How to spend a day-long layover in Dubai

I had a day-long layover at the Dubai Airport recently and learned this is a somewhat common thing with the flight schedules for this particular airport. So if you find yourself in my situation, here's some advice about what you can do with 1 day in Dubai.

If you prefer to sleep at the airport:

If you're tired and want to sleep in someplace other than the plastic chair at the gate, there are a couple options for you without needing to leave customs -- as long as you fly into Terminals 1 or 3.

 - Terminal 1 of the airport has a posh hotel called Dubai International Hotel. The cheapest rooms start at 650 AED (177 USD) per day.
 - Also in Terminal 1, you can find portable snooze cubes, which offer single rooms at 75 AED (21 USD) per 2 hours.

Terminal 3 is connected to Terminal 1 so passengers arriving at this terminal will get all of Terminal 1's benefits.

If you fly into Terminal 2 and are looking for a way to get to Terminal 1, you will have to show the staff there that you've booked a hotel or snooze cube room in advance. This is the only way they will transport you to the other terminal without going through customs. By the time I arrived into Terminal 2, the snooze cube website would only allow me to book in advance by a minimum of 2 days. The hotel was too expensive for me to even consider. So I was stuck.

If you find yourself in this situation, your only option will be to hang out at the Marhaba lounge. It's 150 AED (41 USD) per 2 hours with no shower facilities. There are no comfy loungey chairs of the variety you'd expect to find in a lounge so you will likely not get any sleep. Overall, it's not worth the money unless you're as desperate for some rest as I was.

If you prefer to sitesee:

Airport staff will let you leave to sitesee as long as your layover is several hours long and your passport is from a qualifying country (mine is from the US). The cheapest option for getting around town will be to take the metro. There is also an open-top bus for the outrageous price of 66 USD per day. 

Ofcourse, the metro will only stop at Terminals 1 and 3. If you find yourself unlucky in Terminal 2, you'll have to take a cab to Terminal 1. And they start off with a 25 AED base charge just for taking the taxi from the airport. 

As for itineraries, I suggest downloading the TripAdvisor city app for Dubai onto your phone and taking their suggested walking tours. Find it on Google Play or iTunes.

Below are my notes on the routes offered in the app.

Start with Downtown Dubai

You'll see the most famous landmarks, including the Dubai mall, the Burj Khalifa, etc. The mall itself could be a town. Tour groups walk through this place, it's so big.

Inside the Dubai Mall - Fashion Avenue

Star ceiling in the mall

World's tallest building, Burj Khalifa

If you want to go to the top of Burj Khalifa, make sure to book tickets in advance. The next two days were sold out at the time I visited.

Afterwards, see a completely different side of the city by walking through Historic Dubai

Historic Dubai is a must-see! The tour starts off at the Gold and Spice Souks, where Dubai suddenly turns into Little India. The streets turn into alleyways and everywhere you'll find sites and smells that bring you back to that country.

Take a wooden boat across Dubai Creek for 1 AED. Very much worth the price!

There's one place I highly recommend adding to the beginning of your tour through historic Dubai, the Women's Museum near the Gold Souk bus station. I only found out about this place when I started seeing spray painted signs on dilapidated concrete walls pointing to its location. And who can resist following spray painted arrows? Not me.

What exactly is a Women's Museum in Dubai like, you ask? Yeah, I asked that too, which is why I had to see it. The main attraction is the ground floor, which covers women's history in the UAE, highlighting progress in the areas of education, business, and politics. The second floor displays art pieces made by local female artists and the third floor is dedicated to a famous poet, Ousha.

Third floor of the Women's Museum - quotes from Ousha's poetry.

The two itineraries cumulatively took 10 hours to complete and by this point, I had to head back to the airport. Others with a layover that lasts into the night may want to consider taking an afternoon excursion into the desert. Jeep tours and camel rides are all offered by major tour companies.

Leaving Dubai - photo taken from a metro station on the way to the airport

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Disgusting Bug Bites from Around the World - Istanbul Edition

Here's an update to what should be an ongoing series, Disgusting Bug Bites from Around the World. This time, taking place in Istanbul.

Within minutes of laying down for the night in my hostel dorm bed, I could feel the itchy welts forming on both arms. This place seems to have so many mosquitoes, I thought to myself naively. I tucked myself tightly under the sheets, hoping to get away from the biting. But more welts started forming immediately after that. I could feel them running down my back, my chest, and even my feet. They burned with that distinctively searing pain I've come to recognize from overzealous bugs who were feeding like this was their last supper. Could they be bed bug bites?

I used my phone as a light and pointed it at the bed. Nothing there but blank blue sheets. So I jumped into the hall and used the camera as a mirror on myself. Here's what I saw.

Yikes! I ran downstairs to notify the receptionist, who insisted they looked like mosquito bites and that the hostel never had problems with bed bugs before. She gave me a bottle of mosquito repellent and sent me back into the room. I listened to her because I wanted so badly to believe her. So badly. I laid down into bed trepidatiously.

At this point, I was running through rationalizations in my head to try to get some sleep. For one, I didn't find any bugs on the bed so of course they couldn't be bed bugs. And bed bug bites usually take a day or more to start showing. Only mosquito bites itch immediately like this. And no, these bites don't look like a pattern of three. I could totally believe three separate mosquitoes just coincidentally bit me in the same area simultaneously.

Five more minutes and more itching in new parts of my arms. I sat up quickly and turned the phone at the pillow for light. And there I saw two black dots scurrying away quickly to the underside of the bed. GROSS!! 

I ran back to the receptionist and told her to move me to a new room but the best she could do was put me in a different bed in the same room as the hostel was almost completely booked. At this point, it was 3AM and I was so exhausted, I took her offer. I moved my bags out of the room into the common area and slumped down to sleep. I was not molested again by the critters after that.

The next morning, the receptionist made a mention of the fact that I was checking out as I had made a reservation for two nights. Really??!! Still, she let me go paying for one night only.

I asked her what she planned to do about the bed bugs and she said she would tell the cleaning staff to vacuum the entire mattress. I responded that that was not enough and I recommended they vacate the room of other guests and fumigate it. To this, the receptionist turned wide-eyed. Then silence.

Anyways, it's only a suggestion based on what I've read. I'll just get going now, I told her.

It's times like this that completely drain me of my will. I'm just so tired now and wish I could call a genie to fly me home and pour me a bath of cold milk so I could soak all these burning bruises away. But of course, I have to keep going. I'm sitting in the living room of another hostel now, waiting for my new dorm room to open up. I'm listening in on conversations between other guests and I've so far made out that everyone is from the US and they all appear to speak with a frat boy accent. Just great.

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A few stops in Greece - The end of the journey with my sister

Still travelling with my sister, Kiyoung, we entered Greece through Santorini. You won't see too many backpackers here, wealth emanated from the air here.

I had a grand time here. Every angle of this place was visually satisfying and inspiring. My sister, however, was not as enthusiastic. This was probably the most touristy stop on the entire trip and she was less of a fan of the conspicuous opulence than I was. To each their own, I suppose.

Some shots from Santorini:

Despite that fact that it's an island, it's a bit hard to get around Santorini. Outside the towns, the roads become a nightmare to walk on - what with the complete lack of sidewalks and high volume of vehicles speeding past. So I convinced my hesitant sister we should rent an ATV. And this turned out to be a great idea thanks to yours truly. :-)

After an unmemorable layover in Athens, we headed further North to Meteora, a small cluster of monasteries built on cliff-tops.

Just like Turkey, Greece has no shortage of absolutely adorable stray cats. I realize the prior cat picture has no relation to the rest of the story but I just had to insert it in there because, come on, look at that cutey.

After another unmemorable stop in Athens, my sister and I parted ways so she could get back to something called a job. I then headed North to Greece's second largest city, Thessaloniki. The city is famous for many things. But it was probably the graffiti that made the greatest impression for me.

It's funny, but I don't think I really understood Greek hospitality until the very end of my time here. The realization struck me while in Thessaloniki as I chatted with a 25-year-old boy who likes to hang out at my hostel all day.

Neither a worker nor a guest at the hostel, I had a hard time figuring out what his presence was for. I initially wrote him off as one of those guys who likes to hang around in waiting for young, European girls to check in like a shark looking for their next prey. Not that I'm saying he isn't one of those kinds of guys, because I'm still sure he is. But during one unlikely sober conversation, he started telling me about the diversity of people he was able to meet through the hostel. The overt story was that he got to sleep with women from all over the world. But beyond that, I could sense his satisfaction in being able to help ignorant travellers - guy or girl - see the very best of his city; done in exchange for nothing more than a temporal social connection. Just the very act of sharing this experience gave him great joy.

And this is the sticking point I could never get past before. To me, it's impossible to comprehend this level of hospitality which comes with no strings attached. It made me feel bad because perhaps I'd been acting too cynical this whole time in both Turkey and Greece.

I had swung even further into cautiousness while travelling with my sister, who loved chatting it up with everyone, including the obviously shady ones. Those were some harrowing times for me. I'm sure my sister will give a completely different tale.

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Tomorrow, I'm heading back to Istanbul via an 8-hour bus. I just can't seem to get enough of that city. I'll spend 4 days there and afterwards, I take a flight to New Delhi, booked last minute. I learned a bit late that Diwali is taking place October 23rd so I'm getting into India just in time for the end of the festivities.

I'm having a hard time envisioning New Delhi as even more frantic than when I was last there but I've been warned it will be. I'm a bit nervous about the whole thing to be honest. Like meeting an old friend I haven't kept in touch with. What will it be like this time around? Will it welcome me back into its chaos? Hopefully it will but maybe it'll swallow me whole on top of that.

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Konya to Ephesus

A few pictures from the rest of my trip in Turkey. This is going to be a short and sweet post. I'm sitting in a cafe in wifi-starved Santorini, running out the precious little time I have on this connection.

Visiting Chata hoyuk, an archeological site near Konya dated to the point at which humans first moved from nomadic lifestyles to settlements.

Getting in a whirling dervish show in Konya - for FREE! We happened upon an admission-free annual cultural event in the city.

Soaking in the hot springs of Pammukale. This was a bit of a let down for me. As evidenced in the picture, it would be a really beautiful place, if only you could actually see the landscape underneath all the tourists.

A close up of the mineral rock

The ancient city of Hierapolis stands above the hot springs.

Visiting Ephesus in Western Turkey, another ancient Roman city.

A short stop to the city of Kusadasi on the coast. And a view of the USS Bataan, which is stationed at their port.

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Hot air ballooning over Cappadocia

It's true, riding a hot air balloon in Cappadocia is painfully expensive and you spend the whole time in a basket stuffed to the brim with other tourists. But I'd say it's one of those rare activities that turn out to be completely worth the hype. This was so much fun!

With the pilot after the flight

For anyone researching this trip and in need of a rec, we used Air Kapadokya and paid 150USD for a one-hour ride. It was a reasonable price and I was perfectly satisfied with their service. Bigger names like Butterfly Balloons will charge about 50USD more for the same ride. What you get in return is a better reputation for safety.

Other sites from around Cappadocia:

Overlooking the town of Goreme

Selime Monastery

Resting in the sun in Goreme

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