Maasah al khayer

Good evening.  Did lots of practical, every day things today.  Drove to the grocery store to get stocked up at the house.  Dubai has lots of speed bumps with little warning before you hit them - even on major highways just before a traffic circle.  There are lots of traffic circles, some very big ones.  Some very scary ones!  

You see much of the British influence in their street systems.  There are very few left hand turns to be made.  Most four way intersections use a traffic circle OR you have to drive several blocks, get in the left land and do a turnabout at the designated spot, and go back to you destination.  So, you try to make your trips in a circle using right hand turns.  Which means you really have to know where you are going!  

Spent about 45 minutes just looking around at the non grocery items...everything from clothing to rugs, diapers to sports equipment, perfume to luggage.  Carrefour is sort of like a super sized Target, with a much larger grocery store.  Was fun to see some of their gadgets in several different departments.

Then I got serious with the shopping.  There are a lot of products from the US in the stores.  It's kind of funny - I have been to four different grocery stores now and each of them has a VERY small selection of Campbell's soups....I mean like 5-6 cans of Cream of Mushroom, 5-6 cans of Tomato, and 5-6 cans of Cream of Asparagus.  That's it!  I want to make cheesy potatoes for supper tomorrow so I ended up buying dried Cream of Chicken and will have to make it before I can use it.

I was probably shopping for 2 1/2 hours. 

I missed lunch so I ate some leftover apple crisp with ice cream and then Andy and I headed for

and

This was the first time we went to these stores on our own, so it was a bit of a challenge.  We navigated our way through, by, and around 5 or so major interstates in about 6-7 miles with the signs in Arabic and English.  The number of the highway isn't as important as the destination to the locals, so the road numbers are not often listed or are small.  So, it is difficult to read it all and comprehend just which way you want to go.  Somehow we got there safely, found the underground parking lot, and made our way through the mall.

As we were going down the escalator I noticed this painted camel...reminded me of the painted cows in Chicago a few years ago...

Now we have had some supper and I'm going to iron the clothes I washed yesterday and read a bit before going to bed.  

A-shuwfak bokra --- see you later.