We planned to visit the Al Ain Zoo together with Adam and his colleague, Zain with their families since it is National Day holiday over here in UAE. Everywhere we go, we see these cars decorated with spray paints, stickers (showing the UAE flag or the Sheik), etc...Even though the temperature here is probably almost the same as in Singapore, the sun is super duper peircing hot and so we needed to use this envelope we found in the car to shade us from the sun.
Somehow, the sky here is always beautiful and has many layers.. and always has this gradient of blue from white to light blue to sky blue... pretty!
Our meeting point is a petrol kiosk.. as Adam and friends are not here yet, we decided to take a break. Max had always wanted to buy a hatchback so tat he can sit at the backseat and have a picnic with his family and finally, his dream comes true! Hahahaha..
Once our friends arrived, we are on the way.. since there is nothing much to do in the car, we let Ace play around with the camera a little...
That's Adam and his family in their car... and these are some of the beautiful deserts that we drove past.. I even saw some camels! But too bad it was difficult to capture them on film..
These are some decorations of things we found in roundabouts. The roads here are planned very strangely, every now and then you come to a roundabout. And they go in 3 or 4 directions. And the roundabouts usually have some sort of decoration like you see above..See the beautiful flowers that are in full bloom? If you walk closer to it, you see pipes that release flowers once every few hours (because if not the flowers will die from dehydration) and the interesting thing is that flowers dun bloom forever.. so every few months, they dig out the flowers that wilt and replace them with NEW FLOWERS that are in full bloom ;)
Also, the roads here in Dubai are very deceiving... say you want to go somewhere on a left of your road and see a left turning, DUN MAKE THE TURN or you will definitely regret it.. somehow they cannot plan their roads in such a way that the road just makes a left or right turn like in Singapore. Instead, say you want to go somewhere on the left (in terms of direction), if you follow the signs, very often, you will be lead to turn RIGHT.. and then the road goes in one big round circle and eventually goes to the left side of the road... CONFUSING!
Finally, we reach the Al Ain Zoo!
At the start, it looked kind of sad... and we were all lost and didn't know what to do...
Adam had two children, Ben and Bern who are 8 and 5.. so after being in SOLITUDE for so long, Ace was really happy to see two other kids who are around his age.. he started following them around.. especialy Ben... and he was so happy to see them, suddenly, me and max seemed invisible to Ace.. he doenst listen to us and just wants to follow the other kids tightly... sigh...Anyway, the kids say that they wanted to take the train and so we went to the train station to wait for the train..
After a short wait, we are finally in the train! :)
These are some of the better shots I took while we were on the train.. the bird on the lower left is actually a vulture:)
The reptile house was really quite interesting as we got to see alot of the reptiles that were living in the desert area....
We found out tat GUI GUI's actual name is called an Indian Star Tortoise... and the tortoises here are so big they are as big or even bigger than my face!
Check out the hedgehog, the white pythons and more...
We saw some really big tortoises that are as big as a wheel of a bus! Gosh, how many thousand years must they be to be this big..... Anyway, we were looking at their fruits and veg buffet and guessing what foods they are eating..
Then it was time to to have lunch and we headed off to KFC.. which seems to be the only restaurant there.. however, we found out tat KFC does not sell fried chicken! It sells at best chicken nugget balls.. hahahahahaha.. and we found vegeterian burgers from Hardees (aka Carls's Junior Burger in SGP)... and it is the exact type of burger that Ace likes with cheese and veggie and tomato sauce....
Then while we adults chit chatted... ok, I mean while I chatted with Pauline, Adam's wife.. the children.. (including that botak one who is 1.75 metres tall), started to play games like hide and seek, climbing trees.. etc.. and so, UNCLE MAX became their favourite playmate now...
Anyway, even though Ace wanted to bring his backpack.. it eventually landed up at Max's back... check out the very unhappy face.. HAHAHA..
While the others went to toilet.. Max and Ace goofed around and tried to created like a new hairstyle for Ace..
And then, all of a sudden, the giraffe in the giraffe enclosure came really close to eat leaves.. it was a wonderful moment for all of us to be so close to a giraffe and you can see it sticking out its tongue to gather the leaves..
Check out the sexy giraffe ass!
Then we saw one of the sheltered walkways spraying out the mist and the children happily ran to play inside... and they really do need to spray the mist lor.. cos it was so bloody hot tat most of the animals were just lazing around... after a while, we all tak boleh tahan and decide to head home without exploring the whole 400 hectares of zoo.. which was mainly the same few animals repeated in different enclosures...
Then Max discovered a TIGER.. I mean CAT..hahahaha.. he told the children, "Look! A tiger..." And Ace went, "Chey! That's a cat!"
Bernice and Ace's fav game.. hanging on Max's arm.. so Max got a workout as well...
On our way back to the gate, we saw a few deers huddled together.. and one ODD one at the fence.. I was wondering wat the deer was doing and I realized tat there is space between those straws of hay... and so he was actually PEEPING at us... hahahaha.. maybe he thinks the visitors are the exhibits:)
The owl was sitting on the man in brown vest's arm.. NOT on the arabian's head.. hahaha ;)
Long ride home... Max also nearly fell asleep driving...
Then, Max made dinner while Ace practiced on his magic tricks that he bought from Global Village.. Dinner for the night was fried veggie with "smelly bean"
Then we went to Dubai Festival Mall, thinking they might have fireworks there as well. But in the end, there was no fireworks and Adam said he knows somewhere else with fireworks and we went to bridge near Dubai Creek...
While we were waiting for the fireworks, Ace performed his magic trick of unhooking the two nails from each other. Uncle Adam tried to solve it but can't and Ace was so happy and proud he was the only one with the solution.. hahahah:)
The view on the bridge... oh well, after waiting for 15 min and seeing no fireworks, we decided to go back to Festival City Mall...
On the way back to our cars, we saw these cars tatare all covered with dust.. Max says it is not easy to be covered in such a huge amount of dust and sand.. so if you see cars like tat.. those are abandoned cars abandoned by the pple who were working here and left and had no time or it was not worthwhile for them to even try to sell their cars... Adam says the cars parked in this particular parking lot are for sale.. because these cars cannot be used here but the pple from OMAN or even Malaysia can buy the cars here as long as you pay cash... and many of them are in very good condition too!
Ace, Max and Bernice at their fav game again!
DFC was boring because it was just a group of arabic pple singing or dancing. This year's national day is really very lousy.. no fireworks.. no nothing.. we suspect it is due to the very bad economy.... no budget to do fireworks.. hahaha
The people here are actually quite patriotic..we see alot fo them wear bangles the colours of their flags.. they decorate their clothes, their cars.. wear caps tat were of colours of their flags.. I wish we had more freedom to express our love for sgp like tat too...
Then we decided to have a snack and some drinks.. and then we went to Ace's fav store-- Toys R Us to walk around cos Ace was in a bad mood that he did not get to see fireworks and did not get the UAE flag that Ben found...
On our way home from Toys R Us, we saw their outdoor display in disarray... looked like a bunch of pple died at the playground lor! Wahahahahaha...
And that was the end of our super long day:)
Previous Post: Adventures In Dubai Day 10: Global Village
Then it was time to to have lunch and we headed off to KFC.. which seems to be the only restaurant there.. however, we found out tat KFC does not sell fried chicken! It sells at best chicken nugget balls.. hahahahahaha.. and we found vegeterian burgers from Hardees (aka Carls's Junior Burger in SGP)... and it is the exact type of burger that Ace likes with cheese and veggie and tomato sauce....
Then while we adults chit chatted... ok, I mean while I chatted with Pauline, Adam's wife.. the children.. (including that botak one who is 1.75 metres tall), started to play games like hide and seek, climbing trees.. etc.. and so, UNCLE MAX became their favourite playmate now...
Anyway, even though Ace wanted to bring his backpack.. it eventually landed up at Max's back... check out the very unhappy face.. HAHAHA..
While the others went to toilet.. Max and Ace goofed around and tried to created like a new hairstyle for Ace..
And then, all of a sudden, the giraffe in the giraffe enclosure came really close to eat leaves.. it was a wonderful moment for all of us to be so close to a giraffe and you can see it sticking out its tongue to gather the leaves..
Check out the sexy giraffe ass!
Then we saw one of the sheltered walkways spraying out the mist and the children happily ran to play inside... and they really do need to spray the mist lor.. cos it was so bloody hot tat most of the animals were just lazing around... after a while, we all tak boleh tahan and decide to head home without exploring the whole 400 hectares of zoo.. which was mainly the same few animals repeated in different enclosures...
Then Max discovered a TIGER.. I mean CAT..hahahaha.. he told the children, "Look! A tiger..." And Ace went, "Chey! That's a cat!"
Bernice and Ace's fav game.. hanging on Max's arm.. so Max got a workout as well...
On our way back to the gate, we saw a few deers huddled together.. and one ODD one at the fence.. I was wondering wat the deer was doing and I realized tat there is space between those straws of hay... and so he was actually PEEPING at us... hahahaha.. maybe he thinks the visitors are the exhibits:)
The owl was sitting on the man in brown vest's arm.. NOT on the arabian's head.. hahaha ;)
Long ride home... Max also nearly fell asleep driving...
Then, Max made dinner while Ace practiced on his magic tricks that he bought from Global Village.. Dinner for the night was fried veggie with "smelly bean"
Then we went to Dubai Festival Mall, thinking they might have fireworks there as well. But in the end, there was no fireworks and Adam said he knows somewhere else with fireworks and we went to bridge near Dubai Creek...
While we were waiting for the fireworks, Ace performed his magic trick of unhooking the two nails from each other. Uncle Adam tried to solve it but can't and Ace was so happy and proud he was the only one with the solution.. hahahah:)
The view on the bridge... oh well, after waiting for 15 min and seeing no fireworks, we decided to go back to Festival City Mall...
On the way back to our cars, we saw these cars tatare all covered with dust.. Max says it is not easy to be covered in such a huge amount of dust and sand.. so if you see cars like tat.. those are abandoned cars abandoned by the pple who were working here and left and had no time or it was not worthwhile for them to even try to sell their cars... Adam says the cars parked in this particular parking lot are for sale.. because these cars cannot be used here but the pple from OMAN or even Malaysia can buy the cars here as long as you pay cash... and many of them are in very good condition too!
Ace, Max and Bernice at their fav game again!
DFC was boring because it was just a group of arabic pple singing or dancing. This year's national day is really very lousy.. no fireworks.. no nothing.. we suspect it is due to the very bad economy.... no budget to do fireworks.. hahaha
The people here are actually quite patriotic..we see alot fo them wear bangles the colours of their flags.. they decorate their clothes, their cars.. wear caps tat were of colours of their flags.. I wish we had more freedom to express our love for sgp like tat too...
Then we decided to have a snack and some drinks.. and then we went to Ace's fav store-- Toys R Us to walk around cos Ace was in a bad mood that he did not get to see fireworks and did not get the UAE flag that Ben found...
On our way home from Toys R Us, we saw their outdoor display in disarray... looked like a bunch of pple died at the playground lor! Wahahahahaha...And that was the end of our super long day:)
Previous Post: Adventures In Dubai Day 10: Global Village
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