UAE: Dubai

As soon as I got the taxi from Dubai airport to my hotel, I had a good feeling about Dubai. After being in India, it was so nice to see a modern, functional city.

I met up with Marvin here for the third time. Previously we had met up in Thailand and India. It’s truly remarkable how small a world it is sometime. First, we decided to check out Dubai Mall (the largest mall in the world) and Burj Khalifa (the tallest skyscraper in the world). The are actually both in the same area. Obviously for two men, a giant shopping mall is not particularly thrilling, so we had a quick walk around, got a coffee and left to see the Burj Khalifa. On the way I took this awesome picture that sums up Dubai nicely, with Arabs in the foreground, and the cityscape in the background:

Anyway, back to the tower. This tower is just over 800m tall, and I’m a bit of a skyscraper fan, so I was quite excited to see it. Two years ago, I was at the second biggest skyscraper in the world, the CN Tower in Toronto, but the CN Tower is nearly 300m shorter than the Burj Khalifa. This should give you some idea how enormous this building is. You can go up the tower, but the observation deck is only 400 odd metres high, which is pretty disappointing, so I didn’t do it. The building itself looks pretty ugly in my opinion, and strangely, it barely lights up at all at night.

The next day we went on a desert safari. This was yet another uber-touristic experience. I swear it’s the same everywhere in the world. It was just over an hour drive to the ‘desert’. But of course, we had to stop for a half an hour break. Anyone that’s ever travelled anywhere knows that breaks are only taken so that people can sell you stuff. After this, we got to the desert and were driven over some sand dunes in our 4WD. This is kinda fun for 5 minutes, but then I wanted it to end, because it was giving me motion sickness. Later, we got a buffer dinner in the middle of the desert, which was quite nice. Overall, not really worth the money, but this was my first time in the desert, so I can check that off my list of things to see.

That night was Marvin’s last night before he was to fly back to Germany. We knew there was a bar in one of the floors of the hotel, so we went there. You couldn’t see what was going on in the bar from the outside, but a concierge greeted us and took us in and got our drinks order. The bar was empty, except for two seedy looking Indian men. Oh and there were 10 girls dancing on a stage. They were fully clothed, so this wasn’t a strip club, but they were certainly giving us the eye. Give me a P. Give me an R. Give me an OSTITUTES. What does it spell? PROSTITUTES. I’ve got to say, I don’t think I’ve ever felt so awkward. It would have been OK if there were lots of people, but with only 4 people in the bar, there was nowhere to hide. Ten girls looking and winking at you the whole time is just annoying. Plus they were crap dancers. We quickly got out of there and went back to our room.

The next day Marvin was off home and I was on my own again. Firstly, I went and bought a cheap netbook, to replace my laptop that got burnt in India. Next I went to the Dubai office of my old company, Arup, to visit Joseph, who I used to work with in Brisbane, before he transferred to Dubai. We had a coffee and talked some nerd stuff and then I was headed to the airport. I left it a bit late to go the airport, which shouldn’t have been a problem, except that it was peak hour, and traffic was at a standstill. I almost got to the point of getting out of the taxi and walking that last kilometre or so, but the taxi driver ensured me I’d make it. I made it (just) and checked in, but then I realised my phone had disappeared.  I don’t know exactly where I had lost it, but it would never be seen again L

Summary

Awesome:

Burj Khalifa and other monumental buildings in Dubai

Craptacular:

Prostitutes when you just want a normal bar

What's Next

The holy land. Israel. If I can get in that is.