Still alive

21 hours after I left Christchurch I am in Dubai! So far it looks really cool (I have seen the drive to here from the airport, so a well rounded view!) A mix of old style and new, with a very big park in the middle, considering it's a desert country. Flying Emirates was fine, saw about four bad movies, but at least I got to choose which bad movies to watch.

It's about 40 degrees here, which is kind of a nice change from NZ winer. I'm going to the Emirates mall later today - the one with the indoor ski field. I cannot imagine a situation which involved me choosing to ski, indoors or out, but I might watch other people ski!

Customs was weird... There were two lines, one green, one red (nothing to declare/stuff to declare) but nothing which told you what you had to declare. So I went green and hoped nobody stopped me. That story would be improved if I had talked a burly customs officer into letting me keep my ceremonial grass bowl, but actually no one even looked at me let alone wanted to check my bag. I'm so used to NZ, where they're paranoid about any microbes you might be dragging in.

So that's it. I'm in Dubai. It's hot and pretty.