1st Honeymoon: Around Dubai in a Red Bus

From the Madinat Jemeirah, we hoped onto a Big Red Bus called the Big Bus Tour to take a look at the whole of Dubai on the top of a double decker bus. We bought 2 tickets which was valid for 24hrs and we can alight at any stop the bus makes and we can get on again at the same place after we've seen the place enough. Most of the employees of Big Bus tours are Philipino, the ticket sellers are pinoy, the bus conductors are also pinoy, except the drivers which are mostly Indian. Quite typical lah, I'm guessing most of the Chinese working here would be found in the restaurants.

On board a double decker to circle round Dubai

It was very windy

Next stop will be the Palm Jemeirah

The Palm Jemeirah is a man-made island in the shape of a Palm Tree. It's shape can be seen from Space. There's alot of Hotels and high class residential homes here.

The Palm is made by tredging, filling up the sea with sand and soil

Alot of celebrities own houses here, this could be David Bechham's vacation home

The Palm Atlantis is where we'll be staying the next day

One of the main attractions at the Palm, the Atlantis Hotel

Wafi Shopping center

We got down the bus for a toilet break, so we took a stroll at this mall

Then we headed to the Pier where they're selling an Arabic version of Martabak

While we're deciding on whether to try out this local food, an Arabic man who's on vacation with his family paid the lady for 2 portion of this bread so that we can try out his country's local delicacies. It's the first time someone I don't even know offered to buy me food, we thanked him and he thanked us back instead. I guess the locals here really appreciate the overwhelming number of tourists that comes to the country and helped the country to have another income source besides Crude Oil products. We just felt the locals' hospitality first hand, they are all very nice and they are damn rich.

We tried this version of martabak, it tastes kinda bland, just flour with butter and a bit of egg

If the guy who bought us the bread where to come to Jakarta, I'd let him try our martabak, this one no flavour one.

A makeshift tent for some type of street performance

We took a stroll down the pier to board a river cruise

Woman lah go where see what also want to shop

She say cold so want to buy a scarf, I thinking if never shop cannot one

We took a cruise to view Dubai from its Creek

This portion of the town is the most recent developed with hotels and office buildings

Snaking on board the cruise

The serve dinner on the cruise, but doesn't look too appealing to us so we took the evening one

This is the older part of Dubai, called the Gold Souk and Spice Souk areas

Most of the people who work in Dubai stay at the older part of town, the Gold Souk or Spice Souk, rent is cheaper in the area.

I think that's a big mosque

See the people on the boats, thats the public transport they take from their residential area to their workplaces

I think this prison like building is a palace to the earlier Sheikh, the ruler of Dubai

When we got off the cruise it was dark already

Its a Friday night and the Pier we were strolling earlier become packed with Bangali's. Reminds me of Orchard road during New Years Eve.

There's street performances and stuff

We went for Dinner at another mall

Its a local kebab restaurant

Having kebab

The kebab here you have to fill the pita with your own ingredients that roll it up yourself one. There's chicken, or lamb with yogurt. If ask me to eat this everyday I sure cannot tahan, I also don't like the rice they have here, its the long grain kind. Although its better in nutrion value but its a bit dry and doesn't seem to soak up flavours very well.
We took a night bus tour after dinner to see Dubai at night, but the both of us just fell asleep on the bus after a long day. The thing that caught my attention was a palace that belonged to the sister of the Sheikh. She's referred to as a Sheikah and she often lets the poor people into the premises of her huge palace to distribute food to them. Although I'm thinking here the locals where got poor one, all tax free, housing and education also provided to the local residents.