One Camel, Two Hijabs and the tomb of Sheikh Zayed

Pretty busy day today..  we headed down to the cultural centre to check out some local history. The boys got to ride a camel - I was too scared. We then shot over to the Grand Mosque.. it was impressive although the best part was that Denise and Ange had to put on a hijab.  This new mosque was built at the direction of the previous ruler of UAE, Sheihk Zayed, who died in 2004.  He wanted the mosque to be accessible to non-Muslims to promote understanding etc.  His tomb is built on the site and he has a team of guys to constantly sing/ recite the Qur’an around the clock. We had a lunch at a shopping mall with a huge indoor fountain and shot through to the public beach. This was strictly divided into two areas: single female + family area and separate area for single men.  I think if you were a single man travelling to this part of the world, you would be best off to turn gay, as you probably see more action that way.  Anyway, I was still quite surprised that in the female/ family section bikini's easily outnumbered one-piece outfits and there was even a g-string or two.  Well I think that's enough detail.. it was all quite interesting from a cultural perspective.  I don't think I could live in this type of environment though - just far too conservative for my liking.