Dubai is in the United Arab Emirates and is on the Persian Gulf. It has a great deal of wealth from its oil reserves and has grown rapidly in recent years. Its currency is the Dirham and is pegged at 3.67 DHS to $1 USD. Dubai has a population of 1.8 million and nearby Abu Dhabi has another 1.5 million people. Take a wild guess as to what percentage of the people are foreign ex-patriots. If you guessed 80% you are correct! I must say that the growth has halted due to the recent economic collapse, and Becky and I marveled at the construction crane graveyard. The cranes all sat idle throughout the city and property values have been slashed in half.
There were seven lanes of traffic each way (I am used to five in LA which I thought was extensive) and way too many large fancy malls for my liking. My US comparison would be a combination of Florida and Vegas, because there are stone colored buildings, beaches, and skyscrapers all in the middle of the desert. Finally, rules prevail in Dubai despite the huge ex-pat community. Becky and I took note of or “experienced” the following rules:
Rule #1: The “Women’s area” of the trains are for women only. Okay fine. This rule is straightforward and not the end of the world since they have co-ed cars as well. Too bad the women’s car was not obviously marked. Rule Broken: Becky and I met a fun South African guy who was telling us about surfing and Dubai when the train pulled up and we all boarded. After two minutes we had train security tell us our new friend could not be with us. Punishment: it took further explanation for us to realize we were on a women’s only car and that we all had to move to the co-ed car.
Rule #2: No revealing clothing. This rule means that although it is 120 degrees plus in the desert you must have clothing past your knees and covering your biceps at all times. Anyone who knows me knows that temperatures above 85 degrees (It’s too HOTT ta be ALIVE!) make me want to cry unless water or a/c are involved. We knew this rule, so Becky and I were never caught showing too much skin.
Rule #3: It happened to be Ramadan still which meant there was absolutely no eating or drinking of any kind from sunrise until sunset. People can receive very large fines for breaking this law. The vast majority of restaurants were closed, so food was hard to come by. After nearly starving and passing out the first day we problem solved and bought snacks at markets and went to bathroom stalls to do what we termed secret eating. We became good at secret eating, getting more complicated foods to eat and finding the best bathroom stalls available. Rule Broken: we got a bit too comfortable one day when we went down a dark empty hallway near a bathroom we had secretly ate in earlier. There was no one around as the mall was nearly empty, so I quickly ate a pepperoni stick and had a sip of water. This took two minutes at most, and we walked down two more hallways to leave the mall when we were suddenly approached by a no fun security guard making a strange motion around his mouth. Becky thought she had something on her face, but I instantly knew the jig was up. Punishment: Mr. No Fun must have seen us on the security camera and he told us that eating was not allowed. I promptly replied “no problem,” meaning I was sorry and it would not happen again. This was lost in translation as Mr. No Fun suddenly retorted, “actually it IS a problem” in his harshest voice. I stammered, “ah what I meant was I’m sorry.” We managed to escape without further punishment, and Becky and I nearly died laughing in the parking lot at the whole turn of events.
Rule #4: No food or beverages on the train. I understand this rule and can live with it. It is often a rule in public buildings or transportation around the world. Rule Broken: unfortunately there was little signage again and Becky and I were so excited it was sundown, so we could have water in public. We both had giant smiles and two beverages in hand as we boarded the train. Suddenly it was game over as we were approached and told to get rid of it. Punishment: there was some chugging and sad faces before they were tossed away.
Rule #5-7: No naughty movies (aka above rated PG or PG13) can be brought into Dubai. Luckily Becky and I were movie free when entering the country. No drugs can be brought in either, which I completely understand, although it applies to more than just the hardcore illegal ones we normally think of. No swearing. That’s right, I kept my language in check (“eat a bag” is not swearing) and we did not have any run-ins with this rule.
We honestly felt like we were ten years old again and living with excessively strict parents (our parents were certainly never this strict!). We did do/see some other stuff aside from just breaking rules.
Fancy malls visited: (3) Emirates Mall (highlights: got my netbook which has an Arab keyboard, performed secret eating for the first time in a bathroom stall, saw Inception – secret snacking, snowboarded indoors at Ski Dubai), Meracato Mall (highlights: pedicure (California Coral) and place we got caught eating), and Dubai Mall (highlights: similar to Mall of America but bigger - waterfall, aquarium, ice rink, giant candy and book stores, and we saw the movie Salt where we performed secret eating with six other westerners and the movie ushers trying to catch us).
US Restaurants attended: (4) TGI Friday’s (poor), Tony Roma’s (acceptable), Subway (solid), and CPK (LOVED the Ramadan set dinner menu).
Actual sights seen: We took pictures of the Burj Al Arab Hotel which is the famous seven star hotel that looks like a sailboat. Room prices range from $2,000 to $17,000 per night! We walked through the Bur Dubai Souk near the water, which was an underwhelming night market with stalls and overly aggressive shopkeepers. Becky went to Abu Dhabi and saw the $4.9 billion Sheikzayed Grand Mosque without me since I felt very sick that morning. She came back amazed and her pictures are impressive. The walls have extensive mother of pearl on them and 1,200 Iranian women made the largest rug in the world which is at the mosque.
The highlight of Dubai had to have been our overnight desert safari. We got in a four wheel drive SUV and tore through the red desert sand dunes with three other SUVs. Due to the fun driving two of the other SUVs ended up with flat tires that had to be fixed in the sand. The red sand glowed as the sun began to set and we flew over and slid down the dunes while Arabian music blasted and Becky occasionally screamed. We nearly rolled over at times and it was exciting to say the least, a real live desert rollercoaster. We arrived at a random spot in the middle of the desert where we tried sand boarding (not much fun - I barely moved), rode a camel ever so slowly in a circle, got traditional henna tattoos, and ate delightful Middle Eastern food (more kebabs and hummus). The other car loads packed up and took off, since Becky and I were the only crazies that voluntarily spent the night in the desert. The two Alis hung out with us (mostly telling us that western women spend their husband’s money excessively etc) and then we eventually slept outside since it was unbearably hot in the tents. We were woken up around sunrise, ate breakfast, and flew through the dunes once more en-route to Dubai. We were so hot and gross so we snuck into the pool bathroom (Becky scoped it out before) at our old hotel on the roof for showers; it was a real mission impossible style event.
Finally, we took a late flight to Bahrain where we spent the night in the airport sleeping on a string of hard chairs while the 3AM cleaning crew worked around us before our early flight to Kathmandu, Nepal. Himalayas here we come! Until next time…Sarah.
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