I boarded the plane in LV after a very sad and disappointing attempt to reconnect with my dear brother, Mark.
The Jetblue fight was a redeye so I don't recall much about the JFK. I was just working to switch my sleep pattern 15 hrs. ahead. I rechecked my luggage with Emirates Air and sleepily talked to Linda, after 4 hrs. of straining to stay awake it was time to go.
The airline was off the hook! Snacks, fancy meals, 12in. screen on every seat and the best part of the 12hr. trip was it was uncrowded so those folks up front who paid 4K for a seat that lays down had nothing on me! I watched a TV show from the UK called "Secret Millionaire" where an unknown rich person goes back to his/her roots, lives frugally for 10 days and then has to choose a cause or individual to help. They had 3 episodes and they all made me cry both because of the folks they helped and to see the impact it made on the rich!
On the flight I befriended an elderly Bangladeshi man sitting in front of me as I notice he didn't understand the technology in front of him(music, Movies, TV, etc. Communication between us took awhile and he got a little mad at me once or twice, but we worked though it. He thought it was funny I was only going to be gone 5mos. as he had been away from home 2yrs. He laughed and pointed at me and said "short time!!" When we landed in Dubai the x-ray of his bag showed a pair of sisors for trimming his beard the had slipped thru JFK!! When security tried to get into his bag he started yelling at them so they grabbed his passport! When I got thru I told him he was my friend which was a little scary because by then everyone was yelling and they kept yelling at me "HE'S YOUR FRIEND?' in what I think was some disbelief since I couldn't even pronounce his name. They wanted me to explain that he HAD to stop yelling at them and I took him by the shoulder and told him they were police and shush. It worked and once he calmed down they let him go (with the siccors....nice).
Once inside the Dubai airport I felt as though I'd never left LasVegas! Add slot machines and take away squat toilets (about half of them) and it would be hard to tell the difference. People from everywhere, everything brand spanky new, even fake palm trees and 3 Starbucks. I'm only1/3 of the way adjusting my sleep and I'm tripping. The place is at least 3 miles long and I had 6 hours to explore. I ate a chopp salad at some fast food place because I had to try beef bacon (no pork in Dubai!) anyway it tasted the same. A couple stark differences though: McDonald's assures all meat is Halal and serves a McArabic, and the group of 75+ all in a nice shade of green from Togo going on their Haj. All of the luggage was on the women's heads so when a women lost her sandal she just kept going. When they stopped I tapped her on the shoulder and put it on her foot for her, everyone thanked the stranger in the cowboy hat profusely!