So far east ... I'm west

When flying on El Etihad airlines, you are not only given a map of where you are on the in-seat-video, but a constant compass of where Mecca is in relationship to the plane on the ground and in the air. And in hotels, there is a little arrow in every hotel room pointing to the same. We think of Muslims bowing to the east for Mecca, but in Abu Dhabi - it is actually to the west. We are a long way from home!

After flying 3+ hours from Mumbai to Abu Dhabi after midnight, we were thankful to be met by Mike and Mattie, friends from Bent Tree who have intentionally chosen to live and work outside the US to have Impact (with a capital "I") It's been a difficult transition for Mike, Mattie and three of their children, with another son back in the US in college. Tough to move away from close friends and family, tough to adapt to the business culture, tough to do it without an organization or team to hook up with, tough in every sense of the word. But it's obvious that Mike and Mattie consider home where ever they settle as a family.

We scheduled some extra time to hang out and encourage them, but I'm pretty sure it would be a tie as to who really got the benefit from this "detour."

We hung out, went to breakfast ... coffee! ... Chilis for lunch. Kudos to Chilis for their quality control - everything tasted exactly the same as in the US ... hanging out at their apt ... grocery shopping ... more coffee ... and then a fun Lebonese buffet dinner to celebrate.


View from our hotel. Abu Dhabi is a maze of high-rise buildings along the coast that quickly fade into the desert.

The highlight of day was a tour of the opulent 6th largest mosque in the world that was completed about 2 months ago.

It wasn't the tour itself, but that Mattie had asked her friend, Buzshra to come along to give us the details of the mosque. Buzshra is an Iraqi Believer, formerly Muslim - married to a Muslim man. As she told us about the details of the mosque, she started to get quiet - mentioning that it was painful to think of all the years she wasted in this empty religion and alluding to the difficulty of her mixed marriage.




We finished the day seeing the church where they worship and then a fun dinner at a Lebanese restaurant.

Buzshra brought scarves that we needed to wear in the mosque and then graciously gave them to us. It is a nice prayer reminder of Buzshra and the culture.

Then time to go home! Leaving at midnight, we had a 15 hour flight from Abu Dhabi to New York. Then a 7 hour layover in New York (with a train trip to Jamaica Queens to pass the time - pizza, yumm). And finally, a 4 hour flight to Dallas.

So wonderful to be met by Marty at the airport. After a call to our favorite Mexican restaurant for traditional after-trip-dinner to pick up and a hot shower, it's good to be home!

For the whole slide show of India trip that includes more pictures, just click on the picture below to use controls and see the captions. (Double click on the slide show to see the pictures individually.)