DUBAI / WORLD EXPO 2020

Friends, we just got home from a trip of a lifetime courtesy of the U.S. Department of State, working through Global Ties U.S. which found us through the Wyoming Arts Council and flew us out to Dubai for a week of performances on the Rocket Stage at the USA Pavilion at the World Expo 2020. It was an incredible experience to be around so much diversity, and to share our music with people from around the world. We really felt the universal connection that occurs through music as people from all over danced and cheered to songs that they'd never heard before in a language that most of them likely didn't fully understand. Truly it was an honor to be a part of a World Expo, and share the stage with two other fantastic bands while we were there - both of whom were either finalists or winners of America's Got Talent. Wandering through the Expo site, we got to eat lunch at the Moroccan pavilion, sample beers at the Belgian pavilion, and listen to music outside the Yemen pavilion, inbetween music at wetting our feet in the wide open pool at the Brasilizian pavilion, and taking in all the fantastic architecture that was simple awe-inspiring. We visited Old Dubai, and wandered the street markets there, taking in the sights and smells of mountains of saffron and other spices and reams of glorious cashmere. We took a trip out to the far edge of The Palm Jumeirah, the enormous man made set of islands that looks like a giant palm tree from space, walked along the outer boardwalk and rode the tram back into town marveling at everything, we went out to the desert outside of Dubai, where there are endless red-orange dunes and got to try sand boarding, and experience the thrill of a local driving us through the sand, riding a camel, and saying hi to a trained falcon. We walked the beach in the mornings, stared at the city lights at night, and just kept pinching ourselves the whole time. The travel was long, but it was broken up by long layovers in Seattle where we caught the tram over to the Pike Place Market and enjoyed fresh seafood and stretched our legs. The trip was a dream. It gave us all a renewed sense of hope for this world, and for our passion for music.