Breakfast with Harry

We’d been warned about the baboons. In Pringle Bay, South Africa, the charming village where we shared a vacation villa with our good friends David and Della, there are signs on the road declaring, “Do Not Feed the Baboons!” At the Harold Porter Botanical Gardens in nearby Betty’s Bay, where we had a lovely hike, there were more specific instructions, “If approached by a baboon do not stare or smile at them!” Ok. No smiling, no staring. No problem.

I didn’t imagine I’d need to put these directives into practice. Stan and I had finished a walk on the rugged coastline when he dropped me at Simply Coffee for a cappuccino. I was sitting in their quaint courtyard enjoying my coffee over a copy of Cape Wine. Surprisingly, I looked up to see a very large baboon sauntering towards me. Panic. No, don’t panic, simply no staring, no smiling and the baboon will bugger off. I looked down pretending not to notice the hairy primate getting closer. It wasn’t working. I could see him out of the corner of my eye galloping at me on all fours. He had his eye on my coffee!

I jumped up, ran into the coffee shop and squealed. The owner (a tall South African male nearly as hairy as the baboon) ran out into the courtyard, yelling at the creature. I followed and could see the baboon sitting on top of the table where I had been relaxing, pawing the foam in my cappuccino! Then, gasp; I noticed I had left my camera sitting right next to the coffee he was pawing! “My camera!” I peeped.

The coffee shop owner continued to bellow and stomp and ran rather bravely right at the scary baboon. I’ll call him Harry, since we’ve now shared a coffee. Apparently the South African didn’t buy into the “no staring” rule. Looking only slightly annoyed, Harry, using his opposable thumbs, grabbed the container holding all of the little sugar packets, jumped onto the courtyard wall, then onto the corrugated tin roof. The angry owner (guess he buys a lot of sugar), still screaming and staring, but definitely not smiling was pounding the roof, Harry was jumping and quite a racket ensued. I was just happy my camera and my life had been spared!

This ruckus carried on for what seemed like forever. The coffee guy chased the baboon around like something out of a Three Stooges film. Finally (whew) Harry scampered onto the roof of an adjacent building and ran off to OD on sugar. The irritated coffee guy grabbed his ladder and climbed up onto the roof to retrieve his empty sugar container. My God. That was definitely a bit more excitement than I required first thing in the morning.

Apparently I had met the “Mayor of Pringle Bay,” a male baboon who travels alone. He knows women are afraid of him; therefore he is not afraid of women. People women that is. I was told he would have jumped right up on my table, stared me in the face, and swiped the sugar even if I had bravely sat there and smiled at him. Theoretically, he wouldn’t have attacked me but who’s gonna wait around to test that theory?

I politely thanked the brave coffee guy for saving me, asked for fresh cappuccino and resumed reading my wine magazine, feeling a bit more like Meryl Streep’s character in Out of Africa, then a little ole gal from Iowa.

Lynne's Dubai Indoctrination

My friend Lynne (we call her bad Lynne) came for a whirlwind visit to Dubai. She was on her way to Cairo, then bravely trudging into rural Egypt to volunteer on an international Habitat for Humanity project. Well, her do-gooder self needed to be tempered with at least a brief taste of decadence, so I did my best to show her the “true” Dubai.

It all started with a night in our majlis, which is our inner courtyard. Traditionally "majlis" is a term for a room in a private home used to entertain family and guests. Probably, there would have been a separate majlis for the men, and another for the women. Perhaps the men would gather and smoke shisa and the women would gather and talk about the men? If you come to visit Stan and I here in the desert, we will greet you in our majlis. You’ll likely be buzzing from the lights of the Dubai International Airport, so we’ll bring you down gently, allowing you to sleep off your jet lag. I always pick up some mezze (hummus, vine leaves, olives) from the local deli; we have some wine and enjoy a night under the stars.

Thankfully Lynne slept well, not sure what to credit that to (??) so we were off the next morning to check out the Dubai Mall – it is the world's biggest you know! But who knew Lynne has such a designer fetish? By a stroke of good luck (??) we found ourselves parked next to “Fashion Alley,” so when we emerged from the car park we were blinded by serious bling. Giorgio Armani, Chanel, Dolce & Gabbana, Manolo Blahnik (who we much preferred to Jimmy Cho) you name it and the fashion house is represented in the Dubai Mall. And we browsed nearly every one of them. Chanel won the Friendliest Staff Award (they must be SO BORED) with Tom Ford following a close second. We came out of T. Ford narrowly escaping the purchase of a salmon-colored silk blazer for Stan and smelling like musty leather. The French-Canadian waiting on us was tres généreux with spritzes of Tom’s fragrance line.

Day three lead us to the only mosque in Dubai officially open to non-Muslims. Four days a week at 10:00AM, the Jumeriah Mosque opens it's doors for the Open Minds Open Mosque program. This is where we listened to a British volunteer (pictured above modeling one local style of dress) from the Sheikh Mohammed Center for Cultural Understanding, which sponsors the Open Minds program give her take on Islam in the UAE. She intimated that she is married to an Emirati, and since she had an Arabic name (but an accent reminiscent of Eliza Doolittle pre Henry Higgins) and was white, we assumed she had converted to Islam when she married. That's a lot of assuming on our part, I know. Here's a taste of what she shared with us:

• Adam and Eve turned up in Saudi Arabia 40 years after being ousted from the Garden of Eden. The Kaaba, at the center of Mecca, marks this spot today.
• The women here actually like to wear the black covering (called an abaya in the UAE) over a full set of clothing, often jeans and a long sleeve shirt for modesty, even in the summer heat, because it actually makes them feel cooler. Yep. It’s true. They like the little shadow they make for themselves.
• Women in the UAE cover their faces because it is a throw back to the Bedouin days when they did so to protect themselves from the sun and the sand. You see, it’s really about beauty.
• We all have an angel sitting on our left shoulder recording our bad deeds. And another on our right shoulder keeping track of our good deeds.
• If you die on a Friday, or during the holy month of Ramadan, you get the express train to heaven.
• Islam recognizes all the other “religions of The Book,” however Islam is the most recent edition because Mohammed declared himself the last prophet of God.
• Non-Muslims aren’t allowed to enter other mosques in Dubai simply as a matter of practicality. We might not know the rules. For example, I might walk in with my shoes on followed by someone who would then have to say their prayers, nose to carpet, where I had walked.
• Women aren’t required to go to the mosque to pray because they have more duties than men. It is a convenience for us gals. We are the lucky ones, we can pray in the prayer rooms in the malls, which are rumored to be larger than the entire women’s section of the UAE’s largest mosques!
• Women are expected to pray in a separate room at the rear of the mosque, or behind the men if they DO venture to the mosque at prayer time. This is simply because if I were to stand next to a man saying his prayers, my stunning beauty might shine out from under my abaya and the poor devotee would never be able to concentrate on God.

Lynne commented, with Left-Shoulder Angel taking note, “That woman sure drank the Kool-Aid.”

Peachy Keen

The Donut Peach
Is there a more beautiful expression of nature?


One of the truths of life in Dubai is the lack of seasonality. We do have incredible diversity here when it comes to nationalities, languages, and cuisines, but not when it comes to the seasons. The seasons alternate between hellishly hot and humid and just plain hot. I suppose it could be worse, but how do you define seasonal in a place with no growing season and essentially no seasons?

Unfortunately, this limitation carries over to the fruit and vegetable selection. Because nothing much is grown here for obvious reasons -- the biggest two being sand and the lack of rain (the average monthly rainfall is measured in millimeters!) -- our grocery stores are stocked with imported produce. Sure, we have an abundant supply of tropical fruits like pineapples, mangos, mangosteens, lychees and the funky rambutans year round, but there is no such thing as fresh local asparagus in the spring or (SOB) peaches and cream corn mid-summer. Spring as we know it in the US doesn’t exist, and dates are the only local crops not grown in a sandy hot house. The dates here do have a growing season and they are very delicious, but if you know me, you know I’m into my seasonal, local and whenever possible, organic produce, and only the Bedouin’s seem able to subsist on a diet exclusively made up of dates.

Although there are a few things (besides dates) grown here, you wouldn’t call them seasonal. They’re force-grown in artificial conditions. The local tomatoes are mostly pink and hard year round. The ever-present cucumbers aren’t bad, but what do you suppose they feed them to get them to grow in the sand? To fill in the gaps, we get shipments from the US throughout the year, and winter produce from the southern hemisphere in the summer. See what I mean? It all becomes very confusing. So I try to restrict my seasonal produce to what is somewhat regional, and avoid the countries known to export poison-laced food, like China.

On a recent shopping trip to Carrefour, the French version of Wal-Mart, the gorgeous little donut peaches from Tunisia tempted me. They didn’t claim to be organic, strike one. But Tunisia is in Africa and that’s relatively close to Dubai. And they sure as hell are seasonal; I’ve NEVER seen a beautiful petit donut peach in the dead of winter. “Mon Dieu! I can buy them! This will be such a treat!” I’m imagining the juicy white flesh, the perfume-y aroma, and the delicate floral taste of the little gems I used to buy at the farmer’s market in KC.

I bought several and took them home. After a few days on the kitchen counter they were ripe. Another day in the fridge and they were ready to eat. The anticipation was killing me. Would they be everything I remembered? Would I be able to forgive myself for buying something no bigger than your fist with a carbon footprint the size of Texas? Did slave laborers earning a few pennies a day pick them?

Oh for God’s sake, quit worrying about it all and just eat the thing. I gave one good sniff. Ummmm, the bouquet’s there. I peeled away the beautifully blushed skin with all the pesticides and sunk my teeth into the flesh. Mon Dieu indeed. All the softness, the ripeness, and nectar played on my palate, just like I imagined it would. I even tasted a bit of oak around the pit and thought of a good brut Champagne. I ate two. Organic? Who cares? Local? Not exactly. Seasonal? You bet. Mother Nature knows how to keep a good thing sacred. How can anything, ANYTHING taste so good?

Jet Lag is a Scary Thing

And not for the faint-hearted. Yes, this is me the morning after a nearly thirteen hour nonstop flight from New York to Dubai. I've since recovered.

The Uprising was Quelled Without Incident

A slice of Dubai life - A day at the races.

Known as the World’s Richest Horse Race (and Dubai’s biggest party), The Dubai World Cup gives the ruling royals a chance to display their very expensive horses and fabulous wealth. This day at the races is also an excuse for ex-pats to get dressed up, drink too much champagne, and see and be seen at the horse track. In keeping with the spirit I stuck a pink fluffy thing in my hair, donned a little black dress, drank a bit of champagne and traipsed around the race grounds with my friends. It’s always fun to see everyone dressed to the nines.

Following the obligatory pre-race champagne brunch, we attended the big show with our British friends David and Della. Our American friend Kathy - well connected in the Dubai horse racing community - came through with tickets to the grandstand. Woo-Hoo! We were treated to a full international buffet complete with sushi, stir-fries made-to-order and wine and drink delivery service. This privileged perch meant we were actually able to watch the races, as opposed to what we’ve done in years past (and what most ex-pats still do) which is to wander around the various food and bar venues set up on the grounds outside the track without ever laying eyes on a horse. What a pageant we’ve been missing! It was truly a thrill to see these world-class horses run and we had fun with our own wagering on the side. No official betting at the track: gambling is un-Islamic. But then again so is drinking, but apparently it’s a more tolerable sin.

In typical Dubai fashion the event included a huge pyrotechnic display midway through the races that rivaled the Olympic opening ceremony. Another entertaining spectacle unfolded shortly thereafter. From our roost in the stands we could look down into a fenced-off area just next to the grandstand and adjacent to the track where those without tickets (mostly Indian and Pakistani laborers and young Arabs) were allowed in for free. From this enclosed area they could peer over a hedgerow next to the track for a glimpse of the racing action. But at one point during the festivities this group grew restless and made a break for the grandstand.

Here’s the scene: We were finishing up our dessert and coffee, somewhere after Race No. 7, when the jailbreak occurred. Some poor security guard (probably since deported) who was manning the stairs leading from the free area to the grandstand must have fallen asleep or left his post. All of a sudden a huge wave of smiling and very excited construction workers flooded up the stairs and into any of the vacant grandstand seats they could find. Now there are 50 or so guys sheepishly trying to blend in with the grandstand crowd, probably hoping for a bit of cake and coffee too. We were rooting for them. But alas the revolution was short-lived. A group of local “officials” in white dishdashas soon materialized and sent the unofficial crew packing. There were, however, two teen-aged boys who nearly got away with it. They survived the initial purge and I think they thought they were home free. Actually I thought so too. They were about to order beers, when DRAT! They too were plucked from the stands. So close. Such a short brush with the good life.

Give us Your Tired, Your Poor and Your Corrupt

Isn’t it refreshing to know that there is a safe, comfortable haven for political leaders or rebels in exile from their own country, to take refuge? You know, a place where they can enjoy a cigar, some fresh mango juice, or a round of golf?

The most recent celebrity politician alleged to be hiding behind their Ray bans in Dubai is Thaksin Shinawatra, the Thai telecom mogul who was Prime Minister of Thailand from 2001 to 2006. Since being deposed in a military coup, he’s said to be living in Dubai’s swanky Emirates Hills neighborhood, near our friends David and Della. He’s been seen playing golf at the Montgomerie Golf Club, and probably enjoys a nice life while the yellow shirts protest against him and close down airports in Bangkok.

I went with a friend recently, to the Thai consulate so she could apply for a tourist visa, and we asked if he could come out and play, to no avail.

Benazir Butto should have remained in Dubai. After being removed from the office of Prime Minister of Pakistan twice, under corruption charges, she lived in exile here. She and her children took yoga classes from a friend of mine at one of the local beach clubs. We all know what happened to her, two short months after returning to Pakistan in 2007. She had been in Dubai since 1998.

Idi Amin’s mother was said to have graced the coffee bars here. She probably lived in Jumeriah and belonged to the Expat-Women’s gardening club, although that rumor can neither be confirmed nor denied. I think Stan might have made that up.

But that’s all old news. The most recent high profile case involved another political figure living here, and another assassination. A prominent Chechen, Sulim Yamadayev, who opposed Chechnya’s Moscow-backed president Ramzan Kadyrov, was recently slain James Bond-like by a man with a golden gun wearing black gloves. Or so it was reported. The Russian-made pistol used to gun down the rebel leader was found discarded nearby. All of this took place in a parking garage in the Jumeriah Beach Residence towers, where I teach the way of the peaceful warrior. When I expressed concern for my safety, my pragmatist of a husband replied, “This was a professional hit, honey. I’m thinking they weren’t looking for Starbuck’s-yielding yoga teachers. You’ve been watching Soprano’s reruns again, haven’t you?” And that’s supposed to make me feel better?
Give us your tired, your not-so-poor, and your corrupt. We’ll give them a nice place to live. Wonder if George W. has considered Dubai?