Saturday, December 8, 2007

Holiday Party

This weekend, we celebrated our office Christmas / holiday party. We met at our office Friday afternoon, split up into 13 land cruisers, and then rode out into a conservation area in the desert to go dune-bashing.

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Several of the cars got stuck in the sand, but we did get to see some camel farms and other desert animals. We eventually arrived to the campsite just before sunset, and we laid out on carpets and pillows (seemingly, in the middle of nowhere), drank champaigne, and a falcon trainer flew a falcon for us. I did learn something interesting- the arabs are all so gung-ho on falconry, and I thought they used them in the desert to hunt for food. But we discovered that there is no actual Arabian Falcon, as they are not native to the UAE.

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We walked through the dunes and found ourselves at a compound that looked like a fort from F-troop. Inside, they dressed us all in the national dress, and then we went inside for dinner. They had a tattoo artist, a fortune teller, a belly dancer, and a magician. I kept my distance from all 4! There was an after-party at a very nice club, but I skipped out because I was so sleepy at that point. Man, I sound like a buzzkill... but I got to ride a camel!

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FYI- I corrected the comments setting, so commenting is public again!

1 comment:

BipolarBunny said...

That is a cool office party! Your picture of the dunes is beautiful.