As I was carrying the puke-covered baby in her car seat down the narrow hallway, all I could think was, “how the mighty have fallen.” Four short hours before I was sitting in the Imperial Club lounge, feasting on scones with clotted cream, mini blueberry cheesecakes, and Pellegrino with lime. Then sadly, it was time to leave heaven on earth and move to the Holiday Inn Express.
It’s not too bad, except instead of a tub there’s a tiny corner shower with sliding doors so it’s like being trapped in a plastic box. Oh, and the water had to run for 10 minutes before it heated up enough to shower (I had it maxed out and it still was closer to barely warm than scalding hot). And as we headed to our room there were several rooms with the doors open, revealing people picnicking on the floor, playing games, and passed out asleep in a rumpled bed. It felt a little like walking into a crack house. Not that I’ve actually been to a crack house, but that’s totally what they look like on tv. Except on tv the people aren’t as happy or as well fed.
Anyway, the purpose of this hotel was purely functional. Just a home base to sleep at while we explore the biggest mall in the world (Dubai Mall), go skiing in the middle of the desert at the largest indoor ski slope in the Middle East, and visit the tallest building in the world, the Burj Kalifa.
So we head out to get dinner at the food court at Dubai Mall. Last time we were there we ate at Baja Fresh and Fat Burger, I bought a cute hat, and we were awed by its size and beauty. This time I had plans to visit Lush and Sephora and beyond that, I was open to whatever. This time the only thing we were awed by was the traffic. Today is the first day of Eid, the three day holiday marking the end of Ramadan, and everyone in UAE decided to celebrate with some shopping. Normally, not a big deal except that many things in the Middle East are not designed logically, and this parking structure was one of them.
We spent almost an hour trapped in underground parking garage hell, never finding a spot and never finding a way to go up or down a level. There were main lanes that just dead ended, requiring people to do many-pointed turns to get turned around to go back the other way. There were huge empty sections blocked off for valet parking. When Josh drives the parking gods always smile on him, but not today. I told him that we needed to go back to the hotel and grab a cab because our hotel wasn’t that far from the mall, but Josh doesn’t give up easily so I told him 10 more minutes before we surrender.
Just then we hear coughing and gagging from the back seat and then the dreaded splash, followed by “Camille threw up!” Since vomit trumps everything, we headed back to the hotel, I got the puke prize, and they grabbed a cab back. The water had barely gotten warm in the shower before I got a text saying they had arrived. (See? The taxi idea was way faster.) I got the puker cleaned up and then she threw up again on the floor so I got that cleaned up and now she’s sleeping on top of a towel.
On one hand I’m glad she was healthy while we were at Atlantis, on the other hand, if I were going to be trapped in the hotel room it would be a lot nicer to have the buffet and drink station down the hall, free wifi, and chocolates to help kill time. Oh, and that huge bathtub. I could be pretty happy trapped in that hotel room for a week at least.
A few hours before the puking started she was doing this: Coincidence?
***I spent the next 36 hours stuck in the hotel room and went through piles of towels, but at the 24 hour mark she stopped throwing up and was her perky, yelly self by morning. By then it was time to leave, but I was able to hit Lush and Sephora on our way out of town, so that part of the trip wasn’t a total bust.
