Sally The Camel Had One Hump

Randy came home from work yesterday and told me, "one of the guys at the office told me about something going on at the convention center." I asked him what it was and he said he didn't know what it was but was under the impression it was some type of local cultural event and we should go check it out. We went to the convention center and after walking a mile from our parking spot to the convention center we entered, paid our 10 dirhams each and walked inside to discover we were going to a Sporting and Hunting exhibition. I'm more of a mall rat than a hunter but Randy told me there was going to be a camel auction and my morbid sense of curiosity got the best of me so we went in.

It was just like a camping convention in the states only out front in the VIP parking section there were Ferrari's, Maserati's, Bentley's and more Range Rovers than I could count and a giant trailer with "Camel Stud Service" painted down the side. We watched the camel auction (not everyone can say they have been to one of those!) and Randy hoisted Artem on his shoulders so little man could get a better view of the camels and Randy caught a whiff of something very unpleasant. Artem had a runny diaper that had come through his shorts and Randy had just had him on his shoulders, nice start to the evening. I took Artem to the bathroom to change him and it smelled so bad that an elderly British woman that was in the bathroom with me walked past us on the way out, caught a whiff and said, "Oh my Gawd" and left as fast as she could. I was in the bathroom for crying out loud, it wasn't like I changed him at the food court. I got Artem changed, washed off his shorts, and went back out for the speed tour of the Sporting and Hunting show.

We watched a little bit of the camel auction, which apparently camels are a BIG deal around here and can fetch over 1,000,000 dirhams for one camel, saw some falcons, and checked out some high-end dune buggy's. Falcons are used as sport here and it's a big deal for the country and I'm pretty sure they are the national symbol, kind of like our bald eagle. It was something different to do and despite the blow out in Artem's britches, it was a fun time.

Walking the camels around during the bidding. Their auction was actually very slow and the announcer didn't do the speed talking like the announcers in the states do.

Custom dune buggy, just what every man that lives in the desert needs:

Artem kept pointing to the birds saying, "hat, hat".

I know I've discussed before how people come up to Artem constantly and touch him and get in his face. I even had one lady come up to him and take him by the hand and try to lead him away until Artem stopped and pulled away from her and said, "no, mama". Anyway, this has continued every time we go out and we think Artem is getting tired of it because when people approach him he is no longer friendly with them, he turns his head and tries to hide. I don't blame him, even a 22 month old child can get tired of strangers constantly invading his personal space. Last night 3 female Emirate police officers came up to Artem and tried to play with him and get his attention. Artem told them, "no" and turned to me and put his arms up to me. The woman said, "oh is he shy?" and I told her he was and she said, "that's a good sign, here in Arabia we have a saying that if a boy is shy it means he's attached to his mother and loves her very much." It made me smile.

While we were at the exhibition Randy asked me, "Would you have believed me if I told you the first night that I met you that I would be taking you to live in the middle east with our Russian son and we would be going to a camel auction?" Never in a million years would I have believed him but here I am. Crazy how life goes sometime.