Sri Lanka... It's like Afghanistan but with beaches, women, and food.

My flight here was on another new airline for me - Air Arabia - from Sharjah to Colombo. Booked the day before I flew out, it was only $81.25



Shipwreck beach. My hotel is right across the street, $5 a night.



This photo should have been better. The sand crab was cooperating, my camera was not.



The food here is of course fantastic. This was lunch today. It's like Indian but instead of rice or bread what you mix with the vegitable curries is these rice noodle things called string hoppers. In this photo the curry on the far left in the dish was the best. It was lentils and squash. The 4 sauces around the string hoppers on the plate in front are from the containers behind. A guy comes around and scoops out as much as you want. The rectangular plate next to the containers has extra string hoppers, the doughnut like things are soft dough, the cake things behind them are hard and crunchy. Total cost for this meal, 68 cents US.



Breakfast. Again, stringy noodles are used here intead of bread. The filling inside is sugar and coconut. It's really good.



Friendly folks on the train.



Lady selling food stuff in bags. I didn't get to try these, and had no idea what they were. (I found out later that they are lunch packets. Curry and rice wrapped up for a quick lunch at work or at school)



I'm not sure if these were for sale, decoration, or some sort of shrine.

Five Arabian Nights

Getting out of Afghanistan involved a quick trip to the Arabian Peninsula. It started with a flight on a new airline for me - Kam Air - from Kabul to Dubai.

Now I've always wanted to go to Dubai but once I got there I had no idea why. I didn't like the city at all. First thing I did was go to Carrefour.

Then I went to check out the city's skycrapers. I visited Emirates Towers One and Two which are the 23rd and 40th tallest buildings in the world. Neither one has an observation deck.

I also passed by the construction site of the Burj Dubai which when completed will be the undisputed tallest free standing structure in the world.

On my way to Mall of the Emirates and the Burj al Arab I was waiting at a bus stop and someone offered me a ride. But instead of taking me to Mall of the Emirates he took me to a much cooler mall named after the 14th century Arab traveller Ibn Battuta. This mall was huge and followed the theme of Ibn Battutas travels with sections dedicated to different regions he explored. It had sections for Persia, India, China, Tunisia, Spain, Egypt. It was amazing. After the mall he took me to his brothers house for a huge dinner. From Dubai I made a short trip to Oman and its capital city Muscat. I liked Muscat, it wasn't overly exciting but it was nice. Then it was back to Dubai and on to the Emirate of Sharjah for my flight out.