This is the “sidewalk” outside our apartment. Good luck walking on the sidewalk. Don’t you just love the no parking signs?
Archive for the ‘Dubai’ Category
How to park
November 23, 2008Down our street
October 31, 2008It was 77F when we left the apartment this morning. We thought we’d take a little walk before it got too hot.
This is the police station just down the street from our apartment building.
The rapid transit train will make its transition from being an elevated train to a subway here. You can see the support columns getting progressively shorter.
Notice the men in the picture above. Two of the men on the right are wearing lungi (or dhoti) instead of pants. This is basically a single piece of cloth about 5 yds long that is wrapped around and knotted at the waist. The man on the left is apparently African and wearing a caftan type garment.
In the picture above, our apartment building is just above the head of the guy in the foreground.
I attempted to get this hotel that is under construction in one shot, but it was impossible. And, yes that is a plane flying over it. We frequently see planes flying in for a landing, but there isn’t a noise issue.
This amazes me. They have brought in this large metal platform and will be attaching the concrete sections that will connect the columns and support the train track soon.
Yes, that is the same plane as in the previous photo.
This is the path we take on a daily basis to go to and from our apartment. On the left is the train construction and on the right is a new building being built. This particular building is slow going up and is being done the hard way. Probably not as well funded as most construction projects are.
The black spot way in front of Paul is a stray cat. We both carry a small bag of cat food with us so that we can give a little treat to the stray cats we encounter. He was a cutey. Very lean, but looked healthy. He had a hard time choosing between being petted and eating the food we gave him.
He broke my heart by following us and meowing pitiously. The cats here are very long legged, have big ears and very long tails. They have very little fur due to the heat. Every cat I’ve met so far has had an incredibly loud voice.
GITEX
October 24, 2008GITEX was this week. A whole week of a technology conference, Sunday through Thursday. Being a member of Emirates Mac (the local Mac users group), Paul got in as an exhibitor and volunteered at their booth.
Monday night was a dinner put on by ABM (Arab Business Machines – the local Apple affiliate). Paul went directly to the dinner from the convention. I tried to catch a taxi to take me there and had very little success. I was going to cash it in and go back to the apartment, but Paul didn’t have enough money on him to get home, so I had to go, if I wanted to retrieve my husband. Luckily, I did finally get a taxi. (We SO need a car.) By the time I arrived at the dinner (in one of the poshest hotels) my dogs were not just barking, they were howling. The doors to the dining room were closed and there was a gathering area where one could meet and greet, etc. WITH NO CHAIRS! There was a musician performing background music and my feet hurt so bad I was tempted to sit in her chair when she took a break. I was even considering just sitting on the floor. After standing there waiting for a chance to sit down and being in extreme pain, I finally gave up and went out to a lobby area that did have chairs.
When dinner was finally served it was a buffet with lots of sushi, so it eased my pain a little. We sat with other Mac users, including a guy crazier about Macs than Paul. He collects them. If only we hadn’t disposed of Paul’s collection, we could have made a little money selling them to this guy. The Mac users group has been our best opportunity, so far, to meet Arabic speakers.
Paul had more adventures at GITEX, but I will let him tell the stories himself.
Paul is famous!
October 24, 2008Look at my honey being all geeky and stuff!
http://www.gulfnews.com/gntv/videos/10253904.html In case the other link doesn’t work.
Not Unusual Here
October 17, 2008If you scare easily or are already afraid for our safety, don’t read any further.
Unfortunately, the driving exhibited by the SUV in the YouTube video below is not unusual here. Aggressive driving here is beyond belief. They honk, they flash their lights, they tailgate like nobody’s business and lane lines are considered mere suggestions.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOW-3SCSDw0 (You might want to mute it for language content.)
Add rampant jaywalking and you have an average day in Dubai.
Amazingly, we’ve only witnessed one accident in the two months we’ve been here. We were standing at a bus stop and heard a delivery truck slam on his breaks trying to avoid the taxi that was cutting in front of him. He didn’t make it. He yelled at the taxi driver who acted like it was just another day on the job. No biggie.
Everyone drives aggressively, but they are also constantly aware of what everyone else is doing. Does that count as driving defensively? As a passenger, I’ve gotten fairly jaded and it doesn’t phase me anymore. It is amazing how close people drive to each other and manage to not collide. I suspect that Paul will do all the driving when we finally get wheels. He didn’t like my driving in the States, he definitely won’t like it here. I would fit right in. 😉
Friday Adventure
September 14, 2008
This is the entrance to the Gold Souk. I didn’t take any pictures inside. We were too busy trying to get out to stop and take pictures. As we approached, a man came up alongside us. “Sir, excuse sir, watches? good watches? Rolex….” and he had a really long spiel about the wares in a particular shop. After he ran out of watch brands, he started in on “handbags, Louis Viton …” etc. Then when we approached his shop he tried to steer us into it. This scenario played out several times. I stopped to look in a showcase window only once to see the actual wares and the salesman came to the door and beckoned us in. Too aggressive for me. Not how I like to shop. The prices on the rings that we were looking at were way out of our range. Of course, haggling is expected and that is only a starting price, but it would have taken a lot of haggling to get it to what we could afford. We will have to be much richer before going back to the Gold Souk.
We think this may have been the Old Souk. It was not open. It may just be closed all of Friday (holy day) or it may have openned after sunset. We wandered into the Spice Souk, too. They were not open for business, but we could smell the wares. Yum.
Next we walked down the waterfront of Dubai Creek. The boats are tied up 4-5 deep along the edge.
Along the creekside there are piles of goods to be loaded on the boats and shipped to India or other areas in the Persian Gulf.
Notice the sophisticated way the goods are secured to the boat with wooden pallets and various poles. Pretty amazing.
Here’s a shot of Paul, the goods piled along the creekside and the buildings along the street. A bit of a contrast between the piles of tires, boxes, etc. and the high rise hotels with a creek view.
Some of the goods looked more like garbage.
Then we came to a section where there are small boats that take people on tours of the creek (bay/inlet). The hawkers were out trying to encourage us to take a ride. It was a mild evening, only 100F, but we will wait for this until the weather improves.
Above is one of the tour boats. Below is the second section of goods waiting to be loaded onto boats. It seemed to go on forever.
As we were walking along this section I noticed an entire motor and transmission among the goods to be loaded. Maybe this is where it came from? This stripped and abandoned car is a very unusual sight.
Here is one of the painted camels. Notice the falcon motif. The falcon is to the UAE as the eagle is to the USA. There is a little boy standing under the camel, not a fifth leg.
You can probably guess why the we liked this camel.
Here is a building with the lighted holiday greeting “Ramadan Kareem” which is something like It’s Ramadan, be generous! You see this a lot in shopping malls.
We had another adventure on Saturday, but that’s a tale for another day.
Living the Travel Channel – Jumeirah
September 9, 2008
First let me apologize for posting so many posts in one day. It is difficult for me to get time to post things as my work schedule is hectic and I feel guilty taking time to do personal things. However, today I am putting an extra long day because I can’t leave until my ride leaves, so I am taking advantage of it.
These pictures are of the Madinat Jumeirah Resort area taken on August 27th. Our “convocation” ceremonies were held here in the conference center. It was quite a “to do” complete with a multimedia/laser/pyrotechnics show. There really were fireworks, I kid you not.
The resort has a conference center, a hotel, several restaurants, and a souk (shopping area) all around these canals.
Around town are camels and Arabian horses like this one similar to the painted cow art project that started in Chicago. This camel had the continents and oceans on the other side.
You might notice that some of these pictures have a hazy look around the edges, as if I were photographing Barbara Stanwick, but it is only because it was so humid (and I mean SO HUMID) that the lense was fogged up. It is interesting to live in a place where the condensation is on the outside of the windows not the inside. Sign of a bad day = water dripping from the airconditioning vents and condensation on the outside of the windows.
It is a very beautiful place and I look forward to going back on a more hospitable weather day.
Shopping, driving, ogling
August 25, 2008Saturday, August 16th – We experienced “weekend shopping” yesterday. We had been warned about it, but we had to check out of the hotel, so we needed things like sheets, towels, pots, pans, dishes, etc., in order to begin living in our new apartment. So, we had no choice. We took a taxi to Deira City Center, which is a large mall a short distance from here. Most of the things we needed could be purchased in Carrefour, a large (and I mean LARGE) store not unlike a super Walmart. I don’t think I have ever seen so many people in a mall or store at one time. It was a mad house, not unlike the old jokes about the JC Penney white sales. AND people here drive shopping carts like they drive cars.
We purchased our refrigerator (only appliance not provided with our apartment). If you are wondering about prices here, we got a large side by side with ice maker in the door (656 liter capacity – don’t know what that is in cubit feet) for approximately $1,300.00. Try that in the States! For the most part, prices are comparable or lower for most goods. The rents are sky high, but we don’t have to worry about that.
Gary B. asked what I would miss and I haven’t figured that out, yet. I have found many things that I am delighted are available, however. Fruit juice, REAL fruit juice is cheap and easy to come by. We can buy bottled lemonade that is actually made with lemons and tastes like lemons. Yummy! There are also many other fruit juices available – Mango, Orange, Apple, etc. I have yet to see CranApple, CranGrape, or CranWhatever. The juices aren’t all apple, pear, or white grape base with a little of the titled juice thrown in either. In fact, you can go to a food court restaurant and order fresh squeezed orange juice with your entree.
Our first load of laundry is running right now. The “directions” on the machine are all in symbols, so I hope I have guessed right. I thought the swirly symbol meant wash, but it turned out to mean spin, this lead to the discovery that I should read the symbols from the right to the left, not the left to the right.
It is interesting being out in public and discovering that you are some kind of oddity. The East Indian men “check me out” when I walk by, which wasn’t too unexpected, except that I am old, grey and overweight, so really didn’t expect to get ogled. On other occasions, though, women have given me a thorough look up and down, so I am not sure what that is about. My clothes are not unusual, so maybe it is my grey hair (which I have not seen much of on other people) or my weight (not many overweight people here either) or my pale skin (not much of that in the crowds where we’ve been shopping either). The cab driver, yesterday, seemed very interested in Paul’s appearance and asked us what country we were from. Perhaps he hasn’t seen a ruddy, red bearded guy before.
So, let’s talk about driving/traffic. The only thing I miss at this point is the freedom of having personal transportation. However, we are not in any hurry to start driving here. Lane markings are apparently only suggestions. You don’t actually have to stay in the lane as you round corners or even when driving straight. Changing lanes is done simply by nosing your car into the other lane. You can signal after the fact to let them know what you did. There is NO patience at a stop signal. If the light turns green and the first car does not immediately move forward, horns honk. No dilly dallying allowed. Construction is in progress everywhere, so detours are everywhere also. New buildings are going up everywhere, but infrastructure is not necessarily keeping up. There are plenty of main arterials, but the commute traffic problem is, in part, due to the lack of side street alternatives. No one has laid out a grid of streets, things just sprout up wherever and however large they want to. This plus the total lack of street addresses makes getting around a major challenge. Neither one of us is eager to join the chaos that is traffic.
The rapid transport train that is currently under construction will run right in front of our apartment building. I don’t know where the nearest station will be, but hope that it will be within walking distance. The train does not go right by the college, but will be a short walk (again depending on where the station is placed), although there is talk of a shuttle bus from the train to the college. It is scheduled to be completed in Fall 2009, so my hope is to hold out and taxi/carpool until then.
Sunday (tomorrow) is my first day of orientation/work. I’ll be glad to have something other than shopping to do and to be around others who are new and as bewildered as I. Will let you know how it goes.
Where are we???
August 22, 2008My mom asked us:
“OK, so you don’t have a street address. What about a general idea of where you are so I can look for your place on satellite? And what direction is your apartment facing? And what floor are you on?”
We’re right in the middle of this map. (If the link works properly.)
http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&ll=25.2707,55.321162&spn=0.006171,0.010461&z=17
See? Just a bit to the left [West] of being across the street from the Reef Mall on Salahuddin Road. (Although I’m pretty sure that mentioning the street name to a taxi driver would not be of any use at all. They only seem to shrug when I mention the street that a destination is on.)
Below I’ll include a copy of the map with some additional notes on it.
I’m having trouble getting the satellite images to load here, but if you do manage it, ours is the only building with a swimming pool on its roof on our block. It’s sort of a kidney shaped thing in the NorthEast-ish part of the roof. I’m including an image below from Google Earth that shows it. (If you don’t have Google Earth, it’s worth downloading and it’s free. Sort of like Google Maps on steroids!) See that nice broad, tree-lined thoroughfare in front of our building? It’s all dug up right now while they install the metro light rail system. They are working on it 24 hours a day, so we are sometimes lulled to sleep by the gentle trill of the Arabian Jackhammer. But the noise isn’t too bad for us since we’re on an higher floor. There’s a major upside to it as well: A station is being installed underground right in front of us, so much of the city will be just a quick train ride away when it is finish next year.
Our apartment faces South, which- being on the north end of town- will give us a nice view of the expanse of Dubai when the Summer dust clears. We’re on the 6th floor. The roof is two stories up and offers a slightly better view. We won’t be high up enough to see everything beyond the tall buildings downtown, but we will be able to see to top floors of Al Burj Dubai, the tallest building in the world. I doubt that we’ll be able to see Al Burj Arab, the fancy sail-shaped hotel, or any of the artificial islands- except maybe Palm Deira when it is finished since it’s pretty close as well as huge- but still, for a cityscape it’s a pretty nice view. There’s not an equally tall apartment building directly across from us so we have much more interesting things to look at than our neighbors looking at us!
Directly across from us is a Toys’R’Us and a Marks and Spencer clothing store, and then the Reef Mall across the side street from them. There are many smaller storefronts along the street as well, so we’re not at a loss for shopping without even having to flag down a taxi. Some very good prices at the neighborhood stores as well, so that makes it doubly nice. There seem to be plenty of local restaurants to try in the weeks ahead as well. The Reef Mall is pretty decent size mall, but small by local standards. As if that weren’t enough, just a couple blocks further away is the Al Ghurair Mall Which is a good bit larger, though still not ‘big’.
It’s been too hot to check out our neighborhood freely just yet, but the Summer weather seems to be easing already so it won’t be long before we can explore the city in earnest. The temperatures have been very high- generally well over 100º F- but naturally the humidity has been the most oppressive factor. Pleasingly, the last few days there has been little humidity, and it is fairly tolerable to be outside in that case, for brief periods anyway.
So there ya’ go.
Here’s the map with some additions:
Here’s the Google satellite image, again with notes:
Illal liqaa’
Daddybird
P.S. Also, here’s an interactive map of Dubai that is maintained by the tourism department. (Be aware that it includes several unfinished, under construction and not-yet-started projects, including several new man-made islands.) Enjoy!
http://www.dubaitourism.ae/DubaiMap/tabid/189/language/en-US/default.aspx
Living the Travel Channel 