June 19, 2010 Continued, continued

Well, I met yet antoher great person as we were leaving the airplane last night. She is from Germany and has a worldwide expanding business. She is a "Heilpraktikenn", and a healer, coach, and I believe head of this entire natural anti-aging business. I told her what I am doing this summer and she was very interested. Her business sponsors the program, Nourish teh Children, which is where the food from Feed the Children goes to be distributed to the poor in the world. Her business is booming and is now going to be sponsoring seacology, which is the protection of endangered species and island life. She was very nice, and frequently flew into the Dubai airport for business, as it is really taking off in the Middle East. I thought to ask her if she knew where the hotel was in the airport since she said she was very familiar with the place. Unfortunately, she had no idea there was a hotel in the airport, so she couldn't help me in that regard. I decided to bid her good by and continue on down the airport to find the hotel.
After some sign-following, security checks, and multiple inquiries to workers and the information desks, I finally found the hotel. (This process consisted of me pretty much walking in circles until it all became clear!) It is funny, when I was asking for the hotel, people often questioned, "The business hotel?" To which I would reply, "Yes." I am not the usual clientele for the business hotel I guess! Upon arriving at the hotel lobby, I walked to the desk to check in, and after saying who I was and for what, the lady at the desk spoke, "Passport?" as if I was unintelligent. I quickly got out my passport and gave it to her. It was so interesting to me how the three most important things to have on this trip are things I have never had before this trip: a passport, visa, and international flight itinerary. (The next thing she wanted to see was my boarding pass!) After shelling out a whopping 770 durhams, or about 240 U.S. dollars, I needed to take a breather.
I got to my room - my really really nice room - and began pondering what to do next. I immediately tried to Skype Lisa (with the World Food Prize), but after finding out the regular url for Skype was blocked here, I emailed her instead. It was around midnight here, but I was in no mood to be going to sleep. I was feeling like I had low blood sugar, and was undergoing some late-night culture shock. My computer battery had about 10% left after emailing Lisa from the hotel hallway because the lobby Wi-Fi did not reach my room at first (or grant me access). I went back to the lobby, set a wake-up call for, and I quote, "6:00 p.m." and I went downstairs to the airport to search the prices on electronic adaptors. I found that the price for an international converter was ridiculous, something like 70 us dollars. Although I really wanted charge for my laptop, I really did not want to charge 70 more dollars to my card even more. I just walked around a bit, trying to get a feel for the place, (still moving and grooving like it was daytime at 1:00 a.m.), and tried to get accustomed to the culture.
I felt out of place with my respectable Western wear and cross necklace displayed among the bindis, cloaks, shawls, and turbans. I checked out the prayer room only to discover it was not a universal prayer room, but a mosque and I could not enter of course because I did not have a shawl with me to cover my head. I then moved to the public restroom just for the experience and to be among the people a little longer. This was solely for the "experience", considering I had a private restroom right upstairs in my hotel room. The water in the toilet was warm - really warm, which was an interesting experience indeed. Also, the washer-thing to the right of the toilet reminded me of how toilet paper is more of a Western phenomenon. I was, however, happy to see they also had t.p. as this was an international airport. Ok, enough about that. After these experiences, I had gotten rid of some of my energy and returned to the comfort of my room.
I thought to ask at the hotel desk about an electronic adaptor because I figured, if this is the international business hotel, and I am paying an arm and a leg to stay here, they better have adaptors for their guests! I was given one, but upon looking at it, I saw no compatible plug. I asked if it was compatible all over the world and the man said yes. I retreated to my room and sure enough, it was not compatible. I decided to bring it back and bug them some more (the squeaky wheel gets the most grease, isn't that what they say?!) and I received a plug-in to plug into the adaptor. Yippee! It was now compatible with the US plugins. Electricity never made me so happy. However, the electrical charge made a humming noise and I was worried about voltage compatibility. So, I unplugged the charger and took my laptop to the hallway once again. With my dwindling (really dwindling) batter I researched what the voltage was and my voltage concerns. I found that in Dubai, the voltage is 220-240V, and I confirmed that with a few sites and then also an employee of the hotel. He reassured me the voltage was 220V in the hotel. I then found on my battery that is served as a converter for all voltages from 110 to 220, so I could charge my laptop once again, humming noise or not.
I then decided to treat myself to a warm shower, which I thoroughly enjoyed, and which was much needed. After garnishing myself with a lush white robe from the Dubai International Business Hotel, I decided to take advantage of the internet connection, and when I could resist no longer, I climbed into the big, white bed. I planned to sleep as long as my body liked and I had set an alarm with the front desk for 6:00 p.m. so I knew I would be fine for the 10:15 p.m. flight. However, all of a sudden I awoke to a jovial tune: singing and door-banging in the hallway. I groggily got out of bed after sleeping from 3:40 a.m. and saw 2 desk employees saying, "Ms. Lucas, this is your 6:00 wake-up call!" I said, "Thank you, may I have one for 6:00 p.m. please?" (That is the time I had requested, but here, everything was in military time so I guess it would have been less confusing for the staff than "p.m."!) They laughed and I glanced in the mirror on my way back to bed. One side of my head of hair was horizontal because I slept on it wet. I laughed, slightly hoping it made them feel bad for waking me up at 6:00 (A.M.!) and went back to bed.