Gazette November 9, 2006

Galloping Galan Gazette, November 2006

Hi everybody!! I am finally back!! And I can even include pictures this month!
First off, let me tell all the friends and family I was able to be with during my trip to Michigan and
Washington the first part of October just how great it was to be with you...and how much I love you!

Waldo and I are lucky that we are surrounded by many interesting sights, so I included this postcard because it has many of them! Starting on the left, is the Jumeirah Mosque, which is huge. I am looking forward to the tours they offer...will make a full report! Next are two scenes of the Burg al Arab (disregard the camel). You may remember the first one as the view from my bedroom window. then we have an old shot of downtown Dubai, later on you'll see what it REALLY looks like. another view of the Burg, and in the middle is the Palm Jumeirah, which is a man-made series of islands. They have postponed giving possession again, but sooner or later people will live there! They don't allow just tourists to go over there, but I'll see what i can do! Waldo took some pictures of the desert, and this winter I am looking forward to meeting some of these camels...I imagine the ones they let you ride aren't nearly as charming as these!


















Dubai, like many large cities in the world, has its own Hard Rock Cafe, but of course the distiction here is that it's surrounded by construction. Of course, everything is surrounded by construction! One of the things I liked about our "villa" (Dubai-ese for house) is that there is only one construction project going on down the block. so we are able to escape it for a while.

I hope you can see all the construction cranes in this photo...I've been told Dubai has more of them than anywhere else in the world, with the exception of China, perhaps. there is a lot of energy in this city, that's for sure!

Many people have been asking what the price of gas is here, and I found out---for 95 octane gasoline, the price is 6.25 dirhams per gallon. Are you ready? that converts to 1.70/gal. And people complain that it shouldn't be so high in an oil-producing country!

Waldo has been working very hard in Detroit, London and Cologne, Germany, setting up the business plan for next year. As a matter of fact he's still in London, negotiating with the Israelis. Business in this part of the world is very good.As a matter of fact, Ford's two biggest dealerships in the world are in Israel and Saudi Arabia. The design engineers are constantly working out bugs, however, even when they have to do it in the desert in 120 F weather!

Well, that's all for this edition! For December's edition I'm planning to do a tour of our house and the immediate neighborhood, along with scenes that I think you might find interesting--and we are going to Washington for Christmas, to witness our grand-daughter Jordan being baptised! There is certainly a lot to look forward to in the next month! You might even say theres a lot to be thankful for. We won't be formally celebrating Thanksgivinghere, but you can bet that it will be in our hearts!

You can find out what's up with other members of the family at Rick and April's website: http://www.galanworld.com
also at Jennifer and Waldo's site: http://galanapalooza.hopto.org
We also have a Spanish version of this blog:http://www.gacetagalan.blogspot.com