1.  Ronnie attended a five-day seminar in Marriott Hotel.  This was the main reason why we had to stay in Dubai for a week.  As I have mentioned in my previous post, my husband was on a duty trip to attend a seminar as a part of his continuing professional education.  I am glad that he was able to make use of this opportunity to relax from the stress of his busy work.  I am also happy that he had enjoyed the training.  Not to mention the leather messenger bag and tablet which were given as freebies to the participants.

2.  Reunite with good old friends.  Staying in Dubai gave us the chance to meet and spend some quality time chatting with friends whom we have not seen for quite a while.  It always feels nice to reconnect with friends.  Thank you Papa Ju, Karen, Jessa, Acey and Manuel for taking the time to meet us!  Til our next visit!

3.  Explore new places.  Aside from visiting shopping malls we haven't been to (minus the shopping) and taking photos of some of the tourist attractions, we also get to experience being lost in the busy streets of Dubai.  Ronnie was not familiar driving around Dubai since we're actually based in Abu Dhabi while I totally don't have any navigation skills to start with.  (I'm such a useless passenger!)  So it wouldn't be surprising at all to find ourselves lost from time to time.  That's totally fine.  Tourists usually get lost most of the time.

4.  Visit Dubai International Airport.  Actually, our main purpose here is to fetch my sister-in-law who came from the Philippines to have a month of vacation in the UAE.  The secondary purpose is to see Dubai's airport.  Ronnie and I were both expecting it to have that "wow" factor since Dubai is one of the world's most popular tourist destinations. Unfortunately, we were both left disappointed because it was currently under renovation (so I no longer took the effort to capture photos).

5.  Relax.  The very essence of having this trip is to just live a worry free life and enjoy bonding with the family.  Mission accomplished!