- Critical Perspective (2019-08-16)
- Dubai, Abu Dhabi and the UAE (2022-05-05)
I recently returned from a short vacation in the United Arab Emirates and filled with impressions and I wanted to share some thoughts with the hive:
I was invited to visit Dubai by a mixed group of friends from Russia and Ukraine whom I met back in 2006, and whom due to the recent troubles became residents in Dubai. I spent most of my week in Dubai, with a day trip into Abu Dhabi and I have to say that it is like nothing I’d expected. Reading about the UAE, you see a lot of comparisons to Las Vegas and having been to Vegas more times than I can readily recall, I disagree with that assessment.
My biggest impression after the trip is that Dubai is by far the safest place I’ve ever been. It is a very densely populated city with over 3 million people and yet during a week filled with crawling all of the most touristy areas, I’d only seen one responding ambulance. Even in places that ought to be sketch – downtown alleys at night, crowded markets, outside of night clubs – nothing sketch is happening. People walk about everywhere at all hours, but everyone’s kind, polite and going about their business. I’d like to think that I have a keen radar for trouble, but even when purposely keeping an eye out, I saw zero danger. And it’s not because, like I’d observed elsewhere, there are hundreds of police armed with machineguns everywhere. Matter of fact during the whole trip, I’d only seen a police officer twice and both times they were stopped on the side of the highway. It’s hard to imagine, but there is just no crime whatsoever, nobody is looking to scam you. Even the taxi drivers are honest!
Everywhere I’d been in the UAE, everything is spotless. There is no trash or litter – like at all. This goes for the city streets, all of the tourist areas, same for the markets, the beaches, and the desert wilderness. They do have disposable grocery bags, water bottles, cigarettes, and the dreaded plastic straws – people just throw them away properly. I’m sure there are cleaning services for the streets, but it’s not like they are just cleaning everything round-the-clock. There are no homeless, or beggars. I’d seen no drug use, nor been heckled to buy drugs. I’m not sure what they do to prevent these things, but enablement is certainly not one of them.
It’s a bit of a puzzle to figure out how this is happening. According to the factbook, 88.1% of the residents in the UAE are non-citizen immigrants making the united Arabs a tiny minority within their own country. Think about that for a second. Yet the Arabs created an atmosphere unlike anything I’d ever experienced. It is impossible to be unaware of the contrast between our society that tolerates, enables, and excuses anti-social behavior that we’d grown numb to, and a society where those things just don’t exist. Our world has become accustomed to willful homelessness, abundant littering, human feces on our sidewalks, confrontational heckling, rowdy behavior in our entertainment districts, road rage, and ever-more-expanding property crime. The Arab Emirates are clearly doing something very differently and they’ve managed to achieve a higher state of civilization without becoming a police state. From what I saw, it is a very non-confrontational culture – most laws are enforced through the mail. The police supposedly carry no guns, but I could not confirm this as I never got to actually see a policeman up close. There are some cameras, especially on the roadways, but they are not obnoxious and in-your-face like they are in London and much fewer than we’re used to in Seattle. Like Las Vegas, in Dubai there is drinking, dancing, and night clubs. But I didn’t see any drugs, fights, or screeching ambulances, which are so common in every other tourist destination I’d been to. There must be more to it, but it escaped my eye, and I am truly puzzled as to how they’d managed to accomplish this.
One thing that I was able to determine is that the safety and cleanliness, are not due to a lack of poverty. Thanks to the oil under their feet, the Arabs are Aladdin-rich, but they are very few and far between. The entire working sector is made up of foreign residents many of whom live in slum-like conditions earning far below our minimum wage. Yet they do not allow their relative poverty to serve as an excuse for taking something that is not theirs or feeling entitled to anything that they had not earned.
The UAE is an Absolute Monarchy ruled by a federation of the seven emirate rulers – there is practically no democracy whatsoever. Whatever voting there is, is done by the “National Council” which consists of 12% of the population hand-picked by the monarchs. Moreover, they are technically under Islamic Sharia Law. These are all things we in the Western world are taught to be evil, dysfunctional and archaic. And yet I cannot imagine what these people must think of us and our culture when they visit our cities and see the result of our way of doing things. I pity any Western diplomat tasked with trying to tell these people that our way of life, government, “freedom”, or culture, is superior to theirs.
One of the oddest things I noticed was the fact that people are active at all hours. I was surprised one night when we got back to our building to find kids playing in the playground, young adults playing a game of soccer, and people working on their computers in the lobby alcoves, at 3am in the morning. Days are quite hot here, so many people switch to being partially nocturnal, while others, due to work obligations keep more usual hours. As a result, Dubai is a city that never sleeps and you can get a drink, a coffee ,or a meal at any time.
Language. Literally everyone in the UAE speaks English. Arabs clearly appreciate the respect conveyed by greeting them in their own language, but take zero offence at people approaching them immediately with English.
Prices. This is definitely one of those places where if you want to show off and blow money, the sky is your limit. There are $20k per night hotel rooms, rental Ferrari’s for about $275/hr, yachts, parties, and everything you could imagine. But there was actually a lot less of that in your face than I expected. Vail, Colorado was more stuck-up than anything I’d seen in Dubai. Decent hotel rooms in good areas will run you $90-200/night and there are even more affordable options if you’re willing to have a shared bathroom with a locked tiny bedroom. Food costs are another area were there are insanely expensive options aimed at the ultra-wealthy, as well as easy to find eateries catered to the relatively poor working class, and everything in between. Generally, I would I say that eating at restaurants aimed at tourists, the prices are about 25-40% less than what we would pay in Seattle. I experienced an 8-course meal promotion with wine included for $41, but most places are a bit price-er than that. Prices on excursions, like jetskis, desert dune buggies, and safaris are about on par with what you’d expect at any other tourist hub.
Restrictions. Getting through passport control was a breeze. There were no lines. They check that you have your passport and put a stamp in it. The only question was whether I was planning to apply for residency and they were not checking anyone’s bags. Much is written about various restrictions due to the fact that The Emirates are technically under Sharia Law, which has strict dress and behavioral codes, and punishments ranging up to beheadings for violating things we accept as commonplace. The fact of the matter is that the UAE, unlike Iran and Saudi Arabia, is very tolerant in terms of sharia and welcoming to tourists. Swimsuits and even bikinis are the norm on the beaches and beachfront promenades. Further inland, short-shorts, yoga pants, tank tops, and short skirts are very common and even the Arabs dressed in full-on sharia garb do not seem to mind scantily clad westerners. I’ve observed many times groups in friendly conversations laughing together over coffee, hookah, or meals where some in the group are wearing traditional burkas and others are sitting in a skirt and tank top. What are not accepted are things like going topless and public displays of affection. The only time where sharia dress for men and women is strictly enforced, is if you wish to visit a mosque. Nearby vendors sell a druid-like dress with a hood that goes over whatever clothes you’re wearing, and this fulfills the dress code requirement – these cost about $20. I read in another article that the only time the police (if they were ever present) can enforce sharia law, is if a citizen lodges a formal complaint stating that they already confronted the perpetrator, and the offence is ongoing. So, if you do run a foul of a religious observance, an Arab will come at you (sometimes aggressively) to tell you what you’re doing wrong and the thing to do then is to remedy the situation, or remove yourself, but never to argue. I feel that this is perfectly fair given that we’re guests in their country. When visiting mosques, the reminders I observed from the chaperones were very gentle. For Ramadan, restaurants and cafes were open, but outdoor seating was not permitted from sunup to sundown. They were tolerant of unknowing or uncaring tourists walking around with water and food, but during Ramadan this is considered rude.
Food. I was a bit underwhelmed by the food, to be honest and would rate the overall experience as 7 out of 10. The service, value, and presentation are excellent. But the taste and preparation left something to be desired in that the food was good but didn’t blow my socks off. The one ingredient entirely missing, is pork – you won’t find it anywhere. But you will find French, Persian, Italian, Georgian, Turkish, Japanese, Mexican, Russian and many other eating options, everywhere. I think the issue with the food taste is that restaurants are competing to have these giant menus with myriads of options for every taste and they are working on a very high volume. As a result, I feel like a lot of the food is pre-prepared and aimed at checking checkboxes rather than pursuit of perfection. I’d seen ads for ‘foodie-experiences’ but did not get a chance to try them out. I am sure that there are restaurants and even affordable ones that would please my snobby tastebuds, but they would need to be sought out. Another thing I noticed is that unlike other places around the world, the tourist-aimed restaurant districts aren’t devoid of grocery stores. If you’re on the cheap, have a kitchen, or like to make your own food, large grocery stores are within the hotel districts offering excellent prices and selection. Weirdly, although Coke, Pepsi, RedBull and other beverages are everywhere, the diet versions are very rare and if you do find them, the taste isn’t what we have here.
Clubs. Alcohol is not as commonplace as it is in the West. Licenses to serve it are quite expensive, so many restaurants simply don’t get them and the ones that do charge a hefty mark-up. A beer will cost you a minimum of $10. That said, alcohol is readily available in many restaurants and liquor stores. It is illegal to consume in public, but nobody really checks, so unless you are being obnoxious with it, a pre-filled coffee mug is an easy way to have a drink on the beach. Clubs are very common in tourist areas, but unlike Vegas, they are not visible from the street or advertised. You sort-of need to know where to go. They aren’t illegal, they are just not in-your-face. I didn’t get a chance to check them out on this trip, so I cannot report much about prices, covers, or whatnot. I was a bit surprised in that live music was not more prevalent. Traditional music is commonplace, but it is played over speakers in malls and restaurants. I’d hoped to catch a music performance, or even a dancing show, but it seems like with clubs, one has to figure out where to find it. The fact that I was there at Ramadan may also have something to do with it.
Beaches. The beaches in Dubai are world-class! Some are free and open to the public. Others have an entrance fee of $5-15 and come with a lounge chair and a sun umbrella. Showers, clean restrooms, and changing rooms are very common. In Abu Dhabi we went to what I must say is by far the nicest beach I’d ever seen. Unreal and perfectly uniform white silica sand, crystal clear turquoise warm water, absolute cleanliness, and a gentle perfectly sloping bottom – could not have been designed better.
Architecture. Imagine an architect drafting building designs while tripping on LSD and then what must be a team of brilliant engineers actually figuring out how to build them. That about describes the architecture in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Everything is ultra-modern with LED lighting and lasers highlighting the buildings at night. Construction appears to be very high quality and given how quickly everything gets accomplished, I am going to guess that their regulatory process is very quick and that their labor unions do not insist on 3 workers to operate a 6ft ladder. Naturally everything is very grand – the tallest building on Earth is fronting to the most powerful dancing fountain display, cradled by the biggest shopping mall in the world.
Tourism and people. The Emirates really seek to be a hub of the world and I’ve seen this evidenced by overhearing couples conversing with one another in English, which was clearly non-native to either of them. Everyone is extremely polite and service-oriented. Largely due to the ramifications of the current conflict in Ukraine, there is a huge exodus of Slavic people going to the UAE – Russians and Ukrainians primarily. At times it seemed that more than half of the people in the tourist promenades were Russian-speaking. The merchants and service staff are shockingly adept at learning languages and many of them are now conversing in basic Russian. The building where my Russian friends live has more than a dozen Slavic families about a half of whom fled the conflict in Ukraine. Their kids play together, they help one another out with daycare, take kids to after-school activities and live as one community. This underscores my belief that the divisions between Russians and Ukrainians are largely perpetrated by the media and practiced by the nationalistic diaspora communities who’d been detached from their former homeland for many years and are out of touch with the sentiments of the people they claim to be ‘defending’.
The Gold Market. One of the destinations in Dubai, is their world-famous gold market, or Souk. I’d seen some of this stuff when traveling elsewhere, but I was blown away by the intricate hand-made merchandise at the Dubai gold souk. Despite an endless sea of necklaces, rings, bracelets, belts, crowns and just about anything you can imagine, every piece is unique. I was hoping to see some of the goldsmiths at the souk to observe their craft, but unfortunately that is not a thing there. It was impressive nonetheless to take in the craftsmanship honed to an unbelievable level through the generations. The gold quality is said to be highly controlled and enforced as a matter of national pride, and every tourist guide I read said that you can be assured that if a merchant claims a certain purity of gold, it is accurate. Anything under 18 karats (75% pure), is considered to be second-sort and is virtually non-existent at the market. Jewelry here is all 18-22k, with pure 24k bullion commonly sold alongside. Here too I was amazed to see literally hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of gold laying behind single-plate glass displays without a single police or security officer in sight. Every other shop had $20k Rolexes within the reach of a grab. I don’t know how they would deal with a smash-and-grab like the one suffered recently by Bellevue Rare Coins, but it seems that the concern does not even cross their minds in Dubai.
Marketing of tourism. Unfortunately as with many tourist destinations, there is a bit of creative license taken with tourist marketing. It’s not a complete fraud of a tourist trap like Iceland, but a few things commonly seen in semi-subliminal advertisement are just that – advertising. A blatant example is the frequent mention of police driving around in Bugattis, Lamborghinis, and Ferraris. The two cop cars I saw, were both Toyota SUVs. I’d asked around and even the taxi drivers told me that it’s a bit of a myth – a white whale. I remember a Top Gear episode where they kept running into and filming these cars as if they were on every corner. That is simply not the case. Additionally, although you will see a lot of exotic cars in the tourist areas, they aren’t very common at all outside of ‘the strip’. I suspect that most of them are rentals. The ski hill at the mall was a bit of a joke – creative photography makes it look like a real ski hill, but at best it is only a good place to pose for photos and useless for skiing. As much as they try to make the place scenic – it is a desert. And between the floating sand which hangs in the air, evaporating water vapor from the nearby gulf, and the garden variety air pollution, the crystal clear scenes of the ultra-modern city are mostly a product of time-delayed photography which clears up what is otherwise a foggy view. The east of the country is said to be mountainous and even had forests, but we did not venture that far. However on the western coast the things to appreciate are limited to beautiful city nightscapes, amazing beaches, warm weather, and the Arabic culture. Much of the rest, is marketing.
Covid. As of April, 2022, you are required to have a recent PCR test or updated vaccination record – both of them oddly stipulate that the paper must have a QR code. Mine was briefly glanced at by the airline clerk who gave me my boarding pass. In-country, Dubai and Abu Dhabi are in different Emirates (or Kingdom-States) of the UAE. In Abu Dhabi, you are frequently asked for a recent covid test paper or vax card whenever entering any venue and most public buildings. Test centers are not as prevalent as in Mexico and would require a taxi trip, but there are no lines and rapid tests cost about $40. In Dubai however, there are zero paperwork requirements and the only place I’d been mask-Karen’ed was by the highly polite attendants at the mall.
Economy. This is a bit of an odd one. Obviously, the Emirates are an oil-state, but I was surprised to learn that due to recent diversification, only 30% of their GDP comes from oil and gas. Factbook says that 49.2% of the GDP comes from ‘services’, engaging 78% of the workforce. Those numbers alongside with the insanely rapid real estate development raise many flags in my mind as to the stability of their economy. The sheer amount of square footage constructed within the last decade is mind-blowing! Only a tiny fraction of it is taken up by hotels, restaurants and other tourist-oriented uses. Much of the rest are office buildings and residences, which begs the question – what is it that they do there? Naturally, the tax havens offered by the UAE attract banking and other financial sectors. But they don’t really have a stock exchange and although just about every bank has a presence there, that can only account for so much. They don’t really seem to make anything there. Following oil and gas, their next largest tangible product is fish, which accounts for a sliver of their national exports, which are drowned out by nondescript ‘services’. A place like the Cayman Islands, or Liechtenstein can get away with such shenanigans on their national balance book, but the UAE is not a tiny finance hub – it is a nation about the size of Maine with 10 million people in it. The tech sector does not appear to be developed at all – there are no significant presences from tech firms, or datacenters. Talking with locals, I heard a lot of accounts indicating that although they are still building, many of the existing office buildings have staggering vacancy rates. As mentioned above, the UAE has become a major destination for Slavic people because tourist visas and resident status is very easily obtainable there. Their presence is an unexpected windfall for the economy in UAE, but I don’t think that this will be sufficient to soak up all the excess construction. Let’s just say, I would not invest in regional real estate.
Driving. We often think of middle eastern countries as places with crazy drivers, lots of honking yelling and road rage sometimes being settled with a spontaneous sword fight (real story from Turkey). But surprisingly, traffic in Dubai was relatively normal and organized. Nobody uses turn signals, but speeding and tailgating are enforced via traffic cameras through the mail and the general driving public is quite civil. The road planning however, left me scratching my head. Given that they built everything recently new from scratch, over a topology of a flat desert, without any natural barriers, it is hard to get around in Dubai. That’s not due to traffic – they definitely overbuilt the highways and there are hardly any slow-downs. But the surface roadways are designed with large lawns separating the oncoming lanes, so if you need to go left onto a minor street, you have to drive to the next major intersection and make a u-turn at one of the large round-abouts. A destination that is 10 miles away as the crows fly, will require 18 miles of circling and weaving, if you don’t make any mistakes. The highway system is also very odd as most major intersections will have a soft right, a medium right and a hard right and it is often unclear as to which one you need to take, or which of the turn lanes corresponds to which turn; and if you make a mistake, you will be going for a long looping scenic drive in a neighborhood you never intended visiting. The taxi drivers seemed to have a better handle on this, but nonetheless the system seemed poorly thought-out. Surprisingly, traffic lights were not sensor-driven, so I often felt just like home while sitting at a red light and starting at a completely empty intersection. The one thing I did absolutely love there is the fact that in downtown areas, where intersections were closer to one another, red lights were not only overhead, but they had red bulbs built into the crosswalks. This system in Dubai is highly effective at marking intersection and getting the driver’s attention.
Internet. The internet in Dubai sucks! Not so much due to coverage or speed, but due to arbitrary filtering and firewalling. Depending on what network you are connected to, various sites may or may not be blocked. I could not access my banking websites through the mobile network, but it worked on my hotel WiFi. The mobile network worked for facebook, but most WiFi networks arbitrarily blocked portions of it. WhattsApp was allowed to text, but video and voice calls would only work via the mobile data; Viber would work only for texting and only over WiFi. Google SafeSearch could not be disabled on any network. Most frustrating was the fact that a lot of UAE-hosted sites were also partly kneecapped, which manifested in problems when trying to look up information about, or reserve local tourist activities. Most people traveling to the UAE get themselves set up with VPN apps to bypass the imposed restrictions and if I were going there for any significant amount of time, this would be a requirement. I don’t really understand why they engage in this blocking when it is so easily bypassed and when they seemingly don’t care if you bypass it.
Energy & Environment. Something that cannot escape the eye is just how green the cities and outlaying suburbs are. Every roadway is divided by wide planters with green ground cover and flowers. They’ve somehow imported not only cubic miles of earth, but also a staggering amount of fully mature trees to line the streets. All of this is supported by a vast and very intricate irrigation system – in a country that does not have a fresh water source. The irrigation, as well as drinking water for 10,000,000 people comes entirely from de-salinization, which is a very electricity consuming process. Atop of this, I’ve never seen air conditioning systems like the ones in Dubai and they run them on full blast, often with open doorways. I had to cross-reference the factbook because I could not believe that in a nation so perfect for solar, practically all of their electricity was generated by fossil fuels. Reportedly, this is due to change as recent investments into sodium-solar as well as traditional panels, are underway. There’s also been a hesitancy in allowing a Muslim monarchy to obtain nuclear technology for power plants, due to fears that it can be weaponized. But apparently, they recently worked this out, and a 4-reactor plant is currently under construction. But at present literally less than 1% of their electrical power comes from non-fossil sources. I decided to look this up and the UAE puts 51% more carbon into the air per capita compared to the US, (whereas for what I suspect are similar reasons, Qatar and Kuwait dump more than double of that), it is frustrating to see that Americans are cowering to outside pressure to impose carbon taxes and undergo austerity to reduce emissions to a disproportionate scale compared to so many other places where the issue is a much lower hanging fruit.
Overall, my experience of traveling to the UAE was both eye-opening and fun – everything that travel should be. I would highly recommend that my friends check it out. A week-long trip is perfect to get a good sense of the place and the direct flight from Seattle makes it surprisingly convenient. Best times to travel there are from October through March. And if you have any questions, feel free to ping me.