Dubai

What a place to spend money doing so many different and exciting things...the shopping malls with amazing displays including a Diplodocus Longus dinasour, cinemas, art and entertainment; simulation of sky diving with Papá; greeting the penguins with mummy; 6 hours in Kidzania where I learnt to be a dentist, fireman, security guard, working in Mcdonalds, bottling coke, making perfumes, climbing wall of a building, actor, getting money from a bank; swimming with dolphins and up and down waterpark slides including going through a tank of fish and rays; driving in the desert in a 4-wheel jeep; watching belly dancing and riding a camel; making friends including Martin from Kenya (my best friend from Dubai); playing football on the sand and swimming in the sea which had jelly fish (yuck - message from mummy); Papá took a helicopter ride; we celebrated our trip with a drink to view the coast at night on 52nd floor of a hotel; and of course visited the Burj Khalifa viewing at 452 m (out of 850m) at the 124th floor. Our best shopping mall was Souk Madinat Jumeirah.... and we walked passed a Lamborghini and Ferrari to see the Burj Al Arab 6 star hotel (not allowed to wonder in). At the mall we bought a compass for our sea theme in Óbidos and ate big burger and cocktails for dinner.

Abu Dhabi

We went for a day to Abu Dhabi to Ferrari World and the Mosque Sheik Sahed. Wonderful fun day at Ferrari World and beautiful visit to the Mosque.
Ferrari World is an adventure rides park - Papá went on the fastest roller coaster in the world with 230 km in 5 seconds...I went with papá and then mummy tried too after she saw me do it...on a roller coaster probably half that speed and what a thrill...we did every ride and popped out to go to see the Mosque - wonderful architecture and colour. We then went to the Marina next to the Formula 1 racing track and had dinner. I listened to the band playing while the dinner was made and then I went running around/through the water fountain just to cool off :-)

Qatar

On our way to Dubai, we stopped one night/day in Doha, Qatar...and the heat began :-) We had a lovely walk around the Souk Waqif straight from our hotel where it had all different areas - gold where mummy bought a necklace, birds/tortoises/parrots/all sorts of animals for pets, clothing, perfumes, spices, nuts etc...we also walked to the falcon souq. Wow, you walk into the 'shops' and there are a number of falcons on display, most of them with their eyes protected...bizarre for me. We visited the Islamic Art Museum which is a beautiful building, located on the estuary so a great view across to the modern skyline. It had a special exhibition called Kings and Prawns explaining the history of chess - very interesting - beyond the wonderful permanent exhibitions. Then back to the hotel for the luggage and onto the modern 'hub' airport to continue to Dubai.

School events

Even though mum's french is poor we have some discussion and then we go to join the school events in the evening....this time it was quiz night and I had fun sitting with my friends...surrounded by girls my parents noted....and they sat and met some new parents....in fact it became the foreign table but came 3rd in the competition with not one national Belgium on the team - the quiz was varied on topics of music (yep including old french and Belgium groups), famous faces, maths, history, riddles...and we ate Thai food which was enjoyed more by the parents that the kids, certainly not me except the rice and stew that came at 9.30pm :-)

We also went to see ~The Brick~ exhibition...included The Scream, T-Rex (made of +80,000 pieces) 

Champagne, anyone?

We visited our relatives Papá's Tio, Tia with Vitor and Rafael in Reims. We picked mamá from the Thalys train just back from the US and drove straight for a lovely dinner. The next  day we went to visit Mercier champagne caves before driving home and stopping to visit the largest fort in Europe in Sedan.We arrived on the day of a bicycle/run competition which was fun to be surrounded by. Beautiful weekend.

Portugal carnival week

We went to Portugal for the school holiday to catch up with everyone..went to the cinema to see Lego film with Tio and Rodrigo, visited the family in Vale Cambra for dinner and slept the night before going to Óbidos and then being joined by Tia, Tio, R, R and then grandparents. We of course did some more works in the house like lights, unpacked and set-up the dining room etc...well Papá and the adults...I played Wii, football, made loads of noise etc :-). We dressed up, me as a pirate, and we joined the Carnival procession in Torres Vedras.

Molenheide

I could take a friend with me so Anael joined us for an afternoon of fun at Molenheide where we played mini-golf and then played in the kids fun park. The mini-golf was cool and designed as a mine and last few holes passed through the world of dinosaurs with the last hole No. 18 having a roaring T-Rex. We then played on rigging, pirate castle, football, inflatable climbing wall/slide, up and down a lift etc...On the way home we ate my favourite: popcorn...we made it last by eating every km for 74 km home :-)