hip to be a square

finally the weekend has come- i am exhausted.

this morning we started our first day at Al Futtaim Group Real Estate (AFGRE). we learned more about how they are developing dfc. it is truly a massive undertaking, you have to take a look at their site. they have schools, hundreds of shops, hotels, apartments, villas, hotels, marinas... the list goes on. now they have already started building another one in cairo and are close to starting one in qatar.

we toured some of the intercon residences and went back to the four seasons gulf course. the tour was better than the lecture about the sites in the morning. at least we got to walk around and interact a bit. in the afternoon we went back to the training center to debrief. we came back to the hotel, i went to the gym and haider went swimming. after that ram picked us up and took us to the creek and the gold souk. the souk was not a great combination of modern and old ... it was a much less glamorous side of the city. more normal people, more poor people. i did not see any of the traditional markets or buildings that i was expecting. the highlight of the souk maybe was when some guy at the jucie bar started chatting us up. we just ordered drinks but he was trying to sell us more. we were kind of ignoring him, but then we needed to ask him where to find the creek. so we turn to ask him where is the creek? he just nods yes. haider asks him in urdu and still he just nods. so i try one more time and i turn to him and ask, where is the water? he nods again and smiles this time. he leans in towards me and with a twinkle in his eye, points at the menu and says, "fish burger."

after that ram caught up with us and showed us to the creek, without any fish burgers. ram, by the way, is our driver, but he is actually from al futtaim security, so i prefer to think of him as our bodyguard. the creek was nicer. we spent some time next to it and then went to bur dubai and saw some historical parts of the city. we had dinner on the creek. it was good but it was soooo hot. it was 9, 930, dark and we could not stop sweating. usually the heat has a source, the sun, the radiator, the stove, something. here the heat comes from everywhere- sun shade it doesn't matter, it comes from the air around you. while we were eating our dinner some cats came out to spend time with us. there were three spotted cats that were playing under our table and just beside it ... i think they liked the smell of our kebab.

now we are back at sofitel. majid is at dinner with ahmed his brother and aziz his friend. we will go out with them tonight ... if we are still awake when they call. tomorrow we will do some shopping and then maybe go out into the city some more. then sometime this weekend we are supposed to go out with the al futtaim's on their boat, which should be splendid. if not that, we will find something else to occupy our leisure time.

that's it for now, i was listening to huey lewis earlier, hence the title. also we are pretty [] here in dubai, so ya know how that goes