Dubai 17 Mar 2017

It's back to the travelling again today, albeit only for a couple of hours. It's the first day of the weekend here and, as everywhere in the Muslim world, the mosques are full for Friday prayers. The roads seem to busy too as we head to Dragon Mart to the southeast of Dubai city. This mall is loosely built in the shape of a Dragon and contains hundreds of small shops selling anything from an industrial generator to chopsticks and anything in between. 

As it is Friday, quite a lot of the businesses are closed, but it was still busy. The range of goods for sale is immense. Some of the clothes and materials might not suit Western eyes, but clearly they are popular judging by the stock in the shops and the number of customers. Some items stretch the imagination, we found a shop selling mainly kitchen gadgets that you'd never have guessed existed. The range of electrical gadgets to attach to your phone was beyond belief, some of the iPhone and iPad covers had designs of eye catching colours and shapes.

We visited an electric light shop, perhaps the most colourful and ornate shop I've ever seen. Designs were primarily oriental and ranged from small desk lamps to huge barrel-sized brass ceiling lights. None were wildly expensive, but really were only suitable for houses here, they'd look out of place in Europe. That said, we bought a very attractive standard lamp that has 7 hanging lanterns of different length spiralling around a central column. After a roll or two of sellotape and yards of bubble-wrap were used, it all got packed away ready to go in the car.  This afternoon, Siobhan unwrapped it all and reassembled it. It looks very pretty and suits the flat well.

As it was lunchtime, we left the mall and headed to Jumeirah and The Palm. Once over the bridge and onto the 'trunk' of the Palm, we parked and walked to Bidi Bondi an Australian-themed sports bar to have lunch. By the time we arrived, 'Dubai brunch' was in full swing. Dubai brunch is apparently a Friday event for many expats here. Restaurants and bars offer an inclusive price for food and drink from late morning onwards. It's not a cheap experience, but if your aim is to eat, drink and make merry and basically spend your day in a pub, it's perhaps not a bad deal. Bidi Bondi was offering 4 drinks and a meal, or 5 drinks for 145 Dirhams, that's around £32. A pint of beer on the menu is £10, so perhaps it wasn't too expensive.

We only wanted lunch so ordered off the menu, the food was Australian/American style and was fine, but we left the revellers to enjoy the rest of their day whilst we headed for the supermarket. We really know how to live!

As it is Siobhan and Aaron's wedding anniversary, we bought some rather large prawns for dinner tonight. We won't eat until quite late as Aaron is working until 8 this evening and it takes an hour to get back by Metro afterwards. It's not so breezy tonight, so sitting outside on the balcony is possible tonight. To stave off the pangs of hunger, we purchased some olives to eat as a pre dinner snack!

It's time to say again, that I'm sorry I couldn't post pictures in my blog this time. Before we travel again, I will find a blogging platform that works specifically with an iPad. Photo service will resume next time! Meanwhile, I have posted photos on Facebook (FB) regularly and should you wish to few them, look me up on FB!