The Volvo Ocean Race may not be well known in the U.S. It is worth knowing. It’s the greatest race in the world. Nothing else involves sailboats circling the planet as fast as they possibly can be driven. The sailors will touch every continent except Antarctica and Australia. They will sail over every ocean […]

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On the same night Landon Donovan bid adieu (check the video at the bottom of the link) to international soccer in an emotional evening in Hartford, we were Australia fans for a few hours in Abu Dhabi. The UAE was playing host to the Aussies (or Socceroos, as they sometimes are known, back in the […]

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An obscene gesture can get a person in trouble in most places. I’m fairly confident that more than a few murders in the U.S. hinged on that moment. I think many of us tend to think obscene gestures don’t necessarily travel. Across borders. Around the world. That what is an obscene gesture in, say, Italy, […]

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After about a 10-minute wait tonight, an open cab pulled over. The passenger-side window went down, and the driver leaned over and semi-shouted at me, so I could hear him over the noise of the street. “You know where you are going? I am new!” I said, “Yes, I know,” and climbed in. New cabbies […]

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Planning vacations. Who knew that would be revealed as one of the widest culture gaps in the UAE? In short, westerners plan vacations. Often far in advance. In general, Emiratis plan little or not at all for vacations. And each group finds the other’s approach baffling. Take, for instance, the looming Islamic holiday of Eid […]

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It is abundantly clear on which days the UAE domestic soccer league should play. Thursday night and Friday night. Yet, over the first nine weeks of the current season, only once did the league actually plan for a Thursday-Friday schedule. Which is crazy, and here is why.

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I have mentioned this here before, a time or two, in the nearly five years we have been based in Abu Dhabi. How I have never seen a coin on the street, or the sidewalk. Not one. Not in nearly five years. Not even when I used to walk outside more than a little. When […]

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Just about the only time in the UAE when I feel like an American is when I am in the U.S. Embassy, which is barely a mile from where we live, near the southern end of Abu Dhabi island. Granted, I don’t feel it right off.

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Today was the first full day of Fall, if I read my almanac correctly. Fall, or Autumn, begins on the day of the autumnal equinox, when every place on Earth gets 12 hours of sun and 12 hours of night. In much of the northern hemisphere, it means cooler weather, perhaps even cold weather, in […]

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We have a handful of outdoor plants arranged on the balcony. Just for the sake of a bit of greenery in a part of the world that has very little of it, naturally. The “dirt” of Abu Dhabi island is not actually dirt. It is sand, with little or no nutrients in it. And not […]

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