Sylvia's Journal

We are firmly into a holiday schedule of ‘late to bed’ and ‘late up.’ The day after tomorrow this will have to change back to early to bed and early rising. I can see why people like retirement – no need to be anywhere early.

Our medical tourism trip also turned out to be a gastronomy trip. We have hundreds of pictures to prove it, including this morning’s Arabic brunch with three kinds of goat cheese, olives, olive oil and a herb mixture with cumin, coriander, anise, sesame seeds, and black pepper, to roll the cheese in.

We checked out the beach across from the brunch place but found it too crowded for the steep entry fee and then made our way down to the faux-Venice area called Jumeira Madinat, where the small ferry boats called ‘abras’ replace the gondolas.

We discovered there was a theatre and bought tickets for the day’s show (When Harry met Sally). I thought it would be a Dubai adaptation but it was the real thing, pictures of New York as backdrop. If you’d seen the audience you wouldn’t have guessed you were deep in the Arab world. It could have been New York or London.

Sitting with his back to the faux canal and the color-changing Burj al Arab, Axel finally had his medium rare steak with a glass of Shiraz before we go back to mutton and pomegranate juice. It was one more thing we could scratch of his Dubai wish list before heading back home. There are a few more things left and all of them have to happen tomorrow: one more PT session for Axel, my wrist and knee stitches out, a visit to the nature reserve where the flamingoes are, and maybe one more Indian lunch (or dinner).

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We were able to talk to a real life person at Safi, finally, and changed our return ticket. Now we don’t have to rush the taking out of stitches on Saturday morning. Axel is also able to squeeze in one more PT session that way. We are taking the next flight to Kabul which departs a few hours after midnight on Sunday, to resume our lives in this other universe.

We returned to the textile district to find the Capital Gen. Trading store open. The place is all ribbons and threads and buttons and bows, revealing the secret of how the bejeweled and fancy Indian clothes are made. It made me wish for an atelier with a thousand little boxes, drawers and spools to fill with the notions that were stacked up in the shop. I tried to anticipate what I might possible need when back in Kabul and fashioning clothes out of the fabrics I am bringing back.

The artist in Axel reveled in the colors, textures and patterns of the ribbons for sale. While I was selecting buttons and bands he clicked away. I think this will become a new card series.

We had a lovely vegetarian thali lunch in a restaurant where multiple stainless steel dishes and goblets were already arranged on the tables, waiting for customers so that the filling could begin. An army of wait staff attended to us, constantly filling the dishes with more dhal, curried potatoes, yoghurt curry, cauliflower, sweet carrots, puris, naan, chapattis, green sauce, red sauce, slices of something made of pulses, deep fried balls of something else, and refilling our lhassi goblets.

We looked left and right at other eaters to learn that we had to say ‘no’ when waiters ladled more stuff in the half empty dishes. We finally got the hang of saying ‘no’ more assertively but by then the damage was done. Stuffed and sleepy we left the premises in search of a strong cup of coffee to revive us.

We explored the adjacent restored Bastakiya section of town, named after Basta in Iran from which its original inhabitants hailed. It is now a beautiful but somewhat lifeless reproduction of its earlier self that, nevertheless, contained some unexpected treasures. One of them was a gallery annex hotel with a series of moving exhibits about lost homes, homelessness (from Iran) and the juxtaposition of piercing eyes with mouths that cannot speak. It was a contemplative place, the quietness only interrupted by the polyphonous call to prayer finding us defenseless in the shaded courtyard.

For dinner we joined a cast of thousands enjoying dinner, shisha, coffee and tea by the side of the Creek on the Shindagha heritage site. It’s a different pace of life where children don’t have to go to bed at 7 PM; on the contrary, many happily participated in an open air kids show when we got there at 9:30 PM

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