Stop/Start

No, I'm not referring to how frequently I update this blog....I'm referring to the way some (most) taxi drivers drive their cars in this city.

I'm guessing they all went to the same driving school, because they all tend to press on the gas pedal for a couple of seconds, then take their foot off it for a couple of seconds, then press on it again for a couple of seconds...and so on and so forth....

Which makes for a very, very unpleasant ride (this is particularly true after a long night filled with boozy antics).

Who has taught these people how to drive? How hard is it to just keep your foot on the pedal? Has anyone else experienced (or been bothered by) this type of driving?

Who's handling the PR for Atlantis?

And do they really think they're doing a good job by letting all this negative publicity surround them, without really responding to it? I know we usually say "all publicity is good publicity" but still...this has got to hurt them at some point, no?

Ever since the opening of the water-themed resort, there has been a slew of reports and articles highlighting how unprepared they were for what was meant to be a soft launch.

From parking woes to check-in fiascoes, from the lack of water (at a water-themed park...ha!) to refusing to book non-hotel guests into their restaurants, Atlantis has really been dominating the news for the past couple of weeks.

And now the latest PR blunder to have come out of Atlantis revolves around "Sammy the Shark", a whale shark that was , apparently fatigued and disoriented and placed in the Atlantis aquarium. Initially, he was meant to stay there just long enough to recover. But now, it seems, Atlantis have decided to keep the shark in the aquarium. And this has upset quite a few people, including Gulf News which has launched a "Free Sammy the Shark" campaign which has now gone global.

And yet, despite all this, Atlantis has barely uttered a word, which makes me think that:
a) They are still scrambling, trying to figure out how to
deal with the situation (release the shark...they'll never win if they keep him)
b) They are deliberately not responding, because they're getting so much publicity anyway so who cares?
c) The whole thing was staged...Sammy the Shark was never really captured off the coast of Jebel Ali, this whole thing about him being fatigued and disoriented was just a story that was spun around the shark to make Atlantis look like heroes. And they did, for a little while, not realizing that it would eventually backfire when people started asking for Sammy to be released. So now they're in deep trouble because Atlantis does not really want to release a shark that they probably bought from somewhere and probably paid a lot of money for.

Yes, I'm speculating here, but really...How convenient is it that the Atlantis "found" this shark just a couple of weeks before they launched? And how odd is it that it was the Atlantis team that announced the capture of the shark, and not some environmental body? And how coincidental is it that Atlantis had "a custom-made transport unit with a highly advanced marine life transport system that was used to ensure the safety and well-being of the animal"??

Hmm??? Sounds a bit fishy to me!

Simply disgusting

There's been a recent wave of illegal dumping of raw sewage in storm water drains over the past few months, and this has now led to the closing of the Dubai Sailing Club due to water contamination.

Basically, sewage tank drivers have found a way to cut corners by dumping sewage in drains and other deserted areas, rather than going to the Al Aweer sewage treatment plant. Why? Because apparently they have to wait for up to 12 hours to dump their load at the treatment plant. And they get paid based on the number of loads they dump.

Little did they know that in doing so, they were causing serious environmental and potential health issues, with E-Coli and bacteria now floating around in the water and on our shores.

So who's to blame here? The drivers? Maybe a little bit, but then again, they're just trying to make a living and are probably oblivious to the fact that they are causing environmental damage.

Do we blame the companies that hire these drivers? Yes definitely. They should be blamed for not keeping a vigilant eye on how they run their business. And for not training their employees properly. Or, maybe they DO know what's happening but decide to turn a blind eye, simply because they only care about how much money they make at the end of the day.

Do we blame Dubai Municipality? For sure! With everything in Dubai growing at breakneck speed, no one thought that we would need more than one sewage treatment plant to handle the load of treating the sewage of an ever-expanding city that gets hundreds of new residents every day. Not only that, it seems that they are not doing a thorough job of warning residents not to swim in contaminated waters, with most beach-goers oblivious to the fact that there's been an illegal sewage dumping issue.

Do we blame Dubai Police? Yes, them too. Although they claim to be dealing with the situation by going after these trucks and fining them, there's also been reports of them being very slow in reacting to calls from residents who have spotted these trucks doing their illegal dumping.

All this to say that while we are all willing to put up with the growing pains of Dubai, I, for one, am not willing to accept cutting-corner tactics that may potentially damage my health and harm the environment. It's simply disgusting, and it's simply unacceptable.

I am sick and tired of traffic!

Seriously!

I don't know if it's because it's Ramadan, or because schools started again, or because of construction, or because of Salik, or a combination of all of the above, but traffic in the mornings has been horrendous.

Every single morning, I hear the following traffic report on the radio: Getting out of the Greens, the Springs, the Meadows and Arabian Ranches is a nightmare. And it is! (well, I know in the Greens it is...)

It's simply not normal that it can take up to an hour to get out of the Greens...Just to get on the main road! But no one seems to give a crap...except for the people who live in these places of course. By no one, I mean the RTA and the government. As long as they get to make their money off of Salik, and continue their round-the-clock building of new interchanges, they're happy.

Car-less

I've been car-less since Sunday. Not because my car is being serviced. No. It's much more interesting than that.

I went to renew my registration last week, only to find out that they were confiscating my car for a week. Why? Because I apparently parked in a handicapped zone. When? In April. Where? No clue. No one could give me an answer to that question.

So they gave me a piece of paper that instructed me to impound my car for a week. I dropped it off on Sunday. I parked my car in a gated, sandy area, with hundreds of other dusty, desolate cars. I can only imagine the state my car will be in when I get it back next week.

As I left the pound, I asked the person responsible if I could find a taxi. He said that all I needed to do was walk to the Eppco station that was a few meters away to find one. So I did. At 2PM. Under a blazing sun. I get to the Eppco station, only to find it closed (it's next to the registration place, and they close at 2PM for Ramadan timings). I call a taxi, and wait, and wait...for about 10 minutes. I could feel sweat beads rolling down my back.

Luckily, I see that there are people waiting inside the registration place, so I beg the security guard to let me wait inside while I waited for my cab. And I wait...and wait...and wait...

Twenty minutes later, I call Dubai Transport again and they tell me that they haven't found a taxi yet. At which point, I called a friend of mine who works nearby and begged her to come pick me up. Which she did.

I've told numerous friends about this, and many of them have told me that they've just gotten a Dhs 1000 fine for parking in a handicapped zone. I got a Dhs 500 fine, but why did they also have to confiscate my car for a week? That's just ridiculous! It's not like I'm a serial offender and that I always park in handicapped zones! Plus, I don't even have proof that I actually did park there! I mean, no one's given me a ticket, and no one was able to tell me where this happened, despite asking numerous people at the traffic department.

Oh, and being car-less in Dubai sucks! I've managed to catch rides to and from work with some friends, which has helped a lot, especially when I leave work at 6PM and can't find a taxi in sight!

On a side note, I've added the "Followers" gadget on my blog (right under my Who's visiting map). So if you're a regular reader of the blog, go on, click on it, and show your support :)

Where's my North?

It seems that every time I come back to Dubai after a vacation, something's changed. A new road, a new building, or a blocked road...or a building that's been demolished...

This time is no different. Maybe I just hadn't noticed before but apparently all the road signs that used to indicate "Abu Dhabi" or "Dubai" have now been switched to "South" or "North"...And so we now have "Sheikh Zayed Road North" or "Sheikh Zayed Road South".

Why is that? Does anyone know the reason the reason behind this change?

The whole North/South thing is a bit confusing if you ask me... Today was my first time encountering the new signage, and I headed North thinking I was going towards Abu Dhabi, only to find out that I actually needed to be heading South (I am very directionally challenged by the way...always have been and always will be!). I don't think I'll make that mistake ever again but I will have to think twice whether I need to head North or South from now on.

Bring back Abu Dhabi and Dubai! I don't like this North/South bullsh*t!

Abu Dhabi vs. Dubai - The Rivalry

This article in the Telegraph is one of the only articles I've read that touches upon the unspoken rivalry between Abu Dhabi and Dubai.

It comes after the recent announcement that the Abu Dhabi government has bought the Manchester City football club AND invested 500 million pounds into Warner Brothers.

But all of Abu Dhabi's recent investments into art, culture, sports and movies are not an attempt to mimic Dubai's growth formula, because Abu Dhabi doesn't need the cash as badly as Dubai does apparently:

On the surface, what’s happening in Abu Dhabi mirrors Dubai. But what’s driving its growth is different. Dubai is a story of survival, of how one small city that is running out of oil – it has less than one per cent of Abu Dhabi’s reserves – is saving itself with a mixture of tourism and commercialism, hookahs and hookers. Thanks to oil, Abu Dhabi is not in a rush. It wants to build itself into a global city-state, but is determined to do it with none of the crassness (think prostitution, drunkenness and financial scandal) that is now beginning to tarnish Dubai’s image.

The article also touches upon the personal feud that fuels the rivalry between the 2 cities, which I was also unaware of:

The Nahyans and the ruling Maktoums of Dubai are cousins. They are cordial in public, but compete furiously behind each others’ dishdashas. The Nayhans are irked that poorer Dubai has so far attracted most of the foreign investment, five-star resorts and high-spending tourists in the UAE. They are running fast to catch up.

An interesting read that made me wonder what's in store for Abu Dhabi in the coming years. Will it really be able to differentiate itself from Dubai? Will it really do things differently? Will it be better?

Only time will tell I guess...

Leaving on a jet plane...

...for a 10-day vacation (and to attend a good friend's wedding). Blogging during this period will be minimal to non-existant....

See you in a couple of weeks!

Great books

I've mentioned reading The Namesake before, and it was a great book. When I was on holiday, I saw a book by the same author called Unaccustomed Earth, and decided to buy it. Just like her first book, Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri's Unaccustomed Earth is a collection of short stories. I loved it. And I absolutely recommend it to anyone out there.

Within the span of a few pages, the author managed to get me hooked on the characters, transport me to another world, immerse me in their lives, and made me so attached to them, I didn't want the story to end. But then story did end, and I'd move on to the next one, and just like that, I'd become part of another set of character's lives and stories. Pure reading pleasure.


After I finished reading Unaccustomed Earth, I decided to get her first book, Interpreter of Maladies, which was also an excellent read.

And now, I can't wait for her next book to come out!

So what else was fake?

First we find out about some of the fireworks being fake at the end of the Olympics ceremony, to ensure better visibility according to the Beijing Times:

...members of the Beijing Olympic Committee said it was necessary to replace live video with computer-generated imagery because the city’s hazy, smoggy skies made it too difficult to see, according to The Beijing Times, which first reported the story.

And now, we find out that the little girl that sang during the ceremony did not really sing at all...She was used because she was cute, cuddly and lovable, but it was another -not so photogenic apparently- girl's voice that we heard.

While I may understand about the fireworks, I'm a bit disturbed by the little girl story... That's just so wrong!