The holiday calendar for TWA is a bit wonky. This is for obvious reasons as the school is in a country that does not follow the same calendar nor have the same holidays that I have been accustomed to all my life. There are holidays and celebrations specific to both Saudi Arabia as well as to the Islamic faith. As a result of this our first break came right at the end of October for Eid Al-Adha. This is the time of the year that marks the annual pilgrimage that Muslims must complete as one of the five pillars of Islam that govern the religion. As Saudi is the location of Mecca and thus the holy centre of the faith (think the Vatican City for Islam) the country becomes over run with tens of thousands of pilgrims completing their journey. Mecca is located about 3 hours outside of Jeddah on this side of the country so on trips into the city we have seen our fair share of people dressed in the traditional robes with their prayer beads. Actually quite a unique sight for one who is unaccustomed to seeing it. The ending of this pilgrimage is Eid Al-Adha or The Feast of the Sacrifice commemorating Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son Isaac. It's quite a large celebration time and schools and work places are closed for two weeks as a result. Our school was only planning on being closed for one week but as a result of a mishap invoking our school buses being used to transport pilgrims; we had to miss a second week of teaching (oh darn). We did still come into work during those days and it was nice to catch up/do planning/continue to unpack boxes and set up our rooms.
With a full week off I was considering some options for what I wanted to do and where I wanted to go. After some self deliberation I decided to keep it easy for my first trip out and head to Dubai. A lot of reasons for this: it's very close to Saudi, was relatively cheap to get there by air, and it's a place that was on my checklist to go while living in this part of the world. Seemed like a logical decision to me. I only booked it for four days as well, which I'm glad I did because by the end of the trip I was good to go.
I did end up travelling there by myself but luckily Sam, our operations manager, currently has his family living in Dubai (it's where he was located before coming to Saudi) and offered me a place to stay for two out of the four days. It was very kind of him and his wife Sandra and son Ryan were both a blast to send time with. We had some delicious food courtesy of Sam's excellent cooking skills as well.
My impressions of Dubai were kind of mixed. Without a doubt it is an incredible city to visit. The number of buildings is insane and at night they light up like steel Christmas trees piercing the sky. This is the typical view of what Dubai is, however; it is like any other major city and city in the Middle East. There is an old part to the city and some very sketchy and dilapidated parts as well. It's not all fancy hotels and restaurants (though that does make up a large chunk). I went to a couple of bars over two nights including an Irish pub as well as a Trader Joe's Mai Thai with Same. We met up with some of his work colleagues from the hotel business and at one point it sank in me just how much of a microcosm of Dubai we were. I was sitting there as a Canadian, Sam is Lebanese, and at one point we were chatting with a Brit, an Aussie, an Indian, and a Kenyan. Dubai truly is international and its reliance on the hospitality industry and international corporations contribute to this.
The malls were unreal. Two in particular: Dubai Mall and Mall of the Emirates were enormous and breathtaking. Each of these malls housed over 1000 stores as well as different venues of entertainment. I saw, but didn't participate in, the famous indoor ski hill in Mall of the Emirates and I skated for an hour on the indoor ice rink in Dubai Mall. I even wandered through an indoor aquarium and zoo. There were a ton of sales for Eid as well and I managed to pick up some good swag. It took hours to wander through the malls and see everything but well worth it.
By the end of the trip and through all of the walking and carrying of things I was exhausted. Dubai is definitely a place I would go back to but only on the condition that I was with a group of people (or at least one other person). I boiled it down in my head and there are really only three things to do in Dubai as a tourist: go out eating and/or drinking, go shopping, or go to the beach. Each one of these is infinitely better to do with other people and they ended up being wasted on me travelling alone.
Still, well worth crossing off the bucket list.
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