Here come the dates!

The national food of the UAE is *definitely* dates.  It may be one of the only native foods here and they are everywhere.  They are typically offered with coffee to guests, are just a general snack, can be cooked in some recipes and are used as dessert.  Jake and I have really grown to like dates quite a bit (as did my parents when they came to visit).

There are palm trees all over Abu Dhabi - in all the medians of all the road, in yards, on business grounds, in our complex, at schools - everywhere.  And these palm trees grow dates (not coconuts).  The unripe, green dates come out on the trees around this time of year and then workers typically go around and but green mesh bags around them.  I don't know if that is to protect them from birds or keep them from falling prematurely or what.  And then later in the summer they turn the wrinkly dark brown and will be harvested and bagged for eating.  It's interesting to me to see so many harvestable trees in so many public places (it would be like seeing a bunch of apple trees all over a U.S. city with a swarm of workers who take care of them and pick them when they are ripe).

Here are  few pictures of some low-hanging dates in front of Regan and Jane's school.