Good Bye Dubai
I 'm just waiting at the brand spanking new Dubai Airport for my flight to Doha, Qatar and then onto London . It's not a bad place to spend the night as it's huge, bright and silver clean, and the food is reasonable priced for airport standards. There's free Internet and for those with time and left over dinars, plenty of last minute shopping.
What can I say about Dubai... it reminds me of Las Vegas at times with the super fancy hotels and the way it is so spread out. There are buildings sprouting everywhere but outside the old city by the creek, they are far apart and not conducive to walking. You will be walking along the sidewalk which will suddenly peter out or have to cross a fourteen lane highway as there are no pedestrian walkways to be found. The city is really designed for cars and although the public transport is cheap, it's infrequent and often so packed that they won't pick up anyone. They have only recently began constructing an underground metro. I swear that 90 percent of the bus riders are Indians or Filipinos working in the UAE and the other 10 percent are tourists. The traffic is horrendous and reminds me of Jakarta, and doesn't thin out until after ten o'clock. To get to the public beach from YHA hostel which is a mere 30 KM away, takes over two hours on the public transport.
If you want to save money, make sure you book ahead at the one and only hostel in town. A dorm bed with four other people will cost $20 US. Accommodation is expensive in Dubai and the cheapest one or two star hotel is about $60 US for a single bed. Want to impress that special someone, then book a room at the seven star hotel, Burj Al-Arab which range from the cheapest for $1000 US a night to $8000 US for the grand daddy of them all, the Royal suite which has a rotating bed, a private cinema and dining in the underwater restuarant. People were checking into the hotel by landing on the roof helicopter pad. Nice. And just to get a tour of the hotel, you have to fork out $60 US. Still, the 202 hotel room building (staffed with 1200 workers!) shaped like a narrow crescent moon is impressive.
The stretch of luxury hotels run along the beach which has Mediterranean blue waters (albeit cooler) and white fine sand. The other impressive hotels are shaped like Arabic castles complexes with Wind Towers and lagoons and one shaped like a giant wave. They are also building new developments called the "World Village" where you can buy a property shaped like a country of the world on reclaimed land off the coast. I like to see who buys (and fights over) Israel. They are also building several Palm-like developments off the coast. I just hope they take into the rising sea level from global warming or some very rich people are going to be in for a wet surprise.
Dubai is one of the seven of Emirates that forms the country of the United Arab Emirates. It began from a humble fishing village reliant on pearl harvesting to a port town from the 1930's to 1950's and then quickly to a growing city in the 1970's with the discovery of oil in 1966. Sky scrappers, roads, schools, and housings were rapidly built, fueled by "black gold." Realizing that the oil is running out and the revenues from it now only accounts for 10 to 15 % of the total annual income, Dubai has placed their future on real estate and tourism. Incredibly, 80 percent of the water comes from the desalinization of ocean water through gas plants near the coast and residents have free electricity and water. Most of the menial labour is done by workers from India, the Philippines and some Middle East countries like Egypt who accept the long and poor work conditions for the better pay. As a result of these many workers, the city's gastronomic offerings has a heavy Indian and Asian influence and plenty of cheap eats. There's still the glitzy restaurants and bars where the patrons drive in, in a Ferrari. Even the ultra-egomaniac Chef Gordon Ramsay has opened up shop with the Verre restaurant.
Dubai also reminds me of Hong Kong especially the Khor (Creek) area which looks like Kowloon Harbour. It's very pleasant to walk along the creek at dusk as boats, dhows and ferries move along the waterway, the wharves are busy unloading and the city skyline is impressively lit up. Then there's the shopping. The condensed old city advertising electronic and watches, the spice, textile and gold souqs showing off their wares and plenty of malls to max out your credit cards. Although it's a tax free port, I didn't find the prices so cheap but the variety is there from cheap Chinese exports to boutique offerings from Paris, Milan and London.
You know when you have too much money to spend when... you have world's first air-conditioned bus stand. And when they make a ski hill inside a mall. Producing eights tons of snow a day, for $50 US you too can go down a slope for two hours. It's crazy that you can be walking in over 30 degrees on the outside and the next, feel a -2 degree chill. It's beyond me that they sell snowboard and ski gear, fleece jackets and Gortex gloves in the desert. There's even an artificial wooden ski lodge where you can sip hot chocolate by a fireplace as you watch people go up the ski lift or toboggan down a small hill.
Back to the rain and cold, wet weather in about ten hours. I even gave away my sunscreen lotion yesterday with the realization that I'm flying into England.
What can I say about Dubai... it reminds me of Las Vegas at times with the super fancy hotels and the way it is so spread out. There are buildings sprouting everywhere but outside the old city by the creek, they are far apart and not conducive to walking. You will be walking along the sidewalk which will suddenly peter out or have to cross a fourteen lane highway as there are no pedestrian walkways to be found. The city is really designed for cars and although the public transport is cheap, it's infrequent and often so packed that they won't pick up anyone. They have only recently began constructing an underground metro. I swear that 90 percent of the bus riders are Indians or Filipinos working in the UAE and the other 10 percent are tourists. The traffic is horrendous and reminds me of Jakarta, and doesn't thin out until after ten o'clock. To get to the public beach from YHA hostel which is a mere 30 KM away, takes over two hours on the public transport.
If you want to save money, make sure you book ahead at the one and only hostel in town. A dorm bed with four other people will cost $20 US. Accommodation is expensive in Dubai and the cheapest one or two star hotel is about $60 US for a single bed. Want to impress that special someone, then book a room at the seven star hotel, Burj Al-Arab which range from the cheapest for $1000 US a night to $8000 US for the grand daddy of them all, the Royal suite which has a rotating bed, a private cinema and dining in the underwater restuarant. People were checking into the hotel by landing on the roof helicopter pad. Nice. And just to get a tour of the hotel, you have to fork out $60 US. Still, the 202 hotel room building (staffed with 1200 workers!) shaped like a narrow crescent moon is impressive.
The stretch of luxury hotels run along the beach which has Mediterranean blue waters (albeit cooler) and white fine sand. The other impressive hotels are shaped like Arabic castles complexes with Wind Towers and lagoons and one shaped like a giant wave. They are also building new developments called the "World Village" where you can buy a property shaped like a country of the world on reclaimed land off the coast. I like to see who buys (and fights over) Israel. They are also building several Palm-like developments off the coast. I just hope they take into the rising sea level from global warming or some very rich people are going to be in for a wet surprise.
Dubai is one of the seven of Emirates that forms the country of the United Arab Emirates. It began from a humble fishing village reliant on pearl harvesting to a port town from the 1930's to 1950's and then quickly to a growing city in the 1970's with the discovery of oil in 1966. Sky scrappers, roads, schools, and housings were rapidly built, fueled by "black gold." Realizing that the oil is running out and the revenues from it now only accounts for 10 to 15 % of the total annual income, Dubai has placed their future on real estate and tourism. Incredibly, 80 percent of the water comes from the desalinization of ocean water through gas plants near the coast and residents have free electricity and water. Most of the menial labour is done by workers from India, the Philippines and some Middle East countries like Egypt who accept the long and poor work conditions for the better pay. As a result of these many workers, the city's gastronomic offerings has a heavy Indian and Asian influence and plenty of cheap eats. There's still the glitzy restaurants and bars where the patrons drive in, in a Ferrari. Even the ultra-egomaniac Chef Gordon Ramsay has opened up shop with the Verre restaurant.
Dubai also reminds me of Hong Kong especially the Khor (Creek) area which looks like Kowloon Harbour. It's very pleasant to walk along the creek at dusk as boats, dhows and ferries move along the waterway, the wharves are busy unloading and the city skyline is impressively lit up. Then there's the shopping. The condensed old city advertising electronic and watches, the spice, textile and gold souqs showing off their wares and plenty of malls to max out your credit cards. Although it's a tax free port, I didn't find the prices so cheap but the variety is there from cheap Chinese exports to boutique offerings from Paris, Milan and London.
You know when you have too much money to spend when... you have world's first air-conditioned bus stand. And when they make a ski hill inside a mall. Producing eights tons of snow a day, for $50 US you too can go down a slope for two hours. It's crazy that you can be walking in over 30 degrees on the outside and the next, feel a -2 degree chill. It's beyond me that they sell snowboard and ski gear, fleece jackets and Gortex gloves in the desert. There's even an artificial wooden ski lodge where you can sip hot chocolate by a fireplace as you watch people go up the ski lift or toboggan down a small hill.
Back to the rain and cold, wet weather in about ten hours. I even gave away my sunscreen lotion yesterday with the realization that I'm flying into England.
posted by Louis at 6:52 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home