Surprisingly, I feel great

Despite being 9 hrs ahead, I feel great. A was able to catch a 2 hour nap on the flight from Chicago to London as well another couple of hours from London to Dubai. When we got in last night and finally made it to our hotel, I was plenty tired and able to sleep most of the night.

Total travel time was almost 25 hours with about 15 of that in the air. (coming home, we'll be against the gulf stream so air time will be closer to 20 hrs.) I'm not sure if it would have been better to take a direct flight from NY or have the stop in London. It was nice to walk around Heathrow for 3 hours to wake up and eat, but the direct flight would have been quicker. I mostly watched movies, listened to my ipod and talked with the global controller who came along for this trip. I'm not sure why, but I struggled reading on this flight. Normally, I finish a book on these trips. I guess I was excited about the visit.

When we got to Dubai, we had a fairly long walk to immigration. We walked by a bunch of people waiting for work Visa's. The line for people from India and Pakistan was enormous. Immigration wasn't too bad. A couple of questions about where I came from, where I was staying and what I was doing and we were done. Got my luggage, called home and then took a shuttle service to the hotel. On the shuttle we got a fresh cool wash cloth and water. After all that time on the airplane, the wash cloth was the perfect perk. In addition to being soaked in water, there was some added lemon to the cloth. I immediately felt 10 times better after using it.

The Hotel is very nice. They brought us juice and candies while we were checking in. The rooms are great. Big bathrooms, plenty of closet space and nice firm beds. I also had a plate of fruit (bananas, pears, peaches, plums and grapes) and chocolates waiting for me in the room. The amazing thing to me is our corporate preferred hotels were more expensive than this place. One weird quirk was you had to use your room card to turn on most of the lights. If your card wasn't in the "light holder", you couldn't work most of the lights. I also noticed the rooms didn't have an iron so I had to dry-clean some of my clothes. As for the service, it has been terrific. Either everyone is happy to see other people or they're very well trained. Regardless, they make you feel very comfortable. In fact it feels more like a resort than a hotel.

This morning, we took a taxi to the office. I think we'll walk on the way home. The hotel is literally 2 blocks away. I didn't know it was that close. There is so much construction in Dubai. A local told us they'll be done in 2012 with the final look of Dubai. I found it amazing that Dubai is putting in a rail system. This is an oil country and they're already preparing for the future. When you look around, you realize the AEU is pretty forward thinking. I really think Jen and I are going to enjoy this place.

Later today I'm going to get a tour by the person I'm replacing. I hope to have some great pictures to share. So far, I've been impressed.