SHOPPING ON: Dubai Souk

Pecinta film Sex and The City pasti ingat dengan adegan berbelanja di salah satu pasar tradisional di Dubai, Uni Emirat Arab. Sepatu-sepatu Alladin, kain motif khas Timur Tengah, rempah-rempah dan masih banyak lagi ada di area pasar menarik di Dubai.

I bet all fans of Sex and The City the movie still remember the shopping scene in one of traditional market at Dubai, Uni Emirat Arab. Those markets had lots of interesting stuff like Alladin shoes, Middle-East designed fabric, herbs and spices, and many more.

Salah satu pasar yang wajib dikunjungi saat ke Dubai adalah Souq Al-Arsa, pasar tertua di Uni Emirat Arab yang dahulu menjadi lokasi pertukaran dan geliat ekonomi Dubai masa lampau saat pedagang Persia dan India datang dan bertransaksi dengan warga lokal.

One of the must-visit markets at Dubai is Souq Al-Arsa, the oldest market in Uni Emirat Arab which formerly became the exchange site and economy center of Dubai when merchants from Persian and Indian came to have business with local people.

Crossing the river to Souq Al-Arsa

Sulit untuk berjalan lurus di pasar ini dan bahkan sejak sebelum sampai di Souq Al-Arsa, saya dan teman saya, Sylvia sudah beberapa kali berbelok ke beberapa toko yang sangat menarik sebelum menyeberang di Abra dan kemudian berjalan masuk ke Souq Al-Arsa.

It’s hard to just pass along the market. Even before coming to Souq Al-Arsa, me and my friend, Sylvia, already stopped by some interesting shops for several times before crossing in Abra then continue walking to the entrance of Souq Al-Arsa.

Meski sudah beberapa kali diperbaharui dan sebagian toko sudah cukup modern dengan air conditioner di dalamnya, sejumlah elemen masa lalu masih dipertahankan seperti bentuk dan motif kayu serta atap yang menjadi kanopi di jalanan tengah Souq Al-Arsa.

Even though the souk has been renovated several times and some part of it already modern with air conditioner inside but the element of the past is still maintained until now, all the pattern and wooden ceiling which gave you the old Arabic feeling is the main attention of Souq Al-Arsa.

Spices & Herbs

Jangan hanya berjalan menyusuri toko-toko di jalanan utama karena bagian menyenangkan adalah memasuki gang-gang kecil dengan berbagai toko kecil di kiri dan kanan. Pedagang akan terus memanggil-manggil namun cukup tetap lewat dan tersenyum jika tidak berminat membeli :)

Do not only walk down the main street because small shops inside the alleys are also tempting. The sellers would keep calling and asking you to buy their goods, if you didn’t wanna buy just keep smiling and go ahead

Bagian yang juga tidak boleh dilewatkan di Souq Al-Arsa adalah Gold Souq atau pasar emas. Di Dubai harga emas cenderung lebih murah karena tidak dikenakan pajak. Selain itu juga terdapat banyak perhiasan emas dengan bentuk dan ukuran yang fantastis, bahkan hingga memecahkan rekor dunia.

One thing that you couldn’t be missed in Souq Al-Arsa was Gold Souq or golden market. In Dubai, gold is duty-free so the price tends to be cheaper. Another information, they made gold into an impressive jewelry with fantastic shape and size, even broke the world record.

So, are you ready to shop here?

@marischkaprue - the journeys are gold, the memories are diamonds

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Desert Safari: Fun With Sands

It was all sands, all your eyes can see are hills made of sands. The driver speed up and here we go, directly to the top of the sand hill and we don't know what's behind it, cannot see since it was a sharp edge.

Fun in sand dunes

Seconds later our car feels like falling just as a roller coaster ride when you feel your body grabbed by the gravity and what's holding you at the seat is of course, the seatbelt.

Super fun!

We screamed loud, so happy and excited. All those maneuver at the sand dunes are just so fun and exciting, not as much as scary as what some people think about speeding up and downs those sand dunes; it was all fun and safe! The driver knows what to do and how to handle driving on sand dunes, so what we gotta do is just sit, put seatbelt on and enjoy the thrill.

There are some safety rules before you hop onto this car. First you must always put your seatbelt on, don't open the window during maneuver and just tell the driver if you feel a bit dizzy.

Sands everywhere!

I think I got the right dress for this safari

After the fun ride, we stop at - of course - some sand dunes and just enjoy the scenery filled with desert wherever you set your eyes on. I just wish the are places with all sands because there are some tree on those area and for me it would be so exotic if we got a spot with all sands, no tree at all.

She's beautiful, isn't she? :)

This is the best shot I can get haha

Another thing you can see during the safari is the falcon show. Basicaly they will show you how fast the falcon is, which is about 300 kilometers per hour on average top speed, wow! On this show, the falcon won't move at those speed but even in their "basic" speed, it was so hard for me to take the picture of the peregrine falcon while flying, they just move so fast - and I'm not a pro photographer also so small dots of bird is what I got.

So lucky that an oryx came when we wait for the falcon show, it doesn't usually appear if they sense people are around so we are lucky :)

in front of the camp

night at the desert

here comes the belly dancer

You can see this falcon show before the safari with the car on the sand dunes, and after sunset all cars will go to the big camp with open tent and foods. The main attraction on this camp is the belly dance show. The dancer's body is very supple, she can bend or twist her hips easily (of course, she's a belly dancer) and it's quite amazing to see how she can move her hips and belly :D

Milky way at the desert, photo by Yuriy Kulik

After all those show, we then enjoy the show presented by nature: stargazing. They turn off all the lights at the camp so we can see the stars on the desert. A sweet ending before we leave to go back to the hotel.

Desert Safari is a mandatory thing to do while in Dubai, and you just have to believe me on that ;)

@marischkaprue - at the desert or at the beach, she loves sands

NOTES:

• There are a lot of tour providing Desert Safari Tour, I went with Arabian Adventures, you can see their package here
• The price for Desert Safari is 360 AED (Emirati Dirham) or around Rp. 1,2 juta per person. It will include pick up from your hotel, all drinks during safari and dinner, all attractions during safari and drop back ride to your hotel.
• It took around 1 until 1,5 hours from Downtown Dubai to the Desert Conservation Reserve where the safari took place.

Thanks to Emirates and DTCM (Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing) Dubai for inviting me to Dubai. This is as a part of their "See You in Dubai" campaign. I went to Dubai with Emirates, they have a very nice business class.

Visit Dubai with these fun people, glad to know you guys!

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A Day Inside Emirates Training College

Harus diakui, kita pasti pernah ingin tahu rasanya duduk di area depan pesawat. Bukan di kursi penumpang bagian depan, tapi duduk di kursi pilot. Bayangkan menjadi pilot, berhadapan dengan banyak tombol dan alat, dan menerbangkan pesawat! Terdengar seru bukan? Nah, yang saya alami di sini lebih dari seru. Saya merasa sangat girang seperti anak kecil saat menunjungi Emirates Training College.

Admit it, we always want to know what it feels like to sit in front at the airplane. Not the front passenger seat, but the pilot seat. Imagine you're sitting as a pilot, dealing with all those buttons and tools and there you are, flying the plane. Sounds fun right? Well here, what I got is more than fun. It's super exciting and I'm so happy like a kid at Emirates Training College.

Tempat ini bukan Taman Bermain, namun benar-benar asli dan merupakan tempat latihan sesungguhnya. Itulah yang membuat datang ke sini semakin menarik. Kami, para blogger dan jurnalis, diundang untuk mengintip pelatihan Emirates Training College di Dubai. Tempat ini tidak untuk umum jadi hanya undangan khusus yang boleh melihat ke dalam. Saya merasa sangat beruntung bisa mengunjungi tempat ini.

This place isn’t a theme park, it's a real thing and that what makes it even more exciting. We (bloggers and journalist) got invited to take a peek of what's inside Emirates Training College in Dubai. This place isn't open for public so you gotta be invited to see what's inside and I consider myself very lucky to be able to visit this place.

Ada beberapa area pusat pelatihan yang bisa kita lihat, seperti :

There are several areas of training center that we can see:

Cabin Service Training

The inside resembles the real cabin

Di sini kita dapat melihat interior pesawat tiruan atau dummy untuk pelatihan para kru kabin pesawat, mulai dari pesawat besar Airbus 380-800 sampai Boeing 777-300 ER. Interior tiruan ini terlihat persis seperti aslinya, hanya saja peralatan untuk hiburan tidak berfungsi.

Here you can find "dummy" of the interior of the plane for cabin crew service training. From the huge Airbus 380-800 until Boeing 777-300 ER interior which look the same as the real one, the diffence is just the entertainment system is not working, it's just dummy.

It's for service training so the entertainment system is just a dummy

Di area ini kru kabin berlatih agar terbiasa dengan suasana interior pesawat dan mengetahui pelayanan apa yang harus diberikan pada setiap bagian kabin, misalnya perbedaan pelayanan dan makanan untuk penumpang kelas satu dan ekonomi.

Here the cabin crews learn about the interior environment, knowing what service should be given to each sections of the cabin, from first class to economy with different treatment of service and meals.

The lavatory at first class sections of Emirates A380

looks and feels like the real thing but it don't fly

Karena saya tidak datang untuk training, ini adalah suatu kesempatan yang menyenangkan untuk bisa melihat dan lalu lalang di kabin yang kosong, yang biasanya sulit mendapat kesempatan seperti ini.Kami juga jadi tahu perbedaan antar bagian pesawat Emirates. 

Since I wasn't there for training, it was a fun look around visit especially normally passenger don't have a chance to just stroll around in empty cabin. We also see differences between sections in Emirates airplane.

Emergency Training

it's so fun to see this!

Kami pun menelusuri area lain dan melihat sebuah model pesawat besar untuk simulasi situasi darurat. Di sini kru kabin dilatih untuk tahu apa yang harus dilakukan jika keadaan darurat terjadi.

We went to different area and found a huge airplane model, simulators of emergency situations that might happen and here's where the cabin crew trained to know what to do on those emergency situations.

Hal pertama yang menarik perhatian saya sejak awal adalah dua seluncuran besar di samping pesawat, yang akan terpompa saat keadaan darurat. Thank God saya tidak pernah melihat kedua seluncur ini di keadaan darurat sesungguhnya. Ada juga semacam sistem hidrolik di bawah untuk mensimulasikan guncangan dan pergerakan selama situasi darurat.

What I notice since the beginning is the two big sliders, which will inflate if any emergency situations happened (Thank God I never saw it in real life situations, better not), also some kind of hydraulic system below it to simulate the shake and movements during emergency situations.

Who wants to slide into the pool?

Masih di area yang sama, kami melihat sebuah kolam yang terhubung ke alat simulator di atas, untuk pelatihan jika keadaan darurat terjadi di laut, dan setiap kru kabin harus meluncur ke kolam berisi air dingin tersebut untuk merasakan bagaimana jika situasi yang serupa terjadi. 

On the same area we can find a pool that connects to the simulators, for training if the emergency situations occurs at the sea. They told us that they must slide into the cold water to feel the similar situations if those things happen.

Pilot Training

Sayangnya kami tidak bisa melihat ke dalam ruang simulator pilot karena saat itu sedang ada sesi pelatihan. Namun saya beruntung karena pada kunjungan saya tahun 2011 ke Emirates, saya mendapat kesempatan untuk duduk di kursi pilot dan mencoba mengoperasikannya, tentu dengan perhatian dan pengawasan khusus. Rasanya sangat luar biasa, berbeda dengan simulator di mall karena lebih nyata (dan memang merupakan simulator asli untuk training pilot). Selain itu, simulator ini juga dapat memperagakan berbagai situasi misalnya jika terjadi hujan, ataupun badai dengan pergerakan yang menyerupai jika situasi asli terjadi.

We weren't able to see inside the pilot simulators due to training sessions at that time, but during my visit in 2011 (also with Emirates), I had a chance to sit at the pilot seat and try to operate it (with special attentions and supervision of course) but it was spectacular. It's different with the simulations at the mall since it really like the real thing, it can simulate all kind of situations also and the movements are just exactly the same.

Met the Cabin Crew

 

Di akhir kunjungan, kami semua makan siang di Emirates Training College. Kami sangat senang bisa makan bersama para kru kabin yang cantik dan tampan ;)

At the end of our visit, we have a lunch at Emirates Training College. Yes, in the middle of those good-looking cabin crews, we're all excited ;)

Met a cabin crew from Indonesia :)

Benar-benar pengalaman yang menyenangkan dapat melihat ke dalam tempat pelatihan penerbangan di Emirates Training College. Tak hanya itu, kami jadi tahu sisi lain dari kehidupan para kru kabin.

It's a very nice experience to be able to see and take a look what's inside, also it makes us see a bit the other side of the life of cabin crews.

@marischkaprue - she loves airplane, it took her to various beautiful destinations

Thanks to Emirates and DTCM (Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing) Dubai for inviting me to Dubai. This is as a part of their "See You in Dubai" campaign. I went to Dubai with Emirates, they have a very nice business class.

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