Today was fairly run-of-the-mill. Insofar as days in Dubai can be. I actually got to attend some conference stuff. I have to admit that I look damn good in formal business attire. Though I felt extremely young wandering around, I looked as though I fit in well enough, and people interacted with me accordingly. I was one of the few women, and even one of the fewer more attractive ones (due more to my youth than anything else).

The hotel set-up was pretty crazy; somebody must have struck a silly, money-saving deal which made some of the affair seem rather unprofessional, but it all seemed to work out. The innards of the hotel were more labyrinth- than business-like, but perhaps that's the sacrifice. Some of the sessions I went to were interesting to me, who knows very little about the technology world; however, none seemed in-depth or of any revolutionary value. At least, I assume that most of the people attending such a conference would already be well versed in the basics of internet uses and operations; I imagine there were a lot of bored people wandering around. There was just nothing... eye-catching or unusual or new. And I really thought there would be, not that I would understand it if I were presented with such things concerning the modern state of technology. I know how to turn my computer on, check my email, play on facebook and use iTunes. That's the extent of it.

I also noticed the lack of common courtesy many business people have nowadays. Well, not that I know what things were like "back in the day," as it were, but I can imagine that leaving your cell phone on and allowing it to ring during a presentation used to be considered rude. At this particular conference, it wasn't unusual to have people (mostly the extremely wealthy-looking; given that I am in the United Arab Emirates, you can read into that what you will) not even bothering to leave the room to answer and have extended conversations on cell phones during demonstrations. How far down can society go?

I was surprised, to say the least.

One of the more interesting sessions I attended demonstrated how hard it actually is to gain and keep good records of people, especially immigrants from countries in which they do not use the American-style alphabet. Using a variety of names from a variety of languages, the exercise was to look at immigration records, residential records, utility records, online records, and match up a list of names. It was deemed almost impossible: the number of ways somebody can spell Muhammed (even when they are not trying to hide anything) is incredible, and it also makes it difficult to actually track down people. It was an effective demonstration.

Other sessions I went to were simply 5 minute advertisements on why we should all buy into their company or use their products, which is gross considering what the conference was supposed to be doing. Oh well.

I did manage to get out and find some more indigenous food. I found a little place in the neighborhood and some kind of meat rice thing served with flatbread an hummus, which was cheap and incredibly filling. The guy behind the counter found me fascinating, probably because of my red hair. You don't see that much in Arab countries, as I found out in Morocco. He was very polite (unlike some men in Morocco), and said that he had met a woman from Russia who had hair my color, but that mine "was much prettier." He shook my hand heartily and said he was glad to have a new friend from America and that he now had friends in Russia, Germany, Scotland AND America. He was friendly and harmless enough, and served me up some extra rice and flatbread for free, and I'm always flattered at the attention, especially when I feel as safe as I do in Dubai.

After Jonmikel was finally finished with his conference-going, we headed down to Champions, a sports bar in the basement of the hotel for dinner and some good, old fashioned American pool. He was exhausted and didn't feel like doing much, so we took it easy.