How to Judge a Camel Beauty Contest

Note to readers: This is the final blog of a three part series about our adventure to the Al Dhafra Camel Festival. Top 10 Tips for Enjoying the Al Dhafra Camel Festival, Camel Bling-Bling and How to Judge a Camel Beauty Contest

An Arabian Asayles Beauty Queen.

The first time I heard about a Camel Beauty Contest I laughed. I had no idea these goofy-looking beasts with the big hump had a lot in common with very valuable majestic thoroughbred horses. I learned at the camel festival that a camel’s value, performance and beauty, just like a thoroughbred’s, are determined by their skeletal structure, the sleekness of their coat and the all-important pedigree. Both can cost an absolute fortune.

There is a disparaging saying, “A camel is a horse designed by a committee” because its parts don’t go together. But, I tell you that after our forays into camel festival beauty contests, I believe that a camel is far more complex and has a beauty all-to-its own that can rival a thoroughbred any day. 

Now that Roger and I are semi-pros on the camel festival circuit, I think it is time to impart what we’ve learned about judging a camel’s beauty. I am certain that newly un-employed American Idol judge Simon Cowell is rolling his eyes and touting that little “I can’t believe I am hearing this” smirk. But just eat your heart out Simon, this is way out of your judging league. 

Hot Rod Memories . . . The Hottest Seat in Abu Dhabi

The dilemma of finding a meaningful gift for the one you love is perplexing. Early in our relationship I figured out that Roger really didn't need or want any “things.” So what am I going to do for him on his special days?

Got It! Experiences .  .  . exciting – new - unique life experiences.

The "Silver Surfer" races on the Yas Forlua 1 track.

I can say that after 10 years it is getting very tough to find new experiences. Roger, the builder of airports, has flown in a glider, a World War ll Texan T-6 warbird, a helicopter and a bi-plane. Roger, the car enthusiast has raced a 600 HP NASCAR race car at the Daytona International Speedway, raced his treasured silver Corvette on the Yas Formula 1 track and successfully mastered racing a Segway around Downtown Dubai.  This list could go on but I bet you get the point.

So, what do I give Roger for our tenth wedding anniversary?  

A Culinary Voyage Through the Streets of Old Dubai with Frying Pan Adventures

Frying Pan Adventures foodie explorers 

Varshik, Donna,Kate, Bob & Arva

Many times on my explorations of old Dubai I pass by multitudes of hole-in-the-wall restaurants lining the streets.  Each cafeteria, as these small street-restaurants are called, advertise their offerings with grainy pictures of peculiar looking plates of food and strange – or maybe exotic - aromas settling over the sidewalk.

I always wonder if some really delicious foodie finds are lurking inside. I must confess that I have been tempted but never found the required courage to drop in for a bite.

But that all changed when I met Arva Ahmed. I ran into Arva online through her blog I Live in A Frying Pan. I was instantly taken by her fresh wit, funny take on life and sheer joy of exploring. I was certainly intrigued by the hidden food gems she featured. When I read she was developing ethnic food walking tours in Dubai, I jumped at the chance to try one.  I was not disappointed.

What is one of the great losses of expat living in Dubai? American Football!

First touchdown of the inaugural Desert Bowl Game

is scored by the Abu Dhabi Wildcats.

“Who let the dogs out!” Or, should that be camels?

Guess what my lovely husband Roger finds in Dubai? American football! What a great surprise for poor football-starved Roger.

One of the great losses of expat life in Dubai is watching a good American football game. 

Grocery Shopping in Dubai . . . A Never-ending Scavenger Hunt

Oh Dubai! How I love the adventure of living with you! 

The thrill of navigating your roads, the adrenalin-pumping gauntlet of your bureaucratic mazes, the tongue-twisting test of translating your many English dialects  . . . and the adventure of foraging for groceries! 

Life is a never-ending adventure here!

When one relocates to a new locale, it doesn't have to be as exotic as Dubai just any ordinary city will do, it is always a challenge to locate the right outlets to purchase the food stuffs with which you love to cook. In my case, we are talking American food products.

Be you a lowly beginner, a seasoned chef or an intrepid food explorer we all face the same dilemma. Where do you find the ingredients for that most perfect dish that makes your family sing your praises?

Read on, you will be very surprised to learn what is the hardest product to find in Dubai!

The Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque - One of the most talked about attractions in the world!

Official image of the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque

It seems quite a lot of people agree with me that the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi is one of the most wonderful places on this earth!

Just this week the UAE newspapers reported that users of TripAdvisor ranked it as number 16 on the list of the top most talked about attractions in the world. It joins the ranks of such iconic global sites as Sydney Harbor, the Coliseum in Rome, the Eiffel Tower in Paris and Central Park in New York City. 

What makes it so special?

Battle of the Chefs - Who is Dubai's Top Chef?

"Battle of the Chefs"
Nineteen at The Address Montgomerie

Ok. So I admit it! I am a rabid foodie – a person having an overly zealous interest in food.

I love Food! I love to read about it, I love to shop for it, I love to experiment with it, I love to cook it and I really love to eat it!

I love nothing better than to slosh around my kitchen trying out new dishes, new techniques and/or new ingredients. And God bless Roger for willingly eating the good, the bad and the ugly.

So when my friend Theresa Dommett invites us to Dubai’s “Battle of the Chefs.” faster than Emerile Lagasse can say “BAM, I accept!”  

“Roger, we have another adventure!” I proudly announce. “We are going to watch the top chefs in Dubai battle it out in the kitchen and then we get to taste and judge their unique creations just like the Iron Chef on TV.”  Words cannot express his delight!

2012 Top Adventures In and Around Dubai

Living in Dubai is a never ending adventure and Roger and I are keeping our promise to each other to spend as much time as we can exploring unique experiences in this region of the world. It takes a lot of hard work to keep this promise but someone has to do it!

2012 was an eclectic mix of adventures and here are our 2012 Top Adventures In and Around Dubai.  Even after 2.5  years we are still on the "hunt" for great cultural experiences. With the abundance of things to see and do in this area of the world, we do not lack for opportunities. We are happy to share our top adventures with you and hope you might enjoy them too.

2012 Best Restaurant Experiences In and Around Dubai

One of life's great pleasures is a perfectly prepared meal enjoyed at a nice restaurant. It doesn't matter how fancy or how expensive the restaurant is but it is the ambiance of the setting, the care taken with the foods and flavors plus the graciousness of the staff that makes it memorable.

As we approach the new year, Roger and I reflected on the past year’s dining adventures. For those of you who live in Dubai, or will be visiting, we hope that our list helps you to pare down the overwhelming dining choices in Dubai. It is not an all inclusive list for we know there are many more excellent restaurants in Dubai that we haven’t yet discovered, but here are our favorite dinners from 2012. You may want to try them in 2013.

"Thai Hands On" Cooking in Dubai

Chef Roger

Dubai is an intriguing international city that vibrates with an unbridled appetite for grandness. This grandness can be seen all over the city, but tasting it in the city’s vast offerings of restaurants is an experience.

For the adventurous there are small ethnic food “cafeterias” tucked into every nook and cranny in the old section and for the rest of us there are the 5 star restaurants operated by some of today’s most celebrated chefs.  

Lynn & Katie

But once a year, the most sought after reservation in Dubai is at a stylish private villa on the infamous Palm Jumeirah Island, the world’s largest man-made island. 

Where is the most unique shopping scene in Dubai?

Dubai, like everything else here, takes shopping to the ultimate!

This amazing city is infamous for the extravagance of its shopping experiences. You can gorge yourself at the mega malls, one has more than 1200 stores, packed with every ultra-expensive designer and luxury brand known to woman. You can click right through ever expanding online shopping sites, save at multiple Duty Free Stores at the airport or scrounge for bargains at an outlet mall located in the desert. Shop around the world at Global Village or wander narrow passageways scavenging the traditional souqs for spices, textiles and heaven knows what else.

To tempt shoppers even more, Dubai offers two city wide shopping festivals a year where more than 6,000 stores offer heavy discounts. In fact, retail accounts for around 30 percent of the gross domestic product in Emirate of Dubai.

This is all well and good but maybe you are looking for something more? . . . something priceless?

Where is the most unique shopping experience in Dubai?

Bollywood Dinner Theatre … Only in Dubai!

The lights go down.

Center stage a beautiful Indian woman exquisitely dressed in a seductive sparkling ghagra (skirt) and choli (top) strikes a melodramatic pose.

The heavy bass beat of loud rhythmic music pounds out of the speakers just above our heads.

In the background a gushing waterfall with two suspended TV screens shows flashy dance scenes from Bollywood movies that the on stage performers pantomime.

The exotic dancer gyrates to the rhythm and lip syncs the song. The show is ON!

This is The Moghul Room – The Bollywood Dinner Theatre in Dubai!

11,000 Volunteers Being Human for Every Human Being – Adopt A Camp Ramadan Care Package Project in Dubai

What do you do when 11,000 volunteers show up?

Saher with her "adopted" boys
from the labor camps

I believe that one person can make a difference in the world. What starts with a small act of compassion can become so powerful that thousands of people join in the crusade.

That is exactly what happened with Saher Sheikh’s random act of kindness one day as she stood in the checkout line at her Dubai grocers  watching a laborer carefully count out his coins for a meager meal of bread and laban (a yogurt drink). Seeing the distress in the man’s face, she steps in, pays for the sparse meal and tells him to go get anything else he wants – he simply gets a strawberry drink.

From this small act AdoptA Camp was born. Adopt A Camp is a grass roots organization that today brings assistance to 43 camps helping more than 32,000 laborers in the Dubai area.

TripAdvisor EveryTrail Walking Tour . . . Dubai’s Art Galleries and Architecture

Sheikh Zayed Road
photo courtesy of flashydubai.com 

My assignment from TripAdvisor to develop five walking tours of Dubai is complete. Here are the final two tours.

Enjoy a special collection of Dubai finest art galleries in the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC)  - DIFC Gate Village Art Galleries, an exciting mix of fine art, photography, masters and emerging artists.

Too hot to walk about? Try this fun Dubai Metro tour that follows the infamous Sheikh Zayed Road and shows off Dubai's iconic buildings - Skyscraper City - New Dubai.  

Ramadan 2012 Adopt-A-Camp Project. . . Join me in a small act of charity

Please join me during the 2012 Ramadan holy season in a simple act of compassion to support the Adopt-A-Camp Care Package project. 

The program will provide 5,000 large “care packages” of personal hygiene products, clothing, bedding and food items to help improve the lives of laborers, some who have been abandoned by their employers. 

This effort is organized by the non-profit Adopt-A-Camp organization and the DubaiChamber of Commerce.

The goal is to raise enough money to cover the cost of 5000 pillows @ AED12.

If I can find 200 people to donate 300 dhs each ($80) we will succeed. Thank you for anything you can do.   Please feel free to ask your friends to help. Contact me email: katiefoster46@gmail.com or
cell:055-525 6619

TripAdvisor EveryTrail Walking Tour . . . The Ultimate - Downtown Dubai

My assignment from TripAdvisor to create five walking tours of Dubai has been great fun to develop. Doing the research for the tours has led me to find such interesting facts about my adopted city.

Burj Khalifa - the tallest
building in the world.

Do you know how many “Ultimates” – the superlatives - there are in the Downtown Dubai area? 

It is amazing . . . but then again in Dubai being the first, the biggest, the best is a much sought after quest!

The Ultimate . ..Downtown Dubai Walking Tour

TripAdvisor EveryTrail Walking Guides . . .Dubai Souqs & Bastakiya

I recently picked up a small assignment from TripAdvisor that has been so much fun - create 5 walking tours of Dubai. 

It was easy to come up with the first four – 1) my favorite place in all of Dubai – The Souqs; 2) a very close second - the historic Bastakiya area in Burj Dubai; 3) DIFC Art Galleries – something that has been on my bucket list for some time and so glad I finally went; and 4) The Ultimate Dubai – I was amazed to find so many world records all in one place – Downtown Dubai.  

But, number 5 has been a bit more difficult to identify. 

36 HOURS in DUBAI . . . Top 10 Things to Do and See in Dubai!

Jon & Elaine & the Burj Al Arab

Expats living in Dubai are delighted to have friends and family visit their adopted city. The lucky ones get to stay for an extended period but in many cases it is simply a pass through on the way to/from other travels.  So in a limited amount of time, what are the “must do/see” places in Dubai?

I had to make this decision recently when good friends Jon and Elaine Krupnick stopped by on their way home from an extensive trip to Sri Lanka and India, immediately followed by my sister Paty Barr and her friend Kathryn Brandt who were stopping by to pick up me and Jani Diedam on their way to our excursion to India (more on that later).

Paty & Kathryn's first trip to the desert

MUSANDAM – the Fjords of Arabia . . . A Weekend Excursion from Dubai

The drive from Dubai to Musandam, called the Fjords of Arabia, is described in tour books as being one of raw rustic beauty but otherwise uneventful.

Not so for our intrepid two car caravan.

Diane discovers that camels love her apples.

As we cut across the UAE desert, traveling from the Dubai to the coastline in Ras Al Khaimah, we encounter a small caravan of camels sauntering along the side of the paved desert road.

They appear to be out for a leisurely morning stroll and are totally unfazed by the two SUVs that stop suddenly ejecting eight gleeful expats.

HIGH TEA at the BRITISH EMBASSY . . . DUBAI ELEGANCE for a GOOD CAUSE

Photo courtesy of www.afternoontea.co.ok

Anna, the 7th Duchess of Bedford, disliking the 'sinking feeling’ she got in late afternoon, is credited with the creation of the British tradition of afternoon tea.

She started having a pot of tea in the afternoon, inviting friends to join her, and before long there were cakes and breads added and the ladies were ensconced in this iconic tradition. I wonder who brilliantly introduced Champagne at tea-time?

I partook of high tea on one of my visits to London and can’t say that I liked the tea or the treats. But,  that was not the case at the  British Embassy's   recent High Tea and Jazz to benefit The Flying Angel.