Dragon Boating

Its 5am on a Monday. I’m rowed over facing the couch and suddenly I hear a voice, when I turn over I see a fuzzy figure standing over me. Initially my reaction was to drop kick that scary looking figure and take defensive actions. However, as my vision adjusted I realized that it was Nancy. “Weiiiiii, do you want to go to dragon boatinggggg?”



Nancy belongs to a Dragon Boat team, kind of like crew, but it’s different. I say different for a lack of a better word to describe the awkward style of rowing. The boat seats about 20 some people in rows of two, so you are only rowing on one side of the boat. There is a person at the back working, what I would consider the rudder. However since it doesn’t look like your traditional rudder and more like a long paddle, I’m sure it’s probably called something else. The rowing style consists of making an A shape with your arms. Much of the power comes from your back and shoulders. The form was really difficult to get use to.



My first day at dragon boating was really intense. To be honest I was kind of tired just from the warm up. Furthermore it was really confusing too. Because our coach’s name is Wai, pronounced why. But for someone reason some people would call her “Way”. I’ve only ever met one other Wei in my life and she went by her American name of Maria so this was really strange for me. Now I know how all the Johns and Jennifers feel.



Eventually I got to like Dragon Boating and made some friends there too. We got to a point where we were doing a meet to show off the sport at Dubai Festival City. Oh yeah all the different areas of Dubai are called cities, ei Internet City, Media City, International City, etc. It was hot and during the middle of the day. I think I was dehydrated from the night before too and also running around at 3am trying to find breakfast items with Ben, but that’s an entirely other story.



It was a really short race but the sun just made us all really tired. Afterwards, Nancy#1, Nancy#2, Ben and I headed to Barracudas for a liquor run. Barracudas is a liquor store out in the middle of nowhere and when I say nowhere I mean we drove by a giant sand dune to get to it. This store has alcohol from all over the world to suit the needs of all the expats. In Dubai you must have a liquor card to buy alcohol in bulk and also there is a heavy tax. However, here in BFE the prices are good. To really bring out the point of BFE, here are some pictures of us playing on a sand dune on the way to middle of nowhere liquor store.