shisha, and then headed to some bars. Most European cities have areas like this, packed with bars in a small area, and it was awesome to go out and explore. Once the bars shut down, we all walked down the street and got late night food. There was an interesting bathroom experience that I had, so if you are interested, I will tell you personally. What a fun and exhausting day!

Day 2 was a bit more relaxed, but we did almost as much! In the morning, we met up with Elifs mom and had a late breakfast at a nice restaurant overlooking the sea on the Asian side. I’d never had a Turkish breakfast before, eggs, cheese, olives, and meat, so I was pretty impressed. However, Elif and her mom told me that it was subpar. We walked around the neighborhood and went to an ice scream store and then headed to the Maiden’s tower. It’s an old lighthouse just off the shore of the Asian side with a great view of the whole city. After some tea, Elif and I headed to the European side to check out a quaint neighborhood known for its food. In the neighborhood, there are 10 stalls in a row that sell baked potatoes with every topping imaginable and stuffed mussels. I decided to pass on the potato and stick with mussels, but Elif got a potato with a crazy combination of toppings. These stalls are quite famous, and the vendors yell at you, competing for business.

Completely tired from all the sightseeing, we headed out to a Hamam, or Turkish bath, back on the Asian side. At the bath, you strip down, put on a towel, and lie down on a hot stone. All the baths in Istanbul were built a long time ago, and the one we went to was built in the 1600s. I decided to get the full works, so after 10 minutes, a guy came and washed me. They literally rub soap on you and scrub you with a rough brush that removes all the dead skin from your body. Then you get a quick massage which was the most painful thing I have ever experienced. It is meant to be tough, but man was it painful! I thought the guy was trying to kill me. I was so scared of him, especially because he didn’t speak any English and kept asking me for a tip that I ran out and hid in a mosque for 10 minutes after he followed me out of the bath!

After the bath, relaxed and refreshed, we walked around Elif’s neighborhood. To me, most neighborhoods in Istanbul felt the same. Small, curving, narrow streets packed with people, shops, restaurants, bars, and bazaars. We wandered through some spice and fish stalls and decided to pick up some fish that Elif’s mom could cook for dinner. You get to pick out the fish, then watch as they chop them up and clean them for you. We also stopped to pick up some deserts and I tried a Turkish dish that is a flatbread with lots of meat on it that you roll up and eat like a wrap.

At this point, thoroughly exhausted, and carrying a lot of fish we headed to Elif’s apartment and met her mom, little brother, sister, and one of her friends. Elif’s mom cooked an amazing dinner and we lounged around for a couple hours eating and drinking tea. Elif’s little brother, Mhmet, or Memo, is very good at English and loved talking to me to show off his English. He’s a very funny kid.

Finally I headed to the airport and took a redeye flight back to Dubai, completely and utterly exhausted.

Istanbul is amazing. It’s almost completely Turkish with no foreigners, and a huge city with over 12 million people. There are no slums in the city, which I found very surprising for a city that size. The people are very friendly, but outside the tourist areas, very few people speak English. They might be able to understand it, but they don’t give that impression. All in all an amazing fantastic trip.

I put a lot of pics up on Facebook, so check them out. There were way too many to put up on the blog.

And for the next two weeks I will be in India for Azeem’s wedding! I’ll post something about all the craziness in a couple weeks.

Cousins and Thunderstorm

Sandstorm whiting out the Dubai skyline




I went to Abu Dhabi last Saturday to seem my first cousin, Shakeel, and his family. Abu Dhabi is the capital of the UAE, but its much smaller and not as Vegas like as Dubai. Check out the pics of my cousins and his two awesome kids.

While in Abu Dhabi, a huge thunderstorm hit. Being in the desert, I just assumed that it never rained. But, it does rain every couple of months, and very violently. There are huge storms with tons of lightning, torrential downpours, but it never lasts more than an hour. No cities here are equipped to handle any amount of water, and sand does not absorb water at all. This leads to crazy flash floods, and completely flooded roads, that take days to clear up. The government literally has to pump water into tanks to be transported away. Check out the pics!

Tennis Tournament in Dubai

First ticket! My cousin is a tennis fanatic and he stood in line for hours, starting at 4:30am, to get the first tickets!
Tennis grounds
Sand getting swept off the court; Dubai is a desert, but you don't realize how much sand blows around in the city until you physically see something like this.
Marcos Bhagdatis
Stadium lit up at night
Mikhail Youzny

Every year, Dubai hosts the Dubai Tennis Championships. It sells out every year, but I got really lucky and a cousin had an extra ticket for both the quarters and semis. I got to see Djokovic play twice, including a 3 hour semifinal with Djokovic against Bhagdatis. The stadium is small, so it's really easy to get awesome seats. The whole complex is really nice, and anyone can walk around outside the stadium. There were a couple bars and restaurants and some amazing street food, including Indian food. I had some fresh pani puri and a beer in between one of the matches!

Spoiled/ Incapable of Doing Anything on My Own

Most people in Dubai are extremely spoiled. This is because there’s so much money, the culture, and because you are not really expected to do a lot of things on your own. I live with my grandparents, and they have a cook and a driver, and someone who comes to clean the apartment once a week. Every day my lunch is packed for me for when I go to work, and now that my grandparents are gone, I have the driver to myself. Normally he works from about 9-8, but I’ve almost reversed his schedule. He drops me off at work at 930, and then goes home. He picks me up at 6, and then I usually use him from around 6pm to 11pm, for when I go out at night. Drivers here also run all your errands for you. If you need a prescription to be picked up, anything to be dropped off, etc. you just tell the driver. And drivers here know everything, way more than most people about Dubai. A good example of this is everything that I’ve had to do for my visa. To get a residency visa, I had to prove a graduated from U of C, and since I only brought a copy of my diploma, this was a long process. I had to get a visa service in the states to get a copy of my original diploma, get a copy notarized, then stamped by the DC local government, then taken to the state department to get stamped, then to the UAE embassy in DC, then sent here, then stamped by the ministry of foreign affairs. Once that was done, my company got all the paperwork filled out. Then I had to get a health check, basically TB, HIV, and HEP A/B. I had no idea how to do this, but of course my driver did. He basically took me to a health center and I just stood there while he got all the correct authorizations and I just had to give my blood. Then he went back 3 days later to get the results. To get my license, I have to get an eye test, and of course, my driver knows exactly where to go and how to get everything done. Also, most of the people that work at the government agencies are Indian, so he just runs around, speaks to them in Hindi or his local dialect, and I just stand there until he tells me to do something else. I literally could not have done any of this on my own, and even my cousins told me to ask my driver to do everything for me. So obviously I am extremely spoiled here, but half the things I would normally do, I literally couldn’t. I don’t even know where half the things in my own kitchen are. Even for dry-cleaning, someone comes to my apartment to pick up the clothes and drop them off. This week, the cable stopped working for some reason, so of course, I asked the driver, and he knew exactly what to do. So it’s been awesome being so spoiled, but also frustrating that some things I literally cannot do on my own, and I have to ask others to do them for me, which is a very weird experience. But all in all, I’ll take it!

Shopping, Malls, and the Dubai Shopping Festival (DSF)

Dubai is all about shopping. There are at least 8 major shopping malls, most of which are bigger than those in the states. Some of them are Festival City, Wafi (Egyptian Themed), Mercato (like Venice), Dubai Mall (biggest mall in the world), Mall of the Emirates (with indoor ski area), Ibn Battuta Mall, etc. The DSF is a month long affair that is one of the main tourist attractions in Dubai. Every mall had ridiculous sales, and pretty much any store you can think of is in Dubai. If you spend a certain amount of money, you get free raffle tickets to win cars, your weight in gold, vacations, and tons of money. Before the economic crises, one Rolls Royce was given away every single day. Now it’s slightly more toned down. They also have a fireworks show every single night and carnivals and cultural events throughout the city. Since I needed to go shopping, I figured I’d go during the festival, and I got a couple raffle tickets to win a Mercedes. Fingers crossed! One thing I did buy was a pair of sandals. This was a big deal because I’ve only had crocs for almost a year now, so for all of you croc haters, I will no longer being wearing crocs all the time! As most of you know, I hate shopping and suck at it, so I recruited my cousin and her mom, and they literally had laid out a route through the mall to take me on to get what I needed. I went to Dubai Mall, and took a couple pictures, so you can see how insane the place is. They have maps just for the parking garage! The mall has an ice rank, an aquarium, and tons of other random things. At some point I will post pictures of the other malls so you can see how nice they are. I hate shopping malls generally, but the ones here are so nice, that I don’t mind going to them. Not to mention, it gets so hot here during the summer, that everyone just hangs out in malls, because you cant do anything outside.