11/22-29: Exploring the Arabian Peninsula!
Ahh, Thanksgiving – one of my most favoritist holidays. For me, the hardest days to have been away from home have been a tossup between Thanksgiving and the 4th of July. Courtney on the other hand is a bit more seasoned with being away from home having lived out of the mitten for quite some time now. Still, during her days in Texas, on this holiday all about family, Courtney found herself adopting a new family and had spent her Thanksgiving with her friends Molly and Clifton 3 out of the previous 4 years. Coincidentally, Courtney and her southern compadres jumped off the sinking ship that is the U.S.S. U.S.A. at around the same time – Courtney (obviously) coming to Sweden and Molly and Clifton to the much less exotic Doha, Qatar. Their quest: to win the hearts and minds of the people of the Middle East with some good old fashioned Texas values.
As Doha is marginally closer and marginally cheaper to travel to from northern Europe than the western U.S. we planned a trip to head down to the Arabian Peninsula. Being the structural engineering nerd that I am, I couldn’t come so close to Dubai without seeing it for myself.
The timing of the vacation was a bit awkward as I had only 2 weeks of work under my belt before taking a whole week off, but eh … you gotta take advantage of opportunities when you can.
The day of our travels, Courtney and I woke up after both having an evening out with our respective coworkers to see this out our window:
We were thus faced with an interesting dilemma … wear our warm coats and cold weather gear and bring them along with us all across the Middle East, or layer-up and tough-it-out. Being man and woman of fortitude we chose the latter. Questing through the several inches of snow and slick sidewalks to the airport made for an oft-repeated anecdote for our newfound Qatari qompatriots.
Our flight was more or less uninteresting, as flights tend to be. We left in the evening, had a layover in Paris and arrived in Dubai the following morning …
The following posts have our photos from Dubai and Doha. Enjoy! ! !
Dubai, United Arab Emirates
11/23: "Old" Dubai!
11/24: Ski Dubai and Being Big Shots at the Burj al Arab
11/25: The Burj Dubai
Doha, Qatar
11/26: Texas A&M, Qatar
11/27: Thanksgiving
11/28: Dune Bashing
11/29: Exploring Doha
We were thus faced with an interesting dilemma … wear our warm coats and cold weather gear and bring them along with us all across the 
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