BohemianTranscendence

Dubai, part 2

Claudie — Sat, 14 Apr 2012 18:47:26 +0000

This post is a continuation to my Intro to Dubai trip in which I talked about arriving on late Saturday evening. (Yes, the post I was supposed to publish about 5 Fridays ago )
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Sunday morning, after breakfast, we took a cab to the textile souk.

We walked around the Bastakiya – “the heart of old Dubai”.

Then, we took a short boat ride to the other side of the Dubai Creek to get to the spice and gold souks. Of course, I couldn’t miss the opportunity to bargain for a little nice pair of earrings.

The gold souk (“the gold market”) is full of little (and bigger) stores with gold jewelry and, in each, the daily price of gold is posted. The jewelry itself doesn’t have a fixed price, but is instead priced according to its weight and the gold price for the day. Once the jeweler determines how much it will cost you, you can start to bargain. With some luck and skills, you’ll walk out with the desired piece and a really good discount.

You won’t have any trouble talking to the jewelers, especially the ones in the bigger shops in the main alley. They all speak English and many of them will also understand French, Spanish, and Russian. In fact, during my entire stay in Dubai I heard more of those languages than I heard Arabic. Considering the many immigrants in Dubai as you can see from the nationalities listed in Wikipedia, I guess that’s not very surprising.

Speaking of the language, I must say I was extremely surprised by the Gulf dialect. I had often heard and read that Gulf Arabic is quite similar to MSA (Modern Standard Arabic), and since I had a rather easy time studying the Egyptian dialect after having studied (al-)fuṣ-ḥā (الفصحى), I was confident I’d be able to understand some of the Gulf dialect too.

Well, I was wrong. Very wrong.
While I was able to read – since everything “official” is written in MSA – and I could also understand a good part of “formal” announcements (also in MSA), as soon as I heard Gulf dialect it was as if I was listening to a completely different language.
This was most obvious during the flight announcements traveling to and from Dubai. They were first said in English. Then, in MSA, by a second flight attendant. And then (!), in Gulf dialect by a third flight attendant. I felt pretty happy with my comprehension of the MSA, but couldn’t pick up a single word during the third repeat. I later mentioned that to an Egyptian acquaintance. He told me not to worry; and that yes, Gulf Arabic was way harder.

But, back to the markets.
Apart from the gold souk, I also loved the spice market. One of my goals for this trip was to bring back some fresh saffron. I ended up buying 20 grams for 1/3 of the price I’d buy it for here. And that’s without even considering the difference in quality. The saffron was enclosed in a plastic box, which I wrapped in a plastic bag and then yet another. Despite this, my entire suitcase smells of saffron now. That’s pretty amazing.

We finished visiting the souks around 1:30-2 p.m. and, getting quite hungry, we headed back toward the hotel where we ate a Lebanese restaurant.

That was followed by Turkish coffee back at the hotel, of course.

Everything was delicious. An interesting note is that the pitas we ate in Dubai (not just in the restaurant, but in general) were way thinner than any pita we’ve had before.

After the copious afternoon lunch, the hubby and I somehow managed to pull our strength together and get to the Dubai Mall in which you can find a nice, “little” aquarium.

The aquarium in Dubai Mall holds the Guinness record for “Largest Single Acrylic Panel in the world”.

The divers aren’t impressed by the sharks.

But, while walking in the glass tunnel below the aquarium might be enough of an attraction for many, the Dubai Mall has more to offer. Shopaholics will find pretty much every single brand they can wish for. (After all, it’s the largest mall in the world for some reason!) For those accompanying the shopaholics, but uninterested in shopping themselves, there are plenty of other interesting activities, such as… ice skating.

Of course, there’s also the Dubai Fountain, which is set to perform to light and music.

And just in case you aren’t impressed yet , there’s the tallest building in the world nearby:

Burj Khalifa

With this, I think I’ve pretty much summed up our Sunday Next post: our last day in Dubai!

Blog updates.

Claudie — Sat, 14 Apr 2012 14:00:58 +0000

Just wanted to let you know a couple of things related to the blog:

The issues with IE are solved (at the least the ones I found out about).
I’m currently (as, in this instant) switching comment systems, from IntenseDebate to DISQUS. While I loved the IntenseDebate option of subscribing only to replies, rather than the whole conversation, it never worked for me, neither on this blog, nor on some other people’s blogs I know of + there are many other issues with it as well. I’m going to try DISQUS for a while and see how it goes. Expect changes in the next few hours.

A little wake me up

Claudie — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 13:06:30 +0000

Here’s what I listen to on Friday mornings at 4:30am when attacking my To do list.

Enjoy

A couple of blog related issues…

Claudie — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 06:44:01 +0000

I’m aware of at least 2 bugs that have recently appeared on the website… (Or I just became recently aware of them). One is related to the comment system: apparently it’s declining some of your comments due to e-mail address issues. Thanks to Seb for letting me know about this.

The other one is related to how the site looks under ~~the latest version of~~ IE 8 and more specifically how the font styling looks… If you haven’t had the misfortune of browsing the blog with IE, please do not go ahead and check it out. Seriously. Don’t.

But just in case you actually do go and check it out despite that… Yes, I know it looks like it came straight out of 1999 and that I only need some crazy Word gradient background.

And I thought IE couldn’t surprise me anymore… *sigh*.

I will be fixing both of the issues as soon as possible (probably the commenting issue way sooner). I just need the chance to spend more than 3 minutes on my blog. That will likely also be the time when I’ll be updating my training schedule, reading list, and other items. Until then… good night!

Making the case for running shoes?

Claudie — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 04:00:26 +0000

I know many of you are awaiting for my next posts on Dubai, but before that, I thought I’d share an interesting little article and information about running barefoot.

I’ve seen an increasing number of articles trying to redeem the value of running shoes after everyone seems to have gone crazy about barefoot running. And today, I came across this NYT article:

Making the Case for Running Shoes.

Basically, the entire article is about an experiment in which runners were asked to run with lightweight shoes as well as barefoot but with yoga socks and taped lead strips on top of their foot to have an equal amount of weight as with the shoes. The researchers’ conclusion was that, metabolically, running barefoot was less efficient:

“That something, he and his colleagues believe, is your legs. If you are barefoot, the job of absorbing some of the forces generated by the collision of foot and ground shifts to your leg muscles, a process that Dr. Kram calls the “cushioning effect.” As a result, the leg muscles contract and work more and require additional energy. The metabolic cost of the activity rises.”

To that, I say, yes, in my personal experience, I could agree with the conclusion.

In fact, for the past two weeks, I’ve been running exclusively with my classic pair of Vibrams, on the treadmill, and I’ve ditched the Nike watch, relying only on the machine’s measurements. I’ve worked on short, but intensive and fast runs. My own conclusions: I’m sore!

And not sore from too-much-inactivity-from-winter-and-startup-work-and-mba-work-and-other-stuff. But actually sore from really feeling my muscles work. As another commenter testified below the article, I can feel my legs work in a way they haven’t worked before and even my core feels kind of sore, which is something I haven’t experienced beyond the first month when I began running, in 2009.

However, apart from that, I’m kind of amused by this type of study. First of all, I can’t imagine myself running in yoga socks. I’d probably fall off the treadmill immediately. (And to be honest, I’m having a hard time doing yoga in yoga socks compared to completely bare feet.)

Then, there are the other countless issues with it, such as how’s lead strips on top of the feet comparable to shoes whose weight is generally below the feet?

But even if we disregard all the “details” around the study and just focus on the results for a second and assume they are correct, I still don’t really see what the problem is, or how they make any case for running shoes. Maybe if you want to take the first place in the NYC marathon, and you need every single advantage you can get over your competition. But if we are looking to get stronger leg and a better workout, doesn’t it make more sense to be actually happy with making our muscles work more?

“[...] barefoot running used almost 4 percent more energy during every step than running in shoes.”

Assuming this is right, all I see is (and correct me if I’m wrong): “barefoot running is using more calories than running in shoes”.

I can already see a whole lot of people trying to lose weight getting rid of their running shoes

Because, really, what this would mean would be that:

Not only running barefoot teaches you the proper form of running
Not only running barefoot prevents injuries
Not only running barefoot makes you stronger
But, running barefoot also allows you to burn more calories

How’s that inefficient — or rather, from what point of view? Again, if you are trying to beat a bunch of other professional runners (all in running shoes) by a second or two, that will most likely matter. But otherwise, I only see another benefit for all the “regular” people.

Some randomness and intro to the Dubai trip

Claudie — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 17:23:30 +0000

Good morning all… I started writing this post last night, but since it started getting much longer than I had anticipated, I decided to have a fresh look at it today and publish only its start (next parts to follow soon!).
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If you ever find yourself in a situation where it is Tuesday night, 11:30pm, and one of the few items left to be crossed off your to do list is a blog post, you’d better be baking something. Because you’d never go to bed with the oven on, right?

I’m amazed by how many things I’ve forgotten to write about because of our trip to Dubai. I still haven’t been able to tell you about the dinner the hubby and I had at Atelier Crenn (a place where food meets art), although I posted the pictures in the blog gallery a while back. I completely missed posting about this year’s “Baba Marta” (on March 1st) as well as about Bulgaria’s national day (March 3rd).

A few more tasks, and I might also forget to mention that tomorrow (or already today for many of you) is my birthday

But I guess that what it means to live life at its fullest… being so busy with activities, you don’t have time to write about them. That, or I’m just experiencing what it means to launch a new business.

Anyway, let’s proceed to my promise to Seb (and one of the reasons I’m baking tonight). Let’s talk about Dubai. Tonight, I’ll give you a short introduction to our trip, while in another couple of posts I’ll share more details and pictures.

Speaking of pictures, I uploaded them all this past Sunday, but unless you already have some background of Dubai, I’d advise you to wait till I give a short explanation of what exactly is happening on them in my next posts.

Now about the trip itself. It involved two flights each way and a stay of 2 days in between. The time zone difference? Exactly 12 hours between San Fran and Dubai.
On our way back the longest flight took almost 13 hours. Fortunately, a true miracle occurred and for the first time in my life, I actually fell asleep on the plane (both going and coming back too!), thus having to endure only about 5 hours on each of the two longest flight segments. If only that could happen every time…

We arrived late Saturday night, passed the security rather quickly, and half an hour later were at the hotel. We spent an hour at the hotel bar (last, 50-something floor, beautiful view of Dubai at night), then off to sleep in order to get up early on Sunday morning.

Our plan:
- Sunday: textile, spice, and gold souks, Al-Bastakiya, Dubai mall (largest mall in the world; also containing an aquarium with a Guinness record for “Largest Single Acrylic Panel in the world”) & Dubai fountain (25% larger than Bellagio’s), Burj Khalifa (tallest building in the world).
- Monday: Burj Al Arab (4th tallest hotel in the world, first 7-star hotel), Mall of Emirates (part of which is Ski Dubai), ride with the metro, Ibn Battuta mall, spa, and flight back.

Overall, while the trip was short, I was really happy with all the things we still managed to see. And apart from being an amazing experience, Dubai was also a very unusual one as you’ll get to see from my next posts.

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Well enough for today… I’m off to work (& to celebrate my birthday too ).

Hello Dubai

Claudie — Sun, 04 Mar 2012 02:45:19 +0000

I wrote this post “yesterday” during the flight. To be honest though, I’ve lost a complete sense of time. There are exactly 12 hours of time zone difference between San Fran and Dubai, and I no longer know whether I’m craving breakfast or dinner, nor whether I should consider it’s the 3rd or the 4th.

March 3^rd, 2012…

It is 5:10 a.m. in San Francisco.

5:10 p.m. at our destination.

As to the local time in which we are currently flying: I have no idea. We’ve just begun flying over the black sea, and, if I can rely at all at the accuracy of the small map on the screen in front of me, we should be right above Istanbul.

Today, March 3^rd, is Bulgaria’s national day. And for the first time in about 3 years, I’ve not only come close to what used to be home, but I’ve passed it.

I could probably be already drinking coffee with old friends in Sofia. But instead, I am to stay on this plane for a little over another 3 hours. Listening to “Endless Reverie” by Azam Ali and pondering about the taste of coffee in Dubai.

Certainly, I have my thing for coffee. But it’s neither this, nor the 13 hour flight from DC that makes me focus on such seemingly trivial questions. When you travel to places quite different from anywhere you’ve been, you focus on the known – not the unknown. For how could you visualize the unknown?

So, I focus on my cup of coffee. Imagine it as I hope it to be: strong, hot, warming my hands as I hold the white cup. I fill in the details as much as I can. Perhaps, I’ll be sitting in a small coffee place near the spice souk?

Or, perhaps, further, much further away from it, trying to find a place that appeals more to the locals than the tourists in what’s supposed to be the city of shopping.

As you can see, once you try to fill in unclear details, everything gets much fuzzier. Sure, I could look up in my guides and check if there are any good coffee shops near the souk. I could check for recommendations somewhere further away from it. But, it’ll be all a blurry supposition of what the experience will be like.

So I’m back to looking down at my cup of coffee. I have no idea of what Dubai is really going to be like. But I have experience (probably way too much experience) drinking coffee. I know that it resembles people. Every cup being different. Stronger, lighter, good, bad. Or insert-whatever-fancy-snob-coffee-drinker-descriptive-word-you-want here. But the end, I know coffee. And every cup is the same too. I can make some reasonable assumptions about what it’s going to taste like, how it’s going to smell, and how it’s going to make my eyes go wide open. Most certainly, I can feel it already heating up my finger tips.

And most certainly, I know there’ll be a slight smile on my lips as I drink it, welcoming the familiarity that it brings to any new, unexplored place.

So Hello Dubai. Let’s create some new memories together.

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Some “other” news to mention in this post:

Two weeks ago I visited Boston as planned to see one of my best friends there. While I hadn’t enjoyed too much my first time in Boston a couple years ago, this time we stayed in a different area of the centre with much more life, and I actually liked it quite a lot. I guess every place needs a second chance.
I’ve got a new camera lens… Canon EF 70-300mm USM IS. I thought that coming to Dubai was definitely a good “excuse” to get it. I’m excited and hopefully I’ll manage to get plenty of pictures.

Well, that’s all for now Off to a long day and many discoveries now!

Las Vegas pics & mileage run to NYC

Claudie — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 06:43:26 +0000

Tonight, I am in the mood for something Cuban.
Chan Chan is one of those songs you’ve known all your life, but don’t quite know where you’ve heard it first.

Not that it matters really, because when I listen to this song, my thoughts drift to the beach and late summer evenings.

I published the LAS pictures. There are 437 of them in the gallery. That’s only about half of all I’ve got, but I think it should keep you occupied for some time
A few words about the pictures:

A lot of them are Las Vegas hotel interiors. Hotels in Las Vegas are themed, and in the gallery you’ll find the Ceasars Palace, the Venetian, the Bellagio (actually, the Bellagio is famous for the synchronized performance of its fountain to music — not sure about a theme). Other themes: New York, Paris, the pyramids in Egypt.

The Venetian

Bellagio Fountain

A few of the pics are under/overexposed. Since we were constantly walking without stopping, going in and out, and I was in manual, I sometimes forgot to adjust settings immediately. Woops. And yes, I was too busy to edit the RAW files and fix that. But do not worry — you can see exactly what’s happening on all pictures, even on those with “wrong” exposure.

Las Vegas

A few words about LAS:

I really enjoyed the stay there. Some things I really loved: the fake skies instead of ceilings that, in some of the hotels, looked incredibly real; the brunch at the Bellagio; and the amazing performance “O” performance by Cirque du Soleil. In fact, that last one was my very favorite. The show was so amazing and magical, I’d go see it once more. I highly recommend it to anyone who has the chance to go see it. Even if you those who don’t like the circus will love it (as can be attested by two of the people with whom I was).
Unfortunately and also — as it could be expected, no pics of this as they were forbidden.

“Sky” ceiling at The Ceasars Palace

We were extremely lucky to visit in January when the weather was still cool. If you don’t like the heat, it’s the time to visit.

Now, off to some mileage runs. This Sunday, I got to have my breakfast, as you might have seen from my tweet, at Penelope in NYC. First time I’ve had an “Apple Cider” mimosa. Not bad at all.
From Manhattan, the next stop was Brooklyn (of course). Cappuccinos and a very sweet “lunch” shared with the hubby at The General Greene. Best pastries ever!

Cherry danish, cream cheese cinnamon bun, and baked doughnut.

A couple hours later, we were already heading back to the airport. In less than 24 hours from when we had left, we were once again in San Fran. It was a pretty good day, trip, and mileage run. A good end of the previous week too.

Bye bye January. Hello February and mileage runs!

Claudie — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 05:57:43 +0000

I’ve got to say, I’m pretty proud of myself for getting this post in before the end of January. Getting a second update this month seemed a slight stretch, especially with so much going on due to the new business, my in-laws visit, and the MBA.

Having to switch between monophasic (end of year holidays, in-laws visit) and polyphasic (the rest of the time) every fortnight for the past two months didn’t help much either: I felt like a zombie on all the days I had to give up my naps.

In fact, while I believe I’ve previously mentioned (either here, or on twitter) that my husband had encouraged to go back to a steady polyphasic rhythm, right now he is really pushing for it. Incredible, ha? But apparently, apart from me being the one to wake up first and thus the one to make the coffee, I’m a much nicer person as a polyphasic than as a monophasic.

Well, don’t you worry. I definitely plan to be a much nicer person and, since my in-laws left, I’m back to my “normal” schedule. At least, kind of. Switching between mono- and polyphasic can take a couple of days, but I’m not too worried about this. Today I had a wonderful afternoon nap that refueled my work as well as a second workout for the day and this late evening post.

Speaking of workouts, I must say I felt miserable this morning. Both during my strength training and during my run – if you can even call my pitiful attempt a run. I will blame it on the secondhand smoke in Las Vegas since I know from previous experience how powerfully such smoke can damage my workouts, even when exposed for a shorter amount of time. I’m hoping that my double-training today will help me get rid of the effects by the end of tomorrow.

And now, speaking of Las Vegas: I will be soon posting plenty of pictures in the gallery. Not sure if I’m going to do a post about it yet, but the pictures themselves are pretty telling, so even if I don’t , you won’t need any explanations Still, depending on how many I upload (I shot over 800 photos in less than 3 days), I might choose some featured ones.

Aside from this, there’s a new trip coming up. In my last post, I had already mentioned my mileage run to NYC, my one-night visit to a best friend in Boston, and my long-awaited trip to Buenos Aires. But even I hadn’t expected to get this one in:

DUBAI!!!
(I finally get to go and check how good/bad my Arabic is, heh).

One of the greatest lessons mileage runs have taught me is that you should regularly check for opportunities to fly to the places you want to visit and be very flexible. Most people, even if their schedule allows otherwise, will plan their trip by choosing a destination and date first. Then they will try to get the cheapest option possible. But, when you work on becoming a hardcore frequent flyer, you start with your list of desired destinations and then you jump on the opportunity when it presents itself. That’s how I got Dubai. Best of all – the dates I’ll be there seem to be a pretty good time to visit.

It will, of course, be an extremely intensive trip. The longest I’ve ever had too. I will spend four days travelling (two each way) and only two enjoying the city. On top of that, one of my flights will take over 14 hours. (My record so far has been only over 10 hours…)

To be honest, I’m not sure how I will handle this flight. I just know I’ll have to prepare really carefully because 14 hours is a bit long.

Well, that’s pretty much it for this January. Let’s see what February brings us.

Hello back.

Claudie — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 23:44:43 +0000

I suspect I should feel guilty for having abandoned my blog for so long. No posts, no training logs, no reading list updates. Perhaps, I should blame my absence on the broken cappuccino machine which left me to rehabilitate from my foamy caffeine addiction. But, considering my daily abuse of the French press and that in December I managed to get through a 5lb bag of Brazilian coffee beans all by myself, I doubt it’d be any excuse at all.

And besides, the truth is, I don’t really feel guilty. Sure, I’m annoyed that now I have a lot of catching up to do in order to put everything up-to-date. But that’s it. I’m really too busy to feel anything else right now.

At the beginning of January, I started a new company and while I planned a slow start, I ended up feeling as if I was caught in the pack of professional sprinters at the beginning of a marathon. Hitting the wall at mile 20? More like hitting the pavement right after the starting pistol is fired.

The way I deal with it? … remember that 5lb bag of Brazilian coffee beans? Coffee doesn’t do a very good job of keeping me awake (I prefer yerba mate for this particular purpose), but it does have its way of keeping me cool and focused.

Of course, along with that, the voice of a great singer doesn’t hurt either to help me stay focused and working.

I was exposed to Edith Piaf when I was about 5 or 6 years old. My mother had an audio cassette (remember those?) with some of her best songs, and I loved Piaf’s powerful, distinctive voice. She might have been petite, but her presence must have made up for it by many times.

Apart from my exercise in entrepreneurship, life hasn’t been too extraordinary. Just busy. Very busy. Even (and particularly) around the holidays, despite all the champagne that surrounded the work.

There are some interesting things coming up though. Today, my in-laws arrive from France to visit us.Next week, we are in Las Vegas. (Poker, anyone?… Actually, I should probably brush up on my own skills before our flight.)

Then in February: mileage run to NYC and to Boston.

And finally, the most exciting: April, I am FINALLY (after postponing for 2 years!) going to BUENOS AIRES.

Hopefully, I’ll let you know how all of this goes before another 2.5 months pass. In the meantime, another Piaf song, and it’s time for me to get back to work.

PS: Happy, very belated,
New Year!