28 hours into the longest trip of my life...

Hi guys, so I made it to Dubai! Our flight was cut into two parts, a 14 hour beast from DC to Dubai, after which we were supposed to check into a hotel, check our email, find the itinerary for our next flight the following day for Kabul. Well when my boss and I got into the hotel at 10pm, his email couldnt open the itinerary and we decided to get some dinner and check it in the morning, since the flights usually leave around noon. Well, dinner turned into smoky kareoke bar till 3 am, after which we were able to open the itinerary and realize that our flight was scheduled to leave at 3:30. oops.

No one is quite sure why we couldn't have received our itinerary before we left DC, or why 3:30 is considered a decent hour to fly folks to Kabul, but we are now rebooked on tomorrow's 3:30 flight and that means I have an additional day to play around in Dubai.

Last night was pretty absurd. I have never seen a city without a single car older than a 2007 model, let alone the sheer number of Hummers, Land Rovers, BMWs, Jaguars, and Porches. Gag. I found it poetically ironic that a citystate with such upscale tastes in cars did not also extend that snobery to their food. Let me list you the restaurants I passed last night: McDonalds, KFC, TGI Fridays, Chiles, Popeyes and Haagen Daz. Gag 2.0

That said, my breakfast buffet today was ridiculously delicious, if not particularly breakfast-y. There was cauliflower and leek gratin with pine nuts, little egg pizzas (circles of omlette with onions and peppers and melted cheese on top,) little fried things similar to a sopapilla served with a curried potato dish on top, and then a strange sort of ground meat with tomatoes and chili sauce, delish. Coffee was nestcafe-ish, but oh well. I am still looking forward to going back tomorrow. Oh wait, my flight leaves at 3:30 am. Have I mentioned that?

I am going to take a nap now, get some work done, maybe go to the beach for a minute just to say I did (and get in some last few drops of sun and warm before six weeks of Kabul-in-December weather)

Love yall,

Anna