When The Moneys Runs Out ... What do you do.

Come home and get back to work.

It's harder for Aussie's to travel at the moment as everything costs about 50% more with our current exchange rate in Europe. SUCKS and the cost of living in Italy is a lot higher than back home so unfortunately it's time to come home ( insert 2 sad faces) as its back to real reality!!
We are now home to all our Aussie friends ( insert 2 HUGE smiley faces ) so can't wait to catch up.

We have to get back to work to save for the next 3/4  bit of our Italian Food Journey and gap year, maybe start on that travel and or cook book to help finance the next trip !!!!

I did notice that Sandy picked up a travel mag to read on the plane on the way home ... hmmmm maybe she is telling me something ..... WORK HARD & SAVE so we can do it all again.

We have both had a absolute ball again, leant so much cooking and eaten in some amazing places.
Again from families we have meet on the way this time and from last trip and with people that we just walked into their kitchens or restaurants and announce that we were here to help and see what they were doing.

Shared lots of great meals and many food focused experience with many a different Italian food region and nationality. Somedays it has been so exhausting as you don't want to miss out on a single second or experience, traveling for 3 months can be a bit tough but still Soooooo worth it....

I know I'm a bit cheeky !!! Well hugely cheeky ... with balls the size of a rhino and I have this ....
well .... if you don't ask you don't get approach to life. Mind you, you don't alway get when you
ask !!!!! but it sure is fun asking.

So I have asked and smiled and joked our way into some amazing places, pointed at the Aussie hat as if it is some sort of right of passage. We have both had some truly life changing experiences with a huge array of different and amazing people from all walks of life. I will never forget my time in Piobbico Hard Core truffling with Dorriano, becoming the only Aussie members of Club De Brute.

Best of all I did it all with my Sands xxoo she is so patient with me!!!!

So maybe see you all back in blog land for part 3? ... Where? When? Hmmmm ??...

Hope you have enjoyed the Southern Italian Food Journey with us and I hope that my writing skills and spelling is getting better and a bit easier to read and that the pictures may have helped put you out of "reading misery" a long the way also.

A big thanks for all the little comments along the way also they have been great.

So till next time, love to all and many many double cheek kisses xxoo

Heading Home

Flying at 40,000 feet over the bottom on India and over Columbo so that's where it is !!! Alway thought it was in America hmmmm I need to get out more......

Dubai Food Culture

Last weekend was to be the awards night for the World Luxury Hotel Awards our reason for going to Dubai in the first place.

So as that has been moved to South Africa and postponed till the 6th of December and we couldn't change our flights or accommodation bookings we had better make the best of the Arabic food culture.

So after a couple of fantastic days in the desert its been a eye opening look into Dubai food culture that is quite varied and unique. Being a nomadic Beddawin culture in the past and to me its look and tastes are loosely bases around Lebanese style of food. Hommus and mezze plates plays a big role and with many slow cooked meets mostly chicken and lamb with rice so a sort of a Indian/Arabic Birayani dish all eaten by hand.

The lamb Birayani that we had in the Beddawin tent ... yumm the rice was so fluffy, a perfect mix of moist saucy rice and the dryer plain rice combo just done to traditional perfection, the meat soooooo succulent, waiting on a recipe for that one, but it had cardamon, cumin, cloves and a perfect mix of Arabic spice.

We did two food tours in Dubai the first was a cultural lunch and the second was a night tour that took us into several parts of the city to experience Arabic food.
Traditionally Arabic coffee is served as you enter a Beddawin tent, a person home or a restaurant.
Arabic coffee is served in small handleless cups and is a coffee that uses raw beans, not roasted so its not a strong coffee. It is a refreshing spicy coffee that is drunk a lot just during the day also, it has been brewed with cardamon, clove and cinnamon and is a great pallet cleanser.
Another refreshing drink but this time cold is a small shooter glass of icy cold lemon/lime with a honey sugar syrup and mint. All processed in a blender and strained to make a sweet minty citrus drink SCRUMOOOOO. Especially on the hot days and as we were there at the end of their autumn and still being 40 deg days it was most welcome.

And final on drinks this time a milky drink a COLD yogurt and rose water smoothy I'm addicted and I just kept going back for more.
The highlight for us was the Persian food which was the last restaurant on the night with it depth of flavours and spice combinations. The wood fired flat breads with camel cheese and leaves of mint, holy basil (not an Italian basil it was sort of like a Thai Basil) and the soft lamb and veal kebabs served with hommus and a green chilly oil. Desert was a rosewater ice and mango ice cream a beautiful cool way to finish dinner.

Spice Markets

Dubai doesn't actually have much that it grows or makes itself so it imports most things. But the sights, the sounds, the people and the exotic smells are just so over the top so your know that you are back in an Arabic Spice Market.

The Old Silk & Fabric Suiks

Like other Arabica city's we have visited they all have their old Suiks.
The only difference is that the ones in Dubai were a lot lot cleaner. Not as pristine as the city, but clean and still with loads of rustic charm and heaps of sellers harassing you for your tourist $.
Mainly scarfs, fabrics, cloths, ceramic and metal plates all brightly coloured and coming in from Turkey and India.

I got several great cool new cotton shirts so I was able to dice the old thread bares that I can't wear in Dubai or else I may have been put on the get out of town list!!!!
So all good it will make room in the suit cases for new ones before we travel home.

All thanks to my new best friend and now personal shopper !!!!! obversely "we were destine to meet". What Kamal had in his shop just didn't fit (insert sulky sad face). He followed us down the road for a while with his phone to his ear maybe waiting for me to drop a couple of shirt sizes in the heat ... but as that wasn't going to happen in the short term ... It was a sir sir please wait, please follow me .... I have a cousin ... Hmmmmmm what have we got to loose, Dubai is safe, it may just be fun.

Well we walked and walked and I think I may have dropped a size or 2 by the time we got finally to his cousins shop but "this miss piggy" was still to big.

Kamal, not wanting to loose a sale or a commission had another cousin, of course. Then finally a real big mans shop ... for men with broad shoulders and long arms that almost touch the ground as I walk and of course with a bit of a miss piggy Italian stomach.
Satisfaction .... deals done and with Kamal holding my bags we headed back out to the street to see how much more commission he was able to drum up for himself...

Need some perfume for the lady, perhaps a copy watch or a goochie bag. He wasn't going to let the bag go or a sales opportunity get away. We got to talking about cooking and food and before long we were in another cousin shop eating the best little hot flat bread and discussing life and different cultures.
He in Muslim and he was a very interest young man married with 3 little kids and just trying to make ends meet. I went to pay for the food and he said "no" this was his way to thank us for giving him a chance to sell us something.
He also walked us back to the Main Street and put us in a cab, I finally got my bags back and with huge hand shakes and business card swapped we parted. A true gentleman and clothing contact in Dubai, hmmm may just come in handy.....

The Gold Suiks ( Old Markets )

The gold Suiks are a sight in themselves to see, a disgusting display of wealth and there is just 1000's of little stores all brightly illuminated and all again buying for your tourist $.
With promises of a good price better than everyone else and that you and him are "just destine to meet". Smooth, charming none of the ugly sales people here ... and great with a sales pitch. The jewellery places are packed with Arabic tourist hugely cashed up and in some of the shops several deep looking for a bargain.

It not just the cheep stuff either some of the pieces that looked like costume jewellery were in the 10's to 100's of thousands of $ and were so OTT with bright yellow gold and looking like a chest plate and supporting huge jewels and looked like something that Lady Gargar would wear to her next royal dinner with Charles or a more casual night at a Oil Barron function in a Beddawin Tent.

Huge and showy with a bit of glamour but a lot more cringe....

Dubai

Dubai what an ab-fab and amazing city ... It's all just so brand spanking new.
So glamourise, gleaming and glistening in the hot midday sun and the stunning twinkling lights by night. Absurdly tall, ultra modern and Jetson style sky scrapers and some look more like sandcastles out of marble but all orderly laid out with enough room around them to show them all off too their best. Bronze, silver, gold, platinum, marble and glass stunnnnning.

Pop 7.8 million with only 1.6 mil indigenous/locals and a melting pot of about 200 different nationalities, what a eye opener.

Not the cheapest city that's for sure .... NOTHING is free there is a tax or fees for and on EVERYTHING some explained on the bills and others just part of the bill and if you inquiry why or what ..... well it ... "just is" it Dubai.
The booze is super super expensive, and that's if it's available. Lots of restaurants can't be licensed and where does knows how to charge. Had dinner at a stunning Thai in the city over looking the Emirates Mall Water Show and for a bottle of New Zealand Cloudy Bay it was $330 Aus and that was the entry level for wine. It's enough to turn these two alco's off the booze .... well at least until we get back to our duty free stash in the room!!!!

In saying that petrol is sooooo cheep .... as it should be!!! the cabs are also sooooo cheep.
Coming back in from the desert resort it only cost $30 for a 70 km trip to our accommodation in Dubai called Kempinski check it out.
                     Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaammmmmmmmazingggg!!!!

There is apparently very little crime in Dubai and I must admit we felt so safe where ever we went. There are no street people or beggars anywhere. Maybe that would just look too messy in such a
pristine city so problery the sheiks shipped them back to where they came from!!

Harsh but true, the locals and hotel staff that we talked to tell us that Dubai looks after all it's own so there is no poverty that is directly seen on the streets of Dubai.

Modestly is also addressed, not saying they have fashion police but if someone is in the shopping
centres and is a bit too scantly clad they are nicely removed from the eye site of the locals....

You have rights as a visitor but Dubai people's rights are attended to first, actually it's quite nice in a
respectful way, its there city and if you don't respect that and their culture ... well it's back to the airport and on the next plane out.

A little Bit of Help

Who says we can't look after ourselves !
We seam to be coping just fine .....
Well with perhaps just a little help from our new friends to do our nightly turn down service.

Oh and open a door ... well that's just way to hard for us also!!!!! All just a bit to grand in Dubai

Heading Back into Dubai

So our time in the desert is over and we are now making our way back into Dubai had a sand storm last night so some of the road we interesting coming back into the city at 140km an hour!!!,

Spot of Camel Riding!!!

NOPE not me !!!!

Has Anyone Seen my Falcon

Had a fun BUT HOT afternoon watching a falcon show!!! once the crowed gathered he let  one of the birds go, it decided that it was running away from home so he wasn't going to let the other one go in case he was also going to do a runner also.
Maybe he needs to be a bit nicer to them, so after 1/2 an hour flapping his decoy stuffed road kill to no avail we left him walking the sand dunes hold his highteck antenna ....1/2 and hour later we noticed him leave in a four wheel drive and yes you guessed it the antenna was out the window and he disappeared.....

Taking Your Camel For A Walk

Dinner in the Desert

Dinner and a show cool place under the stars sitting at tables on Turkish rugs.

Bab Al Shams a Desert Resort

It's now midnight with a 3 hour time change and an hour to get in past security !! But thats a story for later over a drink or six we are whisked into our next Emirates car and taken 70 km into the desert for a couple of nights.

As we are traveling at speeds of 150km leaving the city of Dubai on a 6 lane highway and that's just our side of the road so it's not long before we start to see desert dunes in the moonlight and Arabic people sitting on top of them cooling off in the now down to 30 deg temperatures.

Our driver tells us being Thursday night that the next 2 days is their weekend and that Sunday is a workday in Dubai.
It is just so beautifully hot and dry, very much like home but without the desert!!!!
We arrive and wow wow wow wow wow wow get the picture it's WOW I thought we were being looked after before !!!! now we are on Emirates soil theses guys know how to impress and REALY spoil you.

First night the room was amazing and as it was 2am all we wanted was a bed to crash in. The second night once we got into a room that we asked for with a shower as Sandy's knee is being a bit dicky after three months with millions of steps in Italy it was just simply gorgeous and it had a view over the desert. It is so hot here but you want to get out and explore and a soon a you sweat the heat dries you again incredible and it not even the hot season....