A Day in Dubai

The world's tallest building was too tall to fit in the picture

It was time to begin the next chapter of the trip. From Istanbul I would fly overnight to Dubai. I purposely booked my flight so I could have a nice long layover in Dubai for a day before hopping on another overnight flight to Mumbai, India. To be honest, I was a little sad leaving Istanbul, and this half of the world for that matter. Europe has always been my favorite area of the world to visit and Istanbul became one of my favorite cities that I’ve visited. But it was time to move on, and the next thing I knew I was on my way to Dubai.

I was already familiar with some of the things to do in Dubai, which is why I wanted to spend a day there. It worked out perfect too because this place was wayy too expensive to spend more than a day at on this trip. But yea, Dubai is home to what is currently the tallest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa, as well as some insane malls and luxurious accommodations and attractions. This place pretty much blew me away as soon as I arrived. It reminded me of Vegas, but with more money and it’s an actual city. The first place I went to was the Burj Khalifa, and I planned to go to the top. They don’t actually take you to the top, but they take you to the 124th floor (out of 163) which is still pretty high, much higher than any of the other surrounding skyscrapers. So it was still a really nice view, with the Persian Gulf on one side and desert forever on the other. It’s a really tall building and it was very, very impressive to look at; more so from the bottom than the top.

After walking around the Burj for a while I walked through the Dubai Mall for a bit, which was overwhelming, and then the Mall of the Emirates, which was also overwhelming. These malls have every store ever created, as well as waterfalls, ice skating rinks, and even an indoor ski resort (which is why I went to the Mall of the Emirates). So I got to go snowboarding in Dubai, and although the hill was much less impressive than the actual mountain I still had a lot of fun. After some snowboarding, I wanted to check out the Burj Al Arab (7 star hotel and most luxurious in the world) but unfortunately they won’t let you in without a reservation, and even more unfortunately… I didn’t have a reservation. I went to the beach for a bit and made my way back to the airport to prepare for the next flight, the one that would take me to India.

Shredding some pow at the mall in Dubai

But real quick, one thing that really surprised me about Dubai was the amount of Westerners I saw there. Everybody speaks English more than anything else and I swear I saw more Americans there than I’ve even seen in America. I don’t exactly know the story behind why there were so many Americans there and less locals (I know Dubai is probably a tax haven and shopping capital for anyone who has money) but it really surprised me quite a bit, and it was hard to wrap my head around any particular culture that existed here because there wasn’t much authenticity to the place. All in all, a good trip to Dubai. I might go back if it’s ever on the way to anywhere I go in the future.