Another Year (officially)

Well, as of yesterday, we are officially living in Dubai for another year. Not that that is groundbreaking news, or surprising really, but, it's official in that we signed our apartment lease renewal until September 16, 2011. And in Dubai, rent payments are done quite differently than back home, or most places in the world. What you would think would be normal (paying your landlord on a monthly basis, ie, a check every month) is unheard of here. The best you can hope for here are 4 checks for the year (quarterly), but more commonly, they want you to pay for the year in 1 or 2 checks. Pretty crazy. Last year we paid in 2 checks, but in order to negotiate our landlord to knock 10,000 dirhams (roughly $3,000 USD) off our rent for the year we paid in one check. So, more binding than the lease is that we just paid the rent for our apartment for the whole year. Sooo, we'll be sticking around to live in our apartment that we've paid for until next September. Visitors still welcome, because we're going to be here until at least September 16, 2011.

27 on the 27th!

Happy Birthday to me!

Well, yesterday was my 27th birthday, on August 27th. I was pretty excited about that, so I kept telling Jared that it is a very special birthday. And although I didn't get any bling for a gift (as I was secretly hoping), Jared did spoil me and make my first Dubai birthday very special...

Crabcake Benedict for Breakfast! Yum!!

To start the day, I woke up to find Jared secretly cooking away in the kitchen to surprise me with my favorite food for breakfast: Crabcake Benedict. It's truly a New England thing that I can only find a few places in the South Shore and Cape (Grumpy's in Dennis being the best, where I memorably had crabcake benedict twice in one weekend. oops). Jared had wanted to take me out for brunch, but of course Ramadan put a wrinkle in that plan, so decided making it at home was the next best thing. He truly knows the way to my heart, and I kept saying, "I love you, you poached eggs for me..." (Poaching eggs is not something either one of us had ever done before...)

After breakfast I got to open my gifts which included an expensive peony scented lotion I had been oogling, a new beach hat (or rather coupon for me to pick one out myself), and a spa day at a luxurious spa at the Madinat Jumeirah Al Qasr Hotel. I was so surprised, and excited because they are all things I would not buy for myself (isn't that supposed to be what birthday gifts are about?).

We then lounged around the house for a bit to recover from our delicious breakfast, before heading out to the mall so that I could search for a beach hat. An hour and a half or so of looking and I found a perfect hat at Bloomy's (Jared having vetoed approximately 40 hats before finding the right straw hat). Then home we headed so that I could try out my new hat. We headed to the pool and swam and lounged away the afternoon (having my birthday during Ramadan really limited the number of activities we could do, since everything is closed on Fridays, and even more so during Ramadan).

After we got our fill of swimming and felt that we'd spent enough time in the heat, we lounged around the house until it was time to get ready for dinner. Jared surprised me by making a dinner booking at Gary Rhodes' new steak restaurant Twenty10. It only opened 3 weeks ago, and some of the reviews were mixed, so Jared was a little hesitant to go there. Well, it was probably top 5 best meals we've had in Dubai, so a perfect choice.

We got there a little early and got a drink at the bar (mmm, white cranberry cosmo!), and then proceeded to have an amazing meal. The restaurant embraces a sharable starters concept, so we split the Rillettes Fritters (yummy pork rillettes we discovered in Paris once again!), and a Lobster Caesar Salad. We both then got steaks (the restaurant gained brownie points with us right away as they only serve American beef and [some] Wagyu (overrated uberexpensive Australian beef). I got a 12 oz. fillet, and Jared got a giant ribeye. They both came well-seasoned and cooked to medium-rare perfection, with free sauces. I chose the Bearnaise and Jared the horseradish whip. Between Hollandaise and Bearnaise in one day, I was floating in French sauces, which only Jared knows will make me love you forever. The steaks were a la carte, so we also shared spinach and homemade frites as sides (give me steak frites and I'm in heaven). And although we had cake waiting at home, we could not resist getting an order of the sticky toffee pudding to share, which the chef kindly divided into two portions for us on our own plates. All the food was cooked and prepared to perfection, and I could not possibly have wished for a better birthday (whilst in Dubai during Ramadan....). I still maintain that I am 'mid' twenties for one more year (whereas, most of my friends are late twenties...), and I certainly enjoyed my 27 on the 27th!

Back in Dubai and Ramadan

Ramadan Kareem!

So, I've actually been back to Dubai for about two weeks now, but I haven't been on the ball with updating my blog. It could be because I'm lazy, but I think more likely, it's because I've been so depressed that the holy month of Ramadan has begun again. When we moved to Dubai almost a year ago, we arrived mid-Ramadan, but I had forgotten how restrictive and annoying it is... Ramadan is the holy month of the year in Islam, where Muslims fast from food, water, and smoking during daylight hours (to show their solidarity to those less fortunate). And in support of the Muslims' hardship with fasting, the UAE has made it illegal to eat, drink, or smoke in public during daylight hours (because just seeing food or other people eating or drinking would make it impossible to fast and restrain themselves from eating or drinking water. This falls under the same mentality of women wearing abayas, that seeing anything more than a woman's ankle will turn men on to the point of being unable to restrain themselves from sexual assault, yet, somehow, all the other men in the world can... but I digress).

In addition to outlawing public eating, pretty much all food establishments are closed during daylight hours. Not very fun. So, the day before Ramadan began, I stocked up at the supermarket and so have been binging on food and drinks in the privacy of my own home. Economical, but reclusive. Incredibly annoying when it comes to going to the gym and working out in the desert summer (when you can't bring water to rehydrate yourself).

Fortunately though, a few restaurants are open during the day for delivery or take-away. Not without going to extraordinary measures though, to 'hide' the food. Heaven forbid a Muslim should see it.

The giant 30 foot curtain that covers the Dubai Mall Food Court during daylight hours.

Then, when you enter the Food Court, those minimal places that are open (mostly trashy trashy American fast food, including but not limited to McDonald's, Burger King, Taco Bell, KFC, and Pizza Hut), have to go to extreme levels to cover their food. Such as, covering their counters with blankets.

Or covering their counters with place mats. Oh the madness.

Then, after fasting all day, the Muslims more than make up for it when the sun goes down by gorging on Iftar buffets, which all the hotels and big restaurants have every night. It's basically all-you-can-eat international buffets with Arabic, Indian, and other random food from around the world (sometimes pasta and/or pizza, mashed potatoes, fries, pretty much a random mishmash). Although I am usually not that interested in all-you-can-eat buffets (unless it's dirty Chinese food at Ling Ling in Geneva, NY), Iftars are delicious, and I have pretty much been eating my weight in them since Ramadan began. Delicious, but not so conducive to losing the 5 lbs of holiday weight. The first Thursday of Ramadan I was still embracing the holiday spirit, so had my first Iftar of the year at The Palace Hotel's Ewaan Restaurant to catch up with friends after my vacation. One Iftar a year is probably all that any one (non-fasting) person really needs, but I have subsequently been to the One & Only Royal Mirage's Moroccan Iftar at Tagine (for a bday celebration with friends), and participated in an Iftar Potluck at our friends Dom and Melissa's. Next weekend I think we're doing another with my work, with the potential for another one with Jared's work. So, by the end of this month, I will probably have put on 5 more pounds and never want to see another buffet in my life. Two weeks down, two weeks to go. I am definitely counting the days until the unpleasantness that is Ramadan is OVER!

Home, also known as Summer in Boston

Happy happy to be home!

We just returned from an absolutely wonderful trip home! It was our second time home since we moved to Dubai, and after an exceedingly stressful visit over Christmas, we learned to schedule less and allow more relaxation time. So relax we did, although the time still always goes waaay too fast. It was much easier to come back to Dubai after Christmas, when it was cold and snowy at home, than it was this time, when it is beautiful and summery in Boston (and it's still 110 degrees and humid in the Dubai summer). And I had to come back a week sooner than Jared (because I stayed that extra week at Christmas to sort out the rental car accident. argh.). So I spent a lovely 10 days or so, catching up with family and friends and attending our friends Amy and Patrick's Wedding.

Group Photo before heading off to Amy & Patrick's Wedding. Amy is Jared's friend from high school, so a whole bunch of our friends who went to high school with Jared went too!

Beautiful Bride Amy and Jared. Doesn't he look dashing in his lime green tie? (I picked it out for him, of course).

Jenn & I. We caught the bouquets! The two Jen(n)'s caught the bouquets!!

Me & Jared with the happy bride.

So we arrived home on Friday, July 30th, and other than helping Amy and Patrick celebrate their wedding day on July 31st, ate our way through Eastern MA, while taking time to catch up with family (Jared's parents and brothers, and my Aunt, Uncle, and cousins in Wellesley, and conveniently my Grandma Weske from Florida came to Wellesley for a visit while we were home too!) and friends.

And after catching up with family and friends, our second objective while we're home is always to get our fill of American food that we can't get in Dubai. On the way home from the airport our first stop was the delicious dirty Chinese food Ming Dynasty in the South Shore for a PooPoo Platter and crab rangoons. Throughout the rest of the week we made sure to get our fill of American beef, buffalo wings, and nachos. Yum. It's no wonder I gained 5 pounds while I was home. Oops.

Since the weather was so nice, we spent the majority of our time in the South Shore and beaching it in Duxbury. By the end of the week, while enthusiastic that we had had virtually perfect weather for the whole of our holiday, I was worried that I wouldn't see any rain. Since I haven't seen any precipitation in 8 months, I was going to be really disappointed if I came back to Dubai without seeing any rain. I mean I was in London for 8 days for crying out loud, with no rain! I got lucky with a little shower on the Thursday afternoon before I came back, and my visit was complete. I love New England in the summer, so it was with more than a little heartache that I boarded that plane on August 8th to come 'home' to Dubai. Oh well, until Christmas...

PARIS!

Well, despite how long it has taken me to post, we had a fabulous time in Paris! It was my third time visiting, but like London, I hadn't been back in seven years (it seems the heyday of my travels occurred while in college, and then law school really cramped my ability to travel, while also taking all my money to do so)...

So we took our very expensive train ride from London to Paris (via Chunnel) on Monday, July 26th, and then proceeded to spend 4 days eating and drinking our way through the city, with lots of walking and 'tourist' activities in between. We didn't really have an agenda (other than a few restaurant reservations Jared had made in advance, upon extensive research, only the best, you know), and so we mostly wandered around and tried to hit some of the highlights in between.


The Arc de Triomphe

After checking into our hotel on Monday afternoon (the Hotel Therese, 3 minutes from the Lourve) we decided to explore, and began by walking around the Louvre and into the des Tuileries. On both of my previous trips to Paris, I was traveling with other people who were kind of making the calls on what we were seeing and when (my first trip to Paris was Spring Break during my sophomore year of college, when I was traveling with an acquaintance who spoke French [I do not] and so I felt like I kind of needed to stick with her, even though she was an art major dragging me around to various obscure museums, and my second trip was with my Aunt and Uncle the summer I lived in London, and I wanted to stick with them because they were nice enough to take me with them). So, this was truly my first time in Paris, completely on my own terms, and able to see and do what I wanted, when I wanted (Jared is quite accommodating in that way).

So, having never gotten to just meander through the des Tuileries before, we had a lovely time ambling through and continued all the way down the Champs Elysees to the Arc de Triomphe. Perfect beautiful weather; a great afternoon. And, of course, we had to go to the top...

View of the Champs Elysees from the top of the Arc de Triomphe.

View from the top up to Montmartre and Sacre Coeur.

The Tour Eiffel from Trocadero.

And after taking in the views from the Arc de Triomphe, we decided we'd continue on to the Eiffel Tower, and get a glimpse of all the major sights on our first day. And after relaxing in the Parc du Champ de Mars under the Eiffel Tower for awhile, we went on a long walk down Boulevard Grenelle in search of cheese and wine for dinner, only to discover that the place Jared wanted to go was closed. So we took the metro back to our hotel to make a plan for dinner.

Since we had dinner reservations for the following three nights to do big prix fixe menus, we wanted a low-key night, and to get our first taste of what we came to France for in the first place: cheese, bread, and wine (and pork and chocolate, of course). So we asked the hotel concierge for a recommendation on a good place to procure provisions in the neighborhood. He sent us around the corner to the Monoprix, and we were pleasantly surprised, as we bought a feast of 3 kinds of cheese, prosciutto, 2 bottles of wine (Bordeaux, as the concierge insisted that drinking Cote du Rhone, which Jared had mentioned, was low-brow), crackers, bread, and RILLETTES (pulled pork spread, which looks nasty [kind of like a pate] but tastes like a delicious mix of turkey gravy and pulled pork and is strangely addictive). So we had a picnic on the bed in our room, and then passed out in a wine, cheese, and pork induced haze. A fitting conclusion to our first night in Paris.

Picnicking & Galleries Lafayette

Lovely mini-park up from the des Tuileries and the Louvre where we had a picnic lunch, and which was surprisingly tourist-free.

We slept in a bit on Tuesday, 7/27, and then enjoyed a nice (free!) breakfast of fresh juice, pain au chocolat, croissants, and ham and cheese baguettes at the hotel. And after we took a leisurely walk to the Musee d'Orsay, a museum built in a converted train station that I had always wanted to go to in Paris, but had never gone before. It has a huge Impressionist collection with tons of Monet's, Renoir's, Pissaro's, and whole room of Van Gogh's. I loved it, although maybe didn't spend quite as much time as I would have liked because we left so that Jared could have a phone interview. We walked back to the hotel to pick up our picnic food from the previous night, and then headed to the lovely park above, where I enjoyed more cheese, bread, ham, and rillettes for lunch, while Jared had his phone call.

View to the Louvre and its iconic glass pyramid (designed by I.M. Pei, who also designed the Islamic Art Museum in Doha that we visited in April. It seems I am making my rounds to his masterpieces this year) from the park where we had our lunch.

Then after lunch we decided to continue exploring the city by walking and headed up to Boulevard Haussmann to the Galleries Lafayette where my Aunt had told me we could get a great (free!) view of the city from the 7th floor observation deck. So we walked into the store which was bustling with tourists and promptly headed to the escalators and kept going up and up, and noticed that the higher we went in the store, the less tourists there were. By the time we reached the top, it was basically empty, but the views were breathtaking...

Jared on the Galleries Lafayette roof.

Self-take from the Galleries Lafayette.

Spices and seasoned salts in the Gourmet Food Hall.

Then after we had taken in the views from the roof, we explored the store a bit, and as can be expected, found the Gourmet Food Hall the most interesting...

Around Paris

DUCK in the Gourmet Food Hall, with their heads still on. Washing and removing the giblets from a raw 20 lb. turkey is one thing, but decapitating a duck is beyond the scope of what I am willing to do in the kitchen to enjoy poultry.

The ultimate pork treat: sausage stuffed with ham, and wrapped in bacon. It's like the all-pig version of turducken. It was hard to walk away from this without buying it.

Then after we tired of oogling, we continued walking down Boulevard Haussmann, and made our way to the La Madeleine Church, which is designed like a Greek Temple and reminds me of the Parthenon. From the church there is a terrific view down to the Place de la Concorde.

Place de la Concorde from La Madeleine.

After checking out the inside of the church (not as pretty as the outside), we headed back to the hotel to relax a bit before our first big dinner out. Jared had done extensive research on where we should eat in Paris, since it is one of the top foodie locations in the world. In his research, Jared came upon a movement called "Bistronomy" in which classically trained French chefs who have experience working at big-name restaurants, are setting out on their own classic bistros "that seek to bring an eating experience rivaling or even surpassing the classic gastronomic restaurants on a vastly more moderate budget by stripping away some of the more expensive extras normally associated with these restaurants and more or less only focusing on the food." (quoting from www.thecheapgourmand.com for accuracy). So, read, delicious gourmet food, in a bistro atmosphere.

So, for night 1 of our Bistronomy tour of Paris we headed to a new restaurant called "L'Agrume."
L'Agrume is a tiny little restaurant south of the Latin Quarter, near Jardin des Plantes. It only has about 10 tables, and the kitchen is open so you can see the chef Franck Marchesi-Grandi and his 1 helper working away in the kitchen (his wife is the waitress). And since we can't read the French menu anyway, we ordered the 5-course prix fixe, which turned out to be tied for my favorite meal of the week. Everything was made with the freshest ingredients, and it was a light summery menu, which I loved. We started with a gazpacho with a variety of fresh tomatoes and basil. Our second course was a smoked eel and beet salad with foie gras cream dressing (which, I surprisingly really enjoyed, despite my previous aversion to eel), followed by a prawn and white bean/legume soup with dill. Our main was a poached white fish with lemon in an herb butter with leek (or fennel, not sure which). And for dessert there was Vanilla panna cotta with strawberry coulis and cocoa covered chocolate mousse in a mint flavored sauce. We enjoyed a nice bottle of Bordeaux with dinner, and I was just really impressed with the high quality of the food, and that the progression of the meal flowed perfectly. A delicious way to end our second day (all of our dinner bookings were for 9pm, so it really was the end of the day). Yum.

The Opera House, just a few blocks up from our hotel.

On Wednesday, 7/28, we enjoyed breakfast at the hotel again, before deciding that it was finally time to face the crowds and go to the Musee du Louvre. I had been before, but I figured Jared's first trip to Paris would not be complete if he did not at least see the Louvre. It took 30 minutes to get through the line to even get to the metal detector to get in the door, and once we were in, Jared quickly tired of the crowds, so we only lasted about 2 hours (you could spend days in the Louvre). We hit up all the prerequisites like the Mona Lisa (Jared was far from impressed), but the highlight for us was the Napoleon Apartments...

Dining Room in the Napoleon Apartments. Just in case you wanted to host an intimate dinner with 30 of your closest friends... This is probably the biggest dining table I have ever seen.

Les Halles and Notre Dame

Beautiful Garden above Les Halles.

And after we got sick of fighting the crowds at the Louvre, we continued our personal walking tour of the city. We passed these beautiful gardens above Les Halles. Wandering around and stumbling on unexpected beauty is my favorite part of traveling.

Another view of the Forum les Halles.

By now we were getting hungry for lunch, so grabbed fromage and jambon crepes. I couldn't let a visit to Paris end without getting a street crepe. Delicious. And then we headed to the Ile de la Cite to see Notre Dame. A lovely walk along the river and we were there.

Notre Dame Facade.

My artsy shot from below.

Another attempt at being artsy from the side.

More Notre Dame

GARGOYLES! (not only descriptive, but a Wife Swap reference, for those who are fanatics, like my boyfriend)

The backside, and famed 'flying buttresses'.

After walking the entire perimeter, we continued our walk along the River Seine, and came across even more pretty sights.

A random pretty street. So Parisian, with balconies and window shutters.

After we tired of walking, we headed back to the hotel to rest up before Night 2 of our Bistonomy tour de Paris. Our restaurant of choice was Chez L'Ami Jean, located between the Eiffel Tower and Invalides. The chef, Jared later informed me, is from the Basque region of France (the mountains between Spain and France), and the food was pretty heavy "man's man" food, which, although I enjoyed, was a little bit heavier than I would have liked, after the light summery menu of the day before. Also, every single savory course (4 of them! excluding dessert) contained pork. I definitely think I made the most of my time outside a Muslim country... We ordered the 7-course prix fixe (again, easier when you can't read the menu). Our first course was a seafood chowder with crispy bacon bits. Next came two different white fish courses (I didn't take notes on this meal since it I didn't fancy it as much), so the details escape me now, but I know that they both had a big ole piece of bacon on top. And the main course was a giant pork medallion. Nothing green came with this meal, and really a minimal amount of starch. It might have actually worked well for someone on the Adkin's Diet... Good quality food, cooked to perfection, but a bit heavy. An American man sitting next to us with his 8 year old daughter ordered a beef dish and ended up with a 5 pound rare roast for he and his daughter to share, if that gives you any idea. For dessert we had rice pudding (in a big bowl, enough for probably 8 people to share) and a couple other little parfaits that I wasn't too excited about. Jared loved this meal. It was his favorite of the week. Once again we stumbled back to our hotel in a food and wine induced coma and passed out.

On Thursday, 7/29, we woke up for our last full day in Paris. The one other major 'touristy' thing that I wanted to do was go up the Eiffel Tour. We had seen the Tower a number of times, but going up it is something that I always wanted to do, and something I always wanted to do with Jared (how romantic). So after our yummy hotel breakfast, we walked to the Tour Eiffel. Well, my romantic notions soon dissipated as we got into the line of hundreds of people snaking around the base of the tower. The round trip took 3 and a half hours, and after Jared had a run-in with Austrian tourists who seemed to be cutting the queue, all romanticism went out the window. Fantastic views though...

Jared with the Tower.

On the way up, another attempt at being artsy.

Tour de la Eiffel and Last Day...

View from the top toward the Champs Elysees and Arc de Triomphe.

View toward the Louvre and des Tuileries.

Self-take at the top. Somehow we were still smiling despite the long wait. I think we were just glad we made it to the 'sommet'.

Another picnic, underneath the Tour Eiffel.

So, by the time we finished our 3.5 hour extravaganza up the Eiffel Tower, we were quite famished. So, we headed back to the gourmet cheese shop off Boulevard Grenelle that was closed earlier in the week, to buy a picnic lunch to enjoy in the Parc du Champ de Mars. So, two types of cheese and a baguette and we plopped ourselves at the foot of the Eiffel Tower and had lunch. Just lovely.

After we filled our bellies, we decided to meander back toward the hotel, but try a different route along the Seine on the Left Bank. In the process I was hoping to find Julia Child's apartment when she lived in Paris in the late 1940's and early 1950's. Having read her autobiography a couple months ago, I remembered the street name, "Rue de L'Universite," which Julia and her husband Paul nicknamed "Roo de Loo." I didn't remember the number though, so Jared handily looked it up on the blackberry and off we went down Rue de L'Universite. Well, Rue de L'Universite is a very long street, and the odd and even numbers don't match up, so we missed it the first time, but finally, found it...

81 Rue de L'Universite, Julia Child's apartment in Paris.

Roo de Loo.

Self-take at the Place de la Concorde.

So after my Julia Child photo-ops, we continued our walk through the Place de la Corcorde and back to the hotel for another rest before dinner. For Night 3 of our Bistronomy tour we had reservations at Le Chateaubriand for another prix fixe dinner. After our Basque feast of the night before, I really didn't think I could stomach another 7-course meal (and certainly my waist-line couldn't with a dress to fit into for a wedding to attend in 2 days). So, I convinced Jared that instead of another prix fixe, we should get some traditional French steak frites for dinner. Afterall, steak and frites are probably my favorite meal in the world, and at the rate we were going with prix fixes, it didn't seem that would be on the menu, rather white fish and pork, pork, and more pork. So Jared did some quick research and found a "best of" steak frites in Paris list, and we made a booking for Charbon Rouge near the FDR Stop off the Champs. That was more what I had in mind... Crab cakes with guacamole to start, a delicious filet grilled to perfect with Bearnaise sauce, and homemade frites. It tied with L'Agrume for my favorite meal in Paris! Then a walk down the Champs Elysees after dinner, and our last night in Paris was perfection.

Then we woke up bright and early on Friday, 7/30, for a quick 25 minute run through the des Tuileries, before a last breakfast at the hotel, and packing up to go to the airport. Leaving Paris was bittersweet, as we had such a lovely time, but I was super excited to go home. Oh well, as Jared said best, we will definitely be back to Paris!