I've just returned from three days spent visiting friends in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. My companions: a copy of Jonathan Raban's Arabia Through The Looking Glass, not read in many years, and a notebook.
in passing
Just after maghreb. On the bus out to the plane, snatches of conversation from a fair-skinned man who I assume to be Jordanian or Syrian because he is eating as if finally breaking his fast, but whose accent as he starts talking to an Indian man nearby reveals him to be British: "It's the London Jews who did that…Israel…" The details are unclear, but the accusatory tone is not.
keep going ®
Dubai mesmerises me. I could never live there – that would require a certain energy I have never had – but I enjoy seeing it as an outsider for a few days. It is a world apart from my small, quiet life in Bahrain (that I have chosen and that I am grateful for), but just viewing the glossy (if half-constructed) environment and sensing the aspiration-fuelled atmosphere both recharges me, and makes me happy to be where I am.
danger zone
To think about politics in Dubai feels like a betrayal. By choosing to visit Dubai I am tacitly accepting a view of the world in which certain things are understood and others are not discussed. The very act of going to an enormous – no doubt the largest in the world, for this month at least – marble-floored mall silences certain questions in my mind. For example, I cannot wonder at what cost, human and environmental, that mall was made. The safest thing to think about in Dubai: the best ways to spend one’s money.
a marriage made in heaven
I think of the stories I've heard in Bahrain, possibly apocryphal (the truest always are), about some Western women who hang out in certain bars and cafés in the hope of catching the eye of a rich Arab and being showered with gifts, even netting a husband. I might be imagining it, but Dubai and Abu Dhabi seem to have, even now, that same sense of hope in the air. The big opportunities are there for those who believe.
ad interim
Who seriously cares about the future of a hotel? One wants the service to hold up for the length of one’s own stay; and if it gets intolerable one checks out and moves on. Guests continually bump into each other and talk at the bar in a friendly enough fashion; but if the man you drank with last night turns out to be dead this morning, it is more a matter of curiosity than an occasion for grief. Indifference and egotism are embedded in the character of the chronic traveller; sitting at his train window watching the world roll by, fussing over his own creature comforts, his eye is engaged by the passing cavalcade of strangers’ lives, but his heart is not seriously stirred by them. I had plenty of reason to feel this on my own account: it was unnerving to have arrived in a state where a very large proportion of the population were travelling almost as lightly as I was myself.
don’t take my word
In Borders bookshop, I enquire about a particular translation of the Qur’an. The Filipina assistant says, “Sorry, ma’am, I will have to ask my Egyptian colleague to help you. We non-Muslims are not allowed to touch the Qur’ans. Especially the women.”
Surprised, I ask, “And what if non-Muslims want to buy a copy of the Qur’an? Especially women?”
A glimmer of panic enters her eyes. “Ma’am, you are not Muslim?”
disoriented
In Abu Dhabi, we tried in vain to find 28th Street. The numbers jumped from 26th Street to 30th Street. Perhaps it was there, like platform 9¾ at King's Cross, visible only to certain eyes.
de-oriented
When I first arrived in the Mall of the Emirates I looked at one of the large maps of the mall – in English – to see the layout. A little later, to check something, I looked at another one – this time the Arabic version. And I saw that not only did the list of shops read from right-to-left, but the map itself did too. The whole layout had been reversed, so that east had become west, the famous ski slopes now on the other side. I thought I must be mistaken, so I kept checking these maps as I wandered round the mall. All of them were the same. I felt confused; was there a way to look at the reversed map and make sense of it? Were people who spoke only Arabic struggling to find their way around the mall? These thoughts kept nagging me. I only felt some relief when, just before leaving, I picked up the printed mall guides in English and Arabic, and found that the maps in these had the correct layout.
pick-me-up
Taking a taxi back to my friend’s place, I had the bad luck to get a Pakistani driver in a foul mood. The fact that he’d been waiting forever and that the traffic was heavy for the disappointingly short distance I wanted to go was absolutely my fault in his eyes. He kept muttering angrily as he drove. When we got near to my destination, and I was explaining the route to take, he asked, “Madam, where are you from?”
Not wishing to get into the usual long explanation, I said simply, “I live in Bahrain.”
At this he suddenly turned and grinned. “Bahrain? Arabi? Arabi? But madam, your English is like English people.”
I kept quiet, busy sorting out the money to pay the fare. He continued, chortling by now, and not paying any attention to the road. “Madam, you are Arabi? Your English is like the English. Your husband is English?”
Still fiddling with my purse, I said, “Yes.”
“Madam, your husband is English? Or your husband is Arabi?”
“Yes.”
“Which, madam – English or Arabi?” By now a huge grin on his face, happy at last.
a weight to bear
As I joined the queue at the Bahrain Air desk in Dubai airport, the two women just in front were whispering about me and giggling. From their features and the awkward way their gaudily embellished black abayas seemed to sit on them, I guessed (correctly) that they were Moroccan. I felt hostile towards them, not appreciating the amused glances they had given me, but after about five minutes it seemed another thought had occurred to them. One turned and asked me how come I had only a small bag; I explained I had been in Dubai for just three days. The conversation soon led to a request for me to carry one of their suitcases for them, as they were well over their baggage allowance. I had only hand luggage (and was in a forgiving mood after my break in Dubai), so I said I didn’t mind. I suggested we check in together, rather than me checking in their bag for them. They seemed to prefer that, because apparently one of them had once asked an Egyptian man to take a suitcase for her and he had stolen it. “All my shoes went to Alexandria!”
the necessary disclaimer
The above incidents are all true, but may not contain any great truth.
