Some Fun Sites in Dubai

Hi, everyone!

My trip is winding down and soon I will be back in good old Portland, Maine.  I took some time to see a few special sights in Dubai.  Enjoy these fun pictures!

First up is the indoor skiing facility.  Here I am, in the middle of the desert where it can get as hot as 110 degrees very often, and there are families skiing on artificial snow!  Truly amazing.  There appears to be some sledding / luge tracks as well.

I stopped by a toy store where there was this Lego Star Wars Clone trooper display.  I'm guessing that this guy is made up of THOUSANDS of Lego pieces!

At the conference I am attending, they had a camel outside for us to meet...and even ride:

Wheeeeeee!!!!  It was a little odd to jump on, because the camel goes down on its front legs first.  It felt like I was going to fall off!

This is my last post on this blog.  I will be back next week and can tell you all more about my trip!  And you'll get to ask me any questions you have about flying, Australia and Dubai!

Bye for now!


Ryan

Burj Khalifa: Tallest Building in the World!

Hello, all you fabulous students of Ms. Healey's 1st Grade!

Hope you are having a wonderful week!  I have been busy working in Dubai, a large city in the country of the United Arab Emirates.  This city has grown a lot in a short period of time.  Since this area is mainly desert, the city planners have ample space to build.  This means that the streets are very wide, with large brick sidewalks and huge plazas outside most buildings.

There is a LOT of construction going on!  There are cranes and heavy equipment all over the place:

That building in the distance is the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world!  On a walk, I decided to take a look.

It is 163 floors high, plus it has a large spire at the top, full of communication antennas and equipment.  The tower is 830 meters high: that's more than double the height of the Empire State Building in New York City!

I was very happy to be seeing this amazing building!

Later on in the evening, I took an elevator ride up to the 148th floor observation deck.  Actually, it was two elevator rides; in total, the tower is served by fifty-seven elevators!

This picture is from the open-air observation deck.  I could hear and feel the wind up there.  I could also feel the slight swaying of the building; the upper levels can sway up to 1/2 a meter in high wind conditions.  But it's all perfectly safe, as the building was designed to accommodate this movement.

Looking down on the city of Dubai.

And there it is, lit up beautifully at night!

Hope you are all doing well; be back in Maine soon!


Ryan

Videos

Hello, Ms. Healey's class!

This is where I will be posting videos from my trip:

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9rb93eDLBef1kOl7pt89CvryM-hfKLpu

Check them out if you can!


Ryan

Farewell to Brisbane

On my final night in Brisbane, I happened to catch this beautiful little monument in between rain showers.  The glow of the lights was soothing and magical.  The monument was dedicated to a former mayor of the city of Brisbane.

My final night in the city, I was lucky enough to stay at one of the tower hotels downtown.  This was the view from my apartment on the 44th floor.

And, just as I was getting to my plane at the airport, I nabbed this shot looking back at the city.  The sky is so big here and the clouds danced with the light of the sun.  Brisbane is a wonderful place.

Lovely food in Australia!

Hello again, Ms. Healey's 1st Grad!

I have been lucky enough on my trip to sample a lot of different foods.  I would like to share some of the highlights to my dining experience here "down under."

First up is breakfast.  This muffin was...interesting.  When I was ordering my morning cup of coffee, I asked for something to snack on, like a muffin.  The cashier asked if I wanted "sweet" or "savory."  I chose savory and was welcomed with a chickpea-artichoke-vegemite concoction!  It filled my belly, but it tasted a little odd for me.

Luckily, the next day I was able to score a DELICIOUS almond croissant at a lovely little bakery.  It was most, flavorful and a wonderful treat!

I decided to have a fancy meal one evening, after nights of grabbing simple munchies.  I went a upscale Japanese restaurant.  I sat at the chef's counter, where I could see the crew preparing all of the dishes being served:

Whenever the wait staff would walk by the kitchen, they would yell a Japanese phrase (not sure what it was).  Then, the kitchen crew would all yell back a loud reply!  It was fun to see them celebrating the food they were serving.

I began my meal with this seaweed salad.  It was amazingly fresh and had three different types of seaweed in it.  The dark green weed was very salty and tasted like the ocean.  The lighter green was light in flavor and sort of gummy.  The red/purple was sweet and my favorite.  The sauces and seeds made this my favorite salad ever.

I then had an appetizer, Sashimi Tacos.  Hard to see in this photo, but those are two tiny little taco shells filled with fish.  Sashimi is a type of sushi where raw fish is sliced thin and serve without cooking.  These were quite tasty and had a flavorful salsa on top.  The two glasses are filled with sake, a traditional Japanese wine that is made from rice.  The edge of each glass was lined with sugar!

And here is my main meal: FUTOMAKI ROLLS!  Sushi is often served rolled up with rice and seaweed paper.  The center of these are filled with: tuna, prawn (shrimp), avocado, cucumber, pickled ginger, shiitake mushrooms, tamago (a spongy, sweet egg substance) and eel.  Each bite was like a completely different meal!  Each roll was at least 4 inches in diameter, so I really stuffed myself!  My waiter was impressed - he said the he had never seen a customer eat the whole futomaki plate!  I sure was hungry!

Lastly, before I left Brisbane and head to Dubai, I had a quick meal:

The sandwich was full of vegetables: beets, spinach, zucchini.  The salad was full of chickpeas and pumpkin.  Pumpkin is a very popular food here in Australia, though it refers to more than just the ones we carve out at Halloween.  It also refers to most squashes.  The people of Australia love to grill up pumpkin during barbecues.

Hope you are all doing well and enjoying being back at school.  I will send more photos soon!


Ryan

A Walk Through Brisbane

Hello, SuperKids of Ms. Healey's 1st Grade!

I've been quite busy while in Australia, going to meetings and getting my work done.  I haven't had a reliable internet connection, so I am now finally getting to share the photos from my trip.  I went on a nice walk across the city of Brisbane in Queensland, Australia so I thought I would share with you what I saw.

 As I first started walking, I noticed this beautiful old-fashioned car.  It was built by Riley Motor Company and was most likely built in the 1930s.  That means it is about 75 years old!  It looked really stylish to me and I wished I could have seen it driving around.

 This is not a great picture, but I was trying to capture a common sight around Australia.  Rather than regular pickup trucks like we have in the USA, many Australians have these flatbed trucks for hauling and doing work.  I imagine it makes easier to haul wide cargo and is possibly easier to load.

 

These three pictures show some clever outdoor fitness equipment.  They're kind of like a playgroudn for adults!  The first machine uses your body weight to help you work out your chest and shoulder muscles.  The second photo is for doing dips to work your arms.  And the final one is for hooking in your legs and doing situps, I think.  Even though it was raining, I gave them all a go!  I like how each machine is curvy; they almost look like sculptures to me!

I grabbed this photo to show you guys an example of what many houses look like in Australia.  Most homes are only one story high.  People tend to keep a very neat and tidy lawn as well.  It is always very warm here in Queensland, so they don't need to worry about snow.  But they do have a major rain season: right now, in fact, as I am visiting!  There are two cyclones hitting the coast, which are bringing a risk of flooding in some areas.  A few times while I've been here, the sky has opened up and the rain has fallen so heavily.  By the end of this walk, I was soaked.

 

Here a a few photos of some of the playgrounds I saw on my walk along a public bicycle path.  some things are similar to playgrounds back home, but I noticed more rope-based climbing areas.  And, yes, I did take the time to climb on this!

Just before the end of my walk, I got to cross this nice little bridge across one the creeks in Brisbane.  As you can see, the bridge has pipes on the side for pumping across water and sewage.

I hope you are all doing well and that you had a fun February break.  Be seeing you soon!

Bags are Packed!

Hi, Ms Healey's 1st Grade class!

This is Isaiah's Dad, Ryan, letting you know that my bags are packed and I am headed out for my "Trip Around The World!"  I'll be taking pictures and videos while I travel and posting them here for you all to see!  Looking forward to seeing you all again in 2 weeks; I'll tell you all about my trip!

Next stop: Dubai, United Arab Emirates!


Ryan