The trip to Dubai was relatively easy thanks to a lovely business upgrade courtesy of Emirate. Slightly confusing on arrival as they told me in Melbourne I had to collect my bags in Dubai. Wasn’t sure about that, as I didn’t the last time, but believed the nice Melbournian who gave me a ‘free’ business upgrade so dutifully decanted the power cords, nickers, comfy shoes and t-shirt that I had packed for my suitcase-less airport stopover into my suitcase.
Well of course, she had been lovely with her upgrade, but I didn’t get my case so once again found myself possession-less in Dubai. I couldn’t complain too much though as had a fantastic sleep on the way over and arrived in Dubai at 5.30am local time ready for the day ahead. Virginia who was travelling with me also got an upgrade but hadn’t snored for six hours like me so she took to bed.
Somewhere along the way, I managed to remove the lens from my glasses and of course the spare pair were part of my decanting at Tullamarine when the nice woman totally convinced me that I would get my bags back.
The UAE just seem to let you in with no fuss at all, so the no glasses was not totally disastrous with no landing cards to fill in. Whilst Virginia had a sleep I went out to have my glasses fixed. Thanks to the nice young girl with the fantastic nails, who had the lens back in with once flick of her artfully decorated palm tree pictured nails.
We left Dubai airport at about 10 and started a mad 22km walk (or race) around Dubai. After figuring out the trains and trams we headed to the beach. We thought we would visit the Atlantis – had obviously been sucked in by Aussie television UAE campaign. The metro took a while as it sped super efficiently through this concrete jungle built in a desert. Virginia was a bit keen to see the desert – well we saw it – everywhere between buildings. As per my last trip to Dubai there was massive construction happening with huge sand filled holes everywhere. Again no-one on the streets, with most activity occurring in massive shopping malls. We caught the train and then the tram and then a speedy monorail to Atlantis – well the views were stunning of the sail shaped silhouette of the iconic Burj Al Arab and the massive cruise ship in port.
Atlantis – not sure how I describe an exceptionally ugly crass building surrounded by bikini wearing voluptuous young things with most parts of their anatomy false, covered in tanning lotion, tottering on heels and sucking on shisha pipes delivered by the white coated Dr Shish – all weirdly surreal. I struggled with the image of the abaya clad women clashing with the suntanned Brazilian babes. Cause of the case incident, I was part of the surreal vision sitting at the bar with my heavy, ready for London boots on.
From gaudy Atlantis, to the beautiful historic buildings of the Al Bastakiya – a million miles away from each other. So much of Dubai is just big, shiny buildings in the middle of completely desolate sand – it was beautiful to have a wander through the streets of the few buildings on the Dubai Creek that haven’t been created in Disneyland style.
We walked miles and miles and wound our way back to the amazing Dubai mall beside the totally amazing Burj Khalifa – at 828 metres Virginia didn’t think it looked that tall – but the whole bizarre place is filled with massive buildings so its sheer size as the worlds tallest building gets slightly lost amongst the jungle of concrete and glass.
We had dinner beside the Burj Khalifa and watched the amazing Dubai fountains that ‘perform’ in tune with music. As the Arabian night settled in, the men in their robes were out parading with their totally black clad women. The image of the Brazilian babes kept coming back to me. The night confirmed I was in an Arabic country but then beneath the long black clothing I would catch site of a Jimmy Choo shod foot and amazing jewelry – the men constantly on their mobile phones drinking Starbucks coffees – a single day in Dubai is more than the senses can bear.
I did pass on the camel burgers for dinner and Virginia was slightly disappointed that we couldn’t get a glass of wine (or any alcohol) anywhere with dinner. As I sit watching the cabs and red busses of old London town out my window I really wonder whether the last 48 hours or so has been some mad mental dream !! Perhaps it is still a dream as the sunshine streaming down in London and the rather balmy 20C makes me wonder where I really am.
Sleeping under the stars 