July 18, 2024
Day D2B: We're Boiling Here
After somewhat successful planning, I took a taxi to Barry's and then survived a fitness class. The instructor seemed all friendly and nice during the introduction, but she had a hidden agenda to torture her clients. All of a sudden, she changed tone and started screaming at us. The focus was on butts and abs, and my glute muscles have not recovered yet from the class.
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Then for whatever stupid reason I decided to walk back to the shopping mall near Airbnb. How bad could it be right? Only 3km and the temperature had dropped to 39 degreees instead of 46 like a few days ago. Well it was pretty nasty. About halfway I realized I wasn't going to make it. That 24 hour pharmacy came up from the previous walk, and I ducked in hoping to buy a drink. Instead one of the attendants, an older local lady wearing a hijab (yes they exist here, only about 20% of the population) took pity on me. She prepared some water and electrolyte solution and said, "Here sir, take this and sit down and drink." I was grateful for that and this was a reminder of the legendary Arab hospitality I had heard of.
After that delightful little stop, another Arab, this time an older man driving his car saw me and pulled up. He said, "You look like you're boiling, would you like a ride?" I politely turned him down because it was only 500 meters away from the shopping mall but was again touched by the offer. Once inside the mall, that refreshing AC hit me hard and I had to rest for over an hour to drink lots of fluids and eat solid food at the salad bar to replenish.
I was starting to take the hint that walking in this heat wasn't the brightest of ideas. Thankfully I hadn't started biking yet, although I saw lots of bikes on the road so people were doing it.
After having recovered, I walked into the Orange Theory and negotiated with the front desk but she was being rather pushy. Thankfully two coaches came out and had my back. These were the ones with the amazing bodies. They said to me, "No problem at all, just do drop in classes. It's up to you, take rest today, don't push too hard. As long as you're coming in here and doing classes it is fine." They also both gave looks to the front desk and the conversation was done in such a way to indicate they didn't want these sales pitches that could scare away customers. It was nice that these coaches were on my side, and it also felt great that I was popular in only what, the second or third day in Dubai?
On that note, it was time to switch gears and start partying.
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