Blech! Author in need of hug

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Far from seeing the delights of this booming city they call Dubai, your humble correspondent is spending each night in his hotel room, dining solely on room service, as he vainly attempts to fight a nasty stomach bug.

It seems I’m not the only one; one of my students on the course is suffering similarly and was absent for all of Day 2 and the first half of today. Five of my students haven’t been seen at all (rumour has it they too have fallen ill).

Listless, unable to concentrate for long periods and feeling like death warmed up in a bucket, I have done little sightseeing. Despite having listened to the interesting Virgin podcast on Dubai, the only place I have gone to is the ‘Mall of the Emirates’* where I too marvelled at the 1,000 ft ski slope, made with real snow, housed within a huge shopping mall here in this desert city.

I know that we Australians have shipped sand to the middle east before (I can’t remember what for, but apparently the quality of the sand we shipped over was finer than the sand available at its destination), but seeing children have snowball fights was surreal. Sorry, there was such a crowd watching that I couldn’t get close enough to take a photo to prove it.

Trust me, it’s there.

I’m not up to seeing any other sights at the moment… making me wish even less for the 23+ hour flight home in Cattle Class in three days time.

* “Mall of the Emirates is named The World’s Leading New Shopping Mall at World Travel Awards: The recently opened 6.5 million square feet retail and leisure resort houses retailing, entertainment, dining, recreation and 5-star accommodation plus the Middle East’s first ski indoor resort, Ski Dubai.

More than 400 retailers comprising the world’s largest collection of international brand names have signed up for the complex. It offers a wide selection of familiar and established UK high street names along with a vast range of global signature brands including Ralph Lauren, Paul Smith and Burberry’s.

Other familiar names include Debenham’s and Carrefour hypermarket.

For a more authentic experience however there is a traditionally-styled Arabian Souk offering an array of locally produced handicrafts.

All these stores are housed in a beautifully designed building with architecture derived from the Middle East and the Mediterranean. Inspired by the Victor Emmanuel Galleria in Milan, there is a magnificent glass dome roof, rising 42 metres above the ground spreading sunlight throughout the Italian-style piazza below.

There is also a 14-screen Cinestar complex and the Magic Planet entertainment centre offering indoor thrill rides and simulators.

Ski Dubai is the only indoor themed ski resort to be found in the desert that has real snow.”

Source: http://www.ameinfo.com/72039.html

My youngest daughter, a shopaholic, would love it. After 25 minutes of wandering around it trying to find fountain pens (the only shop I could find was Mont Blanc), I lost the will to live.