New Crib in Dubai Marina

spot our new home and our old home

do you know we're moving to a new place? mr khairul got the keys!

no, not shanghai or london. for months, mr khairul spent countless hours browsing http://www.gnads4u.com/properties, calling real-estate agents, driving in and out - when we finally put our foot down and signed a lease.

we're moving from our ol home in bur dubai to a super-chic, urbanized waterfront living of Dubai Marina. dubai marina, or al-marsa dubai in arabic is a completely man-made *marina set to be the world's largest (hey, it's dubai - kalau tak largest, biggest, tallest - tak sah!) it is even sought out to be the 'new dubai'. it's actually built for 6 billion dollars on the desert sand.

*marina is a fancy dock for small yachts and boats

let's play spot it!

spot our home
spot our mall
spot our path to the beach
spot jumeirah beach residence

Jumeirah Beach Residence
you can see for yourself that this dubai marina area will contain over 200 high-rise buildings including ours! also included is the JBR (Jumeirah Beach Residence) buildings (circled in yellow on my map) which is a stretch of exclusive apartments that directly faces the sea. right adjacent to the building is 'The Walk' - a cool walkway much like our 'bintang walk' - from exclusive restaurants to relaxing cafes and fast food joints - a great place to hang out after or before heading straight to the opposite beach.

a very small part of 'the walk' - depan tu beach

on one side of JBR, there's the beach. on the other side is a generous, landscaped pedestrian walkways which also has numerous restaurants and cafes'. the marina to park yatchs
other than the exclusive Jumeirah Beach Residence, Dubai Marina (which is nearly 4 kilometers long) has yachting ports parked at the artificial lake. there are also walkways here lining the waterfront. you can cycle, you can jog, you can have a romantic date - i've seen a couple of kids skateboarding along here! (you can see from the video below, i took when we went one fine night before kahfi was born)

so there are so many places for me to take a comfy evening stroll with kahfi in the pram and khaleef on his bike while waiting for mr khairul to come home from work. i can either go to 'The Walk', the pedestrian boardwalk on the other side, or the walkway lining the marina itself.

Our New Apartment
as pointed out in the map, our apartment building is just a step away from the beach! ours means, 'Pearl of the Marina' in english. ours overlooks the boardwalk of the JBR. we can't see any speck of the marina nor the beach from our windows - but try standing on our apartment rooftop (where the pool area is) and enjoy unobstructed views across the marina, the sea and the freakin man-made island, palm jumeirah!

yup - you can clearly see the palm jumeirah and the atlantis from our rooftop. i wish we could see it right in the comfort of our home but this works for me too.

The Dubai Marina Mall
see our neighbourhood mall? just like OU to the peeps in damansara and taman tun, dubai marina mall would be just a stone throw away for us living in dubai marina. it opens just recently - in fact it opened on the 22nd, a day before kahfi's birthday. it's quite a mall - complete with cineplex and children's entertainment area. so if you guys come over, we can head on to marina mall to check out stuff, eh? i hope they've got mcdonalds...

kenduri doa selamat for kahfi
we will officially be moving by new year 2009. insya-Allah, when everything is in place, we will be having a small makan-makan as kenduri kesyukuran at our new place for bestowing us another wonderful gift of life in a form of Kahfi bin Khairul. it also doubles as a house-warming do. hopefully a whole lot can come and help warm up our new crib...

saying goodbye to Bur Dubai
currently our home is a snug, cozy Victoria Residence in Bur Dubai. despite my extreme excitement of moving to a new apartment, i will always remember this place as my first home in dubai. right from when i stepped out of the airport arriving from malaysia; where i unpacked countless of heavy boxes AND unwrapped a couple of furnitures while 7mths pregnant - he wanted to help but i wouldnt let mr khairul to do anything - he'll just wreck my 'system'. (hihi)

bur dubai also used to be a hot-spot for expats but has cooled down over the years. in my opinion it's very family-friendly with its quiet, laid-back surroundings with many established buildings that has been occupied for years.

6 things i'm gonna miss about my ol home:

1. a minimarket and pharmacy just an elevator away, right downstairs
2. walking distance to spinneys (much like giant/tesco in malaysia)
3. very near burjuman mall
4. 5mins drive to a lot of shawarma/mamak/indian restaurant
5. near our favorite mandy restaurant, al-tawasol
6. ..also, khaleef & kahfi's first home in dubai too!

new baby, new house, new neighbourhood, new year - bring it on!