Dubai: Like Vegas, but no Casinos or Alcohol

  Dubai, United Arab Emirates
Thursday, January 18, 2007

Sorry for the long entry - this place gave us a lot to ponder!

PEOPLE OF DUBAI

We'll start this entry with the people of Dubai. Dubai is a wealthy Sheikdom, part of the United Arab Emirates and the only one of the emirates that is not dependent on oil revenue for its livelihood. The royal family decided that they instead wanted to turn Dubai into the premiere shopping and tourism destination in the world. With no one to argue, they set about doing just that. The first problem they faced was the lack of workers. The citizens are all rich and from what we could could tell they don't do much work beyond good government jobs and working for huge real estate development firms. So, they brought in workers from other countries to do everything else. At this point the country is over 70% immigrants. There are the expats from Western Europe and the US. They work for many of the international firms based in the west that branches here because of their lack of taxes. They are the minority but they live very well, in exclusive communities away from the city. The vast majority of the immigrants that we saw were East Asian (Sri Lankans, Bangladeshis, Pakistanis and Indians), Filipinos and people from poorer Middle Eastern countries. The Filipinos worked almost all the retail, in the shopping malls and restaurants. All we met were fluent in English, of course. The better educated Indians and Pakistanis worked most of the skilled labor jobs and owned many of the shops. The Bangladeshi and Sri Lankans did all the unskilled labor.

Immigrants are in an interesting place in this country in that they do all the work but they have very few rights. There is no option of any sort of naturalization, permanent residency or citizenship. Immigrant children born in Dubai cannot be citizens nor can they go to the public schools. Houses can be bought by non-citizens but land cannot, only leased. Healthcare is too expensive for most people to afford. If you come as an unskilled laborer your family cannot join you here. he labor laws are very lax and if a worker does have a complaint often all the steps in the process are done in Arabic, a language he does not understand. Plus, when the large groups of unskilled laborers are processed by immigration control at the airport, their passports are taken away. Many complain of late pay and poor working/living conditions by the companies they work for. It is all very sketchy. It reminds me a lot of the conditions that the Chinese came to America under when they came to build the railroad. Countries are still seduced by the prospect of extremely cheap labor. And there is no doubt that this city could not have been built so lavishly and quickly without it. The skilled laborers and shop keepers from India and other Middle Eastern countries around Dubai seem to be doing well, however. Most have their families with them and send their children to private schools.

Because workers are also seduced by the prospect of good money, people are pouring into the country looking for work. The pay is not good and the real estate prices keep going up. This forces people to live 6 in a two bed apartment and signs are posted in the poorer immigrant neighborhoods for roommates of particular sexes and ethnic backgrounds.

Unlike Turkey, a secular country almost exclusively Muslim, Dubai is truly a Muslim state. The weekend is Friday-Saturday, everything is closed briefly for prayers and the rules of the city take into account the Muslim faith. No pork products were sold anywhere in the city which I am sure was tough on the Filipinos. Alcohol could only be sold at hotels (at very expensive prices) so all bars had to be in hotels. You had to have a special permit from your boss to keep alcohol in your home (many people ignored that rule) but you could only get liquor for home use at the airport duty free store of you were flying in. It is just not found in the city. In fact, only immigrants were allowed to go into bars, citizens are not supposed to. Israelis or anyone with entry to Israel shown on their passport are not allowed entry.

My favorite rule was the separation of the sexes rule. Because women citizens cannot sit next to men who are not their husbands or family members, many places, most noticeably the buses, have specialized seating for women. Women and their escorts get the front 6-8 seats on the bus. If those seats are filled then the escorts have to move back so other women can sit. Men can't even stand in the aisle in that section. Women can even leave the front door whereas men cannot. The first time I learned of this rule was when we were waiting in line to get on the bus to the industrial district.

Dubai's most famous hotel

We were going to a gigantic export only auto mall where all the Africans we know buy their cars. There were about 40 East Indian men in line in front of us but they brought us to the front of the line first so we could sit in the women's section. Of course the irony of this rule is that very few Muslim women take the bus. Gas is incredibly cheap ($1 a gallon) so most people with money have cars or ride in the very reasonably priced cabs. The women on the bus are mostly Filipino and Indians but like me they are more than happy to take advantage of a rule that almost always guarantees them a seat over the men. We visited an exhibit about Dubai's very much needed tram line and it will be the same situation, special cars for women and children.

As long as these rules are followed, Dubai is actually a very easy place to visit as a westerner. The city is dependent on tourists and workers from other countries so it makes more accommodations than any of its neighbors. Sometimes you forget that you are in a Muslim country, but there would always be something to remind you that this place has a different way of life in the states. When we were going through immigration at the airport Julius had to go to an office to finish some visa formalities. The woman who was processing us asked me "Is he your friend?" and I told her that he was my husband. Her eyes got wide and she asked "Was it a marriage for love?" When I said yes she asked "Is he kind?" I said that he was kinder than me and she laughed. Now that is a line of questioning you won't hear in the west, but here they are valid questions. Maybe not valid for a immigration official, but she was probably bored stamping passports all day.

We also saw many women in different degrees of covering up. The joke is that the Lebanese girls dress like Britney Spears and from there it went all the way to the women who covered their entire face with a sheer veil. One woman in the mall had one of those plus platform shoes. She was an accident waiting to happen, not being able to see well and on the verge of teetering over. A group of friends would walk together, one with a headscarf, one with a veil over her mouth and nose, another with a veil over her face. I wondered what determined who wore what. The shops in the malls for these clothes could be very high end. Some had jewels down the sleeves and were made with the finest fabrics. The women really were good at working with what they had. Those who covered their mouth and nose really made up their eyes. It looks even more alluring than if they left their face uncovered.

DUBAI SHOPPING FESTIVAL

We decided pretty early to include Dubai on our trip. Not only is Dubai getting more press in America, it has been a very popular shopping destination for Africans who can afford to get there. What we didn't know until later was that we would be there during their annual shopping festival. This is a global festival celebrating, what else, shopping! The festival lasted a month and had many different activities for families in temporary sites around the city. Also, the stores all joined in with big Shopping Festival sales of their own. Raffles were drawn daily for gold, cash and Lexus'. Fireworks were shot off in two locations each night.

One of our favorite sites of the festival was the Global Village, a huge area outside of the city full of pavilions from over 30 countries. Not surprisingly, most of the countries were Asian, African and Middle Eastern. Just a couple from Europe. India had the biggest pavilion and there were also pavilions from Iran, Iraq, Yemen, Kenya and Tanzania. I joked with Julius that maybe he would know someone in the Tanzanian pavilion.

Dubai's Shopping Festival

He just laughed. Much to our surprise, we ran into a man who used to ship his handicrafts with a company Julius worked for in Tanzania. They had become good friends but they had not seen each other in 10 years. It was very fun to catch up with him. You never know when you will run into a familiar face. We did a little shopping at the pavilions there, buying tea and biriyani from the Pakistani pavilion as well as some fabric and clothes.

We are not "mall people" in the states but Dubai does warrant a visit to the many malls. Mall of the Emirates was the biggest, it is the largest mall in the world (Sorry, Edmonton). It has four food courts, two Starbucks' and an indoor ski hill. Although the malls were fun to window shop in, we chose to do most of our buying at the cheaper places. Carrefour (sp?), a French version of Walmart, was always packed and had very cheap clothes.

Another Dubai Mall

Also, the city is full of thousands of Indian run shops selling incredibly cheap stuff from China. We were happy to get out of our old clothes and get some new duds. We were tired of those clothes and I am sure people were tired of seeing our picture in them.

We did make one big splurge, a new laptop. There are tons of computer places in Dubai and with the lack of import duty and taxes you can get a very good deal. It was becoming very difficult to travel without a computer when we want to upload photos and write blogs all the time (anyone who is keeping up with the blogs knows how far behind we were getting). Plus, it was getting expensive to keep going to internet cafes! It has made our lives a hundred times easier.


OUR ACTIVITIES IN THE CITY

Dubai was under a constant state of construction. They had a very short time frame for their "premiere shopping tourist destination" goal so it seemed like the whole city was being built at once. They are building golf courses and megamalls in the desert and palm shaped peninsulas and man made islands on the coast. The first of the palms was getting close to completion and two more were in the works. The environmental impact to the sea life cannot be good. I think the real estate companies are flocking here because environmental impact is not an issue. At one point they said that 25% of the construction cranes in the world were in Dubai. We could believe it.

We lived in the neighborhood of Bur Dubai, a mostly immigrant district with cheaper shops catering to them instead of tourists. We also thought it was more central to all the sites. Shabby housing is seen here and there but it seems those buildings are getting torn down as the poorer people are being priced out by the soaring real estate market. Sound familiar, Seattle?

Our hotel was an apartment suite hotel which meant that we had a washing machine, microwave and two burners to cook on. This was very exciting as it allowed us to save some money and cook at home. The hotel was in an Indian neighborhood so we had many Indian groceries to choose from to do our shopping. The only drawback is that Indians still cook most things from scratch. This can be a big hassle if you just want to whip something up quick but the masala mix lists 10 other ingredients to mix the spices with. It made us fondly remember Trader Joes and their wide selection of frozen pre-cooked meals.

Starbuck - Dubai Style

We managed to make some homemade chicken tikka masala and chicken curry but I admit that a meal or two were top ramen with eggs. My favorite item at the market was "pale cream" with a photo of an Indian woman on the box, half her face before pale cream and half her face after. How do you get these fabulous results? Yep, sunscreen. They sell the same stuff in Africa now. It is better than the toxic skin lightening cream they used to sell and it does work. Of course the white people of the world have spray on tans to achieve the opposite results. To each their own.

The streets outside the hotel were always bustling. Not only do the construction companies like to attempt 24 hour construction (many angry letters in the newspapers about jackhammers at 2 am) but people in Bur Dubai do not seem to go to bed. Perhaps they nap? It is as busy in the restaurants at 1 am than it is at 7pm. Street crime is almost non-existent and we did not see any beggars. I imagine if you try that you would just be sent home to your own country. Or they would just hand you a shovel and push you onto a construction site.

Driving is one of the biggest complaints in the city. With gas being a dollar a gallon everyone drives and many drive American SUVs. The roads are absolute gridlock with high volume of cars and roads getting torn up for yet another construction project. A tram is to arrive in three years but that is not soon enough. People are also shameless horn honkers. It drove us crazy, especially Julius. They would honk at an old lady crossing the street if they didn't think she was walking fast enough. Plus, if there is gridlock for miles there is no need to honk. No one can move any faster! Accidents abound as people are coming from countries where drivers aren't good to begin with. Police who should be directing traffic are nowhere to be seen. I have witnessed two accidents as they were happening in my 15 years of driving in the States. In Dubai we witnessed two accidents in a week. One was a bus sideswiping a guy who was very illegally parked and another was someone doing a U-Turn into our lane when our bus was about 3 meters away from him going full speed. Really terrible drivers. The cabs have safety precautions built in where a voice comes out of the dash "please slow down" if the driver begins to speed. Some looked sheepish and slowed and others didn't even pay attention.

After finding a church in Istanbul we had higher hopes of finding one in Dubai. We were not disappointed. There was one Catholic church in the city that manages to serve the biggest Parish I have ever seen. With such a large population of Filipinos and Catholic East Asians here, the church is very well attended and runs like a well oiled machine. The new and modern sanctuary seats 1500 and there were at least 1300 there. Did I mention the church has over 30 masses a week? Most are in English but they also are held in Tagalog, various Indian dialects, Arabic and others (see worship schedule). They have large screens scrolling all of the congregational responses and song lyrics plus screens set up outside for the more popular masses every week where hundreds of people worship in the courtyard. We just about fell out of our pew when the man reading the announcements reminded everyone that they are seeking teachers for the 4000 catechism students. 4000!!! It is a Catholic Mega-Church. They even have one of those soundproof crying rooms right off the altar for all the families with crying babies and squirmy toddlers.

One fun treat of the week was to meet Alice for drinks at a posh hotel/mall. We had met her and her husband in Cappadocia, Turkey and they told us to look them up when we got to Dubai. She gave us insight into the life of an American expat living in the city and answered some puzzling questions we had about how things worked in the mix of cultures.

We managed to stay busy most of the time but were very glad to get a whole week to explore the city at a more leisurely pace. We really felt like we got to know our way around. I think we will definitely be back to see how this city under construction turns out. Plus, it is the best place to eventually buy a car for Tanzania. Any of you who are mall people (my Godmother Barb included) should really try to make it to the shopping festival. We booked a hotel early through Expedia and got a good deal on it, to make the visit affordable. The weather is quite nice in January with cool nights and warm days. There are sooo many opportunities to shop the big sales at every place from Gucci to an alley full of knockoff Gucci. A mall twice the size of the Mall of Emirates (currently the largest mall in the world) is supposed to be finished in 2008. Start your Engines....

Check out all the photos of Dubai on our Smugmug Page!