Secret Dubai diary

Prophecy from 1976

2014-04-20T16:34:00.003+04:00

"You can honestly say that Fitz Lodd is actively in business on the Arabian Gulf and would welcome correspondence from any and all American businessmen who need a good connection here to help them trade in these parts. I anticipate that five years from now Dubai will be the biggest boom town in the world." - Robin Moore, Dubai (1976)

Bye Bye Blackberry

2010-08-01T14:31:00.003+04:00

One quick guess what happened here:

The Telecommunications Regulatory Authority has said that BlackBerry Messenger, BlackBerry E-mail and BlackBerry Web-browsing services in the UAE will be suspended as of October 11.

The suspension is a result of the failure of ongoing attempts, dating back to 2007, to bring BlackBerry services in the UAE in line with UAE telecommunications regulations.

[...]

Today's decision is based on the fact that, in their current form, certain BlackBerry services allow users to act without any legal accountability, causing judicial, social and national security concerns for the UAE.

The UAE tried to get RIM to let them snoop user data, and RIM told them to fuck off.

Comments

RAK a rogue state?

2010-06-11T09:05:00.001+04:00

Rocky Ras Al Khaimah has always been the most fascinating of the seven emirates, and now it's being branded a rogue state:

RAK is a strategically important part of the UAE, 50 miles from Iran across the Strait of Hormuz, through which 17 million barrels of oil are shipped each day. Sheikh Khalid, 66, was ousted by his father and brother as de facto leader in 2003.

The campaign alleges the regime presents an international security threat because the kingdom has become "a rogue state and gateway for Iran", allowing the shipment of weapons, including nuclear weapons parts, drugs and blood diamonds as well as military personnel and terrorists from al-Qaida and other networks.

How incredibly exciting.

Comments

"RIP Plane Victims"

2010-05-24T16:20:00.005+04:00

It is impossible to know whether this post at Al-Emirati.com on the victims of the recent Air India disaster is intended to be some appalling attempt at humour or satire, but by every single measure it is absolutely beyond the pale:

Not really. Not only do I not care if the victims "rest in peace" but it seems to me that they are, rather, resting in pieces!

I am of course talking about flight IX 812 from Dubai to Balglapour (or some other hell hole, they're all the same) that recently crashed (click here)

I know I know. Mean, blah blah. The way I see it is as follows. The UAE is (about) 50% Indians, Something that I, and 90% of all other Emaratis see as a bad thing.

This plane, carrying Indians who live and work here, means that 160 indians that clog up the roads, cause accidents, fail code inspections at Indian restaurants, speak like this guy, and are a general drag on the security of the UAE, wont be coming back. That is a very GOOD thing!

I can only pray that this happens every week!

Sadly, we'll probably have 160 new VISAs for 160 new Indians issued in 3 hours... And the authority in charge of this will flaunt that, as if it's a good thing.

Mocking the victims of a plane crash disaster on the grounds of their race and glorying in their tragic deaths is simply inhumane.

In fact, it is evil.

Comments

From Vision™ to nightmare

2009-11-30T00:49:00.001+04:00

It was October 2003; the setting was the recently opened Madinat Jumeirah, its lobby strewn with even more rose-petals and incense-bearers than usual. For the weary Dubai hack pack, lured there by the anticipation of free Jumeirah International catering and yet another laser-etched paperweight or pleather business folder, it was clear that Sheikhliness was afoot.

Sharpened pencils and reporters' notebooks were readied as the crowds descended the elevator into the press conference room. It was packed to the rafters. As well as journalists there were endless VIP guests, businesspeople and white-robed members of the royal retinue.

This was an era of great works of Vision™ - from Dubai Internet City and Media City to Dubai International Financial Centre. The emirate was growing, it was the start of the boom. People were excited about Dubai, they were anticipating great things. So far everything made sense. The direction was clear. Trade, commerce, technology: all areas that Dubai already did or likely could excel at.

And then a lengthy video played, introducing Dubailand. Endless CGI scenes of housing developments were intercut with stock footage of theme parks and shots of Dubai. It was more bewildering than impressive. As it went on, it made progressively less sense. The accompanying speech was no more enlightening.

As the media shuffled out, and started swapping notes, one thing became clear. Everyone had been left with a strange, prevailing sensation of tackiness. (According to one source in a production company that didn't win the bid, the video was made on the cheap in Asia). Nonetheless, this was an era when everyone believed in Dubai, and when everyone - local or expat - wanted to believe in Dubai.

But no one understood Dubailand. Other than that it appeared to be connected to tourism, it didn't seem very well defined. And its history has been one of cancellations, cover-ups, shifting goalposts. There was this article by ITP (link goes to archived pdf): "Projects worth billions of dollars have been shelved on the massive Dubailand development" - it was hastily pulled from the web, despite containing quotes from a senior official. Its assertions were never corrected or denied. As one source says in the banned article: "Many [projects] were unfeasible and impractical - the numbers just didn’t work, and they were simply shrouded by the glitz of the idea."

Looking back, Dubailand is perhaps the defining moment when the Vision™ first faltered. Let us not forget what we were told that day, these are the words of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum:

"I would like to tell capitalists that Dubai does not need investors, investors need Dubai and I tell you that the risk lies not in using your money but in letting it pile up. It is dormant and dead if it is merely a figure in an account. I tell them not to hold onto it and kill it in safes, let it breathe and be active because money is like water - if you lock it up, it becomes stagnant and foul-smelling, but if you let it flow, it stays fresh. If it does not flow, it will become stagnant and its colour will change. When I encourage you to invest, I am not asking you to put your money into a fire - I guarantee that your money will be invested in carefully studied projects. I want to be frank with you - I have the courage to take decisions and to bear the responsibility for the consequences. Do you have the courage to be frank and decisive?"

Comments

Seven star service

2009-11-22T02:10:00.001+04:00

Here's a lucrative career suggestion for anyone struggling in the Dubai recession, and you don't even have to get out of bed:

"STUNNING star student Paige Ashley turned her back on a lawyer's career to make £1million as a real life Belle de Jour.

My biggest one-off job was with three Arab businessmen at the Emirates Palace Hotel in Abu Dhabi," she said. "It's a seven-star hotel and everything is decked out in gold leaf. They paid me £20,000 for one night with all of them. By morning I was exhausted.

"Arab men are fascinated by Western women. We're almost like status symbols to them. I've met girls working in Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Bahrain who've made a million out of escorting."

Comments

Bubbles in the sand

2009-07-12T10:06:00.001+04:00

I'm forever blowing bubbles
Property bubbles in the sand
They grow so fast, obviously can't last
But why do I care, I still own the land
People keep on buying
I take all their cash
Oh, I'm forever blowing bubbles
And bubbles always crash

"Nowadays, ten months after the financial crisis came crashing in on the United Arab Emirates (UAE), nearly destroying its shiniest component, Dubai, hundreds of cranes and dredgers have yet to resume work. The Queen Elizabeth II, once the world’s smartest liner, due to become yet another posh Dubai hotel, is a sleeping quayside hulk. Nothing is happening on three of the most recently man-made islands shaped like palm trees off Dubai’s coast that were the latest flashy projects of Nakheel, the emirate’s shaky real-estate developer."

Comments

British adulteress arrested in Dubai

2009-05-26T13:28:00.005+04:00

Another lucky expat gets a free stay at the Al Wathba government hotel:

A BRITISH businesswoman faces a year inside a squalid Arab prison for having an affair — after her fuming husband shopped her to police.

Cops in Dubai nabbed blonde mum-of-two Sally Antia, 44, as she left a five-star hotel with her lover in the early hours.

Last night she was in custody and facing deportation after admitting in court: “Yes, I did it.”

Sally, who has been married for 14 years and lived in Dubai for 12, told officers she paid for her lover’s flights from the UK to the strict Muslim emirate.

Calling Dubai a "strict Muslim emirate" is akin to describing Amsterdam as a "puritanical Christian state".

Comments

UAE sheikh filmed committing torture

2009-04-23T14:01:00.003+04:00

This is an unpleasantly graphic story to quote extensively from, but the response of UAE authorities is relevant and disturbing:

In a statement to ABC News, the UAE Ministry of the Interior said it had reviewed the tape and acknowledged the involvement of Sheikh Issa bin Zayed al Nahyan, brother of the country's crown prince, Sheikh Mohammed.

"The incidents depicted in the video tapes were not part of a pattern of behavior," the Interior Ministry's statement declared.

The Minister of the Interior is also one of Sheikh Issa's brother.

The government statement said its review found "all rules, policies and procedures were followed correctly by the Police Department."

That someone born into immeasurable wealth and luxury could commit an act of such inhuman depravity over "a grain delivery" is beyond words. That this man is the son of the late Sheikh Zayed is, for all of us who loved and admired Zayed and greatly mourned his death, a exceedingly bitter pill to swallow.

Comments

The dark side of Dubai

2009-04-07T12:56:00.002+04:00

Probably the best article ever written on Dubai, by Johann Hari in the Independent. It covers everything from wexpats:

Daniel [a brain tumour patient] was arrested and taken away on the day of their eviction. It was six days before she could talk to him. "He told me he was put in a cell with another debtor, a Sri Lankan guy who was only 27, who said he couldn't face the shame to his family. Daniel woke up and the boy had swallowed razor-blades. He banged for help, but nobody came, and the boy died in front of him."

To indentured labourers:

He shows me his room. It is a tiny, poky, concrete cell with triple-decker bunk-beds, where he lives with 11 other men. All his belongings are piled onto his bunk: three shirts, a spare pair of trousers, and a cellphone. The room stinks, because the lavatories in the corner of the camp – holes in the ground – are backed up with excrement and clouds of black flies. There is no air conditioning or fans, so the heat is "unbearable. You cannot sleep. All you do is sweat and scratch all night." At the height of summer, people sleep on the floor, on the roof, anywhere where they can pray for a moment of breeze.

The water delivered to the camp in huge white containers isn't properly desalinated: it tastes of salt. "It makes us sick, but we have nothing else to drink," he says.

The work is "the worst in the world," he says. "You have to carry 50kg bricks and blocks of cement in the worst heat imaginable ... This heat – it is like nothing else. You sweat so much you can't pee, not for days or weeks. It's like all the liquid comes out through your skin and you stink. You become dizzy and sick but you aren't allowed to stop, except for an hour in the afternoon. You know if you drop anything or slip, you could die. If you take time off sick, your wages are docked, and you are trapped here even longer."

To Emiratis:

Sultan is furious. He splutters: "You don't think Mexicans are treated badly in New York City? And how long did it take Britain to treat people well? I could come to London and write about the homeless people on Oxford Street and make your city sound like a terrible place, too! The workers here can leave any time they want! Any Indian can leave, any Asian can leave!"

But they can't, I point out. Their passports are taken away, and their wages are withheld. "Well, I feel bad if that happens, and anybody who does that should be punished. But their embassies should help them." They try. But why do you forbid the workers – with force – from going on strike against lousy employers? "Thank God we don't allow that!" he exclaims. "Strikes are in-convenient! They go on the street – we're not having that. We won't be like France. Imagine a country where they the workers can just stop whenever they want!" So what should the workers do when they are cheated and lied to? "Quit. Leave the country."

Comments

Jumbo camel jet

2009-04-01T00:02:00.002+04:00

Forget the Airbus A380s, Dubai's national airline has a much more exciting way to fly:

Camel flies high over Dubai

Wed 1 Apr, 2009 1:23 AM GMT

DUBAI, 1 April (Reuters) - Emirates airline will put 50-metre high aerodynamic camel humps onto its aircraft in a $30 billion rebranding.

The airline is adopting the camel, the national animal of the United Arab Emirates, as its official corporate symbol.

Airbus engineers have worked closely with Emirates marketing team over the past nine months to design the extensions.

Emirates executive vice president of marketing Jamal Al Majnoon said the move was a "perfect synergy" for the airline.

"The camel is the ship of the desert and the aircraft is the ship of the sky," Mr Al Majnoon said.

"Qatar Airways has the oryx and Gulf Air has the falcon, and Etihad will soon have the desert hamster, so we are adopting Arabia's most noble animal for our own airline," he said.

Airbus senior director of engineering Frederic Fouchameau described the move as "an exceptional feat of aviation dromedisation".

Other world airlines are believed to be considering similar redesigns.

Air Astana is in talks with Boeing to improve on Emirates' design by creating a two-humped, bactrian aircraft.

But some of the construction workers at Dubai airport who caught an early glimpse of the redesigned planes are unimpressed, including indentured labourer Shamsil.

"What is the use of putting the camel's hump onto the plane?" he said.

"For it to be interesting and useful, they should have included the sensitive parts of the camel."

(Reporting by Fitz Lodd; Editing by Laila Smith)

© Thomson Reuters 2009. All Rights Reserved.

Comments

Lie back and think of Abu Dhabi

2009-03-27T01:24:00.002+04:00

Bad luck to single women as well as married women: you now have no control over your fertility. According to the medical clinic at a major Dubai company, the UAE recently stripped away any rights to contraception without a husband's consent:

"[Dubai Company] Clinic have advised that due to a change in UAE federal law, there is now a requirement for a Doctor to have the consent of a spouse to prescribe contraception. The impact is that married staff will require a consent for to be signed by their souse and that the clinic is now unable to prescribe or dispense contraception to single/unmarried staff. The provision of contraceptive pills for the treatment of medical conditions is still allowed. As this law includes the application of severe penalties for any Doctor who do not comply with the law, the clinic will be unable to deviate from these requirements."

Don't worry - they'll be on the black market soon. Just like the morning after pill and the abortion pill, both of which can be obtained for a few hundred dirhams if you nudge the right winks.

Comments

No dancing in Dubai

2009-03-14T17:19:00.002+04:00

Farewell to dancing dishdashes and foxtrotting abayas, with the latest fatwa on fun in the sandlands:

Dubai - Playing loud music, dancing, nudity, kissing and even holding hands in public is considered inappropriate behaviour under new guidelines laid down by the authorities of Dubai, a report said on Saturday.

But wait... what about that legendary Gulf cultural phenomenon, the breathtaking choreographed display known as stickdancing?

An entire Dubai-tourism-video-producing industry falls on its knees and weeps.

Comments
"

An Emirati's view

2009-02-19T13:36:00.002+04:00

The opinion of local Dubai people - the native Emiratis - on Dubai's rapid growth is scarce compared to expat opinion. Partly it's a language issue, many of them probably express themselves more in Arabic than in English. It may be cultural in that they don't like to speak out. But one Emirati shares their view here:

A lot of us Emiratis feel this downturn is exactly what we have needed. The chance to finally slow down and see things as they are without the stink of greed distorting everything. To finally concentrate our efforts where it counts such as improving our schools and colleges, completing the metro, building a stable civil society, and a sustainable economy.

Here are the negatives that I feel the boom brought:

Pollution: I remember when one could see the Trade Centre as a little dot on the horizon when travelling from AbuDhabi to Dubai. Something no longer possible with the haze we have now
Prostitution: Before the boom, people would travel to South East Asia to get their sin fix and bring back AIDS. The only difference being the prostitutes are here, and all the nefarious enablers that goes with it. A great shame
Greed: Not an expat only phenomenon. It's weird when the only things some members of the family would talk about is money, money, money. This flaunting of wealth was once considered unseemly by most Emiratis.

Here are the positives of the boom:

Coverage: Dubai in the international media made us see ourselves from the point of view of others, and what was written usually contradicted our own self image
Culture Change: The boom added a measure of optimism to the somewhat pessimistic culture that is part of our birthright. Emiratis are working in sectors of the economy that before would have been considered beneath them.
Greater Efficiency and transparency in government: Yes, these are halting steps forward. I remember the hair pulling experiences I have had with Dubai government 5 years ago and how much more modern it is.
Metro: Can't wait for it to go live

Comments

Dubai: boom to bust?

2009-02-16T11:34:00.001+04:00

"You don't have to be Einstein to work out that things are slowing down."

Not the words of an Embittered Expat™ retrenched from his tax-free job in one of Dubai's endless "Cities", nor a disgruntled journalist having a whinge over an overpriced pint of frothy haram-juice in the Radisson's Media Bar, but a quote from the CEO of one of the world's biggest construction companies operating in Dubai:

"There are undoubtedly issues in Dubai."

The latest word has it that Abu Dhabi has already bailed Dubai out. Dubai allegedly made the desperate (or cunning?) move of courting Saudi and Iranian funds, and fearing increased Iranian influence, Big Dhabi stepped in.

Despite that, the official line is that Dubai still has US$80 billion worth of debt, and no one knows exactly what needs refinancing when:

"The Dubai government has announced it has debts totalling $80bn, but has yet to release a detailed outline of its servicing requirements or the ability of its assets to generate cash flow.

"Borse Dubai is seeking to refinance a $3.8bn loan which matures this week, but officials say the government-owned group is finding it hard to secure the financing it needs from foreign banks, in spite of strong initial interest."

Meanwhile Dubai Holdings is restructuring and consolidating to cut costs, while local newspapers blame the international economy rather than any wobble in the sheikhly Vision™ :

“Dubai will be the fastest city to recover from the impact of the ongoing credit crunch, and the emirate’s real estate sector will once again witness a period of long term boom."

But when international newspapers are printing "lurid rumours" that the Palm Jumeira is sinking and only cockroaches come of out of the hotel taps, the confidence needed to restore Dubai's boom times may be a very long way away.

Comments

Sun, sea and sewage

2009-01-29T12:12:00.001+04:00

A few years ago the waters off Dubai were like a lovely warm bath. Swimming was a wonderful experience, at least for people who don't enjoy having to break the ice before they dip a frozen toe in the dark and ominous English Channel. On Midsummer's Day.

For some reason, the habit of going to the beach rather died away. Even the urging of bronzed beach-goddesses like Lola Lebcan didn't raise its appeal. Maybe a sunset stroll to take photos of the Burj, once or twice a year. But no more sunbathing, and certainly no more swimming.

Perhaps it was the dredging for the Palms that ruined the oceans. Not just because it fouled up the water with sand and fine particles, but because it stopped them being an endless mystical stretch of water as far as the eye could see. Now the sea was just a sort of inlet or lake, a sad sandy pond. The real Gulf now started the other side of the World's Biggest Man-Made Artificial Sand-Dredged Islands (tm) all rights reserved to His Majesty's Vision Inc (tm).

Anyway we've had this latest story before, last year on the BBC in fact. But now The Times has picked up on the fact that Dubai isn't quite the unspoilt virgin eco-Eden that Nakheel's vast hordes of paid "ecologists" and assorted "environmental scientists" like to promote:

"A noxious tide of toilet paper, raw sewage and chemical waste has transformed Dubai’s most prestigious stretch of shoreline into a foul-smelling health hazard.

"A stretch of the exclusive Jumeirah Beach - a magnet for Western tourists and home to a string of hotels - has been closed. “It’s a cesspool. Our tests show too many E. coli to count. It’s like swimming in a toilet,” said Keith Mutch, the manager of the Offshore Sailing Club, which has posted warnings and been forced to cancel regattas. The pollution is a blow to Dubai’s reputation as an international holiday destination offering almost guaranteed sunshine and clear seas."

The good news for Dubai is that the sort of tourists who flock in on cheap Emirates deals and hang around the Jumeirah Beach Hotel with their tattoos, guts and lycra on grim and sweaty display are probably not Times subscribers.

The bad news is that like everyone else in the world, they're probably about to lose their jobs, homes and savings if they haven't already. Meaning even a weekend in Weston-Super-Mud or Whitley Bay is going to be beyond the budget, let alone The Arabian Effluent Experience.

Comments

"Dens of prostitution"

2009-01-13T15:14:00.002+04:00

Possibly not putting himself in line to win one of DTCM's 2009 Excellence in Journalism awards, Yusuf Abdulla tells it like it is:

"There is also another side to Dubai’s booming market. Most large hotels are little more than dens of prostitution. Hotels are permitted to issue guest permits to bring people from outside. In order to attract customers, many hotels bring girls from Central Asia, Russia, Romania and Western Europe. These girls are provided free accommodation in the hotel for three months while they are expected to service hotel guests. Each hotel has a club where girls enter for free while men must pay 100 dirhams. Alcohol is available and consumed in large quantities. Customers come to these clubs to pick up foreign girls. It has been pointed out to the authorities in Dubai that they are sitting on a time bomb. Girls with such loose moral character are likely to be infected with the AIDS virus. There are already reports of AIDS spreading among the local population because of the behavior of emirati men who then infect their wives."

Interesting how the "girls" are the ones accused of "loose moral character". Not the pimps and slavers that traffic them to Dubai. Nor the hotels who act as brothelmasters. Nor their clients. Or even the unnamed people who "expect" them to provide this service.

An interesting choice of nationalities too. Along with Russia and the CIS: Eastern Europe, Morocco, Africa and China would be more like it.

Comments

From denial to the Nile

2009-01-03T19:26:00.001+04:00

A new year dawns, and with it some big changes for Lola LebCan. After many happy years in Sheikh Zayed Road's prestigious Orifice Towers building, Dubai's PR queen is being forced to pack her bags. Either that, or have thousands of labourers gaze at her naked splendour in the shower every morning as the new Dubai Metro whizzes right past her window.

But like many long-term expats, Dubai has palled for Lola. The once-glittering heights of SZR's skyscrapers are but dusty glass. The glamourous sandlands social whirl is a shallow chore. There is no joy, no inspiration and the city, Lola says, is "soulless". She has even swapped karaoke at Harry Ghatto's for this festive lament:

Deck the malls with discount banners
Fallah-lalala-lala-lala

‘tis the season to sell your hummers
Fallah-lalala-lala-lala

Donning now your old pyjamas
Fallah-lalala-lala-lala

Join the bankrupt Jumeira mamas
Fallah-lalala-lala-lalaaaa*

Two years ago, Lola fled to Egypt for sanctuary. She now plans to seek the healing waters of the Nile once more and work on her Masri twang. Plus there are around 40 million men in Egypt, compared to just 2.5 million in the UAE.

*(c) Lola LebCan 2008

Comments

Time to jail another "adulteress"

2008-12-29T13:09:00.003+04:00

With property prices plummeting and the boom finally bursting, it's nice that Dubai can shift headlines away from its economic meltdown by jailing another expat for "adultery":

A British mother faces jail in Dubai after being convicted of adultery.

Marnie Pearce fears she may never see her two sons again. She insists she is innocent and that it is her ex-husband who cheated on her.

Miss Pearce, 40, claims she was framed by Egyptian Ihab El-Labban so he could win custody of their children, Laith, seven and Ziad, three.

This has to be the best bit:

She was found guilty of adultery in a Dubai court last month after being denied the opportunity to represent herself.

Any woman living in the Middle East should know by now that if you marry a Muslim man, except in exceedingly rare circumstances, you lose the children in the event of divorce. It doesn't matter why your marriage failed or whether you are Muslim yourself. Hopefully of course a marriage wouldn't break down in the first place, or a couple would at least be mature and decent enough to work out a shared custody arrangement.

But if not and it goes to the courts, it's the man who gets custody nearly every time. This is because the UAE applies Sharia law, generally from the Hanbali school, which it has every right to do. You do, however, as an expat, have the right not to visit there, live there, or invest there.

Comments

Twitter time

2008-12-05T12:23:00.000+04:00

Three tasty Twitter options for Dubai news alerts:

#secretdubai
This tweets links to new posts on Secret Dubai diary. It will also be used to tweet links to select interesting articles about Dubai and the UAE.

#uaecommunity
This tweets links to new posts on UAE Community blog.

#dubaifeed
This retweets any Twitter entries containing the terms "Dubai" "Abu Dhabi" or "UAE".

Etihad to take over Emirates?

2008-12-01T01:33:00.003+04:00

According to The Times, Abu Dhabi is demanding control of Emirates in return for a multi billion dollar bailout:

"The emirate, which is ruled by the Al Maktoum family, has been hit hard by the credit crunch. Its property market, in which many of the big players are state-owned or backed, has enjoyed explosive growth over the last decade but prices are now tumbling, leaving heavily indebted developers badly exposed.

"Government sources in Dubai confirmed last week that talks had begun with Abu Dhabi, which has huge oil and gas reserves, about funding. Rather than ploughing cash into the Dubai state, Abu Dhabi has offered to invest in its neighbour’s strategic assets.

"The airline alone is estimated to be worth about £10 billion and selling a stake in it could generate enough cash to prop up much of Dubai’s economy."

Etihad already bills itself as "the national airline of the UAE". A national airline that doesn't, admittedly, actually fly to the biggest, busiest, most famous city in the UAE if not the entire Gulf. But it soon will if Sheikh Ahmed and his aircraft end up as the sacrificial virgins for Dubai's Big Bubble Burst.

Both airlines deny any merger plans. But given the rapid consolidation taking place in the rest of the aviation industry, having two of the world's fastest growing airlines based in the same tiny country makes increasingly less sense. Certainly plenty of pilots think a closer relationship is on the cards.

Xanadu Atlantis

2008-11-22T02:49:00.001+04:00

In Jumeirah did Big Sheikh Mo
A massive great hotel decree
Where streams of sacred sewage ran
Through beaches uninhabitable by man
Down to a polluted sea

So twice five dozen top celebs
Did mingle with the local plebs
And there were fireworks bright with flashing stars
Apparently they could be seen from Mars
The only ones that didn't party or rave
Were some newly captured Pacific dolphin slaves

A sheikh with a kandoora
In a vision once he saw
It was an Abyssinian maid
Overworked and poorly paid

And with fireworks loud and grand
He did build that Dubailand
That massive mall! Those slopes of ice!
And we all thought them very nice
But all should cry, Beware! Beware!
This sandy land is not so fair
And now financial storm clouds grow
It might be time to pack and go
For we on honey-dew hath fed
It's time for some real life instead

Comments

Tragic Tale of the Tomato Plant

2008-11-10T14:42:00.001+04:00

One of the rarest books in Dubai is not Robin Moore's notorious bonkbuster but a tome known best among Jumeirah Janes of the Golden Era, when British expat wives could actually afford to live in spacious seaside villas, do nothing but shop and beautify all day, and employ half the subcontinent to wait upon them.

Gardening in the Gulf was published in 1990 but has been inexplicably out of print for years, despite Dubai's population boom. Now the local weather is cooling but the wider world is global warming, ones thoughts naturally turn to green stuff and gardening and becoming self-sufficient before the sea levels rise and the final volcanic tsunami apocalypse swallows us all. Unless we're camping in the Hajjars that day.

A few years ago one of the local newspapers had an inspirational feature on an Indian couple living in Sharjah who grew vegetables on their city-centre balcony. They used grow-bags, and had huge great harvests of tomatoes and peppers and so on, all thanks to the 365 days of heat and sunshine enjoyed in the sandlands.

By a marvellous coincidence, on a trip to the Dubai Garden Centre not long after, there was one tiny tomato plant left for sale by the till. At that time the garden centre was new,and the only one in Dubai, except for that CITES black hole of Al Hudaiba Street in Satwa. "Plant Street" with pink bougainvillea outside every shop and caged, half-dead endangered wildlife on sale within. If they ever find a living Tasmanian Tiger again, it won't be deep in the Antipodean rainforest. It will be in Satwa.

Anyway with great pride, the new leafy acquisition was set on a sunny corner of the verandah outside Cell Block G. It promised to be the start of a whole new revolution of vegetable growing - a mini market garden that would make Spinneys defunct and bring The Good Life to 21st century Jebel Ali.

But in just a couple of days the tomato plant had developed a score of rots, blights, cankers, diseases and pests. This in itself was something of a miracle, given there were no other plants within about ten metres, save for three palms with their leaves still trussed up. The small solanum struggled, and withered, and died. And with it died all further dreams of self-sufficiency in the Southern Gulf.

Comments

Paris Hilton Towers

2008-11-04T16:43:00.001+04:00

Just when we all thought the property bubble was bursting, here comes Paris Hilton to save the day:

Dubai: Paris Hilton could be the latest in a constellation of stars to light up Dubai's property sector, in a possible $2 million (Dh7.3 million) deal with Abu Dhabi-based developer, Hydra Properties.

Hilton, who was famous before she was even born, will add a dash of desert glam to Dubai's celebrity skyline.

What with Pamela Anderson, Paris Hilton, Jim Davidson and half the English football team, no one can deny that Dubai is a classy place. For the Z-list.

Comments

Dubai property bubble bursting

2008-10-15T02:39:00.001+04:00

"Welcome to Dubai Aromatic City: enjoy an exclusive lifestyle by the azure-brown waters of the Arabian Gulf, or take a dip in your villa's private cess-pool as you watch the rich rivers of effluent run down to the sea,"

Dubai is in the shit in more ways than one. Raw sewage flowing onto tourist beaches is foul enough, but fouler still would be a property sector meltdown:

Then, over the summer, Morgan Stanley issued a note which said that Dubai property prices would fall by 10% by 2010. Quite simply, there may not be enough demand for the wave of new property coming onto the market. To a society used to easy returns, this was a shock.

It's not actually a shock to anyone who bothered to do a few sums on a pocket calculator, as Matein Khalid did back in 2005. He predicted a glut by 2008, which a later report by EFG Hermes also indicated.

Moody's is also bearish: it believes that Dubai may have to borrow from Abu Dhabi or the federal UAE government (which is basically the same entity). The cost of insuring Dubai Holding's bonds have quadrupled since May.

Even Gulf News reports gloomy tidings from Colliers International and from Citi:

"In our view, there is legitimate concern the Dubai market is enduring a liquidity squeeze, witnessing macro-economic and credit deterioration in most of the countries from where its expat buyers hail, maturing from a regulatory perspective and seeing the beginnings of a shakeout of small developers," said an analyst in yesterday's Citi Research real estate report.

No wonder that 75% of Arabian Business readers wouldn't touch Gulf real estate with someone else's bargepole.

Comments