A tour of the sand dunes

It's now Monday morning, I have a late start due to lack of power and transportation logistics. I am sitting at the office downtown waiting for our driver and for AT to do some paperwork. The other Canadian guys have already gone out to work at the other site. I walked the 4 blocks to the office. As I left the hotel, I phoned AT to confirm the address. It then took 15 minutes to get across the road (down a couple of blocks and up and over a crosswalk) and another 5 to walk the 4 blocks up one road and get to the office. When I arrived, AT gave me a strange look. "What's that look for?" "You phoned me 20 minutes ago, how lost did you get?" Glad to know I amuse him as much as he amuses me.

We did the dune bashing tour on Saturday evening. It was a lot of fun, although a bit of touristy kitsch. AT came along, since he's new to the UAE, but it was so cheesy for him, riding camels and looking at desert and smoking a sheesha.

On the way home, I asked AT about Islam in Egypt (what sect is most common there?) and got a lecture from the tour guide. For the rest of the drive, the guide ranted about how there is no difference between Judaism, Christianity and Islam, they all have the same roots, except that Christians are wrong for believing that Mary could have given birth to the son of God (according to him). He said nothing I didn't know, but I couldn't get a word in edgewise, and he would not drop it. Then he went on to rant about the word "terrorism", which he feels is too strong a word, and that even terrorists take offense to being called that. AT is still teasing me about it, he says that when someone starts on like that, the best thing to do is to just shut up and wait for it to end. It's only been a week, and he's learning that I am not very good at that.

It's been rather windy here the last few days, and I'm getting to experience the sand storms.