Dubai

Well this is my First Post........Lets see how it goes shall we..................

Dubai



I’ve spent quite a bit of time over the past 6 months in “the miracle on the gulf” and I have to say that I’m ambivalent at best. One of the first problems with the place is the temperature….when I first went there this year it was June and at 11 pm it was 96 degrees……three shirts a day and three weeks of sniffles when you get back. The back and forth between blast furnace and “arctic aircon” gives you a cold …….It’s an unnatural way to live your life. The last time I was there was about 3 weeks ago and the climate was a lot better (mid 70s). I’ve just got a license to open an office there so it seems I’ll be going every 6 weeks or so.
In some ways Dubai is similar to LA; no one walks anywhere, and the place is all icing and no cake.

Ok
First a few facts:

· Dubai has a population of roughly 970,000 people
· 80% of the population is comprised of expats
· Europeans (read brits) and Asians (read Bangladeshis, Pakistanis, Indians and Filipino’s) make up 70% of the 80%
· The, Bangladeshis and Pakistanis, live a hell on earth working in the mid day sun on the (24 hr) building sites…often for as little as $2.50 an hour
· The Filipino’s work as bar staff or musicians (with an uncanny ability to perfectly mimic Swedish accents whilst doing ABBA covers)
· The Brits are for the most part…CHAVS- http://www.worldwidewords.org/topicalwords/tw-cha2.htm
· The above is a bit unfair….but not far from the truth…..Most Brits I met were real estate agents, crap lawyers, pretend managers, restaurant guys, or Essex cabaret singers……Dubai is kind of a Hong Kong without a pretend “old time resident, pretend colonial upper class” which I guess is a good thing.....but very different from my experiences in Hong Kong.
· There is a sort of “super manager”- usually Brits , Yanks or Germans, who run everything….they stay very much in the background and enjoy the tax free life behind high stone walls
· The Arab locals spend their days in hotel lobbies drinking coffee and waiting for their “joint venture cheques” to arrive….I never seen any local Arab actually working
· The rest are Russians…and they’re either really scary looking guys with no necks and red faces …or “porn star” like hookers….either way best avoided, as one is never very far from the other
· When you go to a bar in Dubai (and they’re always in hotels), the first thing to strike you is the number of prostitutes sitting with guys in white sheet sheets. (That’s not meant as a derogatory statement…I just don’t remember what the name for the bed sheet thing is- and I know you’ll get me with the description)
· Soon Dubai will have the tallest building in the year (until the Chinese top it)
· One eighth of the worlds cranes are presently in Dubai- the skyline changes every time I go

Enough fun facts? The last time I was there, I had a day off and it gave me a little insight into the mentality of the place.

Shopping


Arab women love to shop. Designer gear only….and this year’s stuff….no out of season crap for them……consider the Dubai way of shoe shopping……


You see this in the window, and after a suitable time gazing in wonder at a shoe that costs $5,000.............you go into the shop and sit here............

After this……maybe you might want to go skiing…..stroll across the mall and go here………

Outside the “Mall of the Emirates……is nothing but sand and building sites

http://www.ameinfo.com/72039.html

Enough said.

The thing about Dubai is that there are so many parallel universes in existence. On the one hand you read in the English newspaper that 3 Indonesians had been tried for adultery as they were participating in “sexual acts” in an abandoned villa….the reader is informed that under sharia law they could have been stoned to death……..then you go out and you see 50 year old Saudis happily sipping Bells whisky, talking in broken English while holding the hand of 21 year old Ukrainian hookers……I saw that DURING RAMADAN………….


Consider this………..



Gulf News Tuesday November 22nd 2005

“Many Middle Eastern children could not relate to blonde haired buxom Barbie - her revealing clothes, her frequenting of discos, and her boyfriend Ken had little relevance in Muslim homes.
Enter Fulla. She wears an abaya and her top priorities are respect for her parents and being kind to her friends.
Many Middle Eastern children are happy to at last find a doll they can relate their lives and values to.
"She's popular because she's one of us. She's my sister. She's my mother. She's my wife.
So as a parent, I'd like Fulla for my daughter," Damascus toy store manager Mohammad Al Sabbagh as says.
Fulla can be purchased wearing the abaya - a black head to toe robe and headscarf - worn by women in the Arabian Gulf region, or full-length robes of different colours as are donned by women from Arab countries of the eastern Mediterranean.
More than 200 accessories - including prayer rugs, prayer beads, handbags, in-line skates, beach balls and gummy watches can be purchased to compliment Fulla's outfits.
The ‘Arabic Barbie' has a completely different style for indoors - here she matches her Western counterpart in style and skimpiness sporting bathing suits and even lace underwear.

There is the occasional odd thing appearing in the gulf news............


Man fined Dh1,000 for dressing up as a woman
By Bassam Za'za', Staff Reporter
A lady who entered a beauty salon to have her hair and nails done was fined Dh1,000 because she was a man dressed up and behaving like a woman.
The Dubai Public Prosecution charged the 35-year-old Filipino suspect, identified as C.A., with dressing and behaving like a woman.
The Dubai Court of First heard that the accused entered the salon and was wearing tight jeans and a tight white top. The way he was dressed made it difficult to identify who he was.
He asked for a manicure, pedicure and to have his hair styled.
Dubai police heard that a customer suspected him when he sat beside her to wait.
She grew suspicious and complained to the Moroccan manicurist who instantly called the police.
The police examined him and discovered who he really was, then took him to the police station for questioning.
In his statement to the police, C.A. confessed that he had entered the salon and was planning to do his hair and nails before the woman suspected him and the matter was reported to the police.

As I was leaving Dubai, I saw the new A380 airbus which was there for the airshow. It was HUGE. With two full decks of passengers, it will eventually seat over 600 passengers. Coming in to land it seemed to float, and hardly seemed to be going at any speed at all. The quietness of the engines added to the unreal feeling of it all. Pretty impressive, but I pray I don't find myself stuck in "seatE" in the middle of a row of 10 on a 14 hr flight..............

See you next time,

Terry

That’s it for now….Part 2 coming soon….

Terry