From the cool of the apartment to the unbearable heat of the city we slunk.
For five paces from the front door you really believe that today will be cooler. Then you move beyond the cool waft of air escaping from the interior and beads of sweat well up with each step. Today we went to the only museum in town.
Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan died in 2004. Our destination was neither his mausoleum or a museum, but a Morrocanesque building housing his personal effects where you can see his collection of rifles and machine guns in glass cabinets, between his leopard and lion skin pelts and Mercedes gull wings.
His pictures line the long cool corridors. As the first son of the first sheikh of modern Abu Dhabi he looks gauche and ill-at-ease. As a young ruler, he has grown into his looks. By his forties, his teeth have been fixed and he has perfected the thousand yard stare of a matinee filmstar.
Even as an older man, he had a firm jaw and look about the eyes that suggested he would deal with it, whatever it was. He seemed at ease as a man of the people, even if they were a carefully selected group of accolytes, pre-briefed for the press release.
He took Abu Dhabi from the stone age to the space age and still seems genuinely revered by the people. While his son, Sheikh Khalifa, has occupied the throne for seven years, he still feels like an heir-apparent, so heavy does his father's legacy lay over him.
Inheriting the family estate with the books in order may seem like a blessing, but you can hear something Arabic, whispered on the wind.
'Big boots, son. Big boots.'
For five paces from the front door you really believe that today will be cooler. Then you move beyond the cool waft of air escaping from the interior and beads of sweat well up with each step. Today we went to the only museum in town.
Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan died in 2004. Our destination was neither his mausoleum or a museum, but a Morrocanesque building housing his personal effects where you can see his collection of rifles and machine guns in glass cabinets, between his leopard and lion skin pelts and Mercedes gull wings.
His pictures line the long cool corridors. As the first son of the first sheikh of modern Abu Dhabi he looks gauche and ill-at-ease. As a young ruler, he has grown into his looks. By his forties, his teeth have been fixed and he has perfected the thousand yard stare of a matinee filmstar.
Even as an older man, he had a firm jaw and look about the eyes that suggested he would deal with it, whatever it was. He seemed at ease as a man of the people, even if they were a carefully selected group of accolytes, pre-briefed for the press release.
He took Abu Dhabi from the stone age to the space age and still seems genuinely revered by the people. While his son, Sheikh Khalifa, has occupied the throne for seven years, he still feels like an heir-apparent, so heavy does his father's legacy lay over him.
Inheriting the family estate with the books in order may seem like a blessing, but you can hear something Arabic, whispered on the wind.
'Big boots, son. Big boots.'
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